Deadlight Jack

by Mark Onspaugh

  Deadlight Jack leaned over him and grinned, his Cab Calloway face partially melting away to show the creature underneath.

  “So, my prodigal Georgie of Porgie, you see there are worse things than me, yes?”

  “What was that?”

  Deadlight Jack wagged his finger at George. “I am not here to answer dreary questions.” He turned to the rest of them. “Indeed, we are here to celebrate, as I promised.”

  George was sure the thing was lying, that the food would be nearly inedible.

  But the household staff began to shamble out with large platters filled with steaming dishes: turkey, ham, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, potato salad, greens, peas, okra, and rolls with jam, honey, and butter.

  In one of the saddest moments of his life, George could hear the children’s stomachs growling. They were near starving.

  But it had to be a trick, didn’t it?

  None of the children moved except Doug-Ray, who reached for a roll but stopped when he saw Deadlight Jack look at him. Doug-Ray withdrew his hand and put it in his lap. A tear rolled down his cheek as he licked his lips.

  Like a starving dog, George thought, and grew angry.

  “Now, before we eat,” declared Deadlight Jack, “we must do something. Can anyone tell me what that is?”

  “Say grace,” answered Donny, Trang, Gail, and Jeremy.

  Deadlight Jack shook his head patiently. “I have no truck with such things, my dears. No, it is time to vote! We have such a bounty before us, should we not share with those less fortunate?”

  He gestured, and the ghost children entered the room, now dressed in the finery of their particular era.

  All the living children nodded “yes,” anything to get on with their first real meal in ages.

  “However,” Deadlight Jack said with mock sadness, “mes enfants fantôme derive no nourishment from the same food you do…”

  He gestured, and two of his living dead retainers brought in a struggling man in jeans, tee shirt, and a trucker’s cap. He was heavily tattooed and had a large beer belly.

  The ghost children eyed him hungrily.

  “So,” said Deadlight Jack, his voice merry, celebratory, “shall we all feast together or go without?”

  George looked at the children. They gazed at the sumptuous repast, and at the man, who was straining and cursing.

  It would be easier to spare a child or someone beautiful, George thought. That’s what he’s counting on.

  The man seemed to register the ghost children for the first time, and he turned pale. He looked at Deadlight Jack.

  “Please, Mister, lemme go. I ain’t done nuthin’ to you.”

  “Ah, but it is not up to me, my fine fellow. My children must vote: throw you to my ghost children or go hungry.”

  “What?” The man tried to grasp the concept and was failing.

  Deadlight Jack gestured at the children around the table and at George. “These children can only eat if they let me feed you to my kindergeists.”

  The man turned his attention to George, and George wondered who he was seeing when he looked at Deadlight Jack.

  “Please, Mister, I got a wife and kids. I was just out checking my traps and this fellow grabbed me up. Ain’t a crime trappin’ critters out in the bayou—hell, gators grab most a’ them afore I get there. Please…”

  George looked at the children. He knew they were far, far hungrier than either he or Donny. He gestured to the man. “How about it, children. Shall we let this man go home?”

  Donny pushed himself away from the table, as did Trang. Warren followed suit, then Lena. The Camp Happy Time kids talked among themselves, then got up and walked away, all holding hands. Gail and Jeremy hesitated longer, looking wistfully at the bounty before them, then the man, who was shaking. They looked away from him and the food, and pushed their chairs back.

  George thought some of them believed that Deadlight Jack would change his mind and let them eat—surely he would not let all this food go to waste.

  Doug-Ray agonized the longest. He drooled onto his shirt and seemed not to notice. He eyed the dishes one by one, picturing heaping plates before him, then looked at the man.

  “Please,” the man said, openly weeping.

  Doug-Ray started to reach for a fried-chicken drumstick, then shook his head savagely, as if he was angry at himself. He stood up so abruptly his chair overturned, and he ran from the room.

  Deadlight Jack sighed, disappointed. He gestured, and all the food disappeared. The children heaved a sigh of regret, but George wondered if the food had really been there.

