 
# The Haunted Collection

### The Eclective

With stories by:

Heather Marie Adkins

Emma Jameson

P.J. Jones

Shéa MacLeod

M. Edward McNally

Alan Nayes

R.G Porter

Tara West

Copyright © 2012 by the Eclective

Smashwords Edition

The eight authors in this collection retain and hold their individual respective rights to their stories.

This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited.

Cover Art by Tamra Westberry

Interior Formatting by Heather Adkins|CyberWitch Press, LLC

Visit the Eclective at eclectivebooks.com

# Table of Contents

Empty Vessel by M Edward McNally

The Smell of Death by Tara West

Safe by Emma Jameson

Cupcake Goddess: Soulfully Sweet by Shea MacLeod

May I Go Play? by Heather Marie Adkins

Blehdward, the Vampire Who Couldn't Sparkle by PJ Jones

Franscesca by Alan Nayes

Soul Eaters by RG Porter

# Empty Vessel

M. Edward McNally

The name Wilhemanhe Maulaunahai was a brutal mouthful even for a native Miilarkian Islander, so a crewman only shouted "Cap'n Wil?" down the ladder into the dark hold to summon his commanding officer. Below decks, Wil sighed in the dark. This was his first run as the new, young captain of the _Kaipo_ , and for years he had looked forward to hearing his proud, family name uttered respectfully by the men under him. It wasn't going to happen. Wil had served in the merchant fleet of House Beyasha for more than twenty years, beginning as a cabin boy, and he knew most of the men of the ships as well as they did him. He was always going to be "Wil" to his crew, and he counted himself lucky when any of them remembered to add a quick "Cap'n" to his name.

Wil moved through the darkness toward the shaft of sunlight shining down through a hatch. He had been trying to check the cargo to make sure all the barrels and casks remained secure, but was forced to do it all by feel as it was not safe to light a lantern below decks. The _Kaipo_ was carrying grain between two Oswamban ports; hardly a glorious cargo, but one that could be dangerous as the dust and chaff seeping from rough containers could ignite when touched by an open flame. The air in the hold was as heavy as it was hot, and left a dirty taste in Wil's mouth and even in his nose.

At the base of the ladder, Wil peered up into the swarthy face of a crewman leaning over the open hatch, long braided hair hanging down like a bell-pull.

"A ship, Cap'n," the man called down. Wil waited for more, but there was none.

"Would you care to be a bit more specific?" Wil had the urge to spit just to moisten his dry lips, but did not suppose that would accord with the dignity of an officer.

"She looks to be a drifter, sirrah. We've gained on her for an hour and she's just bobbing out there, sails down. Mr. Moke thought you'd want to get a gander as we pass."

Wil sighed. His second-in-command was an old hand with the full respect of the crew, who always referred to him as such. _Mister_ Moke, sirrah.

The captain ascended the ladder easily, for he was not so far removed from working in the rigging himself, scurrying up and down masts and across spars to tend the sails. One loose rung at the top rolled in Wil's hand, as it had on the way down, and he directed the crewman to see it was caulked. The man replied that Mr. Moke had it on the list when the deck was reworked the next time the vessel reached port, as it was not prudent to fire up tar-pots with a hold full of grain. Wil mumbled " _Mister_ Moke" to himself as he crossed the deck and ascended the stairway to the aftcastle. There his second-in-command and several crewmen were at the starboard gunwales, shielding their eyes against the bright sun to peer across the waves. The men's backs were to Wil with matching braided tails of black hair hanging to their waists, Moke's shot through with gray. This was Eleventhmonth, which would be the middle of the gentle winter in the Islanders' native lands, but here across the belt of the world it was high summer, and unbearably hot off the golden coast of Oswamba visible to the south. Wil wore a somewhat ostentatious captain's coat of olive green, the color of a peridot stone, and he fastened the elaborate lacings and brass buttons up his otherwise bare chest before clasping his hands behind his back and clearing his throat.

Moke and the others turned to him, and while the men nodded politely Wil's second only frowned. Miilarkians tended not to wear any sort of uniform while at sea, for they were a practical people. The men with Wil's second included both Laban and Nui, the House Merchant and the Miisinian priest assigned to the _Kaipo_ as chaplain, but all were alike outfitted only in cloth trousers and billowy cotton shirts, or even just open vests. Mr. Moke wore olive-green wristbands, but no other sign of rank. Only Captain Wil continued to wear his officer's coat aboard, along with boots. The others went barefoot, or preferred sandals.

"What is it, Mr. Moke?" Wil asked, having intended to drop the "Mister" but finding himself unable to do so. Keo Moke was a generation older than Wil, probably half a century in age, and he had been walking the decks of House Beyasha ships long before Wil was even a gleam in his mother's eye, or however that expression went. It was common knowledge that following the old captain's retirement, the House had first offered the captaincy of the _Kaipo_ to the old salt, who for some reason or another had declined the honor. And so it had fallen to Wil, who himself had worked his way into the position of navigator over the years. He had always wanted to be a captain, but not expected to earn the position before the age of forty.

"A corpse, sirrah," Moke said, stepping away from the gunwale and extending a bare arm that looked like mahogany.

Wil stepped to the rail to peer across the sea of light chop until discerning a vessel between the _Kaipo_ and the distant shore, hard to spot at first for her boards were bleached to a faded gray that did not stand out against the golden-beige background. She looked to be a two-masted _dhow_ ; a style of ship with low sides and triangular sails common to coastal Oswamban waters, but unsuitable for deeper seas. The _Kaipo_ was a deep-water caravel, with three masts and tall "castles" both fore and aft, and even from the distance Wil felt like he was looking down on the Oswamban ship.

"She's adrift?" Wil asked, squinting at the gray stranger. Moke gave a nod.

"Looks to be. Note her wood, sirrah. She's been out here a long time, for the Oswambans keep their hulls painted right pretty, they do."

"What is the point, then? She's a dead ship and has been so for years."

Moke gave a snort through his wide nose and shot a look at two of the other men at the rails, the merchant Laban and Nui, the priest of Miisina, Goddess of Coin.

"The ship seems to ride low in the water," Laban said, the House merchant failing utterly to keep an eager gleam out of his eye. He was the sort of man who would chase a rolling copper piece into a sewer.

"She is not low, she's just short," Moke muttered.

"Yet her appearance before us may be a boon," the chaplain intoned with a brilliant, white smile. "Miisina looks kindly on those bold enough to take her gifts." Nui was the sort of man who would trip Laban to the ground in order to chase a rolling copper into a sewer himself.

Wil looked between the two enthusiastic moneymen and gave a silent, inward sigh.

"It is not good luck to board derelict vessels," he said. "Ships tend to be abandoned for a reason."

"But this ship is so old," Nui said. "Surely whatever happened to it was a very long time ago. Fortune favors the bold, as they say."

"They also say a wise man does not poke a sleeping panther," Moke muttered.

Wil glanced at his second, who gave him a stern and somehow fatherly look, and a single shake of his salt-and-pepper head. Wil felt his frown tighten, and though he'd had no intention of approaching the derelict ship; Laban, Nui, and the other crewmen nearby had all seen Mr. Moke give their captain clear direction.

Cap'n Wil gave the order to shorten sails and come about.

* * *

Wil led five men aboard with him; Nui, two sailors and the two House Guilders along as protection for the merchant Laban. Laban decided not to board himself when the _Kaipo_ was alongside the derelict and it became obvious the only way across was an awkward climb down a cargo net to the low deck of the dhow, rubbing against the _Kaipo_ as both ships bobbed with the swell of the ocean. The priest Nui came along as he was still a young man for whom "boldness" left little room to negotiate.

Wil very much enjoyed giving Moke command of the _Kaipo_ , "Until I return," but the quick look around the derelict was a different matter. The ship was indeed very old, with the planks of the deck already gone to warp and opening up gaps. There was not much cabin space and the hold was wide open. The others only moved to look about both areas after the two Guilders had checked them out over the burning matches of their short muskets.

Nui led the sailors down into the hold while Wil looked quickly about the cabins. A Guilder had glanced into the rooms to insure no one was lurking in them, but the fellow had not looked much more carefully than that. In the largest room which must have belonged to the ship's captain, Wil found remains.

They were skeletal, piled strangely on the floor beneath an overhead beam which Wil peered at in the half-light shining through cracks between the plank walls. He opened the intact cover of a porthole, and the old wooden hinges both snapped when he yanked it open. In the light from outside Wil could just see a discoloration around the beam right above the bones, as though a rope once tied there had long since rotted away.

"Hung yourself, did you Cap'n?" Wil asked, stretching out the toe of a boot to push at the bones, but stopping just short owing to a vague feeling of superstition. He put it aside to lean further over the bones, putting his face close to the dusty old skull that had landed on its back with the empty sockets staring straight up. Only scraps of leather clothing and a bit of rope remained intact, tented up by desiccated ribs and limbs.

"Why did your crew leave you here, Captain?" Wil asked quietly, though there was no way to know if the man had been abandoned here by his men. The dhow's lifeboats were gone, but they could have fallen empty into the sea when their rigging rotted away.

Before Wil rose, the slight rocking of the vessel shone a shaft of light directly from the porthole onto the piled remains, and Wil frowned at a small spot of color amidst the dirty white and faded gray of bone and wood, which he lost sight of as the sunlight moved. Still feeling a bit uneasy, Wil reached down among the old bones and closed his fingers gingerly on some sort of knob, which to his surprise felt cool against the hardened pads of his digits. A shiver ran down his back despite the heat of the day, but Wil only frowned at himself. Miilarkian captains were not afraid of spook stories. He straightened and held up an object into the light.

It was a very small statue, only as tall as his hand was long. It was of a standing figure of a man, ramrod straight and fists balled onto its hips, chin held high. It was of porcelain like some Far Western piece, and while it was too dusty to make out much detail it seemed to be finely made. Wil rubbed at its chest with a thumb, and stared at the familiar shade of olive green coloring the coat the figure wore so proudly.

The priest Nui called the captain's name, making Wil jerk where he stood. He collected himself and answered the man, who appeared in the cabin doorway to report with deep resignation that whatever had filled the vessel's hold was rotted away to dry powder. Nui frowned at the bones at Wil's feet but asked no question about the statue, for Wil had crammed it into a coat pocket before calling out to the man.

They returned to the _Kaipo_ , and the captain ordered his ship to proceed.

* * *

With ship's business to oversee, Wil did not get to give the statue a closer examination until well after nightfall, with the derelict vessel left leagues behind their wake. He washed the figure off in a bucket in his quarters, and stared at it in candlelight, for his cabin was in the forecastle high above the dangerous air of the hold. Wil's features assumed and maintained an almost comical expression of open-mouthed surprise.

The figure was plainly that of a Miilarkian man. Wil could make out the braided hair hanging down the back of the figure's coat, to which only the single spot of olive green paint he had first revealed clung stubbornly. The features of the face were obscure, not nearly detailed enough to hint at a national or racial identity, but the hairstyle and coat were a dead giveaway.

It was not, Wil supposed, impossible for such an object to have wound up here, off the coast of Oswamba. Miilarkian vessels had only plied these waters for a few decades, since the first half of the 1200's by the Norothian Calendar, but they had been trading with the Far Western lands where the statue had likely been made since late in the last century. It was not so hard to imagine that some Miilarkian captain, even one of House Beyasha, had commissioned the piece in the West, and later carried it into these waters. It was the sort of small object that made for a handy souvenir, and could easily have been given out or traded later with a fellow seafaring man, in command of his own ship. Captains exchanged such things regularly, and though the giving of gifts was not typical to the Miilarkian character, fitting in with local customs was.

It was a strange coincidence to be sure, but not one Wil allowed himself to dwell upon for very long before he blew out the candle and settled down to sleep in his bunk. The night was unremarkable, but the morning brought a surprise. When Wil opened his eyes the first thing he saw was the porcelain figure on his desk. The whole coat was now, unmistakably, colored the olive green of the peridot stone that was the symbol of House Beyasha. The second thing Wil noticed was that the statue had changed posture. While one arm remained bent with a fist on one hip, the other arm extended into the air and held what appeared to be a very small tube, of the sort in which Miilarkian seamen carried messages.

* * *

For the morning and into the afternoon, Wil went about his duties in a state of distraction.

There was plainly some sort of magic about the figure, and while Wil did not know any wizards or magi personally, as a cosmopolitan man of Miilark he was not unduly startled by sorcery. Nui, the Miisinian, was capable of invoking his own species of clerical spells to heal simple wounds or predict the weather a day or two ahead, and of course the ability of priests to purify saltwater both allowed Miilarkian traders to make long sea voyages without filling half their holds with freshwater, and insured that a priest was always present aboard far-ranging vessels. Magic, of a kind, had very much allowed the people of Miilark to become the world's foremost trading nation. While it could be dangerous, it was not something to be feared. Not always.

Wil considered speaking to Nui about the object he had taken from the derelict, but he knew the substance of any such conversation would pass almost instantly to the whole of the crew the very instant Wil was out of earshot. A Miilarkian captain did not garner respect by scurrying to the ship's chaplain over every little thing. In early afternoon, Wil had made no decision either way, and the question mattered to him less after another ship's sails were sighted to fore.

Many local vessels had been seen with some regularity, for the trade lanes between the cities of Oswamba's northern coast were busy. But the tall vessel ahead was clearly Miilarkian, and when she was close enough to see detail, the crew reacted with surprise to the green flag atop the mizzen mast that implied she was another House Beyasha vessel. A little closer, and that proved not to be the case. The flag of the approaching vessel was a brighter shade of green, typical of an emerald, meaning she was of the House of Deskata. As there was no animosity between the two Houses at the present time, the Island vessels shortened sails as they drew near for calls of greeting to be shouted from deck to deck. Mr. Moke of course shouted on behalf of Wil's _Kaipo_ , as the second-in-command had a strong, bellowing voice. To the surprise of everyone, except perhaps Wil himself who felt only a strange numbness, when the _Kaipo_ identified herself by name to the Deskata vessel _Asera_ , the Deskata men shouted back that they had a message aboard. A message for Captain Wilhemanhe Maulaunahai.

It was not at all uncommon for Miilarkian vessels operating in the same foreign waters to carry messages from the home islands intended for each other, but such things were usually exchanged in port. There was no time for ships on opposite courses at sea to stop dead for a parley without fully dropping their sails and perhaps even anchoring, which would not have been possible at all this far off the coast. The Deskatas however moved swiftly, and even as the vessels passed each other, a man in a black Guild cloak stood at the rear of the _Asera_ 's aftcastle with a bow drawn taut. Wil shouted for his crew to clear the _Kaipo_ 's rear deck, and Moke waved for the Deskata Guilder to take his shot. The man did so, the arrow arcing high but flying poorly with a slim bone scroll tube bound to the shaft. Nevertheless, the Wind that was the luck of the Miilarkians was with Captain Wil that day, and the arrow flew true and thunked into the deck near the wheelhouse.

The crewmen clapped each other on the shoulders for the Deskata archer's prowess, and caps were waved as the vessels moved apart. Moke fetched the tube from the arrow fletched in emerald green feathers, and handed it over to his captain as Wil's name was scratched onto the side, along with the name of his ship.

By Captain's Rights, Wil could have taken the missive to his own quarters and read it privately, but he was surrounded by a circle of curious faces. His heart was thumping in his chest, but he found he was not nervous, or at least not afraid. There had seemed something victorious in the posture of the statue on his desk that morning, with the message held up before it. Wil felt a strange confidence that there could only be good news within, and he broke the seal of olive-green wax to shake out a single sheet of rolled parchment as he stood on the deck. He read the few lines rapidly; the message was short as his wife must have written out a large number of identical missives to put aboard every ship heading south from the Islands a few months ago. Wil blinked at her familiar hand, and read her words over and over.

"Captain?" Mr. Moke asked, and Wil met the man's old eyes in their permanent squint with his own very wide. He gave his second-in-command a lopsided grin.

"I have a son," Wil said, sounding amazed.

Moke blinked. "A son?"

"A fine, healthy son."

The crewmen stared, then exploded with happy calls, several men forgetting their place to hammer Wil familiarly about the shoulders. Their captain did not mind in the least at the moment. Wil called for a double ration of rum to be distributed immediately to all hands, and the cheering redoubled. That evening more of the rum was disposed of by Wil and his officers, along with Nui and Laban who all stayed up late after sundown in the mess. When Wil lurched back to his own cabin, he grinned sloppily at the porcelain figure on his desk, raised it to his lips and planted a kiss on its cool surface before setting it down and flopping into his bunk, still clothed in the green captain's coat.

He awoke next morning with a headache that was nowhere near bad enough to make him feel anything but joyful. His mood changed when he sat up in his bunk with a groan, and cast a look at the figure on his desk.

The statue was on its knees, more colorful now as its braided hair was a dark black much like Wil's, and its hands were the dusky shade typical of a Miilarkian Islander. Wil particularly noticed the hands, as they were raised to cover the figure's bent face, as though the porcelain man were weeping.

* * *

Wil resolved to speak to Nui, though he did not do so immediately. He meant to, but as he hurriedly washed and changed his clothes he began to worry about the hold, and the grain. The dust of the chaff, and the chance of explosion. When he emerged from his cabin in the forecastle he directed the sail master on duty to drop the mains to slow the _Kaipo_ , while ordering the helmsman to hold to course. Not many deckhands were on duty at the early hour, but Wil ordered a pair of them to accompany him to the hold.

"Captain?" Mr. Moke called, approaching across the deck. Moke had stood the nightwatch and looked tired.

"We will slow to reduce the chop below the line of the hatches, fore and aft. I mean to air out the hold."

Moke frowned. "We have done so every forty hours, sirrah. That is plenty long enough to keep down the dust so it won't burn. Three days is safe for a ship our size."

Wil snapped his eyes to his second, temples throbbing.

"Do you not know the sound of an order, Mr. Moke?" he demanded.

Moke frowned. "Aye, Captain. Dropping sails."

The sail master scurried off to shout men up the masts, while Moke followed Wil and the two hands over to the open hatch down to the hold.

"I can direct the men, sirrah, I still have the deck."

"I will see to it myself," Wil snapped, giving his second another glare even as he started down the ladder. He placed one foot on the loose top rung and it rolled. Wil's eyes widened as he started to fall, surely far enough to break a leg, but Mr. Moke had the reflexes of a darting minnow. He reached out both hands and grabbed the front of Wil's coat, catching him. Wil desperately grabbed the man's strong wrists, which felt like iron.

"Captain?" Moke asked.

"I am fine!" Wil snapped. "And fix this gods-damned rung, today! Drive a damned nail through it."

"Aye, sirrah."

Wil stepped down to the next rung and descended into the darkness of the chalky air in the hold. Before the next assigned hand was halfway down behind him, the _Kaipo_ yawed and heeled heavily to starboard.

The crewman behind Wil on the ladder nearly dropped off on top of him, but the captain braced his fall. There was a squealing noise from above, rope winding too fast through a tackle, and a vast _swoosh_ as of a collapsing sail, then shouting voices. The _Kaipo_ rocked back to upright and Wil scurried immediately up the ladder, climbing back into the daylight before his eyes had even adjusted to the dark.

What had happened was plain. A gust from landward had caught the main mizzen sail just as the sleepy sailors of the nightwatch had been dropping it, yanking lines from hands which such suddenness that the boom had spun from right to left, sweeping above the deck at the height of a tall man's head. That last judgment was easy to make, for Mr. Moke was sprawled across the deck, braid lying askew and the back of his skull staved in like a melon struck with a heavy, heavy club.

* * *

The crew was in shock, and the rest of the day was a blur for Wil. Nui saw to Moke's body in his role as ship's chaplain, but he could not get a direct answer from the captain as to whether or not to immediately conduct funerary rites and inter the ship's second in what would be his final rest at sea. At nightfall, Moke's body still remained in the mess, which made serving the evening meal to the crew problematic. Ultimately the men ate while sitting or standing around on the deck, with few words passing among them. The crew had been virtually silent all day, as had their captain who remained sequestered in his own quarters.

Hours after nightfall the captain appeared, but he spoke to no man of the nightwatch as he approached the port-side gunwales and threw some small object from the ship, pitching it as hard as he could to fly out into the darkness without a sound. No splash could be heard of course, but Wil remained standing at the rails for long minutes before disappearing back to his cabin.

In the morning, Wil woke slowly and sat on the edge of his bunk, staring at the deck between his feet and taking a deep breath before glancing up at his desk.

The figure was there, on a spot damp with seawater. The porcelain man was lying face down, and the statue was painted in full color from the olive green coat to the black hair and brown boots, to the welter of red blood shining on a wide wound on its back.

* * *

Wil did not sleep for the next three days, for whenever he started to doze he thought about the statue moving while his eyes were closed. He carried the object with him, sliding it secretively from his pocket to stare at the prone, bloody shape, to insure that it had not changed by as much as an iota. Not that it could have become much worse.

He did not speak to his own men, nor to the priest Nui, nor to the merchant Laban. Wil expected they were all talking about him plenty, and when after two days Mr. Moke was finally laid to rest over the side with a cannonball chained to his dead legs, Cap'n Wil was the only man not standing on deck to give the second a final salute. Wil watched the ceremony from the porthole in the forecastle, and watched the men cluster together afterwards and speak at great length. The priest and the merchant spoke specifically to Laban's two Guilder guards, and Wil thought they all glanced toward him repeatedly as he stood back in the shadows, hand wrapped around the cold porcelain in his pocket.

The third night, Wil roused all hands in the depths of the nightwatch by clanging the claxon bell. He ordered all sails dropped, and when the _Kaipo_ slowed to a drift on the current alone, the captain shouted for assembly by ranks on the mizzen desk. It was still hot in these latitudes even at night, but Wil wore a vast greatcoat over his full uniform as he stood atop the aftcastle and watched the men assemble before him. Wil tied off the wheel so the helmsman could join his fellows, leaving no one behind him or unaccounted for. When all thirty men were assembled below, illuminated by bright moon and starlight, Wil withdrew a stout boarding blunderbuss from beneath his coat, where four more pistols still hung from straps. He lit the fuse of the matchlock from a taper, and trained the double-barreled weapon on his men.

"All of you, into the boats!" Wil barked, voice rough from lack of use and face slack from lack of sleep. His eyes were red; some of the men thought they glowed in the silvery moonlight.

The crew exchanged confused looks, and the captain barked that he had given an order. The priest Nui stepped slowly out in front of the men with his arms at his sides, showing his empty hands. He looked up at Wil with an expression of concern, though a quiet calmness.

"Captain," the ship's chaplain began, but Wil leveled both barrels at the man's chest.

"Not another word, godling," Wil said firmly. "I find...I find that I am accursed, Chaplain, and I mean to break it. I mean to live to see my wife and my son. I must sleep, and I may not do so with any of you here on board. I cannot close my eyes with you all around me, unseen."

Nui kept his mouth firmly shut, staring up into the two dark tunnels of the blunderbuss. Wil looked at the upturned faces of his men, looking back at him with a mixture of confusion and fright. He had known most of them for a very long time, and served beside them before he was promoted. They had never heard him speak as he did now, for he never had done so before.

"When you are all off the ship, I will raise the jibs myself and steer in closer to shore, to a depth to anchor. Rowing the launches, you may overtake me tomorrow. By morning, in one way or another, this will be ended."

Some men exchanged glances, and Wil felt a flush in his face. He knew his words sounded like madness, and he knew that whatever happened, surely no man here would ever be willing to crew under him again. But none of that mattered now. All that mattered was that Wil lived to go home, to meet his son.

The technical third-in-command of the _Kaipo_ was the navigator, but the fellow was a pleasant and unassuming man to whom the crew did not look for leadership. Instead, after looking at the still-silent priest, the men turned toward the merchant Laban, who had authority to speak on behalf of the House in some matters. No one was quite sure if the captain losing his mind was one of those matters, but they turned to Laban as an authority figure. After a long look up at Wil, the merchant took responsibility, and uttered his first and only order ever given.

"Abandon ship."

* * *

After the launch and both lifeboats were in the water and the _Kaipo_ had drifted safely a few hundred yards away from them, Wil secured the wheel on a course due south and moved to the foremast. He hand-winched the first jib up into place, and a gentle breeze puffed the white sail enough to move the great ship in toward shore. Wil returned to the stern to look back at the small, dark shapes in the water falling further and further behind, and he felt a sense of relief as deep as his tired bones. The porcelain figure remained in his pocket, but Wil neither reached in to touch it, nor brought it out into the moonlight. He did not intend to examine it again until he looked upon it by daylight after a solid, profound sleep. With no one about to inflict a wound on his back, he felt like he would be able to do so.

