The Haunting of Ashburn House

by Darcy Coates

Words were carved into the stone’s smooth face. Adrienne took another step forward and bent to read in the failing light.

  E ASHBURN

  FORGOTTEN BUT NOT GONE

  She mouthed the twisted phrase and felt her eyebrows pull together. Was this a joke? Had some prankster come along and cut the words into the headstone? No, they couldn’t have—the grooves were too neat and precise to be made by an amateur.

  Did Edith request this epitaph? And for that matter, why is her grave here? I would have thought she’d be buried in town.

  Adrienne straightened and rubbed her hands over her sides. The cold was biting at her, which was strange, considering it was a mild day and she was wearing a jacket.

  The hairs along her arms stood on end as a prickly, electric sensation touched her. The forest had fallen quiet. The angry bird chatter from earlier had died away, and even the trees’ rustling was hushed.

  She shot a panicked look upwards to where small holes in the boughs’ lattices let her glimpse the sky. It was dark—darker than she’d expected—but not quite black. It was still twilight.

  I can feel it. It’s like… electricity… conviction… stimulus…

  Her mind was struggling to find a way to define the sensation. She felt it physically, in the same way she felt altered when she stood under power lines, but at the same time, the effect was emotionally based—like wanting to scream but having no way to draw breath, or the urge to cry without cause. She understood with absolute certainty that she must run, flee the woods, escape the area before it was too late, but she had no comprehension of why.

  And the feeling was growing stronger.

  She backed away from the grave, feeling nauseous. Her hands were shaking. She breathed in shallow and laboured gasps as her pulse spiked, preparing her for a fight, pumping adrenaline through her limbs and shorting out the rational part of her mind.

  A noise was edging into the periphery of her awareness. She thought she wouldn’t have heard it under normal circumstances, but with the sounds of the woods reduced to a deathly hush, the subtle scratching, scrabbling wormed through her ears and into her brain.

  Run.

  It was the first coherent thought she’d had since the sensation had started. She turned and tore into the forest, neither paying attention to her direction nor searching for the narrow pathway. The woods were thick and tangled. She became caught in branches and fought to break free.

  Above her, twilight was fading into night. The tinges of colour on the horizon would cling on for another minute, then the moon would once again reign over the sky.

  She was having trouble breathing. Leaves crunched and bushes rustled as she pounded through them, but they weren’t loud enough to block out the infernal muffled scratching noise. Like fingernails being dragged through soil.

  Her whole awareness was focussed on getting inside Ashburn. The house offered safety; a firm wall to withstand attack; shelter and warmth and light. Outside, she was vulnerable. Outside, her ankles could be grabbed at by the fingers that scrabbled, and she could be dragged, screaming, back into the heart of the woods.

  She broke through the forest’s edge. Her wild run had taken her off course but not by much; the house stood like a monument to her right, and she dashed towards the door, her breath ragged and her heart ready to burst. She turned the handle, fell through the doorway, and kicked it closed behind her.

  The birds exploded out of the woods in a cacophony of screams.

  18

  Grave Conclusions

  Adrienne came back to her senses slowly. She was lying face down on Ashburn’s entryway rug, knees tucked under her and arms thrown over her head. She felt vaguely sick from exertion and fear, and the stinging pain across her hands and face told her she’d scratched herself on the trees.

  She rolled back onto her heels and blinked. The house was dark now that the sun had set, and she stretched a hand up to the patch of wall beside the door to turn the light on. Her fingers were shaking, and it took a few seconds to flip the switch.

  “What was that?” She stared at her hands. Her heart was slowing, but the jitteriness lingered. She couldn’t remember ever experiencing something so frightening. A couple of horror movies had scared her so badly that she’d been shaking as she left the theatre, but they were nothing compared to the feeling she’d experienced in the clearing and during the run back to the house.

  She pushed strands of hair out of her face and got to her feet. Her legs were like jelly, but she made it into the lounge room. Wolfgang sat in the centre of the red rug, tail wrapped around his paws and ears tilted back just enough to tell her he wasn’t happy.

