by Stephen Cole
Tom stared dumbly at his fingers. ‘The river bank … Deadly Nightshade.’
‘Deadly—’ Kate’s short, high laugh was humourless. ‘Whatever else you are, you’re no boy scout, are you?’
‘Huh?’ Tom frowned.
‘Deadly Nightshade – Belladonna,’ Kate elaborated. ‘You won’t have seen it anywhere near the riverbank. In fact, you won’t see it growing anywhere in the state … ’
What was she talking about? Kate’s angular features kept blurring in and out of focus. ‘So, the Belladonna on my hands … ’ Tom murmured, ‘ … how?’
Was Kate shaking, or was that just his vision swimming again?
‘Cultivated. Here,’ she said quietly. ‘Get out of this house. While you still can … ’
Tom could hear approaching footsteps. And in the same moment he realised Kate wasn’t angry, or frightened by him. She was frightened for him.
The footfalls drew closer, then two dark shapes loomed in the doorway.
‘Tom?’
Groggy as Tom was, there was no mistaking Marcie Folan’s matronly tones.
‘You should be in bed, Tom.’
Tom heard Hal’s deeper voice say quietly, ‘I thought we were keeping his door locked?’
‘Must’ve been Wesley,’ Marcie muttered back. ‘You know what the boy’s like. No sense.’
Kate had fallen silent now.
Tom’s eyes closed. He felt his legs buckle, then a pair of strong arms caught him and carried him out of Kate’s bedroom, along the landing back towards his own.
The next thing Tom knew he was back in bed, shivering with cold even while his body felt like it was burning up. ‘Katherine,’ he said indistinctly. ‘Her books … the pictures … ’
He heard Marcie laugh, a thin, reedy sound. ‘You’re not scared of those old things, are you, Tom?’
‘Perhaps he’s scared of Katherine.’ Though Hal was almost hidden in the shadows at the foot of the bed, there was no hiding the smile in his voice.
‘That’s not true, now, is it?’ Marcie seemed to be telling Tom more than asking him. She held a glass of water to his lips, and he obediently sipped. It tasted strangely sweet. ‘Kate and you have a lot in common. You’ll see. You’re going to get along great.’
As they left the room, Tom was already slipping away, back into the dark place.
He just about heard the lightning-quick turn of the key in the lock. And then he was falling straight back into his nightmare …
He was running again, over that black and featureless plain – but this time, on all fours. The yellow-eyed shadow beast was there again beside him, setting the pace. Sweat prickled his aching body as he bounded along faster and faster, unable to stop.
He woke suddenly, heart pounding, bones aching like he’d been running for real. For a few confused moments, to be chasing like that, to feel that power and strength, seemed like the most natural thing in the world.
g
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CHAPTER FOUR
Two more days crawled by, slowly and sweatily. Now Tom was feeling a little better, time hung more heavily about him. Like the thick, smothering blankets he always kicked off in his fitful sleep.
He decided it was time to assert himself.
‘I need to get back home,’ he announced to Marcie when she came to bring him soup one evening. ‘My family will be totally freaking by now.’
‘Uh-uh,’ she said with a sad shake of the head. ‘Sorry, honey. The causeway is still flooded. No way out.’
‘But the police could get through, couldn’t they?’ Tom screwed up his nose as Marcie placed the soup on the table. It smelt of cumin and ginger, almost overpoweringly so. ‘Or an air ambulance. They could bring Mom and Dad here. You know, just to see I’m OK.’
‘They could if we could get a message to them,’ Marcie agreed. ‘But we can’t, remember?’
Tom couldn’t believe it. ‘But what if you ever had a real emergency here?’
Hal stepped into the room, grave-faced. ‘We look out for ourselves pretty well, Tom. We keep strangers away. If people round here realised who I was, I’d never know a minute’s peace.’
Tom slumped back into his heavy pillows. ‘I … I appreciate that, Mr Folan, and I’m grateful for everything you guys have done, but—’
‘Just drink your soup and relax, Tom,’ Marcie soothed. ‘I reckon that causeway should be safe to cross by tomorrow afternoon. And if it is, we’ll drive you straight back to your folks. OK?’
Tom stared at her, almost afraid to believe. ‘You mean it?’
