The Night Sister

by Jennifer McMahon

  “When did you figure it out?” Rose asked.

  “I started to worry when you told me Sylvie had been sneaking out of bed at night. I watched her carefully, looking for signs. When I discovered Fenton’s body in the tower, I blamed myself; I knew that I could have stopped it. But even then, I had it all wrong. I hid the body, cleaned everything up, and started to watch Sylvie. Finally, yesterday, I confronted her.”

  “Did she know? Did she know what she was?”

  Mama was silent a moment, studying Rose in the moonlight.

  “Sylvie wasn’t the mare, Rose.” Mama looked into Rose’s eyes. “You are. It’s been you all along.”

  “I don’t understand,” Rose said. She dropped to her knees now, head in her hands, the pain a great wave washing over her. She was sure she would be sick, her stomach was churning so.

  Mama’s words hung in the air, bright sparkles that only intensified her pain. Her mother looked small and far away, like she was speaking to Rose from the end of a long tunnel, her words small and echoey.

  “I ran down to the tower last night when I heard you girls fighting. But then I heard another sound, a snarl and a growl, and I got there just in time to see Sylvie fall. I believe she died instantly, thank God.”

  “No!” Rose said. “She transformed! She fell, but she turned into a moth and fluttered back up!”

  “As I told you, that moth you captured was not your sister. She broke her neck. I saw there was nothing I could do and knew I had to hide the body—what if your father woke up and found us? I quickly carried her into the woods.” Mama paused here, took a deep breath, rubbed at her eyes. “When I looked back through the trees, up at the tower, I saw a dog’s shiny black head peering down from the top.”

  “No,” Rose breathed.

  “I don’t believe you meant to hurt her. I believe it was an accident. You were fighting, you started to transform, your sister was frightened, and in her struggle to get away from you, she fell over the edge.”

  “But Sylvie,” Rose croaked out, “she’s the one. She was the mare. I saw her….”

  Rose thought of the nights she’d wandered off from her bed. The strange dreams she’d had, dreams of claws and fangs and blood. How she’d found fur on her pillow. She’d opened her eyes and felt like her body was not her own. She’d believed there was a mare sleeping beside her each night, but it was worse than that. The monster was inside her.

  That’s what Oma had been trying to warn her about, to prepare her for. That was why she’d spent so much time with Rose, why Rose was clearly her favorite. They were two of a kind, she and Oma.

  Rose had dropped the flashlight. It shone on the wall and dimly illuminated the space she and her mother sat in. Her mother continued to speak, even though Rose wanted to beg her to stop, not to say any more.

  “My mother said it usually skipped a generation, that I shouldn’t have children of my own. But then I met your father, and he wanted children so badly.”

  “Does Daddy know? About mares?”

  Mama shook her head. “I never told him; I’ve never told anyone and prayed I would never have to. When he told me about the tower he intended to build, I asked that it have an oubliette, thinking that if either of you girls turned out to be a mare, I would have a place to keep you safe, to keep the world safe from you. I told your father a secret dungeon would give the tower an air of authenticity. I asked him to do it as a special, secret favor for me.

  “I’d like to take you there now, to show you the room. You wouldn’t have to stay there all the time, only at night, only until we find some other way to help you…control this.”

  “A hidden room?” Rose asked. She thought of the story of Rapunzel, locked away in a tower by an evil witch. But Mama was no witch. And this was no fairy tale.

  “I showed it to Oma when she came to visit. She was horrified. Said it was no place for a child. I suppose it’s my fault she lied to protect you. I only wish…”

  Mama was crying now: soft sobs that shook her whole body. “I blame myself for what happened to your sister. You can’t help what you are. I should have stopped you. There are two dead now, and I can promise there won’t be any more.”

  Two dead.

  Two.

  “Fenton?” Rose whimpered.

  Her mother nodded.

  “No,” Rose said, inching away. “It can’t be me. It was Sylvie. I followed her to the tower. I saw her transform.”

  Mama shook her head. “Don’t you know what Sylvie was doing in the tower? Don’t you? She was meeting Fenton.”

