The Wicked and the Wondrous

by Christine Feehan

  “Don’t worry.” She patted his arm, her stomach churning. “I’ll call if we need you. Are you certain you don’t want to stay overnight?”

  “I’ll feel safer out there,” he gestured toward the water.

  Jessica waved him off and turned to look up at the island while she waited to get her land legs back. It had been seven years since she’d last been to the island. Her memories of it were the things of nightmares. Looking up toward the ridge, she half expected to see a fiery inferno, with red and orange flames towering to the skies, but there was only the black night and the rain. The house that once had sat at the top of the cliff overlooking the ocean was long gone, reduced to a pile of ashes.

  In the dark, the vegetation was daunting, a foreboding sight. The weak rays of light from the cloud-covered moon were mottled as they fell across the ground, creating a strange, unnatural pattern. The island was wild with heavy timber and thick with brush; the wind set the trees and bushes dancing in a macabre fashion. Naked branches bowed and scraped together with a grating sound. Heavy evergreens whirled madly, sending sharp needles flying through the air.

  Resolutely, Jessica took a deep breath and picked up her pack, handing Trevor a flashlight to lead the way. “Come on, kids, let’s go see your father.”

  The rain slashed down at them, drenching them, drops piercing like sharp icicles right through their clothes to their skin. Heads down, they began to trudge their way up the steep stone steps leading away from the sea toward the interior of the island where Dillon Wentworth hid from the world.

  Returning to the island brought back a flood of memories of the good times—her mother, Rita Fitzpatrick, landing the job as housekeeper and nanny to the famous Dillon Wentworth. Jessica had been so thrilled. She had been nearly thirteen, already old enough to appreciate the rising star, a musician who would take his place among the greatest recording legends. Dillon spent a great deal of his time on the road, touring, or in the studio, recording, but when he was home, he was usually with his children or hanging out in the kitchen with Rita and Jessica. She had known Dillon in the good times, during five years of incredible magic.

  “Jessie?” Trevor’s young voice interrupted her reflection. “Does he know we’re coming?”

  Jessica met the boy’s steady gaze. At thirteen, Trevor had to be well aware that if they had been expected, they wouldn’t be walking by themselves in the dead of night in the middle of a storm. Someone would have met them by car on the road at the boathouse.

  “He’s your father, Trevor, and it’s coming up on Christmas. He spends far too much time alone.” Jessica slicked back her rain-wet hair and squared her shoulders. “It isn’t good for him.” And Dillon Wentworth had a responsibility to his children. He needed to look after them, to protect them.

  The twins didn’t remember their father the way she did. He had been so alive. So handsome. So everything. His life had been magical. His good looks, his talent, his ready laugh and famous blue eyes. Everyone had wanted him. Dillon had lived his life in the spotlight, a white-hot glare of tabloids and television. Of stadiums and clubs. The energy, the power of Dillon Wentworth were astonishing, indescribable, when he was performing. He burned hot and bright on stage, a man with a poet’s heart and a devil’s talent when he played his guitar and sang with his edgy, smoky voice.

  But at home…Jessica also remembered Vivian Wentworth with her brittle laugh and red, talon-tipped fingers. The glaze in her eyes when she was cloudy with drugs, when she was staggering under the effects of alcohol, when she flew into a rage and smashed glass and ripped pictures out of frames. The slow, terrible descent into the madness of drugs and the occult. Jessica would never forget Vivian’s friends who visited when Dillon wasn’t there. The candles, the orgies, the chanting, always the chanting. And men. Lots of men in the Wentworth bed.

  Without warning, Tara screamed, turning to fling herself at Jessica, nearly knocking her off the stairs. Jessica caught her firmly, wrapping her arms around the girl and holding her close. They were both so cold they were shivering uncontrollably. “What is it, honey?” Jessica whispered into the child’s ear, soothing her, rocking her, there on the steep stairs with the wind slashing them to ribbons.

