While Alec could not see her face clearly, he could tell from her voice that she was crying. He fought the urge to comfort her. He knew she would be angry that he neared her so close to the change.
“Jared, I know you saw the walls, the door,” Lucy said.
“Yes.”
“You have to promise that, when the time comes, that when we’ve run out of hope, you will—help—me,” she stressed the word, giving it dark meaning.
“Lucy—”
“Promise! I’m not as strong as Rene. I don’t think I can,” her voice broke off in a choked sob.
“I promise,” Alec said.
Jared turned his head sharply, took in a ragged breath.
“She’s my sister. And I promise. I will do what has to be done.”
“Not you, Alec,” Lucy said.
“Yes. Jared will never do it. Jared never loses hope.”
“It’s time,” Lucy said suddenly. “Shut the door. It’s time.”
Jared leaped to his feet and placed his hands to the door. As he secured the door, he watched Lucy’s face twist slightly in pain, her expression obscured by a penumbra in the diminishing slant of light from the hall. He sat back in the dim light of the camp stove and lanterns and took Alec’s hands, waiting for the screams to begin.
* * * *
“Shit, there’s another car here,” Kevin said as he pulled up behind the only other car on the empty block.
“Doesn’t mean anybody’s in the building,” Molly replied, hooking her thumb at The Fullerton Building.
“True.”
“Maybe it’s just other explorers, like us,” Tristan offered. They had run into other explorers before. And stray dogs. That was the worst. He shivered at the memory.
“So let’s start at the top and work our way down,” Kevin said as he unfastened his seatbelt. Climbing from the car, he glanced at the car parked in front of him again and then looked around the deserted street. He hated surprises. “Let’s look around for an easy way in.”
Tristan grabbed the cameras and followed behind Kevin and Molly as they searched the outside of the building. He snapped a few images on his phone before taking some establishing shots with his video camera. Being this excited always made him have to pee—that and the soda he had chugged on the ride. “Hey, I’m gonna go around back to take a leak,” he said, breaking away from them.
“Yell if you see a way in,” Kevin said.
Tristan charged into a dark corner on the side of the building, and looking around for cops, unzipped and sighed in relief. When he was done, he noticed the boards missing from the door not far from him. He hustled back to Kevin and Molly, who were coming around the corner. “Found our way in,” Tristan said. He led them back to the door.
“Perfect,” Molly said.
Kevin eyed the wood and, satisfied it hadn’t just been taken off, entered through the door. He flipped on his flashlight. The beam cut across the tiled floor of a back hallway.
“Terrazzo,” Molly cooed as they entered.
“Check out the entablature,” Kevin said as he shone his light toward the ceiling.
“Sweet,” Tristan said.
“I can’t wait to see the grand lobby,” Molly said.
“Last,” Kevin said, grabbing her shoulder playfully.
“I know. I know. We explore top to bottom.”
“Save the best for last,” Kevin beamed.
“Take your cameras, guys,” Tristan said, handing them each a camera. “I feel like we’re gonna catch something tonight.”
Molly puckered her mouth in a bemused smile. Tristan thought that they would catch a ghost every time—even when he wasn’t stoned. She flipped her camera on and set it to night vision. She panned the camera around the room, enjoying the eerie green tint. She flipped the camera off. “Good to go.”
A service stairwell jutted off the hallway they entered. Kevin pushed the door to the stairwell open, and cast his light around, looking for anything in the stairwell before entering. A burial of dust, chipped plaster, and flaked paint coated the floor, but the stairwell was otherwise empty. He entered, propping the door open for Molly and Tristan. Molly shone her light up the stairs, admiring the worn marble steps. The stairs stretched up into darkness, turn after turn. Her light slipped between the spindles of the railing, casting shadows that reminded her of a sideways mini-blind.
Kevin trudged up the stairs, glad they were marble and not wood. “Watch in case they’re slick,” he said. Molly smiled back at Tristan, who rolled his eyes at his friend’s paternal nature.
