by S A Jacobs
On the far wall, there was a door. As I walked towards it, I could hear my footsteps echo in the empty room. The door was unlike any other in the house. It was painted black and instead of the massive wooden doors everywhere else in the house, this one was metal. There were rows of rivets along the edges that made it look more like a door to a battleship than something you would find in a house. I turned the handle and found it to be locked.
As I examined the door with my flashlight, I realized there was something drawn on it. It was hard to see against the black background, but there was what appeared to be a circle with a diagonal line through it. It was crudely drawn and so faint. It looked as though it was painted hastily. There were drip lines at the bottom edges of it. I then realized how to open the door. Surely, it was the door which could be opened with the other key I’d been given.
I immediately pulled my phone out of my pocket. I wanted to tell David about it immediately. The bright screen of the phone briefly blinded me. A moment later, I tried to call David. The call would not go through. There was absolutely no service. I put the phone back in my pocket and sat down in one of the chairs in the room. On top of the desk, there was an array of black and red candles, all about half burned, leaving long ribbons of melted wax on their sides. I opened the drawer on the desk and saw an ancient looking book.
I grabbed the book to examine it. It was older than any book I’d ever seen. The cover was an aged tan leather, but so old and brittle, it gave the impression of an old plastic that would shatter if you put any pressure on it. I kept myself from opening it because I was afraid the whole thing would disintegrate in my hands. There was a crude black hand-writing on the cover. It read “Münchner Handbuch der Nekromantie.”
Afraid of opening it and equally afraid of removing it, I used my phone to take a photo of the cover. The flash of the camera blinded me for a minute, and I gently put the book back in the drawer. I walked back into the warmer parlor.
After only a few steps into the parlor I started to feel dizzy. My feet became increasingly heavy, the muscles in my legs tensed and strained at every step. I made it as far as the chaise where I sat down. My hands stretched to rub my legs and try to coax them back into feeling, but it was no use. I gave into the dizziness and the aches and laid down on the chaise.
As I lay there, the room appeared to darken. The light from my lantern faded. I shut my eyes tightly and shook my head, assuming that when I opened them again everything would be back to normal… It wasn’t.
“Dearest James,” a voice said.
The voice was calm and soothing, but it frightened me. I sat up immediately and looked around the room to place the voice. I was alone. The room was the same, but I knew this voice was not in my head. I was dizzy, but I knew in my core this was real.
“Um, hello,” I said.
I expected an immediate response but there was nothing. Everything was still and silent. My legs still ached, but I forced myself to stand.
“Who’s there?”
I was constantly moving in circles, trying to observe the entire room, when the lantern turned off. I found myself in complete darkness. The darkness only lasted a second though. A warm glow began the sweep through the room, starting from inside the hidden room.
“James, please sit,” the voice said. “It’s me, Ida. I need to speak with you,”
I stumbled back onto the chaise. Within an instant, the room was illuminated, not by my lantern or even the glow I saw from the door. It was daylight streaming in from the windows. Windows that were broken and boarded up. Yet, right then, the afternoon sun was streaming into the room. The boxes were gone. The room was pristine.
I turned my head and saw Ida. She was beautiful, wearing a purple dress and she was walking towards me. She looked exactly as she had in the photos I’d seen. Her features were soft and delicate. Yet, she carried herself with unbridled strength and resolve.
“We must speak,” Ida said.
I was unable to respond. I could only stare at her, second-guessing the reality of everything I was experiencing. She moved closer and sat in a chair across from the chaise. After settling into the chair, she looked at me. No… she looked into me. Her eyes bore into me. She was looking into my soul.
“I cannot tell you how elated I am that you are here. I poured everything I had into the hope that this time would come. And here it is. You are here, and you will finish the task I failed to do.”
“What task? You left me a house.”
“Well, I suppose I owe you a bit of an explanation. Yes, I left you this villa. But that was only a way to bring you into the plan I’d set in motion. You see, this isn’t about this Villa or my desire for you to inherit it. It is about finally putting an end to Samuel and his reign of terror.”
My head was throbbing now more than ever. I knew this was my one chance to get answers, to finally understand everything that was going on.
“Please tell me what this is all about,” I said.
“Samuel is an evil man. I never wanted to marry him in the first place. However, that choice was not mine. My parents left me no say in the matter. In the beginning, everything was fine. Not perfect by any means, but fine. Unfortunately, as time went on, his true self became visible. He really was a despicable man, willing to go to any length to achieve his goals. Not only did he commit atrocious acts but, he thrived on them. He derived a sick pleasure from torturing others.
“It was around this time where I tried to escape this life. Samuel was particularly interested in ensuring that I conceive and carry his son. With my heart elsewhere, I decided that not only would I not give him this son, but I would bear the child of the man I truly loved. In my mind, it was a perfect plan. As soon as he found out, he would leave me, and I would be free of him, free to live the life I wanted and raise my child conceived in love.
