“Well, gentlemen, meet you at the winery,” Margot told the table, with no regard as to whether Emily or Zoey had finished.
They headed back into the minivan in silence. The lunch, with its talk of malevolent ghosts, had left Emily anxious to call Andrew. But as she hunted for her cell phone in her purse, she couldn’t find it anywhere. “Zoey, is my phone up there?” she asked from the backseat.
“Maybe you left it in the restaurant.” Margot said.
“No, I had it out when we stopped. What if it fell out of the van? Hell.”
Emily rummaged through her purse and around the van, but her phone was nowhere to be found. With a strange sense of unease, she double-checked to see that the vinyl pouch she had transferred Nora into was still packed away safe and sound. She patted it with her hand and pushed it further into her clothes.
The bad luck continued, though; as Zoey started to back up the minivan, the car began to emit a lug-gug-gugged, lug-gug-gugged noise along the gravel.
“You got a flat,” they heard Dwayne shout, standing with his gang next to the sidewalk as they all stared at the useless tire.
“Shit! We’re never going to get to the winery now. We’re late already.” Zoey bashed the steering wheel with her hands.
Dinesh, in a fit of pharmaceutically-enhanced chivalry, offered to stay behind and change the flat, leaving them to take the Wiccan van instead.
Emily didn’t know what she was expecting from the Big Doobie, as Zoey had aptly christened it. But whatever it was, the end result was worse. The back of the van had floor-to-ceiling electric-blue, shag carpeting. Peace signs, along with every other conceivable religious talisman, hung around the windows, which were covered in crushed velvet drapes. Of course it had a bar, complete with what looked an awful lot like a hookah pipe, and in the corner stood an incongruous collection of gardening equipment, complete with shovel and pickaxe. The air stunk with the stench of patchouli and pot, and there was nothing to sit on except vinyl bean bag chairs.
“God save us,” muttered Margot as they slammed the doors shut on themselves.
“We’ll be at the winery in a few minutes,” yelled Dwayne from the front. The air conditioning started to fizzle out. At this point Emily realized why they had to stay stoned to travel in this thing, and that she was suddenly hungry again.
They eventually hit the main roads and were soon surrounded by the rolling hills and lush vineyards of the Anderson Valley. She took in a large lungful of air after forcing open a pentagram decorated window, and tasted the faraway hint of salt in the air. They passed into the small town of Philo, and in next to no time turned up the path to Dia Vineyards toward a large timbered house situated on the hill.
Margot was reading from the winery brochure.
“Renowned for its outstanding pinot gris and gewürztraminers, the family-owned vineyard stores a large amount of their wines in a vast series of underground caves.
“The caves were originally built in the eighteen hundreds and are said to be haunted.” She stopped short and rolled her eyes to heaven dramatically. “Is anything not haunted around here? Maybe your ghosts from the Belden graveyard summer here. What do you think, Dwayne?”
“Righteous!”
Margot snorted and continued. “The caves’ consistent cool temperatures coupled with constantly high humidity and low levels of light offer the perfect spot to produce the perfect wine. Tastings are provided within the vast subterranean serpentine structure. Visitors are required to have an escort, as it is quite easy to become lost along the labyrinthine rows of casks.”
“Wait, the tasting rooms are in the caves? How far in the caves?” Emily pressed.
“It won’t be so bad. We’ll hold hands,” announced Zoey the moment they pulled up to stop.
Emily attempted to argue but was shoved out the back of the van into the parking lot.
A middle-aged man jumped off the porch and ran to meet them. He looked stricken, evidently having determined that he didn’t want that many weirdoes overtaking his tasting room.
“Miss Thomas?”
“Yes,” Emily said, surprised that he knew her name.
“A Mr. Hayes called, and he requested for you not to leave here until he meets up with you. He was very insistent.”
Margot rolled her eyes. “Can’t stand a moment away from you, can he?”
“Did he say when he might get here?”
“He didn’t say, but he was—um, very, very insistent.”
“Did he want to chain her to the fence?” asked Margot, putting on her sunglasses.
