Fiction River: Fantasy Adrift

by Fiction River

  This story’s title is appropriate since “Leave a Candle Burning” marks the last light story of the anthology. Dayle’s inspiration came from that moment at winter twilight “when the snow somehow makes the world look deep, haunting blue.”

  Leave a Candle Burning

  Dayle A. Dermatis

  She was lost.

  Claudia stopped in the tree-lined lane, surrounded by the deep blue of twilight, a swirl of snowflakes, and an ever-growing drift of snow on the ground, and shook her head at her own stupidity.

  In truth, the lodge she was heading for (at least, she hoped she was heading in the right direction) wasn’t far from the train station. Walking normally wouldn’t have been a problem. She just hadn’t factored in the earlier sunset this far north and the fact that it might be snowing.

  Snowing, right before Christmas, in upstate New York? Not all that shocking.

  Thankfully, her job scouting locations and stories for America’s Legendary Ghosts meant she knew how to pack light—at least she wasn’t dragging a suitcase behind her. She wore her bulky winter coat and boots, and everything else, including laptop, camera, and clothes, were in her backpack. She’d had to hike to sites before.

  Just not in the damn snow.

  The world held that silent quality that came only in the winter. The snow padded the ground, muffled the air. All she could hear was her own breathing, and the occasional, tiny snap of a twig as some small animal settled for the night.

  The birch trees’ pale bark glowed in the moonlight.

  Claudia felt as if she stood in the middle of a snow globe.

  She thought she’d walked the two miles already, but nary a house was in sight, not even a glow of lights. She didn’t think the snow would have knocked out the power, so this was worrying. The GPS on her phone had been no help: the small dirt lanes didn’t register on the map. And then, of course, because she’d spent too much time on the train working, her battery had died. She couldn’t even call.

  She was just about to turn around and head back to the station when she caught motion out of the corner of her eye. She hadn’t heard anyone approach; her own gasp sounded loud against the sudden pounding of her heart.

  Not a someone…a something. A large white dog—a husky or a white German shepherd, it was hard to tell in the dark—stood a few feet away, tail waving languidly, tongue out, watching her.

  “Well, hello there, pup,” she said in a soothing tone, holding out her hand flat. “Where did you come from?”

  The dog barked, and jerked its head in a gesture that looked suspiciously like Come on, then. It took a few steps towards the trees, then looked back expectantly.

  Its message was clear: Follow me.

  Seriously?

  The dog came back a few steps and barked again, this time more impatiently, then turned and looked over its shoulder.

  The dog could be leading her to shelter, Claudia supposed. Or it could be leading her to someone or something in trouble. Or it could just be leading her…no, why would the dog be trying to lead her nowhere? Even if it wasn’t to the lodge, it would be somewhere with a phone or a car. Dogs didn’t lead people to scary shacks containing serial killers, after all.

  Claudia always trusted her instincts, and they’d never proven her wrong. She also had a lot of faith in dogs. Her choice was clear.

  She settled her pack more firmly on her shoulders and followed the dog into the woods.

  The trees weren’t closely spaced and there was no foliage beneath the snow to trip her up, although in a few open places the snow had piled up. The dog seemed to take delight in bounding off to leap through the drifts before running back to trot ahead of her.

  They hadn’t walked more than ten minutes when Claudia saw lights. As they drew closer, she breathed a sigh of relief, recognizing the stone-and-timber lodge from pictures. The dog had in fact led her directly to the lodge.

  The three-story building toed the line between Victorian and mountain rustic. The roof was steeply pitched to keep too much snow from collecting, with two levels of dormers and multiple chimneys dotting the expanse.

  Warm lights glowed from multiple windows, bathing the snow in warm, welcoming gold, a gorgeous contrast to the midnight blue sky and gleaming snow. Fairy lights in the bare trees added to the cheer. Claudia felt warmer already.

  “Good job, pup!” she said. The dog barked one more time and trotted away, around the building. Probably a doggie door in the back, leading to a mud room or kitchen.

