by Megan Hart
Micah chewed on a pencil stub and shook his head, then showed his brother one of the cards in his hand. Declan scowled and scrubbed at his face, three days' growth of black beard shadowing his jaw. They were all unshaven, and she couldn't blame them. The hot water had gone icy yesterday.
Tori hadn't been playing, but she knew who done it, because she'd been paying attention to all the guesses that they’d made so far. It was the poison, and it was the dining room, but sexy Miss Scarlett was not the murderess. Tori was sure it was Professor Plum.
The only game Mother played was the Ouija board, but she watched the rest of them intently, pride clear in her expression. Sometimes, she would call out advice to one or the other of her sons, but for the most part she simply sat in silence as the board spelled out what seemed like several novels' worth of material. Sometimes, Tori tried to sneak a peek at what the board was saying, but the rest of the time, she sat with Rose on her lap and stayed quiet.
Short days, long nights, monotony. Nobody asked anything of her. Her existence had become sleeping, devouring, and taking care of her baby.
It had become easy to stay here.
She'd stopped wondering when the snow might stop. When the plows might come. When she might be able to leave. Where would she even go, she thought now, watching with drooping eyelids as Jackson rolled the dice and moved his piece around the board. She had no place to go.
Full belly.
Hot room.
She was drifting to sleep. Her head bobbed before she woke herself up, aware that she couldn't allow herself to nod off on the chaise lounge, not with the baby in her arms. She needed to get upstairs and into bed.
"With the poison!"
The words had a shape, hanging in the air between Tori and the table. She struggled to straighten. To open her eyes more than a sliver. In her arms, the baby wriggled and wailed with a constant, droning sound.
Declan and Jackson had both stood. Jackson's chair teetered, on the verge of tipping. The chair didn't fall, held up as though by a phantom hand or the lethargic ticking of time as it slowed, oozing. Everything had gone blurry and unfocused, as though she were underwater. She struggled against the sudden weight of it, but couldn't manage to move.
The brothers faced off across the dining room table. Teeth bared. Fists clenched. The Clue board had gone flying, knocked off the table by one of them in the endless span of time when Tori blinked. Now they snarled at each other, clawing. Micah joined them, snapping his jaws so that spittle sprayed across the table. It glistened in the flickering, inconsistent lighting. Only Luka sat still at his end of the table, watching his brothers go to battle over a board game.
Beneath Mother's fingertips, the planchette spun and spun. Tori gathered Rose to her chest, muffling the baby's shrieks. Her stomach clenched, cramping, but this was a different sort of pain than she'd been having. Her muscles tensed, stiffening her arms and legs no matter how hard she tried to relax. A chill sweat trickled down the line of her spine, tickling. For a terrible moment, she thought she was going to be sick or pass out.
"Poison," she croaked.
Another blink took a lifetime. When she opened her eyes, she discovered she'd struggled to her feet. Everyone was staring at her, all of them seated neatly in their chairs with the game board in its place in front of them. Tori blinked rapidly this time, shaking her head to clear away the fuzziness.
"It wasn't the poison, it was the lead pipe," Luka said.
"No. No." Tori's lip curled at the way the word blurted out of her, like she was some kind of conduit for the Ouija board. She coughed, clearing her throat. "I mean...have you poisoned me?"
Silence, broken after a moment by the bark of Mother's laughter. "Oh, my dear. You fell asleep. You must have been dreaming."
Tori shook her head again, weaving a little on her feet. She was exhausted. She looked at them all. No snarling mouths, no clawing hands. True, all of them were as hairy and unmannered as beasts, but they were all still men, just men.
Men could be scarier than animals, and Tori had always known it.
"I can help you." Luka stood, offering to take Rose from her arms.
The brothers rumbled commentary under their breaths, words she couldn’t make out.
She shook her head. "No. I can do it myself."