  “You felt it too, right?” She bent to scratch his head, but he didn’t lean into it as he usually did. “How about a fire? Looks like you might need it, buddy, and even if you don’t, I certainly do. You wouldn’t believe how badly I scared myself out there.”

  She knelt in front of the grate and began scrunching up sheets of newspaper to light the kindling with. There was enough wood in the holder for another few nights, but she was almost out of kindling. She wondered if Edith had a stash of aged wood on the property. A ninety-year-old surely wouldn’t be cutting her own.

  The thought of her great-aunt returned her to the earlier confusion. Why was Edith buried on the property? And with that inscription?

  Unless…

  The tombstone had looked old, and its markings only said “E ASHBURN.” If Edith’s mother or aunt had names beginning with E, the grave could belong to one of them. Adrienne also considered the possibility of an even older ancestor, but the gravestone looked less than a century old, which would place it about the time of the family’s murder.

  That creates another question, though. Why bury one family member here but not the others? If they all died at the same time, wouldn’t they be buried in the same place or at least laid to rest alongside the husband?

  The newspaper curled up into black soot as the flame licked through it. Soon the kindling, old and well dried, caught as well, and Adrienne began feeding larger sticks onto it as she chewed over her conundrum. Wolfgang came to sit beside her, and she gave him a pat while the flames built.

  There’s one other option. The grave could be empty. There’s no rule saying a gravestone has to mark a body. Edith certainly did many odd things during her lifetime; perhaps creating a fake grave was one of them.

  She shivered and shoved a fresh log onto the growing flames. Sparks spat onto the rug, and she used the heavy glove to flick them back into the hearth before they could burn the fabric.

  “I’m getting morbid, buddy,” she said to the cat poised beside her. “I think this house is a bad influence. Soon I’ll start dressing in gloomy clothes and dying my hair and painting my lips black to join the local goth society.”

  Wolfgang was unimpressed and told her so by ignoring her. She scratched behind his ears, where she knew he liked it, then rose. Her legs were steadier, and her hands no longer shook, but she still felt disoriented. She went to put the kettle on, turning on every light she passed.

  She’d gone to the grave to satiate a curiosity that would have kept her awake. But having visited it, she doubted she was going to get any extra sleep. Adrienne exhaled a humourless chuckle as she leaned on the kitchen bench and stared towards the woods. The trees’ silhouettes were barely visible against the sky. And hidden amongst the trunks was a gravestone marking a mystery she didn’t think she would ever solve.

  I’m not sure I want to stay in this house.

  It was the first time she’d had the thought. Ever since hearing that she’d inherited Ashburn, she’d imagined herself living in it, integrating into the town, and building a life in her great-aunt’s home even if it was cramped or badly insulated or quirky.

  But Ashburn went beyond quirky. The wallpaper that had appeared charming on first sight was starting to make her claustrophobic. The groaning pipes and creaking floorboards spoke less of the building’s character and more of invisible threats
. And now this twilight phenomenon.

  Adrienne, suddenly exhausted, rubbed her palms into her eyes. If I don’t like the house anymore, should I sell it?

  The kettle finished boiling, but she didn’t approach it. Instead, she folded her arms and chewed on her lip as she looked around the kitchen, picking out misshapen faces in the cupboard’s whorls and the dents in the pots hung on the opposite wall.

  Would anyone buy it? The house is old, and it’s a twenty-minute drive from Ipson, which is tiny. Half of the building doesn’t even have electricity. And there are all of these rumours about its history: a bizarre owner, murders, children daring each other to climb up to the porch… who wants that?

  Except for me?

  Adrienne’s chewing graduated from her lip to her thumb. As soon as she’d begun thinking about selling, the idea of losing Ashburn struck her as repulsive. Edith might have been strange, but she’d cared enough for Adrienne to prepare her bedroom. And the house wasn’t without charm. Adrienne had always liked the old-fashioned-roses aesthetic. Even if Ashburn’s fittings were a little dulled from age, there was no denying the antique furniture and fine china were way more decadent than anything she could afford to buy herself.

