Once...

by James Herbert

  Dropping the candle because it was of no further use, he rushed into the room shouting, ‘Get away, get away from him. You’re nothing, you’re phantoms, you’re not real!’

  And then three of the serpents’ heads lunged at him, sending him crashing back against the side of the double doors that was still closed. It rattled in its frame and he slid to the floor, stunned by the impact.

  Impossible. He didn’t believe in them, they were creations of Sir Russell’s mind. Yet they had hurt him. Fuck it, they had hurt him!

  But at least they were leaving him be. The three trailed away to regroup with the mass. Then they squirmed as a whole across the room, towards the crouching man there in the corner, Hugo, who had peeked from behind his raised arms to see their advance. He let out a piercing shriek, a child’s high-pitched cry, and ducked back behind his hands, his body seeming visibly to shrink as he bunched up, tried to make himself as small as possible, foolishly imagining he might go unnoticed there in the shadows. It was pointless though. The snakes struck out at him, taking it in turns, sometimes one flicking a long forked tongue at him, other times two or three together, a chorus of reptiles.

  Jesus, thought Thom, Hugo, who had always abhorred snakes, now to be tormented like this! It then occurred to him that this vision – vision? He had been physically struck by the creature’s snouts – had not just manifested when he had opened the door to the room. No, they were already present, but it had taken his own mind time to adjust, time to bring them into focus. And if that were so, then they truly were figments of the imagination, a vision that leapt from mind to mind, like a disease might leap from body to body, the force so great that even he had believed they could touch him; with the belief came the physical response. But whose vision was it? He guessed he had been wrong in thinking it was Sir Russell’s, for Hugo was the one who had the phobia of snakes.

  ‘Hugo!’ he called across the room. ‘They can’t harm you, not if you don’t let them! Get rid of them, get them out of your mind!’

  He might just as well have been advising a terrified passenger on a crashing jetliner to whistle a happy tune and think of nice things. Hugo continued to shriek, flinching each time a serpent stabbed at his head or shoulder.

  Thom knew he had to get to Hugo, pull him from the room if necessary, slap some sense into him, bring him back to reality. But would it really be that simple? Somewhere in his mind – perhaps his inner self, that canny but elusive voice? – he was being told there was so much more to all this.

  And when lightning outside washed the room with its stammering radiance, there were a new set of shadows occupying the room. They wavered as they grew, taking time to form, but when the glare died and the thunder settled to a rumble, they began to emerge, their forms lit by candlelight. They were huge cowled figures, the silhouettes of giant monks, it seemed to Thom, although each one was bowed, hunched, and their extraordinarily long fingers were curled. It was impossible to tell how many of them there were, for like the serpents that continued to torment Hugo they merged, were as one body, gradually filling half the room, their malodour a poison in the air. They were made of blackness, only their outlines giving sense of form and movement.

  In the gloom, Thom caught sight of Sir Russell again. He was a diminished man, a frail husk, his withered body trembling as if gripped by ague, the face behind the plastic oxygen mask gaunt, hollow-cheeked, the eyes both deep-set yet shiny and bulging in their dark caverns like the haunting eyes of a famine victim. And it seemed that this new manifestation was concentrating on him alone for, as one, the amalgamation of cowled hunchbacked figures moved towards the drapeless four-poster bed, floating around, or moving through, Nell Quick, who maintained her stance near the centre of the room. They advanced on the sick man like some dense drifting fog.

  Sir Russell saw the movement, saw their coming, and his skeletal hands clutched the bedsheets, holding them to his chest like a maiden aunt disturbed by a prowler in the night, the thin material her only protection. Curling and lurching, the sinister clan came closer and Sir Russell backed away, squashing the pillows behind him against the oak headboard.

  Thom, who was still rising from the floor, shouted a pointless warning and, crouched, made ready to go to the sick man’s aid. But his movement was slow, a bad dream’s motion where limbs were hampered by the thickness of the air and a dull sickness in the gut caused by fear. Somehow, it was as if the stroke of months before had taken charge of his whole body. He struggled against the apathy, his arms moving but only lethargically, his legs pushing but only feebly. He could do no more than watch as the massed shapes drifted over the bed towards Sir Russell.

