by Dorian Dawes
The Mr. Sharp image turned towards Eileen. "You must be delighted about the ceremony tomorrow. Finally getting to rid yourself of that boorish husband and walking parasite."
"She's a child," Eileen countered. "Is it necessary to be rid of her? Evan is most certainly sentimental dead-weight, but the girl is useful. And anyway, I have previous contracts I've agreed to."
"Previous contracts?" The memory of Mr. Sharp raised an eyebrow. "Mrs. Kiernan, I assure you our contract holds far more weight than any prior arrangements you might have had. For your initiation into the Carcosa Syndicate to be complete, the dead weights must be severed. You must serve the King alone."
"And why is that? Why do you insist all your new recruits carry on in this barbaric fashion? You gain nothing from the blood sacrifice, no energies are poured forth. The violence and the heartache are wasted on pointless ritual."
Mr. Sharp's memory gave a cruel grin. "You're the first to have such a reaction to our ways, Mrs. Kiernan. Most are horrified at the thought of killing their families, but you take only umbrage with the reasons?"
Eileen threw back her head and laughed. "I don't like waste, Mr. Sharp. Everything has its purpose, even pain and heartache. Those are powerful materials, you know. Your organization could benefit greatly from putting them to a good use. Senseless cruelty is fun, but ultimately fruitless - a meaningless effort. My kind don't live long enough as yours, and I hate to waste what few years I have."
"If it's a matter of mortality, we will all live forever once we find Carcosa," Mr. Sharp's memory hissed.
"I know the mantra." Eileen rolled her eyes. "And tell me how long will this take? Will it come in my lifetime? I have little to spare for empty promises."
"And no time to be a part of something larger than yourself?" Mr. Sharp teased. "To utilize your talents to bring about a grand vision?"
Eileen laughed. "Save the propaganda for your pawns and servants, Mr. Sharp. I signed up because I thought you had real power to promise. A tit-for-tat, as it were. I help you achieve your dreams, you do the same for me. Clearly, there's been a problem in communication. I'm unhappy with our current working relationship."
"The King in Yellow holds true power," Mr. Sharp said. "Without us, your dreams will die."
"I'd like to alter our contract." Eileen pursed her lips. "Evan dies, but Kara lives. You've no use for the both of them. Let me keep the girl and we can continue an amicable relationship."
Mr. Sharp made a hideous clicking sound with his tongue and waggled his finger. "That won't do. We had a deal."
"Technically, the deal is that I sign my family over to you and I'm granted power and full membership to the Syndicate," Eileen said. "Seeing as neither side has yet acted upon their end of the agreement, we can terminate the contract here and now and part ways with no losses to either."
Mr. Sharp laughed. "Oh the audacity of mortals! Fine! We're not unreasonable here at the Carcosa Syndicate. Pack up your things, though; this house must be vacated for those who are more inclined to accept our terms. You won't be permitted to stay another night."
"I already had a place in mind."
"That confident were you in your ability to negotiate?"
"I like to have foresight. Little place in Wakefield. Do look me up sometime. I will miss our talks."
The present-day version of Mr. Sharp waved his hand and the images vanished. Kara kept one hand on her chest. She had to listen to the thudding of her heart to remind herself this was real.
Veronika's eyes narrowed. "Why show us this? What do you get?"
Mr. Sharp shrugged his shoulders. "As I mentioned, Yellow Coasts failed as an experiment, and it was likely this moment where it all went wrong. We should have done a more thorough background check on Eileen. We would have found that her previous contract was far more favorable than anything we were willing to offer at the time."
Kara looked to the spot by the old television set where she'd sat as a child. "And what contract is that?"
Mr. Sharp's fingers tightened around the top of his cane. "We're still investigating. That's where you come in. From this memory, we've been able to extrapolate that you were promised to someone else - another deal that Mrs. Kiernan backed out of at the last moment. She managed to legally worm her way out with us, possibly with the knowledge she wouldn't be able to take us down herself.