He thought of the cargo again before the ship had gone very far. Wil knew the men had aired out the hold again only yesterday, but as he intended to anchor in the shallows, he thought it best to open all the lower hatches lest the flammable air gather while the ship was at rest. He moved to do so now, leaving the blunderbuss with its extinguished taper behind at the helm, and actually checking the four pistols to make sure none of their matchlock fuses were lit, either.

Wil started down the ladder, and almost smirked to himself as he remembered the loose rung. He stretched a foot past it for the next rung down, wanting to risk nothing now that he was safe.

Only the toe of his boot caught the rung, and when Wil put his weight on it the flat sole slid off the wood. He still had his hands on the edge of the hatch and would not have fallen, but when his chest banged the ladder a brass button of his ornate captain's coat struck against the iron lock of a pistol, and a spark flashed in the pan.

There was not enough of the deadly, dusty air gathered in the hold to ignite. The spark fired no conflagration, but it did fire the pistol. The iron ball pierced Wil's chest, cracked off two ribs and tore through the captain's entrails and bowels before blasting a red wound out the back of his olive-green coat.

Wil's numb hands lost their grip and he plummeted into the darkness of the hold, breaking both legs with cracks almost as loud as the sound of the gun. There at the base of the ladder, Captain Wil bled to death over the course of several hours, while the empty _Kaipo_ glided before the wind. For much of that time, the captain's wild eyes were focused on the porcelain figure that had popped out of his pocket to lie in a square of moonlight from the hatch. Its posture was calm, with straight legs and arms at its sides. The figure was a colorless white in the gloom, its face again a blank slate. An empty vessel, awaiting whatever would fill it next.

#

_While it occurs near a different continent and at an earlier time period, the preceding story is set within the world of_ The Norothian Cycle - _a Musket & Magic Fantasy series by M. Edward McNally. Presently at four volumes_ \- The Sable City, Death of a Kingdom, The Wind from Miilark, and Devil Town.

#

M. Edward McNally writes an awful lot of stories set on boats for a guy who lives in a desert.

Find him at his blog sablecity.wordpress.com or follow him on Facebook and Twitter

# The Smell of Death

Tara West

Maggie sat on the edge of the sofa while trying not to take deep breaths. She clutched her doll in her lap as her gaze darted to the others around the room.

"This house is dirty," she mumbled.

She turned toward the kitchen. Her mom and Mrs. Churchill were talking and sipping coffee like old friends. Maggie worried that Mrs. Churchill would give her mom a job and then they'd have to live in a dirty house.

Her gaze wandered back to the others in the room. Mrs. Churchill's elderly mother's vacant eyes were focused somewhere on the large bay window. Maggie doubted the old lady was actually paying attention to the red birds building their nests in the heavy oak branches that shaded the large house from most of the sun's rays.

An orange-hued cat sat in the old lady's lap, his intent feline gaze boring into Maggie. But his cold stare wasn't like the others. Maggie sensed the cat was more curious than anything.

She leaned toward the kitty and whispered. "You're not as dirty as the rest. I might actually learn to like _you_."

His ears twitched but he made no other movement.

Maggie took it as a good sign that the cat responded at all. She tentatively scooted closer to him. Interesting, she thought, as his aura seemed to be brighter than the old lady's. Although it shouldn't have been a surprise that the old lady's light was fading. The sweet, pungent odor of death clung to the woman. The scent permeated the room and made breathing difficult for Maggie.

Maggie secretly hoped the woman would pass soon. She didn't know how long she could stand living in a dirty house that smelled like death, too.

But if the old lady died, Maggie's mom would again be out of a job. Her mom had been stressed trying to find work and a place for them to live.

The cat's ears twitched again and Maggie thought she heard a soft purring sound. Despite the overwhelming stench of the old lady and the cold, unwelcoming stares from the others, Maggie scooted even closer to the cat.

"How did you die?" she asked.

The cat responded by lifting his front leg and licking what appeared to be icicles off the pads of his paw.

Maggie's breath hitched and the gooseflesh on her arms tingled. "You froze to death?"

The cat lowered his paw and twitched his ears again.

"How terrible. I'm so sorry." And truly she was. Though they'd never stayed long enough in one home for Maggie to own a pet of her own, she'd always liked animals.

She briefly wondered if he'd been Mrs. Churchill's cat and if Mrs. Churchill had killed her own pet.

The cat twitched his ears again and Maggie felt the tingling sink beneath her gooseflesh and into her bones. Her eyes fluttered shut and she was struck by several images. Mrs. Churchill sick in bed. An angry white-haired man throwing the cat outside during a winter storm. Mrs. Churchill waking up and finding her cat's lifeless body on the porch.

"Thomas!" the woman sobbed as she fell to her knees.

The strange sensation crawled back out of Maggie's bones and her eyes shot open. "Thomas, " she said to the cat, "who was that white-haired man?"

Thomas turned his head and his tabby ears pointed in the direction of the mantle, toward the portrait of Mrs. Churchill and the same man from Thomas's vision.

"Mr. Churchill?" Maggie breathed.

Thomas answered with a hiss.

The others said nothing as they faded behind a large tapestry on the wall.

A fear like she'd never known suddenly took root in Maggie's gut. She wondered what other dark secrets were hidden inside this house.

"Oh, this house is _very_ dirty," she cried as she clutched her doll to her chest.

Just then, Maggie spotted a large black car pulling into the circular drive. Maggie could see that the person who stepped from the car was the same white-haired man from Thomas's vision, despite the dark aura that shrouded the man like a heavy coat.

Maggie gasped as the others appeared from behind the tapestry again. Their spirits were defined enough that Maggie could make out the whites of their wide eyes. One of them appeared to be a young girl, probably around seven-years-old, just like Maggie.

For a long moment, Maggie and the girl locked gazes. Though the fading spirit didn't share a vision, Maggie knew well enough by the fear reflecting in the spirit's eyes, that Mr. Churchill was a dangerous man.

Panic seized her chest. Rising on wobbly legs, she dropped her doll to the floor, not even bothering to pick it up as she hurried toward her mother in the kitchen. "Mother, we have to go," she whispered into her mother's ear. "This house is dirty!" She'd accidentally blurted the last part.

When Maggie heard Mrs. Churchill gasp, she knew the woman had heard. But Maggie was too frightened to care. She only wanted to get far away from this place.

"Maggie!" her mother scolded.

"I beg your pardon, little girl." Mrs. Churchill's eyebrows dipped beneath the perfectly even bangs of her blonde coiffure as she leveled Maggie with a glare. "I'll have you know my housekeepers work around the clock to ensure this house is spotless."

Maggie's gaze darted from Mrs. Churchill's twisted features, back to her mother's tired eyes. Back before Mother started losing jobs, back when Mother had more meat on her bones and didn't look so tired, Maggie thought she was a beautiful woman. With her high cheekbones, bright green eyes and thick, auburn hair, Mother was always turning heads. A wave of shame overcame Maggie. This was all her fault. She was the reason Mother was always losing her jobs. She was the reason Mother's beauty was fading. But they couldn't stay at this house. Not with an evil man.

Maggie's lower lip trembled as she felt her eyes well up with tears. "But I must tell you a secret, Mother."

Mrs. Churchill rose with a start and strode toward the counter, busying herself by adding more coffee and creamer to her cup. Maggie knew the woman would try to listen. She'd come to learn that people were always curious about her, always asking her and her mother questions, and always pulling back with looks of horror and derision after they'd learned Maggie's secret. That's when Maggie and her mother had begun speaking in code, calling haunted houses 'dirty' and ghosts 'others'.

Their simple plan had always worked in the past. Mother didn't want to live in a dirty house any more than Maggie did. But as Maggie studied her mother's weary eyes and drawn mouth, she feared her mother wouldn't listen this time.

Maggie swallowed hard while tugging on her mother's shirtsleeve. "It's _very_ dirty, Mother. It isn't safe."

"Maggie," her mother warned. "Hold your tongue."

"The white-haired man is here." Maggie tried her best to whisper, but her voice rose along with the urgency in her words. "He's evil. He killed Thomas. He threw him in the cold."

Maggie winced at the sound of breaking glass. She and her mother both turned to see Mrs. Churchill sprawled out on the kitchen floor.

Maggie's mom raced to Mrs. Churchill's side.

Just then Mr. Churchill stormed into the room. "What happened here?" he bellowed as he stood over his wife's body. "You!" He pointed a finger at Maggie's mother. "What have you done to my wife?"

Maggie's mother rushed to Mrs. Churchill's side. "She fell, sir." Mother placed her hand on Mrs. Churchill's neck and then put her ear to Mrs. Churchill's chest.

Mr. Churchill hovered above them and made no offer to help.

He scowled down at Mother. "Who are you?"

Mrs. Churchill moaned as Mother wiped a strand of hair out of the woman's eyes.

"I'm Rebecca, your mother's new caretaker," Mother said without looking up at Mr. Churchill.

Maggie didn't like the way Mr. Churchill tilted his head as his gaze roamed Mother's backside. Maggie had seen other men do the same. Mother had called them perverts. Maggie didn't know what a pervert was, but she suspected Mr. Churchill was even more foul than a pervert.

Mr. Churchill snickered. "That old bat?" He nodded in the direction of the elderly woman. "She's not _my_ mom. She's my wife's mom."

Mother pulled Mrs. Churchill into her arms before fixing Mr. Churchill with a glare. "Please, help me bring _your wife_ to the sofa."

Mr. Churchill grumbled as he bent down and pushed Mother aside. He scooped his wife into his arms and briskly crossed into the living room before plopping her on the sofa.

Maggie and her mother followed.

Mrs. Churchill moaned again as her hand flew to her brow.

Mother sat beside Mrs. Churchill and clasped the woman's pale hand. "Mrs. Churchill, can you hear me?"

"W-what happened?" Mrs. Churchill moaned.

"You fell and hit your head," Mother said. "Let me look into your eyes." Mother held open Mrs. Churchill's eyelids, examining one, and then the other. "Well, it doesn't look like a concussion, but you'd better lie down for a while. Can I get you anything?"

"I'm thirsty," Mrs. Churchill rasped.

"Maggie," Mother called over her shoulder, "Fetch a glass of water from the kitchen, and watch out for that shattered glass on the floor."

But Maggie stood rooted to the spot. The others had returned and they were glaring at Mr. Churchill. Their bodies were much more defined than before. Maggie could even make out bruises circling the child's neck.

"You heard her, girl! Move!" Mr. Churchill bellowed while stomping his foot.

"Maggie. Maggie."

Maggie thought she heard her mother calling her, but the others were moving their mouths. Though no words came out, they were trying to tell her something, she knew it.

"Is she dumb?"

"No."

"The kid looks like she's seen a ghost."

Finally, the girl with the bruised neck pointed toward Mr. Churchill. Maggie's gaze followed to his dark aura.

That's when Maggie saw them. _Really_ saw them. The dark shroud Maggie once thought was an aura, was not an aura at all. Maggie's mouth fell open but she was too shocked to even scream. Black winged creatures with sharp fangs circled Mr. Churchill's body like bees swarming a hive.

Mother stepped in front of Mr. Churchill and clutched Maggie' shoulders. "Maggie. Water."

Maggie nodded and ran into the kitchen. She was relived to be away from the living room, away from Mr. Churchill.

Maggie returned to the living room, walking a wide circle around Mr. Churchill. Those black things were still swarming him. She could hear them now, growling like rabid animals. Luckily, he stood far enough away from the sofa where his wife was lying down. Far enough that he could still gawk at Mother's backside.

Maggie really didn't like Mr. Churchill.

Some of the color had returned to Mrs. Churchill's face. Mother had propped some pillows behind her back. Mrs. Churchill sat with her hands folded in her lap while she glared at her husband. Maggie handed the glass to her.

Mrs. Churchill took a sip of the water and then threw the glass at her husband. "You killed my cat!"

Mr. Churchill ducked as the glass narrowly missed his head. The beasts swarming him howled and hissed. When Mr. Churchill stood, his face was as red as a ripe apple.

He spoke through a frozen smile. "Sugarplum, we've been through this before. "

"You killed Thomas!"

He shook his head and took a step forward. "You hit your head. You're not thinking straight."

"Get out of my house!" Mrs. Churchill raised a shaky finger and pointed toward the kitchen door.

The beasts swarmed Mr. Churchill's ears and hissed, the sound reminding Maggie of sibilant whispers.

If it was at all possible, Mr. Churchill's face turned an even brighter shade of red. "I just unpacked my things."

"Well, pack them again." Mrs. Churchill's bottom lip quivered as her eyes watered over with unshed tears. "And this time, don't come back."

* * *

Maggie retreated to the corner while Mr. Churchill stormed out of the house.

Mother cleaned up the broken glass then sat beside Mrs. Churchill.

After Mrs. Churchill had reassured Mother that she was well, she tossed her legs over the side of the sofa and looked directly at Maggie.

"Come closer, child." Mrs. Churchill crooked a finger at Maggie. "I need to get a good look at you."

Maggie warily eyed Mother for permission. When Mother nodded, Maggie slowly walked toward Mrs. Churchill. The woman was no longer scowling, and her smile, though slight, seemed genuine.

"You have circles under your eyes. Don't you sleep?"

Maggie shrugged. "Sometimes."

When she wasn't woken by the sound of Mother sobbing beside her, or when she wasn't worrying where she and Mother would live, or when the others weren't appearing in her room in the dead of night.

Mrs. Churchill leaned toward Maggie and clutched her hand. Mrs. Churchill's hand was clammy, but Maggie did not pull away. Something in the woman's touch was soothing.

"You see things other people can't see," Mrs. Churchill said.

Maggie looked to her mother again, whose eyes were wide with what looked like shock. Maggie didn't know how to answer Mrs. Churchill, so she simply nodded.

"Do you see..." Mrs. Churchill's voice broke. She heaved a sigh before continuing. "Does my mother have a light?"

Maggie's jaw fell open. How did Mrs. Churchill know about the light? Maggie had only shared that secret with her mother.

Mrs. Churchill squeezed Maggie's hand and gave her a reassuring smile.

Maggie glanced at the old woman. Her jaw had gone slack and she was no longer stroking Thomas. She stared vacantly out the window. If the woman had a light, Maggie didn't see it. Maggie shook her head. "I don't see one."

Tears streamed down Mrs. Churchill's face. She swallowed before casting a glance at her mother. "And Thomas. Is he with her?"

"Yes. "

Mrs. Churchill wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands. "I see her stroking him sometimes. I loved that cat."

Thomas stretched his legs before jumping onto the sofa beside Mrs. Churchill and climbing into her lap. He lovingly purred while rubbing his face against her arm.

Maggie smiled before looking back up at Mrs. Churchill. "He knows."

Mrs. Churchill looked down at her lap. She raised a shaky hand and began palming the air. Thomas leaned into her hand and purred louder.

"He likes it," Maggie said.

Mrs. Churchill answered with a strangled cry. More tears streamed down her face, but she continued to palm the air.

Mother clutched her knees as her wide gaze traveled from Maggie to Mrs. Churchill and back again.

After several tense moments, Thomas finally jumped from Mrs. Churchill's lap and wandered into the kitchen.

"He's gone now," Maggie said.

Mrs. Churchill fixed Maggie with a hardened stare. "Mr. Churchill said it was an accident."

"It wasn't."

Mother finally cleared her throat and leaned toward Mrs. Churchill. "I'm sorry about all this."

"Why are you sorry?" Mrs. Churchill's voice rose several octaves. She waved a hand at Maggie. "You have a very special child."

"I-I know," Mother stammered.

Mrs. Churchill's shoulders fell. "I knew my mother didn't have much longer."

"I'm really sorry," Mother said with an edge of defeat in her voice. She slowly came to her feet. "Maggie and I should go."

"Why would you go?" Mrs. Churchill gasped before reaching up and clutching Mother's hand. "I need you here, Rebecca." She turned kind eyes toward Maggie. "I especially need _you_ , Maggie."

"Me?" Maggie barely choked out the word.

"You said it yourself. I have a dirty house. Who better to clean it?"

Maggie's knees felt weak. Could she and Mother really have found a place to stay? A home where they wouldn't be judged for Maggie's strange sight? This was too good to be true. She shook her head. "The others don't always talk to me."

"But they will, child." Mrs. Churchill's smile widened. She reached out and clasped Maggie on the shoulder. "Give them time." She stood and smoothed a hand down her wrinkled dress before pushing a few loose strands of hair behind her ears. "Rebecca," she said to Mother in a voice that left no room for argument. "You and Maggie _must_ stay. I'll double your salary."

"Double?" Mother gasped. "But what if your mother—"

"My mother's passing will be even more reason for you and Maggie to stay." Her eyes began to water again and her lower lip trembled. "Please."

Maggie looked at her mother. Her hesitant smile was reassuring. Maggie looked back at Mrs. Churchill and nodded.

Mrs. Churchill leaned over and wrapped Maggie in a strong hug. Thomas was back, purring as he rubbed against Maggie's legs.

The house was dirty, very dirty, but if Mrs. Churchill was willing to accept Maggie, maybe she would learn to like living there.

#

When Tara West isn't trying to think of something witty to say, she's busy arguing with the voices in her head.

Find her at her blog tarawestauthor.wordpress.com or follow her on Facebook and Twitter

# Safe

Emma Jameson

London, 1858

To those who ask why I done it, why Benjamin Barrow, son of a respectable rag and bone man, took to thieving from corpses, I says, "For the bleeding steven, hey?" and leave it at that. I don't spill all I know to every Champagne Charlie I meet down the pub. For one thing, half the blokes in this world are thicker than a fresh corpse and less diverting to talk to. For another, I'm an educated man, and that makes all the difference. I can read. Show me a newspaper, open a bleeding book and I'll read out any page. I can do sums and recite most of "Daffodils" by William bloody Wordsworth. So expecting me to reveal me innermost clockwork to any old sod with a pint in hand is like expecting the PM to visit Wapping of a Sunday afternoon. Expect all you please, it ain't bloody happening.

But you—you're not quite the mutton-faced fathead, that much I see. So permit me to whisper the truth in your shell-like. I didn't get in the business of grave robbing just for the money. I got in it for me principles.

Listen. There are urchins no higher than your elbow what thieve in the streets. Cut the purses of rich and poor alike, without a care for them what is inconvenienced and them what is ruined. And down a certain lane you'll find fresh young girls hanging out windows, cherries peeping above the lace, cooing to anything in trousers. The brothel-master trains them up to be regular Whores of Babylon. And don't be soft in the head—boys are hidden inside those houses as well, awaiting men of a certain appetite. Me, I never fancied thieving from strangers nor selling me own sweetmeats. But me education ended suddenly, when I were thirteen. Father went up to Jesus and suddenly there were no one to pay the fees. I apprenticed at the smithy and got on well, too, but after six months a bigger boy took me place. Couldn't find work tending bar, t'was too much competition. Couldn't feed meself on what a boot boy earned, nor stomach the monthly beatings. All that made thieving from them what shuffled off this mortal coil the perfect situation.

Is that a lip-curl I spy? A shudder? Oh, no, luv, t'will never do. Let me disabuse you, as they say in the best circles. Let me enlighten your poor provincial mind.

A grave robber is a robber only in the most academic sense. Who is injured by the grave robber's actions? The family of the dearly departed? Not bloody likely. Believe me, them vultures never plant an exalted stiff without taking their own portion first. Is Society injured? The Rule of Law? Show me how. Piles of bones get planted with riches they don't need. But I need 'em. As for the fresh corpses—those newly-dead blighters that doctors and surgeons occasionally paid me to resurrect—I got no patience for them what bleat, "It injures their dignity." Go dig up a corpse. Haul him up by his neckerchief and stare into his empty eye sockets. The dead got no dignity. Whatever made them human has passed beyond this veil of tears. At least I always thought so. But I'm getting ahead of me story.

Picture it—me, Benjamin Barrow, handsome and dapper and no more than seventeen, though me downy whiskers were in and I could pass for twenty. Dressed in clothes bought off Monmouth Street what fit good, except through the chest and shoulders. Vigorous, I was, and strong as a new ox. Met a man called Mr. Crook in a bar called The Earl's Knob. He said he needed a doughty young fellow to perform the sort of tasks what sent ordinary men running. I asked, is it lawful? Mr. Crook gave me a mouthful of yellow teeth.

"Does it matter?"

It didn't. So I turned up at Lichgate Cemetery just as the church bells rang one o' the clock, the first hour of a bleak new day. Tall, thin and dressed all in black like the gentleman he weren't, Mr. Crook awaited me.

"Where are your tools?" Mr. Crook carried a spade, a small pickax and an unlit lantern.

I shrugged.

"Take mine, then." Looking happy for the excuse, Mr. Crook handed the spade over, shifting the lantern to his other hand.

"I got matches for that." I dug in a pocket.

"Never mind. There's a full moon, and starlight besides." Mr. Crook pointed at the sky. "We shall hold the lantern in reserve as long as possible. Learn to have a care, Barrow, if you wish to prosper in this line of work."

That first night on the job gave me a right case of the shivers. In them days, Lichgate were divided in two parts—three, if you count the Potter's Field. But Mr. Crook's game weren't to dig up paupers or condemned men with stretched necks. Following information passed on by a friend in the funerary business, Mr. Crook led me direct to Lichgate's posh half, where the gold was planted.

Mind you, in them days I was so green, I'd not heard of the men who undertake burials, providing coffin, headstone, even paid mourners. In our family it were always the women what done it: washed and dressed the dead, laid the body in the parlor for viewing, baked the cakes and poured the whiskey. An uncle nailed the lid on the coffin, but otherwise death was women's business. I suppose if me mam and me Auntie Flora died on the same day, God forbid, me old dad might have hired one of them funerary sorts to take over. Elsewise, never. But the rich ain't like us. Need white coffins and white hearses and matching white ponies to bury little girls. Expect stiff beaver hats and bombazine scarves to plant men of good fortune. Want paid weepers and moon-faced children to fill out a scanty crowd or prettify a homely family. What with all the foolishness they spend their steven on, makes you wonder how they earned it in the first place, don't it?

Then there's this rubbish about decorating every corpse with baubles. The rich never heard the maxim 'you can't take it with you,' I reckon. Mr. Crook and his cohort, Mr. Dross, hated the thought of gold and silver and cut jewels sealed underground while their masters or mistresses rotted. They boasted about liberating rings and necklaces and filigreed snuff boxes like they were rescuing maiden ladies from African elephants. Mr. Dross took inventory of the items each corpse was buried with. A few days after the grave had settled, Mr. Crook crept along by night to dig up the treasures, splitting the proceeds with Mr. Dross sixty-forty.

Well. When I says Mr. Crook dug it up, I mean he supervised. A strong back like mine did all the proper work.

"Not there," Mr. Crook sneered the first time I put spade to earth. "You're just above his feet, you realize."

"What difference do it make?"

In truth, I'd started well away from the headstone on purpose. Didn't I say me first night gave me the shivers something awful? Imagine Lichgate Cemetery as it was ten years back, before the King's Road cut through. The Potter's Field were sad and silent, but peaceful. Mostly weeds and the odd marker placed by some stout soul not afraid to publicly grieve. Lichgate's patch of the respectable dead wasn't too bad, neither. Row upon row of marbles, the newer ones upright like soldiers, the old ones falling aslant as them they marked were forgotten. But the posh side of Lichgate? Them counterfeit Greek temples, fenced mausoleums and stone-faced angels thicked me blood with chill, as the poets say. Or for them what lack education—left me pissing meself.

"Barrow?" Mr. Crook's jaw tightened. "You aren't a coward, are you?"

"Course not." I stood up straighter.

"Then move up to the headstone, there's a good fellow. Mr. Dross has made a study of this, you'll find. Delve till the spade strikes wood. Don't fret about uncovering the entire coffin. Dig for the head."

It wasn't easy work, but not hard, neither, compared to me time in the smithy. I struck the coffin lid quicker than Mr. Crook reckoned. Till then we'd made do with moonlight. Now he lit the lantern, shielding it with one hand as if he hadn't already bribed the night watchman with a bottle of gin.

"Use this to break into the coffin," he said, handing me the pickax. "Do not strike too powerfully or the result may prove... distressing."

As if I hadn't guessed as much already. By lying beside the hole and dangling me arms into the grave, I pried up one side of the lid, then cracked it with a single blow. Digging me fingers under the loose edge, I tore off the exposed part of the lid and found myself staring into a woman's face.

Well. She weren't a woman anymore, precisely. Her gray hair was done in curls as if she was going to a ball, but half her face was coated with shiny green fuzz. Her nose had fallen in like something had been eating it from the inside. As I gaped at her, thanking Providence the dead woman wasn't staring back, I noticed the black thread weaving in and out of her sunken eyelids.

