Landlocked Lighthouse (Locked House Hauntings Book 1)

by Mixi J Applebottom

  But he threw nothing; not a pot, or a punch. He didn’t curse me out. We had, in some ways, never fought. Not truly. We avoided the issue until we forgot.

  I didn’t throw things or slap him. One time, I confronted him, determined to work it out. Talk to me! I screamed at his sullen, angry face. He just walked out. I followed, and he turned and he flipped me off. And that was it. That was the only communication we ever had when he was angry.

  I was a farmer, I was tough. I could take the silent treatment. Hell, I carried babies on a roof in a storm. I had the kind of grit that townsfolk never really grasped. They would call for help if their tire was flat. I’d walk, carrying both kids if I needed. Or I’d change it, if I had a spare. Or I’d build one out of wood ‘cause I have wood and no spare. Make do or do without. Teach your babies how to pick wild raspberries and strawberries and hunt in the woods. Tony was already getting good with a slingshot and I hated to admit that I served the squirrels and birds he knocked out.

  Because we were hungry and strained and weary. But we were tough. We could take it. We’d fight through and push on. Sometimes, I wondered if Husband had any grit left, or if he was worn down. A hammer could take a lot of hits before it cracked. I was a hammer made of strong metals. He wore thin; cracked and ready to shatter. He was a city folk in the wrong part of the country.

  That last month was silent it seemed. Even when he was talking to me, he wasn’t talking to me. He was mindlessly chattering about the insignificants. I didn’t even know he applied for a new job until it happened. He said it like nothing. “I’m moving, I got a new job.” I shuddered with horror. Were we over? The end. “I want you to come when you get the house sold,” he said nonchalantly, as though he wasn’t dropping bombs. “I don’t want another farm, just a little house.”

  Me too.

  And then he vanished for five weeks and I hadn’t seen him since. My babies were lost; this house was swallowing me up. Husband did well those weeks while I floundered. He looked muscular and fit. He looked young and fresh.

  But deadly.

  His furious eyes burned at me and he raised his mace full of pointed sticks up menacingly. “You killed Tony. You killed sweet Annabelle. I am gonna make you pay, you bitch.” His words slurred together, and it took a moment for me to grasp what he said.

  “I didn’t. I can’t find them.” Were they dead?

  “You dropped them off the chandelier, poked them full of sticks, stuck them up a pole and hung them in the nursery. I. Saw. You.” His voice trembled with fury.

  He saw me. I couldn’t make words, so instead I darted away, across the room, near the furthest wall from the door. My legs threatened to give out on me. Come on down. I can’t get out the door unless you do.

  I was gonna die here. Annabelle and Tony would starve wherever they were. Starve to death. They only had so many crayons to eat.

  He took the bait and started down the stairs in a slow, steady walk. He tapped the mace in one hand. Staring at the pointed little sticks made me think of Griffin. Brave little Griffin falling down, sticked like a pincushion.

  Even if I ran up the seats from here, Husband would get up the stairs and meet me at the door. I was too far away. So I waited. His big, thumping feet, came down step after step and I waited. My body screamed to run. Not yet. I begged.

  Don’t let him get close. I stepped up on the velvet bench before he could get close enough to swing, I froze, waiting to see. If he went back up the stairs, I was fucked. I needed him to take a swing. Give me just a moment to run or he might connect.

  He swung and I leapt up. A stick tore at my arm, tearing a layer of skin off the good one. The bench let out a whistle of air as the sticks punctured it with a loud pop. I hopped up, one bench at a time, begging my legs not to falter as he roared and lifted the mace again. He was bigger than me, his big feet stepping up the benches faster than I. The top bench suddenly flipped out from under me. I screamed as he drew close. I kicked. Like dominoes, the benches were all teetering and toppling and smashing into each other, pushing him down. I gathered my feet underneath me and slipped out the door, slamming it shut. The heart felt hot on my neckline and I remembered the key. Please. Please oh please.

  I shoved it in the lock and I heard the clicks as the door handle rattled. My hands trembled as I pulled the key from the lock. I was tempted to peer in and see, but right then, a sharp stick stabbed out the keyhole. It almost caught my face.