Without waiting for another word from any of them, Tori left the dining room. The heat from the fireplace kept that room sweltering, but as soon as she started climbing the stairs, the temperature dropped. She was shivering by the time she got to her bedroom door, but not from the cold. Her guts were roiling, her skin clammy. Something was definitely not quite right.
When she settled the baby on the bed and unbuttoned the front of the reluctantly borrowed flannel gown, Tori let out a low groan. Her breasts were hard and throbbing. Hot to the touch, particularly close to her armpits. She cupped them, the size and weight so unfamiliar it was almost like touching someone else's body.
She shivered again as her nipples tightened. The tingling that signaled letdown began, and she muttered a frustrated cry. The only way to stop it was to cross her arms over her chest, thumbs and forefingers pinching the nipples. Rose was quiet and might nurse if offered the breast, but first Tori had to get her body under control.
"...Why do we have to wait?" The voice did not belong to Mother or to Luka, but beyond that, Tori couldn't tell which brother was speaking. "You should just do it now..."
Tori turned toward the open heating grate. It wasn't the first time she'd overheard conversations from downstairs, but this one was the clearest. She couldn't get down on the floor to listen harder, though, not without spraying milk all over the place, so she settled for leaning.
"Enough," Mother snapped, her voice carrying easily up through the grate. "You know it has to be the right time. The board will tell me when the moment is at hand. Remember what happened the last time? I certainly do. I'm the one who ended up in this chair, after all!"
Tori held her breath, waiting for more. Dizziness washed over her again. She wanted to crack open the window and let in the snow-bitten air, but mindful of how it would affect the baby, she didn't.
Mother's voice drifted upward again. "We waited a long time for this. The board told me we would be rewarded, when the time was right. It brought her to us, didn't it?"
Her.
They meant her, Tori. She recoiled, still pressing her nipples. She'd managed to stave off the flow for a few minutes, at least, although when Rose began to cry her body would respond the way it was meant to.
A few moments later, she heard the tread of footsteps on the stairs. A soft knock at her door. She didn't say "come in," but it didn't matter.
"Making sure you're alright," Luka said.
Tori turned with her palms full of bosom. "I think something's wrong. I think I might be sick. I could have a fever."
In three long strides he was across the room, one huge hand pressing her forehead. "I can't tell."
"Here." She took his hand and placed it on her breast.
Tori had never had much luck using her body to gain favors. Oh, men had been willing to fuck her, or more often, fuck her over, but she'd never been any great shakes at seduction. In truth, that hadn't been her intention now. She'd meant only to show him the heat of her skin, the swollen flesh. She wanted him to see that something was wrong.
It might have been a mistake, having Luka touch her. He didn't let go, but his pale green eyes went wide. His nostrils flared. His lips skinned back from his teeth. He leaned in close to smell her, and his lips brushed her ear when he spoke.
"You're sick. An infection."
Tori shuddered, hating that he was right. She could feel it, but grateful he believed her. "Everything hurts."
"You should get into bed. You need rest. I'll bring you something."
"Medicine. I need medicine."
"I'll ask Mother."
"No!" Her voice, so loud it startled the baby into a wail, also surprised Tori. She softened it. "Please, do
n't. I don't want her to know I'm sick. She'd worry."
Her teeth chattered as she lied. Luka tilted his head to look her up and down. He shook his head.
"Mother will know how to take care of you. And the baby. She takes care of all of us. She'll know what to do. She always does."
"Why do you stay here?" Tori hissed. "You should get out. Get away."
Luka shook his head again. "Where would I go? Why would I leave?"
"Because something isn't right here, Luka. I don't know what it is...but I know."
He stroked a hand down the length of her tangled hair. "You're sick. You don't know what's wrong. You'll be all right. I promise."
She did not believe him, but all she could do was crawl into bed beside the baby and pull the covers up over her to help fend off the sudden wash of chills making her shake.
"What happened to her, Luka? What was the accident?"
"It doesn't matter. It happened a long time ago." The bed dipped as he sat on the edge and took her hand in his. His big thumbs stroked over her palms.