Marcie looked him straight in the eyes. ‘Would I say it if I didn’t mean it?’
‘Now drink your soup,’ said Hal. He smiled reassuringly before ducking back out of the room.
‘Thanks,’ Tom told Marcie, hugely relieved. He began to eat. The taste was incredible. Tom found he could pick out the exact flavour of every vegetable, every herb. His head was buzzing, heart tripping out at the thought of seeing his family again.
As Marcie turned to leave, Tom quickly called out to her. ‘So, I guess I don’t need the door locked anymore, right?’
‘Right,’ she agreed. ‘In fact, I thought you might like to come join us downstairs later. Kate’s anxious to say sorry about the other night.’
Tom put down his empty bowl, his mood suddenly more wary. ‘Not a problem,’ he muttered.
Marcie nodded. ‘I’ll call for you later,’ she said with a smile, leaving the door wide open behind her.
Tom was left staring at a plain slab of the passage wall. Dark crimson. The colour of congealed blood.
He thought of Kate and a shiver went through him. She just didn’t fit in, back in Twin Falls, you know? Wesley had told him. Bad stuff happened. Real bad.
A part of him wanted to get out of bed and pull the door tightly shut again. ‘You’ve been stuck here too long,’ he muttered to himself. ‘You’re going crazy. Tomorrow you’ll be out of here. Everything’s gonna be fine.’
Bored and restless, looking away from the open door, Tom found himself listening to the clatter of pans in the kitchen downstairs. Sound sure did carry in this house. He could even hear the hungry sizzling of oil in a skillet around raw meat. Burgers. The smell was almost overpowering. His mouth began to water, so fast he could barely swallow the saliva down. He hadn’t realised just what the heavy oak door had been shutting out all this time.
He scrambled out of bed, fighting against a wave of dizziness. The meat sizzling seemed to fill his ears. Its stench was hitting the back of his head like smelling salts. It was like his senses had been suddenly sharpened and now the world was too loud, too bright; a mass of skin-crawling sensations.
He collapsed to the floor, hands over his ears, feeling like he was going to throw up.
A scuttling noise sounded close by, and he felt a trembling through the threadbare carpet: the light skitter- ing of bugs and other critters, in the dark beneath the floorboards.
You’re imagining it, he told himself. All of it. But he could barely hear the voice in his head for the din all about him.
Shivering, he crawled back into bed, willing the too loud, too bright world to go away and leave him in quiet shadows again.
He had to get out of this place tomorrow. Before it drove him totally out of his mind.
*
The next thing Tom knew, someone was calling him from downstairs. Marcie.
He checked the bedside clock. He’d been asleep for a couple of hours, and things felt more normal, quieter. His head ached, and there was a vile taste in his mouth, but at least he wasn’t hallucinating now.
‘Hey, Tom!’ That was Wesley’s voice, but it sounded almost mocking. ‘You coming down for a bite?’
‘Sure,’ Tom called out hoarsely. He lurched out of bed and stumbled over to open the door. ‘Two minutes.’
He noticed something at his feet. A pile of clean clothes. Wesley’s, he guessed.
It felt weird to be dressed again, but good too. Healthier.
Like convalescence was coming to an end at last. Tom looked at himself in the cracked mirror above the dresser, smoothed back his dark fringe. The shirt was a bit baggy but it would look better than the rumpled T-shirt he’d pretty much lived in since he wound up here.
Something was in his pants pocket. A roll of freshmints – nice touch.
As he padded out along the corridor he saw the light was off in Kate’s room.
Nervously he walked down the stairs into the spacious living room. The walls were bare and bleached like the bare floorboards. Flames crackled over a cluster of coals in a massive granite fireplace, but seemed to spread no warmth. The high ceiling was criss-crossed with exposed beams, the worn wood the same dark hue as the teetering bookcases and well-polished occasional tables below.
At first Tom wondered if his head’s volume control was playing up again, only this time turned way too low instead of cranked up really high. But no. The heavy silence in the room was real, and it made Tom wish he could go straight back to bed.
‘Good to see you up.’ Marcie smiled at Tom expectantly.