  Muted sounds came from behind the transparent oxygen mask, the old man protesting against this stealthy invasion, his shiny eyes burdened by terror. There were screams, but these came from Hugo, who was going through his own ordeal.

  Thom could only look on as the black mass of weaving figures rose over Sir Russell, who had sunk down in the bed, his frail old arms now raised as if to ward off these unworldly predators. The oxygen mask suddenly began to darken as if filling with thick liquid. Its colour gradually filtered through the transparent wall of the mask and it was red. Deep red. The deep red of blood. Oh dear God, thought Thom, the man was about to drown in his own blood.

  But that was not Sir Russell’s only problem, for even as Thom managed to find his feet, the shadows were bearing down on the horrified old man, black claws reaching from the mass to sink into his chest, to clutch at his heart. The swelling drift descended like some heavy crushing load sent to smother Sir Russell with its weighty blackness.

  It was too much for Thom. His mutinous body responded as if commanded by some greater force than his own frightened self. Rigwit had told him to listen to his inner voice and now it seemed that voice had become impatient, was screaming at him, propelling him forward despite the reluctance of his limbs and body.

  Just as Thom staggered towards the bed, lightning flared again and simultaneously thunder shook the ceiling and rattled the big windows. The roof door that had been open when Thom had entered the room swung shut, its crash barely perceptible over the thunder before it swung wide once more.

  Thom cringed as though he thought the ceiling might cave in, but he kept moving, his legs unsteady, his actions still slow. But just before he reached the edge of the bed – he could see the oxygen mask was quite full with blood, red rivers running from its edges down Sir Russell’s hollow cheeks and scrawny neck, and he could see the massive bulk of blackness and reaching claws just inches away from the old man’s prone body, bearing down, the space between gradually shrinking as though the descent were deliberately drawn out to maximize the terror – something appeared in the periphery of his vision, something tall, lumbering forward from a dusky corner of the room.

  His head reflexively swung towards this new shadow, for it was he that it approached. He gasped. He almost fell to the floor. Inside his head, he screamed, No, no, it can’t be, not him!

  For it was Bones who came at him from the flickering shadows. But somehow, he was taller, much taller, his thin cadaverous face wavering way above Thom’s own. And his shoulders were hunched, his elbows bent, his long, thin-fingered hands reaching . . .

  For a moment or two Thom thought he had been betrayed by the manservant, his injuries a fake, a ruse to send Thom up to this room alone. Then he realized that this was an exaggerated figure from a nightmare, an apparition whose resolve was to freeze Thom’s heart.

  But it was from a nightmare, even though it towered over him, a sickening triumphal grin on its skull-like face, eyes piercing Thom’s own like sharpened needles, sliding through eyeballs, muscles and bone to sink into the brain itself and causing pain beyond belief.

  The great bedchamber was a maelstrom of activity and sound, each person – apart from Nell, who still stood as though in a trance – terrorized by their own particular nightmare.

  Nightmare . . . The word, the thought, repeated itself to Thom ov
er and over again as those long, thin fingers grabbed his throat and began to squeeze, their deadly grip unremitting. And Bones was laughing, literally laughing in his face, spittle shooting out between stained teeth to speckle Thom’s cheek and nose, the hands squeezing, squeezing, squeezing the life from him.

  Until a voice broke through the uproar. An external voice this time. A calm voice, a gentle voice, that could be heard without it being loud.

  Although in ‘Bones’s’ clutches, Thom was nonetheless able to see the double doorway, both sides of which were now open, two figures standing in the opening, one very small, the other taller.

  Jennet, her anxious but sweet face lit by candlelight, called to him again.

  ‘Thom. Your inner voice. Listen to it. It will tell you what this is and give you power,’ she was saying.

