Mother of Crows

by David Rodriguez

  Well, Constance had always been kind to him. Mostly. When he visited Harwich Hall as Abby’s guest, Constance was genuinely nice, even if her brand of ‘genuine’ always felt a little phony. When he was there as an employee, she was all business. She seemed to have no problem switching between ‘hostess’ and ‘mistress of the house’, but Nate knew her, and he trusted her. He was as comfortable around her as he could be. And yet, he couldn’t do it.

  Why was this so suddenly difficult? It wasn’t likely that either Hester or Constance would answer the door. They had a butler for that. Bertram knew him. He’d probably send him right up to Abby’s room and it wouldn’t disrupt the party in the slightest.

  Nate still did not knock.

  It wasn’t quite fear that stopped him, though the ghoulish atmosphere of Halloween made everything a little eerier. He thought of the party going on inside. Was it that? He’d seen plenty of movies with rich people up to weird things, though they had to be exaggerated. He imagined Constance and Hester in long robes and strange masks, then he laughed a little. No, that wasn’t it.

  He just couldn’t knock. Every time he tried, he felt a fist clenching in his guts, twisting and wringing.

  He stepped off the porch and instantly felt better. The nape of his neck was still prickling, and his body was covered by a slick of sweat, but it was not as immediate. He moved around the side of the house. There were rose bushes planted alongside the house. He pruned the bushes himself, so he knew which windows provided any kind of view. As he pushed past the thorns, he noted they were due for another trim pretty soon.

  He grabbed the edge of the windowsill and pulled himself up like a cat in order to peer into the room, ready to drop back down if he saw one of the society women looking out the window. He expected that this room, one of the many so-called living rooms in the house, would be full of women in their best gowns, drinking champagne and chatting.

  It was empty. He frowned. That didn’t seem right at all. He hoisted himself up a little more, as though maybe everyone was short and he just wasn’t looking close enough. All the lights were on, but no one was in there.

  Nate dropped down into the flowerbed. It was just one room. It didn’t necessarily mean anything on its own. It was strange that all the lights were on, though. He looked around once more. There wasn’t even any food laid out in there.

  He went around the house to the next window. This one looked into the dining room, strictly reserved for guests of certain status. Whenever he’d eaten at Harwich Hall, it had been in Abby’s room, on the lawn, or in the kitchen. There would definitely be food in the dining room, probably on little silver trays waiting for people to serve themselves.

  Nate pulled himself up to look inside again, just as cautious as the first time.

  Empty.

  Another fully lit, empty room. He could see into the hall through the open doors across the room. No one passed by. He listened. No voices, no string quartet, no sounds of high-stakes card games, no masked orgies.

  Harwich Hall was a big place. They might be somewhere else in the house. Nate continued his trip around, hopping up into windows whenever he could. At each one, he discovered the same thing: absolutely nothing. The lights were on, but the house was as quiet as a mortuary slab. There were too many cars in the driveway and on the street; he should have seen someone. Not necessarily someone important or someone he knew, but there should have been someone, anyone, even just someone wandering the hallways looking for the bathroom. The place was as empty as empty could be.

  Nate stared at the house, wondering what to do next. It was possible Abby was home, but it didn’t seem like it. Where was she?

  Suppressing his dread, he went inside.

  23

  Eleazar Grant

  sindy couldn’t believe it. Abby had lied. And sure, Sindy had lied to her, too, on occasion, but never about anything serious and at least she had the decency to feel guilty about it! Usually, she’d talk up her family, trying to make the Endicotts sound as impressive as the Thorndikes. That was never going to happen, but she needed to try to feel equal to her friend. If Abby knew she looked up to her, she would have probably laughed.

  Sindy stormed through Coffin Manor. She didn’t know precisely what she was looking for, but it wasn’t any more explanations from Abby.

  Lied.

  About something important.

  Really important.

  And Nate! Of course Abby had told Nate. Their whole relationship was weird. Nate obviously worshiped Abby, and she knew it. She’d never actually said as much, but there was no way she could miss it. And Nate was clearly positioning himself as the nice guy that Abby would someday notice. It was dishonest and more than a little creepy, but the two of them were still peas in a pod. Still sharing secrets even she didn’t get to hear. No matter how much she tried to drag Abby out into the light, she always returned to that comforting little hole she shared with Nate.

  It was impossible, and Sindy was beginning to wonder if it was even worth it.

  Sindy stopped at one of the doorways of Coffin Manor. It was impossible to say which one, other than that it was not the front. The distinction between “side” and “back” doors was erased when the entire place was in the middle of construction. She stepped through, shivering in the chill autumn air, and found that she was not outside. She was in the skeleton of a new addition. The air was insistent with the aroma of raw wood. Plastic on the walls crinkled in the breeze. She hugged herself, stepping further into the strange, unfinished new room.

  The ceiling was vaulted. It extended a good fifty feet into the air until it just stopped. She couldn’t imagine what this place might be. Her own home, which had a street number instead of a name like ‘Harwich Hall’ or ‘Coffin Manor’, would never have anything so grand. There was a good reason for that, too.

