by Mia Sheridan
“What does Haddie think of it?”
Scarlett sighed, stopping for a moment. “She seems a little wary of everything right now.” Scarlett frowned. “I’m not sure, Merrilee, it’s like . . . she’s keeping something from me . . . or, oh I don’t know. You know Haddie. She’s secretive.”
“I don’t think she’s secretive, Scar. Or at least . . . not because she doesn’t trust you. I think it’s just that Haddie feels things more deeply than most children and she has to let those things simmer before she finds the right words.”
Warmth filled Scarlett’s chest. Merrilee was right. She knew she was. And how wonderful it felt to discuss her concerns about her daughter with someone who loved her too. “Thanks, Mer. You’re right. Sometimes it’s hard for me to wait for those words to come.”
“I’ve told you before, they’ll come easier the older she gets.”
“Yes, I think so.” She paused as she moved forward, heading toward where the open area turned into a narrower corridor. “Something weird happened in town today.”
“What, honey?”
She told Merrilee about the church playroom and the disabled little boy with the leg braces. She told her how she’d questioned Haddie who had insisted she hadn’t meant what she said. When she’d finished, Merrilee was quiet for a moment. “Haddie’s never been cruel. I’m sure . . . well, I can’t say what that was about, but this is all a big change for her too. Maybe she’s a little confused . . . not exactly herself. That would be natural.”
“Yes, I know. I believed her, I just . . . well, you’re right. It’s going to take time to adjust. Everything here is new and strange for both of us. This house and the town . . . it has a strange vibe to it.” Scarlett leaned into a room, the door half-open. Inside was empty except for a metal bed. She frowned. Had someone once slept in this basement? A strange chill skittered up Scarlett’s spine.
“A girl from LA says a place has a strange vibe? Now I’m concerned. What could possibly shock you that the City of Angels doesn’t already provide? In spades. Although,” she said, dragging the word out, “you are used to the big city and moved to the boondocks.”
She acknowledged what Merrilee said with a chuckle. Her friend was right. But it was more than that too, although Scarlett didn’t know enough about Farrow yet to say exactly what.
“Met anyone interesting?” Merrilee asked.
“Hmm,” Scarlett hummed. “I met the Deputy Sheriff of Farrow. He’s . . . interesting.”
“Ooh, cute interesting, or creepy interesting?”
Scarlett laughed. She would have said cute interesting before today. Before he’d scowled at her and walked away without saying goodbye. “The jury’s out. He’s got a bit of a strange vibe too.”
“Well, I expect you to get back to me on that.”
“Ha. I will. He might have a girlfriend, so there really won’t be much to mention.”
There was a short pause and when Merrilee spoke, the laughter had faded from her voice. “You know,” she said, “if things don’t feel right, now or . . . at any point . . . well, you can come back anytime.”
“I know,” Scarlett said quietly. Only really, she couldn’t. For so long, she’d had this feeling her life was somewhere else, waiting to begin. She’d felt it inside herself, not as a rush on her part, not as an action to fulfill, but as a . . . promise. Something that would make itself known to her when the time had come. Such overwhelming certainty had gripped her when she’d seen the ad for Lilith House. Here. Here it was, finally, the promise that had been waiting to be fulfilled.
Her mother had always said Scarlett had a sixth sense, but Scarlett had written that notion off long ago after making one bad decision after another. If she really had such sharp instincts, why in the hell did she keep making such pitiful choices? At that thought, her daughter came to mind, her chest pinching. One of those “poor choices” had resulted in her beloved girl, so how could she think of it that way? “I’m going to stick it out though, Merrilee. There will be challenges, but I feel like this is the place we’re meant to be. At least for now.”
She heard the smile in Merrilee’s voice when she said, “Then I trust that it is too. And,” she went on, “I’m going to come visit you just as soon as I can get a few days off. Maybe in a couple months?”
“Anytime would be wonderful. I miss you already.”
“I miss you guys too. Give Haddie a kiss from me, okay?”