On the top floor, they began their exploration, enamored with the abandonment. Room after room, they found long forgotten desks, with memos and files still inside; shelves covered in dust, some toppled; intricately carved built-in cabinets; closets with a coat or shoes left behind. The discoveries thrilled them as they imagined who left them, whether they ever missed the item. They snapped photos for their blog and grabbed video of their exploration.
Working their way down, they had just entered the third floor, when they heard the first scream. They all froze, the threat of laughter looming between them.
“Did you hear that?” Tristan asked, though he knew they had. “I bet somebody was murdered here.”
“That was a real fucking scream,” Kevin hissed.
The agonized wail of a woman rose through the building again.
“Shit, Kevin,” Molly whispered. She clutched his arm.
Tristan flipped his camera on. “Turn on your cameras.” Molly and Kevin remained frozen. “Do it, now,” Tristan barked in his enthusiasm. He aimed his camera on their faces to capture their reactions as the third scream echoed through the halls. Their faces—terror-stricken—gazed back at him in the eerie green of night vision.
Molly fumbled with her camera. “I want to go.”
Another shriek cascaded through the building.
Molly shrieked; she couldn’t help herself.
“Shhh,” Kevin said, pulling her closer to him.
Molly nodded.
Deep inside the building they heard the cries again, but it changed as it rose to them, morphing into a roar.
They all screamed.
* * * *
Soft light danced around the hallway as Jared and Alec cuddled on an open sleeping bag. They tried to make the most of the time they had; however, with Lucy snarling behind a wall, it felt anything but romantic and conversation was difficult over the noise. Yet, lying in each other’s arms still felt like an escape. Jared nuzzled Alec’s cheek, and said, “We should have brought the paperwork to translate.”
“I think it’s safer in the apartment.”
“True.” Jared turned, watching the shadows on the wall. “Do you think we’ll ever change?”
“Into werewolves? Or is this a yearbook ‘Don’t ever change’ kind of question?” Alec giggled to himself.
“Werewolves.”
Alec didn’t answer immediately. In the lull of the conversation, the werewolf continued to snarl and scratch at the walls. “I hope not.”
“If we do...” Jared fell silent. He finished his thought, softly, guiltily. “I hope we’re not like Lucy.”
Alec tugged him closer. “I know how you feel.” Alec rolled on his side and kissed a soft trail along Jared’s neck, over his bearded chin, to his full lips. Alec pulled back. “Did you hear that?”
“I can’t hear anything over Lucy.”
Alec stood and walked to the locked door. He listened for a moment and then turned the key in the padlock and eased the door open.
The distinct siren of multiple, tremulous voices carried down to him. “We have company,” he said, turning to Jared.
“I heard it that time. What do we do?”
Alec turned to him, his eyes flashing mischievously in the camp stove light. “They sound scared. So let’s finish the job.”
* * * *
Kevin, Molly, and Tristan made their way to the stairwell, planning to descend to the downstair
s hallway to flee. They clutched each other, trembling, but still half-giddy with the idea of adventure, as they panned their flashlights and cameras in dizzying circles. They moved as a group of friends through a carnival haunted house, never knowing if there was anything real to fear. They swore each shadow moved of its own accord, only to realize that another flashlight caused the shadows to loom and recede. Sounds of fear and laughter erupted from their mouths in intervals as they crept toward the third floor.
Then the howl—low, vicious, long—shot up the stairwell to them with the certainty and speed of a lightning bolt that reveals the shadow of an intruder behind a curtain.
A real, live beast released that howl.
And it lurked somewhere below them—trapping them. Tristan panicked first, plunging through the door into the third floor away from the sound reverberating up the stairwell.
“Tristan, no!” Kevin called, cringing as his shout echoed up and down the darkness. He and Molly followed after Tristan.
“Fuck, man. Fuck.” Tristan repeated over and over, hunched like someone who had sprinted through the woods. “What was that?”
“We have to get out of here,” Molly said, sounding foolish to her own ears.
“How? It’s below us,” Kevin snapped.
Another muffled roar snaked under the door into the hallway where they stood.
