We come upon a stainless sink, and he spins the faucet, sending water sputtering out of a long coiled hose that looks like the one used for food prep at the bowling alley.
Marshall attempts to wipe me down with a cool wet towel. I bat his hands away—dry heaving into the boxy metal basin.
It takes something just this side of forever before I can feel like myself again, before the room stops swirling into a blue tornado and the ground feels solid beneath my feet.
Marshall overturns a metal bucket, instructs me to sit and does the same.
“Do tell,” he frowns, “what happened.”
“Logan,” I take a deep breath, “he dragged me to this Count ritual, and they were all wearing hoods and chanting.” I hold a small towel over my face and breathe into it. “I saw Demetri,” I say as though it might have some sort of effect on him.
Marshall pins me with an icy stare.
“Well, then, Ms. Messenger. Sounds like you’ve just witnessed the inner circle.”
“It sounds dangerous.”
“There’s no other word to describe it.”
“I want to go home.”
“I’m afraid not,” he examines me from head to toe. “I’m keeping you here with me, Skyla. You’ll be mine for a little while more.”
Chapter Three
Spooktacular
Marshall takes me on a grand tour of the facility.
I was right. Ezrina’s hideaway is a lair, a maze that stretches out for miles, football fields—acres. It seems to extend far beyond the borders of Paragon, and I can’t fathom how.
“Are we below the island?”
“Where would you get that idea?” he asks, propelling us forward at unnatural speeds.
“It always seems like I’m falling down when I end up here.”
“What if I told you we were above the island?”
Just the thought makes me dizzy.
“I suppose I’d have to believe you.”
“Well, then, you’d be foolish because we are neither below nor above terra firma. Feel better?”
I’m not sure if he means physically, so I just nod. Truth is I feel like crap. I’m emotionally and physically wrecked.
“Am I time traveling?”
“You are.”
“When?”
“Summer. We’ve yet to meet, and you’ve yet to set foot on Paragon,” he pauses. “Although, I’ve always known you. I waited for you to arrive on the planet.” He examines me briefly. “When you’re through here you’ll return to the stone from whence you came,” he gives a sly smile, “I’m sure that tickles your intestines.”
“It pisses me off,” I say weakly.
“The Counts would have left by then.”
“Why? Are you keeping me here for years or something?” God—this is turning into some kind of celestial kidnapping.
“An undisclosed amount of time will pass,” he pats me on the back as though he’s consoling me over the fact I’m being held captive, by him of all people. I don’t care how abrasively handsome he is, I don’t want Marshall. I want Gage. “I’ve placed a binding spirit around the vicinity should you try to travel your way out, or, heaven forbid, Gage the blue eyed Sage decides to teleport himself to your side. I hope you’ll think long and hard before disclosing my true identity to those living and deceased. Let’s not have a repeat performance of Ms. Bishop’s verbal faux pas.” He glares at me with renewed interest. “She is the only one you’ve babbled to.”
I nod feverishly. “I need to see Gage.”
“No.”
We step outside under a navy colored sky, no stars, just a smooth blank darkness that presses down on me with its full weight. I turn back and see the doublewide doors to the Transfer outlined with an arch of bones. Figures. Most likely human skeletal remains as evidenced by a plethora of elongated femurs, attached ulnas and radius’, the fibulas and tibias, a smatter of hands sprayed throughout for garnish. It’s artistically macabre, beautiful in its own disgusting way.
“Creepy,” I whisper.
Marshall links his arm with mine, progressing us through narrow twisted corridors, cobbled streets with buildings that butt up to one another.
“Market,” Marshall points over to baskets brimming with fruits and vegetables laid out in rows on a stand. “It’s free, take only your fill. Other humans prattle about.”
The road opens to a clearing, and a white mansion surrounded by a wrought iron fence with delicate spears, pointing skyward greets us.
“You have a room at the estate,” he says it directly in my ear as though this might arouse me on some level.
“Great,” I gulp down my fear.