"But whomever else she screwed over? Well, they must've gotten particularly fucked. Someone's been prying around the old channels. We don't know who or why, only that they are pissed and out for blood. Your blood, my dear. Call us busy-bodies, but we are curious to know what the hell Eileen got herself into before she started that silly little cult in Wakefield."
Kara had to say the next few words slowly as she could hardly believe they were coming out of her own mouth. "Someone … is coming for me."
Mr. Sharp gave a full-toothed grin. He looked like a shark.
"Oh …" he said in a breathy whisper. "I'd say they're already here. Ciao!"
He turned heel and darted into a darkened hallway beyond. Veronika looked ready to charge, but then stopped. There was no point. He was already gone.
Kara said nothing. Her fists clenched tight while her entire body shook. She shut her eyes. When they opened, they were full of pain and fury.
Veronika placed a hand on her shoulder. "That guy was probably full of shit. I wouldn't think about it too much."
Kara shook her hand away. She shook her head repeatedly. Her eyes stayed fixed on the darkness where he'd vanished as if he'd somehow pop out again.
"No …" she said. "No, I've got this knack for detecting bullshit. And yeah, he was full of it - but not about this. That was certainly Eileen. This was real … well, as real as memory can be."
"Funny thing to say, but I get what you mean," Veronika said.
Kara wandered over to the place where the brief flickering memory of herself as a child had been shown. She knelt in the same position as she'd been when she was small. There was nothing to connect her to that time in her life but vague recollections, intrusive memories that felt alien but real. She drew her fingers around in the dust. This would take a while to process.
Veronika put both hands in her coat pocket and began walking around the room, surveying it. "At least you know she never intended to kill you."
Kara gave a non-committal grunt. It was the best response she could come up with. Eileen never did anything out of love or warmth. She wasn't capable of affection, that much Kara remembered. If Eileen had turned on the Carcosa Syndicate it was for wholly selfish purposes. "She had a contract," Kara said calmly after a minute's silence. "Do ya wanna do me a favor?"
Veronika was rubbing the tattoo on her arm. She looked concerned and out of place, one of the few times Kara thought she ever looked helpless. Like she wanted to do something but had no clue where to start. "Sure. Anything," said Veronika.
Kara gestured with her head down the darkened hallway. "Eileen's office is down that hall. We might be able to find something in there."
Veronika followed her gaze and nodded. "Right. You gonna be all right?"
Kara shrugged. "Maybe? Give me a minute."
"Sure."
Veronika was almost relieved to be out of the room. Lingering feelings of guilt had resurged after seeing that memory. She'd been selfish coming to Kerryville on her own, abandoning Kara like that. Of any of them, Kara had the most right to find out what happened; Eileen was her mother after all.
As Veronika walked, she had a brief recollection of Blackerly House. She was a little girl screaming for her mommy while sitting naked in a rusted bathtub, bound in barbed wire. She couldn't move or else the wires would dig into her skin, cutting her. She'd cried for her mom, over and over again. She'd no idea at the time that her mother could hear her. Mommy was the one beating her every night and cradling her in barbed wire.
The little flashback was enough to make her stumble. She placed a hand on the grimy wall to steady herself. She felt like vomiting.
"PTSD is a pain in the ass," Veronika muttered to herself.
Holding her stomach, she continued making her way down the hall. Veronika only thought about it after she found the office, but wouldn't someone else have lived here after Eileen? She turned back to look down the hall. Kara would have known that. There'd be little for them to find here and she knew it. Just more senseless rummaging around through someone else's ruin. Despite this, she found herself stepping into the room anyway. She thought that maybe it'd at least give Kara enough time alone to process some of this shit.
The desk was worn and the drawers had mold growing all along the inside. It looked like someone had cleared out most of the books on the shelves, while others had been knocked to the ground, pages torn out and scattered. Some of the shelves were blackened and there was the lingering smell of soot. Had someone tried to burn this place down?
Veronika stepped over a set of papers left scattered from a dusty folder to examine the bookshelf more in depth. She could see scratch marks all along the edges of the shelves nearest the singed corners. It looked as if a wild animal had torn through them.
