The Raven Watcher

by Amy Cross

  “Please,” I whisper, “don't let me die. Don't let me stay dead.”

  He mumbles something under his breath and gets back to work, and I immediately feel his fingers slipping through my chest again. It's as if I'm feeling everything that happens to my body up on the slab, even though I know that none of this makes any sense. I try to get to my feet, but the world is spinning around me and I quickly slump back down. I've got no strength left whatsoever, and I feel as if my mind is going to collapse in on itself at any moment, leaving me with no thoughts left.

  No life.

  “Beat, damn you!” Doctor Grazier shouts. “Beat!”

  I feel his hand on my heart again, and this time he squeezes again and again. With each pump, I let out a gasp of pain, but I can feel blood being forced around my body. I roll onto my back, trying to block out the immense pain, but I'm powerless to ignore the sensation of my heart being repeatedly squeezed. The ceiling seems to be spinning, and after a moment I reach out and try to cling onto the floor, terrified in case I'm suddenly sent crashing through the air. Constant grunts of agony are coming from my lips, but I'm powerless to fight back now. All I can do is wait for the inevitable, and -

  “There!”

  Suddenly I feel a massive jolt in my chest. The world spins around and I sit up, leaning forward and taking a deep gulp of air. Before my vision has cleared, I'm pushed back down, but this time I feel as if I'm no longer on the floor. I turn and look around, and to my surprise I find that I'm back on the slab. I look down at the stone column where I was sitting a moment earlier, but now there's no sign of me. I still feel as if I'm down there, but at the same time I'm up here on the slab and I've got this sense of extreme dizziness. It's almost as if I've suddenly been forced back into my body.

  “You're breathing again,” Doctor Grazier's voice whispers. “That's good. Now I just have to sew you up again.”

  “What?” I stammer, trying again to sit up, only to be forced back down once more. “It hurts. Please stop, it hurts. You can't -”

  Before I can finish, I feel a sharp pain in my belly. I cry out as I look down, and to my astonishment I see thick black wire forcing itself through my skin as if I'm being put back together. I reach out to grab the wire, but something pushes my hands away.

  “Stay still, won't you?” Grazier's voice continues, and now he sounds a little annoyed. “It was too close this time. I can't keep patching you up, eventually...”

  His voice trails off.

  For a moment, I can only stare down in horror as I see pools of blood floating around my intestines. Grazier quickly pulls my skin tight, however, and I see a pair of hands working quickly and deftly to continue threading the wire so that I'm stitched shut. More blood is already leaking from the gaps between the stitches, and the pain is becoming increasingly intense. I keep telling myself that this isn't happening, that it can't be happening, but at the same time I can't deny the agony. Finally I grip the sides of the slab beneath me as I start letting out a pained, whining moan.

  “Do you have to make that awful noise?” Grazier asks.

  “Help me,” I sob. “Please...”

  “I am helping you. It's not the first time, either. Now be quiet and let me work!”

  I try to pull away, but a hand presses down against my chest, holding me in place.

  “This will keep you well for now,” his voice explains. “You need urgent medical attention, but at least you won't bleed to death in the next few hours. I'm sure that when you finally get to the nearest hospital, their surgeons will be amazed at my handiwork. If they ask who helped you, however, do not give them my name. I am quite sure that in your time, I am world-renowned. Fortunately I am a humble man, and I need no further adulation. Indeed, I would prefer to be left alone. I do not want my name becoming known to the world. Not now.”

  Suddenly I scream as the wire's tip pokes into the depths of my gut.

  “Stay still!” Grazier hisses. “How do you expect me to work when you're continually wriggling like this?”

  “You're not real!” I gasp.

  “Such a charming young woman,” he replies. “It's difficult to believe that you're a -”

  He stops suddenly, and he hesitates for a moment before getting back to work.