"Why does Mr. Dross sew their eyes shut?" I called up to Mr. Crook. By then the old woman's smell had hit me, and me stomach were doing flips.

"For your benefit, Barrow." Mr. Crook laughed. "My last associate fled when a corpse's eye came unglued and rolled open. Thought the dead man was winking at him."

I tried to laugh. I was seventeen, after all, and determined not to be called fearful. But then a long worm came sliding out of the old woman's ear, its plump segmented body slicked with the same green sprouting from her flesh. It were all I could do not to scream.

Mr. Crook opened his leather bag and withdrew a scrap of paper. Holding it at arm's length, he read, "Gold necklace with ruby pendant. Opal ring, right hand. Two silver rings, left hand. The gown, watered silk, is unlikely to be salvageable, but her shoes and stockings are particularly fine."

I could see the pendant, of course, but the rest of the corpse was still in the coffin—and still underground, not to put too fine a point on it. Tossing the pickax on the grass, I reached for the shovel. Mr. Crook cleared his throat.

"Never mind that. Be a good fellow and loop this under her arms," he said, withdrawing a coiled length of rope from his bag and passing it down. " _Not_ around her neck, mind. That approach has proven flawed."

It were no treat, getting that cozy with a dead woman, but I did as I was told, concentrating on the coarse rope against me fingers instead of her mottled green face. Her mouth fell open, showing a fat black tongue, and one of her arms gave way with an audible pop. Still, I knotted the rope in place, careful not to touch her bosom any more than I had to. Sure she was dead, but she was still a lady, and I was raised right.

"Secure," I told Mr. Crook.

He lifted his eyebrows. "Surely you don't expect me to take over. On your feet, lad. Haul her up."

And that, me new friend, is how Mr. Crook taught me to ply me new trade without breaking me back three times a night. Dig for the head, crack open the lid, tie a rope under the corpse's shoulders and pull like Samson. But in them early days, I was a bit too strong and far too eager. When I pulled that first body out of the coffin, her foot caught on the interior and snapped right off. It wouldn't have mattered, except the foot still had the shoe on it. Didn't I tell you Mr. Crook weren't no gentleman? Cursed fit to wake the dead. Threatened to deduct half a crown from me wages, but I didn't care. As I brought her up, something foul and black leaked from betwixt her legs, staining her silk dress something monstrous. The worms had been at her from within, don't you know, and that poxy juice was all that was left of her innards. The moment the stench hit me, I started to heave. By the time I finished, Mr. Crook had removed the ruby pendant and rings, tucking them into his coat pocket.

"As I feared, the dress cannot be salvaged," he said. "If you're quite finished being sick, put her back in the earth. And for Heaven's sake, remove the rope first. It cost two bob."

I got her back in the ground and covered over as quick as a flash, desperate to bury that smell. "Should we say a prayer?"

Mr. Crook only laughed. "Prayer is for righteous men. Come along, Barrow. We've one more treasure chest to unearth before the night is out."

And that was me initiation into the grave robbing business. For the next three years we worked together, taking the train to Basildon or Luten for a bit of variety, or to lie low, as it were, when the Peelers were in force. If the Duke of Bugger All said a rude word in Parliament, that was all the newspapers cared to print. But if the weather were calm and the tall pieces on the chessboard played fair, grave robbing was a favorite headline. Families were placing watchmen over fresh graves; some amateur down Dunstable way got nicked by one and hanged. Bribing night watchmen and skulking around in a black topcoat with soot on me face weren't enough. We needed a canary for our particular coalmine, if you mark me. I told Mr. Crook I knew just the boy.

"Saw him steal a meat pie off the cart, right under the seller's nose. Mind you, when the boy tried to lift me own purse, I caught him by the scruff and boxed his ears. That's the trouble with all these rubbish stories in Bentley's Miscellany. Every urchin takes the notion he's the Artful bloody Dodger."

"Yet I presume you feel this failed pickpocket may yet be of some use?" Mr. Crook looked at me over his half-glasses. Three years of living off the dead had ruined him for tolerating ordinary working men like meself. He'd acquired even finer airs, with a shiny gold pocket watch at his waist and new set of false teeth behind them razor-thin lips. He could have let me to run the nightly business—I could read Mr. Dross's list as well as any—but Mr. Crook were too suspicious not to collect the baubles himself. If he'd been willing to oversee matters from his snug townhouse in Clerkenwell, he'd still be above ground today, I reckon. But that's the trouble with thieving. Makes you believe the worst of others, even your fellow thieves.

"Oh, aye, Mr. Crook. The boy's called Jack and he'll be just the ticket. Fifteen but small for his age, hardly comes up to me shoulder. Skinny as piano wire but not so high strung." I paused, waiting for Mr. Crook to crack a smile, but the man were granite. How could a man pretend to be a gentleman, yet refuse to appreciate a well-turned phrase?

"As I was saying." I cleared me throat. "This boy didn't let me boxing his ears detract him none. Next day he were stealing from the pie cart again, bold as brass. Saw me eye on him and ducked away. Crept up behind me not five minutes later and whispered, 'I'll nick one for you if you buy me a tot of gin.'"

"Young drunkards invariably end on the scaffold, Barrow. You know that."

"Not a drunkard, Mr. Crook, just a boy in search of a wee nip. Gave him a penny to shine me shoes. Next day, another penny to deliver a message. He's an orphan, keen for work and fit for nothing. Reckon he'll freeze solid on a street corner, come January, if we don't train him up."

"Such sentimentality." Mr. Crook sighed. "Barrow, we seek an utterly expendable boy to be caught, should the operation go awry, sparing you and I our own appointments with the Black Hat," he said, meaning the cap what judges don before pronouncing the sentence of death. "I have no notion of establishing a home for wayward boys. Should I consent to engage the services of this Jack, it shall be with a solitary aim—to sacrifice him when necessary. Is that understood?"

"Oh, aye, Mr. Crook."

Off I went to find Jack and tell him he'd found an apprenticeship at long last. The boy didn't flinch when I told him all Mr. Crook had said, including the bit about sacrifice.

"This job will keep you fed," I said. "Keep you warm and dry. Provide you with proper clothes, a cap and boots what fit. But it won't be safe. Might even be the death of you."

"Or the making of me." For such a runt, Jack was a stout fellow, game for his chance no matter how steep the odds. I don't mean he were hard, exactly, like Mr. Crook were hard, especially since he'd grown so prosperous. I mean Jack were accepting of the world as it was, knowing there was no mercy in it, not in the end. Of course, I expected him to jump at the offer of nightly work, fetching and carrying for Mr. Crook and Mr. Dross between digs. Remember those boys in the brothels, wretched little blighters? Or boys hanged for stealing food. Boys starving in garrets or floating down the stinking Thames, just another waterlogged bit of rubbish. Jack was determined not to end like them.

"Mind you, never forget that time I boxed your ears," I told Jack that night before letting him sleep on the rug before me fire. "Steal from me again and I'll beat you bloody. We're friends now, and friends deal fair, one to another."

"Friends," Jack agreed. He did his best to sound bluff and manly, but I suspected it were a put-on. Probably he was thirteen, not fifteen. Still and all, thirteen is a good age for a man to begin earning his daily bread. From that day forward, Jack was one of us, but specially loyal to yours truly.

That autumn, a friend of Mr. Dross, Mr. Pepper by name, shut down his funerary business, intent on living out his final days by the seashore. Until then, he'd avoided the temptation to steal from them he planted, but now that he were leaving London, he wanted to feather his future nest. Lacking the courage or experience to do the job alone, he brought in Mr. Crook and Mr. Dross as partners. After supper they gathered in Mr. Crook's office, the coal fire almost out, a oil lamp glowing yellow on the table between them. Jack was forbidden, of course, but I were allowed to sit in a corner and listen.

"Her name was Lucy Hale Hammersly. Her remains rest in the Hale family crypt. I placed her there myself, three years back," Mr. Pepper said. "Her death was a scandal, though her husband and her father paid to keep it out of the papers, except in the vaguest possible terms."

"Suicide, I'll warrant," Mr. Dross said wisely. If you're ever in need of a gloomy suggestion, Mr. Dross is your man.

"Indeed. Poor girl ate strychnine. Great handfuls, from the look of her corpse." Glancing around the office as if he might be overheard, Mr. Pepper lowered his voice. "Her father forced her to marry John Hammersly. You may have seen him at the Exchange, haggling over ha'pennies. A thin man, over-proud of his figure. Used to shut Lucy in her room when she ate too much at dinner. After a year of marriage, she went from a buxom, rosy girl to a shade of herself."

"Shameful." Mr. Crook sounded bored. "I presume the family buried her lavishly to expiate their guilt?"

"Like Croesus's tomb," Mr. Pepper said. "Mr. Hale surrounded his daughter with all the things she'd loved in childhood. Vases, figurines, oil paintings in gilded frames. A proper boudoir for a lady to inhabit whilst she awaits Gideon's trumpet. But the real treasure was placed in the tomb with her. Ruby ear-bobs. Garnet rings and bracelets. A great faceted ruby pendant on a golden chain. Being in the trade," Mr. Pepper smiled weakly, "there's little in this world that unsettles me. But seeing Lucy decked out like an empress, with her lips burned away by strychnine and her hands frozen into claws?" He shook his head. "Still gives me the chills to remember her lying there, grinning."

"You needn't look on such unpleasantness a second time," Mr. Crook said. "Leave it to me and my man Barrow. Sixty percent to me. Twenty to Mr. Dross for the introduction. Twenty to you, Mr. Pepper, for the information. That sounds perfectly fair, does it not?" With the lamplight full on his face, Mr. Crook's friendliest grin could give any corpse a run for its money. Mr. Pepper didn't look happy, but he agreed all the same.

That night I dreamt of Lucy Hale Hammersly. She wasn't dead and rotting, but fresh and lovely as an angel. Dressed all in flowing white, she were, with a gold circlet on her brow like a princess and rings glittering on her fingers. Her tomb was open, the granite slab pushed aside. And the crypt were just like Mr. Pepper said, a perfect lady's boudoir, with chair and vanity, silver-plated brush and mirror. I could see it all, though I had no candle. White light shimmered on her perfect skin; golden light spilled from her yellow hair.

"Till death do us part. I've parted from John," Lucy said.

"Aye." It was all I could manage. I've always been tongue-tied round pretty girls.

"He wasn't my choice. So many men in this wide world. Men I've never tasted."

I nodded. Usually it were whores what talked like that, but from Lucy the words sounded like a tinkling music box.

"I'm famished," Lucy said. "No man shall escape my kiss. Simply famished..."

"Mr. Barrow!"

I sat up in bed, Jack standing over me. He'd shaken me awake.

"You were moaning."

"I don't doubt it," I muttered. First worthwhile dream in a fortnight and the little bugger ruined it.

At midnight, we sent Jack to Lichgate cemetery with a bottle of gin for the night watchman and a crude map of the grounds, the Hale crypt marked with an X. Jack was to go there first, of course, and be nicked if things went wrong. I gave him a meat pie wrapped in wax paper and a word of advice.

"Old Lichgate is posh. Scout the other crypts while you're about it. Who says you and I might not make a secret visit some night?"

That pricked Jack's ears up. "Just you and me? Fifty-fifty?"

"If you find a good bet." In high good humor, I saw the boy off. What can I say? Foresight has never been me strong suit.

Mr. Crook, Mr. Dross, his man Trimble and I passed through Lichgate's east gate just as the Mr. Crook's pocket watch chimed one o'clock. Ordinarily Mr. Dross and Trimble, a dour ex-gravedigger, did not accompany us unless the job was of particular interest. But given the amount of portable wealth we expected to uncover, two extra pairs of hands seemed wise. I carried an ax and a lantern; Trimble had a crowbar and half a dozen empty flour sacks.

"Mr. Barrow!" Jack's whisper carried in the crisp autumn night. His slight figure waved from just outside a tall stone temple's iron fence. "The map weren't right. The Hale crypt is here!"

Mr. Crook made a disapproving noise. He'd sketched the map himself during a daytime visit. "Nonsense." Black coat flapping behind him, he marched to the crypt his map indicated. "I think you'll find this is the..."

He stopped. Mr. Dross said nothing. Trimble waited, oblivious, but I read the family name, KEARNS, by lamplight.

"Over here!" Jack called again.

Drawing himself up, Mr. Crook went toward the boy. I saw Jack smile, saw HALE inscribed over the crypt's lintel. Then Mr. Crook struck Jack with his silver-topped walking stick.

"Impertinence! Do you think I took you on to be corrected by the likes of you?"

"Sorry, sir," Jack said around a mouthful of blood. He was on his knees, hands up to ward off another blow.

"I was not mistaken! Is a simple map too much for you?"

"Sorry." Jack kept his hands up.

"Mr. Crook." I shouldered me way between me employer and Jack as the boy spit out a broken tooth. "Perhaps we ought to get on with the job? Shouting may attract attention. Send us home empty-handed."

Mr. Crook caught hold of himself. The only thing more powerful than his vanity was his greed. "Fair point. Get us into the crypt, Barrow. Jack—remain here. Keep watch, and meditate on the great virtue of silence."

With a swing of me ax, I broke the chain wrapped round gate and post. The hinges squealed as I pushed the gate open. If the Hale family ever paid their respects, they did so from outside the iron fence, it seemed.

The crypt door was padlocked, too, in the events of thieves spry enough to climb the spike-tipped fence. It took three tries to break the heavy lock. As it finally dropped, I turned to find Mr. Crook a handbreadth away, lantern raised high. Long as I'd worked for him, he still never took his eyes off me, not once we were close enough to smell the gold.

"After you, sir."

The door creaked when Mr. Crook pushed against it, opening less than halfway. Something inside the crypt was blocking it—something heavy, I judged, when I put me shoulder against the door and still couldn't budge it. Still, there was plenty of room for a thin man like Mr. Crook to pass, and barely enough space for me and Trimble, if we each turned sideways. Mr. Dross waited outside, shielding his lantern with a gloved hand.

"Damnation!" Mr. Crook's cry echoed inside the crypt. "It's already been sacked!"

I saw what he meant. The oil paintings were slashed to bits. The lady's vanity was destroyed, legs broken, dusted with the sparkling remnants of delicate figurines and mirrored glass. Even the pouf's cushions had been ripped apart, stuffing tossed here and there. With every step, another fragment of porcelain, no doubt from broken vases, crunched under me feet. And the tomb had been opened. Just like in me dream, the granite slab were pushed half askew, blocking the door from opening properly.

"Barrow, go round the tomb. Have a look at those," Mr. Crook said, pointing at a heaped pile of what had once been ladies' finery. Shredded gingham, ripped cotton flounces, silk and bombazine and seersucker still decorated with lace, a wardrobe fit for a duchess reduced to a mountain of rubbish.

"Will there be anything left inside?" Trimble asked Mr. Crook, pointing at the tomb as I worked me way around it.

"How in Heaven's name am I expected to answer that? Use your head, you great lout," Mr. Crook snapped. "Have a look and see."

Up close, the pile of ruined frocks and ball gowns looked unfit for anything, except perhaps stuffing for soft dolls. Wet and foul-smelling, most of it seemed to have been gnawed by rats. Was it damp from rain water? I glanced at the crypt's ceiling, expecting to find a leak.

"Mr. Crook?" Trimble sounded uncertain. "I think I see..."

I looked at the tomb at the same moment Mr. Crook did. I saw Trimble hold up a golden ring set with a winking red jewel. But before I could say, "well done," a claw-like hand closed over me wrist.

"Famished," a voice said as the rag-heap shuddered, falling away to reveal the creature inside. Pointed fingernails cut into me as she arose, naked and skeletal, skin like gray parchment over jutting bones.

"Christ Almighty!" The ax was stuck in me belt, but the thing that had once been Lucy Hammersly had me by the right hand, meaning me brains might as well have been in Dover, for all the use I had of them. I pitched the lantern at her just as Trimble, bless his ex-gravedigger's soul, struck her arm with the crowbar hard enough to break her grip and spare me life.

As I stumbled back, free, the lantern crashed near that pile of chewed-up rags. Even as it broke open, snuffing itself in the dampness, I suddenly understood why they stank. Lucy had stuffed them all in her lipless, grinning mouth.

"Famished!" she shrieked, leaping to catch Trimble's face in both hands. It were obscene, how she clung to him, bare legs wrapped around his waist, fastening her teeth on his lips and growling with every jerk of the head.

No man shall escape my kiss...

Making strangled noises, Trimble tried to shake her off, crashing backward into the tomb as she held fast. With a cry of triumph, Lucy lifted her head. The red, pulpy thing in her mouth was Trimble's upper lip. She sucked it down like an oyster. Then both thumbs dug into Trimble's eye sockets as those bloodstained teeth clamped down again.

You may think me daft, but until that second, I don't think I'd cottoned on that Lucy was real. Perhaps I thought I was dreaming. Perhaps I thought I'd gone mad. But only when Lucy tore off Trimble's nose, gnawing wildly, did I realize I was still crouched in the corner. Mr. Crook, also frozen, seemed to come to the same conclusion as Lucy spit out the gristly nose and tore open Trimble's throat. He started for the door just as Jack appeared.

"Mr. Dross legged it when he heard—" The boy broke off, staring. Blood pumped everywhere, pooling around the open tomb from Trimble's still body as Lucy lifted her face, looking at Mr. Crook and Jack.

"Praise God." Seizing Jack, Mr. Crook slung the boy at Lucy. He collided with the tomb and sprawled, dazed, as Lucy leapt down, abandoning Trimble's corpse to stare at Jack.

"Men." Her voice seemed channeled from someplace far away; her bony frame, coated in blood from head to toe, shook with a queer vitality. Any grave robber will tell you, an old corpse is a fragile thing, but whatever fueled her limbs was a match for me own strength, easy.

"Only men." Turning away from Jack, Lucy launched herself out of the crypt in Mr. Crook's wake.

In me rush to Jack's side, I slipped in Trimble's blood and nearly brained meself on the open tomb. The crypt reeked of copper, shit and vomit. I was grateful only the latter belonged to me.

"She's a ghoul," Jack said. Leave it to a child to know an impossible thing's correct name.

"Never mind that. What are you really called?"

"Mary."

From the graveyard, a man screamed. Lucy had caught up with Mr. Crook.

"All right, Mary," I said, wondering how I'd ever failed to ken my undersized apprentice was a girl. "When we go out that door, you're to fetch help. If the gate is blocked, climb the fence and run till your lungs are bursting."

"What about you?"

"Never mind."

Getting to me feet, I hauled the girl up, looking hard into her eyes. "Remember. Through the gate or over the fence. Run."

I stuck my head out first, in case Lucy were lying in wait. Didn't I say the dead have no dignity? Mr. Crook were proof of that. He was splayed on his back, shirt and waistcoat torn open, Lucy rooting inside his belly like a pig in the garden. Catching something in her teeth, she tugged and tugged, unspooling his bowels in long pale lengths before starting to chew.

"Mr. Barrow," Mary whispered. She still sounded like Jack to me, full of put-on swagger so habitual, it were almost real. "Your ax is stuck in your belt."

"Oh, aye."

"You could cut off her head."

I stared at Mr. Crook. His mouth gaped wide open, false teeth a few feet away. Lucy still feasted, pulling out more lengths of bowel and biting them in two. "You reckon she'll stand still for that?"

" _Oi!_ " Mary cried. " _Oi! Ghoul!_ "

Spitting out something foul, Lucy turned our way. Her grinning face was smeared with more than blood.

"Here's a man!" Mary pointed at me.

Lucy rose, still emaciated except for her distended belly. I had the notion she would gobble flesh till she exploded and perhaps still not stop, even then. Lifting those claw-like hands, she started to run for me, but Mary was quicker. Down the crypt steps the girl ran, flinging her arms around Lucy and propelling them both to the ground. To this day I can't swear how the ax got in me hand, or how me feet found the courage to carry me to Lucy. Probably it were Mary, truth be told. It's hard to be a coward with a little girl watching. Even as Lucy seized Mary by the throat, I swung the ax hard and true. Lucy's head popped off like a snake's, eyes blinking and teeth snapping. It still took all me strength to pry her fingers off Mary's neck.

"I knew there'd be evil things in graveyards," Mary muttered when she could spare the breath.

"I don't know if she meant to be evil." Now that Lucy's corpse had fallen quiet, I could hardly tear me gaze away. Her body curled up like a salted slug while the eyes of her severed head rolled up and her tongue peeked out. "Starvation brings madness."

"I nearly starved last April, when me mam passed." Mary lifted her chin. "Put on me brother's spare suit and worked for me bread, I did."

"Ah, well," I said. "The rich are different."

Before we left Lichgate, I took custody of Mr. Crook's gold pocket watch and set of false teeth. The sale of them set me up in business, don't you know. And I never lost a hour's sleep over it. But after seeing Lucy Hale Hammersly arise by night, I never stole from the dead again. How could I pry open a crypt or dig up a coffin, knowing what might await me? Besides, I had Mary to consider. We couldn't abide under one roof, even with her sleeping on the rug before my fire, knowing what I knew. So I made her Mrs. Barrow, bought us a little house in Clerkenwell and devised a new trade—a form of blacksmithing special to the funerary trade. Have you seen the mort-safe? Often imitated, my friend, but invented by me, Benjamin Barrow. An iron cage locked around a grave or tomb or crypt door, sold to the masses to keep grave robbers at bay. But only a few know the device's true purpose. Not to keep corpses preserved beneath ground, but to keep the living safe from the horrors hidden below.

#

Emma Jameson, author of the Lord & Lady Hetheridge mystery series, doesn't really dig up corpses, but that's only because she lost her shovel!

Find her at her blog stephanieabbottbooks.com or follow her on Facebook and Twitter

# Cupcake Goddess: Soulfully Sweet

Shéa MacLeod

"What idiot invented this stupid holiday anyway?" Branwen snarled as the doorbell rang for the third time in as many minutes. She yanked open the door, a half eaten cupcake in one hand. "Whaddya want?"

"Trick or treat!" A chorus of tiny voices called out as little hands held up bags to receive their goodies. Half a dozen pairs of eyes locked onto her cupcake.

"Give me a break, kids. You're not getting my cupcake. And if you think I'm going to give you a treat for spending the last year annoying me, you've got another thing coming." And with that she unceremoniously slammed the door in their faces.

Okay, so maybe she'd been a little mean, but she was the freaking goddess of love and beauty, for crying out loud. It was bad enough she was stuck in some Podunk town with less power than a pixie, thanks to humanity's extremely short memory. She was not about to pander to the whims of the locals.

She'd just settled back on the couch to watch an episode of Storage Wars when yet another knock sounded. Muttering a few choice curses under her breath, Branwen stormed to the door and threw it open. "Listen, you brats, I told you..."

There was no one there.

"What the...Are you brats playing pranks again? I swear I will turn you into toads."

"Oh, don't do that." The voice that came out of the darkness was breathy with a Southern edge.

"Who's there? Answer me," Branwen demanded.

"Have you forgotten me so soon?" The hollowness of the voice almost sounded like...like it had no body.

A memory flashed through Branwen's mind. A trip to Kentucky nearly a century ago. A woman in a blue summer dress. A terrible accident. A ghost begging to return to the living.

Branwen very nearly dropped her cupcake. Instead she smeared frosting across half her face.

"Viola, is that you?"

A face shimmered into view, like a dim reflection on rippling water, followed by the rest of her body. "Yes. You remember."

Branwen sighed. "Of course, I remember." She remembered everyone who came to her for help.

"I've been searching for you for ages. I was trapped in the dark for so long and I couldn't find you." The ghost wrung her pale hands together, her slender body shaking. Branwen wasn't sure if it was fear, nerves, or excitement. She supposed all of the above if the poor thing had been stuck in between for so long.

"Yeah, I moved to Washington," Branwen said, swiping a glob of frosting off her cheek. "I thought I told you to move on. You know, go into the light and all that crap."

"It's not fair. I didn't get a chance to _live_." Viola's voice held sorrow and anger. Branwen could understand both. The girl had died so very young.

"I'm sorry, Viola, but the whole life and death business is way above my pay grade. There's nothing I can do but tell you to get going. You don't belong on this side anymore."

"Please, Branwen. You must be able to do something."

"I can't."

"I'm not leaving until you do." Viola stomped her foot which promptly sank through the floor. With a snort of disgust, the ghost yanked her foot out, making a slight sucking sound.

Great. She had a stubborn ghost on her hands. The last thing she needed was some Southern belle haunting her for the rest of eternity.

Branwen sighed. "All right. Let me send a letter to Headquarters. Maybe I can convince them to do something."

