Highland Cove

by Dylan J. Morgan

  “Shit.”

  A sibilant hiss, a single word, pierced the chapel’s gloom.

  Movement flashed through his peripheral vision. It shocked him, caused him to flinch. A blow landed, hard and fast against his throat, pain exploding across his shoulders.

  The darkened shape was gone, there for a fleeting moment only to be replaced by dense shadows once more.

  He’d never thought ghosts—if it had truly been his first encounter with a ghost—could physically harm the living.

  Julian raised his hand to where he’d been struck, to the point where a throbbing discomfort coiled through his neck. His skin felt unusually warm under his touch, or maybe his fingers were colder than he thought. Breathing in, he sucked liquid into his lungs.

  A cough erupted from his mouth, spraying a cloud through the air. The warmth at his fingers spread over his digits, ran in a strong flow over his hand. He pinched his throat tighter, and realization trickled into his senses as strength leaked from his legs.

  He mumbled Charlotte’s name, but the word gargled off the blood layering his tongue.

  Julian slumped to his knees, looked at the remains of the static camera under the pew before him, and leaned against the ruined altar.

  He closed his eyes, and felt colder than he ever had before.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Huddled in a dirty corner behind the reception desk, Kristen trembled under the grip of a fear she’d never experienced before. Acute terror pulsed through her veins with every anxious beat of her heart, a small part of her fearing the organ might rupture. Knees tucked to her chest, she stared into the lobby’s darkness and prayed for the first touch of daylight.

  In spite of the surrounding black she saw them: the young girl from the bathroom standing distraught in a corner; the figure from the bedroom, just a grey silhouette in the night; and the old lady in a bath, her decomposing body thrashing in the water as she tried to free herself.

  Kristen doubted any amount of daylight would disperse what she’d seen here. The warmest of summer days wouldn’t be enough to thaw the chill of fear burrowing deep into her bones. This asylum was a place of nightmares and she would take every horror home with her. And locked in petrified shock, she’d done the worst thing possible. She’d panicked and run, leaving Codie behind in the treatment room. She feared for his life, and she feared being here without him—especially now that the ghosts were stirring.

  In an angry flash of brilliant white, electricity split the sky beyond the slender foyer windows. The storm’s energy was intensifying, but she wasn’t sure if the lightning fuelled the spirits or if it was their power adding to the tempest’s vigour. All around the lobby’s high vaulted ceiling, shadows remained where none should be under such a blinding flash of voltage. Dark shapes coiled around the chandelier and drifted towards the floor like twisting smoke. The pulsing light imprinted shadows onto the walls, hunched shapes of anguished souls trapped in an after-world of pain. The rumbling thunder contained the haunted moans of countless tortured voices.

  She couldn’t recall how she’d ended up here, behind the reception desk. Much of her dash through the corridor had dissolved into a blur darkened by fright. Bursting through the doors into the lobby, into some sort of familiarity in this house of despair, had caused her to halt her progress; but she’d felt so open, too exposed, and sought sanctuary beneath the counter. She’d thought she might run forever: out of the door and down the sloping lawn to the sea, keep going until the cold waters swallowed her. Shivering in the blackness, she wondered how long she would remain here, alone, scared, before Codie found her. If indeed he was still alive to search for her.

  Don’t give in to those thoughts, he’s alive, he’s safe; he’s just searching for you, he doesn’t know where you’ve gone.

  Perhaps she could get up, crawl out from this inadequate hiding place and try to find him first. But that would mean she’d have to walk past the bathroom where the young girl waited; would need to traverse the dark corridor where the demented lady stalked her bedroom watching the storm rage outside. She’d have to return to the hydrotherapy room where a dead woman soaked in bath water made filthy by her decayed flesh.

  I’m losing my fucking mind.

  Lightning ruptured the thunderheads outside and bathed undulating spirits in strobes of luminescence. The young girl now sat against the wall behind the counter. Legs pulled in to her chest as Kristen had done, her lifeless eyes glared out between strands of dirty hair.