“I will.” They said their goodbyes, and Scarlett dropped her phone back in her pocket, nudging the next door open. Inside was another bare bed. When she peered inside the third room, the same sight awaited her. Weird. Would the school have put students down here for some reason? Seemed odd and . . . disturbing. Like she’d stumbled upon the school’s version of solitary confinement. Stop letting your imagination run away with you, she admonished herself as she turned back toward the stairs. They’re probably just storage rooms.
She made her way quickly through the piles of boxes and what looked mostly like junk. She’d have to make arrangements to have this hauled away once demo started on the house. As she was about to turn the corner and head up the stairs, she spotted something in the corner to her left. Could it be . . . she yanked the white sheet covering the object and let it drift to the floor, waving her hand to disperse the cloud of dust that had covered it. Just as she’d thought, a birdcage! How perfect. Haddie would love it, and it’d be a place she could safely set her little patient while the baby bird—she hoped—recovered.
She picked it up by the base and carried it up the stairs. She stopped in the kitchen to wipe the cage down, admiring the beautiful scrollwork of the bars. Scarlett didn’t necessarily love the idea of birds in cages, but for their temporary purposes, it would work nicely. And they’d leave the door propped open as a sign of their abiding belief that beautiful, feathered things should not be locked away, unable to fly as God intended.
She took it to their attic room where Haddie sat on the floor, her stuffed animals in a circle, the box holding the injured baby bird directly in front of her. Scarlett set the cage down and grinned at Haddie. “Look what I found in the basement. A recovery hospital for our little patient.”
Haddie stared at the cage for a moment, her eyes widening momentarily as her forehead creased in a frown. Her gaze moved to Scarlett, her lips parting slightly as though she was about to say something, but changed her mind. Haddie’s expression was so . . . strange.
Confused, Scarlett looked from the birdcage to Haddie. “We can leave the door open, baby. I just thought it would be a good temporary home. He’ll be right at your eye level and you can check on him easily . . .”
Haddie picked up the baby bird gently from the box, cradling him against her chest. She turned her shoulder outward as if . . . shielding him. Haddie moved her eyes to the cage, that same peculiar look on her face as she shook her head. “No,” she asserted. “I’ll just keep him with me.”
“Are you sure?” Scarlett glanced at the cage, wondering if it appeared scary for some reason to her daughter. “It’s perfectly—”
“No.” She lowered her face. “No, thank you,” she whispered.
Scarlett paused. Haddie was . . . Haddie, but all kids got strange ideas in their heads sometimes. She supposed the cage might look sort of imposing, especially to such a small girl. “Okay, then. I’ll just put it back.”
Haddie nodded, laying the baby bird back in the box.
“How’s he eating?”
“Good,” Haddie said, using a finger to smooth the downy fluff on the top of his head. Scarlett had looked online and found that softened dog food or well-mashed hard-boiled eggs could be fed to orphaned baby birds, so she’d prepared the eggs. If the little guy was eating well, it gave her even more hope that he’d survive. “How about you get all your friends ready for bed,” she said, smiling around at the circle of—primarily—fur-filled, non-egg-eating pals.
“Okay, Mommy,” Haddie said, shooting the cage one last wary g
lance. Scarlett picked up the apparently offensive piece of furniture and set it outside their room, shutting the door on it.
Half an hour later, Haddie was snuggled up in her bed, the baby bird next to her on the bedside table. Scarlett sat down on the bed and pulled the blanket to her chin. She stroked her daughter’s silken hair and leaned down and kissed her forehead. “I love you,” she murmured just as a loud creak sounded from a floor below. Haddie’s eyes widened. “It’s okay,” she said, smoothing Haddie’s hair back calmly even as her pulse quickened. “It’s an old house. There are going to be lots of creaks.”
“I think it’s waking up, Mommy,” she whispered, but there was no fear in her voice.
Scarlett’s gaze moved over her daughter’s features. “I suppose even houses sleep sometimes if they’re left all alone.”
“Yes,” Haddie agreed. “They do.” She yawned, turning toward where the baby bird slept, its bony breast rising and falling.
