He had finished his cheese and crackers, chewing slowly so that he could maintain a clear idea as to where the things were in the walls. He’d walked his empty plate across to the sink, lowered it into the soapy water, and stood breathing softly, hoping they were still there, within reach . . . for he had a plan. He’d taken enough of their jesting; they didn’t belong in his house, and they were no longer welcome—not that they ever had been. He had stood, waiting patiently, listening for the shuffling that betrayed their position.
He didn’t have to wait long. Just in front of him, slightly above the lemon-yellow tiling at the back of the sink, came a rattle that could only have been caused by one of the things. Without pause, he’d snatched the largest knife out of its block and rammed it straight through the plasterboard, straight through the wall. There had come an almighty squeal, followed by a thick, viscous gargling sound that was both satisfying and terrifying in equal measure. He had hit his target; the knife was rocking from side to side as the thing flailed in agony behind the wall. He couldn’t grasp the handle; such was the creature’s spasmodic reaction to having a knife penetrating its oh-so-soft flesh.
He had laughed, knowing that he’d finally managed to inflict pain upon one of them. Served them right for the many times they had caused him sleepless nights; the times they had startled him during what should have been periods of repose. How dare they, in his own house, cause him to sit up restlessly in the early hours, afraid they were conspiring against him, concocting tricks and ruses to terrify him so the very next day?
He’d watched as a thick, viscous fluid poured out through the plaster; the creature was still screeching in its unbearable manner, even as the knife clattered from side to side and the dark green ooze that seeped from its open flesh slowly dripped down the tiles and onto the draining-board.
He had wondered in that moment—and as he had often pondered during the course of his residence—if the things in the walls had always been there. If so, his mother had never made mention of them. Surely she would have brought it up in conversation, especially knowing her son was to inherit the house after her passing, and subsequently the unwanted guests between the framework.
Suddenly, the creature had fallen silent, the knife came to an anticlimactic halt. He had watched, momentarily mesmerized, as the Phthalo green lifeblood continued to paint a trail across his work-surfaces, knowing that he would have to clean the mess up sooner rather than later.
A noise behind the wall—no, two separate walls and three distinguishing voices—startled him from his rumination. He had stepped away from the wall, the motionless knife, the dead thing hidden in the wall, and came to a stop in the center of the kitchen.
The sounds emanating from the walls weren’t angry; at least not yet.
The creatures were mourning, and it was a sound that turned his blood to mercury.
Later that night he sat in semi-darkness, book in hand. The tiny lamp sitting on his side table was enough for him to read by, and he much preferred it to the glaring beam of the main bulb. The book he was reading was a parody of the bible; he found himself enjoying it a little too much. His faith wasn’t entirely gone, not just yet, and reading such a book made him feel ever-so-slightly guilty. Though, he assured himself, it was a work of fiction and should be judged as such, for nobody would believe that God created the earth by accidentally passing wind after a particularly strong curry; nobody could seriously agree that Adam and Eve were in fact executive bankers from the year 2029. His faith was not being called into question at all with such literature, and he suddenly felt a lot better by simply reminding himself of that.
He was almost at the end of Genesis when the things in the wall began their cruel trickery. At first, he believed that the voice he was hearing did actually belong to his dead mother; that she had somehow returned from the afterlife to palaver with him. He dropped the open book into his lap and scrambled to his feet, scanning the room for the glowing figure of his deceased mother. After a few seconds, and once he gathered his bearings, he realized that it was, indeed, not his mother’s voice that beckoned him.
It was the creatures—for they knew better than anyone the pitch, the drawl, the occasional upturn of a certain word—that belonged to the previous owner. The question, left unanswered from that very same afternoon, had been answered. His mother had had to tolerate the creatures, just as he had to now. Though her secrecy was still beyond his comprehension.
“You must leave this place, son,” her voice said once again. “They’ll kill you if you stay.”
If it was the creatures, and it had to be, then it was the first time he had ever heard them speak with words. Sure they growled, grunted, screeched, whined, whispered and cawed, but with nothing remotely close to the English language.
He spun on the spot, almost tripping as his feet tangled beneath him. The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. The entire room shook as the vibrations of the faux-mother voice played along the skirting, the walls, the coving, and shelves.
He screamed out, hoping that the mere sound of his voice would be enough to perturb them. The voice that replied was still that of his mother, and once again he found himself searching the room for signs of ectoplasm or glowing orbs.
“You killed one of them,” the voice said, “and they will not rest until you are dead. You must leave now, sell the house . . . just go away and never return.”
How could they sound so like her? For primitive creatures—which is what he had always regarded them as—they were remarkably talented at impressions. They must have been listening to every word his mother had said to be able to mimic her so thoroughly. It was, he thought, quite disturbing to think that they were always there, and then he thought back to all the times he had spoken on the telephone, to the times where he had invited guests over to share a dinner, to all the times when he had simply conversed with himself for no other reason than sheer boredom. The hackles rose on the nape of his neck, and it was all he could do not to pass out.