Brow furrowed, she stepped back. The floor gave a loud groaning noise beneath her, as if it threatened to give way at any second. The sudden noise startled her, causing her to topple a small pile of books to the ground. They'd been blocking a section of the floor from view where the carpet had peeled back, revealing the floorboards beneath. Something bright red peeked from the corner where the carpet threads gave way. Red lines, it looked like.
"You gotta be shitting me …" she whispered.
Veronika knelt to examine the red lines closer. They looked engraved into the floorboards, but somehow remained lurid despite the decay. She pulled at the threads of the carpet, ripping it further from the floor. "Yiggie …" she said in a low voice. "What are these?"
Her snake familiar uncoiled itself from its form as a tattoo along her arm. It squinted its beady eyes, gazing upon the markings. Each marking had its own distinctive shape, triangles within circles inlaid with squares and more markings in a language Veronika could not understand.
"Fragments …" Yiggie hissed into her mind. "Ritual fragments, looks like. We'd have to see the full pattern to discern the true nature of the spell what was cast here."
Veronika raised her head and looked out the hall. "Kara! You need to see this!"
They spent the next three hours pulling and tugging at the carpet, ripping it from the floorboards. Both girls kept silent as they worked, barely making eye contact. Veronika only stopped on occasion to refresh the spells that allowed her to keep up with Kara's near-supernatural strength.
Finally, they managed to rip the entirety of the carpet from the office. They found themselves staring at a ritual circle inlaid with strange symbols and arcane geometry.
Kara placed a hand against her forehead and whistled loudly. "You know, a few weeks ago I didn't even know magic existed?" she said. "And then things got weird."
"This is pretty bizarre stuff even for me," Veronika said.
Yiggie slithered down Veronika's arm and stared hard at the ritual circle. Its voice hissed into her mind once more. "We know what took place here. We should leave, flesh-thing. Great evil occurred in this room, and it will surely call to itself."
"I'm a big girl, I can take care of myself, Yiggie." Veronika said.
Kara raised a brow in Veronika's direction. "Your familiar talks to you?"
"Often, yeah."
"Helena would get pissed. She's been attempting to communicate with hers for a while now."
Veronika petted the top of Yiggie's head. "Well when a witch makes a pact with her familiar, it can take time - even years - for them to form a telepathic bond. Yiggie, what happened here?"
"The flesh-thing called Eileen was not content with the familiar who'd come to her," Yiggie said. "So she performed an abhorrent ritual, one considered a betrayal to my kind …"
Kara watched the expression on Veronika's face change. "What is it?"
Veronika clamped a hand over her mouth and shook her head. "It's screwed up. Really screwed up."
"What happened? Was it Eileen?"
Veronika gulped and looked in Kara's direction. "Eileen murdered her familiar. Sacrificed it to call forth another spirit into this world and make a pact with it. That's what this circle is, a ritualistic sacrifice made to bring forth something evil from the outer dark."
"We should leave!" Yiggie's warnings grew more urgent.
Veronika stood quickly and retreated from the room. Kara quickly followed. She couldn't hear Yiggie's warning but had no desire to remain in this wicked place. There was a stench here different from the others, a smell of brimstone and malice that had been growing since they'd come in the room.
It was when Kara came into the hallway that she felt it. She stopped running after Veronika. There was something in the darkness with them … watching. She slowly turned her head, even as Veronika called out, her voice sounding distant and small next to the loud breathing of the thing lurking in the shadows. Kara had felt its presence before. It was possible the thing had been waiting inside this house the entire time, and had only now chosen to make itself known to her.
"It's you," Kara whispered, staring at the darkness. "How long have you lived here?"
A figure clad in a dirty hospital gown shambled out from the shadows, skin the color of ash. He had several bloody bandages wrapped around his face, covering his eyes. All that could be seen of his face were pale blood-red lips and a hideous yellow-toothed smile.
"I will have it …" he croaked in a hoarse voice, revealing his bleeding tongue.
