The Amber Light (Black Acres Book 3)

by Ambrose Ibsen

  Groggily, wiping her eyes, she stepped into the kitchen and was partially blinded by the lights. She yawned and headed for the cellar door. That was when Julian first noticed her.

  “Oh, hey, what've you been up to?” he asked, setting down his sledge and wiping at his brow. A thin haze of dust drifted about the room. His clothing was matted down in debris and sweat and his face was red for the exertion. “Napping all this time?”

  She nodded, opening the cellar door and peering down into the darkened depths. She drew out her phone and switched on the flashlight, making her way down the stairs.

  “Where you going?” he asked, scratching at his dusty, golden hair. “I was thinking maybe it'd be a good time for dinner. Think you could start some pizzas while I knock out this last panel?”

  “Uh-huh,” she replied vacantly. She was focused exclusively on the way ahead, on the heavy door that sat ajar at the foot of the stairs. She hadn't come down to make chit-chat or to prepare his dinner. Julian didn't understand. He simply never understood these things. He was so unsupportive of her. Rather than explain to him what she was doing, she flipped on the cellar light and called up to him with a lie. “Just going to throw a little laundry in the washer. I'll start the food when I'm done.”

  This seemed to please him, and he wandered off into the kitchen again, taking a swig from a water bottle and resuming his noisy work.

  Kim didn't care. From down here everything was muffled. Slipping through the doorway, she entered the nursery and raised her light, seeking out the control panel on the wall. It was strange; every prior visit to this space had filled her with fear. But not this time. On this occasion she felt comfortable. Perhaps it was because she'd been down there so much in recent days. Maybe she was used to it. It now seemed the most unthreatening place in the world; a bunch of old, dusty furniture, an endearing painting. As she reached out to the panel and flipped the first switch, she couldn't understand what she'd ever found frightening about the space.

  Did the Amber Light still work? What would happen if she used these controls, flipped both of the switches? It was what Dakota had asked of her, and Kim had to know. She simply had to know. The fixture was old. She remembered seeing it in the woods, amongst the trees, its body flecked in rust for the years of weathering. But, she thought, maybe it would work. There could be no telling what it would do when it was on, but this seemed to her a necessary action. It was an itch that needed badly scratched.

  She flipped the second switch and then stepped back. Sighing with satisfaction, Kim turned off the light on her phone and stood in the nursery, basking for a moment in the almost perfect darkness of the space. She was pleased with herself. She'd done something good here, had done what Dakota had asked, and maybe something would happen because of it. Kim wanted to make Dakota happy, to make peace with this force about the property that'd hitherto left her shaken.

  As she left the room and started back up the stairs, Kim whistled a brief tune. It was drowned out by the beat of Julian's hammer from the kitchen. She cocked her head to the side as she finished. The tune felt familiar to her somehow, but where she'd heard it she was unsure. She laughed nervously to herself. It felt out of place on her lips.

  Chapter 6

  For the first time in a long while, Kim felt happy.

  The two of them sat in the living room, the contents of the kitchen spilling out all around them, enjoying a meal of beer and pizza. They'd turned on a movie. It was an old drama, some award-winner from the past year. She didn't really pay it much mind, reveling instead in the new knowledge she'd gained. Ordinarily she would have been one to question the veracity of information gained through dreams. Not so with this cache of knowledge, however. The forces about the property had reached out to her and bridged the gaps in her understanding. She'd more or less solved the riddle of the previous owners; the reasons they'd stopped leaving the house as the years wore on, the purpose of the room in the cellar. And of those things she didn't have answers for, she could make educated guesses.

  The story, as far as she could tell it, was that the Reeds had built this house when they were young, had lived in it for some years before coming upon a baby in the woods. They'd kept the child a secret from everyone they knew, probably because they feared some stigma, and then took to caring for the child. Then, when the child, seemingly rambunctious, was old enough, it ran away from home and they spent the bulk of their time in the house waiting for its return.

