“Ashley, you have to hurry. Time is running out,” the voice prodded again.
No longer as fearful because of the love and peace in the eyes of The Saints, I gathered my courage, and leaving all trepidation behind, I quickened my pace and began to hurry up the spiral staircase. I had not gotten even half the way up, however, when something brushed against the hem of my long nightgown. I had no time to react to it, for it had barely registered in my brain when a strong hand grabbed my ankle roughly in a vise-like grip, clamping my foot in place. My heart pounded as I looked down to see who or what had taken hold of me. My eyes locked with Geoffrey’s cold, hard stare coming from underneath the steps. His expression was one of self-satisfied smugness combined with a cold-hearted lasciviousness, a humorless smile hard upon his lips, his eyes cruel.
“My, my, my,” he said, his voice low and oily. “What have we here? Bad girl. You know you’re not allowed up there. I know Ben told you the rules. He’s exceptionally good at that.”
“I – I heard a voice,” I blurted out, not knowing what to say except the truth. “Didn’t you hear it, too?”
“I heard no voice,” he said, letting go of me as he came around to the front of the stairs. In a threatening manner that was almost a slither, he climbed up to me slowly until he was only a few steps below me, and with our height difference we were face to face.
“Careful girl,” he said, pushing his face nearer to mine, “I wouldn’t go around telling people I heard voices. They’ll think you mad.”
“No, Geoffrey, I really did hear a voice,” I protested. “And it told me to come here. I swear I wouldn’t have come here on my own. Even so, I wanted to go back to my room anyway because the paintings scared me. The voice told me not to, though.”
“Oh, the voice told you. And the big, bad paintings scared our little Ashley? Give me a break. You’ve got to do better than that.”
“It’s not just the paintings, Geoffrey, it’s the statues, too. It’s like they’re alive.”
“What kind of lame dribble is this, now?” he said without feeling.
“Look at them, Geoffrey. It’s the eyes. They’re glowing! Why are the eyes glowing?”
“Glowing? You really are nuts. They’re paintings. Just regular paintings. You really are a gem, aren’t you. Hearing things, seeing things. Just wait until I tell Ben about his newest little favorite.”
“Why can’t you see it?” I pleaded. “Geoffrey, I swear, I’m not crazy.”
“It doesn’t matter to me if you are,” he continued. “In fact, I far prefer crazy women over sane ones. They’re a lot more interesting. Take our quite mad Three Sisters, for example. I do, and quite often, as a matter of fact. But breaking the rules is something very different. I mean, whatever will Bensy have to say about this?”
“I thought you were all for breaking the rules, Geoffrey,” I said, finding my nerve.
“Oh, I am, I am. But I’ve never been a fan of those that allow themselves to be caught. Tish, tish, my dear, and look at you, getting caught in the act, red handed and oh, so easily. You bad girl, what a big rule you broke, too. If you’re going to break the rules, you really should do a better job of it. One might even say that this is a case of corpus delicti,” he said, running a strand of my hair through his fingers. “And what a delectable corpse I’m sure you would make. But that’s quite another matter altogether, isn’t it? At least for the time being. I’ll just have to wait in eager anticipation for that pleasure.”
He walked up to the step upon which I stood and grabbed me about the waist, grasping me so tightly I could feel that this encounter was exciting him. He bent down, placing his face close to mine as if he wanted to kiss me, his fingers stroking my cheek. “You really are a naughty, naughty girl. Of course,” he continued, running his right forefinger down my nose and over my lips, “I always liked naughty girls that break the rules. Like the mad ones, they’re ever so much more fun. And you, my dear, naughty and mad together in one package? Why, have I found heaven?” A chill of disgust ran through me as I felt his hot breath upon me.
His mood changed in a flash as he broke his grip upon my waist, grabbed my hand harshly and began to pull me roughly up the stairs behind him. “So, Pandora, you want to open the box, do you? Very well then, why don’t we just open it together!”