  She wasn’t supposed to know, but Sindy had overheard her mother on the phone with the accountant. The Endicott fortune was dwindling, fast. Sindy had lingered in the doorway while her mom and the accountant talked about “options.” Her mom sounded desperate and scared. That word, “options,” was terrifying-when adults started talking about options, there were never any good ones. Any day now, Sindy expected to hear that they would have to move.

  The unfinished addition had an eerie beauty about it. The white sheets standing in for the walls made her think of ghosts. The biting autumn breeze that slithered through the gaps in the sheets carried the smells of the surrounding forest’s seasonal death. She pretended she could smell candy and the pumpkin patch set up on the edge of the O’Sullivan property. Sindy shivered again, but it was a pleasant one: the shiver of an unexpected caress.

  “Sin?” The voice came from behind her, swallowed up in the echoless chamber of the unfinished room.

  She turned. Eleazar Grant stood in the doorway. They called him Laze, but Sindy disliked it. She thought his name had a certain power to it, like all the Biblical names that had fallen out of fashion. It helped that he was a handsome boy with a tragic air about him. His long, thick, pale hair was a perfect counterpoint to her own, but his eyes were deep and nearly black, set into deep, dark pits. He always looked like he had a horrible secret that he could never tell, except maybe through poetry. He wore all black, accented by occasional bits of silver from jewelry or zippers.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “What are you doing out there?”

  She hugged herself against the cold. She found that even though she was chilly, she liked it. “Just walking around. I got lost.”

  “You look cold.” He took off his jacket and walked over, holding it out for her.

  “What about you?”

  “I’m fine.”

  She took the jacket, and inhaled the scent as she put it on. Maybe it was a stray breeze off the Atlantic, but she swore she could smell the salt off the jacket itself. She huddled into it.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “You want to go back into the party?”

 
Sindy looked through the doorway, where she could hear the thundering beats, rendered muddy by distance and obstruction. “No.”

  “Good, me neither. You mind if I stay out here, too?”

  She felt the question as a spark in her heart. She nodded, then listened to the question again in her head, and whispered, “No.”

  “You want me to get us some drinks?”

  She nodded.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  “I’ll be right here.”

  He smiled at her, and she didn’t remember seeing him smile before, or at least not like that. His eyes gobbled up the light, and shone with twin stars, before he went back inside. Sindy smiled to herself and pulled his jacket closer around herself.

  24

  Culmination of the Dream

  Abby stayed in the room alone for some time after Sindy left. She couldn’t blame her friend for what had happened. This whole mess was nobody’s business but hers, sure, but that didn’t mean she should exclude her closest friends. The three of them had an unspoken treaty. What Nate heard, Sindy heard, and vice versa. They both confided in Abby, but not in each other. As they’d grown up, Nate and Sindy had grown further and further apart. Lately, that distance had been accelerating. Sindy wanted to spend all her time with Bryce and his friends. Nate hated them.

  Her little group was clinging together on borrowed time. Abby thought she might have just blown it up. She didn’t want to choose between Nate and Sindy, even if in a small way she already had. Somehow, she could make this work. She could be friends with Nate, and Sindy, and Bryce.

  She’d dreamt of being in Bryce’s house for years, but she hadn’t planned on being alone while a party blared all around her. She wanted to run back to the simple comfort of Nate’s company. They could watch his movies, make caramel corn, and give candy to all the cute kids from the neighborhood. In this big, loud, alienating place, it sounded like the best thing in the world.

  Abby began to feel like she wasn’t in the house at all. She wished for her mom. All she wanted was a little bit of acknowledgement. Constance had never been the warmest woman, but she could be counted on for a hug, a kiss, and a kind word when it was needed… except during functions for the Daughters of Arkham.

  Abby made up her mind. She was going to walk out to the road and call Nate. She’d tell him everything, apologize for the lie, and face the music. He would be mad, but he’d take her home. She would feel guilty, but at least she would feel like a person. She could fall back into tradition and eventually the two of them would feel so much better.

  She sped up as she walked through the house. She had only a vague idea of where she was going. Harwich Hall was all right angles and regular rooms; you could predict where you might end up. Coffin Manor was this bizarre mutant house that sprouted rooms and hallways at random. Abby wondered if even Bryce or his mother knew their way around. Maybe the ever-expanding grounds were just as much a mystery to the people who lived here as they were to her.

  Abby followed the music, hoping to find an exit, but the hallways just kept branching and turning. How she had found that empty room? She didn’t even know how she could get back to it, now. She felt like she was walking through one of her nightmares.

  A strange memory blasted into her consciousness: the night of the carnival, running through the woods, thorns raking her face. She paused, trying to understand what she was seeing, trying to remember what she had been running from. Nothing came. It was a faceless menace, and she couldn’t even be certain it was a physical thing. It felt like the night itself, swallowing up everything behind her in blackness.