Viola smiled. "Excellent. I'll wait." Her image shimmered and disappeared, but Branwen had no doubt the ghost of the dead girl would stick nice and close.

As she powered up her laptop, she ran through her options. Normally she'd just send a text, but this was a more complicated and delicate situation. She needed to make sure HQ understood what was at stake. Mainly, her ass being haunted.

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard. What to say? Inspiration struck and with a smile, Branwen pounded out a quick email explaining the situation and her suggestion for action.

Within minutes she had her answer:

You have 24 hours.

Branwen smiled. That was all she needed.

* * *

Branwen sat in the dark, surrounded by candles while Viola's specter hung in the corner. The candles were completely superfluous, of course, but they created atmosphere. And Branwen was a goddess, for crying out loud. Atmosphere was practically a requirement.

Granted she hadn't had the power to pull off this kind of caper in at least a thousand years. But fortunately HQ had granted her just enough just this once. She practically giggled with glee, but managed to keep a solemn expression for the sake of her non-corporeal guest. Standards must be maintained, after all.

"Viola, draw near." Branwen let the power of a true goddess seep into her voice.

With a shiver, Viola's ghost drew closer into the circle of candle light. Her passing stirred the candle flame.

"Take my hand."

Viola gave her a look that spoke volumes. "I'm a ghost."

"And I'm a goddess. Take my hand."

With a shrug the ghost placed her slender hand into Branwen's pudgy one. The minute they touched, Viola turned solid.

"Oh my." Viola glanced down at herself and practically squealed in excitement. "I'm alive!"

"Not yet. You're only solid because I'm touching you. Close your eyes."

Viola did as she was told and Branwen mumbled a few words in ancient Welsh. It was all for show, of course, but humans, even dead ones, liked a bit of ceremony with their magic. The actual words were lyrics to a raunchy drinking song.

"Okay, done. You can open your eyes."

Viola's eyelids flew open. "I'm real? Alive? Not a ghost anymore?"

"Yep."

"Is it permanent?"

Clever minx. "Depends."

"On what?"

A little smile curved Branwen's lips. "On whether you want it to be."

"Oh, I do," Viola insisted.

"We'll see," Branwen said. "Meet me back here this time tomorrow and I will make this permanent. _If_ you want it to be."

* * *

Viola stepped outside and sucked in a deep lungful of fresh air. That was promptly followed by a coughing fit as a large metal monster roared by spewing black smoke and giving her heart palpations.

Car, she reminded herself. It was a car, not a monster, and the smoke was...well, okay that was smoke, more or less. Why people insisted on driving such things was beyond her. What was wrong with a perfectly good horse and carriage she wanted to know?

She gave another very unladylike hack to clear her lungs and continued down the sidewalk, taking in the wonders of the night. It was such a relief to be able to take a stroll without someone walking through her or a random body part getting stuck in the pavement. Granted in her day a young lady would never walk alone, especially at night. But times had changed and she'd have to change with them if she was going to live in this era.

Viola almost gasped aloud as a pair of women about her age crossed the street in front of her. Their incredibly short skirts showed off legs covered in holey stockings all the way up to...well, their _unmentionables_... and their tops showed off so much of their décolletage it was a wonder anything was left to the imagination. She had no idea how they managed to walk with spikes on their shoes, either. These must be ladies of the night!

She held back a quiver of excitement. She'd never met any ladies of the night before.

One of the women called out, "Nice costume. Where'd you get it?"

Costume? Viola glanced down at her full skirts and bodice. "My maid sewed them for me."

The two ladies of the night glance at each other with raised eyebrows. "Way to stay in character, girl." They giggled. "You must really love Halloween."

Viola had spent the last hundred years thinking of this night as simply the night when the veil between worlds was thinnest. She usually ran around trying to find someone with the power to bring her back. She'd forgotten it was a human holiday. They must think she was headed to a ball or some such.

"Thank you. I like your costumes, as well," she said politely.

One of the women snorted. "These ain't costumes, chicky. These are our uniforms. We're waitresses down at the diner." She pointed down the street to a perfectly ordinary eating establishment. "We're off to get into our costumes now. We're going as hookers and our boyfriends are going as pimps. Won't that be awesome?"

They laughed and waved as they made their way down the street leaving Viola staring at them. If their current outfits were their work clothes, she couldn't imagine what true ladies of the night wore in this day and age. Did this mean she had to dress in such hideous clothing, too? Exposing her flesh like some...some...

"Don't be judgmental, Viola," she whispered to herself. "If you want to live in this world you better learn to fit in." Still, the very thought of wearing such skimpy clothes, or looking at other people in them, made her shudder.

Another metal monster careened by, a heavy thumping sound coming from the interior. The noise made her head throb and she nearly jumped out of her skin as the driver blasted his horn.

"Hey, bitch, get outta the road!" someone yelled out the window. The yell was followed by an empty beer bottle which narrowly avoided hitting her in the head. Instead it hit the pavement and smashed into tiny shards.

One of the bits of glass bounced back, slicing open a tiny cut on her hand. The sharp sting was a shock. She hadn't felt pain in so long she'd forgotten what it felt like. It was only a small cut, but it frightened her. So many horrible things could happen to a person. So much pain. How could she forget the pain of being human?

She realized suddenly she had nowhere to go. No friends. No family. No home. Everyone she knew was long dead. She didn't even have any money and she had no idea how to get any.

Another pain hit, this time in her stomach. For a moment she couldn't figure out what was wrong. Was she dying? Again?

Then she realized she was hungry. Starving, in fact.

Without conscious thought, her feet turned toward the diner the women had pointed out. Inside it was bright and warm and clean. It smelled like bacon and bread and other delicious things.

Her stomach let out a grumble and Viola felt her cheeks heating. Ladies did not have growly stomachs.

"Can I help ya, hon?"

This waitress was marginally more respectable. Her skirt actually went to her knees and her blouse was buttoned up nearly to her throat. She gave Viola a tired smile.

"I...no. Sorry, I don't have any money."

"Unemployed, huh?"

"Yes. That's right." Viola was a little vague on the exact meaning of the word, but she caught the gist.

The waitress gave a tisk of sympathy. "These are hard times for everyone. Well, why don't you sit down for a bit, take a load off. I think I can rustle you up something on the down low." She gave Viola a wink and sashayed off to the kitchen.

Viola had only understood half of what the waitress had said, but she knew enough to take a seat at one of the booths. She flinched as someone turned up what she assumed passed for music, the loud screeching and thumping grating against her ears like nails on a chalkboard.

The waitress plopped down a plate and a glass. "There ya go, hon. Best I can do. But it's better than nothing."

"Thank you."

Viola eyed the plate warily. It contained what appeared to be bread and butter, except the bread was very white and thinly sliced. She took a delicate bite. It tasted faintly of paste and paper, not that she'd ever tried either, but it tasted like they smelled. And people called this bread? The butter was little better, tasting nothing like any butter she'd ever tried. Still, she politely ate every crumb washing it down with the strange brown liquid she found in the glass. It was sickeningly sweet and the bubbles tickled her nose.

Cola. She remembered it from the little drug store around the corner from her home. But it didn't taste like this cola. This cola tasted...fake.

As she finished her sad little repast, a group of young men entered the diner. Their voices were loud and every other word was a shocking vulgarity. Yet, no one took any notice. Apparently swearing loudly in public was perfectly normal. As was kicking the waste basket over, swearing at the waitress, and getting in a fight with the cook.

When one of the young men pulled a knife, Viola flew out the door and into the night, fear flooding her body with adrenaline. What a horrible, violent world this was.

A respectable looking man in a sharply pressed suit strode by, talking loudly. To himself. They let insane people out in public?

A shrill siren split the air, causing her to clap her hands over her ears. What now?

Another metal monster roared up and screeched to a halt in front of the diner she'd just left. Men in blue uniforms spilled out. And they had guns!

Viola didn't wait to see what happened next, she took off running, forgetting completely that ladies didn't run. She dashed across the street, nearly getting plastered by yet another metal monster. She barely noticed the driver, blaring his horn and cussing at her.

She finally arrived at Branwen's building. Rushing inside, she dashed up the stairs until she arrived, out of breath, at the goddess's door. She banged on the door with all her might.

* * *

Branwen was finally unwinding after her little ghost adventure. She had her pajamas on, a box of mini cupcakes at hand, and _Hunger Games_ on DVD. What more could a goddess want?

A sudden and violent banging broke out. Apparently, peace and quiet.

With a few choice cuss words (in Welsh, of course), she got up and answered the door. It was the ghost. Well, the former ghost.

"I already gave you what you wanted. Come back tomorrow." She started to close the door.

"Wait, Branwen, please. I need you to take it back."

Branwen stared at Viola in shock. The girl's eyes were wild and her dark brown hair was sticking up in a dozen different directions. There was a small cut on her hand and she stank of beer and diner grease.

Repressing her smile, Branwen waved the former ghost inside. "You want me to take it back, huh?"

"Yes, please."

"What, so you can haunt my ass for eternity? No thanks."

Viola grabbed her by the arm. "Please. I promise, if you turn me back I will go into the light. Like you told me to all those years ago."

Branwen raised an eyebrow as she sank back onto the couch. "What made you change your mind?"

Viola shook her head. "This world isn't for me. This isn't my place or my time. Everyone I know is gone. Everything is changed. I don't fit in here. I had my chance at life. It wasn't much of one, but it was mine and this isn't." Her expression was sad, but determined.

Branwen allowed the smile to appear. It hadn't even taken the full twenty-four hours. "All right then, go into the light."

Viola blinked. "What?"

Branwen pointed at a bright orb that suddenly appeared, hovering in the middle of the living room. "There it is. You want it? Take it."

Viola frowned at the glowing ball. "But I'm alive, how can I go into the light?"

Branwen sighed. "I'm a goddess, remember. You've got thirty seconds. Either go or stay. Your choice."

"Can I have a cupcake for the road?" Viola asked, eyeing the box.

Branwen grinned. She loved a fellow sweet-tooth and she felt kind of bad for tricking the girl. HQ would have never allowed Viola to stay human, but it was better the girl came to the decision on her own.

"Sure." She held up the box. Viola grabbed a chocolate cupcake and took a delicate bite.

"Best cupcake I ever had."

"I know right?"

The girl started to reach for another, but Branwen stopped her. "Enjoy the one you have. I'm sure they have much better cupcakes where you're going."

With a nod, Viola stepped toward the glowing orb. With a flash, orb and girl were gone leaving behind no trace of their passing save a half eaten cupcake lying in the middle of the living room floor.

#

Shéa MacLeod is obsessed with ghosts and cupcakes. Not necessarily in that order.

Find more information on Shéa and her books at sheamacleod.wordpress.com, or follow her on  Facebook and Twitter

# May I Go Play?

Heather Marie Adkins

The hulking structure sat at an intersection in Savannah: empty, abandoned, shadowed. It was the kind of place that exuded despair and neglect. An unwanted orphan or a forgotten time capsule of an age past. The hot Georgia sun couldn't penetrate the thick gloom that blanketed the property, just as the natives didn't penetrate the thick, barred wall that surrounded it.

Heart fluttering wildly, Micah Noble shifted on her feet, staring at the key ring in her hand.

"It's just a house," her husband said softly. Garrett was always the optimist, and the skeptic—a psychology professor with five degrees on the wall and an ever-present five o'clock shadow. Stick thin, tall as a bean pole, and handsome; but not in any traditional sense. His glasses always seemed to be falling down his nose, and there was a gap between his front teeth that he whistled through even though it drove her nuts.

Micah shook her head, her thick blonde hair moving over her shoulders like a caress of fingers. She shuddered. "It isn't just a house."

Garrett glanced over his shoulder. Elliott sat in the backseat of the SUV with Sticks on her lap, his black-and-white snout panting through the open window. Assured that their daughter wasn't listening, Garrett murmured, "Micah, this house did not kill your great aunt. It belongs to you now. Push away your family's silly legends, and let's go see what condition it's in."

She wanted to argue. She wanted to snap that he hadn't heard the fear in her mother's voice two months earlier when Micah called to tell her.

* * *

"What? My mother left you Bowridge?" Momma Jean gasped.

"Yeah." Micah flipped a page in the packet her lawyer had given her. "The house, property, and any possessions inside. According to Skinner & Fulsom's appraisal, the contents of Bowridge are worth a lot of money. This could be the answer to all our prayers."

Micah glanced around the tiny apartment. The kitchen bled into the living room, which bled into two bedrooms. A family couldn't make a home in a place like this; Elliott needed better.

There was a long silence on the other end of the line. Micah could hear the faint sound of a television in the background. She glanced at the clock—three in the afternoon. She'd interrupted her mother's soaps.

"Honey pie, you don't want that house," Jean finally murmured. "That house is evil."

"It's gorgeous, Mom." Micah flipped to the full-color picture in the back of the packet. An off-white Greek revival with a bit of weather damage.

"Why on earth would Momma leave you that house?" Jean murmured, and Micah had a feeling the question wasn't truly directed at her.

"Because neither you nor your sisters wanted it."

"She should have burned it to the ground," Jean said sharply.

"Mother."

Jean lowered her voice. "You know what happened to your great aunt, Millie."

Sighing, Micah sat the packet aside. "I know, Mom. But Aunt Millie killed herself. How long are you and your sisters going to blame Bowridge for Millie's actions?"

"We blame Bowridge because it was the direct source of all of Millie's problems," her mother snapped. "Micah Louise, if you move my granddaughter into that hell house, I will sue you for custody."

"Oh, Mother." Micah sighed again. "No, you won't."

But the seed was planted. Micah began to remember her mother's tales, and the way 'the aunts' spoke of Bowridge in hushed tones. And in the months leading up to their move, Micah became a believer.

* * *

A stairway led from the cracked sidewalk to a door of heavy wood and stained glass. Beneath the regal, swirling staircase, a gated door—closed and padlocked—hid the servant's entrance on the lower floor. The circular gate gaped like the house's jaws, eternally screaming.

Micah stared up at three stories, the stucco exterior, and a gabled roof. Bowridge sat on a stately square with heavy traffic in downtown Savannah, surrounded by other equally magnificent southern mansions. Fifty years ago, it was probably one of the most beautiful homes in the neighborhood. Now...

Now it watched her.

When she didn't acknowledge his assurance that Bowridge was "just a house," Garrett swiped the key from her open palm—"Now or never, love."—and swept up the crumbling stairs.

Micah waited a moment as a shiver ran up her spine. Then she followed her husband to the front door.

* * *

The mail slot set into one of the ebony doors was broken. The golden lip that should have hung over it was gone, leaving a rectangular hole through which Micah could see a stairwell. She could feel cool air escaping through the bronze slot, a kind of reverse vacuum.

"Why is it cold?" she asked, placing a palm in the rushing wind. It flowed through her fingers: an icy flash that raised the hair on the back of her neck. "It's ninety degrees outside. It should be hot as hell in there."

Garrett shrugged as he shoved the key in the scratched brass lock. "Maybe the lawyer had the electricity turned on for us."

"In a house this big?" Micah scoffed. "You're loony."

The door opened with ease, the hinges barely squeaking. There was a _whoosh_ ing sound, and musty, disused air filtered out, giving Micah pause.

"Momma?" Elliott's voice drifted up to them from the street.

Micah turned her back on the open door and walked to the railing of the balcony as her husband disappeared inside. Elliott was hanging out of the back window of the car, her small palms pressed to the door as she gazed at the house.

"Come on up, baby," Micah called down to her daughter. "Bring Sticks."

It wasn't that she _wanted_ her little girl inside the house. Ideally, Micah wanted Elliott far away from Bowridge with neither knowledge nor memories of the place to tarnish her innocent outlook on life. But that wasn't an option. Not since the fire...

Elliott just didn't like to be left alone. So there was no way Micah could go inside without her. Bowridge was their new home. A new start.

Girl and dog jumped from the car. Using all fifty pounds of her body weight, Elliott slammed the heavy truck door and raced for the steps, Sticks only a few steps ahead of her on his hot-pink leash.

Micah took her daughter's hand with a smile. White blonde hair, sun-tanned skin, and skinny legs just like her father's that jutted from beneath her blue jean skirt. She was the most beautiful child in the world.

Micah couldn't even see the scar anymore. _Hooray for modern medicine_ , she thought, brushing her fingertips across the soft skin of Elliott's bare arm.

"Watch where you step and stay close," Micah warned, giving Sticks a playful nudge with her toes. He nipped at her flip-flop playfully.

Elliott nodded succinctly. "Yes, Momma."

The foyer was fairly small for such a large home. Straight ahead, a worn wooden staircase climbed the pale yellow wall before making a hasty ninety degree turn up to the second floor. An ancient chandelier clung to the ten-foot ceiling above their heads. Beneath the second set of stairs, another archway revealed a staircase that led down to the ground floor.

It was cool a full ten degrees cooler inside, as if the AC were running. Micah raised an eyebrow, holding firmly to Elliott's hand as she reached to flick the light switch next to the door.

Nothing happened.

She flicked the second switch and stepped outside to make sure it didn't control the porch light. The shattered globes on either side of the door weren't any help.

"How can that be?" she asked her husband as he appeared in the archway to the living room. She shut the door, cutting off the ambient street noise. The house fell into eerie silence.

Garrett shrugged. His shaggy black hair was sticking straight up as if he'd stuck his finger in a socket. "Lights in there don't work, either. Electricity must not be on."

"But the air pressure?" Micah gestured to the mail slot. They would have to get that fixed _stat_. She imagined all manner of city vermin climbing through the slot alongside bills and bank statements.

"I'm sure it's just some kind of negative flow. There are broken windows upstairs."

Micah felt a rush of relief. "Oh, that's true."

Garrett leaned over to kiss her gently on the forehead while he ruffled Elliott's hair, making the little girl giggle. "Hey," he said softly against Micah's temple. "Quit worrying. Let's bring our stuff in, and I'll pull out the laptop and get the electric hooked up, 'kay?" He grinned. "This will be fun."

Micah exchanged glances with her daughter—even their young child knew a hopeless case when she saw it.

"Famous last words," Micah said, rolling her eyes.

* * *

"They'll be out in less than an hour."

Micah turned around from gazing into the jungle of a backyard. Or side yard, rather, seeing as the house was long rather than wide, and the teeny quadrangle of yard was situated just outside a side door. Elliott stood in the fenced enclosure with Sticks, throwing a Nerf ball for him to fetch. His floppy red ears bounced with every sprint.

"That's fantastic. How did you manage that?" Micah asked, uncapping her bottled water for a drink. The liquid was refreshing; the energy she had expended carrying luggage inside had made her thirsty.

Garrett rubbed his hands together, a gleam in his eyes. "I have my ways," he intoned, swooping forward to encircle her waist with his arms.

He swung her around so that her flip-flops left the floor and she felt weightless. Micah squealed, "Put me down!"

He did, but instead of pulling away, his lips caught hers: soft, sweet. They tasted like Carmex, his drug of choice. She relented beneath his touch, pressing her body into his—the perfect fit. Ten-year-long puzzle pieces that still clicked together with a perfection borne of friendship.

The kiss grew heated. Micah wanted to shove away her fears about the house, her worries about the cost of restoration, and take her husband right there on the living room floor between the aged, plastic-covered sofa and the coffee table. Judging by his reaction to the kiss, he agreed.

A low giggle brought Micah back from the brink, and she broke the kiss with an audible smack. She glanced over her shoulder to find Elliott in the open doorway, the concrete patio and ivy-trimmed verandah visible behind her.

"You were _kissing_ ," she accused.

Garrett slapped Micah on the rump and pulled away. "I'm going to run to the drugstore. We need a couple of necessities. Like toilet paper."

"We'll go with you," Micah said quickly, striding across the floor to get her purse.

"No, you guys need to stay here just in case the lawyer beats me back." He slipped his wallet into the back pocket of his cargo shorts. "No use making him wait outside."

"I'd rather wait outside," Micah grumbled.

Elliott launched the Nerf ball into the foyer, and Sticks's claws scrabbled for purchase as he took off after it. Micah couldn't even force herself to get on Elliott for throwing balls in the house. She met Garrett at the front door.

"Don't leave us alone here," she said softly, shooting a glance at her daughter. The girl wasn't paying them any mind.

"Micah." Garrett smiled, tucking her hair behind her ear gently. "Love, it is _just a house_. Now." He pressed a quick kiss to her lips. "I'll be back shortly."

Then he was gone.

* * *

"This place is so big," Elliott said, her voice awed.

"Six bedrooms," Micah agreed as she led her daughter down the upstairs hallway. At the apex of the staircase, you could walk left, passing closed doorways—presumably to bedrooms—to the back of the house and a giant bathroom equipped with tub, shower stall, toilet, and a double sink. They were now walking towards the front of the house, where the hallway ended at a gorgeous bay window seat that looked out over the street below.

Sticks's claws clicked along the hardwood floor, the sound much louder in the abnormal silence than it should have been. Micah rolled her eyes at a pile of timber on the floor—that would be a pain to get down to the basement. Or the half-basement, half-ground floor, whatever the heck these southerners called those weird in-between floors underneath the main level.

"Big enough to get lost in, so stay close," Micah went on.

Elliott rolled her eyes. "I _know_ , Mom."

Micah peeked into the first open bedroom door. The room was spacious, with tall ceilings and windows. A four-poster bed dominated the middle of the floor, and a matching antique dresser graced one wall. It was simple and opulent all at once—a throwback to 1800s wealth.

Elliott poked her head around Micah's waist to appraise the room. "There are leaves on the floor," she observed with the acuity of a seven-year-old.

Micah laughed and turned to face her daughter. "Keen senses of observation, daughter-mine. There are quite a few broken windows on this floor. Remind me to Google window replacement companies."

Elliott's brilliant blue eyes crinkled when she smiled. She clicked her heels together and saluted. "Copy that."

They moved on to the next room—similar to the first but with an _en suite_ bathroom. As Micah stepped into the small, porcelain space to coo over the pedestal sink and claw-foot bathtub, Elliott wandered away with Sticks in hot pursuit.

Micah turned the four-armed faucet. It moved, but the pipes just groaned. "Water company," she told herself. "Call the water company."

"Look, Momma!"

Elliott's excited yell spurred Micah into motion. She hurried through the bedroom, passing through warm shafts of afternoon sunlight, and entered the hall. "Where are you?"

"In here!"

Whatever it was had excited her daughter. Micah followed the sound of Elliott's voice into the front bedroom. This room was the biggest, fully equipped with a bed, a dresser, a vanity, and an open door that revealed a huge walk-in closet. The walls were a rich, deep mahogany that contrasted beautifully with the red oak floors.

Micah glanced around for her daughter, noting a fancy archway that led to a third bathroom. Elliott was nowhere in sight.

"Ellie?"

The blonde-haired fae child appeared through an open doorway in the far wall near the front of the house; Micah hadn't even noticed it. "Look! It's a porch, Momma."

Micah followed her through the opening and gasped. The covered porch stretched the length of the house, a wall of windows that overlooked the postage stamp yard and beyond. The half-walls beneath the window were white, as was the porch floor. Micah assumed the concrete façade, a pale egg cream color, was the house's original exterior minus a century-and-a-half of weathering.

Sticks had already found a patch of sunshine and curled up for a snooze. It was stifling hot on the porch, and empty but for a single white, wicker chair.

"How lovely," Micah murmured, looking out over the neighborhood. Just beside their walled backyard, a street bisected the square along a tidy city park teeming with afternoon patrons.

"May I go play, Momma?" Elliott pleaded.

Micah stared down into her daughter's beautiful face. "Not today, baby. We've got a lot to do. I can't go over with you."

Elliott's face darkened. "I can go by myself," she said petulantly.

Fighting a smile, Micah responded, "In time, sunshine. This is a new and unfamiliar place. Let's get settled first."

Micah motioned for Elliott to precede her into the bedroom, and then slapped her own leg and whistled for Sticks, who promptly obeyed. As she reached to shut the door, she glanced at the wicker chair. A feeling of unease settled about her shoulders like a mantle.

The thin blue cushion that covered the seat was indented as if someone were sitting there, looking out over the park.

Micah clutched the door handle, fighting off a shiver. _It's just old and worn_ , she told herself, laughing out loud _. Just old and worn, like the rest of the house._

* * *

Micah handed the _Spongebob Squarepants_ roller suitcase to Elliott, making a face and groaning as if it were heavy. "What do you have in there, rocks?"

Elliott giggled, yanking the handle up from the top. "No, silly. Books."

"Ah, well, that's okay then." Micah pulled her own rolling suitcase from the trunk, and then turned tired eyes on the U-Haul trailer. "I don't have the energy for that. I barely have the energy for what's in the Jeep."

"One at a time," Elliott said, once again proving herself way ahead of the bell curve for a child her age.