  Deadlight Jack looked at the man and said, “Go.”

  The man looked at him, doubtful.

  “Leave my house. I will not harm you,” Deadlight Jack said.

  The man flashed one look of gratitude at George and hurried out. George expected a scream from the foyer, but he heard nothing.

  The ghost children looked expectantly at Deadlight Jack, like a pack of feral dogs. He nodded, and they hurried out after the man.

  They all heard the man screaming, and the children around George began to weep bitterly.

  “It was for nothing,” Doug-Ray said accusingly. “We could have had that supper!”

  “But you’d have sacrificed your soul, son,” George said.

  “I don’t care. I’m hungry and I want to go home!” Doug-Ray wailed, and threw himself to the floor like a toddler.

  Deadlight Jack stood over Doug-Ray. His smile was like a shark’s, much too large and pointed. He knelt and picked the boy up in his arms, and carried him out of the room.

  George looked at Donny. “What is he going to do?”

  Donny shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  Donny looked at Trang, whose face took on a haunted look. “He…he drinks your unhappiness.”

  “You mean, he takes it out of you?” asked George, thinking that might actually be beneficial.

  She shook her head emphatically. “What he leaves is worse because you see his true face.”

  “Like living ink, with too many teeth?” George asked, shuddering.

  She shook her head again. “That’s just another mask. His real face is…it’s…” She began to cry, and Donny put his arms around her and hugged her. She cried into his shoulder.

  I have to get these children out of here, thought George. Next time, they’ll okay the sacrifice, and they’ll all be one step closer to becoming one of those…revenants.

  But he had no ideas, and the one man who might help was surely dead.

  George tried to be strong for Donny and the others, but when he next saw Doug-Ray’s pale and shattered expression, he wept, too.

  —

  Jimmy and Shay-Shay Moon finally arrived at Maison Lémieux, but Jimmy had been sensing the place for the last two miles.

  Hundreds of years of evil, corruption, and decadence, all in this festering morass of dread and despair. It hurt him to think of George and his grandson inside.

  Shay-Shay Moon tugged at his pant leg, and he got down on one knee, still amazed at how effortless it was.

  “I have to go,” she said. “I have something to do, and it’s a secret.” She made a “shh” gesture with her clever paw and Jimmy smiled.

  “I am most grateful for your help, Shay-Shay Moon,” he said. “Will you return?”

  “When I can,” she said, and stretched up to kiss him, her whiskers tickling his cheek. She turned to go, then looked back. “Remind George that this is his battle. He has the tools to fight it, more than anyone else.” And then she scurried off and was gone.

  Jimmy took a deep breath, then walked toward the house.

  Some five hundred feet from the entrance, he found a host of spectral children gathered around a twisted and desiccated body.

  They looked up from the corpse, and he was reminded of a nest of snakes, vigilant and without pity.

  They got up to circle him and he chanted a minor spell of protection. They backed away, wa
ry. It was clear they had never encountered anyone like him, although he was sure someone like the Swamp Witch could have actually dispelled them to the four directions if she were whole.

  Jimmy walked toward the house, a vile and debased structure that should not be standing.

  He went past the ruined front door, where corpses in colonial garb stood like mannequins. He thought he might have seen one of them move slightly, but it might have been his imagination.

  Naas shagee Yéil and Uncle Will, please provide me both wisdom and protection.

  Jimmy made his way through the foyer and followed the candlelight into the parlor. Jimmy had seen the Chamber of Horrors at Madame Tussaud’s in Victoria, BC, when he had taken a trip there with Rose. He had laughed when she cringed and struck melodramatic poses, like the women in classic horror films. That had been grisly but unreal, some of the displays dusty and with no smells save those of previous visitors’ cologne, perfume, sweat, and tobacco.

  This place smelled of mold and rot, decay and effluent. It was the foulest place Jimmy had ever visited, and he hoped sincerely that some force or magic would turn it to dust that would blow away on a clean breeze.

