by Dan Poblocki
“This room isn’t safe,” said Azumi.
“Can we move him?” asked Poppy.
“Hold on a second,” said Dash, his head spinning. He whispered, “Dylan? Dylan, wake up. Please. It’s me. Dash.”
The walls began to creak and crackle, as if the boards behind the plaster were breaking apart. There was a sudden jolt, and the room sank several inches at once. Azumi screamed and clutched Poppy’s arm.
“Dash!” Poppy cried out.
“Just go!” Dash yelled. “If you’re so scared, leave us!”
Poppy shrank back, hurt.
Pieces of the ceiling rained around them. The chandeliers wavered, scattering crystals. Plink, plink, plink!
Dylan’s eyes blinked open. His brown irises shifted around the room and then zeroed in on his brother’s face. “Dash? Is that you?”
Dash pulled his brother up from the floor and squeezed him so hard that Dylan cried out. “Please tell me that you’re actually you,” said Dash.
“Who—Who else would I be?”
“You don’t remember?”
Dylan’s mouth twisted into a frown. Of course he remembered. His lip quivered and his voice shook as he said, “I’m so sorry. My head … It got inside. The things it showed me … You have no idea.” He glanced at Poppy. “I hurt you. I hurt all of you.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” said Azumi, kneeling next to the boys.
Poppy stood rigidly beside her, looking terrified as the house crumbled.
Dylan grabbed Dash’s shoulders and pushed him away, looking into his eyes. “It was, though.” He sniffed. “In the woods, after that thing killed Marcus … I heard what you said.” Glancing up at Poppy, he added, “What both of you said. That I was beyond saving. It made me mad. Madder than I’ve ever been. I think … I think I gave myself to it after that.”
“I think we could all say the same,” Azumi whispered.
Finally, Poppy crouched next to the others. “None of us chose this. Any of it.”
“I get it now,” said Dylan. “It’s just … I was so scared to be alone here without you, Dash. I’m … I’m sorry I was such a horrible brother.”
“I don’t care what you were.” Dash sniffed. “You’re my best friend. Always. No matter what.”
Poppy touched Dash’s shoulder. “If we don’t go now, we might not get another chance.”
The floor dropped again. Cracks shot up the walls, widening like mouths gasping for breath. Dust and ash coughed out of the fireplace in a wide plume that stretched slowly toward the group.
Dash reached for his phone, the flashlight catching the dust, making it sparkle.
They stood, bracing themselves as the floor sloped toward the center. Jagged holes opened up beneath them, dropping chunks of crumbling wood into the darkness below. Clinging to one another, they raced to the door and through it, out into the hallway.
The mansion already seemed smaller. Farther down the landing, a railing appeared. Stairs descended into the foyer. They were so much closer than they’d realized. Huddled together, they made their way to the first floor, the house quaking around them.
The walls were blackened now. After all, the place had been gutted by fires long ago. They were finally seeing the truth behind the house’s mask. A harsh wind battered at the broken windows, making a strange wailing sound, as if the house itself were crying out in pain.
Whatever magic had been holding these ruins together was gone.
The group nearly tripped over the luggage that they’d left in the center of the parquet floor where they’d come together for the first time. Resounding booms belched from all the doorways as distant walls came tumbling down. The structure was trembling so violently, it was difficult for any of them to walk.
Staggering toward the double doors, they heard what sounded like thousands of voices calling to them.
Run!
Help!
Thank you!
Stay!
All of it mixed together in a nightmarish chorus. Poppy wondered if even though they’d destroyed Frederick Caldwell’s pact, the thing that haunted this land was still here. Still angry. Still hungry.
The exit was only a few yards away.
The floor darkened as ashy rot spread under their feet, ready to disintegrate, to drop them down into the catacombs that had been built into the house’s foundation.
Poppy flung herself across the threshold, and didn’t stop running until she’d tumbled down the last few porch stairs and landed on the gravel driveway.