Then, closer, on the third floor with them, something clanged, the sound of metal falling on the floor.
They all spun, pointing their flashlights toward the sound. Only Tristan’s camera mounted to his head pointed toward the sound. Molly and Kevin’s cameras were all but forgotten, hanging in their hands, capturing images at skewed angles.
Down the hall, lit by three, shaking flashlight beams, an office door drifted open, as if pushed by a ghostly wind.
“Shit.” Molly clasped her hand to her mouth as she saw a human silhouette move behind the frosted glass in the open office door.
Tristan saw the shape then, too, and again, he bolted back into the stairwell. Molly and Kevin stumbled behind him. Another monstrous roar rattled up the stairwell. Tristan froze and Kevin and Molly plowed into him on the landing between floors. They stood in silence, trembling. Kevin pointed his flashlight up above. The light shook in his hand, painting a tremulous orb of light as it swooped from object to object. Molly trained her flashlight beam on the door they had just exited, anticipating it opening. Tristan squeezed his flashlight handle until his knuckles turned white as he focused the beam down the stairwell.
Scratching and banging, like something huge thrashing itself against walls rose up to them with the force of a geyser—hot, dangerous, yet wondrous. “Run,” Kevin muttered and stumbled down the few steps to the second floor door. He held the door open as Molly and Tristan slipped through, and then he pressed it shut, and leaned his back against it. “We’re almost out,” he exhaled, hoping to sound brave as his voice cracked.
“The sound’s coming from the basement,” Tristan whispered.
“What’s down there?” Molly asked.
“What if it’s coming up the stairwell?”
“Something’s on the fucking third floor! We saw it!” Kevin’s chest heaved as he pressed against the stairwell door.
“Dude, I can’t go back in that stairwell,” Tristan cried.
“We’re not going back in there. Let’s find the main staircase and get out of here.” Kevin pointed his flashlight down the second-floor hall. Certainly, this building had a main, grand staircase from the lobby to the second floor. I’ll bust our way out the front door, Kevin thought, and we’ll sprint to the car, and we’ll never look back. We’ll never explore again. His camera, the strap still tight around his sweaty palm, dangled, pointing backward as he walked. It captured Molly’s stuttering footsteps.
Kevin took slow, silent steps down the hall, halting every time his or Molly’s or Tristan’s foot crunched on fallen plaster. Offices branched off the hall all around them. Some doors closed, others missing, still many ajar at varying angles. The flashlights cut a path down the wide hallway. Yet darkness swirled in the rooms branching off the hallway.
Tristan, close behind Molly, fought the urge to shine his light into a dark office as they passed it. If something was there, he didn’t want to know. Please, Kevin, he pleaded to himself, please get us out of here. He heard a soft sound in the hallway behind him, and he recognized it as the sound a door made as it clicked closed. The realization hit him, and he froze. “Kev,” he whispered. “Something’s behind us.”
Molly whipped around, focusing her light on the hallway behind them. Their footprints glittered in the dirt and plaster dust. As her flashlight beam hit the stairwell door, she caught just the faintest hint that the stairwell door had clicked closed. So faint was the movement that she could easily rationalize to believe that the door either had or had not moved. “The door just finished closing. It’s up here,” her voice faded in and out, like a broken airwave.
Tristan refused to turn, to see. He had his eyes pressed closed and his face shook with fear. Kevin could see in his friend’s face that he would not move. “Tristan, we have to keep going. Now.”
Tristan nodded.
Suddenly, the hallway behind them erupted with the sound of shattering glass, followed quickly by their frightened howls. They all turned, seeing that at the far end of the hall, something had hurtled through a frosted window, spraying the glass into the hall.
Then, behind them, clacking sounds. They turned again.
From the darkness, an empty chair crawled toward them, its wheels clacking. They stumbled, almost tripping each other, as they shrieked down the hall from the ghostly chair. Halfway down the hall, they found the grand staircase. Kevin shot the beam of his flashlight into the lobby, begging, please be empty, please be empty, as he stumbled down the steps.