  He passed the rotting alligator—now largely bones and gristle—without a second glance because he had begun to hear voices, low and urgent.

  And one of them sounded like George.

  He entered the library, past the bloated horror of Herr Graff, who seemed to doze in his porcelain tub.

  And there was George, with a group of children.

  A young black boy who must have been Donny stopped talking when Jimmy entered, and all the young people turned to stare at the tall and robust Tlingit man, his gray hair in two long plaits down his back.

  George turned last, and his expression of wonder and delighted surprise was a thing to behold.

  He got up slowly, not quite daring to believe it.

  “Jimmy?”

  Jimmy nodded, and George hurried over to him, hugging him.

  “I thought you were dead,” George said, his voice thick.

  “I nearly was. Let’s get out of here. Where is the man in the top hat?”

  “He fed. Apparently he rests for a good while after that.”

  Jimmy gestured at the various still corpses. “These?”

  “Puppeteer’s asleep, so they wait,” George said. “But there are ghosts outside, hungry ones.”

  “I think I can keep them at bay,” Jimmy said.

  That was good enough for George. He motioned to the kids while saying “Come on!” in a low voice.

  Doug-Ray hesitated, but Jimmy nodded to him, and that seemed to imbue him with confidence.

  They all moved as quietly as possible and followed Jimmy out of the house.

  There, on a small patch of grass, was the bag of bones, and Ethan curled around it like an animal guarding a kill. Although Deadlight Jack had extended his punishment by forbidding him to come inside, George thought that might actually be a reprieve.

  Donny whispered to the boy, “Ethan, come with us.”

  Ethan stirred and looked at them. He looked surprised when he realized Deadlight Jack was not with them.

  And Donny whispered to him again, but Ethan shook his head.

  Trang went to the boy and spoke in low and soothing tones. Finally, Ethan nodded and held her hand as they joined the group. He left the dreadful package behind.

  “Mister…” Gail and Jeremy said to Jimmy in unison.

  The ghost children came out of the trees, their wide and blank eyes flickering slightly like dim bulbs. They bared sharp teeth, still stained and caked with their last meal.

  The wraiths moved to surround them, and Jimmy summoned every ounce of his faith and wisdom as a shaman. He was a student of Will Garrison and a champion of Raven—he didn’t need special trappings or talismans to deal with entities like these.

  “Go,” he commanded.

  They hissed but moved off, and the fugitives continued on their route. Both Jimmy and Trang had a sense of where they should go, and they made steady progress, leaving Maison Lémieux far behind.

  They did not encounter the ancient cemetery, and George wondered if that, too, had been an illusion.

  They stopped after two hours, and Jimmy divided what rations he had left in his bag among the children.

  “Eat slowly so you can keep it down,” advised Jimmy, but they were tearing into their rations with savage abandon.

  He and George each took a sip of water and gave the children small sips until they could find more water, which they soon did. Jimmy and George watched for alligators, each wishing he had a pistol or shotgun in case of trouble.

  They walked on for hours, the children and George continually looking back to see if they were being followed. The ghost children had been behind them for about five miles, then had disappeared.

  The youngest of the Camp Happy Time kids was the first to see the lights and tugged on Jimmy’s arm excitedly.

  They all looked. It was undoubtedly a campground, about a half mile away, and they could see several propane lanterns and a campfire from their position.

  They began to walk quicker, each revitalized with the knowledge that they would soon be home.

  Just when it seemed like they might actually make it, they heard strange and sorrowful music. The children began to whimper, and George felt a deep despair come over him. Even Jimmy, who had never heard the music before, could feel its power, feel it trying to steal his will and sap his strength.

  Deadlight Jack was sitting on a large stump, playing his flute of bone, an instrument polished through centuries of use. He smiled, his face morphing through various pleasant aspects, never touching on the visage Jimmy thought of as “The Face of the Abyss.”

  “Ah,” Deadlight Jack said with delight, “there you are. I have been waiting such a long time!” He wagged his finger at them like a benevolent guardian. “You should have eaten all your dinner, you naughty children!”