  Kristen squealed in fright, her gaze locked on the girl as darkness rushed in to swallow her figure. Would she move closer now that night concealed her? The teenager didn’t look like Jenny, but was about the same age. Was the girl attracted to Kristen because of the sorrow billowing from her in clouds? She missed her sister daily, blamed herself for not looking after her. That amount of sadness drew the young girl to her and kept her close.

  A door creaked open in the corridor and she hoped the teenager had crawled back into the bathroom.

  Thunder voiced its anger overhead, as though it were a call to the island’s demented spirits that they should make themselves known. Kristen pinched her legs closer to her chest, shielding her body, wondering when ethereal fingers would curl around her ankle. Could they hurt her? Were the ghosts able to inflict pain in retribution for the lifetime of suffering they’d experienced within these walls? Perhaps they would select her to feel the wrath of their injustice, now that the professor was dead. Dirt crunched beyond the desk, in the lobby’s heart, as footsteps edged close.

  The confined space beneath the reception desk erupted in white as the brightness of a lightning strike burned through the window behind her. It illuminated an old staple gun on a shelf, a couple of discarded pencils, and a dirty coffee mug. It highlighted decayed fingers curling over the lip of the reception desk.

  She screamed, shifting away from her safe spot under the counter. Kristen shuffled along the wall to the opposite corner, anxious to get away from the hand before its decomposed fingers curled into her hair. She stared at the point where she’d seen it; certain she’d witness a darker shadow in the night as the entity hauled itself over the counter.

  Darkness shattered as a solid beam of light flashed over the wall near her head. It passed across the floor, highlighting chunks of shattered masonry and discarded paperwork, the curled legs of a dead spider. The light folded around her, blinding on her retina causing her to shield her eyes with a trembling hand.

  “Kristen!”

  The voice kicked recognition through her fear, a flutter of hope sparking to life in her gut. She blinked into the light, seeing nothing beyond the glare.

  Is this another realm, separate from the hell showing itself to me, coming to rescue my soul?

  “Kristen, sweetheart, thank God you’re safe.”

  The glare fell from her eyes, a shape looming over her. A scream almost erupted from her lips as the figure knelt at her side, hands reaching through the dark for her. Then the dread in her mind cleared a little, and Codie’s face became clearer in the glow from his torch. His hands found her shoulders in a reassuring grip, fingers curling into her top and pulling her into his embrace. Kristen went to him willingly, wrapped her arms over his shoulders. The tears came, flooding over her lids. One of his hands smoothed her hair, the other squeezed her closer. His voice whispered in her ear, soothing and warm, chasing away her fear. The horrors wouldn’t disappear completely, but they wouldn’t plague her so much in his presence.

  “Why did you run?”

  She sniffed, remembered what had terrified her, and almost lost her senses once again. “I saw something in the room, I panicked.”

  He continued to comfort her. “What was it, Kristen? What did you see?”

  “An old lady, in the bath; she was rotten away but she was moving, trying to get out from under the sheet.”

  “Kristen, sweetheart, I looked in those baths; there was no one in there.”

  “But there was!” She looked
at him, his face almost lost in the darkness, her gaze pleading with him to believe her. “I saw her; she was trying to get to me.”

  He pulled her close again, a hand behind her head to press her face into the comforting nook of his neck, offering her protection. “I believe you, baby, I do, but she’s gone now. The old lady is gone, she won’t get to you.”

  She sobbed, and his arms pulled her closer.

  “I’ll never let anything get to you,” he whispered.

  She nodded in response, afraid that if she tried to speak hysterics would follow. She didn’t know if he believed her, wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t. Yet right now all that mattered was his embrace.

  Electricity flared outside, the light flickering behind her closed eyelids, but she dared not open them in case the young girl was there, standing over them.

  Codie planted a soft kiss on her temple. He relaxed his grip and a surge of nervous anxiety burst through her emotions. Coldness flushed in to wrap her as he moved away.

  “Come on, we need to get moving.”

  “Please don’t leave me!”

  She’d spoken louder than anticipated, but Codie simply laid a tender hand on her cheek and looked into her tear-filled eyes. “Baby, I promise I’ll never leave you. Not ever.”