  His inner voice. Vision was beginning to haze over, the fingers around his throat ever-tightening, but he remembered Rigwit had told him to listen to his inner voice. And Bethan, his mother, had told him to listen to his inner voice. But it had not worked before, so why should it now?

  The room was spinning, he was blacking out; somehow though, he listened, but to Jennet, not to this elusive so-called inner voice, for her call was clear above the hubbub, still insisting that he go into himself, escape this place by retreating – no, by sinking, that was her word – into himself. Difficult, though. So difficult to do when . . . he . . . was . . . being . . . throttled . . .

  In fact, it was the violence of the assault that allowed him to find the ‘voice’, for he was losing consciousness, sinking deep. And the inner voice was awaiting him, for it was not far below his conscious level. This is the horror, it seemed to say. This is the nightmare that has haunted you for so long, this is your worst fear . . .

  And it was right, for this was the voice that could only speak truth, no matter how much his brain or conscious mind railed against it. It was the voice inside every man, woman and child, the voice that drew the line between right and wrong, the conscience, if it pleases, the voice that no outside force can deter or overcome. The voice of reason, the voice of the soul.

  He listened. Thom ‘heard’ its unspoken words. The alien things in this room, the manifestations conjured by Nell Quick in her aberration of the wiccan craft, were truly from nightmares. His: recurring dreams of Bones coming to get him since the incident in the cellar all those years ago. Hugo’s: a lifelong fear of snakes, these no doubt dreamt or thought of in times of stress. Sir Russell: his claustrophobia, his dread of enclosed rooms, confined spaces, the reason he insisted all doors inside the house remained open, his refusal to have a lift installed even though he loved this rooftop eyrie and its wonderful views, the room where even in his dying days no curtains were allowed to be drawn, where every bit of daylight was used and welcomed.

  And because the visions – the manifestations – present in this room came from within the mind, because they stemmed from each person’s own psyche, so then they were all the more powerful, their effect all the more horrendous. These horrors were the substance of each individual’s inner phobia; quite literally, they were their worst nightmare come into being.

  Here was the evidence of their private fears all brought together on this night when Nell Quick had sought to raise but one – Sir Russell Bleeth’s greatest horror, conjured to cause his last and fatal heart attack. His last Will and Testament had been, or would be, destroyed, its single witness put out of the way permanently (if not earlier, then later after they had finished with Sir Russell). It was iniquitous, it was evil. It was vicious.

  Sir Russell was to die this very night, but Nell had unleashed more forces than she was capable of controlling. She was a fool, a modern-day wiccan who practised some kind of voodoo and conjuration, but had no idea of how to govern or contain the powers that came forth.

  The grip around his throat became less firm, as though truth was a tool that could be used against an enemy that dwelt within his own darkest thoughts. Yet the hands did not let go completely. The apparition that claimed to be Bones, who in reality was at this moment lying unconscious, perhaps even dead by now, on the hard, cold cellar floor, did not vanish with the de´nouement. It remained poised over him, still visible in all its ghastliness. And the serpents continued to terrorize Hugo, the cowled figures relentlessly beaming down on Sir Russell.

  Thom turned away from further thought in favour of action. His wrists shot up between the apparition’s and spread in one quick, strong movement, and the grip was broken. Still dismayed that the doppelga¨nger had not vanished in light of reason, he looked towards Jennet at the doorway.

  She and the elf had ventured further into the room, but seemed reluctant to come any closer.

  ‘Now you must use the book, Thom,’ she said, her lovely face grave with concern.

  She said something more, but lightning flared and thunder boomed so loudly it might have been in the room with them. It rolled around the chamber, reverberating off the walls and windows, and Thom clapped his hands to his ears. Even after it had died away (almost as though leaving by the swinging roof door), he remained deafened.

  ‘Bones’ and the other manifestations, however, were unaffected: they proceeded with their attack, their intimidation.

  Thom realized he’d dropped the book that Rigwit had given him when he’d been knocked over by the serpents. It lay beside the wall in the uncertain candlelight, open, its pages flicking one after the other as though a wind had entered the chamber.

