House of Darkness

by K. R. Alexander

  “Oh, shit, it’s a little corpse.” Adam laughed. The noise echoed down the hall, around high ceilings, away up a staircase at the front of the house.

  I paused.

  “A corpse?” Wade’s breath rattled through his words.

  “Mousetrap,” Gideon said. “Its dinky bones are still there. Must have been eaten out by maggots and flies and ants. A fox would eat the bones.”

  “Clean as a whistle,” Adam said. “See that, Gid? He’s a dandy. Mama mouse and pup mouse.”

  “Nah, that’s a rat. This one’s a mouse.”

  Wade and I walked purposefully down the hall, past the dining room, around the staircase, back to the foyer, this time watching the floor every step of the way for potential holes.

  Halfway along, two sets of steps jogged after us. Okay, get out, together, and think about this. Maybe we did need a plan.

  At the foot of the staircase, we stopped. The footsteps paused behind us. We waited, Wade easing closer so our shoulders touched. I wouldn’t admit it for a free ride to college, but I was really, really glad he did. Glad to have someone solid and alive to lean into, glad to share that space and be reminded of my mom and dad, the professionals, the team—not alone. They’d tackled these houses and made it look easy. In the end, their team hadn’t been enough. But we weren’t just two. We were four.

  “Gideon?” I said at last. “Let’s go, guys.”

  “We’re coming.” His voice was muffled, faint and hardly distinguishable, as if the blackness and burning, thick air actually held it back. That was how far away it was: far as the kitchen, where Gideon and Adam still were.

  Only those footsteps had been right behind us.

  Keep a hold of yourself. It’s just their tricks. There’s no one there. You know better.

  Someone was breathing on the back of my neck, cool and tingling in the inferno house that was devoid of any breeze, while my hair stirred.

  I squeezed Wade’s hand like a steel trap. He stood by my side, not behind me. The door was shut, the foyer pitch black to our backs. And ghosts don’t breathe.

  12

  I bunched up magic energy and sent it out in a fresh baseball bat explosion as I spun around, screaming, “No!” Releasing Wade to hurl all I had—a blast of light and force—into the unknown at my back.

  The foyer lit up in a blaze of yellow-white light, throwing every surface into stark relief. We faced an open room at the foot of the stairs. There was the gaping black hole in the floor just inside the door—which was shut. No one here.

  “There it is!” Wade pointed up the stairs.

  Two brilliant green disks reflected from the landing, then the fox whipped away.

  “What?” Gideon called, motorcycle boots thumping as he ran up. Adam, barefoot, followed.

  “That fox,” Wade told them, breathless. “Ran upstairs.”

  “No!” I called again, snatching for Gideon’s arm as he tore past me, letting out a whoop.

  “I’m changing back!” Adam called in equal excitement. “We’ll snap it’s neck like a Moon-cursed rat!”

  Gideon sprinted up the stairs while I yelled at him. “It’s not real! Gideon, no!”

  Wade looked wildly around for the stakes or any flashlight that Gideon had left up here before his fall. Nothing here.

  Crunch and snap as Adam’s body twisted and dropped, sprouting fur.

  “Gideon!” Terrified, I started after him.

  Wade caught my hand and yanked me back. “Is there another light in the bag?”

  “My phone.”

  He jerked the zipper and found the phone as Adam bounded past us, taking the steps four at a time, huge paws remarkably agile. Both shifters vanished into darkness.

  “Who is Marybeth?” I gasped and snatched the phone from Wade, shining the light onto the door, both of us having given up trying to hold onto magic light.

  “What?”

  “Gideon told him not to change again because of Marybeth.”

  “How should I know.” Wade shook his head. “His mom? You can unlock that, can’t you?”

  “Is it locked? But we’re on the inside.”

  “I’d take bets on it.”

  “We can’t leave them in here.”

  “I’d bet on that too.”

  With the light on the floor, we squeezed our way, holding onto each other, to reach the doorknob, feet on the edge of the black hole into the basement and vampire lair.