  “You can thank me at a later date,” he continues. “Or rather, please don't. Once you have escaped from this house, you must never return. Nobody can ever return, not even to destroy the place. If it's destroyed, she might escape, so resist that temptation. Just run as far and as fast as you can and don't ever look back. I shall take care of the rest.”

  “I don't know what you're talking about,” I tell him. “You can't be real. This has to be in my head.”

  “You almost died,” he replies. “That makes it much easier for you to see me, but soon that luxury will be gone. You must listen to me, your new heart -”

  “My new what?” I gasp.

  “The old one was destroyed,” he continues. “I could have tried to rebuild it, but there was a perfectly good heart available so that I what I used. You don't sound particularly grateful.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, as he continues to stitch my chest and belly shut. “Whose heart do I have?”

  “It was in perfectly good order. Just an hour or so dead, and not so difficult to restart. Indeed, it was still warm in the poor girl's body, although you're still fortunate that I am such a skilled surgeon. I have had a long time to theorize, and to practice on small animals that wandered into the house. And now that girl's heart beats in your body.”

  I open my mouth to ask what he means, but then I spot a figure slumped on the floor nearby. A cold sweat runs across my face as I see that not only has Alex's body been moved, but her chest has been ripped open and several of her ribs are poking out from her bloodied meat. I don't want to believe what I'm seeing, although slowly I become aware of my heart pounding hard in my chest.

  Or rather, Alex's heart.

  “No,” I whisper, shuddering as I realize that Grazier has done, “please...”

  “Hold tight,” he replies calmly. “This next part might hurt a little.”

  I turn to him, but suddenly the most intense pain bursts through my chest and all I can do is tilt my head back and scream. I don't know what Grazier is doing to me, but it feels as if thousands of tiny, burning hot needles are being driven straight into my gut. No matter how hard I try to get away, I can only cry out in desperation as the pain builds and builds.

  This is like my first night in the house.

  I remember now.

  He saved me before, and now he's saving me again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Doctor Charles Grazier”

  Sunday October 7th, 1888

  I start gently massaging the heart, trying to mimic the way it must have moved when it was still beating in the prostitute's chest, but already I feel a sense of hopelessness creeping through my soul.

  This is not going to work.

  Delilah's body is cold and lifeless, and nothing can return her to her former state.

  Wait...

  Delilah?

  Which Delilah?

  Staring down at the corpse, I see the face of Delilah Culpepper. For a moment, however, that face is replaced by the features of another Delilah. The original Delilah. My Delilah. Delilah Finglebottom. And her eyes are open and she is staring up at me for the first time in years, as if she had never died. It is as if some great miracle has fallen from the heavens and given her back to me. I know this cannot be the case, of course, yet I cannot bring myself to look away. And after a moment, just as I have begun to persuade myself that this is all in my head, she blinks.

  “I...”

  My voice trails off.

  “This cannot be,” I whisper. “You are dead, you died a decade ago. I saw your body in the mud.”

  “Look at you,” she replies, interrupting me. “All grown up. The last time I saw you, Jack, you were just a scruffy boy with plans. Now you look almost li
ke a proper gentleman.”

  I shake my head.

  “I've been waiting for you, you know,” she continues. “It won't be long now. The ravens might not have picked you apart, but your life is drawing to a close. Soon you'll see the end coming, and you won't be scared. You'll find me in the next life and then we'll be together forever. That's what you wanted, isn't it? To be together? Does it really matter where we are, so long as we have each other?”

  “No,” I reply. “That's not how it works.”

  “Then how does it work?”

  “The next life is not some paradise where we are reunited with our loved ones,” I tell her, as a solitary tear trickles down my cheek. “Would that it were, but I am not a child. I do not believe in childish things.”

  “Don't you want to be with me again?”

  “More than anything, but you died a long time ago.”

  “Then how am I here now, speaking to you?”

  “You are a figment of my mind,” I explain. “A hope. A wish. You are a lie that my eyes and ears are telling to me. You are, in effect, a lullaby designed to send my fears to sleep.”