There came a scratching, and then a steady hissing as one of the creatures moved within the wall. From his periphery, he saw an elongated finger jut out of the electrical socket, and then it was gone, moving along the innards of the house—his house . . . his dead mother’s house.
“I won’t be moved!” he called out. “I didn’t mean to kill it. You forced my hand. A man can only endure so much!” He didn’t know why he was trying to justify his actions to the creatures. They were vermin; horrible, disgusting, squatting, mother-mimicking vermin.
And then, the sounds came from everywhere. He didn’t know which way to turn; such was the scope of their shuffling and scratching. One minute they were all behind him, behind the chair in which he had previously been sitting, minding his own business and enjoying the company of a good book; the next minute they were over by the window, beneath the sill. A three-fingered hand shot out through the wallpaper, and he almost cursed in anger at their selfish vandalism. There was a hole back there, behind the paper, of which he had not been aware. His mother, God rest her soul, was not much for home-improvement, nor maintenance, and the hole that the creature’s hand now poked out of would have been near the bottom of the list of things to get done. Perhaps she had never intended to fill the godforsaken thing; her death had not been a surprise. Maybe she had left it purposefully, something for him to do when he got bored.
Though he never got bored, not with all the chasing around after “things in the wall” he did. There was never a moment of rest, never a peaceful day; it was all stress and no release, and he was glad he had managed to kill one of their kind that afternoon. It was in Hell now, where it belonged.
He watched the fingers twirl spasmodically, certain that the thing’s only motive was to annoy him. From the kitchen there came an almighty clatter; he felt his heart jump up into his throat. He rushed through, forgetting all about the protruding fingers in the lounge, to discover an arm had managed to break through the north wall. A skinny, pallid thing that looked less
like an appendage and more like something you might see in an aquarium.
Thrashing wildly, the arm retracted back into the masonry, leaving a twelve-inch hole behind. He reached for the nearest weapon, which happened to be the knife he had used to kill the thing above the sink, and paced across to the unsightly aperture. “You think you’ll get rid of me like this?” he bellowed. “I won’t be moved by your reprehensible pranks.” He lashed at the hole with the blade, knowing that it was pointless, that the thing had already moved on.
Breathlessly, he staggered back to the lounge. The scratching and shuffling was becoming intolerable; he needed to lie down, to forget the things were there, to gather his strength for a battle of wits and determination.
He clambered up the stairs, pushing earphones into his ears in an attempt to drown them out with loud music and late-night talk shows.
He would not be beaten by the things within the walls.
“I can’t play bridge today,” the voice of his mother said. “I’ve got that useless sonofabitch son of mine coming over to visit.”
He pushed himself up from the bed, not knowing how long he had been sleeping. The earphones had fallen out at some point, which is how he heard his mother’s voice say such a wretched thing. He knew it was the things, the ungodly creatures in the walls, using the voice of his deceased mother to once again provoke him. He could hear them shuffling along the skirting, searching for the best place from whence to attack.
He swung his legs off the bed and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. He was so tired, so exhausted from the day’s malarkey—though he knew that he would sleep no more tonight—not with the things continuing their torment.
Just to the right of him, where his wardrobe housed several suits and shirts that he had not worn for several years and not much more, the voice of his mother said, “Pathetic he is. I will be glad when I’m dead so that I don’t have to suffer his stupidity any longer.”
These words cut him to the bone, for he had never heard his mother speak with such venom. Her tongue could be cruel, but against others—not against him. As he sat there, listening to the barrage of abuse creeping out through the walls, he started to believe the words had indeed fallen from the lips of his dead mother. The things were intelligent, certainly; but how could they know about his afflictions, his depression, his inability to find love in any form? His mother had spoken ill of him on the telephone to friends; the things in the wall were simply re-enacting scenes they had witnessed.
No.
Mother, no . . .
“You should have seen him, Bettie,” one cruel voice said from over by the suede ottoman. “He looked like he was going to cry, or piss himself, or both.” It laughed in his mother’s voice, and he knew of the instance she had been speaking of.
He had confided in her, told her about a romantic encounter that had gone terribly wrong; and she had comforted him, told him that everything would be alright. She had even slipped in the old adage about fish in the sea, and how there were plenty more where that particular girl came from.
And all the while she had been laughing; secretly reveling in his misery, probably waiting for him to leave the house so that she could ring Bettie and tell her how pathetic her son was. It crippled him to think about it, and he toppled back onto the mattress, screaming at the voices to stop, to leave him alone for God’s sake and his.
“His father would have beaten him, Bettie. Good job he died a long time ago, for he would have been just as disappointed as I am.”
No please, make it stop. Make them go away! I’m losing my senses; I’m going insane . . .
He sobbed that night, watching as the creatures occasionally popped out from the wall somewhere. The voices soon subsided, and he was able to ponder in silence the enormity of the callousness he had heard spill from behind the walls. There was no way he could live with the knowledge of his mother’s—God rest her evil, obdurate soul—disappointment, her indifference to his many plights, her downright hatred of him. He had to move, or risk insanity. There was always suicide, though his faith was not quite lost yet and he was to still hold true the laws regarding eternal damnation.