Skittering sounded somewhere in the walls. Mice, Scarlett thought. Great. She wondered if there might even be a bat or two. She’d move that exterminator up higher on the priority list. “Sleep tight,” she whispered to Haddie as she stood, picking up the bird in its makeshift nest so it wouldn’t wake her daughter later, turning on the white noise machine, and heading downstairs.
In the kitchen, she stood at the window, staring at the deepening nighttime sky, the silvery stars as clear as scattered diamonds on a bed of azure silk. Movement near the edge of the woods caused her to suck in a startled breath, but then she saw a small red fox duck around a bush. Her heartbeat slowed. Taluta. Her lips tipped as the red fox disappeared into the dense trees beyond.
Her gaze moved to the edge of the windowsill where she’d set the blade of grass Camden had miraculously fashioned into a fox. The grass had stiffened as it died, its color fading from emerald-green to brownish-gold. She picked it up, holding it in her fingers and marveling at it again.
Behind her, she heard the sound of a door softly closing. Scarlett whirled around, a startled breath escaping in a soft gasp. She placed the grass-shaped fox on the counter and moved cautiously toward the kitchen door that led to the hallway, and the foyer beyond. What had that been? A shutter flapping maybe? But no, it’d sounded distinctly like an internal door clicking closed. And it’d been close.
Scarlett leaned forward as she walked, peering around the corner to see into the foyer before she stepped into the open space. It was empty, the gas lanterns that she’d turned on earlier that evening emitting a soft glow, the flickering light making those flowered vines on the wall stretch and grow.
She heard a soft bump and turned toward the noise, her eyes fixed on the wall that held the bannister. She swore it sounded as though someone was climbing the stairs, but the grand staircase was devoid of human life. A shiver moved through her. Calm down. It’s just the age of the house. Stop spooking yourself.
But even as she attempted to explain the sound away, it continued upward, somewhere behind the wall. Something was there, moving. Something with weight. She pictured a strange ghoul, its black body climbing up the inside of the wall. Scarlett stood, frozen, listening to the soft taps of the thing climbing, heading up and away from where she stood, though—thankfully—in the opposite direction of where her daughter slept. Tentatively, she took a step, and then another, gathering her courage and following the sound, pressing her ear to the wall and then pulling quickly away, lest whatever it was reach through the planks and grab her. Which is ridiculous, she tried to reassure herself, and yet still the feeling of barely tempered dread persisted. There was something there. She could feel it on the other side of the wood. She could feel its menacing.
Her breath came short as she walked beside the soft thumps of climbing coming from within the wall until it moved upward, seemingly into the ceiling, the noises fading away. Scarlett waited, her heart thumping, as the sounds of another door opening and closing overhead could be heard. Her heart sped even further as fear spiked within. What the hell? Someone or something was in her house.
A board squeaked above as though whatever she’d heard was now walking the hall and Scarlett turned, bolting down the stairs and running to the kitchen where she picked up her phone and called for help.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Thirteen Years Ago
Kandace couldn’t sleep. She stood at the window, watching as the sun came up over the trees. Even though she’d left Los Angeles less than a month ago, the world felt so far away. Real life seemed so distant. Ever since she’d arrived at Lilith House, she’d felt as if she had slipped and fallen down some rabbit hole that transported her into a skewed past. Lilith House felt . . . ancient somehow. Ancient and off. There were things she could pinpoint that were strange and even dreadful, but there were other peculiarities that she couldn’t name but sensed all the same. As if something lay in wait for her just around each long and twisted hallway.
Kandace leaned forward when she spotted a blur of movement within the trees. Something large and seemingly tall. Or was it just a trick of the hazy lighting? Her blood chilled. Ms. Wykes told us about the natives who used to live in those woods. She said one’s still out there, a war-mongering demon hungry for human flesh.