“It was short-sighted of me. Upon discovering the truth, Samuel had the child executed. I was now to exist as his slave in this prison. I refused to give up. I refused to let him continue. From that point on, I was his prisoner. A fate I would never conform to. I was able to gain some freedom thanks to the public image of us that we needed to maintain. I exploited this freedom to plan my escape. I used the staff of the Villa to spy on him, to listen in to whatever dealings he had. Piece by piece, I started to understand that his evil extended far beyond what I had ever imagined.
“I learned of his dealings with the Knights of the Golden Circle. I had always known of his membership with the order but had always assumed it to be nothing but a bunch of guys drinking together. The more I heard of his dealings with them the more I realized this was not just a group of cohorts. It was a subterfuge to conceal an army looking to take over the country. I learned of munitions being stored and prepared for war as well as money to finance this war being stored around the country. How real or not this was, I really never knew. However, to Samuel, this controlled his every move. My motivation began to change with every bit of this knowledge I learned.
“I sought my freedom personally. Beyond that, he needed to be stopped. He was a murderer of countless victims and everything showed me that he had only begun. So I used my freedom to form a plan.
“The public's view of me soured, showing me as depressed, even mentally unfit. I was able to retreat to Germany under the guise of receiving treatment. It was there I delved into the black arts. I studied incessantly under the tutelage of the most revered witches. Upon my return, I put this knowledge to work and tried to overtake Samuel and break his spells. While my power was not strong enough to overcome him, I was still able to subdue him.
“I was able to ensure that he would never receive an heir fit of taking his place in the KGC. I was able to cast a spell of protection over this home and its contents, items of unexplainable value to him. In my final act, I conspired with my beloved Edgar to put him to rest.”
Hearing this was too much. I couldn’t comprehend it all.
“Put to rest?” I asked.
�
��Yes, my dear Edgar took Samuel’s life much in the manner that Samuel once killed so many in the forest beyond the pond.”
“Wait!” I pleaded. “If you protected the house, and Edgar killed him, then what is this all about? Why am I here? Why is this happening?”
“Dearest James, no doubt you have seen that he is still around. You see, Samuel also had taken an interest in the dark arts. He was able to ensure that death could not hold him. He is here waiting to restore his bloodline.”
“That doesn’t explain to me why I am here.”
“You are here because I called you. When I constructed this plan and realized I could not overcome him, I devised a secondary plan, one to ensure that Samuel’s reign of terror is definitely ended. My protections on this home, my spells binding him to this property, all came with limitations. Upon my death, the clock started ticking and soon all that I have created will be gone.”
“I take it I am your backup plan?”
“You are not a backup plan; you are the plan. You and only you have the ability to lift this shroud of darkness. Only you can defeat Samuel once and for all. It is a burden I never wished to give, but I only gave it to you because I knew you would succeed.”
“What should I do?” I asked.
“The first thing you must do is retrieve the necklace in the safe. My protection spell on that room is gone. Take it, keep it safe, and let no one know that you have ever even seen it!”
19
In a flash, Ida was gone. The warm sunlight was replaced by the jarring white light of the lantern. The parlor was silent.
I sat there sweating and out of breath. My hands were shaking. I was unable to make sense of anything. I had talked to David about ghosts and such, but this was something on a whole new level. In my gut burned the simple question. “Was it real?’
I sat there for a long time pondering that question. I knew so much more about everything going on. I had an explanation for the bones in the forest. To some degree, I had finally gotten the answers I’d been searching for. Part of my wanted to deny the reality of this vision. Yet, deep inside me, I knew it was real. I could no longer think this was all make believe. This was real, ghosts were real, and Sam was very real.
I took a moment to think about it all… to believe every word Ida spoke to me and visualize how that all worked together. It certainly correlated with things that David brought up, but it still left me with some questions. What did Samuel really want? Could he really be a demon who is hell-bent on taking over the world? More so, if his organization really was that powerful, how could they not have found a way to put these plans in motion over the past seventy years?
That was when things started to click in my brain. I realized that, undoubtedly, I needed to follow her advice and go back into that secret room to retrieve the necklace she mentioned. I didn’t know why, but I knew it was something Samuel needed. There were more troubling thoughts when it came to Kat.
I knew that something with Samuel’s KGC connection hinged completely on his bloodline. Kat was indeed of his blood. I began to understand what David meant when he stated that she needed to choose sides. Could she be somehow turned to take the reins of Sam’s evil plot? It was a horrific thought. In the past months, I had grown to love her deeply. The last thing I wanted to consider was her somehow being on his side.
Something deep inside me believed every ounce of what Ida said. In a way, yes, I felt this to be my true destiny. I felt that saving this home and vanquishing Sam was what I needed to do, but I also clung to the fairy tale belief that love would conquer all. That no matter who Kat was or how much she was connected to this, our feelings for each other would rise above anything in our path.
I took a few deep breaths and silently cursed myself for my digression into thoughts questioning Kat. I stood up and found that the dizziness had passed. The pain in my legs was gone. I felt alive. I was alive with a deep sense of knowing what I had to do. I looked around the room. I walked toward the fireplace where the vase of dead flowers still sat. I eyed them for a moment before scanning the room once again. I blew a kiss. In my head, this was my way of showing Ida that I accepted the burden she bestowed on me and that I would not retreat.
