The Siren and the Specter

by Jonathan Janz

  David didn’t bother arguing. The staring black eye of the gun made it impossible to think, much less speak.

  “You were all she talked about,” Chris said, smiling bitterly. “That night we broke in here, we ended up in this room. She said without you there was no point in living, that she’d never love anyone as much as she loved you.” Chris’s face twisted. “When I was right here in front of her. I wanted to scream, ‘I’m here! I love you more than he ever will!’ But do you think she listened? You think she gave one shit about me? It was like I wasn’t even alive!”

  “Let us go,” David said.

  Honey barked out laughter, but Chris’s eyes remained lost, unfocused, his mind firmly on that night twenty-two years ago. “I hugged her. You know, to comfort her. She leaned into me, and I thought she might let me kiss her. I…” Chris licked his lips, “…I put my mouth on hers, but she jerked away, her eyes wide open…Jesus Christ, like she’d been stung or something. She acted like I was some kind of rapist.”

  Jessica stirred. David watched her face, her eyes rolling under her shut lids.

  Chris went on. “I knew then. Even though I loved her – maybe because I loved her – I knew I had to end it.” He smiled. “She’d already written a suicide note. You believe that? Showed it to me. Carried it around with her. I only had to make it look like she’d done it herself. I told her how sorry I was. She wasn’t hard to convince. She always saw me as this….” He bared his teeth. “This harmless troll. She turned her back on me, started to walk out.”

  “Chris….”

  “I tackled her, drove her face first onto the bed.” He nodded toward the nearest bed. “I grabbed her around the throat, grabbed her from behind. I just…choked her. When it was done, I couldn’t believe it. I thought I’d be crushed, that I’d want to die too. But you know how I felt?”

  Chris leaned closer, his grin terrible. “I felt free! I knew no one else would have her. Would ever kiss her…or fuck her.”

  Jessica sucked in breath, let out a wet, rattling cough.

  “She’s dying,” Honey said in a bland voice.

  Chris didn’t seem to notice. “There was a rope, thank God, in the cellar. I had to hunt around for one, but there it was, attached to an inner tube. I brought it up here, pulled down the ladder, and tied that ski rope to the third-floor rafter. I lugged her up to the attic, fitted the rope around her throat where I’d throttled her. Then I pushed her body through the opening and heard her neck crack.”

  He chuckled. “I was sure there’d be an investigation, but the note saved everything. She’d written it, she’d been talking about it to a couple other friends. Everyone was sad, but there was no reason to suspect murder. Do you see the irony, Davey? You saved me. By goading her into suicide, you saved my life.”

  David clenched his fists. “You’re going to hell.”

  Chris’s face spread in an amazed grin. “But you don’t believe in hell. Do you, Davey? You don’t believe in anything. Just your books and your sterling goddamn reputation.”

  “I believe,” David said.

  Chris’s expression darkened. He was about to pull the trigger – David could see it in his eyes – but at that moment the door to the long bedroom slammed shut.

  Freezing air scurried up and down David’s backbone. Chris was looking about with a look of stupefaction.

  But Honey was smiling hungrily and tracing a line with her fingernails over her breastbone. “He’s here,” she said. “Judson’s come.”

  * * *

  As it had on the night he’d videotaped the long bedroom, the energy began to change, the air to swirl. The atmosphere grew charged even while the temperature plummeted. What was more, David could see shapes on the bed clarifying. He thought of what Jessica had told him about the mob of Lancaster’s denizens burning down the Jennings house, and though it turned his stomach, beneath the ozone stench permeating the bedroom, he caught the odor of charred flesh and blackened bones.

  A knocking began from the third story. The joists overhead started to groan. The candles guttered. The light slanting through the windows flickered, died, like a jet blasting through moonless night, its engines failing and its doomed shell spiraling toward earth.

  Chris murmured, “Can’t believe it,” and on his face David saw wonder warring with dread.

  He’s never seen Judson, David thought.

