Tooh gently placed his hand on his mother’s arm. “He’s right, Mom. I’ve been telling you this for weeks now. Let me take over. I’ve got this.”
Jenella patted her son’s cheek. “You have sacrificed so much for them. No matter what they need, you are always there for them, no matter the pain or the cost to you. Every time.” She turned to Pago. “You, too. All of you are.”
Pago nodded towards Dooley. “And they are there for us. Just like Dooley is here for you right now. He will give you his strength. It is our way, Auntie. The way our Spirit Mother and Father taught us to keep our demons at bay.”
Tooh took the needle from her, and expertly inserted it into Dooley’s vein. Once the blood flow started, he removed the tourniquet and tossed it on the table. He filled one tube and gave it to Pago to hold. He filled another, and gave it to his mother to hold, and then filled a third, which Jenella held for him as well. When he finished, he applied pressure to Dooley’s arm and dressed it with a cotton ball and tape to cover the wound. Dooley rolled his shirt sleeves back down.
Jenella handed the extra blood-filled tube to Tooh. He, his mother, and Pago uncapped them and held them up.
Dooley bowed his head and Pago said a series of short prayers in Tok Pisan, an English-based Creole, but then spoke other prayers in a dialect only known by members of the Fore
Tribe and those innately familiar with them. Dooley intoned the prayers expertly along with him. When Pago finished he held up his blood filled tube and said, “To our Spirit Couple, we bless you.”
Dooley responded. “To strength and healing.”
“To your family and ours,” Tooh, Pago, and Jenella responded.
“From my body to yours.” Dooley watched as they drank his blood down.
The doors to the suite slammed open, and a harsh wind blew in and centered on Pago. He immediately held his arms wide while his hair and clothing rippled. Pago closed his eyes and raised his head to the sky. “She is here with us now! Come to me, my mother, I will hold you for as long as I can!”
Something slammed hard into Pago, and he rocked on the chair and squeezed his eyes shut and groaned against an onslaught of pain. He gripped the table with both hands and his body shook with the effort.
Jenella called to him. “Pago, release her and send her to me! Let me try! It has to be a woman, you know that.” She held out her hands and with a grunt, the whirlwind rushed out of Pago towards Jenella. It slammed into her, and Jenella was whipped about so fiercely she nearly fell from the chair. She grasped onto the table for support and then screamed in pain.
Tooh’s eyes were wild. “Pago, you have to stop this. She’s not ready! It will kill her.” He reached out to his mother as her back arched and then dove for her when she shrieked in agony.
Dooley was on him in seconds and held him. “Back off, Tooh. You have to let her try. We must find someone suitable to hold our Spirit Mother.”
Tooh shook him off and his usual jovial expression had hardened. “Don’t be stupid. You know my mother is not trained for this. It could kill her! Pago, I’m telling you to stop this right now!” He looked at his cousin in desperation.
“I can’t,” Pago whispered. “It’s started. Our Spirit Mother has already rooted to her. Look.” His eyes closed and he raised his hands to the sky. He began to pray.
Tooh realized he couldn’t intervene any longer. He fell to his knees and began to pray along with Pago while his mother’s body contorted in pain. She had not been taught how to withstand holding the soul of their Spirit Mother in her body. She had not been deemed strong enough when she was younger to be taught. How did she possibly think that she could hold her now? Tooh’s terrified prayers filled the room.
“Take my strength, Auntie.” Pago reached out and grasped onto Jenella’s hands and closed his eyes again. He began to chant prayers from the swamps of the old country. Tunes and words spoken and handed down from shaman to shaman, from the Dream Man of one generation to the next.
The room seemed to get even colder. Jenella’s body twitched and jerked. Spittle flew from her mouth and she cried and twisted in her chair as if she were possessed.
Suddenly, she collapsed to the table. The whirlwind exploded from her body and flew out the door in a rush, traveling down the hall with a terrible shrieking that mimicked the wind outside.
“Mother!” Tooh was by her side in an instant. He stared at the others. “Her breathing is shallow, but she is alive.”
