With a shuddering pop, I was present. Back in the lighthouse. The door barely creaked opened. How long had I stood there? Too long.
Inside a large light, swirling in a signal. Two gargoyles manned the light, spinning it slowly, tending to its needs. Was the light a calling or a warning? They didn’t pay me any attention or try to kiss me. The one on the ceiling was frozen, pointed towards a door. The door had no carvings, a plain tired door.
I opened it and I found them. Annabelle and Tony. They were so hungry, they had eaten all their crayons, and all their papers.
35
Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me. It’s true you know. The second part is such a lie. But that first part. Sticks can break bones.
On that farm, on that wretched little farm, with the tree and the barn. That was where we lived, that was where we struggled. That was where the door fell on my baby. But, that was also where we played.
I was an angry woman. One particularly wretched month the crops just withered. And the tomato plants that were doing excellent suddenly dried up and died before any fruit was ripe enough to eat. That month when we were hungry, when I had failed so hard. We ate crayons that week.
I encouraged it. We had a brand new box, and I thought maybe if we ate a few, then dinner wouldn’t feel so little.
I was angry that we were hungry, and that was when I taught them to do it. Eat crayons or little rocks and it won’t be so bad.
We made slender sapling branches into bows. I sharpened sticks. They didn’t fly far, but they got the job done. We shot at squirrels and birds. But Tony hit the dog, by accident.
I briefly considered killing the Zippy in that moment. Drive the stick in a little further. One less mouth to feed. The little sharpened stick was tough to pull out, and it left a little scar on her belly.
There was nobody to blame but me. Annabelle and Tony sat in the lighthouse tower, curled up to each other, completely spent. Their little tiny bows sitting by their sides. They had made piles of arrows while they sat here, waiting for me to find them. They would use them too.
Even when I knew that they would kill Griffin and Zippy, and chase Eira, I didn’t take the bows away. I let them be. Like Husband and his camera. It wouldn’t help to do anything because it might have already happened.
By the look of them, it had. They were dirty and their feet calloused and rough from walking in the woods. They lay there, sleeping, unaware of me.
I lay down with them and wrapped my arms around them, tears trickling down my face. This house has caught us. Snared us and changed us for the worse. Their simple breathing calmed me and I slept. I too was weary from the journey. I had one dream.
I saw her, Atgas staring at me in my dream, her white dress still splattered with blood, and mine still fresh and clean. She looked me in the eyes and said with a sneer,
“Lady, lady, fly away home,
Set this house on fire,
Your children will burn.
Except for the little one whose name is Ann,
Wolf her away with a casserole pan.”
I felt my brain pop and burst and dance as soon as she had finished whispering to me. Awake, I sat up, sweat pouring. “Annabelle, Tony, we have to go now.” They opened their tired eyes and hugged me. We stood up and started for the door. I opened it just before the gargoyle reached it. He shrieked No! His mirrored eyes burned at me.
“Don’t look at them; they aren’t our friends any more.” I grabbed their hands and we rushed past the light and down the circular stairs. The stairs seemed endless, but we pushed on. I looked down at my scrawny, withered children and wondered how they could still move. They were weak from dehydration and starvation. But I pressed on with them. We raced to the Squirrel room, and I begged for my great-grandmother’s blue dish to still be in the dresser. Atgas warned me. The dish somehow matters, and there it sat. We ran down the next flight of stairs. The ceiling of gargoyles danced and swung at me. I was quicker, but when one tried to drop on my head from the ceiling, I smashed out his eyes with the casserole dish.
The dish survived it, thank goodness. We ran to the garage, and I found gasoline. I ran in a mad dash, pouring it all over the lion medallion and the front door, hoping that it would be enough to catch the house afire. The gargoyles were crawling down the walls. I locked the lion doors with the key around my neck. The gargoyles were clawing at the inside, trying to force the door open. I lit a match and dropped it and with a whoosh the fire burst upon the doors. I heard eyes burst and the gargoyles scream with terror.
I stood there, relief washing over me. It was over. I had saved them. Annabelle and Tony escaped the horrors of the lighthouse. I turned to hold them tightly in my arms.
Annabelle looked at me, and I saw it in her eyes. Mirrors in her eyes. It was as though her eyes were behind mirrors, barely peering out. Tony was the same; shiny silver where his eyes should have been. My stomach dropped, and I let go of their hands. They both started laughing and slowly froze into a wide mouth laugh. Their skin grew cold and hard and concrete and their eyes grew shinier and more metallic. These were not my children. I looked up at the house I had just set on fire.
36
The flames spread fast. I ran around the house to the pool. Next to the pool was the door to the lamb’s bathroom. I tried the handle, but it was locked. I pressed my key into it and it opened with a quick click. The heat from the foyer already pushed in the bedroom. Zippy still lay there, full of sticks, dead as ever.
I didn’t pay her much mind, and I stepped into the flaming foyer, but I heard a voice. I turned around and there he was, Tony, standing there behind me. “Mama? Is this you? Are you the real Mama?”
I hugged him, and stared intensely into his eyes. Who knew anymore? I was taking him with me. “Annabelle?” I asked.