Emily glared at her.
“Why don’t we start the tour, and we’ll just be a few tastings ahead of them,” Zoey decided and rubbed her hands together. Apparently the effects of inhaling pot for ten miles had set in.
“Are these gentlemen in your party?” the proprietor asked in thinly concealed horror.
“Dude, we are the party!” crowed Dwayne. The three of them madly bobbed their heads in agreement.
“Wonderful…So a total of nine, then? Well, um, right this way. My name is Clarence. Welcome to Dia Vineyards.”
They followed his stout, tanned frame around the grand house and out into the vineyards. As they walked, they heard thrushes warbling in the trees and inhaled the perfume of the spray of roses against the endless rows of vines, and Emily felt herself relax a fraction. Soon the path narrowed and sloped gradually downhill until it came to rest in front of a large arched wooden door painted bright yellow.
“Like a hobbit hole,” Emily said with a smile.
Clarence nodded. “Our ghosts are partial to Tolkien.”
“Oh, that’s nothing. Ours are totally into Dashiell Hammett,” Zoey replied.
He raised his eyebrows, and Emily shrugged her shoulders in response before he heaved open the sizable door to what could only be the entrance to the caves. A blast of cool, damp air enveloped their faces; the beads of sweat on Emily’s forehead tingled. She steeled herself against the claustrophobia to come but reminded herself that the door would only be a few yards behind them and focused instead on her surroundings.
Candles would have been more appropriate along the honed, curved walls, she thought; the place appeared so old. Instead, electric sconces were set here and there, shooting columns of light to the ceiling. The hallways seemed endless.
Their footsteps echoed hollowly on the stone floor as Clarence led them along a few twists and turns, eventually guiding them into a long, dimly lit room filled with a refractory table and a credenza covered in wine bottles. From the far wall, the mouths of two darkened tunnels gaped toothlessly at them.
“What’s down there?”
“More tunnels—mostly storage now. They’re very old—and of course, that’s where the ghosts reside,” he told her with the relish of a seasoned story teller.
“Do you have a favorite?” Emily asked, intent to play along as she watched him begin to uncork a bottle.
He handed her a wine glass. “Oh, definitely The Lady in White.”
The glass nearly slipped from her fingers. “The Lady in White?”
Margot, Zoey, and Emily shared a look.
“She’s been here as long as we can remember. Quite famous in these parts, although she doesn’t come out as often now—a bit of a recluse, I suppose. But I guess that’s a good thing, as she’s usually full of warnings and the talk of death. Not the best for business. Although people always want to drink more after she’s done with them.”
“Wicked,” said Buck, lapping up the gewürztraminer. “This is incredible shit, man.”
Clarence cringed and poured the rest of the group a glass.
“So she lives in the caves, this ghost?” asked Margot skeptically.
“Haunts,” Clarence clarified, and cast a disparaging glance at Buck as he drained his glass and held it out for another round. “More like she inhabits the space between the casks, when she’s here at all, that is. She’s very mercurial.”
“So she ha
s a summer home, as well? Marvelous,” Margot muttered.
“One never knows.”
Emily’s eyes glanced toward the tunnels. The Lady in White—here? She had spoken to Nick’s mother—warned her about something that set off the sequence of events leading up to their deaths.
“Are there any other rooms that have entrances to the caves like this, or is this it?” Emily asked, claustrophobia or no, the plan already forming in her mind.
“No, there are several different tasting rooms that open onto the caves. But rest assured, you have the best.” He smiled warmly, misinterpreting her question.
“Thank you.” By the time they had moved on to the Pinot Noir, Emily had her plan firmly in place. She hadn’t flirted in a long time, but Clarence was going to give her a tour and introduce her to the Lady in White whether he liked it or not.
“Oh, sorry Muse-lady, didn’t mean to step on your foot. How much longer do you think?” asked Dwayne anxiously from behind Emily.