Pago released her hands with a groan and tried to catch his own breath. “It didn’t work. She is gone again.” He stared out the suite doors, concern decorating his features.
Tooh took his mother’s face in his hands. “Mom, please answer me. Are you okay? Speak to me.”
Jenella slowly opened her eyes. Her lips trembled. “I couldn’t hold her, but I felt her. I felt our Spirit Mother.” Her voice was fearful and desperate. “She needs a place to rest. It was so lonely in there.” She gripped her arms around her own waist and rocked. “I don’t understand what I felt. I thought holding her would be wonderful. That it would be a safe place, full of love and joy, but it’s not. There’s pain in there, and death. Horrors unimaginable.” She shuddered violently. “I don’t understand.”
Pago reached towards her and squeezed her shoulder. “Auntie, she is restless. Only with us can our Spirit Mother and Father find peace. They live in a pain-filled world. But you tried, Auntie. She simply needs one of this generation. He turned to Dooley. “She’s going to try to get into Naomi or Ellora next and we must get them ready until we can find another host. Please hurry. The Spirit Father is upset and angry. I am not sure how much longer I can hold him back. He needs his mate and he is trying to search for her on his own. He keeps trying to leave me.” The veins in Pago’s neck pulsed rapidly. “I don’t need to tell you what will happen if he escapes, too.”
Dooley’s voice was hard. “Keep him in, Pago.”
For a second, anger flashed across Pago’s features. “Don’t you think I’m trying to?”
While they bickered, Jenella stood, and in a trance-like state, moved towards the sink. She picked up the bloody knife on the counter and began to point it at her chest.
“Mom, no!” Tooh shrieked.
Dooley flew to Jenella’s side and slammed her hand down. The knife fell to the linoleum floor with a loud clank.
Jenella collapsed into Dooley’s arms and sobbed. “Why did you stop me? I was so close to her. I need to leave, to be with her. I need to go with Grandma Micella. The pain is too great to bear.”
Dooley helped Jenella to the chair.
Pago spoke to him. “Please give her time. It is the effects of holding the mother when you are not strong enough. The effects of living with the pain of our Spirit Parents. It should pass if we stay with her. But she will need to be watched for the foreseeable future.”
Tooh held his mother’s head while she sobbed into his shoulder. He glared at Pago. “We should never have let her try this.”
Pago’s nose flared. “What choice did we have, Tooh? It’s not like we have a lot of options. Just watch her so she doesn’t do anything stupid.”
Meanwhile, Dooley picked up the bowl from the counter. He peered at the wiggly mass of thigh meat, brains and heart inside. “Will this even work, Pago? I don’t think there’s been enough time.”
Pago stared towards the bathroom. “We have to try. If it doesn’t work, we’ll use him next.” He thrust his chin at Ernest. “We don’t have a lot of options here either. There’s just so much we can keep taking from Tooh, no matter how fat he is.”
“We could always take another one of your fingers again, if you’d like, Pago,” Tooh said, coolly. “Your sister, Isa, is doing without six of her toes and limping everywhere, and we don’t see her complaining.” He rubbed his mother’s back. Her sobs had lessened greatly.
Jenella hiccupped. “Grandma Micella should have been enough. She sacrificed herself for all of us.”
Tooh peered dee
ply into his mother’s eyes. “And she will be forever in our hearts, Mom. She died exactly how she wanted. At the age of one hundred and helping the family.” He turned to Dooley. “Try it, Dooley. See if you can tell.”
Dooley reached into the bowl and picked up a piece of the offal. It was a squiggly mass of Mrs. Scott’s brains. He popped it in his mouth, closed his eyes and chewed.
“Well, can you tell?” Pago asked.
Dooley swallowed and opened his eyes. He ran his tongue over his teeth, sucked at something on the inside of his cheek and swallowed again. “I just don’t know. Maybe. I tried it in the guest room and couldn’t tell then. You know how much this repulses me having to consume her? It’s a sacrilege to our family and disgusting to have that shrew now living in my body. It’s only immediate family my body wants, not that piece of garbage.” His voice was bitter.
“We all must make sacrifices, cousin, as you yourself have told us countless times,” Tooh reminded him.