They trudged up the front steps, holding suitcases, pillows, and in Elliott's case a gigantic plush polar bear. Micah pushed the door open and held it for her daughter to pass through. They left their belongings on the leaf-scattered floor and returned to the car for more.

On their third trip inside, Micah gingerly sat a box of breakables on the coffee table just as the sound of shattering glass broke the silence of the house. It came from upstairs, where Elliott had just carried a suitcase to pick out her room.

"Elliott?" Micah yelled, panicked. She burst into the foyer and took the narrow staircase at a run.

"I'm fine, Momma, it wasn't me." Elliott stood at the top of the stairs, staring towards the master bedroom. "It came from in there."

"Go back downstairs and get in the car," Micah told her in a low, urgent tone. "Wait for me there."

Her daughter obeyed without argument, pale blue eyes wide as she skittered down the stairs.

Micah stared at the open bedroom door, heart pounding. Had someone gotten in the house? Worse still, could a homeless person be _living_ there? She hefted an old, dusty two-by-four from a stack on the floor and held it at the ready as she took wide, quiet steps towards the bedroom.

Beyond the distant chirping of birds, there were no sounds from inside. Taking a deep breath, Micah stepped into the room.

Empty. Make-shift weapon still primed for action, Micah checked under the bed, in the closet, the bathroom, and out on the patio. That room clear, she did a sweep of the entire upstairs, and turned up nothing.

Not only was there no one in the house, but there was also no evidence of a newly-broken window.

* * *

"Mrs. Noble. It's a pleasure to meet you in person." Alfred Skinner offered a pudgy, well-manicured hand, a jovial grin on his sunburned face.

"Likewise." She shook his warm, dry hand and stepped back to allow him entrance. If her mind wasn't playing tricks on her, he seemed to brace himself before he walked inside.

"Oh, grand. I see you were able to get the electric hooked without issue?" He gestured to the chandelier hanging over the foyer. It was a black metal contraption of carved leaves. Garrett had replaced all the bulbs in the flower-like holders when he returned home from the drug store.

"Yes, and the water company is sending someone tomorrow. Thank you." Micah shut the door and motioned for him to follow her to the living room. "Would you care for coffee? A bottle of water?"

"Coffee would be great," Alfred boomed. His indoor voice needed work. "I've had a long day, and yet another long night ahead of me. This heat, you know. It just makes people crazy."

She chuckled because she knew he was right.

"Have a seat." Micah gestured to the couch, now rid of its plastic cover. "I'll be right back."

Before she turned her back, she saw fear race across his face, but it was gone almost as soon as she recognized it.

Her lawyer was scared of the house.

Micah took the stairs to the ground floor. They opened into a large, dim kitchen with boxes of silverware and dishes on the floor and the ancient green refrigerator whirring with life.

Earlier, when Garrett had returned from the drug store, the two of them had explored the semi-underground level while Elliott and Sticks unpacked in her room. It wasn't quite a basement, but it wasn't quite aboveground either. It was a maze of rooms, few of them furnished and most of them obviously disused for decades.

Small half-moon windows looked out upon street level. In the growing twilight, tires rolled past, stopping briefly at the "Stop" sign before continuing. Micah had wondered if they paid any attention to the monstrosity beside them.

"It's nice down here," Garrett had murmured as he popped his head out the servant's entrance.

The walls were painted dark, earthy shades, and the windows were curtained in every room. "It's dark," she disagreed. "And dingy."

"We'll change that," Garrett had said, his embrace and kiss sealing the deal.

It was almost sundown now. Even with the lights on, the kitchen was shadowed and dark. Lit by harsh artificial light, the cabinets of peeling burgundy paint and the scarred table and chairs looked unwanted. The linoleum floor, a dizzying pattern of black-and-white diamond shapes, needed an industrial-strength scrub.

Micah found she couldn't muster any excitement over the spacious kitchen. As compared to their old apartment, it was the Taj Mahal. Yet, something about Bowridge didn't sit well with her. First, the feeling of a presence in the chair on the covered porch, and then the phantom glass breakage. She sighed, swiping a hand over her face.

She snuck a peek out the window of the kitchen door. Elliott and Sticks were laying in the shade of a thick, gnarled Black Walnut. They watched Garrett as he attacked the overgrown yard with a weed-eater.

Micah threw some pre-ground grocery coffee into the stainless steel brewer they'd brought from home. She measured out water from the gallon jug and hit "brew," then grabbed herself a diet soda from the fridge as the heady smell of coffee filled the kitchen.

The door to the yard banged open, and a burst of deathly hot Georgia summer filled the room. Micah hadn't realized until then just how well the air conditioning worked in the house. _Thank God for small favors_ , she thought as she turned to smile at her husband.

But no one was there.

She leaned a hip on the counter, steadying herself against a wave of confusion and terror. Her feet refused to move, and her palms grew clammy. How did the door open?

She heard rustling outside, and then Garrett appeared in the open doorway. He raised an eyebrow. "Why's the door open? You're letting all the air out."

"The wind, I guess," Micah tried to explain it away.

He crossed the threshold and shut the door. "It's dead still outside, love."

"Faulty latch?"

He jiggled the doorknob. "I don't think so. You didn't open it?"

Micah shook her head. "No. I didn't open it."

Beyond the door, Micah could see her daughter. Elliott stood in the middle of the backyard, staring up at the house.

* * *

"It's all very straightforward," Alfred said, gently setting his mug on the stained coffee table. "Your grandmother didn't pull any punches. Everything tied to Bowridge belongs to you. Furniture, appliances, property, even clothes still in the closets and books on the shelves." He pointed to a separate sheet that carried a simple paragraph-long statement. "She only had two requirements—one, that the house remain _your_ sole property, meaning nothing of it goes to control of your husband. If anything were to happen to you, she's stipulated that the property will then go to your daughter, with your mother Jean as custodian. And two—you can't sell it."

Micah's heart fell. "Any of it?"

"No. Just the house and the land. If you wanted to sell the furnishings, that is still an option." He spread his hands over the documents and smiled. "Other than that, Mrs. Noble, Bowridge is yours for better or worse."

Micah thought of the kitchen door, thrown open so hard it bounced off the wall. _Definitely worse_.

* * *

An evening storm rolled in just before bedtime. Micah tucked her daughter into bed in the room she'd picked—a white and pink ruffled affair at the back of the house. She wasn't happy that Elliott would be so far from them—she and Garrett would be sleeping in the master bedroom in the front.

"Are you sure about this room?" Micah asked for the fifth time. "There are bigger ones closer to mine and Daddy's."

"Yes, Momma." Elliott smiled, a little blonde angel framed by frilly pillows and stuffed animals. "It feels like mine."

Micah kissed her forehead. "Alright. You know where we'll be if you need us. I love you." She double-checked the bulb on Elliott's tropical fish nightlight, and then hit the lights on the way out.

The hallway was dark as pitch, and unfamiliar. Micah placed a hand to the wall and cautiously moved forward. She jumped as a flash of lightning illuminated the windowseat ahead, filling the space with blue-white light. For a brief moment, she thought she saw a shadow on the stairs, but a crack of thunder followed by another flash revealed an empty stairwell.

She hurried to the bedroom, her heart pounding in her ears. _It was just my imagination_ , she argued with herself. _New house. Unfamiliar_. She was starting to sound like a broken record, even to herself. _Unfamiliar. Unfamiliar._

Garrett was propped up in bed, a pool of soft, warm lamplight on him as he read. His bare chest was mostly softened muscle from years of campus food and sitting at a desk, but she still found him sexy. The sight of him chased away the shadow on the stairs; it chased away the atmospheric storm and patter of rain. Other parts of her, more primal and insatiable, came to the surface instead.

After brushing her teeth and slipping into a thin cotton nightgown, Micah crawled onto her side of the bed. She cuddled against her husband's side, sliding a hand up the warmth of his thigh beneath his boxer shorts.

"Remember that kiss earlier?" she murmured in his ear before she took it between her teeth and gently nipped.

Garrett _mmm_ 'd low in his throat and slipped his bookmark into the book before he set it on the nightstand. Turning into her, he cradled her against his chest. " _Remember_? I've been fantasizing about it for hours."

Micah wrapped her leg over his hips, giggling like a little girl as his hand moved to cup her breast. "Make love to me," she whispered against his lips.

He didn't argue.

* * *

Micah was startled awake by the touch of icy fingers.

She popped up in bed, gasping, one hand fluttering to the spot on her cheek that still felt cold and clammy. She glanced towards the side of the bed, expecting to see her daughter, but there was nothing but darkness.

The storm still rocked the house. A steady pounding of rain on the roof and windows let her know it hadn't lost any of its fury in the hours she'd been out. Beside her, Garrett slept soundly, one arm still tossed listlessly over her lap.

On her nightstand, the digital clock read three am.

Micah fell back against the headboard, trying to catch her breath. _It must have been a dream_ , she thought, trying to remember what she was dreaming. If she had been having a dream, the information was just out of reach and getting more insubstantial the longer she was awake.

A loud boom of thunder made her heart skip a beat, and in the stretch of emptiness that followed she heard the pitter-patter of small feet in the hallway, echoed by the familiar clicking of Sticks's claws. A moment later, Elliott burst through the open door and launched her skinny body onto the bed.

Micah chuckled, scooting to the right so her daughter could squeeze beneath the covers between her and Garrett. "Did the storm scare you, baby?"

As Sticks made a few circles and settled on the rug next to the bed, Elliott turned her pale face up. There was fear in her eyes. "A little. Mostly it was the girl."

"What girl?" Micah's hand drifted once more to her own cheek as she remembered the cold phantom of a small child's fingers.

With a wide-eyed nod, Elliott said, "She keeps whispering to me when I'm trying to sleep."

Micah wanted to attribute the story to her daughter's wicked imagination, but she couldn't get past the sensation of fingers on her face. "What does this girl look like?"

Elliott shrugged, snuggling closer to Garrett, who rolled over and squeezed her in his sleep. "Dunno. Can't see her."

As soon as her daughter's eyes closed and her breathing became regular, Micah laid awake the rest of the night facing the door.

* * *

"Momma, does that look weird to you?" Elliott asked.

They were on the front porch the next morning, Elliott armed with a bottle of glass cleaner and an old t-shirt, while Micah wielded a broom on the steps. Her daughter stood in front of the stained glass front doors, bubbles sliding down the glass as she pointed up.

Micah followed her gesture to the third floor. She hadn't paid much attention to the exterior of the house, other than to note it was a mess. Above the front door, the windowseat jutted out, forming an overhang. To the right of it was the window of the master bedroom—her and Garrett's room. The façade of the house was some kind of stone; without knowledge of architecture, Micah wasn't sure if it was poured concrete or some kind of concrete sculpted over stone or wood. But the textured exterior had survived almost two centuries in the tropical weather of the area, and parts of the house were a bit worse for the wear.

Where her daughter pointed was one of the worst examples of the way time had made a mark on Bowridge. Micah said, "That water stain, you mean?"

"Is that what it is?" Elliott was silent for a moment. "It looks like a face."

Micah looked closer, and then started as she realized it _did_ look like a face. Hollow circles for eyes, sunken cheeks, and long, flowing hair around a pale face. A sideways slash made the face look like it was screaming. The effect was chilling.

"It does," Micah agreed. She forced her eyes away from the sight and vowed to ignore it before her own imagination ran wild. "But it's just our brains piecing together something familiar from the water patterns."

Elliott giggled. "You sound like Daddy."

"Heaven forbid!" Micah teased, turning back to the steps. But for the rest of the time they cleaned, she could feel eyes on her—as if the face were real.

* * *

Micah met her husband at the front door as soon as he got home, relieving him of his briefcase. "Take your shoes off," she warned him. "Elliott and I did the floors."

His brown eyes moved over the shiny hardwood. "No leaves."

She nodded and smiled, proud of herself. "No leaves."

"Where is Elliott?" he asked, yanking off his tie as he followed her to the living room. "Oh, love, it looks great in here."

A thorough cleaning of Murphy's Oil to the hardwood floors had revealed beautiful, shiny wooden slats. She and Elliott had taken scrub brushes to the ornately carved fireplace, cleaning it of debris and dirt, even managing to clean the soot off the concrete stoop. They'd unpacked several boxes, so the living room felt more like home.

Micah deposited Garret's briefcase by the couch. "She's upstairs taking a nap. I almost joined her."

He kissed her forehead, one hand brushing across her neck. "Don't blame you. You guys worked hard today."

"Would you like something to drink?" Micah offered, dying to ask him how the interview went. She refrained.

"Do we have any beer?" Garrett sank to the couch with an _oof!_ and kicked his stocking feet up on the coffee table. His suit had been perfectly pressed that morning, but now it looked wrinkled and worse for the wear.

Micah took the stairs down into the kitchen, quickly grabbing him a Bud Light and herself a bottled rum cocktail, and then ran back up the stairs, ignoring the rising feeling of suffocation she felt every time she stepped foot in the kitchen.

She settled beside him on the couch as he popped the tab on his beer, automatically reaching for her bottle to open it for her. They sat together listening to the faint tick-tock-tick-tock of the wall clock.

Finally, she couldn't stand it any longer. "So. How'd it go?" she asked offhand, crossing her fingers.

He paused for too long, and her heart began to sink. "Oh no."

"I'm just kidding," he said, his face lighting up as a white grin spread from ear to ear. "I got the job."

Micah squealed and leapt forward to toss her arms around his neck. "That's great news!"

"I'll start next Monday."

As she kissed her husband, Micah felt a rush of relief, as if the tables were turning. Maybe Bowridge and Savannah were just what they needed to get out from under the black cloud that had hung over them since the accident.

* * *

The second night was no different than the first. Micah woke up, shocked from sleep by the same touch of cold fingers. She gasped, jerking away from the edge of the bed. The clock switched over to three am.

Disturbed by her reaction, Garrett awoke beside her, sitting up with a groan.

"Wha—Micah?" He reached for her in the dark. "Love, what's wrong?"

Heart pounding, Micah scooted over the sheets between them and curled up in his warmth. She trembled, her entire body shaking as she stared unseeing into the pitch black room.

"Bad dream?" Garrett murmured into her ear, his strong arm closing tightly over her abdomen as he pulled her against his front.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," she answered, covering her cheek with a hand.

He snuffled at her neck before pressing a kiss into the curve of her shoulder. "Try me."

"It happened last night, too," she started quietly. "I woke up thinking it was Elliott. Cold fingers. Here." She took his hand and laid it over her cheek.

"I'm sure it was just a dream," he said with a chuckle, squeezing her tightly. "It's a big, unfamiliar house. And your mom and aunts didn't do you any favors with their stories."

That word again— _unfamiliar_. But the fact of the matter was there was nothing about Bowridge that felt unfamiliar. In fact, it felt eerily familiar, more and more so every minute she remained.

Just as it had the night before, Micah stayed silent as her daughter's quick footsteps hurried down the hallway, and she and Sticks burst into the bedroom. The girl repeated her flight and wormed her way between Garrett and Micah.

There wasn't a storm to be found in Savannah, so Micah figured only one reason could have sent Elliott running for their bed. She propped her head up on one hand as Garrett tucked their daughter in close. "Tell Daddy what you told me last night."

"There is a little girl in my room who whispers when I'm trying to sleep," Elliott told him, acutely knowing what her mother was asking, as always.

Garrett raised an eyebrow in Micah's direction, but she just shook her head. Looking down at her daughter's wispy face in the dark, Micah asked, "Was she bothering you again tonight, baby?"

Elliott nodded. "She wants me to play with her, but I'm so sleepy."

Micah caught her husband's gaze over Elliott, but neither of them spoke. Not in front of Elliott, at any rate.

Cuddled against her child's steady breathing, Micah drifted into dreams of a phantom child.

* * *

Micah woke late the next morning—obviously trying to make up for sleepless nights. She stretched in a beam of hot sun coming through the front window, her arm meeting empty space where her husband and daughter had been.

Tucked into her favorite cotton robe, Micah walked in bare feet downstairs. Elliott was sprawled on the couch in the living room, her feet kicking at the air as she munched on a bowl of corn flakes.

"Don't spill that on the couch," Micah warned.

Elliott took a bite and smiled, showing off flakes in her teeth.

Rolling her eyes, Micah followed the scent of coffee to the kitchen where Garrett was seated at the small round table, paging through the newspaper.

She dropped a kiss to the top of his head before moving on to pour a cup of coffee. "Sleep well?"

"Like a rock," he answered without looking up. "It's peaceful here. You wouldn't think we were in a city."

Micah _hmm_ 'd, not trusting herself to answer. She found no peace at Bowridge—all she found were doors that opened by themselves and a phantom child that haunted her dreams _and_ her daughter.

"What are your plans today?" she asked, opening the fridge to grab the half-and-half.

"I was thinking about tackling the basement," Garrett said, turning a page. The _swish_ was familiar and comforting. He'd read the newspaper every morning of their marriage, even on days when he was sick in bed.

Micah shivered. "It's creepy down here."

He laughed. "You've always found basements creepy, love." He paused to take a sip of coffee. "I may take a look at the fence first. This morning before it gets hot. Some of the rods are bent out of shape and rusted all to hell. I'd hate for Sticks to get caught in any of them."

"I doubt he can climb the stone wall to get to them," Micah laughed, joining Garrett at the table with her own sugared-up coffee.

"Dog jumps like a champ." He folded his newspaper, and then took his coffee mug to the sink. Giving Micah a sloppy kiss on the lips, he said, "I'll be outside if you need me."

* * *

"What are you doing, baby girl?" Micah stepped out onto the covered porch, cradling her jumbo mug of steaming coffee.

She'd already cleaned the main bathroom from top to bottom, and was taking a break before moving on to the next.

Elliott sat in the wicker chair, her knees pulled up to her chest as she gazed out into the morning. "Do you see them?"

Micah crossed the creaky floor and drew up before the glass as she took a sip of coffee. A group of young children played in the park next door. "Yes, of course."

"May I go play?" Elliott turned pleading eyes to her mother.

Micah smiled; there was no way she could tell her "no" today. "Of course, love. Put some sunblock on your face first, please. Oh, and your arm—don't forget your arm. It's going to get hot fast."

"Yay!" Elliott squeezed her mother around the waist and rushed away.

"Look both ways before you cross the road!" Micah yelled.

She groaned. She really needed to tackle the other bathrooms, and if Elliott was going to play outside for the next few hours, it would be prime time to do so. Garrett was in the backyard and could watch their daughter as he worked on the broken railings of their rod-iron and stone walls.

Micah gathered supplies from the main bath—sponges, tub cleaner, a scrub brush—and took it to the _en suite_ in her and Garrett's room. She hit the power button on her docking station, and her mp3 player came to life. Grabbing the Soft Scrub and a sponge, she tackled the toilet.

She was elbow deep in toilet water when the front door clicked open and Elliott screamed, "Mom! Mom!"

Micah's blood ran cold. She abandoned her cleaning and nearly tumbled down the stairs, her heart racing.

Elliott stood panting by the front door, her hands on her knees.

"What is it, baby? Are you hurt?" Micah put a hand to either of her daughter's cheeks and turned her face to the left and then right, searching for evidence. If those kids had bullied her...

Ellott's eyes were wide and her cheeks flushed. She grasped Micah's arms with her tiny hands. "They're gone."

Micah stared down at her daughter, baffled. "Who's gone?"

"The kids in the park."

* * *

The upstairs was silent as a tomb. Micah had left a distraught Elliott on the couch with a bowl of strawberry ice cream and a Disney movie in the DVD player. The girl was _certain_ the kids in the park had run from her. She had been so sensitive ever since the fire, and for no good reason. It had been a complete accident—a freak accident that had almost taken Elliott's life, Micah reminded herself. It wasn't the school's fault.

In a way, maybe it was the school's fault. Elliott had been a normal child, albeit a little shy. But the fire had changed all that. It had nearly killed her, and if it weren't for the amazing burn unit, it would have maimed her. Micah and Garrett had spent everything they had to get Elliott the treatment she needed.

Micah sighed. The jury was still out on whether Bowridge was a curse or a blessing.

The door to the porch was standing open when Micah walked back through her bedroom on the way to finish cleaning. She paused, brow wrinkled. She didn't remember the door being open before Elliott came running home.

The heat wafting in was substantial, so she crossed the room, intent on closing it, but the sound of kids at play made her stop and double-take. She stepped onto the porch, the heavy weight of Georgia summer settling around her, and made her way to the window.

The wicker seat still sat in the same place as always, facing the park. The cushion was flat as a pancake—no imprint.

But outside, across the street in the park, the same group of kids was back in action.

Fury filled Micah. Had they really run from her daughter? _Those little brats._

She threw her yellow plastic gloves into the bathroom and left, making a beeline for the park.

She didn't hear Elliott follow her out the door. She didn't notice her daughter until they both stood at the gate to the park, staring at an empty playground where a single swing swung gently on a breeze-less day.

* * *

Micah sat at the kitchen table, nursing a small glass of whiskey and water. She looked up as Garrett came through the kitchen door.

"Hey," he said, stepping out of his dirty boots. "I think I got most of the messed up rods marked. I'll call later and find someone to come out and replace them."

"This house is going to cost us a fortune," Micah murmured.

Garrett grabbed a bottled water from the fridge and sat down across from her. He smelled like earth and sweat. Combined with the way the whiskey had gone straight to her head, Micah felt an urgent need to climb into his lap and connect with him, make love to him. Something real instead of surreal.

"Micah?" His tone was questioning.

She caught his worried brown eyes. "Something weird happened."

He laughed, the bottle hovering near his lips. "Again?"

"Elliott wanted to play with the kids next door, on the playground. But when she got there, they were gone," Micah told him, feeling as if the words were coming from outside of herself. She really was a terrible lightweight when it came to alcohol. "She came home in tears because she thought they ran away when they saw her coming. But Garrett, when I went back upstairs, I saw the kids in the park again. And I ran over there—I was mad, so mad that they'd hurt Ellie's feelings. They were gone. As if they were never there in the first place."

The worry that marred her husband's brow remained for a split second, and then a curtain fell. His face twisted, hard and cynical, until he didn't even resemble himself. Garrett stood, slamming the bottle to the table. "Why did you let her go?" he demanded. One strong, long-fingered hand shot out and grabbed her bicep in a bruising grip. He shook her until her teeth rattled. "Why?"

"Garrett, what is the matter with you?" Micah bit out, trying to shake him off. Her free hand hit the glass of whiskey, sending it sliding off the table. It shattered on the linoleum. "Let me go!"

"She is better than some commoner ragamuffin!" he roared, letting go of Micah so fast she stumbled backwards and into the counter. Her head hit the edge of the cabinet, and she saw stars. "Our child will _not_ be seen with them!"

A sob ripped through Micah as she cowered against the counter. Garrett lifted a hand, his fist clenched as if he would hit her, but then he changed again. As quickly as the madness crossed his face, it was gone.

Garrett blinked, confused. "Micah? Honey, I thought you were cleaning the bathrooms?"

* * *

Garrett had no idea what she was talking about. He had no recollection of yelling or shaking her, but the growing bruise on the back of her head from connecting with the cabinet was harsh proof that it had happened.

He didn't recall the conversation that led to the outburst, either. And Micah—sober as if she'd never had a drop after the harrowing experience—decided not to tell him again.

A dozen apologies and one promise to get checked out by a doctor later, they parted ways to get back to work on the house.

Micah checked in on Elliott and found the girl sound asleep on the couch, her favorite pillow pet—a stuffed dolphin—on her chest, and Sticks asleep under her knees. Micah couldn't help but feel relieved that her daughter and her usually sensitive dog had slept through the strange domestic violence episode.

Garrett had _never_ raised his voice to Micah or their daughter, much less raised a hand. Micah couldn't explain what had happened down in the kitchen, but whatever it was, it was _not_ her husband.

What if it was, God forbid, a _tumor_? Micah had heard stories before, of people plagued by full personality changes because of the pressure of a tumor on their brain...

Micah shook herself from such morbid thoughts. It could have been the unforgiving Georgia heat, for all she knew. She pulled an afghan from the hall closet and covered Elliott, then headed upstairs to finish the bathroom.

* * *

Micah lay on top of the covers, one arm thrown over her eyes to block the sun coming through the bedroom windows. Her head ached despite a mixture of ibuprofen and acetaminophen. With her other hand, she probed the tender area and winced. She needed ice, but didn't have the energy or the inclination to walk two floors down to get it.

There was a soft knock at the door, and Micah opened her eyes to find her husband hovering in the doorway. He smiled wanly. "How you feeling, love?"

Micah lowered her arm, unwilling to let him know she was hurt. "Fine. What's up?"

