Dreaming Darkly

by Caitlin Kittredge

  “There is another story about the Children of Cain that goes around my family this time of year. Halloween and all. They used to tell me when I was a kid to try to scare me into going home when we’d sneak onto this side of the island,” Doyle said. He looked out at the ocean and then back at me. “We should sit down.”

  We leaned against the granite wall, feeling salt spray hit our faces. I pressed myself into Doyle’s side, feeling his warmth through my jacket, liking the way his voice vibrated through my whole body. “Neil was actually the one who enjoyed trying to scare the piss out of me with this story,” he said. “It goes that Cain killed his brother on purpose as a blood sacrifice to the beasts of the wild, so that he could hold dominion over them. And that Cain also drank that blood and became something that wasn’t entirely human. Something that he passed on to his bloodline, which in turn bent the force of their will in unnatural ways.” Doyle let out a small shiver. “Made people lose their minds, murder, steal free will.”

  “They sound cuddly,” I said.

  “Cain became something that was totally against nature,” Doyle said. “Half demon, half man. He had more relation to the things that dwelled in hell than someone who was flesh and bone anymore. He had many wives and he spread his descendants far and wide, all of them the same beast in their heart. Connor Bloodgood was one of them. Evil powers, murderous rituals, whole nine yards.” He snorted. “Cute story, right?”

  I turned to look at him. “Your cousin told you all that as a kid?” Maybe I was just a little sensitive to the whole “totally against nature, unnatural freak” angle of the story right now. I never thought I’d be looking forward to a brain scan, but right now that appointment couldn’t come fast enough.

  “It’s just a story,” Doyle said. “It’s crap. But it does explain why the IRL cult morons came out here.” After I stayed quiet he said, “I’m sure if your dad was one of those cult people he wasn’t that bad.”

  “You don’t have to try to make me feel better,” I said. “My mother has—had—shitty and prolific taste in men. Nothing would shock me in the dad department. But if they were around in the eighties, I’m safe. They were long gone by the time Mom got knocked up.”

  The moon was starting to crest the sky as we sat there, and Doyle kept looking back at the road that would take him to his side of the island.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “Go home. I don’t want to get you in more trouble.”

  We stood, brushing off the sand and grit from our jeans, and I got on my toes and brushed my lips across the cut on Doyle’s cheek before I could stop myself. His skin was so warm, and he smelled so good, I just wanted to sink against him and stay that way until I’d gotten my fill of being close to him. Instead, I dropped back and waved awkwardly as he gave me a crooked smile and loped through the tombstones and down the hill. The screeching gate was the last sound I heard before everything went quiet again.

  I blew out the candle and shut up the mausoleum, flicking the flashlight back on. The beam burned through the misty night air and hit my mother’s grave.

  The light dropped from my fingers into the dirt at the sight of what had happened. Instead of fresh earth and spiny rosebushes, a berm of brush had been erected, like someone setting up for a bonfire. At the top of the pile, just an outline in the beam of my flashlight, was a smaller pile, crude figures stitched out of burlap, their eyes black thread crosses, mouths smeared with some kind of dark, shiny liquid. The same as the strange little fetish doll I’d seen in my cellar nightmare—or whatever—when I’d found the cavern of bones, except there were a dozen of them, bigger and more detailed. One, sitting on top, had a wisp of copper-red yarn stitched to its scalp, and was wrapped in a scrap of black fabric. Not wanting to look closer but unable to stop myself, I bent down, scrabbling for the flashlight, and focused it on the little burlap figure. It wasn’t yarn, I realized, my stomach rolling over. It was a strand of my hair. The black fabric wasn’t actually black—it was stained, and each of the dozen or more was wrapped in an individual piece. The fabric was stiff, soaked with the dark substance, and I pressed a hand into my mouth so hard my teeth dented my palm. Each doll was decorated with a piece of my bloody tank top, the one I’d been stopped from digging up and destroying. Each doll’s mouth was smeared with fresher blood.

  All of the dolls were me.