"In the woods. It's a grave, isn't it?" Tori ran her tongue over her cracked lips. "Who's buried there?"
Luka made a noise low in his throat. "You should sleep."
"You've poisoned me," she whispered. "I can feel it. You've drugged me."
Luka didn't answer her. He sat holding her hand. He murmured words of assurance to her, over and over, nothing she believed.
"You're so young," Tori said.
"Does it matter?"
She didn't have an answer for that and writhed in the bed with her hands clutched in his.
"Was it you?" She asked him, meaning the night she'd not-dreamed about the mouth between her legs.
His answer came on a mutter. "Yes. It was me. I did it."
It wasn't until after his weight had lifted from her side that Tori thought maybe he hadn't been answering the question she'd asked, but another. The one about his mother and the accident. What, then, had he done?
16
"This happens sometimes. Milk sickness. It's an infection." Mother said this in a sickly sweet voice, as though she cared, but Tori knew that concern was a lie.
She cringed away from the old woman's touch and curled her body around Rose's. "You poisoned me."
"It’s only a sedative, and you should be grateful. You need your sleep. It will help you recover. You should let Luka bring you something cold to drink. Some soup."
Tori shook her head against the pillow. For the first time since Rose’s birth, the thought of food made her want to puke. "No. I need medicine."
"Well, we haven't any, and there's no way to get some. The best I can offer is warm compresses and soup." There came a creak of wicker and the squeak of rubber wheels on the floor.
Tori shuddered. Tears leaked in hot streams down her cheeks. It occurred to her suddenly that Mother was upstairs, but still in the chair. How had she gotten up here?
Did she have the board with her?
Tori struggled to turn in the tangle of blankets. She was too hot now, sweating, and pulled them off. Mother was indeed in the chair, but the board was not on her lap.
"Where's your little ghost talker toy?" Tori asked.
Mother laughed. "It's not a toy, but I can see there's no convincing you. It's okay. No need to. It will tell me everything I need to know."
"About me."
"About everything."
From a bowl on the nightstand that Tori hadn't noticed until now, Mother pulled out a damp cloth. She wheeled closer to the bed and dabbed at Tori's forehead with it. It didn't help, and Tori recoiled from the touch.
"The man who gave it to you. Was he the one in the pictures in that album downstairs?"
Mother's hand jerked back. "You went through my personal things?"
"It was out on the table. I saw it. I didn't know it was a secret. Was it him? Did he give you the board?" Shudders racked her. Nausea rose in her throat. Her breasts ached, throbbing. "You were in that show together. The spiritualist show."
"I was his assistant at first. Then later, we became lovers. He opened up the world to me, both this one and the one beyond."
"He was Jackson's father," Tori said.
YES
Tori looked at the baby to make sure she was still sleeping as she forced herself to sit up. The front of her gown was soaked through. She put a hand between her legs, certain she would be saturated there as well, but she couldn't tell if it was blood or sweat or milk or some combination of every bodily fluid she had ever oozed.
"What happened to him?"
Mother tossed the cloth back into the bowl hard enough to rock it on the end table. Water splashed. "He died."
"Did you kill him?"
Mother should not have been able to reach far enough to slap Tori's face. She shouldn't have had the strength. But she did. Tori rocked backward with the force of the blow, hitting the headboard. She cried out. Rose startled and whimpered.
"I did not kill him," Mother spat. "He died. He fucking died, do you understand me, you little whore? You stupid little piece of trash. What do you know about love? Nothing. Who have you ever loved? Who could possibly have ever loved you?"
Tori touched the corner of her mouth and tasted blood. Mother's cursing made her smile. So much for the old bitch and her talk of manners. When it came right down to it, she was no better than Tori. Maybe worse, since at least Tori had never pretended to be something she was not.
