Eerie

by C. M McCoy

  Chapter Ten

  The Girl Who Died

  “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

  - Napoleon

  The candle wick sparked briefly before it took the flame, which rose up, trembling. Hailey closed her eyes as Holly’s favorite song rang in her ears.

  “ . . .a candle in the night outshines the sun . . .” a serene voice sang in her head.

  Fin placed his hand on her shoulder, and Hailey looked up at him—her candle in the night.

  “She really wanted you to kiss her.”

  “What?” Fin asked, smiling down at Hailey.

  “Yeah,” Hailey nodded, returning her gaze to the candle. “Holly was crazy for you. She thought you were—how did she put it—the paragon of hotness,” Hailey chuckled, stealing a glance at Fin, whose mouth twisted as she spoke.

  “The . . .paragon . . .of . . .hotness . . .” he whispered as if he were thoroughly enjoying how those words sunk in, and a giant smile spread across his face.

  “But she never heard you snoring like a chainsaw,” Hailey said, trying to banter, but it came out sounding sad. “Will you pray with me?”

  His face hardened, but then he knelt down with her, made the sign of the cross and folded his hands as she whispered.

  “Father God, please make a place in Heaven for Holly to dance. Help her find Mom and Dad. Please forgive me for being angry with You. And please help me accept that she’s gone, because my heart keeps telling me she’s alive, and I’m afraid she’s still out there, hurting and waiting for someone to find her.” She sniffled softly. “Please bless Fin. Thank You for bringing him into our lives. Without him, I’d be lost. Amen.”

  She wiped her cheeks and stood, but Fin remained penitently on his knees, and Hailey strolled outside.

  “Sorry,” he said when he caught up to her.

  “Don’t be,” Hailey said kindly, and Fin hurried to get her door.

  “There were some things I had to . . .straighten out with the Big Guy,” he explained as he pulled away from the curb, and Hailey felt somehow comforted by that.

  The House of the Rising Sun was a beautiful, polished stone building with vaulted ceilings and stained glass, stretching at least twenty feet high. It sat on a hill overlooking the Ohio River, just a few blocks from the church. Hailey’s uncles were already inside with the mortician when she and Fin arrived.

  “I wanna see her,” Hailey blurted as soon as she saw Uncle Pix. She didn’t mean for it to come out like that and quickly remembered her polite words. “I’m sorry,” she said dropping her eyes. “Could I please see her now?”

  “Of course, dear.” Pix motioned to the mortician. “This is Mr. Tod. He’s prepared Holly for the service.”

  A kind-looking man in his forties waddled over and shook her hand.

  “Miss Hartley,” he said gently but not at all hesitantly. “There are some things I’d like to tell you before we go see your sister.”

  Hailey gave him her full attention.

  “There was substantial damage to her head and to her face, which may make it hard for you to recognize her. Her body was too badly damaged for us to embalm, and she also had some burns, which has made her skin color very dark. There’s also some charring on her face and head.”

  “How do you know it’s her?”

  “The coroner made the identification using her dental records,” Mr. Tod said, but Hailey still needed to see.

  “I’m ready,” she breathed. Her heart slammed against her throat.

  Mr. Tod led the family toward a room with long, heavy curtains, hazy light, and a polished wooden casket, which sat, lid closed, against the far wall. Uncle Pix stopped Mr. Tod in the hallway, mumbling something about a list of people who had access to Holly’s remains, but Hailey never broke stride and in fact quickened her pace. The casket was so close. She had but to open it, and then she could see—they all would see.

  One of the brothers shouted, “Wait!”

  Hailey threw open the lid and staggered back.

  A charred, skeletal head wearing Holly’s hair gaped at her. The rest was pieces.

  Hailey saw the ceiling and the dim light fixtures spin above her before she hit the floor. Fin fell beside her, cradling her next to him.

  “That’s not Holly,” she managed, the room swinging like a pendulum under her.

  On the night before the burial, there was a gathering at the pub. Nobody called it a wake.