  I whipped around at the sound of a branch cracking in the forest, the scream that had been building dying in my throat. “Doyle?” I whispered, my voice a terror-muted squeak. The flashlight started to flicker, and I smacked it frantically against my palm, but it flared one last time and went out.

  Another crack, two in succession, like firecrackers. Or footsteps.

  I wanted to run so badly I felt myself vibrate like a plucked string. But I made myself go forward instead, reaching into the thorny branches on top of my mother’s grave and grabbing at one of the crude little dolls until it pulled free, ripping along the seams. Clutching it in my hand, I turned and let myself run, hitting my shin hard on the cemetery gate. It screeched as I ran, and I was almost to the bottom of the hill when I heard it again, the cry and groan of rusted hinges.

  Somebody was following me.

  I clearly couldn’t get ahead of them—whoever they were, they were coming up faster than even my seven-minute mile could beat. I took a hard right turn into the far edge of the hedge maze on the mansion grounds, pushing myself into the spiny, naked branches and trying to still my raspy breathing. I normally wouldn’t be panting after barely a half mile, but panic had knocked the wind out of me.

  I waited there, for so many thudding heartbeats I lost count. I had just about convinced myself I had to take whatever cash I could find in the manor and get to the mainland. I could buy a bus ticket and be someplace like Chicago in under forty-eight hours. I could steal the cash for a fake passport, go to Canada, and disappear, just like all those times Mom drilled me on an exit plan for if things went really wrong. She’d known a guy for everything—fake ID, jobs across the border. If I cut my hair and started wearing different clothes, I could pass for eighteen easy. Maybe twenty if I really classed it up.

  I’d have to forget about San Francisco and my plans. But nobody from Darkhaven would ever find me. Especially not whoever was chasing me through a graveyard in the dark. But none of this would matter if I didn’t get away from them, so I plunged into the maze, hoping that I’d make it through to the other side.

  I stumbled out of the hedges on the gravel path leading back up the gentle slope to the manor house, and almost smacked face-first into a figure dressed all in black.

  I screamed and lashed out, but whoever it was caught my wrist. “Calm yourself, young lady,” Doyle’s father growled.

  “What is wrong with you?” I yelled, yanking my hand away from him.

  “I could ask you the same question,” he said. He glared at me, his face a blank black mask in the dark. Just the shine of his eyes was visible, and I shivered.

  “I was going home, because I live here,” I said. “Last time I checked, you don’t, so . . .”

  He sighed sharply. “I had business with your uncle, but I might as well just tell you directly—you stay away from my son. My whole family is off-limits to you as of right now.”

  My breathing was finally under control, and I snapped my head up to glare right back at him when he said that. “Who the hell do you think you are?”

  He mirrored my outraged look. “Who I am? You’re nothing but trailer trash who washed up on shore and you have the nerve to talk back to me?” He shook his head, turning to walk away. “Unbelievable.”

  “I may be trailer trash,” I said loudly, above the wind rattling the hedge maze. “But at least I don’t have to hit my son to feel like a man.”

  Liam’s shoulders clenched together like I’d shot him with a dart. He turned slowly, advancing on me. I stood my ground, even though I could feel every inch of me quivering from the rise and crest of adrenaline triggered when I fled the cemetery.
“What happens in my home is none of your damn business, Ivy Bloodgood, and if you want to stay healthy, you’ll keep it that way.”

  “You don’t scare me,” I hissed, even as I moved up on my toes, ready to run. The kind of guy who’d threaten me without a thought was definitely the kind I didn’t want to be out here alone with.

  “Then you’re even dumber than you look,” Liam said, his voice no longer angry, just low and hateful, like a rabid dog growling. “You know that sooner or later I’ll find out what happened to my nephew. I know you either had something to do with it or you know who did.” He was close enough to bump chests with me, and he looked down, almost blocking out the light from the moon and the manor’s porch lamps. “You should be plenty scared of me, little girl, because I don’t stop once I’ve got somebody in my sights.”