  Humanoid figures materialized on the beds. David cast a glance at Katherine’s mangled carcass, felt the throb of his own forearm, where the leering thing had battened onto him and begun to chew. He’d barely been able to best one creature; how difficult would it be to battle multiple charred horrors?

  Jessica coughed, and he saw a trickle of blood at the corners of her lips. He looked up at Chris. “We have to get out of here.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Chris said, but his voice shook.

  “He’ll kill you,” David said.

  Chris’s face clouded, his eyes darting about the long bedroom as the meager light flickered.

  From below, David heard Harkless hammering on the front door.

  It won’t let her in, he thought, remembering the mob’s inability to enter the Alexander House. No matter what she does, we’re on our own in here.

  “Come to me!” Honey called, and when David glanced that way, he saw she’d turned her back on him, was gazing raptly up at the trapdoor, her arms spread in worshipful anticipation. The negligee had ridden up her thighs; forgotten, her gun drooping toward the western wall.

  Now, David thought. It has to be now.

  As if in confirmation, Jessica coughed again. A dime-sized splat of blood hit the floor.

  He glanced at Honey, at Chris.

  He went for Chris.

  His old friend had turned toward the nearest bed, and because of this David closed half the distance before Chris noticed him. When Chris did look up, David leaped, and at the last moment, before their bodies collided, David was sure he’d missed his chance, that the gun, which was pointed at David’s head, would spit fire and David’s face would be turned to pulp.

  David slammed into him, the pistol detonating, and they both crashed into the pooled darkness between the last bed and the northern dormer. The noise of the gunshot so close to his head started a horrid ringing in his ears, and somehow, Chris had kept hold of the gun. Chris swung it toward David’s face, but David deflected it. He worried Honey would shoot him in the back, but he couldn’t prevent that. He had to disarm Chris before Chris killed him.

  The gun wavered toward him again, but David reached out and seized Chris’s wrist.

  David groaned, the wound in his forearm weakening his grip. The pain was a conflagration, and worse, Chris was winning the struggle. The gun trembled higher, higher, angled toward David’s head. Desperately, he reared back with his free fist, hammered down at Chris’s face. The blow was a solid one, but it awakened a screeching agony where the leering thing had torn into him. At the thought, David became aware of a shape on the bed nearest him, a writhing, twisting, hungry shape that needed only to fully materialize before it could sate its bloodlust.

  From above, footsteps sounded. Heavy, clunking footsteps. David’s stomach roiled at the thought of the giant descending the stairs.

  Chris appeared dazed, yet he was bucking beneath David, fighting to unseat him. David groped for the gun. His fingers closed on it. He was sure he could wrest it from Chris’s grip, but Chris’s free hand landed on David’s bitten wrist, the fingers sliding into the ragged gouges. David gasped, tried to wrench his arm away, but Chris’s fingers had cored into the wound and were squirming through tissue. David cried out in pain, concentrated all his force on the gun. He clutched Chris’s hand, bashed it on the floor. The gun loosened in Chris’s grip but didn’t fall. Chris’s fingernails harrowed the tendons in David’s wrist. Nauseated by the pain, David tried to jerk away, but the pai
n wrought by Chris’s probing fingers incapacitated him. Desperately, he slammed Chris’s hand down again, and this time the gun skittered into a corner. David strained forward, but Chris, with two good hands, latched onto him and held him fast. David sprawled on top of him, wriggled to free himself, but Chris wouldn’t let go.

  “You doomed her,” Chris said, his grin triumphant. “You doomed Anna, you doomed yourself. Now you’ve brought her sister here to be defiled by Judson.”

  Chris’s words scythed through his fear of Judson Alexander and the leering abominations. In its place came a panicked guilt. Was Jessica still alive? He heard Honey back there, importuning her lover to take her, to give her what she needed. But what about Jessica, the woman so loyal to her dead sister that she’d devoted her adulthood to unraveling the mystery of her death?

  And now, David realized, though he knew the truth about Anna, Jessica might never hear it.

  “That’s right,” Chris said, misreading David’s wide-eyed stare. “Judson might even play with you a little.”