Azumi ran past her and then spun, looking back at the house. “Dash!” she cried out. “Dylan! Hurry!”
Poppy turned and saw the boys standing in the doorway. Dash was on the outside, Dylan on the inside, each reaching for the other, both shouting. Pieces of the vaulted ceiling were crashing to the floor of the foyer behind them. Dash gripped Dylan’s hand and was yanking himself backward. But Dylan wasn’t moving.
An invisible barrier had trapped him inside the house.
“Help us!” Dash cried out. The girls rushed back to the entry. They grabbed Dash around the waist and pulled, throwing themselves toward the driveway. But it didn’t work. The three stared into Dylan’s horrified face as he continued to stand in the opening.
“It won’t let me leave!” Dylan cried.
“BUT WHY?” ASKED Poppy. “We destroyed the sigil.”
“We broke Frederick’s pact,” said Dash. “But the creature is holding him here.”
Poppy gasped. “We need to give him something to set him free. Something that was taken from him. Like how we saved the Specials.”
Dylan blinked. “Nobody took anything from me.”
Dash shivered. “Yes, someone did,” he said. The others stared at him. The house continued to rumble as large chunks of its walls crumbled around its periphery. “I took your life. Back in Los Angeles. My prank—”
Dylan’s breath hitched. “But that was an accident. You didn’t mean to.”
Everyone stood in silence for a moment.
“How are you supposed to give his life back?” asked Azumi. She looked into the foyer, and then shouted, “It’s not fair!” She almost expected a growling laugh to answer her, but all that came was the sound of more destruction.
“There’s got to be something we can do,” said Poppy. “Maybe—”
Dash stepped across the threshold and stood beside his brother.
Poppy flinched. “Dash, get out of there. It could collapse at any second.”
Dash shook his head. “I won’t leave him alone again. Not here.”
Azumi reached for them. “But you’ll die!”
“I won’t leave him.”
Dylan shoved at Dash. “No! You can’t!”
“You don’t get to tell me what to do. No one gets to tell me what to do anymore.” He stared into Poppy’s eyes. “This is what I need. Please don’t take it from me.”
The floor cracked open behind the boys. Dust and ash rose up in clouds.
Dash grabbed at the doors and swung them together. Just before he pushed them shut, he yelled out to the girls, “Run!”
Poppy stood her ground. She rattled the handles and then pounded on the wood. But the doors would not budge. “We’ve already made it out, Dash! We beat it! Don’t do this to yourself!” The stone wall began to tremble.
“You’ll be crushed, Poppy!” Azumi shouted. She yanked on Poppy’s arm, dragging her down the front steps and across the gravel.
They paused twenty yards from the mansion, out where the driveway circled around on itself. Looking back, they watched the spires of Larkspur House tilt and tumble, its walls and towers turning to rubble as the first light of dawn began to erase the stars in the dark sky far beyond.
DASH AND DYLAN sat huddled at the bottom of the steps in the foyer. Cross-legged, they faced each other, holding hands.
Boom! Another piece of the ceiling punched a wide hole in the floor several feet away.
Dash examined his brother’s fac
e, looking for the details that had always distinguished them from each other: the way Dylan’s left eyebrow rose higher than his right, the scar under Dylan’s bottom lip from when he’d fallen from his high chair as an infant. Dash knew that if they were to stare at each other for the rest of eternity, they’d find so many differences between them that they wouldn’t even be able to recognize themselves as twins.
Tears dangled from the end of Dylan’s nose. “I didn’t know that ghosts could cry,” said Dash.
Dylan smiled briefly before his face crumpled. “You don’t deserve this,” he said, his voice choked.
“I know,” said Dash. “But neither do you.”
The stained-glass windows near the ceiling shattered, and colored shards rained down. The floor vibrated, and the center opened up like a bull’s-eye. The luggage that had been sitting there all day plunged into the catacomb’s depths. Large stones tumbled down from atop the double doors, just missing the boys.