  I shuddered and stepped back. “You’ve gone mad,” I said to the door, expecting nothing in return.

  “You’re madder than I,” he said. “Remember our honeymoon? You couldn’t keep your hands to yourself. Come in here and I’ll do it all over to you.”

  I shook my head and stepped backwards into the dark.

  “Come on! Let’s do it. I’ll screw around with you before I kill you. Have one nice last good ride before you die.”

  I turned and the mirror eyes were right in front of mine. I tried to pull away but lips pressed, I popped.

  Atgas stood outside, rolling around in the grass. I glimpsed her daughter running close to the house. She hid behind a tree when she saw her mother. Atgas stood there with a big, wolfish grin. Had she spoken to me yet? Was her time line the same as mine?

  She skipped inside the house, I cringed and closed my eyes as she passed the foyer. I didn’t want to see those two. She ran past the stained glass and got on the elevator. Down to the basement she came, and soon she was down here with me.

  I frantically tried to break away, but that gargoyle held me tight and I was the statue for a moment.

  She reached out her hand and flicked on the light.

  33

  I peered into the darkness of the basement. The light was still off. She had flipped the switch. My fingers searched for a switch where she stood and like magic there it was. I flicked them on and the light burned bright.

  The monster that was my husband scared me much less than the monster that was Atgas. Was she still here? I shuddered. Was Atgas here? Was this vision of the past or present? I didn’t see her.

  The room in front of the elevator was rather huge. The door to the theater thumped as my husband smashed at it with his mace. It was a solid door though, I couldn’t imagine it would break. He’d have better luck picking that old-style lock.

  As soon as I thought the thumping stopped the lock picking began.

  The main room was a bar. A large wooden door next to the theater had grapes carved into it. A wine closet, I assumed. The bar was huge and carved elaborately, but no animal crests. Soft leather couches and chairs littered the room. It looked ready for guests. I only saw the one gargoyle standing near the theater door. He was frozen in time, cold lifeless stone.

  Back behind the stairs stood the door. The Wolf. His teeth bared and his nose was low and stealthy as though he would leap forward any moment and tear me to shreds.

  I stared at him. His big eyes held me mesmerized. I wondered if I would die now. Were these my last moments? The Wolf grinning his teeth at me, and my husband picking a lock to come and bash me to pieces?

  A gargoyle suddenly swung down from the ceiling, dangling by his feet and pressing his mouth to mine before I could do anything. I felt that popping burst inside my head.

  Atgas stood there, right in front of me. She almost walked into me. The necklace shimmered as she walked. She opened the door to the wolf, and it swallowed her. I heard Eira crying. I had a moment, a terrifying moment where I wondered if she had stepped into the foyer. If she had seen the confettied eyes of all those gargoyles, sparkling across the twins.

  I tried not to hear it in my mind, the splattering cracks of their infant bodies smashing into the marble.

  Eira, poor baby, please tell me you haven’t been in the foyer. She stood outside the house by the pool. Her tiny hands struggled with the doorknob, to her bathroom, to the Lamb room. It wouldn’t open. She sobbed over the loss of Griffin, but as far as I knew she was unaware of the horrors the twins had suff
ered. Water pooled around her feet, dripping off her dress. Her hair was drenched, and she had four tiny sticks still stuck in her back. I tried to pull them for her, but I could not help the child.

  Her door wouldn’t open for her. She stood there, shivering and terrified, struggling to force the handle open, but it refused her. She slowly sank next to the door and closed her eyes. Her breathing slowed but her lips were moving.

  “One for sorrow,

  Two for joy,

  Three for a girl,

  Four for Griffin,”

  (her tiny lips quivered, and she paused)

  “Five for silver,

  Six for gold,

  Seven for a secret,

  Never to be told

  Eight for heaven,

  Nine for hell

  And ten for I will die.”