Hoards of people move swift in the distance. A woman and a man walk arm in arm just like us. The woman wears a velour gown with a petticoat underneath that peeks out at the world like a dusting of fresh snow with every other step. The man she’s with sports a short dark mustache. He wears a suit with a high collar and a strange thin tie that creates circular loops at the base of his neck.
“They look so,” I struggle to find the right words, “old fashioned.”
“Eighteenth century. It’s all the rage in this part of the netherworld.”
As the couple approaches, I notice their faces have a certain invisibility factor. I can see them and see through them simultaneously. I cover my mouth from the shock of it. The woman stops short and cuts me a death stare before carrying on her conversation without missing a beat.
“For heaven’s sake, don’t incite them,” Marshall scolds. “Once you have them riled with anger, they’re rabid. Just looking at them puts them in a mood. No eye contact with the dearly departed. That’s the first rule, and absolutely no speaking to them. They don’t stand for the whole poor me I’m so human, ploy. The last visitor I housed didn’t fare so well.”
“What happened to him?” My hand flies up to my throat involuntarily.
“She,” his lids lower in my direction, “found my rules difficult to comply with. They shackled her to a millstone, threw her in the lake.”
“Did you save her? Is she OK?”
“Dead. Don’t bother shedding a tear. Death becomes her.” He steps up our clip as we enter through the iron gates that forge together at the top creating a rather menacing skull locked in a scream.
A ragged looking man waves to get our attention from the balcony. He hops over the baluster, and hangs himself successfully by a threadbare rope. His body swings like a Halloween decoration—a pendulum.
I let out a cry of terror that burns through my lungs, hot and sultry like a battle cry.
“I’m not staying here.” I try to pull Marshall back.
“Relax, Skyla. You’ll appease them if you scream at every horrific act of terror they try to delight you with. Look,” he motions back up at the body. The body has vanished, and the rope silently sways as a testament to what just happened. “Most everyone here has long since perished. Mostly Counts and Fems, not your usual social circle. Far from the in-crowd, more like the sin-crowd. Keep to yourself.” He pats my hand as we walk onto the expansive porch. The front doors hold their high polished shine. Marshall twists the gold hardware before motioning me inside.
It’s black as a moonless night. A thousand useless candles offer their dim light to the walls, the halls, the waxed chandeliers hanging from the ceilings. The air is unnaturally crisp and holds the slight scent of apples.
A choir of screams go off at regular intervals, ear piercing, blood curdling cries that raise the hair on the back of my neck. They leave me unsettled until I’ve all but pushed myself through Marshall from holding on so tight.
“I do rather enjoy the intimacy, but I need to breathe.” He loosens my grip just enough.
We walk through a grand room. An oversized piano plays old ragtime music at a frenetic pace. About two-dozen disembodied spirits decked out in eighteenth century garb dance in dizzying circles while laughing and engaging in ceaseless chatter. A few nod in our direction with menacing gri
maces. I bury my face in Marshall’s chest, let him lead me blind through endless twists and turns until we stop all movement.
“First floor rooms are always a bit inferior,” he bemoans.
I open my eyes to see the dark gnarled wood of the door bend and expand as though it were breathing.
“Marshall,” I end his name on a high-pitched wail.
“Don’t show them your weakness.” He spins the doorknob left and right several times as though it were a combination safe before the door gives, letting us inside.
We’re greeted with navy velvet walls. Pictures of ghastly looking people hang crooked in the entry.
“Kitchen, living room.” Marshall darts a finger around, orienting me to the decrepit amenities. A prehistoric kitchen with an ornate white porcelain stove, a living room that consists of a dusty Victorian couch, and very little else. “Bedroom.” He guides me into a rather large area with an oversized four-poster bed, a lit candelabra in the corner. The strong scent of lilacs infiltrates the air. “I’ll be rooming with you.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.” I’m completely freaked out, so cuddling up with Marshall sounds like a godsend.
“Closet full of goodies,” he opens a wardrobe exposing a bevy of ballooned out dresses, and combat boots with heels. I pull out a yellowing bustle, feels like crinoline, the hoops lined with steel springs.