Up the steps he continued to drag me until we got to the top of the staircase and into the darkness of the forbidden third floor.
“Lights!” he demanded and the lights obeyed, illuminating a short hallway dominated by a very large set of carved, black double doors.
“Is that where you were going?” he barked, pointing me toward them. “Is it? Answer me! Is it?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know where I was going! I’ve never been up here before! Geoffrey, please let me go,” I pleaded. “You’re hurting me!”
“You deserve to be hurt, you filthy little traitor. Do you know why you can’t go in there?” He was beginning to lose his practiced transcontinental accent, slipping between that and a more natural Southern country accent instead.
“No,” I was crying. “I don’t.”
“Because you’re not invited and you know that. You were specifically told that you’re not allowed up here yet. And if you’re not allowed on this floor, you’re certainly not allowed in Arrosha’s gateway. I don’t know exactly what you’re up to, but it doesn’t matter. You won’t get close to our gateway. I won’t let you.”
“What gateway?
“Don’t pretend you don’t know.”
“I’m not pretending! I don’t know! What are you talking about Geoffrey? I wasn’t trying to get to Arrosha’s gateway. I don’t even know what a gateway is. Nobody’s told me. How the heck am I supposed to know?”
“Oh, aren’t you just little miss innocent. You may have Ben fooled, that trusting sap, but you don’t fool me. But even he didn’t give you permission to come here, did he? You know more than you’re letting on and snooping around in the middle of the night like this just proves it. Why are you here? What’s your real reason for being at this mansion? You might as well confess. I knew you were up to no good from the start.”
“I told you already! A voice was calling me up here!”
“Okay, be that way. If you refuse to talk, I’ll just have to pull it out of you. But rest assured, my dear, that before this day passes, I’ll make sure that you’re exposed for what you really are and punished for it.
“You don’t belong here with us,” his badgering continued. “How dare you try to join our ranks? We can’t even trust you enough to turn our backs on you. You’re actions tonight have proven that.
“You’re nothing but trash. You always were and it’s all you’ll ever be. You’re not worthy of being a child of Arrosha. I’ll make sure that you’re never allowed up here again because that temple in there,” he said, pointing to the large double doors, “is sacred. It’s certainly not meant for the foul likes of you.”
“Why do you hate me so much, Geoffrey?”
“Because I know that not on the level, that you’re trying to infiltrate us. You pretend to be one of us and the only reason you’re here is to destroy us.”
“That’s not true! I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Well, why don’t we find out, then?” He opened a small, unassuming door on the opposite side of the hall, one that appeared to lead into nothing more than a closet. He flung me so roughly into the dark room that I fell onto the sharp, hard edge of an object, then landed on the floor, bruised. As I rubbed my painful thigh, Geoffrey pulled a chain and turned on the ceiling lamp, which illuminated a room that looked like an attic stuffed with old furniture, lamps and lots of empty picture frames.
“This is the storage room. It contains all of the stuff that Arrosha thinks isn’t good enough to display in her mansion. This is the only place here you belong.”
I blinked up at Geoffrey, now just a silhouette looming above me in front of the glaring light. With one h
and, I shielded my eyes, tearing with pain and anger and asked, “Why are you being so mean to me? Why don’t you like me?”
“Why don’t you like me? Why don’t you like me?” he mimicked meanly. “I’ll tell you why I don’t like you, you little bitch, it’s because I know who you are!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Quit the innocent act, you lousy traitor. It’s not working with me. It never did.”
“Geoff, I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“Oh, you don’t know, do you? Well, let me fill you in then. I’ll tell you what you are; you’re like all the other rejects in this room, you don’t belong.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re not good enough for us. You’re not good enough for Arrosha. Oh, I knew it before I laid eyes on you. You’re not like the rest of us and you never will be. You may have Ben fooled, you may have the others fooled, but you sure don’t have me fooled.”