  When she finished, she had calmed down, and she stood. She considered where to run to next. The little sticks whizzed from behind me and she took off. I turned to look, but I saw nothing shooting. The sticks shot out of the woods, fast and straight. She ran around the pool, her little voice squeaking when she got hit. Her feet scrambled and she ran around the edge of the house. The shooter would have to reposition, I hoped. Soon, she was in the garden and she hid behind a bush shaped like a lion. The gargoyle in the middle of the garden, the one with the orb that Annabelle and Tony had found; his mirror eyes stared at her. He held the shiny mirror orb up higher and stared into it. I saw through his eyes and into the shining globe. I could see everything, bouncing around the corners of the house. The child and the whole garden warped and shifted. I identified what shot those arrows too. My stomach dropped, and I gasped with horrified shock.

  My lips broke, free and the gargoyle gave me a devilish smile. He lunged for my mouth again, his rock fingers holding my head steady, but I pulled away. My brown hair was pulled out by the handful, but I had no time to feel pain. I stormed forward and opened the door to the wolf. Just before the door swung shut, I heard the other one open. I saw Husband, standing with his sharpened mace walking towards me. I clicked the door shut, and I tried to lock it, but found the key did not work.

  Cruel and Merciless. The two words were carved into the ornate wood on the ceiling. The carved wooden floor held a large wolf. He was thick and textured and uneven beneath my feet. I was standing in his teeth. There was a desk against the wall. The desk was full of papers.

  I walked to it quickly and rifled through it. The papers were pictures. Hand drawn pictures of wolves, ravens, lions, and the other crests. A few photographs, but I didn’t have time for them. These looked like the odd scribbles of someone who had been locked down here long enough to go mad. I opened the drawers in a rush. I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for yet, but in the next drawer was a jackpot.

  The camera with a nice tripod. I touched it; not even dusty. Next to the camera was a key, a black pen, and a red pen.

  He hadn’t come in. Husband waited quietly outside of the door. He waited for me to open it so he could swing and hit. Even though I knew it was a trap, I still had few choices. Either I walked out or I never left. I could try negotiating, but he’d never hear a thing I said.

  I slid the red pen into the pocket of the dress. The key fit neatly next to the heart on the necklace. Two keys, one heart. I had an idea. “Hey honey.”

  He didn’t reply, but I heard a soft snort of disgust.

  “Do you want this camera?”

  The door clicked and opened. His eyes were wolfish and wild. He held the mace tight in his hands.

  “Do you want it?” I backed away from the desk. “It’s there in the drawer. A tripod too. It’s kind of old fashioned, but I think it prints the pictures when you take them. I’m gonna go get the kids.”

  He stared at me and then turned back to the desk. His mace clattered on the floor as he rifled through the drawers. He turned over the camera in his hands when I snuck out the door.

  I rode up the elevator to the highest floor it would go. I ended up in the large family room with the pool table. The gargoyles’ eyes I had smashed still littered the floor. The two on the end tables still held up lightbulbs. “Leave me alone. It’s time for me to get my kids.”

  They never moved. I didn’t know if they were frozen again or if they just didn’t want to stop me.

  I trudged up the circular room, up the stairs that led on for days. Finally, I made it to the top. I pushed the new key in the door. I was too late. I already knew that. It was too easy to lose track of time in this place. Had it been a few hours? A few weeks? How long had I walked up the stairs even? Ten minutes? Ten days? Time was confusing.

  The door opened. A mouth swung down to mine, and I was back with Eira in a loud pop.

  She ran from the garden, begging them to stop, but the arrows kept flying. I couldn’t bear to look at them again, so I stared at her. Her tear-covered face was now streaked with blood. Her back had eight little sticks in it. I tried to break the kiss. I tried to feel the stone mouth. This isn’t real. I begged my body to release the concrete and to find my children. For a moment, I came back and the mirrored eyes reflecting mine back at me, and then a painful pop and I was back staring at the girl.

  I don’t want to watch. Eira ran to the front door. Don’t make me watch. Her little body let out a squeal as a stick caught her calf. She fell, and she seemed to give up. Atgas opened the front door. She let out a loud yell, and the arrows stopped. She turned and looked at her little girl. Then back to where the arrows had flown from. She picked up the child and in they went. Eira’s face buried in her mother’s chest. The girl never saw the mirrored confetti sprinkling the infant corpses.

