In Creeps The Night

by Natalie Gibson

  People were shouting now. Footsteps echoed in the hallway outside and someone yelled for me to open the door. The grownups were here, but they would be too late. They were always too late.

  “I won’t let you die again. I’ll keep you safe this time.” I steadied the pistol, squinting against the light that shouldn’t be there, and kept shooting and shooting and shooting.

  Kathryn, Kathryn what did you do?

  EVERYONE KNOWS ABOUT the old black house at the end of the road. No one has lived in it for years. On Halloween, they say you can see ghosts in the windows and if you go in after them you will never come back out. I think it’s just a story, but if there is anything going on, my friends and I want to find out.

  “Josh, I wanna go home,” my little brother Tommy says as he grips my hand.

  “Oh come on, it’ll be fun,” I say. “I thought you liked haunted houses.”

  “Not real ones!” he cries.

  I open the gate and walk into the yard. The grass is overgrown. The house itself is dark, nothing but old curtains in broken windows with cracked and peeling black paint.

  “There’s no such thing as real ghosts,” says Scott, my friend from next door, as he comes up through the gate behind us. With him are Lucy and Charles, friends from our seventh-grade class.

  “Yeah,” chimes in Lucy, “except on Halloween night.”

  “Oooooooooh,” Charles moans, trying to scare Tommy further.

  “Give him a break, guys,” I say. “He’s only eight.”

  We stand at the door dressed in our costumes. Lucy is an astronaut, her school backpack looking out of place, Scott is a skeleton, and Charles is a vampire. I am a zombie, and Tommy is wearing my ghost costume from last year.

  “It’s locked,” Scott says as he tries to turn the doorknob. “We’re going to have to find another way in.”

  “Look,” Lucy says, pointing at a window at the end of the porch. “It’s broken. We can get in through here.”

  The three of them walk toward the window when Tommy pulls on my hand.

  “There’s someone in there,” he says. I look but nothing is there.

  “Tommy, there’s no one here but us,” I say. “Come on, let’s get inside.”

  With a little work Charles gets the window open. He helps Scott inside, and they help the rest of us through. With all of us safely in the house, I pull out a glow stick and snap it. The glow illuminates the edges of the room.

  The room is dusty and shadows fill every corner. A staircase rises upward and on either side are hallways leading farther into the house. At the back of the room is a door. That’s where Scott goes.

  The door opens to stairs leading into the basement. Scott toes the threshold and looks down. He reaches out to me, and I hand him another glow stick. Cracking it, he tosses it down, but it bounces out of view.

  “You first,” Lucy says, peering over the edge.

  Scott smiles and starts down the steps. Charles follows with me, Tommy, and Lucy right behind. At the bottom Scott picks up the glow stick and throws it forward, revealing some boxes and old house supplies.

  “Hey, do you think the lights work?” asks Charles.

  He looks for a light switch and finds one near the stairs. He flips it, and the basement fills with light. We see the large room all at once. Boxes are stacked along the walls, the old cardboard barely holding together. In the middle sits a table with a ring of candles around its rim. Piled in the center of the table are dead flowers. A glass figurine in the shape of a woman wearing a flowing dress sits on top.

  “What’s this?” I ask as I walk over and look at the figurine.

  “An altar?” Scott suggests.

  I reach for the figurine.

  “No, don’t!” Tommy barks. He tries to pull me away.

  “It’s just a toy,” I say as I grab the figurine. “See? It’s like one of grandma’s porcelain dolls. Probably just as old, too.”

  “Spooky,” Lucy says as she puts her backpack down. “You know what would make this even better?” She unzips the bag and pulls out a long box.

  “A Ouija board? Awesome!” Scott says as he runs over to help Lucy. The rest of us sit on the floor around them and put our hands on the pointer except Tommy who stands behind me not wanting to get closer.

  “Are there any ghosts here?” Lucy asks.

  The pointer doesn’t move.

  “Is there anyone here at all?” I ask.

  The pointer moves to “yes.”

  “What are you doing? Stop!” Tommy begs, tugging on my shoulder.