  I started talking without thinking, in some kind of weird survival reflex. “You know what I think? I think that you’ve lived on this island across the water from a shitty little town for so long you think you’re God. But I’m not from here, and I’m not impressed by you. Maybe the Darkhaven cops don’t care what you do, but somebody, somewhere will. You keep harassing me and see what happens. You have a lot of boats and cars and fancy guns for a guy with no job, Liam, so I bet the state police would be interested in what you do with your time. Maybe the IRS and the DEA too.” I swallowed, throat desert-dry. I had no intention of telling anyone about what the Ramseys were doing—I didn’t hate Liam enough to risk bringing somebody more competent than local cops to look into Neil’s death. As far as I knew, everyone had, like Simon, put it down to a vendetta or a jealous husband, like Doyle thought, but if the state police or the Feds got involved that could change real fast.

  But Liam didn’t know that. And I must have struck a nerve, because he lunged at me, hand up, before I could get away. Somebody grabbed me by the elbow and hauled me back, so hard I tripped and fell in the dry grass by the path. Liam’s blow whiffed harmlessly through the air, so much force behind it he stumbled a little. “You little bitch!” he hollered.

  “That is enough!” Simon shouted. Liam started for me again, and Simon put his body between us. “I mean it,” he said, so low I almost couldn’t hear him. Liam’s barrel chest was heaving, his face blotched with red rage spots visible even in the low light. He stayed where he was, though, and didn’t make a move at Simon.

  “I see her on my property again, she’ll get a lot more than a slap,” he muttered, then turned and stormed away down the path.

  Simon came and helped me up. “Are you all right?” he asked.

  I nodded, accepting his hand.

  “Good,” he said. “That brings me to my next question: What the hell were you thinking?”

  That was a good question. Threatening a man like Liam Ramsey was literally one of the dumbest impulses I’d ever had. I stayed quiet. I was just embarrassed, honestly. Spend a few weeks without grifting and scamming people and I was losing the ability to sweet-talk my way out of bad situations. Soon I’d be a normal person who mostly told the truth. That was a terrifying thought.

  “Ivy,” Simon said quietly, guiding me back toward the house. “You can never do something like that again, understand?”

  I nodded numbly. The adrenaline had worn off, all my muscles ached, my butt hurt where I’d hit the ground, and I still had to deal with knowing my grandmother was alive and Simon had lied to me for some reason.

  “Good,” he said. “Go get cleaned up and get some rest. I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

  “I’m good,” I said quickly. Bitter horrible herbs were not going to help this sick feeling. “I just want to sleep.”

  “You won’t sleep like this,” Simon said. “Take a few moments to relax before bed. I’ll make it herbal, so you won’t wake up.”

  “Simon,” I said, clasping my hands in front of me. “I get that tea and snacks and stuff are your way of letting me know you care for me, and I appreciate that, I really do, but free advice?”

  He inclined his head, looking surprised but not mad. I normally wouldn’t have been this open with anyone, but I figured after our little family drama at Mom’s burial I could at least talk to him like he wasn’t a moron.

  “I’m a teenage girl,” I said. “And sometimes we just want our parental figures to stay out of our business and let us be.”

  Simon didn’t get mad; he actually gave a small chuckle. “Fair enough, Ivy. You sleep well.”

  “You too,” I said. “Good night, Uncle Simon.”

  I went up to my room, stripped out of my damp clothes, and put on sweats, and a T-shirt. I felt in my jacket pocket for the doll. It was gone.

  I cursed, throwing my jacket to the ground. It must have fallen out of my pocket when I was running. And I couldn’t go back out now. Not with Liam Ramsey prowling around.

  If I’d even really seen what I thought I’d seen, or picked up anything at all. I had the terrible, pricking idea that if I did go back out there, I’d see nothing but the same old temporary headstone and frozen earth. No funeral pyre, no dolls.

  I got in bed, pulled the covers over my head, and tried to block out the never-ending wind.

  I tried that for about an hour and couldn’t sleep, so I flipped my light back on and dug around in my backpack, under my homework and my mother’s tarot cards, to find one of the crappy vampire books. I also pulled out my track team schedule. I’d made the decision without even realizing it, pretty much as soon as I’d found those county records. There was an away meet in Portland in two weeks. We’d be gone overnight, and I’d have plenty of time to drive to the hospital where my grandmother had last been committed.