  “I am?”

  I pause, before nodding.

  “I wish I could surrender myself to this illusion,” I continue, “but I cannot. Perhaps that is a fault of mine. I should be able to calm my thoughts and accept what I truly want, but I cannot lie to myself. You are not really here. You are a face overlaid upon a corpse.”

  “Oh.” Her brow furrows slightly. “I suppose you might be right. Maybe I -”

  And then she's gone, leaving me to stare down once more at Delilah Culpepper's dead features. I believe I began to lose my mind for a moment, I began to follow Doctor Grazier along the path to madness. As strange as it might seem, I honestly believe that I was starting to replicate all his mistakes, even down to the fact that I was determined to bring a woman back from the dead. As I look at the pale, lifeless heart in Delilah Culpepper's chest now, I am no longer able to fool myself into believing that this body can ever be resuscitated.

  My efforts have come to naught.

  My work is over.

  “Who were you talking to?” the voice whispers from behind the door.

  Turning, I realize that while I no longer have any hope of saving Delilah, there is one pressing matter that must be dealt with. The creature behind that door is absolutely real, of that there can be no doubt, and she – or it – must never be allowed to escape. I am sure that she is powerful, and although my first instinct is to burn the house down, I cannot be sure that fire would consume her. Instead, I believe the house will have to become her tomb, that she must rot down here for the rest of time.

  Stepping over to the door, I look again at the carvings that I put in place earlier. My mind is racing and I know I must work fast. Already, she will be growing in strength.

  “Who were you talking to?” she asks again. “I heard you speak, but nobody replied. Were you imagining someone? Was it her, the woman you want to get back? Let me out of here and I'll help you. How much longer are you going to resist?”

  “That would be unnatural,” I whisper under my breath.

  “What did you say? I didn't quite catch that.”

  Crouching down, I run a fingertip against the carvings. They are not deep enough, and I am starting to realize that I must put more around the house. I know enough about such matters to understand the strategic importance of the markings, but I also know that there is a danger they could cancel one another out. I have to carefully calculate the best position for each of them, and then they will form a kind of cage that this creature will never be able to escape. First, though, I shall require some assistance.

  I must go and speak to the one person who truly knows how such things function. To the person who raised me up from the mud.

  ***

  A dredging vessel lets out a mournful blast of its horn as it makes its way along the Thames. It's late and cold, so cold that I have had to tie my coat tight around my waist. I have not been down to this part of the city for quite some time, not since I was young, but I hope I can still find the old man who taught me about the dark arts.

  “Are you looking for some fun?” a woman asks from the shadows. “I've got all the fun you could want inside. Doesn't matter how young you like 'em. I've got 'em. Some of 'em ain't even begun to sprout yet.”

  I don't even bother to reply.

  “Hey, handsome!”

  She hurries after me, trying to grab my arm. I pull away, of course, but she tries again.

  “Come on, handsome,” she continues, trying now to get ahead of me and block my way. She's desperate; even more desperate than the average prostitute. “Hey handsome, why not stop a while and -”

  Her voice catches, and I see the shock in her eyes.

  “Oh,” she says, finally stopping and letting me walk on. “Well that's okay, honey!” she calls after me, although now she sounds a little uncertain. “There's different kinds of handsome! For a little extra, I could still make sure you have a good time!”

  Ignoring her, I make my way along the dark alley. I'm already heading away from the brothels, and after just a couple of minutes I find myself down at the very edge of the river. My boots squelch into thick, boggy silt as I start heading toward the underside of the bridge. I had been hoping to spot a fire burning by now, or perhaps some other sign that the old man still resided here, but all I see ahead is darkness. In the past, he was well known for providing a patch of heat and light in the dead of night, although I suppose times change.