Dylan lunged forward and threw his arms around Dash, as if he could protect him.
“I wish we’d said good-bye to Mom and Dad,” said Dash, trying to ignore everything but his brother. “Will they ever find out what happened to us?”
Dylan sniffed. “Well, they already know what happened to me.”
Dash nodded. “Right. I guess I’ll be the mystery.”
A great whooshing sound echoed from the top of the stairs, as if all the air were being sucked out of the building. Something was coming. Something large and dark and unforgiving.
“Will it hurt?” Dash whispered.
Dylan shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“If you can’t remember,” said Dash, “then maybe it doesn’t matter.” Something wrenched at the ceiling. An enormous piece of it dropped inward with a shriek, bringing several dozen rafters with it. Dash yelped.
Dylan squeezed his hands. “Thank you, Dash.”
“For what?”
“For giving me what I needed.”
Dash shuddered, confused. “But I didn’t—” He stopped talking. Dylan had started to fade, his skin growing transparent, his touch cool instead of warm. “What’s happening?”
But Dash knew. He understood. It was time. Finally.
Dylan’s voice whispered, “Go. Hurry.”
His lips parted, his teeth gleaming in the dark and dusty space. A smile. A real one. Genuine. Happy. It lingered in the air for a few seconds, even after the rest of his body had gone away. Then it too disintegrated into nothing.
Dash stood on trembling legs, the house rumbling in its final throes. The rushing sound at the top of the stair grew louder, like a storm approaching, a wall of wind ready to clear a path of destruction.
A black pit opened just inches from where he stood. Looking down, Dash could see bleached skulls staring up at him from the shadowed crypts.
He leapt up the stone steps, finding solid ground by the double doors. Yanking desperately at the handles, he cried out, “Dylan! Help me!” But the doors wouldn’t give. And Dylan didn’t answer. Dash shrieked in anger and terror as Larkspur’s walls toppled around him.
POPPY AND AZUMI stared in awe as a cloud of smoke and dust rose up from the wreckage.
When the haze began to lift, lit pink by the coming sun, Larkspur’s remains stood out in silhouette. The roof was gone. Patches of stone wall marked where the sprawling foundation had been buried, with green saplings and thick brush growing through the gaps. Brick archways were all that was left of old doorways and windows. Almost a dozen chimneys stood over it all like watchtowers at a prison.
Poppy didn’t realize that she was holding Azumi’s hand until Azumi let go and dropped to the ground, weeping. Poppy felt strangely empty. This place was supposed to have been her new home. But now she couldn’t imagine ever living here. And the poor people who had …
Birds in the distance chattered and sang, awakened by the dawn. A soft breeze rustled the brush in the ruins and blew her mess of hair out of her face.
“Connie?” Poppy whispered. “Are you still here?” Part of her hoped that the house had released its hold on the Girl, but she worried about what life might hand her next and how she would survive without her old friend. Connie didn’t answer.
Someone else did.
“Help … me …”
The voice was so soft that Poppy wondered if she’d imagined it. It called out again. This time, it was clear that it was buried under the pile of rocks.
“Dash!” Azumi yelled. She ran past Poppy, leaping up the stone steps and over mounds of debris.
Shocked, Poppy chased after her, wondering if they were both still under the house’s spell.
A bruised hand reached up from around the side of a wide, broken door. “Poppy! Get over here! He’s alive!”
The girls worked furiously, tossing rocks out of the way, uncovering the doors that had fallen end to end and protected Dash from being crushed. They pulled him free to find that, miraculously, he was covered with only small cuts and bruises.
Sitting up, he burst into tears. Poppy and Azumi leaned back and let him cry.
Dash told them what had happened as the house came down—how Dylan had disappeared, freed from Larkspur’s clutches.
Freed from Dash’s own need to keep him close.
After they caught their breath, they scrambled away from the ruins, making their way back to the gravel driveway. There was nothing left for them to do but follow the path down the hill and into the woods. They walked quickly, not speaking of what they’d do if they found the gate closed again.