  And if she moved, where would she go? She had no living relatives that she knew of. Her high school friends had scattered across the country in the years following graduation, and she’d lost touch with most of them. Ashburn was the only place where she had any history, incidental as it was.

  The nightfall phenomenon, though…

  Adrienne looked at her hands. They’d finally stopped shaking, but her chest still felt tight, and the stress had created a low-level headache. Her mind was becoming clearer, though, and with that came doubt about what she’d experienced.

  Nothing had been chasing her. She wasn’t hurt except for what she’d done to herself by dashing through the trees. And the only physical, tangible manifestation of the phenomenon was the birds scattering out of the trees.

  But I’ve never felt fear so acutely before. That couldn’t have been all in my mind, could it?

  She looked back at the window. The moon, fat and heavy as it moved towards full, infused the outside scene with a cool, calming glow.

  Her brain felt too full to think anything through clearly. Adrienne exhaled a sigh, turned the kettle back on, and focussed on preparing the tea. By the time she returned to the lounge room, Wolfgang had stretched himself out on the rug in front of the fire. The blaze was comforting, and its light helped shake some of the shadows out of the room. Adrienne took the fireside chair, placed the tea on the round table beside her charging laptop, and stretched her legs towards the blaze.

  I don’t have to stay. She extended the tip of her sneaker to scratch down Wolfgang’s back. He arched into the contact and huffed a happy, grumbling purr. But I think I’d like to.

  She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes. Her mind was still buzzing, so she made a conscious effort to purge all thoughts and relax. The back of her eyelids were empty for a second, then they filled with the memory of helping to fold Marion—stiff, silent, and cold—into the car.

  Fresh anxiety rose through her, and Adrienne moaned. What had happened to the friendly vet student? Was she still at the hospital, back at home, or…?

  Not the morgue. Don’t think like that.

  Adrienne fought the impulse to rise and pace. If she’d had a phone, she could have called Jayne. Instead, she was stuck with her conjectures and overactive imagination until someone drove up to Ashburn to see her, or until she walked to town.

  I’ll go early tomorrow. I can’t afford to buy anything, but at the very least, I can hear how Marion’s doing and check my email.

  She brought her attention back to the giant tabby at her feet. He’d contorted into what she called his roadkill pose: on his back, legs pointed towards the ceiling, head twisted at an awkward angle, and lips peeled back to show two white teeth and the tip of his tongue. Adrienne chuckled. He’d adapted to Ashburn surprisingly quickly. The fireplace upgrade might have helped with that.

  Watching Wolfgang’s little twitches and shifts let her finally relax, and it didn’t take long for her eyelids to feel heavy. Adrienne had only planned on staying in the lounge room until she was calm enough to go to bed, but her limbs felt heavier with every minute that passed, and she was half-asleep by the time the grandfather clock struck nine.

  — § —

  She fastened her bony fingers around a low-hanging branch. Her muscles had atrophied, and she had to expend both physical energy and willpower to drag her withered body forward. She gained ten inches and released the branch. Drew in a rattling, bone-aching breath, though her lungs were far past the point of being able to process air. Reached forward. Gripped a new branch.

  Dirt still caked her, filling every crevice in her wrinkled skin. Her hair had been long in life but had grown longer in death. It dragged behind her like a long, matted blanket, catching in the leaf litter and branches.

  She hadn’t expected to be so weak. But she had been buried much longer than she had anticipated, and she had been interred deep.

  Moonlight was not far ahead. She could see it through the trees, glimmering across the lawn and over the face of her dear Ashburn. The moon would revive her and give her the strength to quell the occupant, that arrogant child, to drag her down, peel the skin from her frame, drown her screams in flowing blood, crack her bones, and taste her still-pulsing flesh.

