Paranormal Lovers Box Set

by Wayne Mansfield

  “I’m Reginald Batt, of the Big River Batts. Pleased to meet you.”

  He proffered his hand, which I took, somewhat tentatively. It was a firm handshake, not at all as I expected from one who was almost as thin and pale as I was. But then I already suspected he was a larger-than-life character and one quite obviously possessed of oodles of exuberance.

  “I’m Morgan Berry.”

  “Two Bs,” said Reginald. “Our family names. They both begin with B.”

  “You’re right,” I replied, unable to think of a more interesting response.

  “Do you live around here?” he asked, walking a little further past me.

  I shrugged. “I’m not sure. Where is here?”

  “Here is here,” he replied thrusting out his hands, palms up, before letting them drop by his sides. “I’ve never seen you in these parts before so I was wondering if you were a stranger here.”

  I glanced about me, seeing nothing but the dark shapes of trees, and Reginald. “I’ve never really been anywhere. In my whole life I’ve only ever lived in two houses. I don’t recognise this place so I guess I must be a stranger.”

  “Glad to hear it,” he said patting me on the shoulder. “Strangers make the most interesting friends.”

  “Why?” I asked, feeling as if the answer was going to be obvious.

  “Because you don’t know anything about them. Old friends are all well and good, but they can become a little boring and predictable, don’t you agree?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” I replied. “I’ve never really had any friends.”

  “There you are,” he said with a clap of his hands. “Already I’ve found out something about you and we’ve barely known each other for five minutes.”

  I couldn’t help but agree.

  “So tell me, friend, where are you headed? On such a wonderful night I could travel forever.”

  I furrowed my brow. “I thought you lived here.”

  “But I do. I do live here. I said I could travel forever. In fact, now that I have a travelling companion I might do exactly that.”

  “Hang on. I never said anything about travelling. I don’t even know where I am.”

  “Well, how about we settle here for the night and decide in the morning? The grass is soft and sweet, and I’ve no doubt it’ll make a wonderful place to sleep. I prefer to rest in the tree. I feel strangely comfortable there…not sure why.”

  His voice trailed off. For a few seconds there was only the faraway sound of cicadas.

  “At any rate, I’ll see you in the morning and we’ll make our plans then.”

  I wasn’t certain I wanted to make any plans. In all honesty I was still more than a little confused as to where I was and how I had come to be there.

  As I lay down in the grass, resting my head on my arm, I heard Reginald call ‘good night’ to me.

  “Night,” I called back and closed my eyes.

  Sleep was a long time coming, but when I finally nodded off my dreams were vivid and more than a little disturbing.

  * * * *

  I was awakened the following morning by the burnt orange and gold light of dawn that filtered through the darkness. With both my mind and body unenthusiastic about rising at such an ungodly hour, I remained recumbent in the long grass and was soon rewarded with my first ever sunrise.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” said Reginald from his perch above me.

  I shook my head in awe. “I’ve never seen anything so beautiful.”

  The light was unlike anything I had witnessed before, so fresh and clean. It dusted everything it touched with a fine, powdery luminosity, which gave it a magical quality. It was as if every tree and every blade of grass had been created during the night and was, that morning, making its debut.

  Reginald leapt from the tree and joined me at the edge of the small rise to watch the sun slowly rise higher above the forest canopy.

  I could see Reginald more clearly now. He was indeed slim and pale, much paler than me. I could even see the faint blue tentacles of tiny veins just beneath the surface of his skin. He wore strange clothing, like men from times gone by I had seen in books. His high collar and dirty white scarf hid his neck though his breeches didn’t do anything at all to hide the large bulge of his cock.

  When he looked at me I noticed he had eyes of such pale blue they could have almost been white. They reminded me of winter, of ice. But there was nothing icy about his smile. His pale purple lips were full and looked as soft as cushions. His teeth were dull, no sheen, but perfectly white.

  “Ready to go?” he said.