‘I feel much better,’ said Tom uneasily. He tried to catch Wesley’s eye, but he was slumped in a chair, thumbs working over a hand-held computer game, staring at the little screen like no one else existed. As for Hal, he was nowhere to be seen. Then Tom realised Marcie was gesturing across at a swivel chair with its back turned to him.
‘Kate, darling,’ she said. ‘Tom’s here. I know you want to talk to him.’
Tom heard a soft sigh as the chair swivelled slowly round. Then he began to blush. Kate was dressed for a date. Her long dark hair was piled up on her head, and she was wearing a deep green low-cut dress that looked like it was silk or something. A string of pearls hung elegantly around her porcelain neck, each one as cold and pale as her narrowed eyes.
‘Hi,’ she said.
Tom’s face felt like it was burning. ‘I’m, uh … I’m sorry we got off to a bad start. You know, me coming into your room and all.’
‘Forget it,’ said Kate dismissively. She got up and crossed to one of the couches.
Tom could feel Marcie’s eyes flicking between the pair of them.
‘Why don’t you sit beside Kate, Tom?’ she said.
‘He’s got sense, that’s why,’ murmured Wesley.
‘That’s enough out of you,’ hissed Marcie.
Tom recoiled from the venom in her voice, even though it wasn’t directed at him.
Wesley gave a pantomime shrug. ‘Later,’ he called over his shoulder in Tom’s direction, and slunk away, pale and edgy.
Hal passed him coming out of the kitchen. He was holding a tray of party food – flans, sausage rolls and stuff. This was all getting majorly weird.
Tom perched himself on the couch beside Kate. She wriggled away a couple of inches. Hal set down the tray in front of them. Tom thanked him, though the hot, pungent smell of sausage turned his guts. He sucked the last of his mint as discreetly as possible.
The silence was excruciating. Time to try again. ‘You look, uh, good, Kate. All dressed up and nowhere to go, huh?’
‘I haven’t been let out for days,’ Kate said sullenly.
Tom frowned. ‘How could you go out? The causeway’s blocked, right?’
Kate looked at her mother. ‘Whoops. I keep coming out with them, don’t I?’
‘Figure of speech,’ Marcie put in smoothly.
‘Eat something.’ Hal spoke softly but the words sounded more like an order than a suggestion.
Tom showed willing and took a slice of the flan, but the stink of Stilton was way too strong. He grimaced.
‘Home-made,’ Marcie said, encouragingly. ‘Kate’s quite the chef.’
‘My stomach’s still a little upset,’ Tom murmured, putting the slice down.
Kate looked away, making a little scoffing sound at the back of her throat. Like she didn’t believe him.
Just for a moment Tom caught her scent, musky but with a sweet, messy smell like raspberries about it. It was so good, it all but wiped out his other senses.
In a daze, he realised he was sitting there looking at her like some kind of freak.
‘What are you staring at?’ she inquired acidly.
‘He’s staring because you look quite beautiful tonight,’ suggested Hal. ‘Doesn’t she, Tom?’
‘Uh, yeah.’ Tom wished the ground would open and swallow him up, no matter how many bugs were scuttling about down there. ‘Yeah, she sure does.’
Kate stood up. Tom saw she was trembling as she turned to her mother. ‘This is sick. Pathetic. Just what the hell are you expecting here?’
‘Some manners, darling?’ Marcie’s voice was like ice cracking.
‘I think maybe I should go back to bed,’ Tom announced, too loudly, feeling almost light-headed. ‘Better rest up if I’m leaving tomorrow … ’
Kate looked like she was about to say something, but changed her mind. ‘Goodnight, then,’ she said.
Tom nodded, smiled awkwardly, and moved towards the stairs. What the hell had all that been about?
‘Wait down here, Kate,’ said Hal. ‘We need a little talk, don’t you think?’
‘You all need a little talk,’ muttered Tom to himself as he walked up the stairs, ‘with the biggest shrink in Washington State.’ All the same, a part of him wished he could hear what was going to be said next.
As he reached the top of the stairs, he found he could.
Even as he moved further along the landing, by concentrating on the low voices downstairs he could still make out every word. Weird, but it kind of figured. The acoustics in this house were as crazy as the people who lived in it.
‘You need to warm up your attitude, you icy little bitch.’