  Thom lunged for it just as the spectre representing Bones reached again for him. It missed its grab completely, for Thom was already on his hands and knees, scrabbling for the book. His fingertips found it, he picked it up, he frantically leafed through the pages.

  The phantom lumbered in his direction.

  ‘Any page, any page!’ shouted Rigwit and, at last, his little voice could be heard.

  ‘Just choose a page, Thom, and then think of them,’ called Jennet, still some distance away. ‘Will them to come to you.’

  His back against the wall, Thom sat cross-ankled, the book lying open between his knees.

  ‘Bones’ towered over him. Began to stoop towards him; malicious grin, evil, lunatic eyes, hands crooked like claws.

  ‘Hurry, Thom!’

  He concentrated.

  Nothing happened.

  He willed the faeries to come through the aged pages.

  Nothing happened.

  The hands of ‘Bones’, as material as any solid object, grabbed his shirt and began to pull.

  ‘Don’t think too hard,’ Jennet cried. ‘Just will it to happen.’

  ‘Help me!’ Thom yelled back as he felt himself lifted from the floor.

  ‘I can’t. You have to do it alone.’

  With a control that surprised even Thom himself, he blanked his mind, not quite shedding the fear, but shielding himself from it for a brief time. In the not quite empty space of his consciousness, a space that was besieged from the periphery, he simply said silently:

  Come.

  And they did. They burst out of the open book as though they had been waiting for his call, flying into the room and whizzing everywhere at once, sprinkling that same starry powder Thom had witnessed before.

  The spectre gripping his shirt let go and sprang back, a look first of consternation on its face, then doubt, then fear, then even loathing. More and more came, magical lights pouring forth, bringing with them a new energy. Thom felt his heart lift again, his own fear slacken. And the better he felt, so the more the thing before him was diminished. It started to fade, its blackness turning to grey. Soon Thom was able to see through it.

  The faery hordes, increasing by the moment, quickly numbering hundreds or more, swept through the black mass hovering over Sir Russell’s prostrate body; so close were these cowled figures and so heavy-looking their mass that it seemed the old man would be crushed rather than smothered.

  But now the black amalgamation was disintegrating, being torn apart by tin
y but fierce opponents of all things evil, who swooped into its darkness, brightening its murk, striking at the nucleus that was the darkest part of all. Gold, silver, violet, blue, red, purple, indigo, green and pure white – all these brilliant colours dissipated the central solidity, breaking it down so that it began to deteriorate, decay into smaller pieces, while the cohorts, the shadows resembling hooded monks, yowled their anguish, their screeches filling the air as if they were in true despairing agony – which Thom sincerely hoped they were.

  He saw his chance. Sir Russell had been reprieved, his body beneath the sheet freed of its tormentors. But still his shiny eyes were filled with horror and his thin body continued to shake.

  The oxygen mask was dense with blood and Thom realized the old man was choking, drowning, his infirm hands too feeble to rip the mask away. Thom swiftly laid the book down, making sure the pages were flat and open as the little creatures continued to emerge, fluttering like butterflies now, spilling out at a more leisurely pace, their high-pitched jabbering and singing filling the room as if their voices, too, might defeat the darkness. Thom knew there was still great danger in this place though, and he pushed himself to his feet to run through the diaphanous image of Bones, his own body completing the dream figure’s final disintegration. All that remained were wisps of grey matter floating in the air behind him.

  He leapt on to the four-poster bed and snatched at Sir Russell’s oxygen mask, digging his fingers into its edges and whipping it away, snapping the restraining straps. The blood flooded over the sick man’s already bloodied face, staining the parchment skin a glossy red. Sir Russell belched the blood he had swallowed and a dreadfully thin hand clutched Thom’s wrist. The emaciated body spasmed in the younger man’s arms and the eyelids flickered as though fighting unconsciousness. Those weary old eyes suddenly focused on Thom.