The Legend of Darklore Manor and Other Tales of Terror (4 page)

by Timothy Bennett and Joseph Vargo

T
his is what death feels like. An icy grip seizing my very breath, damming the blood in my head and petrifying my body as I struggle to hold on to life. And the darkness before my eyes, so terrifying and bleak, coldly reflects the image of my death back at me.
     All this I came to comprehend in my final fleeting moments, and with a grim certainty I realized that my demise was inescapable. Does my entire life now pass before me? No. I only see the events that have brought the Angel of Death to my company.
     My 40th, and final, birthday came and went as most have, quietly... until late that evening. A pounding at the side door interrupted my solitude as a delivery person arrived with the unexpected, a crate big enough to hold gifts for all my birthdays combined. A second delivery person was hidden behind the monstrosity. I joined them in bringing the box to rest in the middle of my studio, leaving the crate standing like a wooden obelisk.
     I almost didn't want to open it, wanting instead to relish in my excitement trying to determine what could be inside. As I signed for the crate, I was handed an accompanying envelope postmarked from Jerusalem. The handwriting was familiar, and when opened, the salutation was unmistakable.
     A Gift from the Magi: Happy Birthday Bones. I bartered for this in my usual fashion. Some locals found this in a newly excavated crypt. Four magnificent guardian angels surrounded it on the floor above. You're not that good a friend to pay what they wanted for those, so got this thing from the basement. See you soon. — The Bobcat.
     Bob was my best friend from college, and we kept in touch despite our different paths. He traveled the world searching for the meaning of life, while I remained safe at home letting life go by. Bones. That always made me laugh. Bob always said archaeologists were "doctors of the dead". When I pointed out that his nickname for my profession didn't make any sense, it only seemed to make it funnier to him.
     The coolness of the basement studio didn't prevent me from perspiring profusely as I pried the front of the box off with the enthusiasm of a kid on Christmas morning. Finally, it fell like the draw bridge of a castle; packing material cascading onto the floor, revealing the crate's contents. It happened so quickly, the sight of it startled me.
     A dark angel stared out from the inside of the crate, perched in such a manner that it seemed as if it was prepared to leap and fly away. Dark, not just because it was formed from a stone as black as a cloud of smoke, but because its wings were those of a bat. Its ears rose high and pointy, surrounding a head that was gaunt and malformed, looking more like a skull than a face.
     When I caught my breath, I noticed that the thing was crouching upon some sort of pedestal. Cautiously, almost as if not to frighten it, I approached the statue to marvel at its sinister detail. I found myself mesmerized, frozen and staring into the abyss where its eyes should have been. Then I realized the eyes were indeed there, glistening so darkly that I could see myself in them.
     Stepping back to view my gift in its entirety, I began to appreciate the reason Bob had sent this for my birthday. The creature sat perched on a tall, square block that held a chiseled inscription. A few of the characters were instantly recognizable, but spread among far too many that were not. An ancient puzzle to solve... I loved it.
     Part of me wanted to laugh at how great a gift it was, and how Bob knew the four guardian angels had no value to me in comparison to this magnificent, stone beast. The other part of me held back my joy, feeling as if it would be almost disrespectful to my morbid guest. I only wish some part of me could have remembered, no matter how well-intentioned Bob was in his efforts to make me enjoy life, how I always found myself getting into trouble as a result.
     When Bob said "See you soon," that usually meant about two months. It had taken the crate almost three weeks to arrive, so I had about five weeks to solve my birthday gift before he returned, near the end of October.
     I'm not sure if I slept at all during that first week, re-reading the books in my library to refresh my knowledge of lost civilizations and the occult, and consuming volumes of new research in an effort to translate the inscription. The language was similar to ancient Hebrew dialects I had come across, with elements of dead Eastern characters, often grouped together as that of the Magi. Still other characters I cross-referenced with that of the Etruscan texts recently found in northern Italy.
     The fragments of words I deciphered made little sense.
G-O-L was the beginning of the large inscription, but the stone base was quite weathered, making it nearly impossible to discern some of the markings. Below that were etched words such as blood, servant and master. After close to a month, I had hit a wall of frustration as imposing as the monolith itself.