  That way I’d know for sure whether Simon was lying to me, and if he was, whether it was motivated by good intentions or the more usual reasons why people lied. Then I could figure out what to do, if I got to stay here or if I had to pack up and get the hell out all over again.

  I didn’t sleep much and woke up around dawn to the faraway honk of the ferry going between the mainland and the nearby populated islands. I sleepwalked through school, avoiding Doyle and everyone else, and told Mrs. MacLeod I wasn’t feeling well when she tried to press some kind of meat loaf on me for dinner.

  Two weeks seemed like a year. I didn’t sleep again that night, and dawn didn’t bring me any relief.

  Chapter 19

  Simon and Mrs. MacLeod left for the mainland early to buy groceries and do errands, and Simon knocked on my door to invite me along, but I played sick. Trusting normal souls they were, they believed me and left me in bed. Mrs. MacLeod even told me I could use her laptop to watch a movie—she’d pulled out and hidden her mobile hotspot card, of course, though; couldn’t make it easy on me even once. She brought me a little silver packet of cold medicine and a bottle of water along with the laptop. I wasn’t used to anyone caring I was sick. Mom’s usual response was to sigh heavily, drop a bottle of cough syrup on the bed next to me, and then cover her nose and mouth whenever I so much as breathed in her direction.

  After I heard the Jeep pull away from the gravel drive, I got up and got started on my real reason for staying home—for the first time, I knew where both Simon and Mrs. MacLeod were and when they’d be back. I had a good eight hours to explore the house on my own, with no interruptions. There might be something about my grandmother dying in Simon’s papers that would set my mind at ease.

  Maybe even information about my father.

  I ended up back in my mother’s room first. I went through her drawers again, the few winter coats hanging inside the wardrobe, a worn-out pair of combat boots with a hole over the big toe.

  I got a lot of cobwebs in my hair and dust up my nose for my trouble, but nothing about my grandmother or my mother or who my father might be. I flopped back on her bed, the springs groaning under me, and stared up at the water-stained ceiling. The sun blinked on outside the window as a cloud blew away, and I tracked a void in the stains high on the wall next to the wardrobe. I sat up, looking at the massive
, ugly piece of furniture. It was definitely big enough to lead to Narnia. There were gouges under the lion feet too—somebody had moved it from the spot where it had clearly rested since it was put in the room, judging by the condition of the wall.

  I jumped up and grabbed a corner of the wardrobe. It was even heavier than it looked, and I braced myself and used my feet to shove it away from the wall. A trickle of plaster dust sifted to the floor, and I saw the edge of a crude hole hacked into the wall, wallpaper and horsehair fringing the edge. It was tucked between two wall beams, leading to a void about as deep as my forearm.

  I could barely reach, and the wardrobe wasn’t budging any more, but I stuck my hand into the opening, praying I wasn’t going to touch anything gross. Something crinkled, and I yanked out a plastic bag taped around a small stack of papers. The tape was mummified, and I ripped the bag open.

  The papers inside had mostly crumbled, their edges brown and burned. The whole thing smelled faintly of lighter fluid. I sifted through the ashes. Only two bits of paper had survived mostly intact—one a thick official-looking sheet stamped with the state of Maine seal and one a photograph, mostly bubbled away, one corner burned off entirely, but still clear enough to make out the image of a blond boy, six or seven years old, in horn-rimmed glasses, a tie and jacket. It was posed, the smile fake and awkward, but I’d recognize Simon’s pale eyes and widow’s peak anywhere.

  I set the photo aside and looked at the other sheet, which was a birth certificate. The first name of the baby had BENJAMIN typed crookedly above the line, but the rest had been burned away.

  I set the birth certificate next to the photo, wondering what they meant. If my mother had hidden these, it could be nothing—who knew what significance she’d given Simon’s old school picture and a random birth certificate? I would have thought it possibly meant I had a brother, except the certificate was clearly way older than my seventeen years—it was typed, rather than printed out, and the ink from the typewriter ribbon was faded.