  I pulled the deadbolt back by hand, yanked at the door, but it wouldn’t budge. Wade pulled. I tried magic. Wade kicked it and almost lost his balance, grabbing me and the knob. The door remained impervious.

  “Break a window,” Wade panted.

  Something overhead scuffled and thumped. Gideon swore.

  “Gideon? We’re getting out of here!”

  No reply.

  “Dammit… We have to get them.”

  Wade tugged me to a window, then back, focused on the glass and giving us space. He was going to blow up the glass, first pushing me behind him. Having been focused on watching the floor, I shined the light on the window, getting our bearings in the front room, and we both screamed.

  13

  Our reflections in the glass when I held up the light showed an army of horrors reaching for us, grabbing, biting, throttling.

  I hurtled from that room and straight up the stairs. Yelling for Gideon and Adam, tripping and nearly dropping the phone, I didn’t even remember to wonder about Wade until I’d dashed across the landing and nearly reached the top. I needn’t have worried; he was at my heels.

  “Gideon!” It wasn’t that I thought a werewolf could do anything to help against phantasms. It was the simple terror of being split up and relatively alone in that moment, the memory that two was not enough to take on a Midway City infestation, and fear that the images just hinted to us could already be happening to Gideon and Adam upstairs.

  So I shouted as I ran, up the stairs, down the hall, and wham as someone stepped from a doorway. I crashed headlong into him, the phone knocked from my grip. Strong hands grabbed my arms before I could fall.

  “What happened?”

  “Gideon? Where’s Adam?”

  “We have to get out of here.” Wade grabbed me from behind, starting a subtle tug-of-war with Gideon. “Why did you take off?”

  “Didn’t you see that?”

  “Yes, I saw it! All the more reason to get out!”

  “And leave them?”

  “What’s going on?” Gideon cut in.

  Adam appeared in the doorway. His fur was thick with dust and webs, a cupboard’s worth of cobwebs strung between his ears. He picked up my glowing phone in his teeth.

  “What’s going on is we need to get out of here, now, and need to go together,” I told Gideon, realizing mid-flow that I sounded really pissed off at him—my usual when I got scared. Gideon took the anger at face-value and stepped back, letting me go.

  “Fine,” he snapped. “Head for greener pastures. You won’t catch us stopping you. Mosey along and we’ll follow just as soon as we’ve ripped that flea-bearing earmuff into confetti.”

  “There’s no fox! I keep telling you! It’s a vengeful spirit!” I snatched the phone from Adam’s mouth as he stepped up.

  “You said the fox left that blood!” Gideon shouted back.

  “Well…” He had me there.

  “What in Moon’s name are we doing in here if not to rout vengeful spirits?” Gideon continued. “Doesn’t matter what it is—something’s going down.”

  Adam was trying to catch his attention, woofing and finally nudging at me.

  Gideon glared at him, then shook his head. “Oh…? Think it was human?”

  “What?” Wade asked.

  “He says that blood wasn’t a critter the fox killed. Says it was human, right?” Gideon checked with Adam, who whined and wagged his tail.

  “Great,” Wade said. “That’s swell. So there are vampires and ghosts and people in here being stabbed or bludgeoned or
beheaded. And you all run upstairs just to make it especially difficult to leave.”

  “We came in together,” I said, “we’ll go out together—”

  “Yeah, feet-first—”

  “You’re just going to project worse energy!”

  Wade chuckled weakly. “Once you’re thinking about your own body going through the wood-chipper you’re at rock bottom on that front.”

  “Spirits don’t put people through wood-chippers.”

  “And a vampire never would,” Gideon said. “Even a capable, young one. They want your blood.”

  “That’s what it was,” I said. “It was just blood they … had. You know? And it … spilled?”

  “Who had?” Wade asked. “The vampires are down in the pit, right? The spirits are up here?”

  “Uh…?”

  Something moved down the hall, at the edge of my phone’s limiting flashlight.

  Adam tore after it. I yelled. Gideon followed. I followed him.

  Wade swore, grabbed my arm, tripped, and we crashed to the dusty wood floor. By the time I looked up, the two shifters had vanished.