  “Relax, Tommy. It’s not real,” Lucy begins as she picks up the pointer and puts it in the center of the board. “It doesn’t move on its own; we move it.”

  “Yeah, it’s just for fun,” Charles adds.

  “Watch, Tommy,” I say, taking my hand off the pointer. “I’ll ask something when no one is touching it and you’ll see.”

  Everyone nods and pulls away. I think for a moment and look at the glass figurine on the table. “Glass woman, do you have a name?”

  We stare at the pointer, but nothing happens. After a few moments I look to Tommy.

  “See?”

  Suddenly the lights flicker. A rush of wind blows all around us and tosses the flowers from the table. The pointer slowly slides over to “yes.”

  “Josh!” Tommy yelps as he points at the board. “It moved!”

  “Th-that’s impossible,” Lucy stammers. She reaches for the pointer and tries to move it. “It’s stuck.”

  “You’re joking,” Scott says as he wraps his fingers around the pointer and tugs. The color drains from his face. “I-I can’t move it.”

  The lights go out, and the glow sticks seem to disappear. We sit paralyzed with fear until a blue glow appears and begins to grow brighter. It’s coming from the glass figurine. The sound of the board grabs our attention. The pointer scrapes around before shooting across on its own. It flies to the letters A L I C before stopping on E.

  “Alice,” I whisper. Then I yell, “What do you want?”

  The wind intensifies, and the light grows blinding. It explodes and knocks us back. When the haze clears I see a woman, pale and thin. She’s dressed in a torn flowing gown, floating over the figurine. She stares at us with hollow eyes.

  “I want…” she says in a raspy voice, “…freedom. I want…you!”

  Ghostly fire erupts in a ring around us, blocking any way out. Alice swoops down and hovers over the Ouija board. We remain frozen in fear.

  “We didn’t do anything to you!” Lucy screams.

  “Long ago I was put under a curse,” Alice moans, “to be forever trapped in glass. Only allowed to roam on Halloween night until I could find someone to take my place.”

  She turns to me and points a long, bony finger.

  “Now it’s Halloween again, and I will trap you in the glass, forever!” Alice reels back and then charges me.

  “No!” Tommy yells, jumping in front of me. Alice slams into him and grabs him.

  “Tommy!” I scream.

  But it’s too late. Another flash blinds us, and it’s all over. The wind disappears; the fire is gone. And the glass figurine lies on the ground shattered into pieces.

  Tommy lies motionless. I run to his side and turn him to face me. I pull off his mask and try to wake him, but he doesn’t move. His tussled and messy black hair now has a ghostly gray streak in it, and I touch it, trying to see if it’s real.

  Tommy coughs and wakes up. He brushes the gray hair from his face and looks at me. His eyes swirl with a blue light that slowly fades away.

  “Can we go home now?”

  THEY STOOD IN the middle of the hallway, all four of them blocking our exit from the darkened building.

  “Why can’t you just let us go?”

  No response. They just stood there, the shadows covering their faces.

  “Why are you doing this?”

  Still nothing. Portia shrank into me fearfully.

  “Let’s g
o,” she whispered to me.

  We began inching away from them in small steps until we heard a hard crash behind us. We turned and saw the body of our physics professor, Mr. Alston, on the ground. His throat ripped and bloodied. Portia let out an ear-shattering scream; I held her close.

  “You know, I don’t think people taste better with age, maybe that’s just wine.”

  The voice was all too familiar. I looked past the darkness as a figure emerged from the shadows.

  “Nick?” I said, nearly losing consciousness. My roommate, Nick, he was one of them. His face was stained with blood, no doubt from our physics professor.

  “There’s nothing you can do to save her, Austin,” Nick said to me. “We have to consume her heart to finish the ritual.”

  I held Portia closer to me, falsely hoping to protect her as the other four slowly closed in on us.

  “Austin, you knew this day would come,” Nick continued. “Do you know what this would mean to your own ancestors and the thousands of cultists around the world who were killed by her people?”

  “What are you talking about, Nick?” I asked.