“Stop it,” she whispered to herself. She refused to give credence to dark fairy tales. She knew very well that was just a story used to keep the girls in line. Keep them from attempting to venture off the Lilith House grounds. She squinted, trying to make out what it actually was when suddenly something else to her right caught her attention. It was the kid. Kandace turned her head, watching as the boy paused for a moment as though listening to make sure he didn’t hear anyone nearby, and then ducked around the chapel and headed for the forest.
What are you doing, Dreamboat?
Kandace turned, looking at her roommates who both slept soundly. Then she pulled on her uniform, left her room—committing the sin of breaking curfew—and tiptoed quietly down the stairs. For a moment she stood still, listening for any sounds, but all she heard were the creaks and moans she’d grown used to. The students and teachers were still in bed, but Lilith House? Lilith House never slept. Lilith House had stories to tell, especially in the dark. She crept toward the back stairs. If she returned before anyone woke, no one would be the wiser.
When she made it to the first level, she checked quickly behind her, and then ducked out the back door, closing it very gently.
Kandace took the same route the boy had, entering the woods at the large gray rock where she’d seen him last. She expected that she’d have to travel more deeply into the forest to find him—if she was able to locate him at all—and so when she practically stumbled upon him just a few feet from the edge of the tree line, she almost screamed.
The kid, obviously shocked to see her, jumped to his feet, eyes wide, face filled with fear.
Kandace held her hand out. “Whoa, sorry. It’s Kandace. Remember me?”
He stared at her another few beats before bobbing his head and swallowing. “Yes. I remember you.”
“Okay, good.” She didn’t lower her hand, still attempting to calm him, to wipe that startled expression from his face. He looked like a frightened animal who’d just been cornered in the wild. Could she really blame him? If he’d grown up at Lilith House . . . Geez. She didn’t even want to think of what sort of life he’d led. She’d be a chronic nervous wreck if she’d spent her life in that hellhole too.
He swallowed again, his eyes darting to the ground and then back to her. She followed his gaze to the place he’d just looked. “Holy shit. What is that?” She lowered her arm, going slowly to her knees so she could get a better look.
The boy dropped down beside her, still looking at her warily. “A baby fox.”
Kandace tilted her head. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Twisted leg,” he murmured. “Probably born that way. His mother abandoned him. Nature doesn’t tolerate imperfection. It’s a weakness. And in nature, weakness equals death.”<
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She stared at him for a moment. He had mumbled it, but his eyes shone with passion as though the words he’d said were very personal. “How sad,” Kandace murmured, her heart giving a small twist as she took in the tiny creature with what looked like a miniature splint on its leg. She knew what it felt like to be motherless, despite that her mother was very much alive. And maybe that made it worse. She looked from the small, curled-up creature to the boy. “Where’d you find it?”
He glanced down at the baby animal he’d been mending and then back to her before shrugging. “They come to me.”
Kandace frowned. “They come to . . . what does that mean?”
He shrugged again. “They seem to . . . find me. Sometimes here . . . sometimes closer to the back door of my room. They’re sick or injured—imperfect—and I help them.”
“How often?”
His eyes met hers. “All the time.”
Confusion swept through her. Had no one ever seen this boy? The others he’d mentioned? Or if they had, had they been explained away as one of the staff member’s children? She thought of the crawl space where he’d helped her hide. Were they the whisperers in the walls? The source of the sounds she’d heard on her first night at Lilith House, convincing herself it was merely the wind? As she stared at him tending to the baby animal, she felt both disturbed and . . . awe-struck. As though the forest sent its faulty babies to be mended by this dreamy boy who sometimes existed as nothing but a hidden whisper. Weird and . . . wonderful, especially considering the trauma of watching the bird be tortured and killed in Ms. Wykes’s office. It was like the discovery of Dreamboat here and what he did on a seemingly regular basis, righted a terrible wrong, if such a thing were even possible.
Even more, to find anything gentle and kind in the midst of such depravity felt like a small miracle.
Kandace raised her head and looked deeper into the forest. She swore she heard the soft beat of a drum but wrote it off as the wind or the soft pitter-patter of hooves somewhere far away.