The Dark Princess said …
Sorry! TTYL
Balthazar’s-Arm-Candy said …
Peace.
Amber logged out, turned off the iPad, and let it drop on to the bed. Little by little, they were robbing her of every last semblance of normality, stripping her of every last link to her old life. She didn’t even know who she was anymore. Everything her personality had been built on was a lie, and the more she examined it, the more it crumbled beneath her gaze.
If she wasn’t a beloved daughter, and if she wasn’t an only child, then who was she? Ten days ago, Amber Lamont had been a good person. But now she was someone who’d bitten off a finger. Now she was someone with a pair of jeans soaked in the black blood of a man whose chest she’d caved in.
Now she didn’t know who she was.
WHEN AMBER CAME DOWN for dinner, her place was set at a large, long table, next to Glen’s and across from Milo’s. Another guest was joining them, an attractive, dark-haired woman in her thirties.
“Company!” the woman said, clearly delighted. “I haven’t had company while eating for ages! Are you staying long?”
“Probably not,” said Amber. “We’re on a family road trip. This is my cousin Glen, my dad Milo, and I’m Amber.”
“Very pleased to meet you,” said the woman. “I’m Veronica. Have you travelled far?”
“We’ve been on the road for a few days,” Milo said. “What about you?”
Veronica gave them all quite a beautiful smile. “I actually live here. Not in the hotel, but Cascade Falls. Well, I did. I thought I’d bought a place but it fell through at the last minute, and I’ve already sold my old house, so here I am, destitute. Destitute in a lovely hotel, but still … destitute.”
“Why are you moving?” Amber asked. “It’s such a beautiful place.”
“It is,” said Veronica, “it really is. And I’m going to miss it, but sometimes you just have to –” she fluttered her fingers – “leave.”
“I noticed some closed-down stores,” Milo said. “Does that have anything to do with it?”
Veronica shrugged. “Maybe. A few of my friends have moved away recently, a few more are about to follow them … No single reason, though. It’s still a great place to live. We just … I don’t know. We want somewhere new. So where are you from?”
“Georgia,” said Milo. “My wife and I split up, and this trip is our father-daughter time.”
“Father-daughter and cousin,” said Glen quickly.
“How nice,” Veronica said. “And your wife was okay with taking Amber out of school for this?”
Milo hesitated for just a moment too long, and Amber jumped in. “When he says they split up, what he means is, Mom passed away last year. Visiting all her favourite places is our way of saying goodbye.”
“Oh no,” said Veronica. “Oh, I’m so sorry.”
“Not at all,” said Milo, shooting a look at Amber.
“I’m from Ireland,” said Glen.
Veronica nodded and smiled, and didn’t say anything to that.
Glen looked mystified. He started to speak again – probably to repeat what he’d just said in the hope of a different reaction – when the doors opened and a man entered. Tall, astonishingly so, with broad shoulders and narrow hips, accentuated by the grey fitted coat he wore – tight around the midsection, then flowing to the floor. His trousers were black, his legs long, his arms long, even his fingers were long. He was handsome, had the complexion of a man who spent his time indoors, and his black hair was swept off his high forehead in an exaggerated widow’s peak. He had a long nose, cheekbones like knife cuts, and twinkling dark eyes under a heavy brow.
“Miss Cartwright,” he said, smiling. His accent was foreign, and unfamiliar to Amber. “It is a pleasure to see you, as always. And our newest guests – my deepest apologies for not being here to greet you upon your arrival. My name is Johann Varga, the owner of this hotel. I trust your time with us so far has been pleasant?”
“It has,” said Milo. “Thank you.”
“Have you travelled far?” Varga asked.
“It doesn’t seem like it,” said Milo, sounding genuinely friendly. “We’ve only been here a few hours, but even we can see that a town like Cascade Falls really rejuvenates a person, body and soul.”
“Doesn’t it?” Varga said. “A most peaceful place we have here. We are all quite rightly proud.”
“You should be,” Milo said, smiling.
Varga nodded his appreciation. “Alas, I have business to attend to. I hope to talk to you all again. For now, I bid you goodnight.”
Amber joined the polite chorus that responded, and Varga left, drawing the doors closed behind him.
“Lovely man,” said Veronica. “He does a lot for the town. It wouldn’t be what it is today without him, and he never asks for anything in return. Sometimes I wonder what it must be like to be that selfless …”
“I like to do charity work,” said Glen.
Veronica took her eyes away from Milo, and smiled like she was interested. “What kind?”
Glen shrugged. “It varies. I volunteer at homeless shelters and animal rescue places, mostly. Cancer research. That sort of thing.”
“You have no particular charity that’s close to your heart?”
Glen adjusted his sitting position. “Well, I mean, yeah, I do. The main one, the main charity I do work for, is oil spills. Y’know when you see all those people in waterproofs cleaning seagulls and wildlife? That’s me. I’ve always loved wildlife and I live near the sea back in Dublin, so it’s pretty handy.”
“Do you get a lot of oil spills in Dublin?”
“Uh, well, not really, no. But I’m always there if a whale gets beached, or whatever.”
“Oh? What do you do when that happens?”