"I found something in the basement I thought you would want to see."

She delicately sat up and got out of bed, then followed him downstairs. Through the living room archway, she noticed Elliott was no longer on the couch.

"Where's Ellie?" she asked, a burst of worry making her heart skip a beat.

"She's fine," Garrett assured her, giving her a funny look. "She took Sticks outside."

"The backyard?" Micah clarified.

He paused before the steps to the ground level. "Micah, is this about earlier?"

She shrugged, a flush rising to her face. She'd never felt unsure of Garrett being able to keep an eye on their daughter, and the emotion bothered her.

He grasped her shoulders gently, as if she would break, and stared into her eyes. "Love, I don't know what happened. I can't explain it, nor can I explain why I lost that time. But I would never, _ever_ harm you or Elliott intentionally."

Micah sighed and sank against him, wrapping her arms around his waist. She didn't answer. She didn't trust herself to answer.

As Garrett released her and started down the stairs, Micah was hit by a wave of dizziness. She gripped the doorframe, staring down at her husband's retreating back. His bright red t-shirt shimmered in her vision. Rage flooded her, and she felt absolutely certain that she should shove her husband down the stairs.

She stepped forward, lifting her hands to push him—and her vision righted itself. The rage was gone, and Garrett was standing at the bottom of the stairs, staring at her.

"Micah? Honey, what's going on?"

Micah shook her head, pressing a hand to the bruise. "I...don't know." She focused on the man she loved and wondered what on earth had come over her. "Will you throw some ice in a baggie for me?"

He nodded and disappeared from sight.

Micah made her way down the stairs unsteadily, and by the time she came to rest near the kitchen table, Garrett handed her the baggie.

She pressed it to the back of her head as he asked, "Are you thirsty? Did you take anything?"

She shook her head. "No. Just show me what you wanted to show me so I can go lie back down."

He put a hand to her forehead and then slipped it to her cheek. "You don't feel hot. But I don't think you should lay down, love. You might have a concussion." He cradled his head in both hands and tore at his hair. "God, I can't believe this has happened."

"Quit worrying." Micah hugged him, inhaling the comforting scent of his cologne. "I love you."

She followed him through the swinging door into the further recesses of the basement, where he entered a small, windowless room. A box was open on the floor in front of a wall of filled bookshelves. There were two armchairs against the other wall, separated by a small table and illuminated brass lamp.

"I don't know why I wanted to open this," Garrett said excitedly. "I wasn't even going to come in this room tonight. But I just had this crazy feeling..." He picked up a leather-bound book from the floor and put it in Micah's hands.

The cover was old, the leather peeling away from the cloth inside. There was nothing but a date on the front, gold-embossed— _1868_. Micah sat in one of the chairs, ignoring the cloud of dust that drifted up around her.

The first page was faded, the ink yellowed with time. A lilting script declared "General Benjamin W. Jones and Mrs. Adele Langley Jones, with their daughter Beverly, 1868." Turning the page, Micah landed on an old black-and-white photograph.

A dour, older man with dazzling white hair stood military-straight over a seated woman with the kind of breathtaking beauty that belonged in a magazine. On her knee sat a smiling young girl with a round face and laughing eyes.

Micah turned a quizzical look to her husband. "A photo album."

"Better," he said, turning the page. He tapped an image of Bowridge, the edges of the photo burnt and blackened. Beneath it, the same flowery script declared "Bowridge upon purchase, January 10th, 1868."

Micah turned another page and found an image of the daughter on the covered porch, her chubby legs on tip-toe as she peered out the window. "She's young here. What do you think? Five?"

Garrett nodded. "Yeah, that was my guess."

"They look so happy. Well"—Micah laughed—"Mrs. Jones and Beverly do. The general is... um... sour."

Garrett laughed.

Micah flipped through half the book, and then the pictures just ended at a final photo of Beverly sitting on the wicker chair on the covered porch.

"They stop."

"And look..." Garrett tugged a stack of papers from inside the box, handing them over.

It was a certificate of sale for November 1868. "They only lived here for ten months?"

"Looks that way. I tried to find out what happened. If they moved away. But there's nothing. The house traded into the Ness family."

"My family," Micah mused. She traced the profile of the little girl in her last picture at Bowridge. "I wonder what her story is."

Garrett took the album from her, setting it gently on top of the box before he offered her his hands. "Come on. I'll tuck you in with a fresh bag of ice."

* * *

She sat, silent in her worries. She had dreaded leaving her father alone; he had been married to her mother for so long that he could hardly care for himself. But she missed her daughter.

The carriage trundled through the city, the familiar sights easing her nerves. She tugged at her high-necked dress; the heat was nearly unendurable. If it weren't for Benjamin's assignment to Savannah, they never would have left the more agreeable climate in the north.

A smile broke out over her face as she drew near to Bowridge. Home. She couldn't wait to see her family, to feel the embrace of her husband and the tiny hands of her daughter.

To forget the pain of her mother's passing.

* * *

Micah's eyes opened to the dark night and a steady patter of rain on the window. She lay still on her back, Garrett's hand resting on her stomach as he slept on.

The dream had seemed so vivid, so real. She'd been in the carriage. She felt the cobblestones beneath the wheels, jolting and uncomfortable. She had heard the clip-clop of hooves, the calls of passers-by outside the open window. The smell of southern magnolia.

Was she channeling Adele Jones? The simple but telling images in the Jones' family album had haunted Micah all evening, preoccupying her mind through a spaghetti dinner prepared by a guilty Garrett, and through a late-night movie with Elliott. Maybe her mind had latched onto Adele—a young woman with a young child.

It had just felt so damn _real_.

With a sigh, Micah turned over and closed her eyes to go back to sleep, but she snapped them open a moment later when Sticks's growl ripped through the room.

Micah sat up, rubbing her eyes as she searched for his shadow on the floor. She was surprised to find his silhouette standing at the door to the covered patio—a door that was standing wide open, though it had been closed and locked at bedtime.

She swiveled on her bottom and got out of bed, drawn by Sticks's low growl like a moth to its demise. She wiped her sweaty palms on her nightgown.

Sticks's hackles were raised, his four legs planted firmly on the hardwood floor and his nose pointed out through the doorway.

Micah didn't want to look. She didn't want to see a ghostly Adele Langley Jones or General Benjamin on the porch, returned to Bowridge in death. But she was drawn to the porch, unable to stop her forward momentum.

She gasped as the porch came into view. A small blonde figure sat primly in the chair, her back to the doorway.

Micah crossed the threshold. "Elliott?" she asked in a low voice, slowly walking up to the chair.

But the face that turned to look at her wasn't her daughter's. A face more than a century old peered up at Micah—the face of Beverly Jones.

"May I go play, Mother?" The voice echoed as if it were two different voices combined.

Heart racing, Micah stepped backwards, riveted by the face of a long dead child. Beverly lifted a hand to point at the window. No, beyond the window. Micah followed her fingertip.

In the park across the street, lit by flickering torches she'd never seen before, a group of children played.

Micah turned back to Beverly to find the girl watching her. The child's face flickered—a brief image of Elliott shone through, and Micah screamed.

All at once, Beverly faded, leaving a confused Elliott sitting in the chair in her supernatural wake. Elliott reached for Micah. "Momma? Was I sleepwalking?"

Micah fainted.

* * *

She mounted the steps at Bowridge, her heart singing at the thought of Beverly waiting for her on the other side of the door. Her daughter was her everything; the two weeks Adele had spent away at her parents' home had felt like a lifetime.

Adele's key clicked in the lock, and she opened the door. "Beverly? Mother's home." She stepped inside, listening for the shuffling run of her five-year-old daughter as she shut and locked the door.

The house was entirely too hot. Adele yearned for the colder north as she opened the front window in the living room in an attempt to circulate some air.

Benjamin appeared in the archway, a smile flitting across his face beneath his bushy white beard. Adele offered him a chaste kiss. "My husband," she greeted him. "Where is Beverly?"

_Her husband's face darkened. "Beverly sneaked from the house again to play with the..._ riffraff _next door. I punished her by making her sit on the porch to watch them play."_

" _Oh, Benjamin." Adele sighed. "You really must learn to rein in your temper. She is only a child."_

" _She must learn early to obey me," he boomed. "Lest she not obey her future husband."_

Adele bit her tongue. Arguing would do no good. Her husband was arrogant. He always would be.

" _Instruct Cook to start dinner," Adele told him. "Beverly and I will meet you in the dining room shortly."_

Adele walked into her bedroom, tugging her traveling gloves from her hands. "Beverly? Dearest one, I am home."

She paused as she tucked her gloves into the drawer of her bureau. No reply was forthcoming from the porch. "Beverly?" she called, heading for the door.

Her daughter's head rested on the back of her favorite wicker chair. Adele smiled. The chit had fallen asleep! She clicked over the concrete floor and gazed down at her daughter lovingly.

The breath caught in Adele's throat. Beverly's eyes were wide open, glassy and unseeing.

* * *

Micah was unsure when dreams became reality. It was dark outside the bedroom window. Garrett wasn't in bed beside her. The bathroom spilled warm yellow light into the room.

Adele felt as if she were imprinted on Micah's senses. Panic gripped her at the memory of Beverly's dead eyes. Beverly? _Or Elliott?_

The covered porch was hot, still filled with the heat of the day. Tears pricked Micah's eyes as she saw the small blonde figure upon the wicker chair.

It was Elliott. Her body lay limp exactly as Beverly Jones had died, and her pale blue eyes stared out over the park forever.

* * *

Micah's limbs were numb. She felt her way down the staircase one foot at a time. She trailed her fingertips along the wall but didn't feel it.

Garrett was walking past the steps on his way to the basement stairs when he noticed her ghosting down. "Micah? Honey, what are you doing out of bed?" He came to meet her, gently taking her hands. "You had a nasty fall on the porch. You scared Elliott half to death. You should be resting."

Micah resisted as he attempted to steer her back up the stairs. She jerked from his grasp and backed away down the hallway. "Beverly is dead."

Garrett stiffened. He walked towards her, a tight, controlled gait. "That can't be. I must check with Aida about dinner." He brushed past her.

"How long was she on the porch, Benjamin?" Micah shrieked, advancing on her husband.

Garrett spun around, his back to the basement staircase as his eyes hardened. "No daughter of mine will consort with lower classes."

"She shall never consort with anyone ever again. You have murdered our daughter with your hubris." Micah ended the statement on a primal yell, one borne of anger, hate, and grief. She rushed at Garrett, both hands connecting with his solid chest.

He wheeled backwards, his eyes registering his imminent accident, and then he tumbled down the steps.

The ensuing silence rang in Micah's ears. She waited a moment before she stepped forward and gazed down. Garrett... _no, Benjamin_... Her husband lay prone on the black-and-white floor, blood oozing from beneath his head. His eyes were closed, his limbs splayed.

The numbness returned. First her mother— _wait, I just spoke to Jean earlier today about her visit, she isn't dead..._ —then her daughter...and now, she'd killed her husband.

Micah returned to the third floor and the safe haven of her marital bedroom. She wanted to see her daughter one last time, but the very idea of going back out to the porch and seeing Elliott's beautiful eyes... A sob wrenched her body.

She slid the sash up on the front window. The Georgia night was cool— _A cool night wouldn't have killed my daughter. Only a hot night. Hot._ —and breezy. Tears slid down her cheeks as Micah leaned out over the street.

A flash— _this is the window where the water-stained face is_ —and Micah put one leg out the window.

Micah, wake up.

OhmyGod, Micah NO!

Her torso was through now. Micah struggled to the surface, struggled against the influence of Adele, but it was a losing battle. Adele's anguish was too strong.

If I cannot have my child...you shall not have yours either.

Micah tried to hold on, but her fingers let go, and she began to fall.

She didn't even scream.

* * *

"Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Coleman!" Janet Kramer held out a hand, first to the prim and proper Missus, and then to the stout but sweetly smiling Mister. She knelt before the small girl clinging to her mother's hand. "And you must be Kate! It's a pleasure to meet you."

Kate smiled shyly. "Hi."

Janet stood, tucking her clipboard against her elbow as she grinned at the couple. "You will simply love this house, Mrs. Coleman. It is exactly what you were hoping for when we began searching for your perfect southern mansion."

Mrs. Coleman stared up at the hulking monstrosity. Even beneath the September sun, it seemed dark and menacing. "I don't know, Janet. Isn't it...a little run down?"

"Nonsense," Janet replied. "The former family did quite a bit of clean-up on it, so it's rather lovely inside. If you'll follow me." She mounted the crumbling front steps. "The outside does need a little work, of course. You can see how the concrete façade has a bit of weather damage."

"An easy fix," Mr. Coleman said with a succinct nod.

Inside, Janet showed them through the living room and dining rooms, pointing out the staircase to the basement before she led them upstairs.

"This bedroom here at the end of the hall makes a lovely little girl's room, what with the pink-and-white striped wallpaper. I envision ruffles and teddy bears every time I see it." Janet tittered.

"It is lovely," Mrs. Coleman agreed. "What do you think, Kate?"

But the little girl was nowhere to be found.

"Kate?" Mrs. Coleman's heart skipped a beat. The house was so large and unfamiliar...

They found six-year-old Kate standing on the covered porch.

"What are you doing, dear?" Mrs. Coleman asked, crossing the porch to gaze out over the peaceful street. Across the way, a group of kids clambered about the playground.

"Can you see them?" Kate asked.

Her mother smiled indulgently. "Yes, of course."

Kate's pretty face turned up to her beseechingly. "May I go play?"

#

Heather Marie Adkins is psychotically obsessed with abandoned places and would live in one, preferably with ghosts.

Find more information on Heather and her books at heathermarieadkins.com, or follow her on Facebook and Twitter

# Blehdward, the Vampire Who Couldn't Sparkle

P.J. Jones

Blehdward wiped blood from his fanged mouth while looking down at the wide, vacant eyes of his latest victim. Her body lay on top of a heap of twisted metal that was once a walker.

Blehdward nearly gagged at the aftertaste in his mouth. Her blood tasted like prunes.

He bent down and pulled a tennis ball off of a broken walker leg and tossed it absently against a wall. But he'd forgotten about his super-human vampire strength. The ball bounced back and knocked his left ear clean off his head. The little flap of skin flew in an arc across the room before landing in a bed pan with a splash.

Gross. Blehdward's life sucked.

He sulked over to the mortal woman's bed and peered over the railing. The other stuff floating in the pan beside his ear was too horrifying to mention. He briefly wondered if it was worth the trouble of fishing out his ear and reattaching it to his head.

The problem was, vampires lived for an eternity. In the span of forever, other vampires would one day notice the missing ear, just like they noticed all of Blehdward's other physical flaws.

He searched the room for something to fish his ear out of the bedpan. All he could come up with were a pair of panties the size of Texas, a bag of stale prunes, and an empty denture crème jar.

Blehdward turned his head and pinched his nose while he used the jar to fish out his ear. Once the deed was done, he sealed the jar and wiped it clean with the granny panties. Then, he scrubbed his hands for about fifteen minutes. He would have to reattach his ear later, after he managed to control the urge to vomit old lady blood all over the speckled tile floor.

He was starting to wonder if raiding retirement homes was actually worth it. Sure, they were easy targets, but his feasts never ended without incident. At least this one hadn't crapped her adult diapers.

Blehdward missed his old life, when other vampires thought he was cool and invited him on their raids. But those vampires didn't think he was cool anymore.

Not since the sun incident.

Now he was relegated to feeding off the dregs of mortal society because the bedrooms of spoiled high school chicks were strictly forbidden to vampires who couldn't sparkle.

* * *

Blehdward scanned the darkened bar. A few werewolves were in the corner playing pool. One was humping a bar stool. A zombie had been trying to figure out how to push open the bathroom door for at least fifteen minutes. He'd finally given up and wet his pants. How embarrassing. Though Blehdward couldn't sparkle, he was still relieved he wasn't at the bottom of the immortal food chain. That spot was reserved for zombies who lacked the fine motor skills needed to turn a door handle, and who thought nothing about wetting their pants in public.

Blehdward's shoulders fell as he heaved a sigh. Not much happening at Immortals on a Wednesday night. All the cool vamps were probably feasting on high school chicks by now. He sighed before taking a sip of his drink, then he wiped blood off his lips with the back of his sleeve.

The door to Immortals flew open, but oddly, Blehdward didn't see anyone come inside. He blinked hard, thinking perhaps he'd seen a shadow glide past him. He shivered as a chill snaked up his spine, which was odd, because as a cold-blooded vampire, he wasn't supposed to feel such sensations.

He swiveled in his bar stool and stole a glance at the pale-faced stranger who was sitting beside him. His hooded, sunken orbs were framed by a gaunt face with jarring angles. Not a strand of his slicked-back dark hair was out of place. A violent, jagged scar stretched from the tip of his left brow to his chin. The rest of his body was concealed in a long, black cloak.

Another shiver racked Blehdward's body. This guy looked like he'd just done time in vampire prison.

"O Negative," the stranger hissed to the bartender. The man angled his head, and his cold, vacant gaze bore into Blehdward.

Blehdward felt compelled to look away. He swallowed hard. Whoever this vampire was, he was badass. He must have sparkled like a freaking treasure trove of diamonds when he stood in the sun.

"Sparkling is for pussies," the vampire growled as he took the drink from the bartender.

Another icy tendril of fear snaked up Blehdward's spine. He hesitantly turned back to the vampire. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me." The vampire's eyes were red, and not just the color of blood, but demonic, glowing red.

Blehdward nearly wet his pants, which would have been beyond embarrassing. Pants pissing was for zombies. "How did you hear my thoughts?"

The vampire's lip turned up in snarl, revealing the pointiest incisors Blehdward had ever seen.

"I hear everything," the vampire said before leaning closer to Blehdward and inhaling. "Your smell, it reminds me of prunes."

"Really? That's odd." Blehdward's hand shook as he reached for his glass and downed the contents in one swallow.

The vampire leaned closer and inhaled deeper. "You don't smell like the other pansy-ass vampires that haunt this city." One black brow shot up. "Does your skin burn in the sun?"

While keeping his gaze fixed on the stranger, Blehdward slowly nodded.

A subtle smile cracked the vampire's granite expression. "As it should."

Blehdward gasped. "But everyone knows real vampires sparkle."

"Where did you hear that shit?" he snapped.

Blehdward shrugged. Honestly, he had no idea where he'd heard it. Maybe from a book? He'd just always known vampires were supposed to sparkle.

"Vampires are _not_ supposed to sparkle," the stranger growled. "Sparkling is for sissies."

Hope surged inside Blehdward's cold chest cavity. If vampires weren't supposed to sparkle, then he might have a chance to prove himself cool again.

"Do you know who I am?" the strange vampire asked.

"No." Blehdward shook his head. "Should I?"

"I am Raithe, a true descendent of the ancient and powerful Vampyren. I am here to right the wrongs done to the Vampyren race by the clan of sparkling vampires." He leveled Blehdward with a sinister glare. "And you will help me."

* * *

"Are you sure the sparkling clan frequents this establishment?"

"Yeah, at least three times weekly." Blehdward enthusiastically nodded while he scanned the craft store's exit from his hiding spot behind the dumpster. "It's where all the high school chicks hang out."

"Yes, but it is all very peculiar—and degrading." Raithe frowned as he slowly stood from his crouched position. He peeled a crusty wad of gum off his pant leg. "Vampires should be haunting cemeteries and stalking darkened alleyways."

"They have really good prices here," Blehdward said with a little too much excitement. "Last week their spring floral arrangements were half off." He pointed toward the sliding glass doors. "Here they come."

A pair of pale-faced men dressed in low rise denim, leather studded belts and matching button up shirts, casually walked out of the store. They each sported a skanky high school chick on one arm, and a bag filled with newly purchased crafts in the other.

"You there!" Raithe called as he stepped from behind the dumpster.

They took one look at Raithe and ran in the other direction at full speed. They didn't even spare their whiny high school chicks a second glance.

It was over before it began. Raithe had caught up to them within a few long strides.

Blehdward caught up with them a few minutes later, very winded and nearly out of breath.

The vampires had both been knocked on their backs.

Raithe was going through the contents of their bags. "Glitter glue?" He pulled out several sticks of roll-on glitter.

"It repels the sun's rays so we can go outside during daylight," one of the glitter vamps whimpered while rising to a sitting position.

Raithe shook his head. "This is just pathetic."

"I'm tired of sleeping during the day." The other glitter vamp slowly sat up from his fetal position. "It has completely messed up my circadian rhythm."

Raithe sneered as he hovered over the two of them. "So you are willing to wear gobs of glitter glue rather than face who you are?"

Blehdward scratched his head. All this time they'd had him convinced they could actually sparkle. What dicks. "I can't believe you lied to me."

No wonder whenever he tried to sparkle in the sun, the ultraviolet light's rays burned holes through his skin.

The glitter vamps simply looked at him with goofy grins and shrugged.

"How do mortals feel about sparkly vampires in their midst?" Raithe asked.

The glitter vamps puffed out their scrawny chests. "All the girls think we're sexy."

"I thought the purpose was to feast off their blood, not get dates." Blehdward gasped as he pointed an accusatory finger at the vamps. "O-mi-god, you're not _eating_ high school chicks, you're _sleeping_ with them!"

Raithe shook his head and snickered. "Pathetic excuses for vampires."

Blehdward saw a flash of metal. In the next instant Raithe had decapitated both of the vamps with one swift slice of a sword. Their glittery faces rolled to the ground, their mouths still hanging open in shock.

"Whoa!" Blehdward wrapped protective fingers around his neck and looked at Raithe with wide eyes. "I didn't even know you had a sword."

Raithe quickly sheathed the sword in a compartment inside his cloak. "You will relay a message to the remainder of the sparkling clan. The Vampyren will not tolerate sparkling, glittering or gleaming of any kind. Cease all sparkling or suffer the penalty of death and an eternity burning in hell."

Blehdward took a step back. "Uh, okay."

Raithe narrowed his eyes to slits and nodded toward the left side of Blehdward's head. "What happened to your ear?"

"Long story," Blehdward squeaked as he took several more steps back. "Old lady tennis ball. I've got the ear in a denture crème jar. I was going to sew it on later tonight."

Raithe folded his arms across his chest and sneered. "You are lucky I'm in a charitable mood tonight, pruny vampire. Feasting off old people is almost as degrading as sparkling. For now on you will feast like a _real_ vampire or suffer the consequences."

In the blink of an eye, Raithe was gone. He'd disappeared into the shadows like a phantom of the night, or else like a vampire who actually knew how to act like a vampire.

As Blehdward's underwear slowly filled up with seeping warmth, he was so glad Raithe had vanished, because he suspected wetting one's pants was degrading vampire behavior as well.

#

PJ Jones is afraid of flyswatters and she thinks clowns are evil.

Read more about PJ Jones at pjjoneswrites.com or follow her on Facebook and Twitter

# Franscesca

Alan Nayes

ILHÉUS, BRAZIL 1928

The woman moved with the lithe grace of a female panther as she gathered herbs and succulents sprouting from the fertile banks of the Cachoeira River. On any world stage, the women of Ilhéus, Brazil, would be considered beautiful yet this girl surpassed even the aesthetic standards of Ilhéus. It began a decade ago when she was just fourteen. Sailors and merchants traveling to the port city would see her walking the town's cobblestone streets or arranging scrimshaw figurines in her father's ivory shop and dream of stroking that smooth caramel skin, running their fingers through her thick mane of black hair, or lying beside her supple body during the humid Brazilian nights. Only a few had ever achieved such sensual nirvana. One who did was a man known throughout the Amazonian region as _El Escultor_ , the sculptor. Though the sculptor's talent of carving stone was unsurpassed in the territory, his reputation as a _paquerar as mulheres_ —womanizer—was a close second. Handsome and gregarious, El Escultor had been irrevocably smitten by the twenty-four year old woman's extraordinary beauty when he'd consulted her on the opening of his new studio. Six months ago she'd entered his house to 'bless' his marble and granite projects, and in doing so had entwined his heart and soul more tightly than the thick _lianas_ choking the great trunks of the mahogany trees growing in the town square.

El Escultor was the reason for the woman's foray into the tropical rainforest that afternoon. She was on the quest for herbs, one in particular— _muira puama_ —a potent aphrodisiac. Tonight, she and El Escultor would celebrate her return from a tiny _aldeola_ hidden miles up river by towering kapok trees and the impenetrable mangrove swamps. The woman was supposed to spend a week in Santa Santos, but her work as the territory _feiticeira_ went very well, thus her arrival back to Ilhéus. That evening she planned to surprise him.