  “Where to?” I asked.

  “Anywhere,” he said waving a hand before him as though he were presenting the world to me.

  “What about breakfast?” I asked. “We haven’t eaten anything yet.”

  “Are you hungry?”

  When I thought about it, I realised I wasn’t. In fact, it amazed me I wasn’t. It was another mystery to add to a growing list.

  “No,” I replied.

  “Then let’s go.”

  He whistled and from out of nowhere a horse materialised. It looked a little gaunt, a little tired, but it was nevertheless a horse. The beast looked at me, snorted and lowered its head to the grass, though I noticed it didn’t appear to be hungry either.

  “How…?” I was gobsmacked. I couldn’t finish my question.

  “Duchess was here all the time, weren’t you, girl?” He patted the horse’s neck and she responded with a flick of her head.

  I felt rooted to the spot. Part of me wanted to reach out and touch her just to see if I wasn’t going completely mad, but I was too afraid. When I did move, it was to take a step back. And another.

  “Where are you going?” Reginald asked.

  “I-I-I…” I had never stuttered before in my life. “…have to go. Over…” I pointed over my shoulder. “…this way.”

  I turned and walked as fast as I could away from Reginald and Duchess.

  “Wait for us!”

  My eyes bulged when I heard the sound of heavy hooves approaching me from behind.

  “I’m fine,” I said. “I can find my own way. Thanks for everything.”

  I was walking so fast, I was almost running. I could hear the swish-swish of the long grass whipping against my legs. When I heard the horse snort by my right ear, I gasped and almost fell to the ground.

  “Oh God!” I muttered.

  I changed direction. I heard the hooves come after me. Another snort. My shoulder connected with the chest of the horse. I shrieked and as I recoiled, I tripped and went hurtling to the ground.

  “What is the matter with you?” Reginald asked. “Are you afraid of horses? Surely not?”

  “I’m afraid of that horse,” I replied with a whimper. “And you. What are you?”

  “Well!” Reginald huffed. “I’ve never been so insulted. Here I am, being as nice as I can possibly be, and you ask me what I am.” He dismounted, landing inches from where I lay, propped up on my elbow and ready to scurry away if necessary. “As I have told you, I am Reginald Batt, of the Big River Batts. And I thought we were friends!”

  I felt a twinge of guilt. Reginald had been nothing but hospitable, yet the way his horse had appeared was positively paranormal and when I thought about it some more, he didn’t appear completely human either. But how could I voice my thoughts without further offending him?

  For no reason I could think of, Reginald burst out laughing.

  “Of course,” he said. “It’s only just occurred to you that I’m dead.”

  My eyes bulged a second time. I felt bilious.

  “Oh come now,” he said leaning down to offer me his hand. “Spirits are nothing to be frightened of. Have I done anything at all to warrant such a reaction?”

  I hung my head, averting my eyes. He retracted his hand.

  “No,” I replied. “But…”

  “But nothing. Let’s say no more about it. Here.” He thrust his hand out at me once again. “Duc
hess would very much like to meet you.”

  I reluctantly took his hand and he pulled me to my feet. Once more I was reminded how surprisingly strong he was for someone who was so thin. And dead.

  “Duchess, meet a new friend of ours—Morgan Berry.” He reached under her neck and patted her. She nuzzled his ear. “Yes, I know our family names both begin with B. Isn’t that a bizarre coincidence?”

  Duchess nodded and for a moment I wondered if the beast had actually understood her owner.

  “Come on, Morgan. Say hello.”

  I approached the horse with my palm out in readiness to stroke her. When my hand made contact, Duchess looked around and snorted at my hand. I felt twin bursts of warm air explode on my skin.

  “She’s beautiful,” I said looking into her chocolaty eyes.

  Reginald was grinning. “There you are. What did I tell you? She thinks you’re beautiful, too. Almost too beautiful to be a man.”

  I bristled, but let it go. I’d been mistaken for a girl many times before, although not so much in recent years.