  Then again, it is many years since he saved me. Since I stumbled down here alone and terrified, with my mind in tatters following Delilah Finglebottom's death. I don't even remember what I meant to do that night, but I suppose I intended to drown myself. Yet as luck would have it, I stumbled across the oldest and wisest man in all of London, a man who chooses to live beneath a bridge and watch the river. He taught me so much, and I learned despite the crack in my skull. By the time I left his care, I had become the man I am today. I thought I would never come back to search for him, but tonight of all nights I need him one more time.

  As I get closer to the bridge, however, I see no sign of anyone.

  Stopping, I look around, but it's clear that the old man is no longer here. It has indeed been some time since I last came to see him, but I had assumed – naively, perhaps – that he would always be waiting. I have never known him to leave the shadows of the bridge before, and I still cannot quite imagine where else he could have gone. He must be here, even if at present he is for some reason concealing himself from me. It is simply impossible that he would ever leave his station.

  “Hello!” I call out, before stepping forward. “It's me! It's Jack! I need to ask you something! You must remember me! It's ten years or more since I was last here, but we used to speak a lot! I'm in need of your advice! I'm in need of your help!”

  Sighing, I realize that this is hopeless. I am just a madman standing on the dark shore, shouting in the night air. Perhaps it was too optimistic to think that the old man would still be here; perhaps it would have been too easy to have come down here and found him still warming his hands close to a fire, still ready to dispense his wisdom. I take one last look around, just in case I have perhaps missed him, and then I turn to walk away. I cannot imagine what circumstance could have lured him away from here, but then I suppose he must be in great demand. He was the defining influence on my life, yet to him I probably seemed like nothing more than a gnat.

  “I remember you,” a familiar, frail voice says suddenly, barely loud enough to be heard over the lapping of water at the shore. “How could I not?”

  I stop and look over my shoulder, but I do not see exactly where the voice comes from.

  It is him, though.

  I would know his voice anywhere.

  “You would come down so often,” he continues, “and listen to me. I told you many things, didn't I? Things that other people would think are signs of madne
ss. I told you secrets that are hidden from most men. But you listened, and you took it all in. Into your cracked and opened head.”

  “Where are you?” I ask, still looking around but seeing only the silhouette of the unlit bridge against the starry night sky. “I do not see you.”

  “I am here,” the voice replies. “Do you need to see me, so long you can hear me? After all, I am not especially handsome. Not these days. Not that I was...”

  He starts chuckling.

  “Not that I was handsome before,” he adds finally. “Then again, who of us down here can claim to be handsome?”

  A breeze blows along the shoreline, and I hear the sound of rattling bones in the cold night air.

  “There's barely anything left to see, anyway,” he continues. “I long ago gave up on the pretense of a strong physical form. The flesh distracts the mind, don't you find?”

  I open my mouth to ask what he means, but at that moment I hear another faint jangling noise. I have been around long enough to know the sound of bare bones bumping against one another, and I feel a shudder pass through my chest as I realize that perhaps there is a good reason why the old man no longer wants to be seen. When I was last here, he was mostly bones with just a few tattered patches of skin remaining; if the skin is gone, I cannot even imagine what holds him together.

  “You must have something on your mind,” he says, “to come back here after so long. Last time I saw you, you announced you were striking off to explore the world, yet here you are again. Something must be troubling you a great deal.”

  “I need to contain a demon,” I reply, before realizing that this explanation must sound woefully inadequate. Inaccurate, even. “Or some kind of creature. I do not know its precise nature, but at present it resides in a locked room in a Whitechapel house. I know very little of its origin, or of its nature, but I am absolutely certain that its intentions are malevolent. It means to break free from the house, and that cannot be allowed.”

  “Then stay awhile and tell me about this creature,” the old man's voice says. “Whatever it is, I am sure we can find a way to send it back whence it came. Or at the very least, we can ensure that it never managed to spread its wings in this world. This cannot be the first time that such an entity has visited our city. Tell me what you know of this thing.”