“Nice,” I bleat out disappointed. Really, I don’t care what I wear. I want to be home, not shacking up in a haunted hotel with Marshall.
“Let’s get to bed shall we?” He hops on the mattress, a bit overeager.
I dismiss his overzealous behavior and crawl up alongside him. Truth is, I’m exhausted on every level.
I close my eyes and lay my head on Marshall’s chest.
“Don’t even think about kissing me,” I say as the room disintegrates behind my eyelids. My head pounds as it tries to erase the new reality I’ve landed myself in. I try to think happy thoughts, thoughts of Gage—dust off the memories we’ve created, and bask in our love, but it only seems to highlight my newfound sadness.
I know what I have to do.
In my dreams I wait for him.
Logan.
He stalks the outer recesses of my mind for just the right moment. He thinks it will buy him time—time that will cost him nothing, avail him much, perhaps garner a kiss if he’s lucky.
I form the hill, the trees, shape the river that bisects this strange landscape he seems to will us to each time he comes to me.
I fashion a long sharp sword out of my imagination and watch as the scalloped blade shimmers under the artificial sun.
“Skyla,” he calls to me.
A smile plays on my lips as I spin on my heels.
I give a swift blow to the neck, greet him by way of decapitation—watch as his head rolls onto the grass and settles near the base of a willow tree.
Logan groans, gives several hard blinks before looking right at me. “So I guess this means you’re angry.”
***
“Rise my love!” A sharp voice bellows from above.
I stretch like a cat and struggle to open my eyes. Marshall floats in and out of focus, makes me wonder if I’m still dreaming.
A part of me expects to find myself nestled in my own bed beneath my canopy, safe on Paragon with a house full of Counts—my perennially pissed off stepfather milling around downstairs, but I don’t. Instead, I see Marshall in a t-shirt and jeans, not his usual teacher attire of chinos and a button-down. The heavenly scent of lilacs has been tainted with something far more commonplace—
“Wakey, wakey, eggs and bacon.” He stirs a frying pan in front of me as evidence.
I follow him over to the haunted looking dining room. Silverware is laid out, each heavy piece with a neatly carved face. Mine is a girl with long wavy hair, large blank eyes.
“Is this me?” I hold it up, accusingly.
“Pretty, aren’t you?” Marshall doesn’t pay it much attention. Instead, he doles out a large portion of food on the flat gold platter set before me. I unfurl a sapphire velveteen napkin and thread it through my fingers hypnotically. This is the color of the night sky, the last thing I saw as I lay on the stone. I pull it through my hands over and over like a habit. A tall silver goblet with the foot of a bird sits before me. I peer inside to find a bright red liquid that I’m pretty sure I’m staying the hell away from.
“What is this?” I pick it up and sniff.
“A common breakfast medium adored by citrus farmers the world over. Orange juice.” He settles across from me with his own plate loaded with the food he promised in his chime. “Blood orange juice. Squeezed it myself. Go on, you’ll love it.”
I take an uneasy sip.
“Excellent.” Tastes less blood, more orange.
“I thought so.” He examines me like a predator as I dig into my meal.
I’m starved and totally at the mercy of Marshall’s culinary skills, which apparently are well-honed because this is the best breakfast I think I’ve ever had.
“Eat up. You’ve got a long day ahead of you.”
“Doing what? You have an arena where you pit unwitting humans against Fems? Where a crowd of long deceased Counts hunger for our demise?” Hopefully he’ll send me packing, even if it is a very long hike back to Paragon from this suspended reality—
“You didn’t think you were going to receive room and board and wonderful meals whipped up by yours truly without an exchange, did you? It’s called work, Skyla.”
“You want me to scoop horse crap out of your barn?” I have a feeling that would be the best-case scenario.
“Don’t be silly, you won’t be working for me,” he picks up his fork and holds out the carved figure of a woman, her wild frazzled hair looks all too familiar.
Ezrina.