  Reginald climbed into the worn leather saddle. “Have you ever ridden a horse before?”

  I shook my head.

  “Up you come then.” He reached down to help me up. “You’re in for a treat.”

  I didn’t move. From down here I thought Duchess was a beautiful creature, a powerful animal despite her slightly malnourished appearance. But she was also a tall animal. It was a long way to fall from up there to down here.

  “Come on, Morgan.” Reginald shook his hand impatiently. “Or Duchess will think you don’t want to ride her.”

  I took a tentative step towards the horse.

  “I might fall off,” I said.

  Reginald tut-tutted me. “What sort of horse do you think Duchess is? She’d never let anyone fall off.”

  “Ah, what the hell,” I mumbled as I took Reginald’s hand. He lifted me onto the horse almost entirely without any assistance from me.

  “You’re really strong,” I commented as I wrapped my arms around his narrow waist and settled in behind him.

  He ignored the compliment. “Hold on tight,” he said.

  He simultaneously clicked his teeth, jiggled the reins, and gently kicked his heels against Duchess’s belly, and we began to move.

  “Where would you like to go?” asked Reginald.

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “Somewhere interesting and exciting.”

  Reginald kicked his legs again and Duchess began to gallop.

  “Right you are, Morgan.”

  Chapter 3

  We rode for the entire day. Non-stop. Whole towns flashed by. Hills and forests were a blur on either side of me. Several times I remembered I hadn’t eaten since dinner time the previous night, but I wasn’t hungry. It must have been the excitement. A couple of times I thought about my mother. I wondered where she was and what she’d be doing, but then I remembered her duplicity and told myself I didn’t care.

  Eventually, the sun began to slip further towards the horizon, painting the sky with vibrant pink, gold, and orange, and highlighting its masterpiece with traces of blue and purple before finally the black of night swallowed the whole lot down and we were riding in complete darkness.

  We arrived at a small forest and only then did Reginald bring Duchess to a stop.

  “This looks like a nice place to spend the night,” he said.

  I could neither agree nor disagree. I wasn’t as used to using the landscape as a Holiday Inn as Reginald obviously was.

  “You dismount first,” he said.

  “No, you dismount first,” I countered. “I’ll need you to help me off.”

  I couldn’t see the ground clearly. I didn’t want to fall and break my neck.

  “Very well then.”

  In the blink of an eye Reginald, who had taken on a luminescent quality in the darkness, was on the ground.

  “Come on, lad. Jump down. Duchess needs her rest, too.”

  “If she wasn’t dead already, I’d be wondering how she was still standing after all that galloping.”

  I leapt into Reginald’s arms. Fortunately he caught me.

  “You’re going to have to learn to dismount by yourself,” he said as he released me.

  We walked through the forest a little way, the evening filled with animal sounds—birds settling for the night, frogs croaking messages to each other, the batting of wings and squeaks of bats. Every now and again a breeze would sweep through the canopy, rustling the leaves.

  “So Mr Berry,” Reginald began, “we’ve been riding together all day and I know very little about you.”

  “I could say the same.”

  Reginald laughed. “That you could, friend. That you could. But I think the time is ripe to exchange some basic details about each other like, where are you from, for example?”

  “I was born in Mount Durum,” I replied. “So I guess I’m from there. But then my mother met…someone and we moved to Napier’s Valley, which probably wasn’t very far from where you found me.” The thought of my mother and what she had done, what she had helped Dennis do, brought a lump to my throat. I swallowed it down. “Where I found myself,” I mumbled. “And you?”

  “I’m from Big River. I told you that when we first met.”

  “Oh, yeah.” My mind raced to think of a better question. In an instant I had one. A question whose answer I’d been dying to know all day, though I hardly dared to ask it. “How…”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s just…I’ve got so many questions,” I replied, buying time to reconsider whether I should go ahead with my original question. “But I’m not sure I should ask them. It’s really none of my business and I don’t want to offend you. You’ve been so good…”

  “Have no fear. Ask what you will. I promise I shall take no offence.”