  She went up the flagstone steps to the enclosed porch that ran the length of the building and let herself in, stomping her feet on the entry rug to knock off the snow before continuing to the front door.

  Before she could ring the bell, she saw movement through the glass, and then the door opened.

  “You must be Claudia,” the very attractive man said. His eyes were the color of winter twilight.

  “Must I?” she asked, stepping inside.

  “Mrs. Hawley said someone named Claudia was supposed to arrive tonight, and she’s been fretting that you’re late and your phone goes straight to voicemail,” he said, his voice low and pleasant. He closed the door. “So it’s a good assumption you’re Claudia.”

  “Excellent powers of deduction,” Claudia said, holding out her gloved hand.

  “I’m Reese,” he said, shaking her hand. “Come on in. Mrs. Hawley’s in the parlor with the other guests. I was on my way back from the bathroom when I saw you on the porch.”

  It was warm inside, enough to make her chilled cheeks hurt in a pleasant way. She shivered, adjusting.

  She followed him through the foyer, unable to decide whether to look at the gorgeous architecture or him (also gorgeous). The foyer, although paneled with dark wood, was welcoming thanks to the warm light from antique Tiffany lamps and the faded oriental rug covering the center of the floor. A steep staircase dominated the right side, its likely hand-carved newel posts a testament to an art form mostly lost today. The wood—currently wrapped with a sweet-smelling pine garland—shone, polished by more than a century of hands caressing the railing as residents and then hotel guests made their way up or downstairs.

  Claudia smiled, feeling the tension melt away. She already liked it here.

  She had a job to do, so she shouldn’t allow herself to be distracted by Reese, but unfortunately, she already was. Okay, maybe not full-on attracted to after their extremely brief conversation, but at least appreciative of.

  The snug way his jeans hugged him didn’t hurt, definitely. Nor did the in-need-of-a-trim black hair, striking blue eyes, and warm smile. Nor the comfortable way he led her through to the parlor. Not cocky, but simply confident, settled in his own skin.

  She wouldn’t have minded more time alone with him, but the parlor was full of people, and that settled that.

  “Oh goodness,” said a tall, rangy older woman, “you must be Claudia.”

  “I must,” she agreed this time. “You’re Mrs. Hawley?”

  “That I am.” The woman’s white hair framed a face that showed a lifetime of smiles in the fine lines around her eyes and mouth. She looked comfortable in jeans and a red cable-knit sweater. “Let me show you to your room, dearie, and then you can settle in and meet everyone. Shall I make you a pot of tea? Or hot chocolate? Or…?”

  “Hot chocolate sounds lovely,” Claudia said. She leaned in conspiratorially. “Especially if it has a nip of crème de menthe in it.”

  Mrs. Hawley smiled, and for a brief moment Claudia thought the older woman was going to fist-bump her. “Absolutely,” she said.

  Up the gorgeous staircase and down one hall and up another, all carpeted in faded runners, framed old photographs lining the walls, until they came to a room with a hand-painted wooden plaque that said “The White Lady” hanging on the door.

  “I hope you don’t mind me putting you in here,” Mrs. Hawley said. “But given that your purpose here is to decide whether our resident ghost is worth publicizing…”

&
nbsp; “This is perfect,” Claudia said. The turned-wood four-poster bed had a cream-colored, crocheted blanket at its foot and a lavender-scented sachet on the pillow, and the room’s uneven wooden floors creaked as she entered. Cozy and charming. “I’ll be down in a few minutes.”

  It took her even less than that—the lingering chill (although the room itself was toasty) drove her to drop her backpack and shuck her parka before plugging in her traitorous phone and heading downstairs to properly meet the rest of the guests.

  She was here to determine whether the Heather Mountain Lodge was a viable candidate for an episode of America’s Legendary Ghosts. Proving the existence of ghosts wasn’t the focus or purpose of the show. It was highlighting the facts behind them, and then analyzing how those facts had developed into legends, and why.

