Skullenia

by Tony Lewis

  As it turned out, Rupert’s friends were very pleasant, although he did find it a bit strange that a fifteen year old boy should have acquaintances in their late twenties and early thirties.

  “It’s time,” a gentleman sitting near Rupert had remarked at some point in the early hours of the morning.

  “Time for what?” Ethan had asked, turning to Rupert for clarification.

  Ethan was shocked by the look that he now saw on his friends face. Rupert seemed impassive and emotionless, but his eyes were shining brightly, the way a person who was halfway to being drunk would appear.

  “This is my real family,” said Rupert, a passionate tone in his voice that contradicted the set of his features. “They look after me, and I’ll be staying with them when I’m done here. Give me your hand.”

  It wasn’t an order. It didn’t even feel like a request. More a statement of fact said in the knowledge that the words spoken would be obeyed without question.

  Almost involuntarily Ethan felt his right hand rise, but all the while his gaze never left his friends mesmerising glare.

  “Everybody needs a family that loves and supports them,” Rupert continued, taking hold of Ethan’s hand in his own and raising it to his lips, “and I think you, just like me, need one too.”

  With that, Rupert bit down on the fleshy pad beneath Ethan’s thumb hard enough to draw blood, but he did it with such care and tenderness that Ethan felt absolutely nothing at all. As he withdrew his hand, Ethan saw a thin trickle of blood wend its way down Rupert’s chin. It should have felt alien and if it had been anyone else, he would have snatched his hand away and run off screaming. But he didn’t. It felt right somehow.

  “Welcome, Ethan,” Rupert said, now smiling, a greeting that was uttered reverentially by the rest of the group.

  Ethan passed out at that point and didn’t wake up until the next morning after having the best sleep of his entire life. He did tell Rupert about this amazing dream that he’d had, one of those ones that was so vivid that it was almost real.

  He’d dreamt of running free through woodlands, unencumbered by his human body and its feeble limitations. On and on he’d gone, never tiring and never wanting to stop. He told Rupert of his night time vision, and his friend listened with interest and pleasure.

  Rupert had explained to Ethan about his heritage later that night after lights out, and that Ethan’s dream wasn’t a dream at all. He told Ethan about the life cycle of a lycanthrope and provided him with the information that would guide and protect him for the rest of his days.

  Ethan listened in rapt wonderment, amazed at everything that he was being told and even more amazed that it all seemed to make perfect sense to him.

  The two had remained friends after school had finished, and even to this day stayed in touch and met up whenever they could, but they weren’t constrained by the nature of their relationship, which was maybe how living in the confines of the werehouse had made him feel. With Ollie and the others he felt a kinship, a bond of friendship undoubtedly, but he didn’t feel tied to them. Of course he would do almost anything for any one of them but it wasn’t expected. It was this feeling of freedom within the boundaries of a relationship that ultimately convinced him to leave his pack and move on.

  “So,” said Ollie, “is the way clear for us?”

  “It is,” answered Ethan, turning away from Stitches, “and I found the well.” he announced proudly.

  He led them on for another five minutes or so, until they left the trees behind and entered a large clearing.

  “There we go.”

  About a hundred feet away, there it was.

  The Tonboot Well.

  “Looks like a thatched cottage for a dwarf,” said Stitches as he watched Ronnie approach it.

  “I think it’s dry,” said Ronnie, leaning over and peering into the black depths. He took hold of the wooden pulley and turned it slowly for thirty seconds or so, until the ancient bucket appeared.

  “Just a bit damp, but I think that’s more to do with the rain than anything else.”

  “Who’s got the pages?” asked Ollie keen to get on.

  Ethan poked around in his backpack and retrieved them.

  “Right,” he said, “here we go.”

  “Over the hill and down the lane,

  across the stream and back again.

  Look to the north and then to the west,

  to find the path that will serve you best.

  Through the wood and traverse the fen,

  will bring you to a covered glen.