  With what strength he could muster, David yanked his arms down, breaking Chris’s hold. Chris twisted onto his side and strained toward the gun, which lay just out of reach.

  David took Chris by the throat, began to squeeze. Chris’s eyes went wide, and he pushed against David, but David held on, bore all his weight to pin Chris on his back.

  “Uh-uh,” David said. “I want you to see me killing you. You fucking monster. You couldn’t even look at Anna while you strangled her.”

  The name seemed to ignite a greater panic in Chris. He slapped at David’s hands. His tongue lolled out, his eyes rolling white. David no longer felt his fingers, no longer governed his own body. The muscles flexed of their own accord. His teeth ground together in mindless hatred.

  A lazy voice drawled, “Let go of him if you don’t want to be killed.”

  David froze. Slowly, he turned and looked at Honey, who’d interrupted her Judson-worship to train the gun on him.

  “Did you really think I’d let you strangle him?” she asked. “Hell, he’s the only friend I have left.” The grin broadened. “At least, the only living one.”

  David lay atop Chris, indecisive. He knew there was nothing to be done. His fingers slackened. Beneath him, Chris sucked in hoarse, desperate breath. He coughed wetly, his body tremoring. To David’s right, the shape in the nearest bed was rippling beneath the covers, a hint of scorched flesh showing at the rim of the blanket. And from above, the sounds of heavy footfalls. Judson was materializing, preparing to unleash his malice on David and his unspeakable lust on Honey.

  And Jessica, a hideous voice whispered.

  Honey had the gun extended and was peering up in fascination at the trapdoor, and because of this she didn’t see the gleaming slender object piston toward her bare right foot. The spike – Jessica’s remaining hair needle – punctured the webbing between Honey’s toes and hammered all the way to the floor. Honey flung her arms up and howled in agony, and David scrambled off Chris, leaped for Chris’s gun, got hold of it. He swung it around to face Honey, who’d remembered her own weapon, was bringing it down toward Jessica, the one who’d stabbed her.

  “You cunt,” Honey growled, teeth bared.

  “Hey, Honey?” David said.

  She looked at him and he fired. The slug shattered her sternum, a purplish blossom opening between her breasts. She gaped down at it, staggered. He fired again, this time nailing her in the heart, and she slumped to the floor beside Jessica, who no longer appeared to be moving.

  Above their bodies, the trapdoor jolted.

  David surged toward Jessica, but something seized him around the legs. David stumbled and pushed against his assailant. It was Chris, weak from the near-strangulation, but intent on fighting him. Chris’s eyes were glazed over but he was still climbing up David’s body. David cracked an elbow into the side of Chris’s head, disentangling him, but when David moved toward Jessica – they had to escape this fucking house! – Chris fell against him again, wrapped his arms around David’s midsection. David pumped a knee into Chris’s gut, lifted him off his feet. He reached down, seized a handful of Chris’s receding hair, drew his head back to expose his face, and slammed the pistol against his cheek. He felt the cheekbone collapse, heard his old friend emit a surprised bleat, and then Chris blundered sideways onto the bed.

  Where a charred creature rose up behind him.

  David stepped back involuntarily as the gnarled, blackened arms snaked around Chris’s chest. Chris’s eyes cleared and flooded with terror. The leering thing opened its fanged maw and clamped down on the meat of Chris’s shoulder just below the neck. David looked away, but not before he saw another shape dart off the next bed and swarm over Chris’s chest, biting and tearing and ribboning his flesh. Chris’s wails became a phlegmy gurgle. Sickened, David lurched toward Jessica, his forearm and wrist screaming, his vision gauzy from blood loss.

  He bent to scoop her up. A boom sounded above him. Despite the pain in his limbs, David managed to get his arms under Jessica’s limp body, push to his feet, and hurry toward the door.

  Ahead of him, a creature hurtled off the second bed and hit the floor with a revolting squelch. Another creature slithered off the first bed and began dragging itself on fire-blackened claws to bar his way. Briefly, David considered vaulting them or climbing onto the beds to evade them, but he saw the figure in the doorway then watched in numb terror as it stepped forward, the door shutting behind it of its own accord.

