Dark Winter: Trilogy

by Hennessy, John

  So, I looked into the mirror, and saw just what I expected.

  "I just see me, Nan." Christ. Just look at my hair. I really did need to fix it. My eyes were sunk into their sockets, and black bags hung underneath. I almost looked like someone you would see on Jeremy Kyle. What a mess. I would simply have to forget the horror movies, and get to sleep earlier. Channel Four were having a Hellraiser season, and I had only watched the first two. If Pinhead ever compiled a list of possible prom dates, the way I was looking, I could qualify.

  "Look a little longer, Milly," said Nan. "Then, then you will see."

  "Huh? What the-" I blurted out the words just as my image disappeared, and the mirror just showed the back of the bedroom wall, as if I wasn’t even there. My hand also seemed to have fused with part of the mirror’s handle, somehow, though I knew such thoughts were crazy.

  Thoughts were one thing. Feelings were another. I felt my hands start to burn, and the skin around my fingers, hands and wrists gave off a burnt ash type scent.

  Then I felt voices in my head, and I felt light headed. There were too many voices to process, never mind understand what they were saying. I went to drop the mirror, and Nan cradled the mirror and caught hold of my arm.

  "Nan? What’s….what’s happening?"

  "That, my dear, is no ordinary mirror. It catches souls."

  My Nan said this with the straightest of faces.

  "I can tell you don’t believe me, but it’s true. Romilly Winter, you have to believe me."

  Oh no. If Nan called me Romilly Winter, and not her usual Milly, that meant one of two things. Either I was in trouble, or about to get into trouble. I couldn’t tell with any certainty what it was, much less fear to ask.

  I stared at her absent-mindedly, then at my singed hands. Something was very wrong here. So. Enough of playing chicken. I somehow plucked up courage to ask her anyway.

  "Nan, you’re serious, aren’t you? You’re absolutely serious."

  I know that other people in my situation would have been running down to Mum and Dad to say the old dear had gone crazy, but there was an intensity, a sincerity about Nan that made

  me think that she really was telling the truth.

  "The Mirror of Souls," said Nan. "You felt them, didn’t you, when you held the Mirror, right Milly?"

  Milly. I’m Milly again, thank goodness.

  "Yes, but-"

  "No time for buts. The Mirror is yours now. Look after it."

  "No! I won’t keep it Nan! This is too weird. I can’t handle it."

  "You must. I’ve fewer years ahead of me than you have, so…..don’t argue with me. I’ve seen the future, little one, and you…..you need the Mirror. You’re the only one who can deal with what is coming. I am too old for all that."

  "All what Nan? This is show and tell. You show me things, but you tell me nothing."

  "You will be fine Milly. Just…keep on doing what you are doing. You are still going to kung fu class, aren’t you?"

  What a strange question. "Yes…but-"

  "You’re going to Rosewinter for your birthday, right?"

  "I am. At least, that’s the plan. You know Mum."

  "You cannot take no for an answer. I know you won’t want to go, but you have to be there. Something will try and take the Mirror from you, and kill you if you get in its way. But you can’t let it, Milly. Do you see the marks on your hands?"

  I did. God, I did.

  "They will…protect you. But you have to protect others as well. You see, my markings are fading, yours are getting stronger. The Mirror will imprint itself on you, and only you now. Should any foe try to harm you, place your hand on their chest. There will be an intense heat emanating from your fingers, even hotter than what felt just now, and that which would attack you, will fade."

  Mirrors. Markings. Unknown things that would try to kill me. This was no mere story, no fantasy. Nan was very matter-of-fact when she spoke about this, and was not at all like the conversational tone she used when telling me ghost stories.

  "Um, Nan….you were saying something about protecting others?"

  "Oh. Oh yes. Remember my magic gloves?"

  Oh yes. I loved that trick. Nan would place these white lace gloves over her hands, and voila! The markings would disappear. I never quite figured out how she did it.

  She reached the inside of her pillow slip, pulled the gloves out and held them in front of me.

  "Now, they belong to you as well."

  "Oh no, Nan, I couldn’t possibly take them from you."

  "You’re not taking them, I’m giving them to you. If you don’t wear them, everyone will see your markings. If you ever find yourself with dark thoughts, you may end up hurting others. I know you don’t want that, so please, wear them at all times except when you feel at your safest. Don’t bring tears to your old Nan, now. Just promise you’ll go to Rosewinter for your sixteenth birthday. Promise me."

  Well, what could I do? It couldn’t harm me to keep the Mirror in the box, and if it made Nan happy, well, what of it? I just wish she had said it was some kind of antique, was worth a hundred thousand pounds now, and if I kept it safe for a few years, it would be worth ten times that, and I would be set for life. No such luck.

  "I promise, Nan."

  I could always back out of it later.

  I tried to rationalise things. Whatever I had just saw or felt, it was as a result of successive nights of Nan’s ghost stories. I was more than a little unnerved, but decided that I would do my best to keep composed. I would go to sleep, wake up the next day, and it would all be fine.