  She drew her lips back from rotting teeth as anticipation quickened her breath. Fixed her fingers around a new branch. Pulled.

  19

  Strangers

  Adrienne clawed at the air. A scream gurgled in her throat, but her lungs didn’t hold enough breath to give it form. The terror had returned, but this time it had a source.

  A woman was coming. She was withered, her body twisted and malformed, her teeth like yellow stubs in black gums, her hair a river of tangles and heavy with dirt. And she was coming for Adrienne.

  The room was dark. Slivers of moonlight highlighted the edges of the furniture, but the fire had crumbled and exhausted itself. Adrienne held herself still, posed awkwardly in a position that was half sitting, half lying, and tried to absorb her surroundings.

  The house seemed silent at first, but the longer she listened, the more she began to pick out tiny sounds of life. The grandfather clock’s ticking, inaudible during the day, created a steady pulse. The wood contracted as it cooled in the night air, creating muffled cracking and groaning noises. She could even hear the rustle of trees outside.

  Then there was a low exhalation as something moved in the shadows. Adrienne’s heart stuttered, and she opened her mouth to cry out.

  The figure turned towards her, and two round, sea-green eyes caught the moonlight. Wolfgang. The scream died on Adrienne’s tongue, and she slumped forward, arms held around her torso, and finally gained enough control over her muscles to breathe.

  It was a dream. That’s all. She tilted her head to meet Wolfgang’s eyes and began to chuckle. “You nearly gave me a heart attack, buddy.”

  Her laughter petered out. The house felt too empty and too quiet to allow for levity. Wolfgang continued to watch her for a moment then turned back to face the window. Adrienne licked at dry lips and sat back in the chair as chills began to run through her, starting at the top of her spine and working their way down her back.

  She tried to remember the dream. It had felt intensely real, but within seconds of waking, the details had begun to slip away. There was a woman. An old and contorted woman. And the moon was somehow important. But every other detail fled as soon as she reached for it.

  Wolfgang’s silhouette was barely visible in the gloom. He sat pin straight, bushy tail wrapped around his paws, and faced the window. That unnerved Adrienne. Her cat rarely paid attention to the outside unless he could see something moving.

  It was too dark; the longer she sat, the easier it was to imagine a thousand horrors creeping throu
gh the shadows. Adrienne pushed out of the chair and felt her way through the room, running her fingers over the wallpaper as she neared the door. She touched the plastic light switch, flicked it, and felt her courage wither. The light didn’t turn on.

  Did the bulb blow? Jayne wouldn’t have cut power to the house, would she?

  The black was pressing against her, weighing her down like a thick blanket. Adrienne made her way across the room to the fireplace and knelt on the rug ahead of it. She found the newspaper with trembling fingers and wadded up several sheets, placed them in the cooling ash, then ran her fingertips across the mantel until she found the box of matches.

  The first match broke when she tried to strike it, so she threw it into the fireplace. The second flared nicely. She touched the flame to the newspaper and released her breath when it caught and the blaze began to grow.

  She turned towards the kindling bucket, and her heart dropped. It was empty except for a few small twigs; she’d forgotten she’d used the last of the kindling for the previous night’s fire.

  “Crap.” She dropped the twigs onto the newspaper, but it was clear they wouldn’t be enough to catch any of the larger logs. She watched as the flames licked the sticks, converting them into ash, and her malformed fire died before it had a chance to live.

  Adrienne turned. Instead of chasing away the dark, the fire had made her blind; when she’d first woken, her night-adjusted eyes had been able to pick out shapes in the moonlight, but now she couldn’t see anything.

  There’s the lamp in the hallway. Adrienne’s chest was tight, and she rose carefully. As long as I can find it and light it.

  She thought she saw a flicker of motion in the room’s corner. Wolfgang? The moon was nearing full, but the windows’ grime smothered its glow. She crossed the room, hands held ahead of her to guide her way through the furniture, and touched the door.