  “Let’s just go.” Wade fought with me. “If they want to tangle with this place without a light or stakes or magic—their funeral.”

  “I got them into this.” I recovered my phone from the floor, fighting away from him. “We can’t survive split up in here.”

  “But we can all survive if we leave. You gave them that option.”

  “We don’t even have a way out.” I twisted free, onto my feet, and ran after them.

  My jeans stuck to my legs like a swimsuit. The dirt on my skin had turned to mud. Dirty, damp hair whipped across my streaked glasses. My feet were so hot it seemed my socks were more sweat than fabric.

  Shouldn’t it have been enough to come, find the spirits, and send them on their ways? Couldn’t I intuit the bits that I didn’t really know? And try to find my curse? A couple of practices and I’d have this thing licked. It was this particular house that was the problem. What sort of house plays so dirty it won’t even let you step into the foyer?

  We could try again later. Maybe I could explain that to Gideon and Adam and talk them out of this darkness. I couldn’t leave them. I’d led them here. They were my team—meaning I didn’t have to face this alone. I had to return the favor.

  Except that I couldn’t find the pair. I reached the doorway they’d dashed through only to discover the door shut—and locked. With someone yelping inside.

  14

  “Adam!” Forgetting magic, I shoved the door. “Gideon, open up!”

  “All right, look—” Wade grabbed my arm and jerked me toward him. “If you won’t come, I’ll go alone. One way or another, we weren’t prepared for this place and sticking around makes as much sense as hanging a hammock between two corn stalks. Are you coming or not?”

  I blinked, startled, then pried my arm from his grip. “You won’t really go alone and leave me here.”

  “So help me—” Wade lifted a dramatic finger toward the ceiling, puffing up his chest, taking a deep breath. He mouthed silent words, looking back into my eyes from several inches away, brandishing the finger in a circle.

  He gulped, lowered his hand, and slapped the wall, covered in dark wallpaper with a flower pattern. “Damn…”

  I turned the light on the wall, chest heaving, heart in my throat, but momentarily still, only transfixed by the paper.

  “Wade?” I hadn’t meant to whisper.

  He followed my gaze.

  The wallpaper displayed a pattern of yellow carnations with green leaves and stems on a dark blue background. We both stared.

  “They … do that, right?” Wade swallowed again, voice a breath. “Like … someone else would see something different. It’s the… You said they…”

  I nodded. “Sure they do. It’s only … yeah…”

  We kept staring at the wall.

  Gideon and Adam burst into the doorway of the room on our right.

  I’d seen them run into the room on our left, which now had the closed and locked door and something inside that had ceased yelping.

  Now they stood on our right in an open doorway, both panting, Adam’s tongue dripping, Gideon wiping sweat from his brow.

  I looked at the closed door, looked at them, looked at Wade. He also blinked at the door.

  “Did you see it?” Gideon demanded. “Sure it went in there, but we can’t find the varmint.”

  “Gideon? What pattern is on this wallpaper?”

  Gideon squinted as I aimed the light along the wall. “Yellow flower on an almost navy background. Why?”

  “No reason. Where does the window of this room lead to?”

  “Out back. That fox didn’t escape through it, though; it’s closed.”

  “How far a drop is it?” I pushed past them into the large bedroom which seemed to be in the center of the backside of the house.

  “Near enough to help you down if you want out.” Gideon sounded far more agreeable now that I wasn’t yelling or telling him what to do, moving with me toward the window.

  I flashed the light around the room. Old brass bed, moth-bitten, faded quilt. Antique oak dresser and mirror, humpback trunk that might have been Civil War era, a simple writing desk and chair. I thought spirits didn’t like mirrors? Mom used a mirror in her banishing work. This one was so grimy and covered in dust and cobwebs maybe it didn’t count. Other than spiders, a moth flapping around the light, and the scuttle of a mouse, nothing moved in the room.

  The four of us stepped to the window but Adam veered off, keeping watch and sniffing, still seeming to think a fox might be in here.

  “Will it open?” Wade asked.

  I shined the light into the glass, trying to judge how far down, but the grungy glare rendered the whole test moot.