“I still don’t understand,” I said, hurt and confused.
Geoffrey crouched down and stared at me. I blinked and tried to focus, to study his face for a clue for what I had done to deserve this tirade, but it was difficult, since he was little more than a silhouette of afterimages against the strong light.
“Arrosha told me you might turn up. She’s warned me lots of times that a stranger might arrive at our door. She’s been expecting you for a long, long time. Nobody ever showed up before now. You’re the first.”
“What did she tell you to do then?” I spat out in anger, regretting the question the second it left my mouth. I should have known better than to challenge him. Besides, I really didn’t want to know the answer.
“Absolutely nothing,” he replied. “Just to keep an eye on you.” Geoffrey had calmed down now, but his deliberate, hard, coldness was more threatening than his angry outburst had been before. “She told me just to watch, to listen, to ask the others what you’d said, what you’d done, and to keep her informed.”
“She told you to spy on me? Well, you haven’t done a very good job of it, have you?” I knew better than to bait him, but now I despised Geoffrey so much that I couldn’t help myself. “Let’s face it, I’ve barely seen you since I got here.”
“Hey, why should I bother wasting my time when I’ve got Ben doing all of my leg work? He tells me everything.” He leaned in so closely that I could feel his breath upon my hair. “Everything.”
“But if you were just supposed to be watching me, why are you confronting me now? Why are you being so hateful?”
“Because I know what you are and I want to punish you for it. How dare you threaten our group, our way of life!” After this outburst, his manner once again became coldly calculating. “Besides, let’s just say that I wanted to take a more active role in helping Arrosha. I felt it was time for me to take on more leadership.”
“Leadership? So you want Ben’s position?”
“Why? So I can preside over ritual? Pour water from the sacred challis and all that crap? Don’t be ridiculous. Get real. Ben might be satisfied with it, but his position is meaningless to me. I don’t need Ben’s place. I don’t want Ben’s place. I couldn’t care less about presiding over worship and ceremonies. He can have it and he can keep it, for all I care.
“You don’t get the pecking order around here, missy. Ben’s only a figurehead. I’m the one that Arrosha turns to, confides in. I’m the one she comes to when she needs something done. I’m the one she grants special privileges to. Ben might be the leader of the group because he’s the oldest and the original member, but when all is said and done, I’m her favorite.
“For years I was happy just to watch and wait for the interloper Arrosha said would come. I was happy just to keep my eyes and ears open. But as of late, I’ve become more, well, let’s just say, independent minded. I realized that I wanted to be able to do more than that for Arrosha. I wanted to help her more, to become more important to her.”
“Ambitious, aren’t you?” I replied.
“You could say that. Instead of being satisfied with doing just the bare minimum that she had asked of me, I wanted to give her my all, I wanted to go that extra mile for her, I wanted to make myself completely indispensable to her.”
“Why? What’s the point? You have everything you could possibly ask for already. Quite literally, in fact.”
“You think that this is all there is to it? You think this is the point of our entire lives, just to play and have fun? Do you have any idea of how boring that can get after only a few decades?”
“No, Geoffrey,” I said flatly. “It’s still new to me, so I really don’t.”
“Oh, it will get boring. Trust me,” he replied. “Give it another twenty or thirty years and it will.”
“So what more do you want?”
“I want something bigger than all of this,” he motioning with his arm as if to the entire estate. “I’m tired of cowering in the bushes like some frightened dog. I’m tired of waiting.”
“What are you waiting for?”
“The moment, Ash, when Arrosha is ready to take this show on the road. And when it comes, it’s gonna be huge. Arrosha has told me that she just has to overcome one big obstacle and then we are going public big time and the world is gonna know all about us.”
“Ben said he hoped for pubic exposure, but he was just speculating.”
“Ben’s got good instincts, but he really doesn’t know. I told you that I’m the one that Arrosha confides in. Yesiree, baby, the way I figure it, we are going to be the biggest non-governmental, non-tax-paying corporation this world has ever seen.”