She crept quietly along familiar trails, unafraid of the prowling jaguar or lurking anaconda. Her late mother, also a _feiticeira_ or witch doctor, had taught her well the ways of the jungle before succumbing to the poison dart of a former apprentice who'd set up 'practice' in a neighboring village. _Feiticeira_ 's work was in constant demand, after all curses and evil spirits had been intimately ingrained in the indigenous cultures of the Amazon for centuries. And only a genuine _feiticeira_ could control the power of the occult. With demand came competition. Yet in this instance, the former apprentice had underestimated the mother's daughter. Barely seventeen and thoroughly familiar with the dark secrets of _capoeira_ voodoos, the teen _mulher de condomble_ —witch—had concocted a blend of _jagupa_ and _ayahuasca_ that sent the murderer into convulsions. The young conqueress stood silently and watched as the nightmares cascaded one upon the other, eventually resulting in the vanquished taking a machete and slicing open her own abdomen in search of the vipers she imagined coiling in her intestines. Whispers spread like ripples on a pond. No one wished to anger the newly christened _queen of black magic_.

Slowing, the woman took a moment to admire the abundant plant life stretching for miles inland. She inhaled the sweet scents of orchids and bromeliads festooned above her in the forest canopy. Gardenias blossomed around her waist where her dark taffeta tunic was cinched tight, emphasizing her sensuous feminine curves. An _indio_ coming upon her mystically vibrant form would think he'd discovered a living goddess.

She stepped around a termite mound, teeming with activity. She'd used the crushed juices of termites in Santa Santos in invoking the spirits of the deceased village's elders to return and drive away poachers from a nearby campsite. One of the poachers had stolen a young village girl and raped her. Because the men of the hamlet were unable to apprehend the rapist—he was fast and left no tracks to follow—the _feiticeira_ was hired to remedy the situation. Utilizing the denizens of the earth, she'd temporarily brought back those _spirits_ which the earth had claimed. The concoction was especially powerful because only three nights after fanning the vapors over the _aldeola_ burial mounds, screams of terror could be heard coming from the poachers' encampment. The next morning the rapist's body was found tethered crudely to a tree, his eyes gouged out and his genitalia mutilated. The woman's work was finished in Santa Santos.

High above her head, howler monkeys raced along endless vines and epiphytes. Hummingbirds darted within easy reach. She spied an emerald tree boa coiled lazily over a gnarled tree limb. Ducking just under the serpent's flicking tongue, the _feiticeira_ pushed through a dense stand of philodendron and ferns, the fronds half as big as she. Tree frogs leaped out of reach. The _ranas_ had many uses for the woman, but not today.

The woman stopped. Just ahead, she spotted the tight familiar clusters of blue flowers. _Muira puama_. The petals were of no use, but the bulbous roots of the plant would create just what she desired. A sexual craving so powerful, tonight's activities would last well into the following day. Deftly avoiding the buzzing honey bees and myriad centipedes crawling over the forest moss, the woman dug away the dirt, exposing the herb's root system. Quickly, she picked the most succulent, noted by the deep reddish hue. Blood roots, her mother had taught her.

On her return, she collected other herbs and leaves—hibiscus, cassia bark, _pfaffia_ root, _jalapa_ leaf, _pau d'Arco_ —and added these to her leather _bolsa_ which hung at her side.

By the time she emerged from the jungle, the sun had touched the forest canopy, turning the horizon a rich saffron orange. A memorable night was only hours away, the _feiticeira_ mused. She could feel the spirits already beginning the dance in her chest.

The woman followed the dirt road to the outskirts of Ilhéus. Villagers passing her way smiled politely.

" _Ora essa_ ," a few greeted her in their native Portuguese, surprised at seeing her back so soon.

Some, especially the children, looked upon her in fear. After all, she was the _feiticeira_ , never to be crossed. Men, too, respected her power of the spirits, though none could deny the hunger in their loins for just one touch of her hot flesh.

Fruit bats were already dipping low over the trees when she arrived at the sculptor's studio. Dusk had descended over the town and gas lights sprinkled their glow along the main cobblestone thoroughfare. The woman didn't knock, she didn't need to, and went inside the two story brick edifice. She listened. No sound anywhere. The smell of polished marble and limestone dust hung in the damp air. For a long moment she waited in the tile foyer, gazing over what would be half hers in the near future. Three quarters of the entire lower floor was devoted to El Escultor's projects, some only barely begun, others near completion. Marble blocks, slabs of limestone, obsidian, and granite lay stocked along one wall. The tools of his trade—rasps, heavy files, cleavers, chisels, mallets of all sizes and weights—were spread haphazardly over the entire length of a long mahogany counter.

It was true, she realized. Her blessings and incantations had worked, just as she'd promised. El Escultor had never been more busy or his works in greater demand. His fame had spread to the neighboring states of _Amazonas_ and _Ceara_.

"I will do this for you, _meu amor_ ," she had vowed the first night they'd made love. "But you will love only me."

"I pledge my entire being to only you," El Escultor had promised in return. "This I swear by these hands that can carve life into that which is lifeless."

Some in the village had tried to warn the young _feiticeira_ of El Escultor's numerous infidelities. How his chiseled _Italiano_ good looks created too many temptations for any mortal male, especially a man of his talents. The woman would consider none of their admonitions. Why would her lover drink bland tea when he could partake of the sweetest wine the natural world could produce?

The woman smiled now as she gazed at proof of her Escultor's loyalty. She walked across the wood floor, kicking up tiny puffs of dust with each light step.

The huge block of azul pegaso granite took up nearly one quarter of one wall and stood over two meters in height. The color was a shade of blue she'd never witnessed before, extraordinary in its purity and boundless richness. Staring into the stone's granite matrix, she could sense its depth extending far beyond the rock's physical constraints. She felt at times, if the stars in the Brazilian sky aligned just right, she could actually walk into the stone and travel to any mystical place on earth. Reaching out, she placed one palm against the block. The surface was cool and momentarily she shivered. The sensation only intensified the dancing under her full breasts.

One day, this pegaso stone of infinite beauty would be of her likeness. This, the sculptor had promised. Up and down the great Amazon River, people would travel to admire the magnificent gift El Escultor had created for her. The _feiticeira_ would live on into eternity as a sculpture of granite that would last eons. Just this one singular thought made her heart leap and she laughed out loud.

"Ahhh," she giggled softly as she spread gardenia petals around the stone's base. "Spirits watch over this rock," she whispered. She recited a silent incantation her mother had taught her.

The granite block was huge and too soon the woman's _bolsa_ was emptied of petals. She glanced at a table near the foot of the stairs and for the first time saw the generous bouquet of flowers. Gardenias, also. The woman smiled—her favorite flower. She could smell their ambrosial fragrance as she approached the stairs. El Escultor was planning to give them to her, she realized. The sweet bouquet should be in water, though, not wrapped in simple twine. They would have wilted before her return tomorrow evening when she was expected. She noticed he'd also neglected to seal the small envelope with her card. As she lifted the card, she heard the onset of a familiar creaking upstairs. Rhythmic and vulgarly metrical. El Escultor's bed springs. Instantly, the dancing in the _feiticeira_ 's chest grew still. She could feel the blood pulsing madly behind her eyes. Her breathing stopped.

Slowly, she tore the card in half, not bothering to read the words. They weren't meant for her.

Quietly, like a cat stalking an unsuspecting rodent, she crept up the narrow stairwell. His bedroom was right off the second floor landing. This is where he'd first loosened her tunic, letting the cloth drop to the floor, and run his powerful hands over the sensual curves of her body. She felt no sensuality now—only venomous hatred.

Peering past the scarred wood door jamb, she looked only long enough for the image to be seared into her brain for all time—El Escultor driving himself into the naked girl sumptuously spread out beneath him, her bare feet held high in the humid air.

The human heart is made of muscle and blood. That night, the _feiticeira_ 's heart turned to stone.

* * *

One month later...

Whispers quickly spread around Ilhéus' rotunda like smoke from a burning flame. She was back. The _feiticeira_ had returned.

For four weeks after that night of betrayal, the woman had vanished into the jungle. Initially, questions had risen with no answers, but in short time it became known how El Escultor had taken another, this girl only a young puta used to service the mariners on the sailing ships. The _feiticeira_ should have listened, the villagers laughed. She thought her beauty and magic would be enough. Alas, no.

And today she was back in Ilhéus. On a day that was unusually warm, they saw no overt signs of humiliation or disgrace in the _feiticeira_ 's demeanor. If anything, the woman appeared happy, in good spirits. The elders of the town warned the woman not to disturb El Escultor, carefully of course. They did not wish to draw her ire. They explained how the sculptor's projects were bringing the town rewards, both monetarily and culturally. She received their admonitions in silence.

El Escultor met the woman at his studio door. " _Meu amor_ ," he boasted raucously. "Your past beauty is only superceded by how glorious you look today." He embraced her as if the past were only a figment of a bad dream. " _Entrar, por favor_ ," he boldly requested, gesturing amorously.

"No." But she promised to return that evening for a night they would both remember for all their lives. First, she wanted to gather a special herb from the rainforest.

The moon was three-quarters full in the western sky when she arrived back at El Escultor's studio later that same night. "And the stone?" she asked, allowing herself to be led inside.

"As magnificent as the day she was mined from the earth's bowels," El Escultor replied. "But..." he paused uncharacteristically.

"Yes?"

He smiled. His confidence was back. "We will talk later about the rock. First," and he motioned to the bottle of _cachaca_ , a rum favored by the Brazilian elite, saying, "We drink."

His famed wood bench had been cleared of all tools and transformed to a banquet table, lavishly stocked with roast pig, _caipirinha_ , wine, _saladas_ , and _frutas_. They drank and ate their fill. All the while, the woman's eyes rarely left the great stone block for long, always returning, even after making love on the studio floor that had been swept clean and covered with a soft blanket of alpaca fur.

Gazing hungrily at the _feiticeira_ 's luscious curves, El Escultor professed over and over, "I will always love you, _meu amor_. Till time stands still, and longer."

She pulled his head against her breast, flaming his ravenous appetite for her flesh. "You will love only me," she whispered, though if he'd listened closer, more cautiously, he would have heard the viper's hiss behind each syllable.

"The young _puta_ meant nothing to me," he confided, aware of the alcohol in his blood.

"I know," she said.

"My work, it is everything, all that matters."

"I know that, too, _mue carino_."

"And you matter," he vowed.

She smiled, again gazing across his muscled shoulders at the block. How could a stone so huge be so magnificently blue?

"The stone will be me," she said under her breath.

El Escultor heard her and she didn't miss the wary flash of concern in his expression. He averted her sharp gaze and looked down at the silver chalice which held the sweet liquid he'd been imbibing. He swigged until only a few drops remained. "What do you call this?" he asked, his words slurring.

"It is _virola_ , made from bark shavings," she said. "More?"

" _Por favor_."

She filled the goblet, then watched him drink. "Intoxicating, yes," she said.

"As are...you." His speech slurred even more. The woman studied how he rested his head back. "I am feeling funny," he moaned.

"You will," she said, her eyes no longer on the granite but fixated on the stone carver's tools. She settled on the heavy mallet and chisel. "What about my gift?" she asked, her tone suddenly harsh.

He attempted to lift his head. "What...have...you... done...to me?" he stuttered. He couldn't move. Thick sheets of fear coated every word.

"The granite," she said, her tone as cold as the ice bucket chilling the _cachaca_. "Tell me what you have planned for the granite."

Deception was impossible and he knew it. "The village elders have paid a large sum. They have commissioned a statue of Saint—"

"Speak not." The woman hissed. She positioned an anvil behind his head and pulled both paralyzed arms back, placing them across the steely iron surface.

" _Mue amor, no_ ," he blubbered. Fear became panic and panic, terror. "I will find a new stone, even better, I promise you this. I swear, Franscesca," he pleaded.

The _feiticeira_ stared malevolently down at this man, El Escultor, so talented and strong, now as helpless as a newborn. "No one but me," she cursed. "No one but me, Atilio, will ever be in that stone."

Pressing the tempered chisel blade against the blanched skin of one forearm, she raised the heavy mallet and swung it down. And again. And again. Then she moved to his other arm, ignoring his horrific hi-pitched wails of excruciating pain. In less than a minute her revenge was complete.

* * *

Within days, the angry villagers apprehended the _feiticeira_ and strapped her naked to a hardwood plank. After all, she'd just stolen the small town's ticket to fame and prosperity. In the most hideous manner imaginable, the men of Ilhéus maimed and brutally tortured the beautiful young witch doctor, ignoring her screams of infinite agony. To both their dismay and surprise, though, she never begged for mercy. Instead, the _feiticeira_ swore by all the black magic at her disposal, she would never die. She belonged to the great granite stone. And within the stone is where her soul would forever reside.

No one could take that from her. _No one!_

* * *

SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL 1954

The wealthy Peruvian businessman could not believe his good fortune. For months he'd searched for a proper pedestal on which to mount the statues of his three young children—two girls and one boy. He planned to place them around a marble fountain built in the courtyard of his large Liman estate. This would be a surprise birthday gift to his wife who had designed the fountain but had no idea her spouse had commissioned sculptures of their beautiful offspring to adorn the structure.

The statues were complete, life-size, and stored in his textile warehouse in Lima. The stone mason he'd hired to do the work was a longtime friend and the businessman trusted the artist's creative judgment completely. Choosing the appropriate pedestal mounts had proved challenging, though. With his wide network of connections in the industry, even the mason could not find the stone with just the quality of blue to highlight the turquoise ingrained in the marble sculptures as well as the indigo stones catching the fountain water. Until three weeks ago, he'd given up on granite and decided a softer limestone or even polished feldspar would have to suffice.

"My wife turns forty next month," the rich businessman reminded him daily.

"We'll find her," the mason constantly reassured him. All carving stones to him were of the female gender.

Then came the call from São Paulo both had been praying for. A trader in quartz and marble had recently acquired a huge block of azul pegaso granite. It was too large to easily place, and though it was unnaturally pure, he was on the verge of returning the block to the Azul Bahia Quarry near Ilhéus where the rock had been mined.

"It is the most extraordinary hue of blue I've ever witnessed," the trader boasted, "bluer than indigo tourmaline."

"You have cutting tools there?" the mason inquired in eager anticipation.

"For the right price."

A tentative deal was consummated over the phone and the following day the mason flew to São Paulo, Brazil.

Now as the mason studied the monstrous block of granite, he realized the trader had not been exaggerating. If anything, he'd misjudged the granite's quality. In virtual awe, he noted the deep azure matrix, as blue as an emerald pendant, though infinitely larger. Nothing in his many years of masonry had ever made him experience what he was feeling that evening.

" _Increible_ ," he muttered repeatedly. Depending on the angle of his vision, the rock would glisten under the cutting studio lights as if a million minute iridescent stars were twinkling just under the granite's surface. Initially, he thought the stone was moist, but no—cool and dry to his touch. Just placing one palm against the block's surface made him shiver. And it was a warm night in São Paulo.

For long moments, all he could do was stare. The mason found himself seriously reconsidering his orders to cleave the stone into three pieces. What a shame to destroy such a prize. But he knew the rock was perfect for the businessman's fountain, and a deal was a deal. With regret, he walked to the door and locked it. He didn't wish to be disturbed. Earlier, the trader had helped him attach a winch and hoist the huge slab onto her side. Then he'd excused himself for dinner. Before leaving, the trader had told him, "You and your Peruvian friend were quite fortunate. For over two and a half decades this rock sat in Ilhéus. Only last week, it was shipped here. It was to be crushed into small fragments and used as aggregate in a decorative botanical garden walk. But the project engineer died suddenly while preparing the stone for pulverization. Heart attack, imagine that."

One engineer's unfortunate luck is another man's good fortune, the mason concluded. He checked the time. Nine PM. He would finish by eleven, and the three separate slabs could then be safely packaged and shipped back to Lima, Peru in the morning.

He pushed the bulky cutting saw toward the block. The massive three foot circular diamond-studded blade would make his work go smoothly. He slipped on a mask and pair of protective goggles. Reaching for the earplugs, he paused abruptly, listening.

Someone had spoken. A woman, but when he searched the studio, it was empty. The voice had come from outside, he decided, and was incomprehensible anyway. Perhaps it was only a laugh from the street he'd heard. A tourist.

Shoving the ear plugs in place, he flipped a switch and the big saw blade began to spin. Even with the ear protection, the din was uncomfortable, making him grimace. As loud as a jet turbine.

Positioning the saw, he watched the heavy blade inch nearer the block.

" _Dios mios_ ," he started suddenly. He'd seen a shadow. Something had moved behind the block. He was sure now he was no longer alone. Aware of a new unsettling sensation in his gut, he shut the huge saw down. Didn't wish to lose a finger or hand being careless. Somewhat nervously, he inspected behind the azul pegaso stone. Nothing. He heard the saw blade whir to a stop. Yet the intangible disquiet settling over the studio wouldn't release him.

_Chingada_ , he cursed as the saw blade began to spin again. What the fuck. Cutting machines didn't turn themselves on. Briefly, he gazed at the monster spinning blade, tempted to check the switch for a malfunction.

But his escalating unease drew his attention back to the great rock. Perhaps his measurements had been inaccurate. He would recalculate the stone's cleavage points. Climbing on top of the thick block, he noticed the granite was no longer cool, but warm. _And it felt moist!_ Very odd, indeed.

Yet, it was the sweet fragrance of flowers that caught him by total surprise. Puzzled, he glanced around the studio but there were no flowers. An unexplained cold fear took hold that he was powerless to ignore. Where was that strange scent coming from? He gazed down onto the stone's smooth surface and saw his own frightened face reflecting back.

The smell came from the granite!

He continued to stare and what he suddenly observed inside the great rock stole the breath from his lungs. "No!" cried out the stone mason, leaping from the block. Too late, he realized his mortal mistake.

Catching one boot on the winch cable, he stumbled, sending both arms falling toward the spinning diamond saw blade, severing tendon, muscle, and bone seconds before the wails began.

Though armless, and unable to unlock the studio door or staunch the flow of blood, death came not from exsanguination, rather emotional shock. Utter, absolute terror!

#

Read how Franscesca's vengeful spirit becomes Girl Blue in Alan Nayes' erotic horror story _GIRL BLUE_ published by Samhain Publishing.

#

Alan Nayes has never seen a spirit in stone, but he has seen plenty of stoned spirits.

Read more about Alan Nayes and his books at www.anayes.com or follow him on Facebook and Twitter

# Soul Eaters

R.G. Porter
Chapter One:

Kaitlyn's shopping bags slammed against one of the stone pillars as she left the store in a rush. With thunder rumbling across the sky, she knew she didn't have much time. Moving to the parking lot, she heard a whisper near a large fountain in the middle of the walkway. Glancing down, she watched as her image shimmered in the depths of the sparkling water. She nearly lost her balance when a brush of wind moved in from the north, pushing her to the side. Her hand caught the stone fountain, her hair whipping around her face. She felt a small tug and noticed as one of her earrings fell into the water. Uncertain of whether to retrieve her precious heirloom, she glanced around to see if anyone was nearby.

"Oh great," she muttered.

The air bristled with electricity from the coming lightning, and cloud shadows darkened the street beneath her as she searched for her grandmother's earring. She checked her purse to see if she had remembered to pack her stylish black umbrella, but with a great sigh, she remembered leaving it on the floorboard of her car. She glanced up for a moment, confirming what she already knew—rain was imminent and by the time she got back to the fountain from her car, it may not be safe to open a metal umbrella at all.

"Fine."

Kaitlyn sat on the edge of the stone fixture. Praying the rain would hold off, she rolled up her sleeve and reached down into the crystal-clear basin. As soon as her skin broke the surface of the water, a chill ran across her skin. Lightning arced in the sky in a ferocity she'd never seen before. The air around her infused with energy as thunder began roaring. Quickly grasping across the basin floor, her fingers brushed against the cold metal of her earring. The moment her hand wrapped around the small piece of jewelry, a jolt rushed through her. The suddenness of it took her by surprise, and she lost control of her legs. She felt her body falling forward into the cold water. She expected a frigid shock, but none came. Instead, a dark vortex of energy wrapped around her.

"Help!" Kaitlyn tried to scream, but her voice never reached her own ears.

The world faded away, and she found only darkness staring back. Everything in her soul told her that she was peering into purest evil, and her mind tried to steel against the onslaught of cold and evil just as the menacing presence tried to push its way in. As the world continued to shift into darkness, she felt her body give in to the malevolent creature. She fought against the invading wraith, willing her conscience to overpower it, but as the seconds became agonizing minutes, a nagging fear began to take hold. Her mind might be strong enough, but her body simply could not withstand the lure of this terror. Soon she found she had no choice. The cold and darkness wrapped tight against her; her mind and her body both folded. She prayed this was just a dream.

* * *

Kaitlyn woke with her head pounding. What had happened? The last she remembered, she'd been fishing out her earring from the fountain. Everything had gone dark after that. Rubbing the back of her head, she tried to recall just what had happened. Kaitlyn tried to move, but her body felt heavy. Cursing under her breath, she needed to figure out where she was.

_Open your eyes Kaitlyn. You can't stay here. You must get up._ Uncertainty laced the woman's voice.

Kaitlyn's eyelids fluttered open to darkness. Nothing around her made sense. Moments slipped by as her eyes adjusted to the area. Trees were everywhere, their limbs reaching out as if to grab hold of her. Where was she? Reaching into her jacket, she found only lint. Someone had taken her keys and pepper spray.

"Dammit."

Loud stomps echoed in the distance. Though she was lost, Kaitlyn had a deep sense of danger heading her way. Suddenly, she fully understood the fight or flight reflex. Normally one to stand her ground, flight won out as she wasn't about to wait to see what was coming. Running seemed the best idea for now. Getting to her feet, she looked around for anything familiar. Trees and bushes were everywhere, but none of the foliage looked familiar, no landmarks, and no buildings. Where had she ended up?

"Okay, Katie, let's move our body."

Her voice sounded strange, but she had no time to think it over. Getting to her feet, she moved away from the sounds and to the left. She wasn't sure where the sounds were coming from, but they seemed to be everywhere. With every step, it was as if the noises were following her. Her body shivered with the brush of a cold wind.

Running as fast as her feet would take her, she found it difficult to maintain balance against the uneven forest floor. Roots and rocks jutted out to slow her progress, but Kaitlyn refused to stop. Several times her leg was sliced with the edge of a limb, the sting of pain enough to bring tears to her eyes. She wanted to shout into the darkness but held her tongue. And still, nothing was familiar. No lights or cars, just pure darkness. All around her were trees, stars, the moon and the howling of animals from within the shadows.

The sounds were getting closer, but her pursuers were steeped in shadows. Kaitlyn kept moving forward. The full moon shone through the clouds now, and she crashed into trees and foliage less frequently, but the pursuing cacophony continued to increase. She had to find shelter somewhere or else meet whatever was following her. Just when she was sure she was going to meet those from the shadows, two hands grasped her waist and pulled her into the moss-covered earth. Kaitlyn opened her mouth to scream but the same hands covered her lips. Had she fallen into a trap?

"Shh before you get us killed." The man's voice whispered in her ear. "Be quiet or we will be found."

Kaitlyn struggled to get out of the man's grip, but his arms held her tight. She needed to move, to breathe before he suffocated her with his hand. One thought ran through her mind, though she feared doing it. Her need to breathe won out. Biting hard on his hand, his yelp and a quick intake of air was her reward. She thought about screaming but stopped. The sounds were even closer, and danger from the man next to her seemed smaller by comparison.

The man pulled her close to him. "That was uncalled for." He rubbed his hand. "Not to mention it hurt like hell."

Kaitlyn hated being held against her will but at least she had gotten her point across. "I had no choice. I couldn't breathe!" He loosened his grip on her. She turned to try and face him but found shadows across his face. "What the hell were those and why did you try to suffocate me?" If she was stuck next to him, she needed answers. "And who are you?"

His body tensed under her inquiry. "My name is Jack Sinclair. Now hush 'til they are gone."

"Fair enough. I'm Kaitlyn, by the way." Leaning in closer, she whispered in his ear. "So what the hell are those things?"

Jack glared at her. "I'll answer you when it's safe, now be quiet."

"But..."

She was about to speak when his fingers covered her lips. She wanted to protest, but the approaching sounds made her pause. Now that she was closer to him, she could see his face. She could see his eyes through the darkness and found compassion in their depths. That thought eased the tightness developing in her chest. Nodding, she felt his fingers move from her lips.

"Watch." He pointed in the distance.

Kaitlyn turned to face where he was pointing. The sounds were getting louder. Squinting, she tried to see what was coming. What she saw drew the breath from her lungs. Emerging from the bushes were men, but deformed into something else. Their bodies were hunched over on all fours and elongated beyond what could be possible. Ashen colored skin covered their body, and they ran like animals.