  There were details, though, which she couldn't account for in this neat little narrative, details which she found herself pushing out of her mind. These details; the masked onlookers in the woods, the religious paraphernalia in the cellar, the fact that Marshall had, supposedly, buried their child in that makeshift grave near the woods, were things she could not place in the chronology for fear that they might suggest other, more ominous events. She took to dismissing them each as she nibbled on a crust of pizza, legs crossed.

  She'd seen the photograph of the masked subjects, probably taken some Halloween many years ago, and in her earlier, worried state, she'd glimpsed things out in the yard that weren't really there. Then there was the matter of the visitation outside, the night she'd been led out of the house by a phantasm masquerading as her husband. Dakota had wished to make contact with her, that was all. And the religious items were commonplace enough. Perhaps they'd been gifts, or intended as gifts, and simply left behind in the chamber by the couple. Dakota's assertion that Marshall had buried the child near the woods, well, that was frankly impossible. It would have constituted murder. And then, there was the fact that she herself had investigated that grave and found a tunnel issuing from the pit. No human being, much less a child, could possibly dig through so much earth to free itself. There was no way Dakota had actually meant that. Kim had misremembered, or her dreaming mind had taken liberties with that specific bit of information.

  Everything was falling together nicely. With a little effort she could easily explain the events that'd left her ill at ease during their time at the house. It all seemed so ordinary to her now, so comfortable by comparison. She had her answers and was pleased. Virtually everything, except for what'd happened to the Reeds, was known to her, but she now found her curiosity ebbing away. Her hunger over that specific tidbit had waned. It might have sounded strange, but Kim felt a kind of sisterhood with Dakota. Dakota's life had been one with no shortage of frustrations, and having to deal with an unsupportive husband was something that Kim had grown to know well since moving into the Beacon estate. Reading the journal, having her series of fevered dreams, Kim felt she knew Dakota better than any of her friends had known her in life. She was no longer frightened, holding only pity in her heart for the old pair who'd likely gone on waiting till the end of their days for their runaway child. Maybe, she thought, the elderly pair had gone looking for the child in the woods and had gotten lost, possibly hurt, never to emerge again. That was probably what'd happened.

  Kim had spent her first weeks in the house running away. She'd reacted with fright and outrage whenever Dakota made herself known, whenever the forces about the property revealed something new to her. That'd been the wrong attitude entirely. Had she only done the opposite, acted warm and open to the mourning spirits of the Beacon estate, then perhaps she'd have saved herself a good deal of grief. Following Dakota's lead, listening to her whims, would have been the smarter thing to do.

  It occurred to her, too, that in listening to what Dakota had to say, Kim could help her spirit move on. Kim had seen the tortured soul of Dakota with her own eyes; some aspect of the woman still lingered here, wandering the halls late at night, communicating through dreams. If Kim could stay the course and listen, then she could help Dakota move into the next life after eight years of isolation and suffering. From that point on, she resolved to keep her wits about her, to remain understanding to the spirit's plight and to do her best to assist. There was no telling what Dakota might ask for, but if Kim kept an open mind, then perhaps she wouldn
't see it fit to resort to fright tactics like she'd been doing.

  Julian was exhausted from the day's work. Having guzzled a few beers and eaten some pizza, he laid back on the sofa and began nodding off, eventually settling against the armrest and snoring lightly. She smiled, throwing a knit blanket over the top of him and shutting off the television. Stretching out herself, she placed her heels up on the edge of a nearby coffee table and picked up one of her books.

  This, she thought, is what it felt like to truly live in a home. More and more she was becoming excited about their future there, about the possibilities that awaited them. Her finger still ailed her, but as soon as it'd fully healed, she'd be able to help Julian with the renovations. She shared his vision now, looked forward to fixing up the house and making it theirs. With nothing left to fear, she possessed only the warmth of happiness in her breast.

  For about an hour Kim sat and read by lamplight. She'd set her book aside and patted Julian on the arm with the intention of going to bed, when her gaze was drawn towards the kitchen. She perked up a little, incredulous.