     Long, sleepless nights of constant work didn't make the task any easier. At times, the draftiness of my studio made me feel the creature was sighing in impatience. Its eyes, those unblinking obsidian orbits, followed me around the room as if the thing were waiting for me to unlock its secret. Falling asleep from sheer exhaustion, I would awaken to the sound of grinding stone pushing its mass across the cold, damp slab of the studio. And on the rare occurrence when the room was in total darkness, I would think it was moving, so slightly, like an enormous, restless sloth in a cage.
     But in the light of day, and when clear of mind, it was just the graven image of a fallen angel.
     I awoke on this night, the night of my death, with my head resting on my drawing table, having scribbled for the thousandth time the letters and words of the inscription. I stirred suddenly, sensing a cold presence, as if something were standing behind me and looking over my shoulder. I turned and saw the creature perched where it had been since its arrival. When I turned back to the table, the sound of grinding stone gripped me. My neck was rigid with fear, and I was terrified to look back again. I moved just enough to see a murky reflection in a picture frame, and through it, the soulless black eyes of the creature looked back at me.
     With my heart pounding, I spun around wildly and prepared to scream for help. Nothing. There it stood as always, staring back at me with a cold, emotionless gaze.
     From deep inside came the answer, like a maniacal revelation. I knew what it was. G-O-L and the other indistinguishable characters—a golem. This wasn't the image of a fallen angel Bob found in the holy land. It was a golem, a creature that, according to legend, was chiseled from stone or molded from clay and could be animated by a magical invocation to do its master's bidding. All the fragmented words suddenly begin to make sense. I knew enough to assume what the other characters stood for, and what the words meant.
     GOLEM —Let Blood Bind Servant To Master.
     I was electrified with my own maddening genius. Then the realization that this was no mere puzzle, this was a golem. I pricked my thumb and began scribbling in my own blood. I copied the inscription character-for-character on a piece of paper, and took my place in front of the inanimate idol. Could I actually bring this creature to life?
     As I stood in front of it, its stare hypnotized me. In my mind, I heard the stone moving, saw its head tilting, and its mouth open. I shut my eyes and shook my head, and when I opened them again, there it stood as it had been.
     I took heart from my vision and stepped closer, placing the paper in the creature's mouth.
     And then death gripped me.
     The golem's eyes stared blankly into mine as its stone appendages came to life. Its wings unfolded and reached out over me, its talons impaling my hands, spreading my arms away from me and lifting me off the studio floor. With a grating sound, it stepped from its perch, and as it did, the thing lifted me further above it. Its movement was a grinding yet fluid motion. Then it pulled me closer, enfolding me within its wings, staring at me with its dead, black eyes.
     Its left hand seized my throat and its right hand slashed open my chest. The creature closed its mouth on the bloodstained paper, then spat it out against my face.
     This thing was no golem. I now experienced the true revelation, the one free of madness and pure with the knowledge I had long forgotten. The word I so eagerly accepted as GOLEM was in reality GOLGOTH, the Angel of Torment.
     I can see myself dying in the reflection of its eyes. The creature's unrelenting grip around my throat allows me no last breath. "Let Blood Bind Servant To Master," the meaning of the cryptic message was clear to me now, even as my vision blurred; it was not what my power-mad mind wanted it to be. Sheer dread swept over me, as my final mortal thought was that of how my suffering would serve to nourish my newly resurrected master.

by Joseph Vargo

P
ale moonlight filtered into Anna's bedroom window through the silken mesh of her curtains, casting web-like patterns on the hardwood floor. The autumn moon danced behind the clouds, appearing again and again to illuminate the darkened heavens. As she lay awake in bed, Anna drifted between the mundane reality of her adolescent life and a realm of gothic dreams and fantasies. Outside the wind whistled though the barren branches, rustling the few remaining leaves that had not yet withered and fallen. As she began to return to her dreams, another sound roused her from her sleep. Between the howls of the cool autumn breeze, she heard a voice that sounded as if it had faintly whispered her name.
     "Anna..."