Pago chimed in. “I assure you Mrs. Scott is not living within you, Dooley. She is not from our community, our bloodline, and in no way is her soul residing in your body. Our Spirit Mother and Spirit Father would never allow that sort of intrusion and dishonor. She is simply a vessel, a piece of meat to help our family. They’ve told us this. She is nothing more than sustenance.”
Dooley licked his lips to clean them. “That’s reassuring. Now let’s hope it was enough time for her to even digest it. Last time this happened we were able to keep them sequestered for a week before we used them and it barely worked then. We’ll just have to see. Even if it helps a little, it will buy us time until we can figure out what to do.” He turned to Jenella. “Hold out your hand for me. I want to see if you’re okay now. I can’t take you upstairs if you’re not.”
She did. Her hand was steady as a rock.
“And how are you feeling?”
She took a deep breath and shuddered. “A bit better as time is going on. That deep malaise of wanting to kill myself and leave this world to be with our Spirit Mother and Father is leaving somewhat. I just have this lingering, intense sadness and confusion seeping deep into my bones. I remember hearing the other girls explain it to us, but I didn’t understand the depth of it until I lived through it. There’s… screaming. I don’t understand. I don’t know how you and Roselyn and the others endure it, Pago.”
“You get used to it, Auntie. The things they show me now and again. The way they were tortured. It is up to us to keep them safe. To sacrifice ourselves, our bodies, our blood, to keep them safe. You just need to be strong.”
Dooley patted her hand. “Woman, listen to me. Don’t let it get that bad again, or sacrifice yourself if you don’t have to. Do you hear me? There are other ways and I can’t afford for any of you to go down. Now, let’s go. There’s no telling what’s going on up there. Pago, did you relock the door to the staircase to the lower floors? How they got out is beyond me.”
Pago nodded. “The doors are secure again, but Ridley had some moments of clarity a few days ago and broke off the locks. The girls apparently used that back staircase regularly. It’s disgusting in there. I would never have let it get that bad had I known they were using it.”
“Who was watching him when that happened?” Dooley accused. “He never should have been released from his bindings. He’s been too violent when he’s not being treated regularly.”
The others looked uncomfortable and Dooley understood. “It was Roselyn, wasn’t it? That damned girl always had a thing for him. Was that when she gave him another one of her fingers? I saw what she did, you know. I just didn’t say anything, but I knew she’d been trying to hide it by keeping her hands in her housedress pockets. Did Gerald help her cut it off this time?”
No one said anything.
Dooley glared at all of them. “Will you stop protecting him? He did, didn’t he? I’m going to have to have a talk with him when this is all settled. He’s a live wire and does not follow the rules.”
Jenella sighed. “Don’t blame our son. Gerald adored Roselyn and Roselyn just loved Ridley’s voice. You know how much Ridley loved singing to her when he was lucid. She was one of his favorites and she was just trying to help. But none of this matters because now she’s dead.” Her lips trembled and she moaned. “What are we going to do?”
Pago squeezed her arm. “We’ll do what we have to, Auntie. But we have another problem. I am certain someone’s been up there in the attic with them. There were fresh foot prints in the muck on the staircase.”
Tooh raised his brows in shocked surprise. “One of the guests? Which one?”
Pago tilted his head. “I’m not sure. Most of them have been down in the lobby, but I’ve seen Ms. Porter walking around the floors. In fact, I am nearly certain she saw Ellora or Naomi, though I’m not sure which one of them got out.”
Dooley whipped his head around. “When was this?”
“Earlier today,” Pago replied. “I ran into her on the staircase during the blackout. You need to know something. I am certain she has the gift of sight. I didn’t say this earlier because I wanted to be sure, but I believe she can feel the Spirit Mother and Father. Whenever I’ve touched her or bumped into her, our Spirit Father jumped and she’s then given me the oddest expressions. She once asked me if I heard them speak. Not to mention she keeps trying to get close to me. I think she’s trying to figure out what’s happening. Because of that, we should consider using her if the girls don’t work.”