"What is it?" Kara said. She reached forwards, feeling pity for the creature. "Did Eileen hurt you? Is she the one who trapped you here?"
The creature stumbled forwards again. "Give me what was promised …"
Veronika rushed back into the hallway, immediately recognizing the creature. "Kara! Stop!"
Some sort of invisible barrier rose up before her. It had the solidity of cold molasses. She could barely move. It felt like one of those nightmares where she was running as fast as she could but made little to no progress. "Kara!" she screamed.
It was no use. Her voice came out muffled and hollow. Veronika was trapped, helpless to warn her.
"Let me help you," Kara said. "Tell me what she promised to you."
The creature's head snapped up, its neck moving in an unnatural manner. "I was promised … YOUR AZOTH!"
It lunged forward, fingers and nails extending into horrific claws as all pretenses of a suffering being were cast to the side. Kara's outstretched hand curled into a fist and she met the beast with a full punch to the chest even as it lunged at her. The creature was sent hurling and screaming into the dark.
"Still no idea what that fucking means," Kara said, panting heavily. "But from what I've heard, it seems like I'll be holding on to it for a little while, thanks."
The barrier dispelled and Veronika was able to scramble to Kara's side. "That thing!" she yelled. "You can't fight it. We have to get out of here!"
"I have punched ghosts, zombies, cultists, and my dead mom," Kara said. "There's not a single problem that can't be solved with blunt-force trauma, Veronika. And I don't run away from my problems!"
Hoarse, hollow laughter emerged from the darkness beyond. Kara stared down the hall. She hadn't recalled it stretching that long before, almost as if the darkness made it go on into infinity. It wouldn't be the strangest thing she'd seen that year.
The laughter continued to grow louder and more alien. She and Veronika could hear the sounds of something in the dark stretching, growing. Kara was partially reminded of the awful sound fat made when it was fried - that horrible popping, squelching of grease over a fire.
"Your powers have grown …" the creature whispered, its voice coming from all around them. "Your azoth will be nice and fat. Yes. You'll make a fine FEAST!"
The boards of the house groaned as heavy footfalls appr
oached. It was a wonder the floorboards didn't give way beneath such a massive creature. Kara and Veronika could feel the ground quaking beneath them.
Tentacles shot out from the darkness. Each tendril had eyes and mouths opening and closing with tiny little teeth ever-chomping. Kara hoisted Veronika over her shoulder and fled the house without so much as looking back.
"I thought you said you never ran from your problems!" Veronika yelled, despite a great sense of relief at having fled the nightmare behind them.
"True, but I am a consistent procrastinator and that problem can wait for another day!"
The thing appeared to stop chasing them at the edge of the yard. That didn't stop it straining to grasp at them with hungry tentacles. Kara set Veronika down gently while they both watched in fascination and horror at the ugly beast scrambling out to meet them. Most of its features were still obscured in darkness. The thing was unable to leave the house.
"So that's it, huh?" Kara gestured with a nod. "Eileen's familiar?"
Veronika squinted. "Yeah. But I don't know why it's bound to this house … to this place. Before, it was quite fine with chasing me all over Kerryville."
A well-known voice greeted them from behind. "That would be your doing, dear ladies. And well done indeed!"
Kara and Veronika turned to face the grinning man behind them. Mr. Sharp had thrown on a pair of round sunglasses. The lenses were tinted yellow.
Kara grimaced. "Think you might be taking the color-coding a little too far?"
He ignored the jab at his appearance. "As I said earlier, the Carcosa Syndicate is looking to realign ourselves for the future - make new progress and seek ever greater heights - but before that, old sins must be dealt with.
"The beast would have never come here on its own, so I'm afraid I was forced to use you as bait. The summoning sigil would also only react to the blood of the original person who cast it … that would be your blood, Ms. Kiernan, or at least the blood of your mother that runs through your veins."
Kara turned around to look at the house. The tentacles were now slowly retreating once more behind the darkness of its walls. She could still feel the evil radiating out of it, like some horrible vice tightening slowly about her soul. She turned to look at her wrist.
