The Bone Keeper

by Luca Veste

  ‘You’re wrong,’ Louise said, her voice barely above a whisper. She could feel him almost on her now. His warm breath on her face, the air between them disappearing into nothingness. ‘I could never do what you have done.’

  ‘Just give into it,’ he replied, his teeth showing as he opened his mouth and smiled. ‘You know that’s what you want.’

  Louise screwed her eyes tightly shut, shaking her head. Her breathing grew shallow, her chest tightening. She could sense him looming over her, as her legs became weaker.

  ‘No, you won’t do this to me,’ Louise screamed, birds lifted into the air above them at the sound, unseen but she imagined their wings flapping in unison as they escaped the hell she had stumbled into. Her eyes had snapped open, spittle flying from her mouth. ‘You won’t have me. I won’t do this anymore. You’re nothing. You’re no better than any other scum. And I’m stopping this now.’

  She didn’t see him move, just a blur as the darkness shifted and then she was on the ground. A bolt of light flashed through her back, as her head smacked into the earth and made her vision shake. An arm went across her throat, cutting off her air supply, before she had a chance to react.

  ‘Don’t move,’ he said above her, his mouth wide, revealing blackened, rotting teeth. ‘This will hurt less if you just allow it to happen.’

  She bucked beneath him, grasping at his arms, trying to prise them away from her chest and throat. She dug her nails into any soft flesh she could find, but he didn’t react.

  It’s not supposed to be like this.

  SHUT UP!

  Louise battered against his arms, her hands balled into fists, as she gasped for air that wasn’t there. She could only look into those pools of darkness which lay where his eyes should have been. She tried to shake her head, but he used his free hand to keep it pinned to the ground. She continued to pound at his body, his arms. Anything she could.

  ‘It’ll be over soon, Louise,’ he said, his words coming to her on a wave of haziness. ‘I didn’t want it to end this way. I thought you’d see sense. That you could join me, like the others did.’

  She could feel herself drifting away, so she redoubled her efforts.

  It’s too late. You should never have come here.

  She couldn’t allow this to happen, but her fight was becoming useless. He was too strong for her, too powerful.

  Too experienced.

  The stories she had heard as a child had become his. He had personified them, made them his own.

  He had become the monster.

  Now, he was killing her as well.

  Forty-Six

  They were sitting in silence, almost waiting for the next part of their lives to unfold. Her mother had stopped suggesting they go to the police now, which pleased Caroline. There was no point, she had told her over and over.

  She played with the card with Louise’s number written on it, twirling it in her hands. She had hidden the truth from Louise – from them all – and she wondered if they had seen through her lies by now. She didn’t think it was possible, but it wouldn’t matter soon anyway.

  ‘He’s coming home.’

  Caroline’s mum had said that after she’d read the card and tried to tell her mum who it was really from. Not Matty, but something else. Something that could arrive at any moment.

  He was coming.

  ‘It can’t be him, Mum,’ Caroline said, trying to break the silence that had festered between them for an hour or so. Both staring at the unfolding events on the television. ‘He’s . . . he’s not out there.’

  ‘Look at the writing,’ her mum replied, without breaking her gaze from the screen and the increasing horror it was reporting. ‘It’s his.’

  Caroline didn’t need to look at it again. The scrawled writing, almost illegible. Childlike in so many ways.

  ‘That’s his handwriting. Look at the way he writes mum. The way the M curves up and around. That’s him.’

  She left her seat, almost banging into the coffee table in her haste. Caroline heard footsteps pounding up the stairs, then overhead in the bedroom. She stared at Louise’s card again. Wondering.

  ‘Here, look,’ her mum said, thrusting one of Matty’s old schoolbooks into her face. She opened the pages and began tapping at blurred words Caroline couldn’t read. ‘That’s it, right there.’

  Caroline didn’t say anything, unable to summon the energy. She wanted to forget. More than anything.

  Another part of her knew she couldn’t turn her back now.

  That she would have to go back at some point.

  They settled back into silence – her mum, waiting for a son who was long gone to return; Caroline waiting for what was coming their way. Caroline wanted to get out, out of her mother’s web of depression, which had now grown around them both. Sitting in the living room, watching the twenty-four-hour news channel, waiting for it to tell them more about what was happening in their city. Every time she moved, she could sense her mum tensing, fear exuding from her every pore.

  ‘Just wait,’ her mum had said the last time she’d attempted to talk about leaving. ‘He’ll be here soon.’

  Caroline was stuck, not wanting to explain again that Matty wasn’t coming back. That they never came back. That once you’re gone, you’re gone. It was never the same afterwards.

  He was never going to come back and be the son she wanted, even if he could. It had been too long.

  ‘Are we supposed to sit here all night and wait?’ Caroline said, trying to make her mother see the futility of it all. Trying to make her see sense.

  ‘He’s coming, you’ll see.’

