Demon Hotel
By C.M. Chidgey
Copyright 2013 C.M. Chidgey
Smashwords Edition
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Discover other titles by C.M. Chidgey at Smashwords.com:
(Gladden Halya Saga, Book 1)
Shades Of The Iris: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/331726
(Hidden Descendant Series, Book 1)
One Of The Enemy: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/331736
Prologue
12 years ago.
I am six years old and my name is Taylor Mckenzie, it is not Tinkerbell like my stupid neighbour, Lucian Adams keeps calling me. Ever since he moved next door four years ago he keeps annoying me. Just because he is eight he thinks he can get away with anything and because he is older parents believe him over me.
I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him playing catch with his friend, Gordon. I wanted to just go over there and kick him, he had messed up my game with my dog. He had pushed over the trash can so everything went rolling away and then blamed it on Patch! Patch hadn’t done anything though, I had seen Lucian do it, but now Patch was locked in his cage for being bad and I was not happy!
Boys were definitely the worst, my sister, Trisha was always screaming at Mummy for not letting her out with boys. She was seventeen years old and she was crazy if she wanted to spend time with boys.
Mummy and Daddy kept telling me to come out and play with Lucian, but I didn’t want to and now he had made sure I would be bored out here. He was so mean, but next week we would all be going to Australia. Why did they think it would be fun to invite him and his Mummy to Australia? He would spend the whole time annoying me, I liked his Mummy though, she was nice, I don’t know how he got so mean.
I’d rather his Mummy came and we took Patch instead of him, Daddy had told me that Patch wasn’t allowed to come though, some people were going to look after him for us because he was afraid of airplanes. I didn’t know why he was scared though, Daddy said that it would be like flying and that sounded really fun until Lucian said that I was used to flying anyway because Tinkerbell flew all the time.
Maybe they would just move somewhere else soon and I wouldn’t have to see him anymore.
8 years ago.
“Hey Tink, watch out for the spiders.” Lucian called before running into his room.
Yes, despite all my hopes that they would move, they still lived next door and the Australia trip had become a yearly thing since I was six. This was the fifth one, we always came to Queensland and Lucian always tried to scare me with the spiders, but the truth was that they didn’t really bother me. I didn’t like spiders, but it’s not like the idea of them being in the room kept me up as long as they kept to themselves I didn’t care. He probably knew that by now, but he never passed up a chance to say something annoying. Our fights and arguments with each other had only developed more the older we got, we had mud fights, food fights, snowball fights, water fights, you name it and we had probably done it. Most people in our neighbourhood avoided us nowadays so that they didn’t get caught in the crossfire and my parents and his Mum had learnt by now to let it run its course instead of trying to stop us. We argued about almost anything and when a girl from school got caught in our argument she burst into tears and I realised then how strange it was that no matter what happened I never resorted to tears and in typical Lucian style he had no problem telling me how weird I was.
We were now getting ready to go on one of Dad’s long walks he had planned out, I never looked forward to them, they were long and tiring and he barely let us have any breaks. Last year I had come back with so many blisters on my feet that I thought they would fall off much to Lucian’s amusement who of course didn’t have a single one. Since Trisha hadn’t been with us I had been the only one complaining and I had a feeling since she was absent this year too it was going to be a repeat experience.
We all met at the front door where Dad was filling up a rucksack with bottles of water, a map, a book of Australian wildlife, some snacks and a torch. I really hoped we wouldn’t need the torch, the idea of being out there in the dark seemed even less fun than walking out there in the day.
“You walk up here with me Luc and you walk back there with Mum Taylor, I don’t want to be held up by a fight between you two so keep your distance.”
I saw the grin on Lucian’s face before he turned to follow Dad leaving me with just the back of his black hair covered head to see before his Mum followed and then I followed with my Mum next to me.
As I had thought we hadn’t even been walking for that long when my feet began to hurt, my Mum was holding my hand and almost dragging me along so that I wouldn’t fall behind. I kept up with her help, my feet had been worse than this before so I kept going.
The Australian heat beating down on us through the trees didn’t help at all, we were all breathing heavily and I was sure we must be coming to a stop soon, but Dad just kept walking and looking at his map. I was sure that a ten year old shouldn’t be sweating this much and I was so thirsty, but I knew if I asked for water now I probably wouldn’t have enough for later so I kept quiet and forced myself to keep walking.
I was glad when Dad’s steps became slower as he started matching wildlife to the pictures in his book so that he could find out about them. It proved how tired I was when I didn’t mind stopping so close to spiders for my Dad to compare them to his book.
When he sped up again though I groaned and started dragging my feet before whining out. “Mum, my feet really hurt.”
“Mine too sweetie, but we have to keep up with the others.”
I nodded and took abut ten more steps before I couldn’t take it anymore and tugged on her hand when we stood in a clearing. “Mum, please can we sit down for just a few minutes?”