They had won, after all. The creatures; the things that lived in the walls.
Adam Millard is the author of sixteen novels, seven novellas, and more than a hundred short stories, which can be found in various collections and anthologies. Probably best known for his post-apocalyptic fiction, Adam also writes fantasy/horror for children, as well as bizarro fiction for several publishers. His “Dead” series has been the filling in a Stephen King/Bram Stoker sandwich on Amazon’s bestsellers chart, and the translation rights have recently sold to German publisher, Voodoo Press. Adam dwells online at adammillard.co.uk and @adammillard on Twitter.
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I hope her lips were worth it.
Sleep well, my frail prince,
my Knight of Death,
and pay your fare to dreamland.
While she’s beside you in our bed,
my charred soul runs nightmare’s errand.
Clock’s faces can’t breathe and a slut’s eyes
don’t really see; you’ve been buried beneath
talus of flesh toys avalanche. And still
my stringy love, tactful beige, like a glue
Two at once? I laughed, I’d rather be dead
. . . but for you, I probably would have.
Even now it’s still funny. That star there?
I’ll take each piece down for you—
As I choke on jagged stars wrought from cold heaven,
frail prince, in your bloodsleep hear my words:
This act shall not easily be undone.
You’d better bury me in the desert;
you’d better bury my head separate.
Slaughter the white lamb the first dead moon
in August, and sleep fitfully with all three eyes open
. . . bed full of plastic crosses.
Instead may I suggest you invest in silver,
acreage of boneset, barrels of myrrh,
Talismans of Saturn carved into your chest
and tattooed ideograms of fresh juniper ash.
The musky tang of Corvus sweat and feathers,
edges burnt and sharply folded under,
sharp just like jagged stars feel
permeates the woodshed, parches your heart—
the head turns, looks your way from under coals;
those blistered black eyes know your secrets.
Love, you’d better bury me deep in the desert,
and I suggest you bury my head separate.
In an expensive box of imported ivory
with inlaid symbols of gold; prettiest trinket—
and still, I can’t promise those hinges will hold.
Sleep with all three eyes open
Frail prince,
because I might just be coming back.
For you, my brave Knight of Death,
I’ll be clawing my way back.
Dot Wickliff is a hopeless necromantic v.3 ultra grey-human hybrid with cerebral Jujutsu add-ons and reinforced sham-animisti Apache genetic matrix. While you ponder that, go see more of Dot’s thoughts at epochellipses.blogspot.com.
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The last few words on the page burned his eyes like fever. The sculptor read them again and again until they blurred into insensibility. He let the book fall to the floor and left it where it fell, the soft flapping of closing pages like a balm to his mind, the sudden loss of stimulus like a cold compress over his hot eyes. He rubbed them until he saw stars and spoke those last few words out loud. In doing so, he not only confirmed to himself that it could be done; he knew instantly the way to do it.
It would not be enough to build the thing of clay alone. He knew that. He had read the lore, of course—had in fact taken much of it with a pinch of salt—but much had touched something in him, something that bypas
sed his blinding grief. It had to do with hope and belief. It had to do with the fact that so much truth was hidden within the myth . . . so much that had to be true. It was this he clung to, a raft hopelessly battered upon a sea of nonsense. And then he had found the book. Simply called Earth, Risen, it was written anonymously in flowing script onto dark parchment-like paper in a mixture of Hebrew and English. It was this book that had finally convinced him that it could be done.
Are you sure you want to know? the bookseller had asked him. There are some things a man should not be party to, and I believe with all my heart that this is one of them.
But the bookseller was as driven by money as anyone else, and he had accepted the payment graciously, holding the sculptor’s gaze for perhaps longer than necessary. And so the book had been bought and devoured in the way important books so often are. The book had such simplicity to it that he knew at once it was genuine. So much of the lore he had studied had been hyperbole, covering up lies and misrepresented fact with drama and shocking revelation. Not so with this book. It was, in essence, an instruction manual—a description of the how and why of it. He bent now to retrieve the slim volume and turned immediately to the last page.
“. . . and so with truth, and with their own vitality, or substantial part of it, they will live. And when truth dies, as it eventually must, it will be the end of them, and they cannot revive . . .”
And then that last line, as with the bookseller, holding his gaze just a little bit longer than he would have liked.
“. . . be aware of what you do. Wrath, like love, has to be earned. Be determined which one you truly seek. Because all is possible, and all is truth . . .”
The sculptor stood, and the candles set all about him danced as he moved. A soft wind blew about his feet, sending dust motes into frenzied choreography. He poured a large glass of wine, took half of it in one swallow, and set the glass down on a long low bench that flanked one side of the room. In the center of the room lay a table, high and sturdy. Next to this was a box—an old tea chest, rough-hewn planks making up its walls, a hinged lid open to the floor. He reached into the chest, grabbed the neck of the sack within, and hefted the load onto the table. A muted clunk broke the silence, and pale dust sifted through the open weave of the sacking. He opened the sack, and lifted out the contents one by one, arranging them roughly, discarding the sack when he was done.
Darkness Ad Infinitum Page 3