  Tap the stump and spin round thrice,

  and what you seek will appear in a trice.”

  “Over the hill and down the lane. Well that’s simple enough. There’s a small knoll just over there,” said Ollie.

  They crested the shallow incline and saw at once a rocky path leading away from its other side. They followed this new trail until they reached a stream.

  “What’s next?” asked Stitches.

  “Um, across the stream and back again,” answered Ethan.

  “Ah, I see what they mean,” said Ollie, pointing to their left. About twenty feet away was a wooden bridge. Beyond that was a fairly deep chasm that stretched back into the woods, and beyond that still was yet another bridge. “We need to cross this one and then come back over the other one.”

  Once on the other side of the gorge, Ethan read out the next line of the verse.

  “Look to the North and then to the West, to find the path that will serve you best. So do we go north for a bit and then head west?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Ronnie, “otherwise that’s what it would tell us to do. I reckon we have to head northwest until we come to the next bit.”

  All agreed with this reasoning, they set off once more. About five minutes later Flug said “Ronnie, steps.”

  He was right. Leading off to their right were three earthen steps that led down into another patch of forest.

  “This must be it,” said Ethan, directing his torch at the paper. “The next line reads ‘through the woods and traverse the fen will bring you to a covered glen’. So I’m assuming we go through here until we come to an open area.”

  Thankfully the wooded area wasn’t too extensive, and they were through it in about a quarter of an hour. As they emerged from the forest, they did indeed stumble into a large open area of grassland that looked stunning in the light of the full moon.

  “Looks a bit desolate,” observed Stitches, straining his eyes in an effort to make out something, anything in fact. “Should we keep going this way?”

  “I think so,” said Ollie. “We’ve followed the instructions so far. Let’s keep going.”

  “Dere a building,” said Flug, pointing at something that he could see in the distance. Try as they might though, none of the others could see what he was getting at.

  “Are you sure?” asked Ethan. “My eyesight’s excellent, but I can’t make anything out.”

  “Me sure. It dere,” Flug repeated insistently.

  Ronnie moved to the front of the group.

  “If there’s one thing I’m sure of,” he stated vehemently, “if Flug says he sees something, then you can be sure that it’s there.”

  “What, like our non-existent cat?” said Stitches.

  “No.”

  “Or the dragon he reckons he keeps as a pet at the bottom of the garden?”

  “Don’t be awkward,” said Ollie, joining Ronnie, “you know exactly what he means. Flug?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Can you take us to the building, please?”

  “Okay, boss. But stay wiv me. It dark.”

  The grassland was damp and overgrown. Thistles and vines covered the ground, making the going tricky, but they eventually made it without too much trouble.

  “It’s a mausoleum,” exclaimed Ollie, shining a light at the marble structure looming before them. “But there’s nothing about it in the verse.”

  “Yes, there is,” said Ro
nnie, chuckling quietly. “Have a look at this.”

  The entrance to the tomb was a large oak door that looked like it weighed about six tonnes. Attached to it was a shiny brass plate, which had what was obviously the family name engraved on it.

  “GLEN,” said Ollie in exasperation. “Would you believe it?”

  “You come to a covered glen,” said Stitches snorting in disbelief and, he admitted silently to himself, a little bit of admiration. “Good job it didn’t say you come to a hidden Clive or an out of the way Bob. We’d have been knackered. Well, at least it shows that whoever wrote the text had a sense of humour.”

  “We’ll see,” responded Ethan. “I’ll make my mind up about that once we’re done inside. Okay, everybody look for a stump.”

  It didn’t take long. Round the back of the tomb, Stitches came across the stump. Well, came across isn’t exactly the right phrase. He fell across it because he didn’t see it, and in the process dislocated a knee joint.

  “I bet Indiana Jones never had this trouble,” he said miserably, trying to manipulate his patella back into place.