She didn’t answer. Her teeth rattled as she peered at her watch. She regretted having schmoozed Clarence into taking the stoners and herself down here. Zoey and Margot had politely declined, having no desire to trudge through foul, moldy holes in the ground. She had misjudged how intensely her claustrophobia would affect her. They had been creeping through those tunnels for twenty minutes, and she was chilled to the bone, not to mention completely turned around. The tunnels were endless, stretching on and on and looping back around again like some giant earthen maze. She concentrated on her breathing and continued on.
A handful of fluorescent bulbs were scattered across the ceiling like old scratched Christmas lights, casting a fizzling glow down upon the rows of casks. She was thankful that Clarence had handed out a few flashlights or they would be completely blind, but even with them they were constantly bumping into each other. Between the dank earthiness of the caves and the even more pungent earthiness of her friends, her stomach began to turn.
Dusty casks, nearly twelve feet in height, loomed ominously around them and cast massive shadows through which they passed. The farther they walked, the more sporadic the bulbs appeared; it would soon become entirely dark, their flashlights offering only spheres of light in the clammy blackness.
A growing sense of dread washed over her and sharpened her other senses as they passed deeper into the caves. The ground seemed to slope downward as they walked along, adding to Emily’s already blinding disorientation.
Several minutes later she heard Dwayne whisper, “Oh, shit.” He froze in his tracks, and she slammed into him.
“Why are you whispering?” she choked out.
“See those little dudes over there? Don’t want to get them pissed, I can tell you that.” He pointed to something in the pitch blackness.
From the darkness a strange sound seeped like hundreds of trembling wings. Peering harder, she saw it. Hanging from the cave walls were a thick line of pulsating blobs.
Bats.
Why hadn’t Clarence mentioned anything about bats? The blood rushed to her face and her palms began to sweat.
“We’re very deep within the caves now,” Clarence told them. “The Lady in White usually likes to hover around the last series of rows up ahead where we store all the old abandoned barrels. That is as far as we can safely go. Mind you, the rows run very long, so we don’t go near the far ends. The light is too poor there, and it’s too dangerous since we could fall into the other tunnels that lead deeper underground. And don’t make any loud noises, you’ll annoy the tenants.”
“Not a problem,” said Emily.
Clarence took the lead, followed by Buck and Egan. They were soon several yards ahead of Emily and Dwayne. She was shining her flashlight into the inky blackness, making sure she could see them, when suddenly a hand grabbed her arm. She jumped out of her skin but quickly realized it was only Dwayne clutching her elbow. His face was beaded in sweat, his pallor a sickening shade of green.
“You must be used to this,” she told him through numb lips. “Dealing with ghosts all the time, right?”
“Sure,” he squeaked. “Only problem is—I’m claustrophobic.”
“Why did you wait till now to tell me that?” she hissed at him. But he looked so much worse than she did that her heart softened at the sight of his trembling facial tattoos. “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine, just keep taking deep breaths,” she tried to reassure him. But with every step they took, the worse off he appeared. Clarence was far ahead now, and they were forced to stumble along, arm-in-arm, their flashlights shaking oval pools of light at their feet.
“Clarence,” Emily shouted.
Her voice seemed to vibrate along the walls. With unsteady hands, she shined her flashlight slowly up the back cave wall. It seemed to spire upward, much, much higher on this side than they had seen before. Crags and ledges jutted forth from a monumental sheer face riddled with pockmarked cavities. From those charnel-like holes a fetid wind blew across their faces and a chill of horror shot down her spine. The crags and ledges seemed to be teeming, rippling in a grotesque unearthly way. The sinister pits were alive—they pulsated. They were infested with bats.
Terrified speechless, she staggered back a step, nearly dropping her flashlight. She had never seen so many in one place. They hung in a misshapen way, curled upward, their reptilian wings shrouded around their rat-like bodies. A macabre rustle pulsed through the air, and the ammonium stink of guano nearly made her gag.
Suddenly a shape seemed to sweep among them, setting them to stir like an infestation of rats. She frantically grabbed for Dwayne’s arm. Except he wasn’t there.