“The wealth you have now will seem small in comparison, I’m sure,” I said, mustering as much sarcasm in my voice that my fear would allow.
“Damn right, it will,” he continued, so caught up in his own lusts, his own visions, that even while he was looking straight at me, I doubted he saw me. He envisioned only that world which lay before him in his mind’s eye. “But it’s not about the wealth, not really. It’s about the power. Can you imagine the power I’ll have if I play my cards right and really make an impression on Arrosha at this pivotal point in the project? Sure, she’ll put Ben up as her front-man. He’s always been ear-marked for that job. He’s the warm and fuzzy one that people like, that people will listen to. Let him be the head guru, let him get the love and admiration. What do I care? I want real power. I want to be Arrosha’s right-hand man and I want nothing less.”
“So you just want to do her dirty work?”
“That’s not my primary motive, just a perk of the job. What I want is to be her real second in command, her grand vizier, you might say.”
“Good for you, Geoffrey, But what has this got to do with me? Why did you bring me here?”
“Why?” he said, snapping out of his grand vision, his rage returning. “Because I figure that those the stranger she warned me about must be the form her enemy will take and since you’re the only one that showed up, that must mean that you’re the obstacle that needs to be taken out. So, in answer to your question, my dear, the reason I brought you up here was to kill you.”
Panic rose up in me. I was alone in an attic with a madman about to murder me and there was no one to rescue me because nobody else in the house even knew I was here.
“Geoffrey, please.” I said, trying to remain as outwardly calm as I possibly could. “It’s always possible that you could be wrong, at least about my being the obstacle. Maybe she told you to keep an eye on me for another reason.”
“No, I have proof that you are the obstacle.”
“What proof?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll show it to you before I kill you. It’ll be my pleasure.”
My mind went into overdrive as I tried to think fast. “No, Geoff, wait. Even if you do have proof, think about it, think it through. Arrosha is a goddess, right?”
“Of course she is.”
“Well, then, don’t you think that if she wanted me dead that she wou
ld have killed me herself when I first got here? Don’t you think she would have done it already?”
“Of course she would have if she’d wanted to get her hands dirty with the likes of you! But she is a deity, divine and pure. Doing the dirty work, as you so aptly named it, is my job and you need to know that I’m quite capable of it. I’m more than just another sheep. I can think and act for myself, I can do more than just follow orders. I am worthy beyond all doubts of the highest post that Arrosha will have to offer!”
He reached over and picked up a sturdy rope from a table, one I’m sure that he had set there in ready just for me. “There are many ways that I could kill you, Ashley, but only a few that are appropriate for a traitor such as yourself. I don’t want to make a mess, though, or wake the others, so with that restriction in mind, I’ll just have to strangle the evil out of you.”
“No, Geoffrey, no!” I pleaded hard now, my heart pounding, my body shaking. “You can’t kill me, you can’t murder me, here, alone, you just can’t!”
“And why not?” he said, coming toward me with the rope, snapping it so that I could see its strength.
“Because,” I cried, “The others will wonder what happened to me.”
“No they won’t. They’ll find you up here tomorrow, where you’ve hanged yourself.”
“Geoffrey, don’t do it!” my mind raced for survival, searched for words that could reach him in his madness. “You might ruin Arrosha’s plan!”
This caught his attention and he slowly lowered his hands, letting the rope go slack. “Go on,” he said, interested.
“Because, maybe, well maybe she didn’t do it when I arrived here because, well, maybe,” I stuttered, trying to flesh out the nugget of an excuse that had popped into my brain only a moment earlier.
“Spit it out!” Geoffrey commanded.
“Maybe she didn’t give you the order to kill me because she’s not ready yet,” I said, realizing that this argument might not save me in the long run but it could buy me some time.
The Nightmare Game Page 45