“Joseph, we need to take a break!” She called to them and they were the best words I had heard all day.
I let out a breath of relief before letting go of her hand and sitting down on a close by log.
“Surely we should have stopped for a break before this?” Lucian’s Mum asked as they walked back towards us.
“I was trying to get us to this spot on the map, but I can’t seem to find it.” My Dad answered.
“You mean we’re lost?” Mum asked in outrage.
“No, no Nikki, I’m just not sure where that spot is.”
“Which means we are lost!” She said raising her voice.
I groaned, great we might be lost in trees full of spiders. This was the sort of thing that Lucian would do to me.
“Dad, can I have some water please?” I interrupted their argument.
He took his rucksack off and pulled water out without even stopping the shouting back and forth. I took the water without even bothering to thank him knowing that there wouldn’t be much point and took a mouthful, it felt amazing sliding down my parched throat.
“Aww, is the walking too much for Tinkerbell?” Lucian asked with a smirk taking his time to drink some of his water.
I glared at him not bothering with any words knowing that I didn’t have the energy to waste after all this walking. After taking another mouthful of water I did it back up and waited to find out what my parents w
ere going to do. My Dad was now looking at the map and Mum came and sat next to me while Lucian’s Mum savoured her water.
“No spiders around here are there?” Mum asked me looking around us suspiciously.
She was even more frightened of spiders than I was and clearly the idea of spiders in the trees was really bothering her. “I hope not.” I answered.
Suddenly a few birds flew out of close by trees and I jumped letting out a little squeak and dropping my bottle of water having sudden images of spiders jumping out of trees at us.
Lucian started laughing at me and I glared at him again before leaning down to pick up my bottle from behind the log. Since I was still glaring at him I never looked down before picking it up and that was the biggest mistake I had ever made.
I felt it before I looked at it, there was a sudden intense pain in my wrist making me drop my water bottle, cry out in pain and look at my wrist to find a spider biting me. It pulled its teeth out and I could actually see it rear back to bite me again when I jumped to my feet and started screaming my head off. My sore feet were forgotten, the heat from the sun seemed like nothing, all that existed was the searing pain in my wrist as I shook it trying to get it off.
My Mum being the closest one to me grabbed at it suddenly making it direct its attack at her after landing on her hand. She must really love me if she was willing to get a spider off of me when I knew how frightened she was of them. I didn’t stop screaming even though it was off of me because it started biting my Mum stabbing its fangs into her arm repeatedly. My Mum was screeching for Dad to kill it, everything seemed to move so slow and it seemed like it took forever for my Dad to get there, but I was certain he had started moving towards us the moment I had started screaming. I was so happy for Dad’s wildlife book at that moment when he used it to hit the spider off of Mum’s arm before stamping on it killing it outright.
We were both crying and my Mum shouted in between tears. “That’s it, we are never coming on one of these stupid walks again!”
“I know, I’m sorry love.” Dad said taking my Mum into his arms.
My whole body was shaking and my legs felt weak, but I refused to sit on that log again. I looked down at my wrist to see the two little holes there still bleeding.
“You ok?” Lucian asked from next to me.
I jumped and wiped my eyes before looking away from him. I really didn’t need him to use this later for something to laugh at me about.
“I’m f-fine.” I stuttered.
I wiped my eyes again refusing to cry anymore, but tears didn’t seem to stop coming. I wasn’t really crying anymore so it didn’t make sense that my eyes were still blurring.
“Are you ok sweetie?” My Dad asked me pulling me in for a hug now that Mum seemed slightly less hysterical.
I nodded against his t-shirt and gasped out. “I’m fine Dad.”
Now I was panting, that was weird. Apparently my Dad thought so too because he pulled back and looked at me as if he’d never seen me before. I blinked several times when he blurred into two people and I stumbled.
“Dad, I don’t feel good.” I admitted in between breaths.
“Taylor, what’s wrong?” Mum asked me and I thought I could detect a slight breathlessness in her voice.
“What kind of spider was that?” Lucian’s Mum suddenly demanded grabbing the wildlife book.
“I don’t know.” Dad answered as she started flicking through the book glancing at the dead spider on the floor after every few pages.
Suddenly she stood up and grabbed Dad’s map. “We need to get them to the hospital now.”
I took one step before my legs gave way and Dad scooped me up and followed her into the trees.
“What is it Stephanie?” Mum asked stumbling against Dad.
“Funnel-Web spider, we need to get them the antidote now.” She stopped. “Give me Taylor, you better carry Nikki.” She said to my Dad.
He handed me over quickly before scooping my Mum up and they started marching through the trees. Lucian of course kept up without a problem and was completely silent.
“How long does it take to spread?” Dad asked between breaths, but I knew that was from walking so fast with the extra weight of my Mum too.
“Anywhere from fifteen minutes to three days. It depends on a number of things, I hope we are going the right way.”
“We are, I can find the way back.”