  “Fenton? Why?”

  “She believed she was in love with him. She confessed the whole thing to me, when I confronted her about her nighttime wanderings, thinking she was the mare. She told me she’d been meeting Fenton in the tower at night for years now. They’d even discovered the secret room, but had no idea what it was for. She asked me about it during our talk yesterday, and I denied knowing it even existed. Anyway, in the beginning, Sylvie and Fenton would hide out down there and just talk late into the night. But as time went on and their feelings grew, they became…romantic. They were planning to run away together. To California.”

  “But Sylvie—”

  “Sylvie is gone, Rose. I took care of her body. Gave her a proper burial where no one will ever find her. The last thing we want is an investigation. If our secret was uncovered, I would never be able to protect you.”

  Rose dropped her chin to her chest and began to sob. Mama moved forward and stroked Rose’s tangled hair with tentative fingers.

  “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but it’s going to be all right. Like I told you, my mother discovered she was able to keep herself from transforming by using sedatives at night. We can start trying them on you. We’ll find a way, Rose.”

  Everything Rose thought she knew fell away from her then.

  “You can have a life. A normal life. I’ve lost one daughter. I won’t lose both.”

  Rose looked up at her mother, who looked at her with eyes that simmered with fear, regret, and something else—loathing. She knew, knew that, try as she might, her mother would never forgive her. Sylvie would always be the good daughter: the beautiful moth with pale-green iridescent wings. Rose, even locked in a dungeon or cured by medicine, would always be the monster.

  2013

  Piper

  Piper sat in shock as the nurse came bustling into Rose’s room, pushing the med cart. “Rose,” the nurse said, “time for your evening pills.”

  Rose nodded, and dutifully took the tiny paper cup of pills and the cup of water with a flexible plastic straw from the nurse. She tipped the cup of pills into her mouth, took a sip of water, and swallowed.

  “Good girl,” the nurse said. “You ring if you need anything.”

  She nodded politely at Piper and said, “The pills can make our Rose a little groggy.”

  “I understand,” Piper said.

  And she did. They kept Rose medicated to keep her from disappearing. But what they didn’t know was that it wasn’t Rose in human form they were looking for when they found her bed empty at night—it was Rose in mare form, Rose as a black dog, or even an insect. She’d told Piper that it really wasn’t that hard for her to change into whatever she wished. It was a skill, like any other, something a mare develops over time. She’d also learned to transform at will when wide awake, and was able to keep a good part of her human consciousness—and conscience—once she’d changed. Mostly, however, she’d learned, over the years, to control it—to take just the right amount of muscle relaxants every evening to keep her from changing in her sleep, unaware.

  The nurse wheeled the cart out of the room and turned left, making her way down the hall.

  Rose stared at the jar on the bedside table with the luna moth inside.

  “Charlotte showed us that jar that summer,” Piper said. “She told us you always believed it was Sylvie.”

  Rose shook her head. “For about twenty-four hours I did, yes. But then
I learned the truth: my sister died in that fall, and my mother covered it up; she hid the body so there wouldn’t be any investigation that might reveal our family secret.”

  “So why did you keep the moth?”

  Rose smiled bitterly. “I suppose as a reminder of how we all trick ourselves into believing what we need to believe.”

  “Was it you Amy saw that summer? You who left those notes in the typewriter? Not Sylvie’s ghost?”

  “Yes,” Rose said. “My mother and I agreed that it wouldn’t have been safe for me to live at home. What if I slipped up and Amy saw me transform? Or what if, God forbid, I hurt Amy by accident when I was a mare?”

  “So you just left her?”

  “I never went far. We allowed the story of my supposed drinking problem to flourish; my mother made references to me being far away, ‘getting help.’ But I mostly stayed around Vermont; I rented squalid little rooms and apartments, and got by however I could, working at supermarkets and Laundromats. I even stole a bit here and there if I needed to—never enough to call attention to myself, of course. And at night sometimes I came back to the motel and checked up on things. Like I did today.” She smiled at Piper.

  “It was you? You left me the note this morning?”