  “Agreed, but then again, he’s not two hundred years old and falling apart,” said Ollie.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” responded Stitches after a loud pop. “Did you see The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull? He was older and more decrepit than most of the relics he was looking for. His museum thought that one of its exhibits had escaped.”

  Ollie reached out a hand and helped his friend back to his feet.

  “Right,” said Ethan, “the last line says tap the stump and spin round thrice and, well, basically something should happen.”

  “I’ll do it,” volunteered Ronnie.

  He leant over and rapped firmly on the top of the moss covered stump, after which he pirouetted three times on the spot, rather gracefully, it has to be said.

  A loud creaking shattered the peaceful silence that covered the landscape, made all the more intense by the stillness of the night. It was the sort of sound that you would hear in one of those old sixties horror films, just before a hapless victim got an axe through their cranium. Let’s face it though, they usually deserve it. If you’re going to wander around spooky, abandoned buildings because you think that’s the most romantic place to take your girlfriend, then good luck to you. If watching horror films has taught society anything, it should be that you shouldn’t engage in any activity or visit any place that was a murder scene, a closed insane asylum or a hotel shut for the winter, and the like. Something is bound to go badly wrong and you won’t be leaving with the same number of limbs you arrived with. Or with a full compliment of friends. Or anything for that matter, because you’ll probably end up as a lampshade, on a table next to some aged crone in a rocking chair. Then you’re dead and gone until your wandering spirit is disturbed by Yvette Fielding, shrieking at you at the top of her voice for you to manifest. There are many things that a spirit would appear for. Christina Hendricks in a low cut top, bending over to pick up the glass that you’ve knocked onto the floor using your newly discovered supernatural powers, the chance to watch Reservoir Dogs one more time (the proper one, not the director’s cut, not the specially extended edition, not the redux version and not the specially extended director’s final cut with an extra forty five minutes of footage that you fast forward through anyway, because that’s why the director cut it out in the first place, he knew it was rubbish) or to play Gears of War again, but not for a screaming harpy who prowls around old abandoned buildings ringing bells, playing with Ouija boards and jumping yards whenever someone so much as breaks wind. That’s why there’s no actual documented evidence of ghosts existing. Only complete idiots go looking for them. You wouldn’t answer your front door if you knew that a total arse was outside, wanting you to blow out a candle or make a noise on a voice recorder. They should send Stephen Fry in. Everybody loves him.

  The loud creaking sounded just like a mausoleum door opening.

  “The mausoleum door’s opening,” announced Ethan to the others.

  As they assembled outside the now open tomb, they felt a faint rush of warm air issuing from within. It smelt damp and musty and was tinged with a vague hint of decay, like a fridge that had been switched off for a few days.

  “I suppose we just go in,” suggested Ollie, shining his torch inside. It revealed nothing. The darkness swallowed the light like a black hole.

  “Sure, why not? What could possibly go wrong?” mused Stitches.

  The gap that the door had left was big enough to allow two of them through at once. Ethan and Ollie stepped up and tentatively made their way in. Slowly.

  “This is ridiculous,” said Ollie, thrusting his torch forward as if that would encourage the beam to try harder. “It’s like the torch is on, but isn’t working.”

  Stitches and Ronnie came in next, with Flug bringing up the rear. As soon as he was over the threshold the door slammed shut, trapping them inside.

  Without warning bright lights came on, flooding the whole area and their optic nerves with dazzling intensity.

  “And here they are, the five plucky adventurers who have chosen to take on this most difficult quest.”

  The voice was booming and confident but had a subtle hint of insincerity, tucked quietly away in there somewhere. It was a disc jockey’s voice, but a disc jockey who was slightly too old to be playing the latest modern music on his early morning show.

  “Master Stitches, would you step forward please.”

  “Huh. What? What’s he talking about? Why has my name been called out? How the hell does it know my name anyway? What’s going on? Alright, which one of you jokers is pulling my leg?”

