The Grim Keepers

by CW Publishing House

  ***

  Panic threw Mara’s eyes open, the knowledge that she had fallen asleep this time like an alarm demanding her attention. She ran into Kirsty’s room and her daughter sat upright in her bed, her eyes full of new betrayal.

  “Mom!”

  “Sorry,” Mara said and shut the door as relief washed over her. She’d broken her boundary, but that was okay. Kirsty didn’t seem afraid now, and her flashing green eyes looked normal.

  Shaking her head, Mara decided her panic last night may have exaggerated what she saw, though the memory of the silver eyes didn’t go away. Walking into the kitchen to make breakfast, she knew Kristy would have another day planned for the woods, but she couldn’t push the nerves that twisted in her at the thought. Whether her mind had distorted things last night didn’t dissolve the fear that now filled her from the mass of trees and dark, invisible life. She didn’t remember seeing Kristy’s project either, though it, too, could have been hidden in the shadows behind the moon’s revealing light.

  “Bye!” Kirsty smiled as she stuffed a piece of toast in her mouth.

  Mara’s daze barely broke in time for her to swing around, snatching Kirsty’s arm with a firm squeeze. “No,” she warned.

  Kirsty reeled to meet her gaze, dumbstruck. “I ate toast. It’s breakfast.”

  “You went out there without telling me, and you went at night. That’s two strikes, Kirsty.”

  “No I didn’t!”

  “Three strikes for lying. No more woods.”

  “What?”

  Mara’s heart ripped at the sight of her daughter’s heartbroken gaze. “I won’t play games with you.”

  “I didn’t lie. I wasn’t in the woods.”

  Mara laughed airily, disbelief plain on her face. “Do you not remember me catching you last night? That’s enough. I’ll go get your projects for you, but you’re not allowed out there. Where are they?”

  “Nowhere!” she screamed through furious tears. “They belong to the woods.”

  The words tugged a nerve. Mara didn’t care to hear that anymore. “If you don’t tell me, how will you finish your project for daddy?” she decided to say, sure Kirsty had left to work on it. Really though, the fact that Kirsty refused to tell her where they were made Mara more curious about what she had done with her projects.

  “I can only finish it in the woods.”

  “Well you’re not going to the woods. You should have thought about that when you snuck out.”

  “I didn’t sneak out.” The words were a hiss and tears followed down her face. Kirsty whipped around and stormed into her bedroom, slamming the door behind her and twisting the lock in place.

  Mara considered busting the door down, frustration testing her mood. Kirsty’s rule-breaking would drive them both to insanity. She couldn’t allow her daughter to have a ‘privacy room’ if she wanted to force her mother out. She sighed and faced the line of trees she had just forbidden her child to enter. Guilt flooded her, reminding her that she had removed the only thing Kirsty wanted to do and the only apparent connection she somehow related to her father. Tears welled, and she tried to shove away the memory that now slammed against the front of her thoughts.

  She wished she had been more concerned with who had knocked on the door, but she never thought the man who burst in would demand to see Michael or threaten his family. The gun had flashed about the room like a glistening gem, a dangerous weapon aimed to collect a payment of suffering.

  ***

  “What does he owe?” Mara had asked, pressing herself against the back door in case Kirsty came running home with Michael. She didn’t like the woods, but she would eagerly wait outside the mass of thick trees and brush for her dad while he searched for the mushrooms she loved. “What did he do?”

  The man threw the gun up, and she looked down the undesirable depths of the cold, lifeless barrel. “What did he do? Damn husband was watching me and my wife.”

  “What?” she gasped, her heart dropping into her stomach with a hard slam. “No, he’s been home… Here. He stopped—”

  “Yeah, I’m sure. Thought so too, until I caught him again the other day. First time I’ve caught him in years.”

  “But…” She almost asked how he was sure it was her husband but stopped short. “I’m really sorry.” She tried to steady her breath, wondering if she would pay the price for what now seemed a long-forgotten past.

  “He will be.” The man’s eyes flickered with a new light, and Mara followed his gaze to the little girl running from the woods toward the door. Michael followed behind, his care-free grin seeming to drown the idea of his former demons come to haunt him again.