Behind him, Molly slipped on the dusty stairs. Blubbering, she clutched the rail, righted herself, and continuing to run.
Tristan hesitated at the top of the stairs, just a moment, to gaze down the hallway where the office door window had shattered. His flashlight caught the trail of footprints in the dust. We’re not alone, he thought. He shuffled down the stairs, stopping to look back at the second floor as he reached the landing.
Kevin shot through the grand lobby. He plowed into the large, old glass double doors, boarded up from the outside. The door began to open and jerked to a stop as the chain and lock on the outside held it in place. Kevin cried out in panic. He began to kick the board fastened over the bottom half of the door. “Let us out.” He chanted as he kicked. Molly and Tristan rushed up behind him. They turned their backs to Kevin to shine their lights onto the stairs they had just descended. Another roar tore through the lobby.
“Hurry, dude.”
“Kevin, please.”
Kevin could feel the board weakening. Again, Kevin kicked the plywood until he heard the definite sound of wood splintering. He struck with renewed vigor as the wood broke in two pieces. He bent down and shoved the pieces of wood aside. He squeezed through. “Hurry, Molly!”
Molly fell to her hands and knees. She reached through the door, and Kevin half-dragged her through the opening. As Molly slipped through, Tristan looked back at the stairwell. He shone his light up the stairs, counting their footsteps in the dust: One, two, three. He panned his light across the lobby to the second set of stairs on the other side of the lobby.
One, two sets of footprints.
The realization that someone else had walked down the stairs and was now in the lobby with him erupted from him in a high-pitched yelp. He dived through the broken-out door, skidding on the marble steps. He clamored to his feet. “Run,” he cried. “Run.”
He trailed close behind Molly as they sprinted to the car. Tristan looked back once at the front doors but never stopped.
Kevin clicked the car doors unlocked as he ran and flopped into the driver’s seat. He turned the ignition, thankful that the car simply started without hesitation. He h
eard two doors slam shut. “All here?” He asked without looking as he slammed the car into drive.
Two voices cried yes. Two voices he knew and loved.
At first, Kevin simply drove away from The Fullerton Building, not exactly home, just away. Laughter eventually broke the silence. “What the fuck just happened?” Kevin asked.
Molly heaved, still breathless. “Ghosts. Tristan, I think we caught your ghosts.”
“Those weren’t ghosts,” Tristan argued.
“What?” Molly asked.
“They left footprints. They were real, guys. Something real was after us.” Tristan leaned back in the seat, fighting the urge to puke. “I’m never going exploring again. Seriously.”
Molly looked over at Kevin, who was still pale and looked clammy. “Maybe we should take up white water rafting.”
* * * *
Back in the lobby of The Fullerton Building, Alec and Jared hugged each other in delighted congratulations. “Alec, that was brilliant. And fun.”
“I don’t think they’ll be back,” Alec agreed, his voice bright.
Jared peered at the kicked out board. “We should fix that.” He turned to face Alec. “Let’s not tell Lucy... About someone being here.”
“Absolutely.”
“I feel a little guilty,” Jared said, looking again at the door where the three had escaped.
Alec shrugged. “We gave them a free haunted house. They didn’t get hurt.”
“Luckily.”
“And, luckily, it’s over.” As they headed back for the shelter of the basement, they didn’t notice an extra set of footprints in the dust of the lobby floor.
Making Plans
Crossing the Atlantic from London to Detroit in his private Learjet, Nigel Rathborne took a video call with his six commanders-in-chief, each responsible for successful campaigns on their assigned continent. “I expect a full report on my desk by the end of the week,” he stated. “That includes progress at all schools.”
“If progress is static from the last report?” Asked the commander for Europe.
“Then you’ll be replaced,” Nigel warned. “Decades of research and planning have gone into this campaign. We have one night. Just the one. There can be no mistakes. Every operative must be in place. Every guard, every bridge engineer, every baggage handler.”
The Wolf in His Arms (The Runes Trilogy) Page 7