“Why do you think she saw one of the girls?” Dooley asked.
“When I ran into her on the stairway, I heard one of the girls running back down the hall. Not to mention they left a discarded offering on the landing.”
Dooley pursed his lips. “It was dark. Perhaps Ms. Porter didn’t see anything. Or understand what she saw.”
Pago considered this. “That’s possible. She didn’t have a flashlight with her. I was going up there to make sure she and Mr. Gisborne had enough blankets and food. But, there is always the chance she saw them. Not to mention Gerald told me she and Gisborne have also been in the temple.”
Jenella flinched and paled. “They were in the temple? When?”
He nodded. “Again, earlier today when they were exploring the property.”
“It’s over a half mile through the woods, in the snow! How did they even find it?” Jenella moaned.
“Apparently the wind must have shifted direction and the ceremonial scents drifted. They simply followed the smell directly to the shack.”
Jenella frowned. “Smell? She is not a smell, Pago!”
Pago squeezed her hand. “No, she isn’t. Auntie, they had no idea what they were seeing, and they said they did not touch anything.”
“But you don’t know for sure, do you?” Jenella began to mumble in Tok Pisan and wrung her hands. She stared at Pago. “How long has Grandma been there? They cannot touch her, Pago. She will never move on!”
“Days, Aunt Jenella. And I’d just done the last of the prayers for her. I assure you the last of her spirit is gone from the temple. All that was left was her lingering essence. She’s still sitting here with me and our Spirit Father.” He took his Aunt’s palm and placed it to his chest. “I’ll release her as soon as our Spirit Mother is reunited with us and then she can move on.”
“But what if we can’t get her back? How long can you hold her soul?”
“I will hold all of them as long as I can, Auntie. It’s what I’ve trained my entire life to do.”
“But if you can’t?” Her voice took on a desperate edge. “She will become a wandering ghost, never to rest. None of us will ever rest! None of them who died in the fire will ever rest!”
Dooley glowered. “You listen to me, Jenella. We will get our Spirit Mother back, even if I have to go through every single guest in this resort. We will get her back, and that includes using Ms. Porter if we have to. I say we go on the assumption she saw something. We can’t have witnesses.”
Jenella scoffed.
“So, your solution is to do away with all the guests on the notion that they saw something? You realize because of the fire and how many people have died that the authorities will be up here like flies as soon as they are able. Dooley, we lost most of our families! This can never work. We have killed someone today and kidnapped another! We will have to flee and return to the islands!”
Dooley’s gaze hardened. “I’m well aware of what we lost, Jenella, but I am even more aware of what we will lose if we don’t rein this in. I’m not going to sit here doing nothing and let us all die! Listen to me. This will work. We will do what we have done for over a hundred and fifty years to keep our families together. To protect our Spirit Mother and Spirit Father. This is our religion. Why we are alive and why we breathe. There are ways to get things done, and you know it. And there are ways to hide things. No one from the outside is going to be able to help us for days. We have no heat. People die from hypothermia all the time, or get lost in the woods. We could come up with something plausible as an excuse. We did it thirty years ago, didn’t we? When your father, Basil, died and our Spirit Father was released? Your own brother took over quickly without a lot of training, until Pago was able to assume the role of Dream Man. How hard was it to find an excuse for that entire family drowning in the lake after taking out that motorboat in the dark? Getting caught up in the propeller blades?” He let that memory hang in the air. “Feasible explanation for the missing body parts. We could do it again if we have to. The alternative is not an answer and you know that. We could get rid of Gisborne first. Herb admitted he gave him a mixed fruit Vodka with kiwi in it by accident, and Gerald said he’d never seen a reaction so bad, so quickly. He’d be easy enough to incapacitate and if we do, Ms. Porter will be sure to be right at his side.”
“Why don’t we use her right now?” Pago suggested. “Force her upstairs to be part of the ceremony. She is of the right age, and with her second sense we could use her if the girls don’t work out. We won’t know until we try. I don’t have to tell you that this must work. I can’t keep our Spirit Father calm for much longer. It’s becoming… difficult.”
The Haunting of Cragg Hill House Page 19