  Mara glanced at the man and breathed deeply before shoving into him. He grabbed her arm, swinging her into a bar stool that fell against the door. Mara tried pulling herself off the ground, but he lifted her onto her feet again and dragged her away, throwing her to the ground in the living room and stomping out the back door. A scream and a desperate cry sent Mara tumbling forward toward the door, her vision throwing things sporadically out of place. She fumbled for the knob and threw it open, the knot catching in her chest as her daughter struggled against the man’s grip on her with the gun to her head.

  “No!” she screamed, her mind running wild as she ran toward the man. He swung Kirsty around and pressed the gun to her head in warning. Mara stopped.

  She eyed Michael, whose hands reached forward in hopes of earning their child back. “I swear, it wasn’t me watching you.”

  “You’re the only bastard I’ve ever caught watching me. Hell with you!”

  “I haven’t… I couldn’t be more sorry for what I did in the past, but I swear it wasn’t me. I have a daughter. I have…” He choked, his arms trembling toward his daughter.

  The man cocked his head until his neck popped. “If it happens again, it’ll be on video. For now, hopefully she’ll teach you something.”

  Mara ran toward the man, but Michael beat her to him. He jerked Kirsty out of his grasp as a shot rang through the air. Mara fell to the ground and pulled her daughter in her arms, and another shot stole sound from the once beautiful day. Another shot, and Mara buried Kirsty’s face into her shoulder, hiding her own face in her daughter’s hair as the sound of a falling body hit the grass.

  ***

  “Stop!” Mara screamed, pressing her hands over her ears. She fell to her knees beside the counter, crying into the memory through restrained pleas for her husband. “Stop.”

  The words seemed to drown the vivid memory away, and Mara caught her breath in time to see Kirsty peek through a crack in her doorway. She sighed, knowing her daughter had heard the same words she had once used, but Kirsty closed the door and left Mara to pick herself up.

  Kirsty didn’t argue when Mara told her to meet her in the ‘Schoolroom’, an office space next to Kirsty’s bedroom they used for her homeschooling. The lesson went quick, and Kirsty hid in her room again after the lesson ended. Mara didn’t argue and looked out into the woods again, knowing she still needed to search for the project Kirsty had worked on. Curiosity tugged, and she decided she’d leave after dinner so Kirsty wouldn’t have a reason to come out of her room and find her mother gone.

  ***

  The sun kissed the tops of the trees as she walked into its shadowed world. She planned on leaving before the sun set, but it was surprisingly difficult to tell the time of day from beneath the branches. The forest was thick, lush, and beautiful, and Mara wondered why she had never entered the woods herself. She felt peace and the uneasiness of walking into the woods dissipated as she searched for sign of anything that didn’t belong there.

  Darkness enveloped the woods almost too soon. It hadn’t seemed like a lot of time had passed, but when Mara found a break in the trees above her, the moon shone bright at its peak in the sky. She didn’t know how she had managed to stay in the woods as long as she did, and she hadn’t found sign of any of Kirsty’s projects. She had even walked a little deeper in case Kirs
ty had snuck out before to hide her projects. With an irritated sigh, Mara glanced at the moon once more as it disappeared above the trees and continued to walk toward home.

  A soft whisper stopped her, and she turned toward the darkness in the trees as she had the night before. The voice sounded more clear now, louder and familiar. She listened and tried to pick out the words, but a rustling sound broke her from falling into a trance and she jerked around. Kirsty walked past her like she didn’t exist. Mara’s anger boiled and she reached to pull her daughter backward, but she instead watched her go.

  Kirsty continued to walk without a thought to stop her, so Mara followed, curiosity in her direction pulling her forward but preventing her interception. Kirsty had broken the rules yet again, but something strange had seemed to take over her daughter’s awkwardly stiff steps, her body now a straight pillar of determined thought. Mara shook the chill curling her body into a cold torrent of fear and hoped Kirsty was sleepwalking. She knew better, but she needed some kind of comfort to continue following her daughter, who didn’t seem to care otherwise.