  Ivy’s blood-rimed cheeks spread in a sly grin.

  “Do you believe yet?” she asked.

  * * *

  Jessica lay heavy in his arms, her neck pressing his bitten wrist. He couldn’t hold her much longer.

  “Move,” he told Ivy.

  The moonlight strobed and danced.

  “You can’t get past three of us,” she said.

  David made the mistake of glancing at the creatures, saw one actually lick its chops with a scorched earthworm tongue, both of them crawling inexorably toward where he stood. Across the room, the other two creatures were ripping Chris’s body apart, the blood spouting over their faces, soaking the bedsheets.

  “Even if you got past us,” Ivy said, her tone conversational, “you’d never get out of the house. His power is too great.”

  A leering thing darted toward his legs. David danced backward, nearly toppled, and heard the creature’s teeth click together. It let out a frustrated hiss.

  A groaning sound from above.

  David had just pivoted toward the trapdoor when it burst open, the hinged bottom section swinging down with a crack as explosive as a pistol report. Jessica stirred in his arms. He spared Jessica a glance, discerned the pinched look on her face, and was overcome with a gust of desolation more powerful than any he’d ever experienced. Never in his life had he so wanted to protect someone; never in his life had he felt so inept.

  She wasn’t Anna, and there was no way to take back the pain he’d inflicted on Anna. But if he could save Jessica…even if he didn’t save himself….

  Fingers closed around his ankle. David gasped and jerked away. The leering thing reared up on its knees, chortled deep in its ruined throat. An uncontrollable shudder gripped him, the sensation of the creature’s fingers indelible on his calf, like curling strips of burned bacon crackling against his skin.

  “Papa’s here,” Ivy murmured.

  David’s chest turned to stone. He rotated slowly and beheld the giant work boots, the dark breeches.

  From below, David heard thuds, Harkless attempting to gain entry.

  But there was no entry into the Alexander House; he knew that now. Whatever power resided here girded the dwelling against invaders. That long-ago mob from Lancaster had tried for hours to break into the Alexander House, had attempted to set fire to it. What chance did Georgia Harkless have if so many had tried
and failed?

  Judson Alexander clumped methodically down the ladder steps, his movements like, yet unlike, those of a living being. In the shadow of the descending behemoth, David felt insignificant. The light dimmed, flickered, as if absorbed by the massive figure.

  David backed away but froze when he brushed a leering thing. It swiped at his calves. There was nowhere to go.

  David turned as Judson’s white shirt came into view, a pale swath of chest. His broad bull’s throat.

  Judson stepped down onto the hardwood and stared at David, who stood eight feet away. The thick black eyebrows arched and moved like separate creatures. The black hair hung lank and greasy on Judson’s shoulders, the tendons of his neck bristling with unspeakable power. A goatish smell flooded the bedroom.

  The light pulsed, faded. David was aware of his heartbeat, deep and thornlike, each beat damaging him, nudging him closer to unconsciousness.

  Judson lowered his face, the deranged gaze riveting on Jessica.

  His meaning was plain. Judson wanted her.

  In confirmation, he extended his great arms, his eyes dancing with childish anticipation.

  With Jessica slumped in his arms, David took a step toward the door.

  The leering things leaped at him.

  His instinct was to shield Jessica, but when he did, they fell on his back, biting and scratching. David squealed, the revulsion of having the creatures affixed to his back only equaled by the agony of their wicked claws and their shredding teeth. With no other choice – he’d die if he didn’t protect himself – he deposited Jessica on the bed closest to the door, and then he was pawing at the creatures, crying out at the pain in his back. He knocked one off, but as it fell away, he felt a tearing, another leering thing having bitten out a chunk of flesh. He reached back, groped for the other creature. Unable to displace it, he staggered toward the wall and smashed his back into the plaster. Trapped between David’s body and the wall, the creature gave off biting, swept its talons toward David’s temples. David gasped and wrenched away, sheets of blood pouring down his cheeks.