  Gideon felt across the catch and lock. The window should pull upward if it hadn’t been painted shut or warped beyond opening at all.

  I leaned in with him, light on the seams, brushing back spider webs and checking the edges while Gideon tried to tug loose the rusty catch. So close we touched, only upping the blistering heat. Sweat stung my eyes and I had to step back from him, bending and pulling up the hem of my T-shirt to wipe my face. I tugged off my glasses, cleaning the lenses and wiping the wet bridge of my nose before pushing them back on.

  By the time I returned my attention to the window, Gideon had given up and was looking at me.

  I met his eyes, holding the light loosely in my left hand, reflecting off floor and walls to lend a dusty white glow to the bedroom.

  He was so handsome. Totally overreacting to this fox vendetta, but hadn’t Adam said overreaction was his jam? He couldn’t help it. At least he wasn’t afraid. Maybe magical creatures who looked like that didn’t have anything to fear. You would have to have serious self-image issues to be Gideon and not be pretty confident. It seemed our magic made them uneasy, but they probably hadn’t been around spellcasters anymore than I’d been around shifters. Fair enough.

  Why was I standing here looking at Gideon and thinking about Gideon and waiting for Gideon to … I wasn’t sure, when we’d been meaning to open the window?

  “Should we, uh…” I lost my train of thought and cleared my throat. “Did you feel any, I mean, did it, when you touched it…?” I licked my lips. “Did it move?”

  “You don’t have to skedaddle, Ripley.” His voice was soft as mine, soothing, like he thought I was upset. “Stay and we’ll look after you. We’ll hunt for you, sing with you … always.”

  I nodded. Because that made perfect sense. He was right. He was too handsome and brawny and smart and vivacious not to be right.

  “Ripley?” Wade touched my arm.

  I looked at him instead, at first startled to notice him there, then startled that I hadn’t noticed him. He was gorgeous, elegant, and ghostly in the dim light. Tall but not too tall for me. Just right. I’d noticed at The Silk Door how tall he was and how he smiled and offered me a yellow
carnation and … those eyes. Ice-blue eyes. Inferno house.

  We didn’t have to stay here, did we? To be together? Of course not. Gideon wasn’t thinking clearly, that was all.

  Wade went on. “I’ve never been on a third date like this. Or any other number.”

  “You two are dating?” Gideon asked. He sounded amused. Like he would humor Wade.

  “Uh…” Wade watched my face.

  “Yes,” I said. “Third date. We’re just starting out, so everything is… You have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.”

  Wade nodded. “I know. They’re like stars, aren’t they?”

  “They are like stars,” I breathed.

  “You have the most beguiling hair I’ve ever seen,” he said. “Fire hair with ice eyes? I mean…” Lifting both hands with a shrug as if to say, Come on, how could we possibly go wrong?

  No way we could go wrong.

  “So what would be usual for you on a third date?” I asked, inching closer.

  “What difference does it make?” Wade stepped up to my face. “What about this one has been normal?”

  He was just enough taller that I tipped my chin up to meet his kiss. So hot, there against him, breaths and touches and sweat mingling. So how did chills race down my spine and tingle through my blood? So hot and so … oh … angels and demons … I hadn’t expected such a good kisser. Like blowing up heads, how many hidden talents did our pale, pretty mage have?

  I tasted his salty sweat, then tongue like a feather of flame as he ran the tip along my lips. His hands came to my face, more heat, more contact, and I leaned into him, feeling his body all the way down, hot shirt, smooth abs running into narrow hips. He returned pressure, moving in close and tight while I reached around his head to twist my fingers through his tousled hair. What happened to the phone? Had I dropped it? Yes, the light blazed below us, as if we stood above a ground-light on our own stage.

  My pulse felt thready, breaths catching and panting against his lips.

  “Wade…” What was I going to say? He kept kissing me and it didn’t matter.

  The oven wasn’t just preheating anymore, that sucker had maxed out. I had to get my clothes off—both of us, couldn’t live like this. Hadn’t someone been about to open a window? That would help. Just open a window and… Was there some other reason for the window? We were in this house and it was…