  Caroline knew she had made a mistake in telling her mum what had happened to her. In coming back to this house, this life. She had escaped once, away from this nightmare.

  She should never have tried to find him. To bring him back.

  The wind picked up, chimes dinging away outside. She could feel the darkness out there and it reminded her of the woods. The way the wind had howled through the trees, almost deafening her with its hostility. In the darkness, with the trees and earth all around, things became much more apparent than they ever had in the light.

  She thought she could still feel his breath on her. The way he moved. The way he touched her.

  She had managed to get out, but it felt futile now.

  Caroline’s eyes were transfixed by the television screen as her mum left her side and made her way into the back room. The unfolding news, becoming more and more unbelievable as it went, the scattering of events, the increasing number of scenes of interest.

  The videos.

  It was becoming too much for her to bear. The way her nightmares had become real.

  ‘Sky News has received this video, which shows something in the woods . . .’

  She stared again at Louise’s number on the card, then made a decision. Reached across and picked up her mum’s mobile phone and began keying the number. As she was about to hit the call button, she became aware of something happening in the other room. A sharp intake of breath, a mumbling, an escaped cry. She tore her eyes away from the phone screen, just in time to see her mum talking to herself as she reached out to the door handle and turned it.

  ‘He’s here, he’s come back.’

  She became rigid with fear, as she saw the figure in black in the space outside the door. Rose to her feet, without realising. ‘Mum, don’t open that.’

  They don’t come back. They never come back.

  He could see them inside, waiting patiently for his return.

  He wished it was always this way.

  He followed instructions carefully.

  The Bone Keeper had shown him the way. Made him in his own image. Showed him the light and the darkness.

  Taught him to kill.

  This was the end of the story. The last chapter. Tomorrow, he would begin a new story. Away from there.

  A different place. New and exciting.

  He wouldn’t be able to be the Bone Keeper anymor
e. It would require a new start. Every city, every town, every village . . . they all had their own Bone Keeper story. It would just take a little time to discover what it was and then consume it.

  Become the myth.

  That was the plan for them all. A final night of violence, in this city where they had all been born, then a fresh start.

  The air was beginning to still now, its howling and violence quietening. He looked to the sky, the grey of the clouds against the dark night. It would rain soon, he thought.

  He enjoyed the rain.

  The two women were inside, sitting on the sofa in the living room in silence, staring at the television in the corner. He imagined them taking in the information being shown, the different stories being told.

  All those people.

  All those bodies.

  He could see Caroline. The marks on her face, the wince as she moved. How close he had been to killing her.

  He remembered her best just before dawn. The soft light playing across her face, the soft rustle of the leaves beneath her body almost like a lullaby, soothing her sleep. She had been both beautiful and horrifying in equal measure.

  He moved with the grace of someone used to living their life in the shadows. Never seen. Never noticed. He had spent years living this life, invisible to all until he decided to reveal himself.

  The air was becoming colder around him, but he didn’t notice it. Instead, he watched and he waited.

  Decided on his next move.

  Caroline and her mother had to die. So they could continue to live.

  He was saving her.

  He took in a deep breath of air, as if he had never tasted anything as sweet and good before. Prepared himself to taste the stale air he knew resided inside the house before him. He imagined it swirling around in front of him, flowing in a thick and slovenly manner.

  He preferred the freshness of the air in the woods he called home.

  The mother stood up, said something to Caroline, then crossed the living room and went into the back room. There was a difference between the two connected areas, carpet in the living room, wood floors in what looked like the dining part of it. These all led to a large bay window, floor to almost ceiling. It covered most of the outer wall, the door in the middle bordered by a wall-length windowpane at each side. It had given him an uninterrupted view inside, right through into the front of the house where they had been sitting in their silence.

  He shifted a little, watching as the mother crossed to the windows. He could see into her eyes, the pain that lay there, the hurt. The lines that creased her face, the sag to her skin and body. He imagined her grief like a weight, bearing down on her shoulders, so she was only just able to carry it around. He could see it was becoming too much for her, that it was too heavy now.

  He watched as she paused at the door, looking out into the garden. He stared at her, thinking of all the things she had lived with. All the things she had lived without.

  There was a moment when he could see directly into her eyes. His locking with hers, even though she was simply staring into the darkness. There was a connection there – a bond they shared, without her ever knowing.

  A familiarity.

  He had something inside him she missed with every fibre of her being. A part of him she would recognise, think of as part of herself. He could almost feel her thoughts, her feelings.

  He moved now, quickly, without sound. He could feel himself almost gliding across the surface below him, a straight line towards the door where she stood. She didn’t see him at first, as he continued to blend into the darkness with ease.

  Her face changed as he emerged in her line of sight. At first, she stepped back in shock, as he came to a stop just beyond the glass that separated them. Then she stepped forward again, her hands shaking as she lifted them to her face.