“Well, I … I push it back into the sea.”
Veronica nodded, and waited for him to say more. When it became clear that he had nothing else to add, she turned back to Milo, and Glen frowned and sank a little lower in his chair.
After dinner, Amber took a shower in the bathroom down the hall from her room. It was a quaint affair and while, on the whole, she much preferred hotels that had bathrooms, it was still better than some of the motels they’d had to stay in so far.
She dried herself off, dressed in pyjamas, and bundled up her clothes, balancing her shoes on top. The carpet was soft under her bare feet as she walked to her room. Rounding the corner, she heard voices, and Milo and Veronica came into view, headed for Milo’s room. They saw her and stopped. She blinked.
Eventually she said, “Just had a shower.”
Milo nodded. “Good.”
“How was the water?” Veronica asked.
“Hot,” said Amber.
Milo nodded again, like this was an important piece of information he needed to file away. “Okay, well, see you in the morning.”
“Yes, you will,” Amber replied. “Goodnight.”
Veronica gave her a beautiful smile, and Amber watched them both disappear into Milo’s room.
She got to her own room and locked the door, then put her clothes on the chair. Then she stood in the middle of the room and frowned.
She had to admit, it was weird seeing Milo and Veronica … together. She found herself actually surprised, probably because the kind of things she associated with Milo were danger and fear and, to a possibly worrying degree, death. It had never occurred to her that he might have normal feelings behind all that alert coolness. She was even disappointed, in a way. She would have thought that someone like Veronica, as undeniably sexy as she was, would have had no effect on him. Amber had expected him to be above that sort of thing.
She laughed to herself at how prudish she sounded. He was a grown man, and he was allowed to do whatever he wanted, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with her.
She crossed to her bed, pulled the covers back, and slipped between them. The sheets were crisp, and she smiled. Nothing better than a freshly
made bed. The pillow was cool, and she sank back into it. Not too soft, not too firm. Just right, as Goldilocks had said. She looked up at the ceiling, an off-white without any cracks.
Her smile faded.
She thought about Dacre Shanks, being digested in the trunk of the Charger. She thought about the Charger itself, and what manner of beast it was. She thought about Heather Medina and her father, wondered how they were. She thought of Gregory Buxton’s mother, and what they were going to do if they couldn’t convince her to help them. And she thought of her parents.
Most of all, she thought of her parents.
When tears came to her eyes, she rubbed them away and turned out the light. She dozed, then woke and lay there, changing position every few minutes.
Finally, she rolled on to her back again and listened to the hotel. It creaked softly. Groaned. Doors opened and closed. She heard muted footsteps. Muted voices. A dimmed world beyond these four walls, a world that was not about her, a world that didn’t concern itself with her fears or her troubles. A world that would not mourn her passing, yet neither would it celebrate. An indifferent world. Uncaring. A world that reduced her to a speck.
Amber sat up. “Well, that’s depressing,” she muttered aloud.
She turned on the light and got up. She drew back the curtains, then opened the window and leaned out, breathing in the night air. She liked how cool it was. The air actually made her shiver. She allowed herself a smile, let herself enjoy the sensation.
There was movement below her – a window opening. Amber watched with mild amusement as someone else leaned out to experience the night in the same way as her. All she could see was the top of the guest’s head. Maybe this was a thing people felt compelled to do here – look out across town and contemplate life.
Another window opened, and another head poked out. Then another, and the top of yet another guest’s head. Amber stifled a giggle, remembering clips she’d seen from an old game show called Hollywood Squares. She resisted the urge to call out to them, let them share in the joke. But her smile faded when she watched the guests climb out of the windows, clinging to the wall, face down, before they let themselves drop into the darkness below.
Something blurred by to her left – someone dropping from a window above. She turned, looked up, straight into the face of Varga himself as he clung to the brickwork, his coat billowing behind him, his eyes wild and boring into hers. Then he released his hold on the wall and plummeted towards her.
AMBER SHRIEKED AND WHIPPED her head back, and Varga fell past her window.
She shut it quickly, backed away, then left the room, running to Milo’s.
She slammed her fist against the door. “Milo, open up! Milo!”
Glen emerged from his room. “Amber? What’s going on?”
“We have to leave. Varga’s … I don’t know what he is. But there’s others like him, and we have to get out of here before they … do something.”
Glen nodded. “You’re not making a whole lot of sense, you know.”
Amber ignored him, twisting the handle of Milo’s door. To her surprise, it opened, and she ran in. The room was empty. The bed hadn’t been slept in.
Amber’s fingers curled in her hair. “Did you see him?”
“See who?” asked Glen.
“Milo! Who else? Did you see him?”
“Since dinner? No. Did you?”
“I saw him heading in here, with her.”
“Her who?”
“The woman, Veronica.”
Glen looked dismayed. “She went off with Milo? Aw man. She was giving me the eye all evening.”
“She barely looked at you.”
“That’s called being coy.”
Amber brushed past him, ran back to her room. Glen tried coming in after her, but she pushed him out.
“I’m getting dressed,” she said. “Wait there. Tell me if you see anyone.”
She slammed the door, ripped off her pyjamas and pulled on her clothes. When she was done, she left the room and hurried down the stairs.