  There'd been three, firm knocks at the back door.

  Kim wondered if she wasn't imagining things, but the fact that Julian himself had sit up and taken notice, along with the utter solidity of the noises, reassured her. Someone was knocking at their back door. It was well after dark, so that she couldn't imagine having company of any kind. She felt the familiar stirrings of dread well up inside her but did her best to subdue them. Relax, she thought. It's probably nothing pressing; someone's gotten lost out here and is asking for directions. Or, if it is something... supernatural, well, Dakota knows you're on her side.

  It was at that moment that she remembered the Amber Light. She'd gone into the basement to flip the switches some hours ago, just as Dakota had asked. She tensed. Had the light actually worked? Had it subsequently drawn someone... or something... from the woods? She cracked a nervous smile and looked to her husband, who was standing up.

  “I'll check it out,” said Julian, his grogginess banished at once. He approached the door firmly, straightening his clothes and narrowing his gaze. “It was this door back here, wasn't it?” he asked as he crossed into the kitchen.

  “Yeah, I think so,” replied Kim. She was up and following him in the next moment, keeping just a few feet behind.

  Pausing before the back door, Julian reached over and plucked a crowbar from the floor where he'd earlier been doing work with it. Grasping it firmly in one hand, he hovered by the door with obvious hesitance until a second sequence of firm knocks, three in all, started him and he moved to open it. “Stay back,” he said to her as he unlocked the deadbolt and gripped the handle.

  Julian opened the door, his other hand twitching as he did so and the crowbar ready to fly into action at any moment.

  Then, a few seconds and a few curious glances later, Julian took a couple of steps outside. “Hello?” he said quietly.

  Kim walked up to the door, looking out into the cool, dark night. There was no one there. “What in the world?” she muttered. “Was anyone there?”

  He shook his head. “Nah, doesn't look like it.” He looked this way and that, first out to the woods, then to his right and left. There was no one. Julian scratched at his head and sighed, loosing a nervous chuckle. “You know, that's really damn weird.” He cleared his throat, taking a step back and looking up to the moonlit sky. “I opened the door just as the knocking was going on; if someone did knock, then there's just no way they'd be able to disappear that quickly. I'd have caught a glimpse of them running towards the woods, or walking around the house or something.”

  “Maybe it was someone looking for directions,” she ventured. “Maybe a car broke down on the main road, or...” She trailed off, her limbs growing tense at the passage of an unnaturally chill breeze. It wafted in through the door, hanging about her frame for a rather long while before dissipating into the kitchen. She felt her hair standing on end, as though something had just shifted in the space immediately before her. She knew the space between her and the door to be empty, but had felt the new presence nonetheless. Julian was pacing about the lawn, looking around for the source of the knocking and apparently oblivious to the chill. Kim shuddered, looking behind her, towards the cellar door, and then the living room, wondering if some unseen trespasser hadn't just walked by.

  The house had fallen still. Completely. Not a floorboard creaked, not a pipe rattled. It was a sepulchral quiet, unlike anything she'd ever known in the house. Even in the dead of night, when both of them were asleep, she couldn't remember it ever being this quiet. Tonguing her molars pensively, she found she didn't care for it one bit. She crossed her arms and waited for Julian to come back inside.

  Pointing out into the distance, Julian came back towards the door, stealing a glance her way and stepping aside to let her through. “Say, what is that out there?” He paused, squinting. “Maybe it's just me, but the woods look a lot brighter than normal. Don't they? Could be that the moon is hitting them just right. I dunno what to make of it.”

  Taking a step forward, Kim looked out towards the woods, studying the treeline for a time. That was when she realized it, her heart fluttering. The Amber Light... it worked. It really worked. She shook her head and denied it, saying that they looked the same way they always did. Julian dropped it, unconcerned, and reentered the house. But Kim hesitated at the threshold for a brief time, her eyes glued to the faint amber glow that dwelt between the trunks of the dense trees like the flickering candlelight of a jack-o-lantern. It was unmistakable.