  The whispering continued. It grew louder, but the words weren’t any more clear. Kirsty answered them with whispers of her own, giggling softly as if she were having a conversation with a friend. Mara shook her head and struggled to hear the words, but the sound of them froze her in place as Kirsty turned around to face her, the silver glow in her eyes as present and real as the night before.

  “Daddy,” she whispered, facing a tree that separated Mara from her daughter. Kirsty looked up, so Mara followed her gaze to a dark shadow that lay high above the trees. A rope dangled from a branch, and Kirsty jumped toward it, barely catching it in her fingers as it pulled down with her.

  Mara screamed, the large silhouette breaking apart while things hit the ground and blew dirt in every direction. The moon lit the ground, brightly revealed in the open space above the trees, and Mara backed away with disbelieving eyes. She looked at Kirsty, but her daughter didn’t seem to notice her as she rummaged through the junk. She came out of the mess with a jar of black liquid and proceeded to spread it across her neck as she spoke softly to the whispering voice.

  “For you, daddy,” she said.

  She started to walk forward, scared for what her daughter wanted to do, but the whispering voice answered back with words Mara recognized. “Death is empty, Kirsty.”

  Mara walked toward the mess and recognized the materials Kirsty had used in the previous months. Nothing seemed put together, but Kirsty stared at it with pride behind her silver eyes. Mara opened her mouth to speak but jumped back as Kirsty lifted her little arms into the air, her fingers oozing with the black liquid. The junk shook and pieces lifted into the air with an invisible hand to control them.

  “Kirs—” Mara tried to say, but something held her throat closed and she fell into the ground, scratching at her neck for air. She opened her mouth to scream, but nothing came out.

  “Death is empty,” the voice said again, and she felt a presence beside her that she couldn’t see. It held her, removing all air from her lungs and holding her from reaching for her daughter. Kirsty climbed on a box she had used, one of the first things she’d taken from the garage. Pieces of wood had been nailed into the trees, and Kirsty climbed on them and grabbed a metal ratchet lodged into the bark beside a large branch.

  Mara sucked in air, gasping as her vision distorted itself and a tingling feeling spread all over her body. She screamed for Kirsty, but her silent voice echoed in her ears as if a wall kept the voice inside. The tingling spread into her stomach and legs, and she thrashed about to find its source. She rose to her feet and tried stumbling toward Kirsty, but her legs gave from under her and she slipped into the dirt again.

  Kirsty crawled along the branch, and the rope she had taken most recently dangled lightly over it. Kirsty pulled it up and her eyes drifted across the ground until their silver pupils found Mara, helpless on the ground.

  She smiled. “Death is empty, mommy.” The words echoed like tormenting strikes in a memory, and Mara screamed again as she pulled herself up without thinking.

  “Kirsty!” she cried, but her daughter didn’t seem to hear her. She walked toward her, her body moving without conscious intention. “Kirsty, what’s wrong?” Her words didn’t seem to penetrate her daughter’s entranced mind, and the smile created a foreign look that Mara didn’t recognize. “What’s happening!”

  “Daddy misses us,” she whispered, and Mara stood beneath the branch from which Kirsty looked down at her. Mara shook her head, though a calm had washed over the panic she felt she should have felt.

  “What’s wrong, Kirsty?” she pleaded, wishing she had grabbed her daughter when she first saw her.

  Kirsty looked deeper into the woods and giggled. “We belong to the woods now.”

  “No, Kirsty.”

  “Daddy told me what to do. He says me first.”

  The rope fell from the branches and tumbled down until it stopped in front of Mara. She stopped breathing, the bright red noose tight around the wooden dog she had made. The dog fell out as the noose widened, and Mara tried shoving herself away from the rope. Something held her though, and the noose rose into the trees again. Kirsty wrapped it around her neck, smiling as she glanced down at the dog that had held firm in its decent.

  “Kirsty!” Mara screamed, unable to move. “Kirsty, wake up. This isn’t real. Daddy isn’t here. Please, Kirsty!”