  The salamander tattoos blazed brightly on his face, which now turned as dark and inhuman as oil. The fiery creatures moved to his shoulders and swayed like cobras from their vantage points.

  The children huddled together and began to tremble, all except Doug-Ray. He had kept a knife from the banquet, one he had secreted when the Professor had his attention on George. He ran his thumb along the blade in his pocket. It sliced into the meat of it, and the pain was good, an honest feeling, proof that he was still alive.

  “Now, my wandering gamins…” began Deadlight Jack.

  Doug-Ray charged Deadlight Jack, screaming incoherently; nothing left of the boy who had loved superheroes, fishing, and chocolate cake except rage and a need to rend, tear, and destroy.

  Deadlight Jack beamed, his smile growing into a wide and toothy jack-o’-lantern grin, his sharp teeth glowing like fireplace embers.

  Doug-Ray stabbed Deadlight Jack several times, and they all heard the sick, wet-meat sounds and the splintering of sternum and ribs.

  But Deadlight Jack just laughed like he was a child at the circus, and when Doug-Ray collapsed to the dirt, he applauded.

  Jimmy and George started forward, but Deadlight Jack gestured, and they found themselves unable to move.

  Now fear threatened to overwhelm Jimmy, just like the rest of them.

  Deadlight Jack moved his hands with theatrical expression and the grace of a master puppeteer, and Doug-Ray stood up as if he had been hauled upright.

  Doug-Ray’s eyes were wide and staring, and his mouth hung slack as he looked at nothing, uncomprehending and unblinking.

  Deadlight Jack made another gesture, and his salamanders began to move down his arms, both of them blazing brighter with each step.

  “No,” Jimmy moaned.

  Deadlight Jack looked at him and sneered. Suddenly, he leaned forward and bit Doug-Ray in the face as the burning salamanders hissed.

  Doug-Ray screamed but stayed upright as he began to burn from the inside out. They could see his skeleton within h
is body, glowing green and ever brighter while his flesh sizzled.

  Mercifully, it was quick after that. Doug-Ray burst into a spectral incandescence of bright green. Rather than being reduced to ash, he was devoured by the flame until he was nothing but a small ball of green light that Deadlight Jack held above his left hand.

  “Ah, the despair in that boy! Came from a loving home and had a wonderful childhood. Such misery! Such hopelessness and torment! How delicious, how toothsome! And now he will help lure others into my embrace.”

  Deadlight Jack stared greedily at the small ball of light, and then popped it into his mouth like a treasured sweet. He sighed with pleasure as the energy of the hapless boy invigorated him.

  Now he twirled the flute with careless expertise, then tossed it high into the air. It did not come back down.

  He looked at them and clapped his hands.

  Jimmy and George were freed from their paralysis and fell to the ground.

  “In case you are wondering,” Deadlight Jack said, “the lights you saw are real. You were so very close to getting away!”

  The children began to weep openly. Gail and Jeremy collapsed to the ground.

  “Now we will play and play and play,” Deadlight Jack said merrily. “I have so many games in mind, and now that my favorite has returned…” He gestured to George. “Well, there is just so much we can do.”

  George whispered to Jimmy, “Isn’t there anything you can do?”

  Jimmy shook his head. “My magic is limited here.”

  George groaned and hung his head.

  Jimmy remembered the words of Shay-Shay Moon. He pulled George close to him and said, “George, it’s up to you. You must draw deep from your own faith—that is your magic. You can defeat him.”

  Deadlight Jack hopped down from the stump and pointed at Jimmy theatrically. “You! I never asked you to my party, and we have seen what happens to people who show up uninvited. But you, Jimmy Kalmaku, you are the Son of the Raven—ha! That foolish little bird wants you to believe he made the world and brought light into it. He makes nothing but birdshit. He is no Trickster; he is a flea-bitten thief with delusions of grandeur! However, out of deference to your beliefs, I am going to make your death particularly terrible. Anything you have suffered in the past will be a blessing compared to what I will visit upon you.”