  When lit up in this way, the woods seemed to take on a new characteristic. They were given a kind of life, their solid trunks subtly animated. She closed the door behind her and suggested they go to bed.

  Even as she changed into pajamas and made her way across the bedroom, she caught hints of the ethereal amber glow issuing from the woods through the closed curtains. Burning like a beacon out there, its rusted shape casting an eerie light in those woods where light was such an oddity, was the fixture the Reeds had installed in the hopes of drawing their runaway child back to the house.

  It was when she laid her head upon her pillow and fought to get to sleep that Kim recalled a detail out of her dream. She remembered Dakota's complaint that Marshall was unsupportive; unsupportive because he claimed their child was not a child at all, but something else.

  She sighed deeply. Of course it'd been a child. Kim had seen the photograph herself.

  And, if the Reeds hadn't installed that light in the dark woods to lead their child back home, then... what, she wondered, could they have hoped to guide to the property?

  It was unwise to dwell on such a thing considering the hour. Kim forced it from her mind, but still her wandering thoughts returned to that territory, until sleep overcame her.

  Chapter 7

  The night passed without incident. There'd been no other disturbances, no dreams. The pair had slept soundly into the early afternoon and risen refreshed.

  Still, as she considered her mug of coffee, Kim felt that something was awry.

  Having felt comfortable around the house the previous day, and pleased with having learned more about its previous owners, she'd been confident that she could now put the property's “bad vibes” behind her. And yet, here they were, all the same, and with renewed gusto. Something was different in the air, and it wasn't solely the clouds of dust that Julian's noisy, constant work on the kitchen floors was producing. The air, even from her spot in the living room, felt heavy, unsuitable for breathing. She stirred her coffee for a minute, let more steam pour off of the top before chancing a careful sip.

  It tasted awful to her, the bitterness nigh overwhelming. She'd made it the same way she always did, had used the same beans and water in the same proportions. Glancing around at the crowded living room, the piles of dishes upon the relocated dinner table, stacks of boxed foods filling a nearby chair, she wondered at the source of this new unease. It wasn't new, exactly, but i
t was different. She'd thought herself through with all of this dread, but its newest incarnation hit her from somewhere far closer than ever before. There'd been a sea change in the house overnight, ever since the queer knocking at the back door the previous evening. She recalled the way she'd felt a profound cold wash over her, the way her senses had tracked movement where her eyes could find none.

  Kim was jumpier this morning than she had been for quite some time. Julian's pounding and grunting in the kitchen did little to calm her nerves. More than once she'd startled, staining the bandage on her finger with fresh coffee. Sitting on the edge of the sofa, fidgeting, she tried to remember what she'd done the previous day, or the day before. Each day in her memory ran into the last, however, and in searching through her thoughts she could suss out only the highlights, usually curious or frightening. Anything that didn't deal with the house or the Reeds became blotted out and obscured. Dinners with Julian, books she'd read; none of that could enter her focus.

  Palming at her forehead, Kim continued to fidget, her toes tapping against the rug in a nervous dance. She felt like her head was elsewhere, as if she'd somehow become disembodied and the act of rejoining her body and mind was too difficult. Something was in the way, scrambling her thoughts and making her feel sapped of intelligence. Maybe she'd eaten something off, or gotten too drunk the previous night. No, you hardly drank then, didn't you? She doubted her memories of the previous night's dinner, counted, then recounted her memory of the beers she'd consumed.

  It didn't matter.

  Setting her coffee down amidst the clutter of a side table, Kim rose in a huff and ascended the stairs. Entering the master bath, she switched on the light and pulled out the first-aid kit. It was time to change her bandage, the white gauze still damp with lukewarm coffee. Tugging away the old bandage, she threw it in the waste bin before applying an antiseptic spray and tugging open a new patch of gauze. The digit was healing well, and had clotted evenly, but it was still hot and red around the wound. She carefully applied the gauze, wrapping it around the tip of her finger, and then finished it up with some paper tape as before.