  Rose nodded. “Wednesday mornings are busy here. We’ve got Bingo; then the children from the elementary school come to visit and sing songs with us. It’s not so hard to slip away in the chaos. No one notices a little bird flying out through an open window; in no time, I can be across town at the motel.”

  “And back then, you never let Amy see you. You let her believe it was Sylvie’s ghost.”

  “It was easier that way. I knew I should just stay away, but I couldn’t. I’d come back and watch Amy while she slept, just to make sure I hadn’t passed it on to her.”

  “And was she?” Piper asked, hardly believing she was even asking the question. “Was Amy one, too?”

  “No,” Rose said. “Like my mother told me—it usually skips a generation.”

  Piper sprang forward in her chair. “Lou? She’s a mare?”

  Rose nodded, licked her lips. Her eyelids started to close. Fast-acting medication, whatever it was. Or maybe she’d just worn Rose out.

  “Did Amy know?”

  “Didn’t want to believe it. That’s why I came back, why I moved back into the house with them. I tried to help them, like Oma tried to help me. I sensed it right away with Lou, but of course I needed to be sure before I could warn Amy. Once the transformations began, I tried to tell Amy, but it was too late. She called me crazy, and her stupid husband backed her up.

  “Then, last week, she came to me, hysterical. She’d seen Lou transform. She wanted to know what to do. I told her about the medicine. I told her to take Lou to the twenty-ninth room and try to keep her down there until she figured out how to get the medicine, what the right dosage would be. Lou was stronger than I ever was. She had quickly learned how to transform at will—to change in the daytime, even, and take whatever form she wanted. And, like any young mare, she was impulsive…dangerous. She wasn’t always able to control her actions once she turned.”

  “Wait a second—are you saying it was Lou? That she killed her family?”

  The old woman’s eyes were shut now, her voice trailing off into sleep. “A mare can’t help what it is. Can’t help the things it does.”

  “Oh my God,” Piper said, grabbing her bag and running for the door. “Margot.”

  Margot

  Something was wrong and Margot knew it, had known it all day. She’d been uncomfortable since breakfast, but she had told herself that the cramping she felt was brought on by too many crêpes.

  “I think I need to take a little bathroom break,” Margot told Lou. The girl looked disappointed. She’d won four hands of Crazy Eights and was well on her way to another victory. They’d already taken one long break when Lou had gone into the kitchen to bring back a snack—saltine crackers with globs of jelly, something that had somehow taken her nearly twenty minutes to prepare.

  The cordless phone on the nightstand rang, and Margot picked up.

  “Hello?”

  “Margot? It’s me,” Piper said, sounding out of breath. “Is everything okay?”

  “Yeah, we’re fine,” Margot said.

  “And Lou, she’s still there? And she’s…she’s okay?”

  “Yes, Lou is right here and she’s fine. We’re both fine.” Margot smiled at Lou, who was watching her intently with a small frown. “She’s killing me at Crazy Eights! Why all the concern?”

  “Is that Piper?” Lou asked. Margot nodded and held up a finger—one minute. Lou stood suddenly, knocking the cards off the bed, and left the room.

  “It’s something Rose told me,” Piper went on. “Margot, I know this is going to sound crazy, but I think Lou might be—” The connection went dead.

  “Piper? Hello?”

  Lou returned and plopped herself down beside Margot on the bed, another jelly-smeared saltine in her hand.

  “Is everything okay?” Lou asked.

  “Yes, fine. Piper just wanted to check in. We had a bad connection. Now, I’m going to run to the bathroom, and then you and I can get back to cards. Why don’t you go ahead and pick them up, then deal us a new hand?”

  Margot began the slow process of dragging her huge body out of bed. She did what the doctor told her: sat for a minute with her feet on the floor before standing. Still, when she did rise to her feet, she felt dizzy.

  “Are you okay?” Lou asked.

  “I think so,” Margot said, black spots swimming in front of her eyes. She sat back down on the bed, hard.

  When she hit the mattress, she realized her pajama pants were soaking wet.