  She believed him, always trusted in what he said. He’d never lied to her before, had always been a rock she could count on. They’d be together forever, throughout this life and into the next, just as he’d told her they would.

  Reaching up, she took his hand in hers and moved it to her lips, kissing his skin. “I know you won’t and I’ll never leave you either.”

  “Good.”

  The storm erupted, shattering the dark heavens with strobes of brilliant electricity. Light rebounded throughout the lobby, and Kristen glanced over Codie’s shoulders, searching for movement in the shadows. Nothing lurked behind him, the young girl no longer watched.

  “We need to get to the others,” he said. “Catch up with Julian and Alex, see if they’ve found Liam.”

  He was right; they should regroup and stick together. She only needed Codie, but perhaps would feel more secure if the other guys were with them as well. Hopefully they’d found Liam and there was a reasonable explanation as to why he’d gone missing wearing only one shoe. With any luck he wasn’t seriously injured—she liked Liam, but maybe if he had fallen and hurt himself it’d be a timely excuse to get off the island. A ripple of guilt wavered through her and she closed her eyes to the shame of her thought. It would be better for them all, better for Codie especially, if they found him in good health.

  “We’d better go,” she agreed. “We shouldn’t waste any more time.”

  “Are you okay?”

  Kristen nodded. “I’m fine—I’ll be fine. I promise I won’t freak out and run off again.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her. She ached to pull him in to her, to prolong their touch and lose herself in his embrace once more, but she resisted. Stepping away from him, she grabbed the comforting strength of his hand and allowed him to lead her into the dark.

  ~~

  Blood glimmered in the light from the torch. The smear stood clear in the pale hue of the corridor’s grime-coated wall. It started as a large smudge, tapering into nothing.

  He hadn’t expected to see it, the sight causing a frantic stab of anxiety to slash through Codie’s chest. Maybe it had been there before when they’d passed through and he simply hadn’t seen it, but something about the reflection of light in its surface called to him. He hesitated for a moment, hand grasping tight to Kristen’s as she huddled in close at his back. Her emotional state was deteriorating, the storm getting worse, and they had to make a decision about how long to wait on this island. O’Connell wouldn’t be around for another twenty-four hours, but if the storm relented they could possibly leave via the row boat. It would be an arduous trek across the strait in potentially treacherous seas, but he’d make the journey for the sake of them all.

  But, the blood . . .

  “This way,” he whispered over his shoulder, and led Kristen towards the stained wall.

  He paused at the wall, examining the bloodstain. Grains of dirt were stuck in the mess, the splatter’s outline resembling the handprint of someone palming off the wall. Not wishing to release Kristen’s grip, he reached out with his free hand and pressed two fingers into the stain.

  Sticky and pliable, it was relatively fresh.

  “Is that blood?” Kristen asked in a trembling voice.

  With a shallow nod Codie said, “Yes.”

  Letting the torch light fall away from the blemish, he looked about the floor. The dirt had been disturbed in the corridor, but they’d walked through there quite a lot since arriving here. If he had his bearings correct this hall would lead to the ground-floor chapel—they’d been in there earlier, during the walk through. Liam had been particularly excited about revisiting the area, claimed it exhibited a high degree of paranormal activity. They’d not experienced anything when they’d been there at midnight, the only thing that’d moved through the area was a cold wind laced with the odour of wet earth and rotten timber. He was pretty certain the bloodstains were not there earlier.

  “Codie, I’m scared.”

  “I know, sweetheart. I am too, but we have to find the others.”

  She squeezed his hand and it felt good. Having her with him calmed his nerves, gave him some form of inner protection. He’d been crazy with worry when he’d lost her earlier in the hydrotherapy room and he didn’t want to go through that again.

  The torch light picked out a splatter on the floor a short way along the corridor. Blood again, by the look of its shape and dark colouring. Nervous anxiety twisted his gut, and he knew they had to search the chapel.