  Just as her memories had been.

  She emerged into the front hall. The door was still open. The pathway to the gate shone in the moonlight.

  “There you are.”

  She turned and saw Bryce. He was shining with sweat from the dance floor, and his smile was utterly brilliant. Abby’s knees turned to jelly. “Hey. I was just…”

  “Don’t tell me you were going.”

  “Um. Okay?”

  “I was looking for you. Heard you were around, but couldn’t find you.”

  She curtsied and instantly felt silly. “Here I am.”

  “Come on. Let’s dance.”

  She couldn’t have refused him if she tried, and she didn’t want to. She took his hand, warm and comforting, and allowed him to draw her close. He grinned at her, and she could think of nothing else.

  25

  Alone

  The front door was unlocked, but Nate didn’t know if rich people ever locked their doors. He wondered if wrought-iron gates and privilege was enough of a shield for them. There wasn’t much crime in Arkham, but Nate wouldn’t have left his front door unlocked under any circumstance. His parents had drilled him quite thoroughly about the ever-present threats of kidnappers and perverts, and when his parents weren’t home, he had to look out for Veronica.

  The door only creaked a little as he eased it open. It was a normal sound and somehow that was worse than the sepulchral groan of a haunted house. He would have preferred to confirm his assumption that this place was empty, haunted, and someone else’s problem.

  Abby was sick. He couldn’t let a perfectly normal door creak stop him.

  “Hello?” he called, though he knew that Bertram would have answered him if he were there.

  There was no sound.

  The front hallway was all dark woods and even darker paint. The art on the wall had a distinctly American feel with bold landscapes and dying soldiers. The light, provided by antique glass lamps, always made Nate think of a library. He waited in the doorway, not wanting to venture any further inside. It was like there was one of those force fields from Star Trek barring his way inside. He strained to hear any sound beyond his own breathing. The house was utterly silent. Harwich Hall was big, but the sounds of a party should have carried to front hallway. He couldn’t hear the tinkle of glassware. There were no conversations, no clicking of heels on the hard wood.

  “Abby?”

  If she responded, that would be permission to enter. Nate could see Abby’s room from where he stood. The light was off, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t home. He looked at the stairs, but still he didn’t move.

  The silence had somehow grown louder. Intellectually, he knew that he was hearing the rhythmic thump-squish of blood rushing through his head, but holding onto rational thought was a battle he was on the verge of losing. The silence had become something else, something just on the edge of recognizable. It moved and scraped at the extreme range of his senses.

  Nate looked down at the threshold again. This was ridiculous. The only barrier here was in his mind. There was no one inside the house; he was hearing blood, and wind, and absolutely nothing else. He couldn’t help himself, though; the superstitious, monkey part of his mind saw a predator in every shadow.

  Where was the party?

  The party at Harwich Hall every Halloween was something he accepted on faith. He had never seen the party, but he knew it was there. And since the party guaranteed Abby to him for one night of the year, it never occurred to him to doubt its existence. He imagined it was the way his mother thought about God.

  He turned around, halfway convinced that the cars would be gone. They were all still lined up end-to-end with only scant inches in between. He could see the dim outlines of other cars parked down the street, too. Tons of people had arrived at this party… and then they’d vanished.

  Nate looked into the house again. Everything seemed to be telling him to walk away. He could take the sandwiches home and share them with his sister. Veronica was probably stuffed full of candy and could use some real food. But, Abby might be inside. He wouldn’t leave if there was a chance to see her.

  He shivered and took a step over the threshold. The thrill of this simple act staggered him. He wasn’t breaking in. Not really. Not even legally. The door was unlocked and he had called out twice.

  “Abby?” he said again. Superstition sa
id that three was a magical number; it warded off danger.

  There was still no response. Nate could feel something deep in the house listening to him. He knew it was there. Nate didn’t know if it was waiting patiently for prey or if it worried it would be discovered.

  He took another step inside. This was it. He was too far from the doorway to claim this had been an accident. Nate forced himself to take another three steps, then he headed directly for the staircase. He stepped lightly. This isn’t exactly sneaking, he told himself. Thieves sneak. I’m just delivering sandwiches.

  The house didn’t look familiar to him anymore; everything had taken on a strange and otherworldly air. The paintings almost seemed to move. The furniture cast shadows that were too long and the curtains billowed and swelled with what Nate assumed was murderous intent. He tried his best to concentrate on the task at hand, but he couldn’t. The persistent tingle on the back of his neck kept telling him that someone was right behind him. Whenever he turned to look, there was nothing.

  He walked-almost-ran up the stairs, stepping as close to the wall as he could to minimize the creaking. Abby had taught him that trick. Sneaking upstairs right now seemed both wrong and necessary. If there really was something-no, someone, if there were someone-in the house, he thought it would be best if he passed unnoticed. If someone was here, it wasn’t the Thorndikes or their servants. This was something-dammit, someone-else.

  Best do this quickly and get out.