  “Hunter!” An unfamiliar voice sounded off from a distance as gunshots boomed through the hallway. Portia and I automatically hit the deck, shielding our heads from the ensuing fire.

  The gunshots stopped after a short time. We looked up and Nick and the others disappeared. A man emerged from the shadows hurriedly, leaning down to help us up.

  “Jack?” Portia said.

  “We gotta go. They’ll be back, let’s move.”

  We hurried to a nearby classroom where Jack slammed the door shut and left a perfect line of red dust across the threshold.

  Nick appeared in the doorway staring through the glass at us. His green eyes were the coldest and most inhuman I’d ever seen them. They were empty, as if a soul never inhabited his body. A grin spread across his face revealing perfectly white fanged teeth. He disappeared once more, his body disintegrating into a black smoke.

  Jack turned to me, pointing his gun directly at me. My hands rose involuntarily in response.

  “Jack, stop!” Portia stepped in front of me defensively. “He’s not one of them.”

  “He’s a dhampir, Portia!”

  “He’s not one of them, Jack! Put down the damn gun!”

  Jack hesitated for a moment then lowered the gun.

  “He saved me from them, Jack,” she explained. “They’ve already killed the others. I’m the last one. Without me they can’t complete the ritual.”

  “Fair enough,” said Jack, refusing to take his eyes off me.

  “How much longer ‘til the eclipse ends?” Portia asked.

  “About an hour,” Jack said. “Until then we have to stall. The red brick dust will keep them out, so long as the line remains unbroken.”

  I was baffled.

  “Portia, you’re a vampire hunter?” She nodded. I felt my face frown slightly.

  “It’s not something I can choose Austin. My family comes from a long line of vampire hunters like yours comes from vampires.”

  “So what happens after all of this is over? Will you guys let them go or will they be taken prisoner for the hunters?” I asked.

  “Neither,” Jack said nonchalantly. He’d emptied the contents of the bag he carried onto a nearby lab table and was diligently searching for something.

  The single worded response finally registered in my brain. “You mean—”

  “We’re going to kill them,” Jack cut me off sharply.

  “B-But—” I began only to be cut off by Portia this time.

  “Austin, sacrificial magic is wrong. They’ve killed people. You have to understand,” she said.

  “And you’ve never killed people? How can I possibly understand that?” I’d never killed anyone and I’d have never imagined they’d be people I knew who would be the victims. How could they think of killing so easily?

  “These freaks want demonic powers from worshipping a dark god and killing eighteen-year-olds. They’re evil,” Jack said. “And the more you justify them, the more suspicious I am of you so if you don’t want to join your blood-drinking cannibal friends I suggest you calm down and let us do our job.”

  I swallowed heavily at his threatening words. The room fell silent as Jack brandished a Colt 45 Revolver from the inner pocket of his jacket. He loaded it with gleaming silver bullets, which had images of tiny crescent moons inscribed continuously all over them. I recognized this symbol. It was the brand of the vampire hunters.

  Jack stood at the table loading the pistol while Portia prepared a pistol of her own. Vampire hunters, I thought. I am half vampire after all. I wondered why they hadn’t killed me yet. What was their criteria for that?

  Austin, a voice whispered to my mind. I wasn’t startled: other vampires communicated to me this way all the time. Any other night this would be shocking, Nick was only a vampire cultist, a mortal blood drinker, but on this night he was in transition. Austin, I know I should have told you about my cult a long time ago but you have to hear me out.

  I tried to ignore Nick’s voice but his words assaulted my mind.

  My family never rose to Supremacy but the vampire hunters killed them regardless of that. They never sacrificed, never killed, but they were still hunted down like dangerous animals.

  Nick what you’re doing is wrong, I thought back. This is wrong.

  And what they’re doing is better? Nick shot back. Did you see how quickly that bastard raised his gun to you?

  I didn’t reply, I couldn’t admit that Nick was right.

  Portia and Jack still paid me no mind, tending to their various weapons.

  When we rise to Supremacy we’ll make sure that the likes of them are dealt with.