  He smiled.

  This was the moment he had waited for. The look she was giving him now, as if she had recognised him. As if he was everything she had been waiting for.

  As if he were the son she had been missing.

  The son who was long dead.

  The first victim of the new story. When the Bone Keeper had returned.

  He remembered sitting in the darkness, listening to the story, unable to tear his eyes away from the older man. He had been so young then, a decade or so earlier, but he had absorbed every word.

  He had been offered a way out of his disgusting life. His drug-addicted parents now long forgotten. It had been in those woods that he’d been born.

  He could see her mouthing silent words, hands still shaking as she shook her head and began to cry. He motioned towards the door with his head and she complied.

  Opened it and welcomed him inside.

  Forty-Seven

  Louise could only see spots of black in her vision, her mouth open, her tongue becoming dead and useless. She continued to fight, unprepared to simply give up and allow him to take what he wanted. There was no way she was going to let that happen.

  Not without exhausting every possibility.

  She straightened her legs out, then brought them towards her body knees first, driving them into the small of his back. He shifted a little, the arm he had across her throat moving a few inches over and away for a moment. That gave her the chance to suck in one breath, which gave her renewed energy. She did it again, then once more, hearing a satisfying noise of pain from above her.

  She knew she wouldn’t have long to escape. A million thoughts were running through her head, colliding with each other until they became one indiscernible cacophony of noise. In that moment, it didn’t matter what her history was, her past, her future. It was one moment in time, everything coming down to her.

  Then, she couldn’t breathe again, her air supply cut off by his arm across her throat once more. He bore down, trying to use his whole weight to keep her trapped. She struggled to move, his attempt to keep her prone, dormant, almost working.

  Their eyes were locked together as she continued to bash her arm against his biceps, his neck. He moved his head, dodging her blows with ease. She looked into those eyes of his, dark and soulless yet in so many ways familiar, and narrowed her own gaze. Pleaded with him, without being able to say a word.

  He smiled at her through matted hair around his mouth, baring those disgusting, rotten teeth and gums of his. She remembered another time – another smile. One which had made her happy. Made her feel safe. Now, it had become twisted and deformed.

  This was not the same person she had known.

  She closed her eyes, summoning one final burst of energy.

  Her knees drove into him, a satisfying thump directly into the area that was always the most effective target on a man. And that’s all he was. Not a monster, not some kind of ogre. Just a human being.

  That’s all he was.

  He gave a sharp intake of breath, then became soundless, the weight he had been applying to her neck slowly diminishing. He moved slightly and she didn’t think twice, pushing against him and slipping out from underneath his body.

  Louise didn’t look back, getting to her feet and taking off down the first path she saw. She commanded her body to run and it responded without question, moving through the trees as if she were suddenly a light-footed gazelle. Branches snapped against her body, her face, as she moved through the thick brush, each foot pounding into the ground, arms pumping at her sides. She could almost hear him following her with each step she took, a roar of anger somewhere in the distance, gaining with each passing second.

  She stumbled on a fallen branch, losing her footing and twisting over on her ankle. A sharp jolt of pain flashed up her foot and into her calf as she fell to the ground and instinctively clutched at her lower limb. She looked around, expecting him to be pushing himself through the trees behind her, but could only see the broken path she had made as she ran.

  Louise lifted herself up, her hands now almost black, caked in mud and God knew what else. She continued moving, not prepared to chance h
im either giving up or being unable to find her. He knew those woods better than she ever could, so she continued onwards, trying to find her way out. With each step pain coursed through her foot, but she tried to ignore it, limping on as swiftly as she was able.

  A few moments later, she broke through the treeline and out into the open field where she’d arrived earlier, which already felt like a lifetime ago.

  She was a hundred metres or so away from the actual path that led into the woods, but she felt safer already. In the distance, she could see lights, the road. Signs of life.

  People.

  She slowed down, risking more weight on her ankle, which she could almost feel swelling up beneath her.

  It could have been broken. Then it would have been over.

  Louise continued to stumble down the lane, which she knew led to where she’d parked her car. Paused for a second, looking behind her, expecting him to be there. Only trees and the lane could be seen. Calm, untouched. No one rushing up to take her, there in the open.

  He was going to kill you. You. Why?

  Louise shook her head, driving the voice out, not willing to think about that yet. First, she had to get to her car, then away from there as fast as possible. After that, she wasn’t sure, but then she didn’t think her decisions could be trusted at that point.

  She kept moving, crossing the field in a minute or so and hitting the path that connected to the one leading to the car parking area. She could feel the salt air on the breeze now. She welcomed the normality of it.

  A man passed her, being pulled along by a cocker spaniel on a lead. She turned her head away from him, shoving her hands in the pockets of her jacket, but she saw the quick glance and frown he gave her. She didn’t stop, hoping he didn’t call her back. Ask if she was okay, a polite concern to his voice.