I immediately felt a warm embrace, as if a set of invisible arms wrapped around me and held me tight. This was right! This was exactly what I was meant to do!
Unsure of what my next steps should be, I decided to continue with my original intention of going to the pond. I felt I needed to be there and see exactly where my dream had taken place. I slowly walked from the parlor to the front foyer. I was beginning to see the entire house differently. No longer the derelict mansion it was currently, but the stately manor it originally had been. As I opened the front door, I was struck with the view of a radiant sunset.
I shook my head momentarily to try to make sense of it. When I’d entered the house, it had been early in the day. How long could I have been in there? The events inside, as I played them through my head, couldn’t have taken more than a couple hours, but here it was evening. I glanced down at my watch. It was near six o’clock. I couldn’t understand how that was possible.
It made no difference to me though. I was driven and headed out towards what remained of the pond. With fall quickly grabbing hold, the path was covered in a bed of fallen leaves. The brisk wind howled through the trees and made it feel significantly colder than it was.
I tried to follow the same path I had waked in my dream. The walkways, being completely overgrown, were difficult to follow. As I turned the final corner, to face the far side of the pond, everything changed. At that moment, I was not looking at the dilapidated remains of the pond but the pond completely restored… the pond I’d seen in my dreams. I stood there staring at it, stopping only to rub my eyes. I knew what I saw was impossible, but yet it was real. It was right there in front of me.
I walked along the side of the pond, closer and closer to the marble bench. It was the very bench I saw Sam slay Kat on. I found myself shaking my head a few times. Still in disbelief, I tried to shake off the vision before me. Soon, I was standing beside the bench. While everything around the pond was pristine, the bench was not.
As I leaned in to look at spots on the top of the bench, I realized they were red wax. Droplets of wax had once dripped onto the surface and left reddish smudges all over the bench. As I looked at them, all of a sudden the sunlight dimmed. A dark shadow had fallen over the bench. I jolted up and turned to look.
A few feet behind me stood a wolf. Its blue eyes stared me down as it bared its teeth. I could see nothing but Kat’s eyes on this wolf.
“Go ahead,” I yelled in a moment of courage. “I know you won’t attack me. You need me!”
The wolf responded by stepping back, still staring at me.
“That’s what I thought,” I taunted.
I turned away from the wolf and began walking along the edge of the pond. I felt a cold wind shoot across the pond, chilling me. I turned my head to look. The wolf was no longer there. I continued to walk a few steps when I saw another shadow cross my path. This time, the shadow was in the shape of a man. From what I could see, there was no person, only a defined dark shadow.
“Master James, I knew you would come,” a voice boomed from all directions. “Yet, I see you have not heeded my warning and have chosen to come alone. Do not test my patience. Your time is running out. Bring me what I need.”
“Or what? You're trapped here!”
“You know more than I assumed, James. Yes, I am trapped here, but that does not mean I don’t have my ways of getting what I seek. In fact, I have already shown you what will happen if you choose not to heed my warning.”
I thought back to the dream. I saw the vision of him taking Kat’s life on that bench. I refused to let that become reality. I needed to stop him. Yet, at that moment I was paralyzed. I wanted to speak. I wanted to run. There were so many things running through my head as he spoke to me. I stood frozen, unable to move.
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nbsp; The shadow turned toward me in a vicious whirl. It struck me! The massive force shoved me in the chest. I was thrown back onto the bench, my head slamming against the cold marble. I fought to stand, fought to move! All I could do was feel the cold marble beneath me and the warm blood trickling down my forehead.
I opened my eyes to darkness. My head was throbbing, and I was freezing. I sat up and only then came to the realization that I was at the pond. It was dark outside. I could only see by the light of the moon. As my eyes adjusted, and I looked around, I could see this was not the pond in my dream. This was the real pond in all its dilapidated glory. I looked down at the crumbling bench I sat on and noticed the dried pool of blood. That was when I started to remember everything.
My head ached in a way I’d never felt. As I rubbed my fingers on my forehead, I could feel the large bump along with my hair, stiff with dried blood. I wasn’t ready to stand up yet. I reached to get my phone out of my pocket and found the battery was dead. I was out there alone with no way to get a hold of anyone. I decided I had to get to my truck. Even if I couldn’t drive, it would be warmer inside it, and I could charge my phone and call Kat for help.
I slowly got to my feet. I could barely stand without wobbling like a drunk. I cupped my hands around my mouth and blew a few deep breaths into them, hoping the warmth would bring some feeling back to my fingertips. I slowly started to take a few steps. I was weak and disorientated, but it was working. One step at a time, I made my way to the far edge of the pond.
I was getting a little bit stronger with every step but I was still wobbly. I reached into my pocket and found that I still had my flashlight. I was thankful. I couldn’t imagine trying to navigate these overgrown paths without it. The bright beam of light allowed me to see each step in front of me, ensuring I could find purchase and not fall. The typically five-minute walk was taking me forever.