  Supremacy was not an easily achieved feat. Each member of the circle would consume the hearts of five eighteen-year-olds on this day, under the eclipsed sun, while the world lies in darkness. This day only happened once in a generation.

  I walked to the door, watching the deep blackness of the empty hall through the glass.

  “Do you see anything?” Portia called to me. I slid my foot along the threshold, silently scattering the line of brick dust.

  “Not yet,” I said turning away, leaving the door wide open behind me. I sat back in the revolving chair and watched as the smoky mist poured into the room slowly. It found the area where Portia and Jack stood with their bag before it transformed into Nick and the other four cultists.

  Nick wrapped his arms around Jack and sank his teeth deep into his neck. Portia screamed at the top of her lungs as she watched Nick ravenously chew her brother’s neck. But there was nothing she could do as the other cultists restricted her arms and carried her away. She screamed my name continuously, hoping for my help to escape her death again but I didn’t respond. I just sat and watched as they carried her from the room.

  Nick watched me from across the room, blood dripping from his face as he stood over Jack’s corpse. He walked to the door, inclining his head before following his fellow cultist out into the darkness.

  I sat with my chin resting on my interlocked fingers, listening to Portia howl in pain as Nick’s coven completed the ritual.

  I am half vampire after all.

  THEY SAVED MANDY’S room for last—the rest of the house was packed. The first moving van had picked up the furniture earlier except for the bedroom suite. One more night in the house they loved, then on to new adventures.

  Mandy packed her beloved dolls carefully while her mother emptied her closet into another box. Hattie hated leaving, but Mandy was being bullied at school and there was no brick and mortar in the world worth that. Hattie knew she had to get her daughter away before it got worse.

  When Brianna and Brylie found out about Mandy’s love of dolls, they tormented her. They said dolls were creepy and nobody wanted to be friends with the creepy doll girl. All the girls in Mandy’s grade followed Brianna’s and Brylie’s lead. They didn’t taunt like those two had,
but they didn’t come to her birthday party either. No one came.

  Angry at the memory of Mandy’s ninth birthday being ruined, Hattie snatched the last dress off the hanging rod, tearing it as it caught on something. Cursing silently, she examined the damage. A strip of pink cloth hung from the corner of a wood plank that made the side wall of the closet. Yanking it free, it jostled the wall.

  Tossing the dress in the box, Hattie examined the wall closer. A faint, dusty draft blew around the cracks, making Hattie’s nose itch. It wasn’t a wall. It was clearly a door. Halfway down was a screw hole where a handle must have been attached. Hattie wedged her fingernails in the crack and pulled. The door moved a little and then a little more, until it opened all the way.

  “Mandy, hand me a flashlight, please.”

  Instead, her daughter handed her a stuffed unicorn whose belly lit up. Shining the light, it illuminated a set of narrow wooden stairs. “Did you know about this?”

  Mandy shook her head no.

  “Wonder what’s up there…”

  A shrug was the only reply.

  Years of undisturbed dust coated each step. It was apparent no one had used them in a long time. Unable to resist, Hattie began to climb up. She had to know what was up there.

  Attics were normally warm and uncomfortable during summer but with each step she took the temperature dropped several degrees. This explained her high electric bill. There must be a leak in the AC venting system.

  No door stood at the top of the stairs, although small footprints covered the floor. Maybe not Mandy, but someone had been there recently. The silence felt loud and unnatural, devoid of exterior noise, as if the area were insulated from the rest of the house.

  Movement in the air gave Hattie the distinct feeling she wasn’t alone. Shining the light around, she searched for another entrance. A narrow attic space, longer than wide, opened before her. To the left mannequins were lined up and covered with sheets. Open trunks filled with decrepit, ancient dolls lined the right wall. “Mandy, come see. Dolls!” Then what stood at the opposite end of the room caught the light. “And a dollhouse, too!”

  The dollhouse wasn’t an ordinary child’s toy. A replica of their actual house, it contained more details than anything Hattie had ever seen. From the weather-vane standing proudly on the roof to the latticework on the porches, it was an exact duplicate. “Mandy, are you coming? This is amazing.”