  He walked down the corridor, picking his way through the debris. Dread escalated inside him but he didn’t want to rush down the hall in case it sparked a greater fear in Kristen. Without stopping, he stepped over the bloodstain on the floor, didn’t need to inspect it to know it was as fresh as the mark on the wall. He recognized the damaged doorway to the chapel, each step nearer eliciting a more frantic rhythm of dread in his heart. Dryness crept across his tongue; he had no spit to swallow. Sweat layered his palm, mingling with the nervous perspiration coating Kristen’s.

  Inhaling a deep breath he stepped through the broken doorway and entered the chapel.

  The gothic windows revealed thunderheads blacker and more aggressive than when he’d been woken earlier. The strait echoed the storm’s depth, and even in the darkness he saw waves folding over each other like a trough of spilt blood. Rain whipped against the glass that remained in the frames, wind screaming through gaps in a haunting moan. Nothing had changed in the chapel, its pews lined on either side and coated in a layer of dust and grime. The high ceiling sucked in the darkness and spread night thicker throughout the room. Lightning forked across the channel, laying a coating of vivid light over a figure sitting against the altar.

  “There’s someone down there,” he whispered to Kristen. He quickened his pace between the benches. “Liam?”

  The person responded, or perhaps it was just the echo of fading thunder. Codie directed the torch light on the figure, but its light had dimmed in the hours he’d been using it and it barely reached the person’s feet. Why are they sitting there? A fresh coil of dread unravelled in his gut, as he realized Liam had been hurt. Maybe he’d broken a leg, had passed out due to shock. Why hadn’t Julian and Alex seen him when they’d passed through?

  Dragging Kristen behind him, he edged past the front pews. He shook the torch, rattling the batteries, bringing a fresh spurt of life into the bulb. The beam glowed brighter, draping over the altar.

  Breath locked in Codie’s throat as he stared into Julian’s ashen face.

  Pale, his friend stared into the beam of light without registering its brightness. His arms were limp in his lap, legs curled around sections of the roof that had collapsed into the chapel. A flood
of bright red liquid spread down Julian’s chest, darkness settled into the deep laceration in his throat.

  “Holy shit,” he said, releasing Kristen’s hold as he rushed forward.

  She exclaimed something behind him: a gasp of horror, shock at what her torch light presented to her. Sinking to his knees at his friend’s side, Codie dropped his fading flashlight to the dirt and grabbed at Julian’s wrist. A deep chill pervaded his flesh, but Codie hoped that was just from the chapel’s cold atmosphere. He reached up, fingers brushing along the savage wound in Julian’s neck, a large puncture just below the jaw. Words flowed from Codie’s mouth, encouragement for his friend to hang on, although he had no idea what he actually said, the sentences coming in a flow of panic. He almost released his grip on Julian’s hand when a beat rippled under his fingertips.

  Thick like treacle, a line of blood oozed from the neck wound.

  “He’s alive!” Codie said.

  With both hands to Julian’s throat he applied pressure, hoping to staunch the blood flow, desperate to close the gash. His mind screamed that he might be choking him, but he pushed harder, anxious to press the life back into him. Julian had lost so much blood, his shirt was covered in the stuff, it had soaked into his jeans, but Codie squeezed tighter.

  “Kristen,” he whispered. “Help me.”

  She squatted at his side, laid a hand on his shoulder—she curled her fingers into Julian’s hand and held him.

  “Stay with me, man,” Codie said to Julian. “Don’t leave me.”

  Breath wheezed through Julian’s taut lips, his mouth working in subtle movements as he tried to utter forced words.

  “That’s right,” Codie said. “Keep talking to me, you’ll be fine. We’ll get you outta here, back home real soon.”

  A tear rolled from Julian’s eye, and Codie pressed harder.

  A jumble of motley images tumbled through his memory: countless evenings spent down the pub, shooting pool or playing darts, drinking beer until the landlord had no choice but to physically remove them at closing time. He remembered the way Julian’s eyes sparkled when he told him he was going to be a father for the first time. Those eyes were now faded and sullen, staring over Codie’s shoulder at the depths of darkness.