  Essentially, Claudia was a sociologist in a location scout’s clothing. And as long as she didn’t think about it too hard, she was quite all right with that.

  Back in the parlor, she met the other six guests who had chosen to spend their Christmas holiday waiting to see a ghost. She was happy to settle in an antique rocker near the stone fireplace, where a fire crackled and spat heat and the scent of wood smoke.

  “Mrs. Hawley’s off making your hot chocolate; we had an early supper so she could let the cook go for the night because of the snow,” Reese said. “Which doesn’t bode well for breakfast.”

  “We aren’t going to be snowed in for long, I hope?” asked a man wearing glasses and a Dr. Horrible T-shirt. He held hands with a pretty redhead wearing multicolored striped socks and a matching crocheted hat.

  “The weather report said it should stop snowing overnight,” said a teenaged girl with a blond French braid, glancing up from her phone.

  “And once the plow comes through, we’ll be fine,” Reese added.

  Introductions were made. The young couple were Matt and Holly; the girl was Brittany, with her parents Tom and Sherry; and the final guest was Angela, a musician looking for inspiration for a gothic musical she was writing.

  The lodge officially closed down over the holidays—from two days before Christmas through two days after—except for a limited number of people. Only eight could reserve during that time…and there was, Claudia had been told, a waiting list. Apparently she’d been able to sneak in this year because of a last-minute cancellation (or, she half-suspected, because Mrs. Hawley wanted the publicity).

  The proprietor in question returned with Claudia’s hot chocolate, and now that everybody was assembled, began her story.

  “The White Lady,” Mrs. Hawley said, settling herself into her chair and into her story. “We don’t know much about her past, really—we don’t know who she was when she was alive.

  “And I realize the name ‘The White Lady’ is a common one when it comes to ghosts,” Mrs. Hawley added, glancing at Claudia. Claudia nodded, but didn’t comment. This was the host’s show.

  “What we do know is this: The White Lady, whoever she was, was married, and her husband was away one night in late December. We’re not sure why; I’ve heard he’d been out hunting that day, and also that he went out in the storm to help someone. As the snow came down harder, she knew it would be more difficult for her husband to find his way home. So she went from window to window, lighting candles to guide him to safety.”

  Mrs. Hawley paused to take a sip of her own hot chocolate before continuing.

  “Since then, each year, starting a day or two before Christmas and going until a day or two afterwards, after dusk falls she moves through the lower rooms of the house, lighting candles in the windows to bring her beloved home.”

  Holly shivered. “That’s a beautiful story.” She squeezed Matt’s hand. “So romantic and tragic.”

  Claudia fought not to roll her eyes. Tragic, yes, and somewhat romantic—The White Lady did seem to mourn her husband given her actions—but not beautiful. Just sad. And whether there was any truth to the story…well, that was her job to figure out.

  “What style of clothing does she wear?” she asked.

  “She’s seen dressed in white,” Mrs. Hawley said.

  “A nightgown?” Claudia pressed. “A Victorian dress? Earlier period, later?”

  “Oh, well, I can’t say for sure,” Mrs. Hawley said, looking down at her hands. “I’m not an expert in these things.”

  “I understand,” Claudia said. “It’s just, if we can narrow down her clothing style, we can narrow down who she might be.”

  “Oh, that’s right,” Reese said. “You’re from one of those reality shows—you’re a ghost hunter.”

  Claudia laughed. “Not hardly. I’m a location scout; I don’t get any air time at all. And America’s Legendary Ghosts isn’t a ghost-hunting show—we don’t run around with EMF detectors or try to debunk the stories. We focus on the truth behind the legend…we want to know whether the ghost story has some basis in history. That’s what’s interesting, the history. We’re more of a history program than a reality show.”

  “So you’re here to decide whether The White Lady is real or not?” Angela asked.

  “I’m here to discover whether there’s any historical basis for The White Lady,” Claudia said. “If I can find records that prove that a woman lived here whose husband or other close male relative was found dead in the snow around Christmas time, then we have a show.”