“Can you please tell me what’s going on?” Glen asked, right behind her.
Amber put a finger to her lips, and he scowled and shut up.
She crept through the hotel, noting for the first time how quiet it suddenly was, like it was holding its breath. There was no one at the front desk. She turned to share a look with Glen, but he was completely oblivious to how creepy it all was.
“Can I talk now?” he asked.
She hissed, and hit him, and he scowled again and rubbed his arm.
She led the way to the rear of the hotel. By now, even Glen had noticed how unnatural the silence was.
“Where is everyone?” he whispered.
Amber didn’t answer.
They got to the small door leading to the parking area in the courtyard. The few feeble lights outside did little to dispel the encroaching darkness, but Amber really had no choice. She counted to three, then lunged from the hotel. Nothing jumped out at her, thank God. She ran to the hedge and stopped, her feet kicking up a shower of little stones. Glen almost bumped into her.
“Oops, sorry,” he said. “What’s wrong? Why— Hey, where’s the car?”
“He’s gone,” Amber said softly.
Glen walked to the middle of the courtyard, like that would give him a vantage point from which to see the missing Charger. “Where? Where’s he gone? Do you think he has Veronica with him? We should have a rule in future. The I saw her first rule. Y’know, it would have been me, but I’m too much of a gentleman to make a move so soon.”
From overhead, a fluttering.
Amber looked up. The lights in the courtyard made the darkness above an impenetrable shroud of starless black.
She turned her head, following the fluttering as it moved from right to left. Then another, from in front to behind. More fluttering, getting closer and closer and then swooping up and away.
The fluttering not of feathers, or of wings, but of clothes.
“Glen,” Amber whispered.
Glen stood there with his hands on his hips. “Milo knew I liked her. It was obvious. Maybe it’s an Irish thing, but guys do not do that to each other. That is uncool.”
“Glen.”
“When he gets back, we’re going to have a talk. Man to man.”
“Glen, get inside,” Amber said, her voice flat.
From above, a giggle.
Glen looked round. “You hear that?”
“Get inside, Glen.”
Frowning, he watched her as she backed up to the door. The darkness was alive around them. On either side, a dreadful whispering, gleeful and mocking, while above, that fluttering. Always the fluttering.
Amber stepped backwards into the hotel, holding the door open for Glen as he came after her. He was frowning as he walked, kept turning his head. The darkness rippled above him. She saw shapes moving. The whispering got louder. Louder. There was laughter now – cruel and malicious laughter. Glen stopped looking around and fixed his eyes on Amber. He was terrified. His face trembled, like he was holding in a scream, like he was getting ready to bolt.
On either side of him, people were stepping from the shadows. An old man with white hair. A middle-aged woman with a pearl necklace. A young man with acne. More and more. They all wore identical smiles.
Then the shadows moved and something reached down from above and Amber grabbed Glen and yanked him inside, slammed the door and pressed her back to it.
Instant silence.
Except for Glen.
“Ohhhh my God! Holy crap! Would you look at my arms? See the goosebumps? What the hell was that? That was creepy! Oh yikes, y’know?”
He rubbed his arms and the back of his neck and laughed. “This place gets to you after a while, doesn’t it?”
Amber stared at him. “Did you not see them?”
“See who?”
“The people.”
“Where?”
“Out there! We were surrounded!”
/> “Uh, we were the only two out there, Amber …”
“They were about to grab you!”
“Who were?”
“The people! You heard them!”
“That was the wind. It was all creepy and spooky and scary and, y’know … The wind.”
“That was voices. That was people whispering and laughing.”
“It did sound like laughing.”
“And what about the people flying?”
“Flying? What?”
“They were going to grab you!”
Glen put both hands on her shoulders, and said with an irritatingly soothing tone, “Amber, we’re freaked out. The hotel is empty and Milo has taken off and we haven’t a clue what the hell’s going on, but we have to try to remain calm. If we let our imaginations run away with us, then we’re—”
“Screw you,” said Amber, walking past him.
“I didn’t mean anything bad,” Glen said, following. “Where are you going?”
“To my room. I’m going to barricade the door and wait till morning.”
“Yeah, a good night’s sleep is probably best.”
“Shut up, Glen.”
She climbed the stairs.
“Hey, I get it,” he said. “You’re scared. I get it, I do. Maybe if you change into your, y’know, other self, you mightn’t be so freaked out. You might be able to calm down.”
“Calming down is not a good idea when we’re in danger. We have to stay frightened and alert.”
“I agree,” said Glen. “And I believe you. I believe that we’re in danger. So I think we should go to your room, barricade the door, you should change into your other self, and we’ll wait until morning.”
Amber glared at him. “We?”
“I’m in danger, too, right?”
She sighed. “Yeah.”
“Well then,” he said, and walked into her room.
Gritting her teeth, Amber followed, and locked her door.
“I’ll take first watch if you want,” said Glen, moving to the open window. “You can change any time now.”
Amber felt the blood drain from her face. “I shut that before I left,” she whispered.
Glen rested his hands on the sill. “Hey,” he said, “you can see Althea’s house from here.”