  “I saw something, eyes glowing, staring at us. They were red eyes, Jess. Red, like a monster…or a devil.” The girl shuddered and gripped Jessica harder.

  “Where, Tara?” Jessica sounded calm even though her stomach was knotted with tension. Red eyes. She had seen those eyes.

  “There.” Tara pointed without looking, keeping her face hidden against Jessica. “Through the trees, something was staring at us.”

  “There are animals on the island, honey,” Jessica soothed, but she was straining to see into the darkness. Trevor valiantly tried to shine the small circle of light toward the spot his twin had indicated, but the light couldn’t penetrate the pouring rain.

  “It wasn’t a dog, it wasn’t, Jessie, it was some kind of demon. Please take me home, I don’t want to be here. I’m so afraid of him. He’s so hideous.”

  Jessica took a deep breath and let it out slowly, hoping to stay calm when she suddenly wanted to turn and run herself. There were too many memories here, crowding in, reaching for her with greedy claws. “He was scarred terribly in a fire, Tara, you know that.” It took effort to keep her voice steady.

  “I know he hates us. He hates us so much he doesn’t ever want to see us. And I don’t want to see him. He murdered people.” Tara flung the bitter accusation at Jessica. The howling wind caught the words and took them out over the island, spreading them like a disease.

  Jessica tightened her grip on Tara, gave her a short, impatient shake. “I never want to hear you say such a terrible thing again, not ever, do you understand me? Do you know why your father went into the house that night? Tara, you’re too intelligent to listen to gossip and anonymous phone callers.”

  “I saw the papers. It was in all the papers!” Tara wailed.

  Jessica was furious. Furious. Why would someone suddenly, after seven years, send old newspapers and tabloids to the twins? Tara had innocently opened the package wrapped in a plain brown paper. The tabloids had been brutal, filled with accusations of drugs, jealousy, and the occult. The speculation that Dillon had caught his wife in bed with another man, that there had been an orgy of sex, drugs, devil worship, and murder, had been far too titillating for the scandal sheets not to play it up long before the actual facts could come out. Jessica had found Tara sobbing pitifully in her room. Whoever had seen fit to enlighten the twins about their father’s past had called the house repeatedly whispering horrible things to Trevor and Tara, insisting their father had murdered several people including their mother.

  “Your father went into a burning house to save you kids. He thought you were both inside. Everyone who had gotten out tried to stop him, but he fought them, got away, and went into a burning inferno for you. That isn’t hate, Tara. That’s love. I remember that day, every detail.” She pressed her fingers to her pounding temples. “I can’t ever forget it no matter how much I try.”

  And she had tried. She had tried desperately to drown out the sounds of chanting. The vision of the black lights and candles. The scent of the incense. She remembered the shouting, the raised voices, the sound of the gun. And the flames. The terrible greedy flames. The blanket of smoke, so thick one couldn’t see. And the smells never went away. Sometimes she still woke up to the smell of burning flesh.

  Trevor put his arm around her. “Don’t cry, Jessica. We’re already here, we’re all freezing, let’s just go. Let’s have Christmas with Dad, make a new beginning, try to get along with him this time.”

  Jessica smiled at him through the rain and the tears. Trevor. So much like his father and he didn’t even realize it. “We’re going to have a wonderful Christmas, Tara, you wait and see.”

  They continued up the stairs until the ground leveled out and Jessica found the familiar path winding through the thick timber to the estate. As
islands went, in the surrounding sea between Washington and Canada, it was small and remote, no ferry even traveled to it. That was the way Dillon had preferred it, wanting privacy for his family on his own personal island. In the old days, there had been guards and dogs. Now there were shadows and haunting memories that tore at her soul.

  In the old days the island had been alive with people, bustling with activities; now it was silent, only a caretaker lived somewhere on the island in one of the smaller houses. Jessica’s mother had told her that Dillon tolerated only one older man on his island on a regular basis. Even in the wind and rain, Jessica couldn’t help noticing the boathouse was ill-kept and the road leading around and up toward the house was overgrown, showing little use. Where there had always been several boats docked at the pier, none were in sight, although Dillon must still have had one in the boathouse.