  “I’ve always wanted to know her background,” Mrs. Hawley said. “I’ll do anything I can to help.”

  “Do you have a history of the lodge? A list of owners?”

  “Yes and no. The lodge wasn’t always this big. It started as a large home, and was added onto over the years, attaching other cottages and outbuildings to it and then renovating them. So The White Lady could have been someone from one of the smaller homes. We also know that caretakers took over when the family was away, and we don’t know all the servants’ names over the years. Or, of course, it could have been one of the family’s guests.”

  Well, that was going to make things more fun. In truth, Claudia had already done some preliminary research, which she intended to supplement with local records now that she was in the area. She’d been hoping Mrs. Hawley would give her more useful information, but that might not be the case.

  “And you’ve seen her?” Claudia asked.

  “Indeed I have.” Mrs. Hawley sat up straight. “Every year.”

  “Please, tell me.”

  Mrs. Hawley surveyed her audience, and Claudia knew she was going to tell the tale she’d always told, a familiar story, the rhythm and cadence driving her words forward rather than an unrehearsed account.

  It didn’t mean she wasn’t being honest, that she wasn’t telling the story of what she believed she saw. It just meant she was…telling it in the most suspenseful way possible. Which meant the details might be a wee bit fudged for dramatic purposes.

  “Like I said, The White Lady lights candles in the windows to guide her husband home. She goes from window to window, with a tallow in hand. We’ve had candles in the windows here in winter for as long as I can remember—and I’ve been here since I was a little girl. Even if no one sees her, people come down in the morning and find candles burning, or melted wax where the candles have burned down.”

  “And what happens if people try to interact with her?”

  “They can’t. She doesn’t respond to questions or any verbal attempt to communicate with her. As far as I know, nobody’s tried to touch her—plus, if they come close, she disappears.”

  “Vanishes?”

  “Essentially.”

  “Did her husband make it home?” Tom asked.

  Mrs. Hawley looked sad. “We don’t know,” she said. “We just don’t know.”

  “I’m guessing he didn’t,” Claudia said. “If he had, she wouldn’t feel compelled to keep lighting the candles.”

  They all stared at her as if she’d just kicked their collective puppy. Clearly she’d harshed their mellow. What had they expected? Before she had a chance to sp
eak, Brittany looked up from her phone and said, “Well, isn’t it obvious? It’s a ghost. It’s not supposed to be happy.”

  Although the others nodded in agreement, that effectively killed the conversation. After one or two more half-hearted questions, the group broke up, Mrs. Hawley retiring for an early night, no doubt so she could handle breakfast.

  “You didn’t get any supper, did you?” Reese asked Claudia.

  “I had a snack on the train, but that was it.”

  “Come with me.”

  She followed him to the kitchen. It had been upgraded with professional appliances, but still held the sense of a homey Victorian kitchen, thanks to details such as herbs drying from a rack hanging from the ceiling, a fireplace with a bread oven along one wall, and an open wooden cabinet displaying blue-patterned china.

  “Do you live around here?” Claudia asked. “Mrs. Hawley seems comfortable with you.”

  “I don’t live here now, but I did when I was young,” Reese said, opening cabinets and pulling out a plate and bread with a comfortable ease, as if he were well acquainted with the layout. “My mom worked for Mrs. Hawley for a few years, so I hung out here a lot. I’d like to say I was helping, but I’m pretty sure I was just underfoot.”

  Claudia settled on a stool and propped her elbows on the butcher block island. “So, have you seen The White Lady?”

  “As a matter of fact, I have.” He was leaning into the industrial refrigerator, so she couldn’t see his face, although his deep voice was casual and confident. He didn’t sound like he was lying. “I was walking by the parlor and I saw her in there. It scared the snot out of me, and I ran to find my mom.”

  He emerged from the fridge, balancing ham and cheese and condiments in his arms. Claudia held her breath until they were safely deposited on the butcher block. She felt bad for not helping, but damn, she was tired.