  No markings, no Mirror, no mystery.

  "On one condition, Nan. You’ve got to keep telling me your stories."

  "You’ve got a deal there, Milly."

  I put the lid on the box, stood up, straightened my nightgown and hugged Nan, giving her a kiss on the cheek. I had a million questions about all that had happened, but it would have to wait until the morning at least.

  I just had to steel myself from opening the box again, at least until the morning. I just wanted to satisfy myself that what had happened, hadn’t happened at all. I do remember putting the box away in my dresser. That, I remember.

  Despite my exhaustion, and Hellraiser 3 playing in the background, it wasn’t easy to sleep, and it was little to do with Nan’s story and prophecy that something would try and kill me on my sixteenth birthday.

  No, what was making it hard to sleep was the imprint on my hands from the handle of the Mirror. That was real. It was like I had been branded, somehow, like slaves of old that I would hear about in history class.

  I dozed off, then woke again. I immediately checked my hands and was relieved to see they were unblemished. No markings at all!

  Mum and Dad told me Nan’s hands looked as they did because she had burnt her hands handling a hot fire poker in her youth.

  I know that now not to be true.

  I was fixated on my hands as the pain of the branding made tiny little rivers of red on my hands, first on the back, then on my palms and wrists. The pain was intolerable, and yet, just as I was about to scream my loudest scream ever, the pain subsided.

  There was no longer any doubt what the markings on what my Nan’s hands were – because now, I have those same identical markings on mine.

  The Demon of Gorswood Forest

  15th October. My Birthday’s Eve. One more day of being fifteen.

  On this, the last night before my parents were due to return, I didn’t need my special sense of things to appreciate the sudden cooling of the temperature that just hit the main room, but there was more to it than that. A menacing chill enveloped me, making the hairs on my neck stand up. A simple sigh from me, releasing vapour into the air, and it would have been visible to all that something not of this world had made the temperature plummet.

  It was usually at this point I really would see a ghost. Oh, my Nan had talked about ghosts before, and how she had seen them on many occasions. I liked her ghost stor
ies, and although I’ll admit her ‘Zeryths are coming to kill you and only this mirror can stop them’ story freaked me out more than the others, I found myself being a glutton for punishment.

  I would ask her to tell me lots of ghost stories, then, when I would try to sleep, I would be unable to, and be screaming downstairs to anyone who would listen, to come up and console me.

  I’d be even too scared to get out of bed to switch the light off, because, well, that’s when They would get you. I couldn’t have that, could I?

  Not bothering to use mirrors anymore, I looked at my reflection in the window and lightly brushed my long brown mousey hair. It’s wavy, although I’ve grown a fringe in the last few years, and the bangs hang over my right eye. I like it just-so, and I’m not getting my hair cut, no matter what my mother or anyone else says. It seems that I am destined to stop growing past five foot seven inches too.

  But here, no-one is saying anything. There are no kids here from the school I used to go to, and my parents are a long drive away from here. One of our neighbours from the town did frequent the woods though, even on nights like this, so maybe if I need help, I would just have to shout. The damnedest thing of all, was that I had agreed to my Nan’s request, or rather her insistence, that I be here now.

  Tonight, things seem way too quiet. The silence was deafening. I lay with my eyes to the ceiling, when I heard it. Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud. The sound of an apple hitting each step of the stairwell.

  I gripped the bedsheets a bit tighter. What a time to be alone.

  Take a deep breath, Romilly. You imagined the thud, okay?

  Usually, this suits me just fine because I like my own company, and wish to be left to my own devices. I distracted myself with thoughts of my past, as I wasn’t sure what was to become of my future.

  At school I was the proverbial wallflower, and it was a reputation well deserved. I don’t mix with others easily, though I’ve had friends in the past. Beth O’Neill, who I would partner with in Home Economics, Toril Withers from Drama class, and Jacinta Crow who would sit next to me when Beth and Toril weren’t there.

  I somehow tended to mess up even the good things in my life, and whilst Beth had previously spent time with me at Rosewinter, there was scant chance of a repeat now.

  The wind howled incessantly in the woods, and that, combined with the darkness that comes all too quickly in these late summer evenings, really unsettled me. I try to be rational, say to myself that there is nothing to worry about, and yet I can’t shrink away from the uneasy feeling that something has happened to my parents. The thought of losing them scares me even more than the other unshakable feeling - that something really horrible was about to happen to me.

  When I get these feelings, I do the only thing any sensible person would do. I reach for the kettle, and make a cup of tea. It helps to settle the nerves on the long dark nights.

  As I turn the water tap on, it croaks into life. The pipes rattle like the bones of a skeleton, being dragged from a grave without its permission. In that same moment I shudder violently, and cup my hands around my shoulders.

  What was that? I feel like someone or some thing touched the back of my neck, moving my hair to one side. It can’t be the case though, I am here on my own.