  The path led through the thick trees. The wind was whipping branches so that overhead the canopy of trees swayed precariously. The rain had a much more difficult time penetrating through the treetops to reach them, but drops hitting the pathway plopped loudly. Small animals rustled in the bushes as they passed.

  “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” Trevor quipped, with a shaky smile.

  Jessica immediately hugged him to her. “Lions and tigers and bears, oh, my,” she quoted just to watch the grin spread across his face.

  “I can’t believe he lives here.” Tara sniffed.

  “It’s beautiful during the day,” Jessica insisted, “give it a chance. It’s such a wonderful place. The island’s small, but it has everything.”

  They followed a bend, stumbling a little over the uneven ground. Trevor’s flashlight cast a meager circle of light on the ground in front of them, which only served to make the forest darker and more frightening as it surrounded them. “Are you certain you know the way, Jess? You haven’t been here in years,” he said.

  “I know this path with my eyes closed,” Jessica assured him. Which wasn’t exactly the truth. In the old days, the path had been well manicured and had veered off toward the cliff. This one was overgrown and led through the thick part of the forest toward the interior of the island, rising steadily uphill. “If you listen, you can hear the water rushing off to our left. The stream is large right now, but in the summer it isn’t so strong or deep. There are ferns all along the bank.” She wanted to keep talking, hoping it would keep fear at bay.

  All three of them were breathing hard from the climb, and they paused to catch their breath under a particularly large tree that helped to shelter them from the driving rain. Trevor shined the light up the massive tree trunk and into the canopy, making light patterns to amuse Tara. As he whirled the light back down the trunk, the small circle illuminated the ground a few feet beyond where they were standing.

  Jessica stiffened, jammed a fist in her mouth to keep from screaming, and yanked the flashlight from Trevor to shine it back to the spot he had accidentally lit up. For one terrible moment she could hardly breathe. She was certain she had seen someone staring at them. Someone in a heavily hooded long black cloak that swirled around the shadowy figure as if he were a vampire from one of the movies the twins were always watching. Whoever it was had been staring malevolently at them. He had been holding something in his hands that glinted in the flash of light.

  Her hand was shaking badly but she managed to find the place where he had been with the flashlight’s small circle of light. It was empty. There was nothing, no humans, no vampires in hooded cloaks. She continued to search through the trees, but there was nothing.

  Trevor reached out and caught her wrist, pulling her hand gently to him, taking the flashlight. “What did you see, Jess?” He sounded very calm.

  She looked at them then, ashamed of showing such naked fear, ashamed the island could reduce to her to that terrified teenager she once had been. She had hoped for so much: to bring them all together, to find a way to bring Dillon back to the world. But instead she was hallucinating. That shadowy figure belonged in her nightmares, not in the middle of a terrible rainstorm.

  The twins were staring up at her for direction. Jessica shook her head. “I don’t know, a shadow maybe. Let’s just get to the house.” She pushed them ahead of her, trying to guard their backs, trying to see in front of them, on both sides.

  With every step she took, she was more convinced she hadn’t seen a shadow. She hadn’t been hallucinating. She was certain something, someone had been watching them. “Hurry, Trevor, I’m cold,” she urged.

  As they topped the rise, the sight of the house took her breath away. It was huge, rambling, several stories high with round turrets and great chimneys. The original house had been completely destroyed in the fire and here, at the top of the rise, surrounded by timber, Dillon had built the house of his boyhood dreams. He had loved the Gothic architecture, the lines and carvings, the vaulted ceilings, and intricate passageways. She remembered him talking with such enthusiasm, spreading pictures on the counter in the kitchen for her and her mother to admire. Jessica had teased him unmercifully about being a frustrated architect and he had always laughed and replied he belonged in a castle or a palace, or that he was a Renaissance man. He would chase her around with an imaginary sword and talk of terrible traps in secret passageways.