  The voice from beyond the grave spoke again. Well, it was in the grave, but you get the point. It was a bit spooky.

  “No one is pulling your leg, Master Stitches because it would probably come off. HA HA. Excuse my little jest. Would you PLEASE step forward.”

  “I think you had better do as it says, mate,” Ollie said worriedly, “he sounded a bit more serious that time.”

  “Oh, good grief.”

  Stitches took a tentative step forward. As soon as his foot hit the floor the lights dimmed to a more acceptable level, affording them the luxury of seeing what was going on.

  The walls, cracked and covered in cobwebs, had several recesses embedded in them that all appeared to contain coffins or caskets. A large chandelier hung from the ceiling. It was about four feet across and was dripping with sparkling jewels. It was decadent, overly ostentatious and looked totally out of place here. It would have looked more at home hanging somewhere in Jocular’s castle, maybe in a library or a torture chamber.

  Right in the centre of the open space was a chair that Stitches could have sworn wasn’t there a moment ago. It was upholstered in black leather, an office type, high backed, the sort that would be found at desks all over the world.

  “Please sit down, Master Stitches.”

  The zombie looked imploringly back at his friends, a worried expression on his face.

  “What do I do now?” he whispered.

  “Sit down, mate,” answered Ronnie. “After all we’re on a quest, aren’t we? We’re just going to have to get on with it.”

  “That’s easy for you to say when the we you’re talking about is me, and not you.”

  “Please do not be alarmed, Master Stitches,” the disembodied voice returned again. “If you follow the rules, no harm will come to you. Your companions’ turns will come in due course.”

  Stitches noticed, with a hint of pleasure he had to admit, four faces suddenly gawping in anguish. He turned away from them and slowly approached the chair. He checked it thoroughly and decided that it was safe to sit down. As soon as his skinny backside touched the leather the chair spun around so that he was facing away from the others, and a grinding noise from above made them all look up. At least two dozen of the jewels on the light fitting shot downwards and embedded themselves into the stone floor. Connected to each was a sha
ft of steel running upwards where it came to an end in the chandelier. In effect, Stitches was now trapped in a barred cage.

  “Oh, terrific. Now I’m completely stuffed.”

  Ethan and Ronnie made to move forward to help their friend, but Ollie stopped them.

  “I think it’s best that we leave it and let him get on with it by himself,” he stated forcefully. “This is happening for a reason, and for the moment he doesn’t actually seem to be in any danger. Let’s wait and see what occurs.”

  As a hush descended, a shimmering in the atmosphere about six feet in front of Stitches caught their attention. It looked a bit like the wibbly wobbly visual effect from a TV show when they wanted to denote going back in time. It took a few seconds to stop and when it did, what appeared to be the ghostly apparition of a man was floating before them.

  “Yvette Fielding isn’t here, is she?”asked the figure, looking around nervously.

  “No,” replied Stitches. “She’s off trying to resurrect Amy Winehouse’s career. Need to resurrect Miss Winehouse first of course, but hey, it’s the thought that counts.”

  “Good. In that case, welcome, Master Stitches. My name is Flapper, and I will be your host for this evening’s proceedings.”

  “Charmed, I’m sure.”

  “Do you know where you are?”

  “Sure do. Right in it.”

  “This is the first task on your quest for the Cup of All Souls. Each of you in turn will face a challenge, and it is on completion of said challenge that a portion of the Cup will be awarded. Do you wish to continue?”

  “What if I say no?” Stitches asked.

  “Then you will be allowed on your way, but none of you will have any recollection of this encounter.”

  “And if I fail?”

  “Best not to, really, if I’m honest.”

  Stitches turned his head as far as he could and looked at his companions.

  “Well,” he asked, “what’s it going to be?”

  Ollie glanced at the others but the only answer he got was the very loud shrugging of shoulders.

  “It’s your call, mate,” he called to the zombie. “You’re the one in the chair. If you say let’s get out of here, we go.”