“The monster Mama made us shoot those kids,” he whispered in a low voice. He sounded dazed and in shock. He looked just as before: dirty, barefooted, dehydrated, sickly. His eyes found Zippy’s carcass and he cringed with sorrow. “I couldn’t stop.” A sob suddenly burst up his throat in a wolfish bark.
“Tony. Where is your sister? The house is burning, we have to find her now.” I stared into his eyes, trying to comfort him (checking for silver).
“We got separated.” He took my hand and we stepped into the foyer. The flames were hot and the smoke was already starting to get thick. Gargoyles had formed a long chain and were handing a little cup of water back and forth, tossing on the flames to no avail. The one closest to the door screamed as his eyes burst from the heat.
“Annabelle! We have to leave now! The house is burning!” I screamed with a loud, bellowing sound.
Her voice called me. “Mama! I can’t get the elevator to work.” We ran down past the stained glass, Wolf, Bear, Lion, Lamb, Raven, Stag, and Squirrel. Tony clung tightly to my hand racing along with me.
The elevator had something jammed in the door. Upon closer inspection, I saw it was the leg of a gargoyle holding the door open. I pushed the doors apart with my hands and the gargoyle squealed angrily. My casserole pan took out his eyes before he kissed.
Tony clung to my leg tightly as we rode down. As soon as the doors opened I saw her. Beautiful little Annabelle standing in front of the doors. She was hungry, thin, dehydrated and scared to death but it was her. No silver in her eyes. Big Tony grabbed her, tossing her up on his shoulder and trudging towards the wolf.
“NO!” I shouted and sprang forward. The elevator doors snapped shut and little Tony was left inside, his tiny eyes terrified. Husband turned and swung his board full of sticks at me.
“You can’t stop me. I can’t either.” He said with a snarling sound, and his eyes looked silver coated. I thought this was him, I thought he was too far gone. He couldn’t control himself any more than I could have stopped scribbling with my red pen.
He pulled open the wolf door to feed it our daughter. “The house is on fire! We can stop now,” I pleaded.
“The wolf is
cruel and merciless,” he replied, laying her between its teeth.
I threw the only weapon I had, great-grandmother’s casserole dish. I called her with my heart, If ghosts are real and you can hear me, strike true. Keep her safe.
In a popping burst I saw her, my great-grandmother, she said, “Hard to do both. Strike true or keep her safe. I chose best.”
And the dish struck true. It hit the little girl so hard, she never had a chance to feel it. Her head cracked open, and she crumpled and bled out instantly, satisfying the wolf. His wretched mouth pooled with her blood.
Husband stared at her. “Thank you. I couldn’t have lived with myself.”
I screamed. It bellowed out of me like a volcano bursting lava. Husband pulled me into the elevator. “We have to find Tony.” He said in my ear.
The elevator took us up, but I was still shaking with rage mixed with grief. My hot lava still poured. I had ruptured. In a daze, we stepped out of the elevator. The flames had consumed this floor. Each stained glass burst, one at a time. Lion, Lamb, Stag and Squirrel, Bear and Blackbird, and finally, the Wolf. He held out the longest.
Tony, little Tony was in the foyer, in the heart of the fire. He was coughing and screaming and trying to open the door I had locked. He was burning. Husband ran into the room and as he drew close to Tony the gargoyle dropped the chandelier on his head.
37
I am not sure how much time has passed since the fire. It is easy to lose time in this place. The house was like magic hiding behind that line of trees. The driveway was long and far and lined with signs.
“Auction today.”
“House available.”
“5 + baths.”
“Auction!”
“Registered Checks required!”
I told the children to start making arrows.
My name is Atgas.
This is my house.
The wolf is hungry.
A Note from Mixi…
Thank you for reading Landlocked Lighthouse. I’d really appreciate a review if you aren’t too busy.
If you enjoyed this novel and haven’t yet read Jaspierre, you might want to give it a try- Here is a little excerpt:
“That man with his junk hanging all over the place better be a good influence on her.” She started wiping down the cabinet. “At least she won’t be so lonely!” Up went her hands. “Maybe she won’t even stab me with a sword in the next few months.” She grinned as she shined the next counter. “Of course, that’s half the fun of the job! I wonder if that man’s infection is better yet. And his toes! Lordy. His toes!” Up went her hands.
Marcy finished with the counter-tops, and quickly unloaded and loaded the dishwasher. There were only a few dishes about. “Golly, if he keeps on a’cleanin like this, I’m gonna end up outta a job. This kitchen only took me fifteen minutes. Fifteen!” Up went her hands. “He better not have vacuumed upstairs. Could you imagine!” She turned to go into the next room and let out a surprised scream.
The first thing she saw was missing toes. Stubby feet chopped off at the ends. They were dripping blood, raw and meaty. The white pants were covered in blood and dirt. His shirt was wrinkled and the left half was covered in blood. His left arm was bleeding still, with blood dripping off the shirt with a quiet plinking noise. His right arm held a sword.
I wrote this novel while remodeling my ridiculous five-story fixer-upper house. I currently have three children and three cats. If you want to hear when my next book is out, sign up for my newsletter.
Thanks so much!
Mixi J Applebottom
Feel free to contact Mixi directly at: [email protected]
or visit her blog at: mixijapplebottom.wordpress.com
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Landlocked Lighthouse (Locked House Hauntings Book 1) Page 13