  Someone sang a sad, slow tune in old Irish, which Hailey understood perfectly even if she didn’t know what the words meant. The song ended, and hush dropped like a heavy curtain over the Hullachan.

  Holly was dead.

  The church held a Requiem Mass the next day. Every seat was filled.

  Hailey sat down, blinked once, and it was over.

  The next thing she knew, she was standing over Holly’s open grave.

  Numb.

  Squatting down, she wrapped her fingers around some loose Earth, red clay she squeezed into crumbles against her palm. She buried her sister at 2pm on a windy Sunday. She dropped a fistful of dirt onto the casket.

  And just like that, Holly was gone.

  Cobon waited for the last human to leave the cemetery before he revealed himself to Asher.

  “Lovely service, wouldn’t you agree?”

  Strolling with his hands clasped leisurely behind his back, he approached Asher, who stood unmoving in the shade of a giant oak, facing Holly’s grave.

  “I especially liked that bit about perpetual light,” he continued, taking his place at his brother’s side. “Though,” he said, rocking back on his heels then forward again, “I doubt that even the temporary light of this wretched planet could ever find all of her pieces . . .”

  Asher said nothing.

  Cobon pressed his lips together. “Well, not in that mausoleum anyway.” He leaned closer to Asher. “Too many cracks and crevices.”

  Asher remained lost in his own thoughts, uninterrupted and quite obviously unamused.

  “In fact, I think some of her is still stuck in my fingernails.” He scraped a bit of dried blood from his thumb and flicked it away.

  When Asher still took no notice of him, Cobon dropped his hands and impatiently quickened his cadence.

  “Magnificent soul, though—pity I had to shred it, what a waste.”

  He looked for a moment with Asher at Holly’s fresh grave.

  “Simply exquisite that one, even my wicked humans thought so. Oh, they were happy enough to ravage her, but they just couldn’t bring themselves to kill her—I had to wait hours for her to bleed out.” He shook his head in short, minute bursts and muttered almost angrily, “Lucky I found a black widow to ensnare the girl—chop her foot off. Otherwise, those two buffoons would’ve failed to even get her into the car.”

  Asher was unaware of a third human involved in this scheme, and he tried not to show it . . .tried hard not to show a sudden, intense concern for his girl, but Cobon might’ve sensed it. Asher’s jaw had tightened, ever so slightly.

  But still he said nothing, and Cobon spoke even faster.

  “Oh, but she’s not the one you care about, is she—not the one you protect. I saw you, of course, touch her.” Cobon looked as if he’d just bitten into a lemon. “Resilient, that one . . .downright un-charmable—” he gulped some air “—of course, you interrupted me on the balcony—and she shut me out of her mind anyway. Tell me, how will you control her?”

  “I will not control her,” Asher said slowly.

  Cobon leaned back, drawing a deep, cleansing breath and letting it out with a smile.

  “I hate it when you ignore me.”

  “I ignore your madness.”

  “It’s not mad to dispose of a few wretches, is it?”

  “The girl was no wretch. You took a life before
its time, brother. Again.”

  Cobon shrugged.

  “Maybe, but only just. Call it an act of mercy—collateral damage, if you like,” he reasoned. “And you’re the only one who cares.”

  “The others grow intolerant of your—”

  “The others grow desperate,” Cobon spat. “And in their desperation, they grow more tolerant. This place . . .” He brought his hands to his head and clenched them into fists. “This place is driving us all mad. We don’t belong here, Asher, we have to go home!”

  Asher searched Cobon’s eyes, and Cobon let him.

  “You were there, Asher. You saw them all, watching and waiting.”

  Cobon looked him up and down.

  “Even you stood by as I ripped her apart.”

  Asher dropped his eyes. He had stood by and done little more than watch as the girl endured unspeakable atrocities. She’d cried out several times and once even looked Asher dead in the eyes.

  And he’d looked away, ashamed.