Chapter Four
Overtime
Working shoulder to shoulder with Ezrina in the chop shop isn’t exactly my idea of a reprieve from real life, sort of a nightmare if you ask me.
“So, you’re never going to believe this,” I start. “Your great, great…great? Anyway one of your relatives is my cheer coach, Ms. Richards.”
Ezrina pulls down a metal tray and slams it against the stainless counter, creating a horrific cacophony of sounds that reminds me of the jazz music my dad used to play in the car.
“She doesn’t visit.” Her voice reverberates through the metal chair I’ve perched myself on—rings through me like the shrill cry of a bell.
“Yeah, well, I don’t think she knows about you.”
Ezrina’s burgundy eyes flare into perfect kaleidoscopes of fire.
“I mean she knows about you, but I think she’s unaware of the fact you still exist.” As in—blissfully unaware.
“There’s always a way, Skyla.” Her ghastly pale flesh doesn’t peak or break out in a sweat as she continues to move at a breakneck pace. She pulls something a little larger than a butcher knife out of a drawer, causing me to leap off the stool—clear across the room for safety.
“Come,” she calls. Pulling back a plastic sheet, she reveals an array of bloodied human limbs.
Instinctually I want to scream but my hand flexes over my lips and I give a few unproductive dry heaves instead.
“Vomit—you’ll eat it to clean it.” Her pallid features pinch in a quiet rage.
I straighten, and go over, trying not to pass out at the sight.
“What is it?” Who is it, or was it, might be a better question. Hopefully Chloe.
“Noster lost a man competing.”
I don’t know what he was competing in, but if you lose your feet and hands in the process, I’m pretty sure it’s not any kind of competition I’d be interested in.
“Grab a tray,” she instructs.
I’m a little shocked at how quickly I’ve succumbed to the role of Ezrina’s assistant—accomplice, and find myself beside her sporting a metal platter in my hands.
She hacks at the base of an ankle wit
h the squared off blade in her hands while prying away the upper portion of the leg.
“Sort of reminds me of the time you chopped off my arm,” I say without any real emotion behind it. Secretly, I’m hoping to bond with Ezrina, lend her great pause before she attempts to hack off another limb that happens to be attached to my body.
Ezrina rolls her head over her neck, and a thin dried blood of a smile starts to form. She gives a powerhouse swing at the ankle once again, loud as a gunshot as the knife connects, cutting the foot right off the joint.
Blood splatters over my dress, my face. I wipe off my lips with the back of my hand, spit the bitter taste out of my mouth.
Worse job ever.
Next time I see Marshall I’m grabbing him by the collar and demanding he send me back to Paragon—back to Gage.
***
Days drift by, a week—then another. Marshall doesn’t come. He’s left me in this haunted version of reality to rot like the corpses Ezrina spends her days attending to. I pick up fruits and vegetables from the farmers market of horror and bolt back to the haunted mansion Marshall has me holed up in. I’ve worn each of the bloated dresses at least three times. So tired of strange fitting underwear, bra’s too big or too small, all of the above rotted and yellow with time.
“I want to see Marshall,” I say to her while bagging the fingers of a Levatio. Just handling the flesh of something even remotely related to Gage makes me ache for him—hunger for him so intensely until I feel I’m about to break.
Ezrina ignores me per usual.
“What happened to you, Ezrina? I heard you wandered into the forest, and never came out.”
She expels a breath with a faraway look in her eyes as though she were reliving a painful memory. “Love,” she says, stripping the flesh off a forearm and scrapping bone samples onto a Petri dish.
“Love?” As in she’s calling me love, or she actually had the opportunity to experience it? “Love is a great thing,” I say. Ezrina is locked in a morbid gaze, staring off into nothing as though she finally reached the end of her existence. “So, are you a scientist?” I ask, changing the subject. “A mortician?” Just the mention of a mortician reminds me of Dr. Oliver, and I want to go home, to the mortuary—hell at this point I’d take the underbelly of the cemetery. “Do you think Gage can visit me here?”