That was Marcie. Tom blinked in surprise. Nice pep talk.
‘Remember Mark?’ Hal added. ‘Don’t let that happen again, sweetheart. Please.’
Mark. The boyfriend. Then with a shiver Tom remembered the candles burning for him in Kate’s room.
‘Poor, sweet Mark,’ agreed Marcie. ‘So keen on you. When you wouldn’t play ball, well … it just tore him apart.’ Her voice hardened. ‘Remember?’
‘You disgust me.’
Tom could hear the quaver in Kate’s voice as she tried to hold back tears.
‘Not as much as you disgust me,’ replied Marcie coldly. ‘You’re soft. Toothless. A frightened rabbit when you could be … so much more.’
Tom strained to hear now over the thudding of his heart. To hear a mother say that stuff to her own child … It was horrible. He thought of his own parents, closed his eyes and wished they were here now.
Marcie’s voice had fallen to a hoarse whisper. ‘But none of that matters. This is going to happen, just as you promised it would. There’s no way out for you. None.’
Tom listened on in a kind of trance.
‘Dad?’ Kate sounded like a little girl now, pleading for help.
‘Accept it, Katherine,’ he said softly. ‘It’s for your own good. For the good of the family.’
‘Well, I hate this family,’ Kate hissed. Then she was thundering up the stairs. Angry. Defiant. ‘All of you!’
Whoa. How screwed-up was this? Tom ducked inside his room and quietly shut the door, terrified without really knowing why. Kate’s muffled sobs from the bathroom sounded down the landing.
He stood there listening to them for some time.
*
Kate turned off the bath taps. The bathroom was filled with steam. The water pipes hissed like a nest of vipers.
She dipped her foot in the scalding water, felt the heat bite into her skin. With a soft whimper, she plunged in first one leg, then the other, and stood there in the overflowing tub, trembling.
She bit her lip, screwed up her eyes. The hairs on her arms were standing up with the shock of it. Slowly, soundlessly, she crouched, sank through the acid burn of the steaming water’s surface. Finally a choked gasp escaped her.
The pain was excruciating, the wa
ter like fire.
Purifying fire.
She needed to feel clean.
‘Remember Mark,’ her father had said.
Like she could ever, ever forget.
His pale face. Blue eyes wide and fearful. Clammy hands grasping for hers.
Kate wished she could dissolve in the searing water. She couldn’t keep the scene from replaying in her mind …
‘I love you, Kate,’ Mark says, just the way he always does, ever since a few days after they’d met. But his eyes are slightly glazed now, his skin beaded with sweat, like he’s taken something.
Kate sees the ugly wound in his neck, the bruised and puckered skin around it, and feels tears building. ‘I told you never to come here, I told you … ’
‘Couldn’t keep away.’ He smiles goofily.
‘We said we’d wait! Wait till I finished school, till I—’
‘Oh, baby, all that time apart … You know I’m smitten.’ He giggles suddenly. ‘Smitten and bitten now … just think what we’ll be able to do together … ’
Kate can’t believe what she’s hearing. ‘So now you know what my family are – and you’re OK with it? You actually want this?’
Mark glances behind to where Marcie stands watching, a crafty shine in her eyes. Then he turns back to Kate, and nods. ‘I’m glad your mother bit me,’ he drawls. ‘C’mon, Kate. Say you’ll do it. For me – for us … ’ He tries to pull her to him.
Kate shrugs him away, her heart breaking. She can’t let him touch her. ‘You don’t know what you’re saying.’
She turns to Marcie. ‘I’ll never forgive you for this.’
Marcie smiles coldly. ‘Blessed be the bite. It’s a natural high, sweetheart, if the spirit is willing.’
Mark clumsily reaches for Kate again. ‘I’m still your Mark, baby,’ he protests.
‘No!’ Kate shakes her head fiercely. ‘No, you’re not. You’re one of them now. And if I give myself to you, I’ll be like them too.’
Mark turns to Marcie. ‘She’ll come round, in time. I know she will. We love each other.’
Kate feels a knife twist in her guts. She dashes away her tears then turns to her mother. ‘No way am I playing this sick game of yours. Not now, not ever. I’m not going to let you rule my life!’