“Dwayne?” Emily hissed out, her voice echoing off the walls. The bats twitched, chittering in alarm; the nauseating thrumming from thousands of flesh-covered wings made her blood freeze in her veins. She turned around. Dwayne had passed out dead on the floor.
Fuck! she thought in silent rage, bending down to see if she could shake him awake. “Dwayne?” she whispered as loud as she dared. “Dwayne? Wake up!”
It was then that she heard it. Another set of footsteps. Gratitude rushed through her; someone was here to help.
“Help,” she cried softly. “Clarence? Egan?” The bats rustled angrily.
She heard their footfalls coming toward her. Without warning, an icy breeze swept over her body, chilling her down to the marrow of her bones. She spun around. A shape moved in the blackness; she inched backward until she felt a cask pressed against her spine.
“Who’s there?” she said sharply. She knew something was out there, standing alone, listening to her voice. It darted from the faint beams of her flashlight.
“A Thomas alone,” a chilling voice cooed.
Out of the thick blackness overhead a phantom glided forth. The unearthly apparition of a woman shrouded in a long ivory gown floated before Emily. Her translucent amber eyes blazed beneath a pure white aura of light, holding Emily’s gaze in rapt attention. Emily pressed harder against the cask, trembling from head to toe.
“Are you—are you The Lady in White?” she mouthed, her lips barely able to move.
“A Thomas alone,” she repeated, the sound of her voice tinkling like broken glass. “No Chamberlain with her?”
The ghost suddenly swept around her, enveloping her body in a chilling embrace. “But there is a Chamberlain. Oh yes, there is a Chamberlain near,” her blue-black lips whispered against Emily’s goose-pimpled skin.
“Nick—he is a Chamberlain,” Emily sputtered out despite her fear. “Is he buried nearby? Can you tell me where he is?”
“Ah, Nick Chamberlain. The young man who did not believe.” She drew back, studying her, the temperature plummeting around them. Her glowing eyes hypnotized Emily; her spectral hair billowed in wild ringlets about her narrow face.
“Believe in what?”
“Fate.” Her astral shape swirled as the vapors of her face darkened into a caul of blackness.
“Do you know where Nick is laid to rest?”
�
��He is not at rest.”
Emily shut her eyes and tried to summon her courage, her inner Nora. It was easier to speak with her when she didn’t have to see those phantasmagorical black lips.
“Please, I need to find Nick Chamberlain’s body. I need to know what you told his mother.”
“You need much. I don’t know where his dust is. And I told his mother the truth, as tragic as it was. But the inescapable truth. The truth he chose to dismiss.”
“What truth?”
Suddenly she rose above Emily; her gowned arms flew open wide as though to engulf her.
“Run!” she commanded.
“What?”
“Someone wants to harm you!”
“I don’t understand!”
“Miss Thomas!” Clarence shouted as the group of men emerged from the darkness, taking in the twin shocks of the ghost and the prone body of Dwayne on the ground.
The Lady in White twisted in the air, her arms shielding her like a mother would a child. Emily stumbled backward.
“Emily! Emily, please!”
The voice paralyzed every nerve in her body. The horribly familiar voice.
“Who’s there?” shouted Clarence. “You shouldn’t be down here without an escort.”
“Don’t hide her from me.”
She knew that blunt accent. Vandin. How could Vandin be here?
“I don’t want to hurt you. I only want her.” His voice sounded frayed, unstable. “Emily, please, we have to get out of here, Emily.”
Vandin stepped into the ring of flashlights, his clothes disheveled, his hair on end, a gun held in his hands. “I can’t…stop her. She’s in my mind, Emily. It hurts—she hurts. We have to go. There’s no time.”
Dwayne had come to and was struggling to his legs. Vandin fired, missing him by inches.
At the sound of the shot, the bats pelted down from the cave walls like an avalanche, shrieking in rage. Emily bolted down the aisle, shouts of distress roaring all around her.
She stopped short. She had reached the end of the row and scrambled under the barrels to hide, dirt choking her throat.
Grave Refrain: A Love/Ghost Story Page 42