  I am here on my own, and I am in total control. I say this to myself, over and over again, as if

  to reaffirm that I really am in control of everything, even if I’m not.

  I was told to try this by one of the school teachers, who said that "Other children’s words can only hurt you, Romilly, if you let them. You can’t control what they say, but you can control your reaction to them."

  This was all sound advice, unless you were the target of name calling at school. Teachers themselves were rarely, if ever, the target of playground bullying, so they couldn’t possibly understand what I had been through.

  The feeling won’t go away though, and I know, I just know, that I did not imagine that…whatever it was that brushed the back of my neck. I cup the back of my neck with my hand, as if by doing so, I will be safe. A fake assurance, but assurance nonetheless.

  I tell myself I am being silly. I tell myself that Mum and Dad are fine, and that they will be here to meet with me tomorrow morning. I really should just enjoy my last night of freedom. Outside, the simple pleasantness of September was gone. October growled with disapproval. Winter was coming. How brutal would my cold friend be this time?

  I gulped down my tea, and slid into my very warm and comfortable bed. The cup is still half-full, when I arrive at my most peaceful sleep.

  An ear shattering noise rudely awakens me.

  I sat bolt upright in my bed, with such force that my arms are almost ripped from their sockets.

  The door to the wood-cabin burst open, and found my peaceful-yet-slightly-unnerved world, shattered. The noise was deliberate. It wanted me to know fear. It wasn’t going to kill me in my sleep. It wanted to look into my eyes as my life ebbed away.

  Whatever had been hunting me all this time, had now found its quarry. If my Nan was right, some bog-eyed zombie with no legs and blood filled eyes, would make a move to claim the Mirror.

  One thing was for certain. I was no longer alone.

  ***

  16th October. My Birthday. Just past mid-night.

  Happy Birthday, Romilly. Hope it’s not for the last time.

  Although the noise shook the hell out of me, it shouldn’t have come as a complete surprise. After all, I knew what she had come for, but it didn’t make my job any easier. I didn’t like to kill anything, even if it was dead in the first place, but I had no doubt she would kill me if I hesitated.

  I had seen her kind before, but only in my dreams, which had a nasty habit of coming true of late. Nan wasn’t mistaken. This zombie-girl, humanoid appearance aside, bore little resemblance to you or I.

  Still, she wasn’t your traditional, slow walking, dead eyed, drop-and-splat-in-one-hard-stroke kind of zombie. That kind of zombie remained in the movies, and she didn’t look to me like she had just walked off-set, and made her way to my little abode.

  Her bedraggled black hair was wet with something, it clung to her face. Burned into her forehead – branded perhaps – were the strangest of markings, and though the rest of her face was almost normal, she had no lips to speak of. Her teeth stuck out from behind her skin, like a skeleton. She might have been human at one time, but to me she now looked like she was ridden with infection, disease and the over-riding stench of death. Her skin was a greyish-yellow, making her look slightly jaundiced. Nothing so disgusting looking could possibly be for real, and yet, here it was, dripping blood on my floor, which dissolved the wood, making a hissing, fizzing sound as it splattered everywhere.

  If I concentrated too much on her looks, I would be forgiven for neglecting the axe she was holding, the blade of which seemed far too large and cumbersome for someone of her size to wield.

  As if reading my thoughts, she let the heavy blade hit the floor, which made a clunking, scraping sound on the floor as it travelled, awkwardly but purposely towards me. Shards of wood gave way as she approached me. I noticed that the axe was already covered in blood, skin, and bits of bone. She wore a white blouse that had been reddened by blood and dried by time – if time existed where she came from.

  Whatever she was remained strangely corporeal when swinging wildly at me with an axe, and yet I could almost see right through her.

  I really wanted to kick out at her but was severely under-dressed. My nightgown was far too long, and I was in my bare feet, and the splintered wood from the door and the floor that had been cut up by the axe, was drawing pipettes of blood from my toes. Talk about being totally unprepared for my first visit by a Zeryth. Having them come into your nightmares and then, coming into your home, were two completely different things. I scream myself awake from a nightmare. This was for real though, and I had to deal with the situation head-on.

  Some people at my school, even my parents, had said I use
d humour as some kind of defence. Maybe I do that, but here, I am very scared.

  What could I do then? I tried my hardest to scream at her, but no words would come from my throat.

  Remember you’re in control, Romilly. What they say or do can’t hurt you.

  I had always been told in self-defence class to put your hands up in front of your body to put an adversary off, but something told me this was not going to work this time. I had forgotten to ask the instructor what to do if a zombie-girl ends up in your house uninvited. I’m sure the response would have been "Oh. Zombie self defence class. You must have missed that one."

  Still, the non-zombie classes hadn’t been a total waste. Keeping my hands in some sort of guard, as she swung at me, I managed to put her off from hitting me full-on. Nearly three years of irregular kung fu training had passed, but I still felt I knew practically nothing.