  Her daughter giggled as she leapt from the trees. The rope lessened in slack as Mara watched, horror-stricken, until the rope tightened and a small, dangling body jerked around. The invisible hold on her broke, and Mara screeched inaudibly as she ran to her daughter’s side. Fear enveloped the girl’s eyes, the silver now the innocent, emerald green darkened with terror. Mara pulled her daughter into her arms and tugged at the knot around her neck, but the rope wouldn’t loosen. Screaming, she struggled with Kirsty as they both fumbled for the rope, but Kirsty stopped and her body stiffened.

  “Kirsty!” she cried, screaming as the body went limp in her arms. The presence surrounded her and chilled her bones, but she ignored it as she managed to loosen the knot, not noticing as it loosened into a wider, larger loop.

  She cried, washing her hands over her daughter’s face and burying her sobs into Kirsty’s neck. She felt the presence tightening on her muscles, and she jerked upward before it could control her.

  “Death is empty,” the voice said, and Mara struggled to fight the presence entering her head.

  “No,” she growled through battered tears. She tried to process or understand what happened, but the recognizable presence ended her questioning and stopped her in place as she looked out into the field behind her house. She turned on her heels, smiling slightly as the voice enveloped her thoughts.

  “Michael.”

  Something in her cried for freedom, but Michael’s presence forced new thoughts in her head, and she couldn’t stop their driving force. “Come home.”

  She nodded and walked back toward the noose, setting her daughter on the ground before walking up the makeshift steps and grabbing the jar of black liquid. She grinned into the silver eyes that shone back at her in its reflection and an image of the man who killed Michael flashed in its black depths, the next one to be drawn deep in the woods. She smiled again and wrapped the noose around her neck. “Death is empty.”

  About Cayce Berryman

  Cayce Berryman claims her freelance editing and her own writing as her passions above all else. However, she humbles herself with the knowledge that all writers and editors can always learn more. She offers a variety of editing and proofreading services, both for fiction and non-fiction works. She also owns and runs an interactive Facebook group, “An Author’s Tale”, which serves as a building platform for budding writers and published authors. The Lord fuels her faith daily, and she makes sure to include Him in all she does.

  Contact or connect with Cayce:

  Website/Blog: www.cayceberryman.com<
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  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Cayce-Berryman-Writer/1546794008925725

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  Crepuscular

  by Rachel Fox

  “It’s for the best, Mrs. Watson, believe me. We can look after her, keep her safe.”

  Sophie sat on the edge of the bed, her feet hanging just above the floor. Her long black hair fanned out across her bare knees. She heard her mother’s sobs but didn’t respond. The drugs had made her sluggish, and she was enjoying it.

  “You can call any time, day or night, and visit whenever you like.” The nurse was talking again. “We have no restrictions, but call first in case it’s a…difficult time.”

  There was more talking, but Sophie had dissolved into her thoughts so she didn’t hear what was said. She was vaguely aware of her mother touching her shoulder, maybe kissing her on the head, and then it was dark. She stared up at the ceiling as it bled in and out of focus above her. Darkness on darkness. Shadows on shadows. She couldn’t differentiate her body from the bed, couldn’t tell if she was flesh and blood or metal and fabric. She didn’t care.

  She hadn’t always felt this way, couldn’t remember when it started. Maybe it was when her dad left, or when her mum married Jeff. Maybe it was when the disgusting sprog arrived, and she had been moved to the box room like an unwanted piece of furniture. Maybe it was the way the other girls excluded her at school, or when Mark dumped her. Maybe it was just normal teenage stuff. All she knew was that on that day, at that moment, she hadn’t wanted to live another second, let alone another day. All she’d wanted, needed, was relief from the crushing pain inside her.

  She ran her nails over the bandages at her wrist, evidence of her failure. They thought it was a cry for help because she’d done such a terrible job of it, but it wasn’t. She’d barely scratched the surface before her mother found her. She sat up and began to wrestle the bandages free. They fell slack onto the bed and she examined the crusted welts. Crying silently, she pulled at the scabs. The pain echoed up her arm, dampening the pain in her heart. She breathed out heavily as the tiny scarlet beads bloomed on her skin as she rested back on the bed.