She wanted to believe she was still dreaming, but the man next to her made that fantasy impossible. His body heat was very real, which meant those creatures were just as real.

"What—" She bit her lip as she looked more closely at one of the creatures. Red eyes stared in her direction from shallow eye sockets. It was not a human face, but more of a shimmering of bone and flesh that flickered from within. Kaitlyn's stomach twisted as they passed. She wasn't about to let the creatures know where she was. Not after what she'd seen. As the things continued on, a whisper began to form inside her head, calling to her to stand up and show herself.

"Don't listen to them," Jack said. "They will try and call you out. You have to ignore them."

Kaitlyn did her best to ignore the sense of being summoned, but the compulsion was strong. Her mind was happy Jack was keeping her down, but her body wanted to listen to the whispers. She closed her eyes and tried to allow other thoughts to move through her mind. She needed some kind of distraction to get through this. Soon, the whispers eased and the tightness left her chest. Opening her eyes, she found Jack staring at her again.

"Where did you come from?"

His question startled her back into reality. "What do you mean? I was leaving a store and now I'm here. Speaking of, where am I?"

He eyed her cautiously. "That's a complicated answer. How long have you been running around out here?"

"I... I don't know."

Standing up, he reached down and offered his hand to her, and she took it. "You are in the Forest of Shadows. It's not safe here. You're lucky the scouts didn't find you."

_Scouts? Forest of Shadows? Am I dreaming?_ The calls she had heard had been too real. "This isn't right. I shouldn't be here." Kaitlyn wanted to run, but where would she go? Nothing was as it seemed in this place.

Jack's hand held her arm as she rose. "No one should be here. That's the problem. Yet here we are."

Kaitlyn stood to regain her balance but found her footing was off. "What do you mean? I don't understand." A sound in the distance drew their attention. The branches and bushes began to move with the wind. Even the air around them began to thicken.

"I need to go." She felt the need to run but his arm tightened around her waist, his free hand lifting her chin to face him. Deep blue eyes stared at her in question. "Please let me go." She knew she was begging but fear ran through her veins.

"Where will you go? The forest isn't safe. Nowhere near here is," Jack explained. "If you want to survive, come with me. I won't harm you."

"I want to go home."

"There is no safety, only death." A voice from the darkness echoed around them.

She turned to find the source but only red eyes peered from the darkness. "We go...now." Jack grabbed Kaitlyn's arm. She wanted to protest but a creature unlike anything she had seen before emerged from the shadows. Suddenly Jack's grab wasn't as bad as the thing that had found them. She didn't care what the creature was; she only wanted to be as far away from it as possible. Running through the forest, Kaitlyn finally released the scream she'd held deep inside.

Chapter Two:

They ran for what felt like an hour before Jack finally stopped. Kaitlyn dropped to her knees and tried to calm her breathing. Her hands were shaking and her chest burned as she breathed. Looking around, she had no idea where she was.

"Okay, so, what is this place?" Kaitlyn finally asked.

Jack knelt near her. "That's a bit complicated to explain."

His reply didn't make sense. Kaitlyn looked around her and found nothing but dark forest. No birds, no animals, nothing. She'd hiked in many forests before and the vibe was always the same. This place was completely different. It felt off. Getting back to her feet, she moved close to one of the trees and ran her fingers across the bark. It was real. Nevertheless, this place didn't feel right.

Kaitlyn turned around to find Jack staring at her.

"We can't hang around here," he said.

"Why not? What's going on with this place?"

"I'll tell you once we are somewhere safe."

"Promise?" Kaitlyn didn't like the idea of waiting, but she also didn't want to face those creatures again.

"Promise."

Kaitlyn followed Jack for another half a mile at least. Just when she thought the forest was not going to end, it did. As they exited from the thick underbrush, Kaitlyn found herself in the middle of a makeshift camp surrounded by tall trees. It was still part of the forest, but some of the area looked to have been cleared. As soon as they got close enough to see Kaitlyn, the people stopped and stared.

"Who... who is with you?" A small young woman asked Jack.

"This is Kaitlyn."

The woman looked terrified. Something had them scared. If what Kaitlyn had seen was any indication of what roamed this place, she couldn't blame her. Still, there were shelters here. Could they have found a way to avoid detection? Deep inside she had a strong feeling it was false sense of security.

"What is this place?"

"Home," one of the strangers replied.

Jack shook hands with the man. "Well, as close to home as we have, for now."

More people emerged from the houses. Women, men and even a few children. There were so many people out here, but how had they remained safe? Then again, how much time had passed? From where Kaitlyn stood she counted at least twenty other people. Did they all live here? Did they abandon their lives to move here? She found it hard to believe that was the case. One of the children got closer, her disheveled hair pulled back into a braid.

"They got you too, huh?"

"They?"

One of the men circled Kaitlyn. "She's got no idea what's going on."

Jack dropped a bag onto the ground. "No, not yet."

Kaitlyn sighed. "Will someone please tell me what is going on?"

Jack led her to one of the few chairs that littered the area. "Sit." Kaitlyn wanted to stand but gave in. Her legs were killing her. Sitting on one of the wooden chairs, she waited.

"Now, some of this is going to sound strange, but trust me when I tell you it's the truth," Jack began

"Isn't that the truth," another man said.

"Dan, enough." Jack turned his gaze back to her. "This place can't be found on any map. It does not exist in the mortal plane. It is part of a world, a reality so to speak, that mirrors our own. Only here, there are very bad creatures roaming about."

Kaitlyn shook her head. "I don't understand. How did we get here?"

"That can be different for everyone. For me, I was renovating an old home and came across a full length mirror. Beverly over there was cleaning the windows and little Evie; well, she was getting ready to take a bath."

"Water," Kaitlyn whispered. She looked up and found the others staring. "Last thing I remember, I was reaching into a fountain for something I had dropped. Next thing I know, here I am."

"Sounds about right. However we all got here, we do know that dark and sinister creatures rule this world. Somehow, they are able to pull us into it."

"But why? Why do they want us here?"

"The Hunt."

"What's the Hunt?"

A man from the shadows moved forward. "It is a game these creatures play. They pull us here and give us time to adjust. Then they come. At first it's the scouts. They search for our scent." He drew closer, his stubbled chin and cold stare sending goose bumps across Kaitlyn's skin. "Once the scouts catch your scent, the others come. If they catch you, they devour your soul. It is what fuels them."

"Ed, enough."

She shivered at Ed's words. "So, these things will be hunting us? Why?" Kaitlyn felt her throat close up at the thought. "How do we get out of here?"

"We don't." Ed's reply was as cold as his eyes. "Once you are pulled into this place, you either find a way to survive or you die. No one ever gets out."

Kaitlyn stood and faced Ed. "I don't believe you. If there is a way in, then there has to be a way out. I don't care what these things are, I refuse to die here. I will find a way—- with, or without, your help." Kaitlyn walked to the far end of the encampment. "I can't die here," she whispered, both for herself and to those who had kidnapped her from her world.

"It's not that easy, you know." Jack said. His words made her jump. He moved around to face her. "Don't you think others have tried?"

"What happened to them?"

Jack's frown increased. "Some came back, changed. Most were never seen again."

"I can't just give in." She moved closer to Jack, her hand touching his shoulder. "Don't you understand? If they can bring us here, there has to be a way back. We just need to find it."

"Are you willing to risk your life to find out?"

Kaitlyn glanced behind her at the gathered people. They'd spent time here and survived, but at what cost? She could see that they were tired, their eyes shadowed. If those things were hunting them, how could any of them ever rest? Even the dull eyes of the children made them look as though they had lost all sense of youth and wonder. Turning back to face Jack, Kaitlyn found him staring at her.

"Look at these people, Jack. They have no hope, no will to fight. How can you consider this living?" She moved closer to the edge of the encampment and the shadows of the forest. "I would rather die trying to find a way out than wither away."

Jack's smile returned. "You would go at it alone? Not having a clue what direction to go, so long as there was a chance to get out?"

Kaitlyn sighed. "Wouldn't you?"

"Yes, I guess I would," he admitted. "But for tonight, at least, rest and eat. We can formulate something later."

"Promise? I am not going to change my mind."

"No, somehow I can't imagine you will."

Jack led her back to the middle of the camp and the rest of the group. Her eyes came to rest on one of the small children who had come to greet her. The girl looked to be no more than maybe seven years old, yet her eyes had seen more than any child should have. That tore at Kaitlyn more than anything else.

* * *

Kaitlyn woke with a start. Something loud had broken through her restless sleep. She barely remembered lying down, let alone actually sleeping. Sitting up, she looked around. Somehow she'd found her way into one of the makeshift houses. It was sparsely furnished, but at least it kept the elements out. Glancing through one of the windows, Kaitlyn found it was still dark. How long had she slept? She stretched. Every muscle in her body ached. Still, she didn't have the luxury of wandering around to ease her tight muscles. Not after what she'd seen yesterday. Kaitlyn got to her feet and moved quietly to the exit. Peeking out, she caught sight of a few of the men seated by the fire.

"I don't like it, Jack. She's not one of us."

"I know that, but it doesn't matter. She's still human. That makes her one of us."

"But she's going to get us noticed." Kaitlyn could not miss the fear in Ed's voice. No wonder he had been so defensive. "If she is determined to find a way out, make sure you take far from here and leave her to it. We've been safe for a while now. I don't want to lose that."

"Do you really think this is safe? Any day now we could be found. With, or without her presence, that is a possibility. Don't lay blame simply because she is convenient."

Kaitlyn didn't like being talked about behind her back. Jack continued to defend her, but it didn't matter. Their voices were getting louder and that wasn't good. Even if they'd been here for a long time, raised voices could garner something's attention. She trusted their abilities since they were still alive, but her internal warning system had already started to go off. Moving out from the house, she found both men were too deep in discussion to notice her.

As she moved closer she felt something pull at her shirt. Turning around, Kaitlyn found a small girl staring up at her. Kaitlyn knelt next to the girl. "And who might you be?"

"I'm Jessica."

"Well, nice to meet you Jessica. How long have you been here?"

At first she didn't answer, but looked around as if searching for something. "I don't know, but I miss my momma." Turning to face Kaitlyn, tears shimmered in her eyes. "Can you take me to her? Mommy and Daddy always take me to the pizza place. I miss it. I miss them."

Kaitlyn just smiled. The path she was embarking on was going to be dangerous. Could she chance taking a child with her? Still, what else could she do? Telling Jessica no meant leaving her in this place where she would likely end up dead. Yet taking a child along would certainly put them both in harm's way. Neither option was optimal. Kaitlyn glanced over at Jack and then back at Jessica.

"Look..." Kaitlyn stopped as a movement within the forest caught her attention. "What is that?" Every time Kaitlyn caught sight of something, it vanished. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end. Grabbing Jessica's hand, Kaitlyn pulled her towards some large tree stumps at the edge of camp. She knelt back down and waited. Perhaps fate had decided for her.

"What..." Jessica started to ask, but Kaitlyn placed her hand over the child's mouth.

Jack must have heard them because he began to head their way. The movement in the forest hadn't stopped. It was getting closer to the shelters. Jack had a questioning look on his face, but Kaitlyn wasn't about to give away her position. Pointing towards the trees, she tried to get him to understand. After a few seconds he looked where she was pointing. The moment he turned, the trees were pushed aside and a black mist emerged.

"Cover, now!" Ed shouted.

Kaitlyn held Jessica close. As soon as the dark mist entered the camp, more of the scouts formed, and then something else came through the dark veil. Tall, dark creatures followed the scouts. Could they be the creatures that did the hunting? She tried to get a better look, but with Jessica squirming in her arms she had to hold back. She wasn't about to let the creatures see either her or the child. They must have been followed. The rest of the camp was rushing out of their shelters; women, children and men running everywhere, trying to escape.

"Oh God," Kaitlyn whispered. One of Hunters had caught up to a man. He had turned around to face the shadow, and froze in his spot. The creature's hand covered the man's face, and he screamed. Kaitlyn wanted to turn away, but she refused to. She needed to know what she was up against. The creature screeched as he held the man, his body beginning to shake. A thin line of energy moved from the man's mouth and into the wraith's palm. His skin and bones cracked as the energy was drained. Everything that made them human was sucked out by the Hunters. Within minutes the man's body, or what was left of it, dropped to the ground.

"We need to go," Jack whispered as he grabbed Kaitlyn's hand. "Come on."

"What about the others?" Kaitlyn asked.

Jack turned her to face him. "We can't help them. We stay, we die. Now, come on."

Kaitlyn pulled Jessica into her arms and followed Jack out from their hiding spot and into the forest. She could hear some of the others following their lead.

_Good_ , she thought. _At least some of them had been smart and not waited._

Jack set a fast pace. They ran through the woods without stopping. Tree branches and bushes reached out to stop them, the limbs scratching and cutting into their skin. None of that mattered as screams still echoed behind them. But it was more than that. A dark coldness had blanketed the area. Could they be running into a trap?

"Jack..."

"I know. Follow me." He made a sharp turn to the left and kept running.

Kaitlyn didn't miss a beat. Holding Jessica tight, she followed him to the edge of a hill and into a small alcove and ducked under an overhang.

"Here, we can rest for a few minutes," he said. "I want to see which way they go."

Kaitlyn allowed Jessica to drop to the ground. "Stay down and quiet, sweetie, and whatever you do, look away if they appear. Promise me?"

Jessica nodded but remained silent. Kaitlyn held the child's hand but looked back to Jack. "How did they find us?"

"Shh, wait. I hear something."

Kaitlyn moved closer to Jack and followed his line of sight. One of the women she'd seen back at the campsite had tried to follow them and broken through one of the bushes not far from where they were hidden. Kaitlyn held her breath and waited. As tempting as it was to call out, she also knew it would bring unwanted attention to them all. The woman was searching for them, but the spot must have been camouflaged just enough. Just as she began to turn toward the alcove, a loud screech rang out. From the other side of the clearing, one of the creatures leapt from the shadows.

"Oh no." Kaitlyn held Jessica close, covering her eyes. "Jack, can't we do something?"

He shook his head. "No. We go out there, we're dead." His hand gripped hers. "I'm sorry."

The woman sprinted away, but the creature was too fast. Its fingers wrapped around her neck, pulling her up into the air. As soon as the woman's feet left the ground, the creature's mouth opened. From where she hid, Katelyn caught glimpses of the Hunter. Its body was scaled from head to toe. The hands had only four fingers, but the nails were long and razor sharp. The wraith extended its arm toward the woman's face, exposing small circular indentions on its palms. Watching, she noticed the woman's body had gone still, and an aura emanated around her. The nimbus went from bright yellow to orange, and then it flickered. It was as if a hole had been opened in her, taking her life-force away. As her life trickled out, her skin took on an ashen color.

Jack leaned in. "We need to move."

"No, wait. We need to know where they are going. If we can follow, perhaps we can find the source of where they pull us from."

"Are you nuts? We'll get caught if we follow them. I want to live. If you are smart, you will do as I say."

Kaitlyn turned to face Jack. "Have you ever followed them before? Back in Missouri, I used to hunt with my father. He always said, 'The best way to understand a predator was to follow it.' Our very survival may depend on understanding where these creatures go and why. We may even find a way out." She leaned in so close his breath brushed against her skin. "Please trust me. I know it's asking a lot, but I'm sure I'm right."

"I do trust you," Jack replied. "Just give me one second. I need to make sure of something."

"What?"

Jack pointed to the woman. "That." Her body had started to shake before morphing into the same scouts who'd hunted them earlier.

"Jack, does that happen all the time?"

"I've only seen it happen twice." There was sadness in his tone.

"They took someone close to you?"

"When I was pulled, I didn't come alone." He paused and stared at the ground. "My...my best friend, my brother-in-law, was with me. He was taken the first night we were here."

_His friend_. No wonder he had sounded sad. But she understood his hesitation at getting out. He was scared. Scared of the questions and of facing his wife knowing she'd lost her brother to these things. Staying, and surviving, could seem easier than facing the truth.

"I'm sorry for your loss." Her fingers gripped his hand. "I know going back must seem like a bad dream, but you can't stay here. No one can. If we can find a way out, we have to try. If not for me, or for you, do it for Jessica. She shouldn't be condemned to this place. She has her whole life ahead of her. Besides, don't you have someone back home?" Kaitlyn waited to let her words sink in.

"Yes, my wife is still there. We were supposed to have dinner the evening I was pulled."

"Then you need to get back to her."

"What about you?" Jack asked.

Kaitlyn kicked a small stone across the ground. "My parents are dead, and I was an only child. No one is back there to miss me."

"I'm sorry." His hand touched hers.

"It's okay. Right now we just need to find a way out of this place. I don't want to die here."

"Fine, but we keep a good distance. I don't want them to see us."

Kaitlyn held back a sigh. "Fair enough." She squeezed his hand. "Thank you." She leaned up and kissed his cheek. She hated what he'd already gone through. She wanted to take away his pain, but she knew she couldn't. It was something he would have to work through, but she would do what she could to help. That was, if he was willing to accept her help.

"Come on, it's moving."

Kaitlyn looked down at Jessica, her eyes still closed. "Okay sweetie, it's time for us to move. Now, I'll need you to remain as quiet as possible. Think you can do that for me?"

Jessica just nodded. For her young age, she'd seen more than any adult ever should. Kaitlyn prayed her idea was right and she wasn't walking them into a larger trap. If so, she would do everything she could to save them. Gripping the child's hand, Kaitlyn allowed Jack to lead the way. Exiting the hideout he began to pick up speed towards the north, in the direction the creature had gone. They were on their way. On their way to what, Kaitlyn had no idea, but she hoped it was a way out.

Chapter Three:

They'd run for a good mile before Jack dragged them all to the ground behind a large stump. They had caught up to the Hunter. Kaitlyn kept still and waited, with the hair on the back of her neck standing up again. Glancing over the edge of the stump, she could see the Hunter ahead stop and turn to look around. Could it have sensed their presence? Kaitlyn waited. A few minutes passed before the creature slipped into some of the vines and was gone.

"Where did it go?"

Kaitlyn pulled Jessica close. "I don't know sweetie, but don't you worry. You'll be fine."

Leaning towards Jack, she whispered in his ear. "Did that thing just vanish into the wall or am I missing something?"

"I really don't know," he answered. "Okay, let's move slowly forward. I want to see if there is an entrance here we don't know about. Maybe the way out is in there."

"Works for me." She felt Jack begin to move. "But, if it isn't. Thank you for coming. It means a lot to me."

Jack turned to face her, placing a kiss on her forehead. "No, thank you."

"For?"

"For giving me hope. For pushing me to find a way out. I don't know if I ever would have tried to, if not for you."

Kaitlyn was about to say more, but she heard another movement in the forest. Pulling Jack and Jessica onto the forest floor she waited. Another Hunter appeared from the far end of the clearing. It was also looking around, as if trying to locate something it couldn't see. Its eyes came to rest on their spot, but it didn't move forward. A few minutes passed by, and then it drifted towards the rock wall and vanished as quickly as had the other. There was definitely some sort of passage over there.

"It was acting as back up, in case one of us had followed. Glad you stopped me from moving."

Kaitlyn squeezed Jack's arm. "Not a problem. We'll call it even for saving my butt earlier. Come on, let's go. I want to see what's inside there." She started to stand, but a sense of dread moved across her again. "Let's take it slow and keep to the bushes as much as possible. I don't want to chance being seen if any of the others come back."

They moved from their hiding spot and headed quietly towards the spot where the Hunters had disappeared. The closer they got, the more Kaitlyn's chest tightened. As they approached the wall, her hands reached out to find any kind of opening. The spot the Hunters had seemed to pass through felt solid. Moving along the wall, Kaitlyn's fingers continued to brush across stone and vines. Pushing further in, she felt a slight rush of air.

"Here," Kaitlyn whispered to Jack. "There is a change in airflow."

"I feel it."

Jack moved ahead of her and pushed into the thick bushes. His body vanished before her eyes. Kaitlyn was about to call out to him, when his arm reappeared reaching out to her. Uncertainty rushed through Kaitlyn, but she knew she couldn't turn back. Not now. Squeezing Jessica's hand, she grabbed Jack's hand. He pulled them both through the bushes and into a dimly lit room. Looking around, Kaitlyn saw crude pictures painted on the wall. She moved closer to get a better view.

"Oh wow. This is amazing." Her fingers ran across the stone wall. "This looks to be a history of who they are. From what I can tell, they don't do this all the time."

Jack moved closer. "What do you mean?"

"Well, look at this. This shows them as if they are rising from some kind of sleep or something. Look, they rise and surround some kind of bright light. From within that light, people are pulled through. But, check this out. The first people they take, you can see them absorbing their energy."

"We've seen that."

"I know, but keep looking how these pictures unfold. It looks like they turn the first set of people they hunt, but then on this next wall, it only shows them absorbing their life force." She moved to another wall on the opposite side. "Check this out, it looks like they go back to sleep after a while only to wake again."

"Well that can't be good."

Kaitlyn turned to face Jack. "I don't like what this represents. How can they manage it?"

Jack shrugged. "No idea. All I can think of is that absorbing the energy of those they hunt, allows them to live very long lives." He moved closer to one of the walls. "It's the only thing that makes sense."

"So they will keep doing this over and over." Kaitlyn sighed.

"Unless we can find a way to stop them." Jack moved toward a hallway that lead away from the room. "Let's see where that goes. I don't want to be here if any of the Hunters return."

"Works for me," Kaitlyn replied.

They headed towards the hallway, which was darker than the room they just left. Thankfully, the darkness only went on for about ten feet before the passage opened into a larger room. As her eyes adjusted back to the light, Kaitlyn noticed at least ten sarcophagi in the room. They were situated in a circle with a large oval mirror in the center. Kaitlyn had never seen anything like it before.

"Do you think that mirror is the way out?" Kaitlyn asked.

"It's as good an idea as any," Jack whispered. "When we move forward, we do so quickly. Don't stop, don't look around. If they show themselves, just try and find a place to hide."

Kaitlyn closed her eyes for a moment. "I get it. Don't pass go, don't stop for anything." She tried to still her nerves. "Sorry, don't mind my sarcasm. Force of habit when I'm nervous."

Jack smiled. "No worries. Come on, let's go. I don't want to delay this any longer."

"Understood." She knelt down and faced Jessica. "Okay sweetie. You understand what we are doing, yes? Just run to the middle of the room with us, and we will see if this mirror can help us."

"Okay." Jessica looked up at her. "I can't wait to go home."

Kaitlyn glanced at Jack and nodded. "Let's go."

Jack smiled and took her hand. Standing, they all ran to the middle of the room and past the resting places of the Hunters. As they got closer to the middle of the room, the air that surrounded them changed and became electrified. A loud screech echoed from the hallway, and Kaitlyn turned to find the Hunters emerging from the darkness. The creatures somehow sensed they were here, as if some invisible alarm system had been triggered. It was something they couldn't worry about. With only about a foot to go, the Hunters were coming at them with full force.

"Go, go, go!" Jack shouted.

As they got close, the mirror shimmered and came to life. The reflective surface changed from a solid plane into something more. It almost resembled the water Kaitlyn had touched before being pulled through. Could it be the way out? Behind her the Hunters drew closer and she knew she had to act.

Kaitlyn took Jessica's hand and put it in Jack's to replace her own. "I'm sorry. Take care of her."

"What?" Jack asked.

She hated the confusion on his face. "I'm sorry."

She pushed both Jessica and Jack into the portal, their bodies absorbed from this place and taken to the next. Kaitlyn prayed she was right that they'd been sent back to the human realm and not somewhere even more dangerous. As soon as she was certain they were safe, she pulled with every ounce of strength she had on the frame of the mirror. At first it didn't seem as if it would budge, but then the metal began to give way. As the frame came crashing to the ground, loud ear-piercing shrieks from the Hunters echoed in the room. Kaitlyn might die, but at least she'd saved them. It was her gift to them, the last she would ever give anyone.

"Take care of her, Jack."

The darkness converged around Kaitlyn. Her life was forfeit, but at least Jack and Jessica had escaped. Kaitlyn's body felt warm and then turned ice cold, the world around her fading into shadows and darkness. If she screamed, she had no clue; but she'd won. It was all that mattered.

#

RG Porter has always been fascinated with the dark and mysterious worlds we can't see. Now she writes what most would consider nightmares.

Read more about RG Porter and her books at rgporter.net or follow her on Facebook and Twitter

# The Eclective

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Heather Marie Adkins

Emma Jameson

P.J. Jones

Shéa MacLeod

M. Edward McNally

Alan Nayes

R.G. Porter

Tara West

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