  Atgas took her to the elevator, and down they went. I followed along, snapping from eyes to eyes, staring out of stone face after stone face. She opened the room to the wolf. I saw a gargoyle slip in quickly at the top of the doorframe, hiding on the ceiling. The child sat where I had stood, between the teeth of the wolf. Atgas sat at the desk, frantically writing. Husband was standing in the corner, setting up the tripod. He positioned Eira as she moaned. The camera clicked with a loud popping bang and the light burned bright. The picture slid out the side of the camera. It had captured them both, Atgas drawing at her desk, and Eira writhing in pain on the floor. After he took it, Atgas stood up and walked to the girl. Husband was drawing on the back of the picture with the black pen.

  He handed it to me. The picture. The child in the wolf’s mouth, and the mother at the desk. Just barely the glitter of the mirror eyes I was looking through. On the back he had drawn a wolf and the words “Cruel and Merciless.”

  I gripped the red pen and wrote back to him, “Why is this happening?”

  He looked at my note, smiled and set the picture on the desk. Atgas never noticed either of us. She pulled the pins from her daughter the pincushion. The bloody, sharp sticks made a small pile on the floor. Twelve in total now. Eira whimpered as she pulled each painful barbed piece.

  34

  Time rewound and we bore witness in this way. He clicked and snapped and we wrote notes on the pictures. Many of them we left for me to find later, but some, we took to the desk. We swished from the twins in the chandelier, and then the floor, to the nursemaid hanging right next to Eira and Griffin as Atgas held them for the photo. We swirled past the chef with Atgas’ stick in his back, and on to the Stag, to the Bear, the Squirrel, Lamb, Lion, Raven, and Wolf. On each photo he drew a picture, and I scrawled a note, but we never spoke. We watched and took notes, and wrote warnings.

  Suddenly, at the very beginning, we were watching pancakes being made in the kitchen. Eira smiled and was midclap when Husband snapped. Griffin stood cheering and chef cooked. In the kitchen.

  I wrote, “The last known picture.”

  And then we swirled through time to the last stop. The house was normal. Atgas smiled happily, the children were living the maid fed babies, and the chef made meals. Atgas left her children and wandered downstairs to the wolf. Her tidy office was not yet litter
ed with drawings. But, I realized, it wasn’t hers. Her husband sat in the chair and turned towards us. He smiled at me, then turned to my husband and held out his hand.

  My husband handed him the camera, tripod and all. He took a snap of his wife. Atgas frowned and mumbled something about her hair as her hands lifted up to fuss at it.

  He handed Atgas the photograph and she stared into it, then gasped and turned around. “Who is here?”

  I saw us in the picture, leering behind Atgas. I looked at my husband confused. We both watched as Atgas implored her husband to leave with her, go anywhere. This was a bad place.

  Haunted.

  He didn’t respond. Instead, he pulled open a drawer in the desk and lifted out a mirrored orb. Atgas snatched it from his hands and kissed it. I felt it, in that moment, the cold winds and the popping kiss, her brain tickle at mine. A violent twinge. As her lips released, her legs wrapped around her husband; frantically she tore off his pants. He let out a happy sound right before she shoved a letter opener into his neck. He filled the crevices on the floor and the wolf carving filled in, drowning in blood.

  The orb fell from his hands and into the blood, settling into the wolf’s eye. Hundreds of gargoyles crawled out of the mirrored eye and slipped out into the mansion. When it finally stopped pulsing with creatures, Atgas stood, walking up the stairs to hang the nursemaid.

  Time flew forwards like a rocket and I was with Eira and her mother in this same room. Her sticks had been plucked. The wolf was hungry for blood compelling Atgas. She slit Eira’s throat, filling the wolf with blood, quenching its thirst for a bit longer. The last few gargoyles crawled out of the mirrored eyes.

  Atgas sat at the desk and frantically drew. She turned to hand it to me and suddenly the kiss broke.