In fact, they didn’t speak much at all.
* * *
Azumi stepped into the shadowed forest, half expecting the trees from the base of Mount Fuji to rise up around her and send her back into the middle of her nightmares. But the birds continued to sing. Daylight was breaking through the branches overhead.
She thought of her parents, suddenly unsure why they’d allowed her to travel alone to a school they’d never actually visited themselves. Had they been under Larkspur’s spell? Or did they really believe that Azumi would be safe?
What would she tell them? That a haunted house had lured her across the country and then tried to eat her? That she’d made contact with her dead sister? That she’d nearly gone crazy?
Or maybe she’d come up with another story. Something easier to believe. Something that wouldn’t give them nightmares. The big question, however, was this: Would the story give Azumi nightmares? Would she keep walking at night?
Would the voices continue?
Or had Larkspur made her stronger?
Poppy and Dash strolled ahead of her, his arm thrown over her shoulder. It helped Azumi to know that she wouldn’t be alone with the memories of this place. She knew that these two would be there whenever she needed them. Probably forever.
Azumi peered up the driveway, wishing that Moriko—the real Moriko—would appear one last time.
Leave the path, Azumi. Get out. Run …
How easy it was to get lost.
The path …
Azumi sighed and swiped at her eyes, thankful that this one would lead her home.
* * *
Dash limped down the gravel driveway. Poppy helped him along, steering him around potholes and lumpy weeds.
He thought of his brother. Of his smile fading into shadow.
He remembered now. The accident. The funeral. The hospital. Everything was clear. They weren’t pleasant memories, but at least they were there. Destroying Frederick Caldwell’s sigil had not only ended the creature’s pact, but also its hold on Dash’s mind.
He thought of Marcus and Azumi and Poppy.
If each of them had been called to Larkspur because of their connection with the dead, Dash felt like that connection had been severed.
A blessing and a curse.
Dylan was gone for good.
No more pretending. No more pranks or games.
Maybe when he got back to LA, his parents would see that he was bette
r. That he was healing. Or that at least he was willing to try.
* * *
The morning was cool. Dew clung to Poppy’s arms and shoulders. She walked with purpose, her head held high, her eyes focused forward.
But her mind raced as she laid out plans.
She would not return to Thursday’s Hope. At least not right away.
Once the group made it back to town, she’d ask Azumi if there was an extra bed in her family’s house. Maybe she could stay there for awhile. If Azumi said no, Dash’s parents might be able to help out. And if not there … she’d go somewhere else. There were plenty of options.
But the next step wasn’t the most important part. Whatever happened to her after this would only help Poppy reach her final destination. Her mother.
Poppy understood why her mother had left her at Thursday’s Hope all those years ago. She’d believed in the Caldwell curse. She’d been trying to protect Poppy from whatever she’d believed was chasing her. How wonderful it would be to tell her mother that she’d defeated it, to let her know that they were safe now.
They could be together. They didn’t have to hide anymore.
Poppy thought of Connie and Marcus and Dylan. She thought of all the souls who’d been caught in the creature’s web: the Specials, the first orphans, the medium’s wards, the young explorers from Greencliffe.
Her own family had set up the web in the first place. It felt right that she’d been the one to tear it down. To set everyone free.
Poppy was free now too.
She took Dash’s arm and hiked it higher on her shoulder. He glanced at her and smiled.
“Look!” said Azumi, pointing forward.
Ahead, the stone wall appeared through the trees. At the spot where it intersected the driveway, the gate was open.
Poppy could see the road on the other side and the woods beyond, and she whooped with joy. Azumi and Dash joined her. It made her feel wild and a bit dizzy.
The group rushed forward, stopping just at the threshold of the opening, peering down the hill, where the rooftops of Greencliffe peeked up through the trees. The Hudson River glimmered in the distance, reflecting a violet sky over the horizon.