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Okay then. How did you die?”

  I could hear the smile in Reginald’s voice. “I thought it might be something like that.” He placed a hand on my back and kept it there as we walked. “I was hanged. I was hanged in the very tree you found me in. A lot of spirit people tend to do that—linger where they die.”

  “Why?”

  “I can’t speak for other spirits,” said Reginald, “but I like to remain there simply because I feel comfortable there.”

  I furrowed my brow. “I would have thought a person hated the place they were killed. I think I would.”

  There was a brief moment of silence. I got the feeling Reginald was trying to determine the answer for himself first before he could relay it to me.

  “I suspect it’s because it’s the place I feel most connected to the world, to my previous existence.”

  “Why do you need to feel connected to this world? I mean, why aren’t you in Heaven? Or wherever it is people go when they…die?”

  “Ah.” The smile in his voice had returned. I could hear it in that one syllable. “I’m what is known as a ‘free spirit’. I wander. That’s just what I do. Did you know, friend, that if you’re permitted entry into Heaven, you may go at a moment of your own choosing? Hell, on the other hand, is a different matter. If Hell is your destination then you must report immediately after death. Of course, there are those that rebel and Hell has to send out soldiers to locate and capture these errant spirits.”

  The whole thing sounded wonderfully exciting. “So you’re going to Heaven then?”

  “Eventually.”

  “Why have you waited so long? From what I’ve heard it’s a place most people would love to go to as soon as they could.”

  We stopped walking. “That’s the problem.”

  “What is?”

  Reginald turned to face me and placed a hand on each of my shoulders. “How about instead of telling you, I show you?”

  “Now?” I asked excitedly.

  “When we’ve rested.”

  He started walking again and I followed. When he came to a large tree, whose branches sprea
d out into the night in every direction, he leapt into its canopy, leaving a streak of pale luminescence in his wake.

  “Good night,” he called back.

  “Night,” I replied, searching the pitch dark to find evidence of where he had settled, but seeing not a single clue.

  I found a grassy spot by the tree trunk to lie down then spent a good hour or so just staring up at the night sky. Many thoughts meandered through my mind. Some stayed a while and I pondered them in great depth. I wondered why we were here in the first place. What was the purpose of our existence? Was there any purpose at all? And if we had a purpose, did every living thing have a purpose? I wasn’t thinking of purpose as in the purpose of a carrot is to be eaten or the purpose of a cow is to give milk. And be eaten. I wondered whether they had any spiritual significance. And if they didn’t, why were human beings any different?

  I confess, I did think of my mother, and Dennis. I wondered if she missed me. Thought of me? I knew Dennis couldn’t care less, but I hoped the anxiety of waiting to be arrested for what he thought he had done was eating him up. As far as they were concerned, I was dead. He had beaten the life out of me and together they had dumped me in a field somewhere. Both of them had committed a crime and I hoped they were living in terror of spending the rest of their lives behind bars. Especially Dennis.

  Eventually my thoughts began to disintegrate and I dissolved into nothingness. There were no dreams, just…nothingness.

  * * * *

  I was awoken the following morning, not by the sun, which was quite high in a blue, cloudless sky by the time I became conscious, but by the sound of a girl calling a name.

  “Rosamond! Rosamond!”

  I opened my eyes as the girl, wearing a simple white dress, decorated with embroidered flowers, and wearing her hair in twin braids, appeared from behind the massive trunk of an ancient tree. I stood up, ready to greet her.

  She gasped. “Please don’t hurt me,” she said, her eyes full of fear.

  I was a little offended. “I have no intention of hurting you.”

  The girl’s expression became friendlier. Her body relaxed, though she kept her distance.

  “Who’s Rosamond?” I asked.

  At that moment, Reginald leapt from the branches, flinging half a dozen dead leaves into the air as he landed.