  Rita Fitzpatrick had cried over this house, telling Jessica how Dillon had clung to his dreams of music and how he had claimed that having the house built was symbolic of his rise from the ashes. But at some point during Dillon’s months at the hospital, after he’d endured the pain and agony of such terrible burns and after he realized that his life would never return to normal, the house had become for him, and all who knew him, a symbol of the darkness that had crept into his soul. Looking at it, Jessica felt fear welling inside her, a foreboding that Dillon was a very changed man.

  They stared at the great hulk, half expecting to see a ghost push open one of the shutters and warn them off. The house was dark with the exception of two windows on the third story facing them, giving the effect of two eyes staring back at them. Winged creatures seemed to be swarming up its sides. The mottled light from the moon lent the stone carvings a certain animation.

  “I don’t want to go in there,” Tara said, backing away. “It looks…” she trailed off, slipping her hand into her brother’s.

  “Evil,” Trevor supplied. “It does, Jess, like one of those haunted houses in the old movies. It looks like it’s staring at us.”

  Jessica bit at her lower lip, glancing behind them, her gaze searching, wary. “You two have seen too many scary movies. No more for either of you.” The house looked far worse than anything she had ever seen in a movie. It looked like a brooding hulk, waiting silently for unsuspecting prey. Gargoyles crouched in the eaves, staring with blank eyes at them. She shook her head to clear the image. “No more movies, you’re making me see it that way.” She forced a small, uneasy laugh. “Mass hallucination.”

  “We’re a small mass, but it works for me.” There was a trace of humor in Trevor’s voice. “I’m freezing; we may as well go inside.”

  No one moved. They continued to stare up at the house in silence, at the strange animating effect of the wind and the moon on the carvings. Only the sound of the relentless rain filled the night. Jessica could feel her heart slamming hard in her chest. They couldn’t go back. There was something in the woods. There was no boat to go back to, only the wind and piercing rain. But the house seemed to stare at them with that same malevolence as the figure in the woods.

  Dillon had no inkling they were near. She thought it would be a relief to reach him, that she would feel safe, but instead, she was frightened of his anger. Frightened of what he would say in front of the twins. He wouldn’t be pleased that she hadn’t warned him of their arrival, but if she had called, he would have told her not to come. He always told her not to come. Although she tried to console herself with the fact that his last few letters had been more cheerful and more interested in the twins, she couldn’
t deceive herself into believing he would welcome them.

  Trevor was the first to move, patting Jessica on the back in reassurance as he took a step around her toward the house. Tara followed him, and Jessica brought up the rear. At some point the area around the house had been landscaped, the bushes shaped, and beds of flowers planted, but it looked as though it hadn’t been tended in quite a while. A large sculpture of leaping dolphins rose up out of a pond on the far side of the front yard. There were statues of fierce jungle cats strewn about the wild edges of the yard, peering out of the heavier brush.

  Tara moved closer to Jessica, a small sound of alarm escaping her as they gained the slate walkway. All of them were violently shivering, their teeth were chattering, and Jessica told herself it was the rain and cold. They made it to within yards of the wraparound porch with its long thick columns when they heard it. A low, fierce growl welled up. It came out of the wind and rain, impossible to pinpoint but swelling in volume.

  Tara’s fingers dug into Jessica’s arms. “What do we do?” she whimpered.

  Jessica could feel the child shivering convulsively. “We keep walking. Trevor, have your flashlight handy—you may need it to hit the thing over the head if it attacks us.” She continued walking toward the house, taking the twins with her, moving slowly but steadily, not wanting to trigger a guard dog’s aggressive behavior by running.

  The growl rose to a roar of warning. Lights unexpectedly flooded the lawn and porch, revealing the large German shepherd, head down, teeth bared, snarling at them. He stood in the thick brush just off the porch, his gaze focused on them as they gained the steps. The dog took a step toward them just as the front door was flung open.