  He hadn’t looked again until it was over, until her final thoughts evaporated. She’d projected quite a beautiful image as she’d suffered, of dancing with her little sister, and he had thoroughly enjoyed it.

  That bothered him.

  “Why do you linger here?” Asher asked.

  Cobon frowned. “I’ve lost my rock,” he said, kicking the ground. “I’ve looked for it everywhere. I even tore those two buffoons apart, but I just can’t find it.”

  Asher knew perfectly well where the black stone was. After a doorway into the Aether didn’t open, Cobon had flown into a rage and flung his precious rock onto the cemetery grass. Asher had seen it, and he had very stealthily taken it. The rock was in his pocket, and he wasn’t about to tell Cobon that.

  “Your experiment failed,” Asher said flatly. “The passage is shut. Your rock is finished.”

  Cobon shook his head.

  “No . . .no, I’d know if it were finished. I can still . . .” Cobon raised his shoulders. “feel it, I just can’t find it.”

  Asher returned to gazing at Holly’s grave.

  “And you?” asked Cobon. “Why do you linger? Amused by your female? You do so adore your pets,” Cobon said, frowning. “I might have claimed dear Hailey for my own, you know, but . . .” Asher squinted, and Cobon continued with some hesitation “ . . .well, what good is a human who won’t obey?”

  Cobon tapped his chin then waved his arm at the rose in Asher’s hand. “For the girl?”

  “For her suffering,” Asher said simply.

  “You are brave. I don’t think this one killed Adalwolf.” He flung his hand toward Holly. “Not much fight in her at all.”

  He looked at the rose and then again at Asher, and his face softened into sanity.

  “Do be careful, brother,” he said quietly. “I will not condemn you, but the others are watching, and you remember what happened to Kiya.”

  Of course he remembered. An Envoy never forgot. To his everlasting shame, Asher had destroyed Kiya.

  Her demise had unfolded in short order. She had fallen in love with a human and openly displayed her affection. When the others noticed, they were appalled. Their rage came on swift wings, and Kiya had come to Asher begging for protection. But instead of protecting her, Asher handed her to the mob, and then he joined them in shredding her into scraps of energy, which dissipated into the void.

  Only Cobon had tried to help her, a futile attempt at a rescue. The others shunned him after that, which likely hastened his spiral into lunacy. Insane and genius and unrelenting, Cobon would tear Hailey apart if he knew he’d killed the wrong girl.

  And now Cobon was possibly Asher’s only ally—the only Envoy that would tolerate his feelings for the girl—the only Envoy that might stand with him, should the others attack him as they did Kiya.

  “Strange how fate weaves us apart and together again,” Cobon remarked, as if his thoughts had followed the same course as Asher’s. He narrowed his eyes at the rose.

  “Do enjoy your little pets, Brother. I so hope they don’t bite you in the end, but perhaps you’ll buy a muzzle for Pádraig or Fin or whatever the humans are calling him now.” Cobon continued muttering to himself as he faded away. “I do find your feelings for that girl utterly despicable . . .”

  Asher returned to his thoughts, letting his mind drift into the Aether. It was becoming more and more difficult to exist there. Where three thousand years ago, he’d spent most of his time in the Aether and was pulled away to the Earth only sporadically, now it was the other way around.

  How he missed his home. And how he weighed once again whether he would remain on Earth and love Hailey for the rest of her natural life . . .

  Or tear her apart tomorrow and end his torment.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Vanishing Rose

  “And then there stole into my fancy, like a rich musical note,

  the thought of what sweet rest there must be in the grave.”

  - Edgar Allan Poe, The Pit and the Pendulum

  Hailey tossed and turned, worried into insomnia about her return to school after her sister’s burial. At 3:13am, she flopped on her side and decided to watch as each minute flipped a digit on her bedside clock, and she kept watching until 5:30 a.m., when she decided it was finally late enough to rise. And rise she did, like a drone, inching toward the bathroom, point-focused on her next task and thinking of little else.

  Brush teeth. Done.