From that point on everything seemed far away at one second and too close at another, things blurred and I couldn’t seem to make out anything. I could have sworn I heard Lucian trying to talk to me at some points, but I didn’t know if that was just my imagination or not. I heard the voices of my Dad and Lucian’s Mum, but they always sounded panicked and I couldn’t make out exactly what they were saying.
Then there were voices that I didn’t even recognize and I thought I heard my Dad crying, but that must have been wrong because my Dad never cried. I knew I wasn’t in Lucian’s Mum’s arms anymore, but I couldn’t identify where I was either and it didn’t seem to matter I was just so tired. I wasn’t even sure why I had forced myself to stay awake for so long, but I couldn’t find the energy anymore so I let sleep pull me under hoping my Mum would be there to hug me when I woke up.
The spider was on me again, only it was bigger and it wouldn’t let go no matter how much I shook my arm it clung on biting me repeatedly. I screamed and screamed until my throat was raw, but it was still there. My wrist was hurting so much where it was biting me and I just wanted my Mum there to save me and tell me it was all ok, but she never came and it never stopped biting me until my screams woke me up.
“Sweetie, wake up, you’re safe.”
It was my Dad’s voice and my eyes snapped open to find him sitting there next to me in a chair. A sob escaped my throat and I climbed out of what I now noticed was a hospital bed before crawling into his lap and crying against his chest. He wrapped his arms around me and soothed me until I had finally calmed down.
It wasn’t until I lifted my head up to look at him that I noticed the red circles around his eyes as if he had been crying too. I looked around the room to find Lucian and his Mum sitting in here too, but where was my Mum? Lucian’s Mum still had tears running down her cheeks and Lucian for once didn’t look amused as if he was about to make fun of me.
“Daddy, where’s Mummy?” I asked calling them by the name’s that I had replaced with Mum and Dad a while ago.
“Sweetie…-“ Dad started before taking a deep breath seeming unable to finish a sentence.
“Dad, I don’t understand, you don’t cry.” I said wiping a tear off of his cheek when it fell.
“Your Mother is gone sweetie.” He whispered before more tears fell.
“No.” I shook my head. “Where is she gone Dad, what do you mean?”
When he refused to answer me I started screaming at him and hitting his chest. He had to tell me where she was, she couldn’t be gone. What did that mean anyway, where did she go, what was he even talking about?
I didn’t stop until Lucian’s Mum pulled me from his lap saying.
“She died Taylor.”
The words hit me like a slap to the face before I fell on my knees and cried and screamed for my Mum hoping it was all some mistake and she would come in the room at any minute and hold me, but she didn’t. Lucian’s Mum and my Dad were the only ones there to comfort me while Lucian watched from his chair with a look on his face that I couldn’t even identify.
4 years ago.
I sighed and slammed my locker shut before leaning against it, I was having such a bad day. First, I had, had a bad night of sleep so I was exhausted when I woke up, then I forgot that we were having a pop quiz in English so I had got a one out of ten mark, then I had been kicked out of Math for falling asleep at the desk and I had just been disqualified from a test when I asked for a new pen because mine ran out. I swear the stupid teachers were ganging up on me to make my school experience hell.
I groaned when I
saw Lucian turn the corner into the hallway, great that was all I needed. We still annoyed the hell out of each other, the only time he had stopped was for around a month when we had returned from that life changing trip in Australia. Then suddenly without any warning we were arguing and fighting full force again. It had taken me a while to understand that my Mum was killed and I survived, but the doctor had explained that the spider had injected a lot more venom into her so it had killed her quicker and apparently I was almost dead when we arrived. Understandably I was now absolutely terrified of spiders and I still had nightmares about that day. Trisha had moved away, we never heard from her anymore and my Dad was raising me the best that he could, but I wasn’t immune to the sadness that enveloped me every time I entered the room he was in.
“Hey, Tinkerbell!”
I just closed my eyes and didn’t acknowledge him just hoping he would go away, but of course that didn’t happen. When I knew he was standing in front of me I sighed and opened my eyes. He had one hand pressed against the lockers above my head and was leaning down all in my personal space with a smirk on his face. Just because he was annoying as hell though it didn’t make me oblivious to how attractive he was. He still had the same messy black hair and eyes so dark that they were almost black just the same as when he had first arrived in the house next door. What was different though were the muscles he was developing in his chest and shoulders. Every girl I knew wanted to kiss the guy, but that was because they didn’t have to deal with him all the time.
“Thanks for the paint splattered on the inside of my locker. I got detention for that you know.”
I smirked at him. “Thanks for the glitter you poured inside mine Adams. Was real fun trying to get all of the glitter out of my books. Did you want something?”
“Careful Tink, I might think you’re glad to see me.”
“I’m not in the mood today Adams, save it for tomorrow.” I said trying to slide along the lockers so I could get away from him.
Demon Hotel (Zombie Apocalypse Series, Book 1) Page 1