  It took a few seconds for her to realize what had happened: her water had broken. This was normal. Everything was fine.

  She picked up the cordless phone and dialed Jason’s number. Nothing happened. The line was dead. Maybe the battery was drained?

  “Lou?” Margot said with all the calm and clarity she could muster. “Could you hand me my cell phone, sweetie? It’s over on the other nightstand.”

  Lou crawled off the bed and dug around on the nightstand on Jason’s side of the bed. “I don’t see a phone,” she said.

  “It was right there,” Margot said, panting a little as a huge cramp came on.

  Not a cramp. A contraction.

  The baby was coming.

  “Well, it’s not here now,” Lou said cheerfully.

  Odd. She could have sworn she’d just seen it. But she must be mistaken. Maybe Piper had picked it up and put it somewhere else? Or maybe she’d even mistakenly thought it was hers and taken it with her? No problem. There was another cordless phone in the kitchen, plugged into the base. She’d call Jason, then Piper, and tell them the baby was coming. She wouldn’t tell them how dizzy she was, how the black spots were swimming in front of her eyes. No need to worry them. She just needed to get the wheels in motion. Get to the hospital. The doctors and nurses would know what to do. They’d take care of her and the baby.

  “Okay,” she said, voice calm and assured. It was her mother voice. Her woman-with-a-plan voice. “There’s another cordless phone in the kitchen. Could you bring that to me, please?”

  “Sure,” Lou said, skipping out of the room.

  From here, her footsteps in the hallway sounded almost like—like scrabbling, like a dog’s nails running on wood. What kind of shoes was the kid wearing?

  In a minute, Lou was back, phone in hand, her feet bare. But there was something funny about her feet: they were terribly long, the toenails pointed. Margot blinked. Her blood pressure was affecting her vision.

  “Thanks,” she said, taking the phone from Lou. She pressed the keys to speed-dial Jason’s cell. Nothing happened. She hung up, pushed another button. There was nothing. No dial tone.

  “It’s dead,” she said lamely. They kept it plugged into the base to charge. How could the battery be dead?


  Lou had picked up the framed wedding photo of Margot and Jason that they kept on their dresser. “Jay Jay,” Lou said, smiling at the picture.

  “That’s my husband,” Margot said, flinching at Amy’s old nickname for Jason.

  Lou smiled placidly. “It’s Mommy’s friend Jay Jay.”

  The spots in front of Margot’s eyes grew larger, wavier. Another contraction rolled over her. She tried to breathe through it.

  “What else did Piper say when she called?” Lou asked. “Did they find Aunt Crystal?”

  “No, sweetie. Not yet. I’m sorry.”

  “Good,” Lou said. “She was mean. I don’t like it when people are mean to me.”

  “There’s another cordless phone in the office,” Margot said, panic starting to creep over her. “Could you go get that one for me?”

  “Yup,” Lou said; she put the photo back down and bounded out of the room. For a second, Margot thought she saw feathers woven into the back of Lou’s braid. But then Lou was back in a flash, holding the second phone in her hand. Or was it a claw? No, she didn’t have four reptilian digits where her fingers should be. She couldn’t.

  “Your hand,” Margot said. There were definitely sharp talons at the ends of Lou’s fingers.

  “What?” Lou asked, smiling, holding up her other hand, which was normal.

  Margot knew, even before she took it, that this phone was dead, too. She knew it from the way the girl smiled at her, her teeth strangely pointed, her eyes distinctly wrong now—the blue irises huge, covering any trace of white, the pupils vertical slits.

  It was as if a curtain had been dropped: everything got dark and quiet except for a strange buzzing sound in Margot’s ears. And Lou’s voice.

  “You and Piper, you’ve been so nice. You wouldn’t do anything mean, would you?”

  “Of course not,” Margot said. “I promise.”

  The girl’s face was dark now, more animal than human. Margot shook her head, sure she was seeing things.

  “Mama promised, too,” Lou said quietly, regretfully.

  “I need…” Margot said, trying to stand, but too dizzy to manage. “Help,” she mumbled, sitting back down. “I need you to go get help.”