  Turn on shower. Done.

  Get in shower. Done.

  Wash hair. Done.

  Grab towel—step out of shower. Done.

  Turn off shower. Done.

  Forget to wipe up a puddle so Holly can find it with a socked foot. Done.

  Catch glimpse of white-haired boy in mirror...

  Hailey whipped her head around, a scream stuck in her throat. There was—there really was a white-haired boy of twelve or thirteen staring at her from behind the bathroom mirror.

  She stared at him wide-eyed, unable to force air, and frozen in place, hoping that if she didn’t move, he wouldn’t see her.

  Several seconds passed, and neither of them blinked.

  The mirror took on the sheen of an oil painting, covered in thick strokes of washed-out tones which bled together to form a frozen face.

  Breathing as quietly as she could, Hailey leaned in for a closer look. Then she pulled her face back, and the white-haired boy mimed her every movement. He now stared back at her slack-jawed with one eyebrow raised higher than the other.

  Hailey closed her mouth, and the white-haired boy closed his mouth.

  She squinted at him suspiciously, and he squinted right back.

  Hailey sighed; he sighed, and then she threw her towel over the mirror and held it there. With both hands engaged, she wasn’t quite sure what to do next, and she couldn’t move without exposing the glass.

  This was crazy.

  She’d just decided she’d imagined the whole thing when a pair of albino arms jutted out from the mirror, through her towel and went straight for Hailey’s head, pulling and twisting her hair this way and that, and Hailey fought against them, grabbing one and using all her might to pull it away.

  It shook her loose. Then it slapped her hand and went back to work on her hair. Ducking and squirming, Hailey bunched herself into the corner. Finally, the hands stopped.

  Hailey stood up, rubbing her head and finding her hair was pulled into a beautiful, ornate, albeit soaking wet, French braid.

  The white-haired boy saluted her from the mirror then disappeared.

  Hailey blinked, dumbfounded.

  No way that just happened. No way anyone would ever believe her if it actually had happened. She probably braided her hair herself and from lack of sleep simply imagined the whole affair with the mirror. That’s what happened.

&nb
sp; Except, Hailey didn’t know how to braid.

  Eyes wide, she very slowly got dressed and went about her day.

  With her hair gorgeously organized, she caught the bus to school, sat herself in the front seat, and avoided all eye contact.

  Whispers erupted all around her, and they were hard to ignore. Some girls didn’t even bother whispering their gossip about Hailey and her sister.

  “—I heard when they were digging her sister’s grave, her uncle poured a bottle of whiskey into it,” gushed one girl in Physics class.

  It was half a bottle, Hailey corrected her in her head. Her uncles drank the rest.

  The girl sitting right behind her chimed in next. “At least she finally bought a brush for her hair,” she giggled and a few others laughed with her.

  Holy crap, I’m sitting right here.

  Tage followed her off the bus that afternoon and fell in step with her as she moped home, walking so close, he actually brushed against her.

  Hailey didn’t really feel like talking.

  “You’ve got a toothbrush in your hair,” he said.

  “What?!”

  Hailey felt around and sure enough pulled Holly’s toothbrush out of her braid.

  “That albino little punk,” she muttered. She glanced at Tage briefly then returned her attention to her feet. No wonder everyone was laughing at her . . .

  “I missed seeing you in school.”

  Hailey pulled the corners of her mouth back in a weak smile.

  “I never realized how nice it was to hear your feet tapping under your desk.”

  “I do that?” That was something Holly used to do. Hailey didn’t know she did it too. It made her smile for real.

  “Yeah, and it’s always a pretty cool rhythm.” Tage rubbed the back of his neck.

  “Oh.” Hailey dropped her head again and tried to hide behind some strands of hair that had come out of her braid.

  “Wait,” he said smiling. “Was that embarrassing?” He chuckled, and Hailey could feel her cheeks heat. “Actually, I’m glad you’re so shy, otherwise I’d never have the courage to ask you to prom.”