"You know nothing of love." Mother spat to the side and wheeled her chair backwards. "Of what a woman will do for love. What I have done. For a time he talked to me, through the board. But after a time, he started to fade away. I had to get close to him. To get him back. I knew the only way was to give him a place to live again. He'd died too soon. He needed a place to land. And what better vessel than the flesh of his flesh? Blood of his blood? The board spoke to me, you see. It told me what I needed to do. Another child."
"And when that didn't work, another and another?" Tori gave a liquid-sounding laugh. Everything around her seemed fluid and melting. Her pain had not faded, exactly, but she was getting distant from it. The fever, she thought. It was making her float.
"I needed to recreate him as closely as I could. The board told me how. And each time, I got closer and closer to making him anew. Each time, blood to blood, flesh to flesh, ready and open in those three, first empty months...."
Tori's lip curled. "So you went out and fucked a series of randos in order to get knocked up --"
"You shut your whore mouth, you disgusting piece of shit! How dare you? You have no idea what I had to do in order to make this happen! Years and years of waiting, do you know how long it takes before a boy is old enough to make a child in his father's image?"
Another wave of heat swept through Tori, followed immediately by a sick chill, then another and another, back and forth in waves while the room spun, except that now she didn't think it was from any infection, not a fever, now it was because the pieces had slipped into place. Now she understood what it was Mother had done, what made this family so fucking weird.
"Oh my God. Jackson? Jackson is Luka's father!"
Mother's chair locked into place. Her hands moved in the air, mimicking the way she'd used the Ouija board. Back and forth.
YES NO YES NO YES NO YES NO YES NO
NO
NO
"No. Micah is Luka's father. Declan is Micah's father. Jackson is Declan's father," Mother said. "I nourished each of them with the birth blood of what they'd helped me create, making them strong. Together we created a new life, a vessel, an empty space for my love to fill. It was supposed to work. The board said it would. But something went wrong each time. I tried, but something went wrong, and at the end of the first three months they were not filled with my lover, but with something else. So I tried again. Each time, getting closer."
Tori thought of Luka asking her about eating the placenta, and her gorge rose. She remembered the pleasure of a mouth on her. The baby's
screaming went on and on, ringing in her head.
"It was him," she muttered. "That night, it wasn't a dream."
Mother's laugh twisted, harsh and low. "No, it was not a dream. I sent him to you. He needed to be strong for the ritual."
"So he fucking ate my afterbirth? What is wrong with you? You're insane!" Tori clapped her hands over her face, rocking hard enough to knock the headboard against the wall. Rose's screams eased, but only for a moment or so before starting again.
"Sacrifices must be made. Rituals performed. None of them were the perfect vessel, but each time it was closer. There must be blood, to nourish them. And then to create a new vessel, empty those first few months. Leaving time to be filled. Each time I was closer. And then the girl child...."
Tori writhed, thinking of the grave. The picture in the drawer. "You got pregnant with Luka, and you had a girl. He gave you a daughter instead of another son."
"He named her Rose."
Tori cried out, the noise mingling with that of her still screaming infant. "What the fuck did your fucking board tell you to do then, you sick old fuck?"
"My love --"
"Your love sounds like the devil to me," Tori said. "I've only been a mother for a week or so, but I can tell you, not even Satan could get me to do anything that would hurt my baby. You think you know what love is and I don't? Fuck you. You have no idea what it means to love."
Tori meant to scream, but all she could manage was a whisper. She'd have sprung out the bed and shoved the old woman and her chair down the stairs, if she'd been able, but she was too weak. Beside her on the bed, the baby shrieked.
"Blood to blood," Mother said. "Flesh to flesh. The board told me what needed to be done. What use was a girl child, except for the blood and the flesh, for the ritual? But I was impatient. I was too eager. I didn't want to wait. I rushed it. I made mistakes."
"You were too batshit fucking crazy, that's what you were," Tori spat. "What did you do with the baby?"
“We needed her. For the ritual.”
“What,” Tori said, “did you do?”
“What had to be done." Mother sounded sad, but the look on her face was of a strange and secret joy.