     She listened more intently, but there was only wind to be heard. After a few minutes her eyelids grew heavy and she began drifting back to the land of dreams when she heard the voice call her name once more.
     "Anna..."
     She sat up and slowly crept out of bed, then began to step as silently as possible toward her window. She peered cautiously through the curtains to survey her yard. The moonlight fell upon the barren trees, casting long shadows that appeared to reach out with bony fingers across the ground, straining to catch the fallen leaves that rustled past. Clouds obscured the moon once again and Anna now noticed a dim glow emanating from the attic window of the abandoned house next to her home. She drew back the curtain and stared into the darkness and as she did, the light went out, as if someone had suddenly extinguished a candle.
     Anna stepped back behind the curtain and continued to watch the house for the next several hours, until the crimson rays of sunlight announced the approaching dawn. Finally, she returned to her bed and fell fast asleep to dream once more of ravens and vampire lords. Late in the afternoon, she awoke to the sound of her stepfather banging on her bedroom door, yelling at her to get out of bed.
     Since it was a Saturday, Anna had no school, leaving her with the entire weekend to investigate the abandoned house. When she asked her mother if someone had moved in next door, she replied "No," without stopping to question her. Anna dropped the subject and didn't mention anything about what she had seen the night before, fearful that her parents would try to thwart her from investigating further. It seemed that they always tried to stop her from doing anything remotely dangerous or fun.
     As her parents became lost in their daily routines, Anna slipped out of her house and made her way next door. She approached the decrepit old house and stood before it, surveying every window for signs of life. The old Colonial-style home didn't look like particularly frightening, yet something about it made her pause before proceeding closer. Hesitantly, she climbed the old wooden porch steps and peered in through the tall window beside the front door.
     The interior of the house was completely devoid of furniture and there were no apparent signs of life to be seen. Weak sunlight filtered in through the window, illuminating thick motes of dust. Anna tested the latch to see if it was locked, and to her surprise the door opened.
     Glancing around to make sure no one was watching, Anna quickly entered the home, thrilled and frightened at the same time. She closed the heavy door behind her and leaned against it. Other than the stale smell that permeated the interior of the house, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. A quick survey of the other rooms led her to the conclusion that the house was empty. Anna began to wonder if she had simply let her wild imagination get the better of her. Just then she became aware of a creaking noise from the floor above her. As silently as possible, she made her way up the attic stairs.
     She lightly placed her fingertips upon the attic door and slowly pushed it open as quietly as possible. The old attic was strewn with cobwebs that hung like tattered drapes from the support beams and cascaded down to cover the walls. With her first step into the room, she could feel that the attic was much colder than the rest of the house, cold enough to make her shiver. At the far side of the attic, an antique rocking chair faced the window overlooking Anna's home. The rocker swayed slightly, as if someone had recently been sitting in it.
     As Anna advanced across the dusty floorboards, she now noticed a half-melted candle resting in a candle holder on the windowsill. She crept toward the old chair to discover a crackled porcelain doll lying in the dust. She picked it up and recognized the doll as one that had belonged to her when she was a child. Her hands began to tremble and the doll slipped from her grasp, dropping to the floor.
     A sudden chill swept over her and she was overtaken with the uneasy feeling that she was being watched. In the periphery of her vision, she perceived a dark shape lurking behind a thick layer of cobwebs to her right.
     "Who's there?" Anna whispered into the darkness. But the shadow made no sound. Anna brushed her hand through the webbing that obscured her view and suddenly realized that what she had first taken to be cobwebs were in reality spiderwebs. Dozens of large black spiders came scampering out of the opening she had made in the veil of webs. They flooded out onto the floor and swarmed over the broken doll at her feet. Anna screamed and jumped back, then she turned her gaze to the darkness above her. The entire attic was infested with nests, and hundreds of spiders were crawling across the ceiling directly over her head.
     Anna screamed again then ran out of the house, frantically swiping her hands over her hair and body to brush away any spiders. She burst through the front door and out into the yard. Anna shuddered as she looked back up at the attic window but there were no traces of mystery intruders or swarming spiders to be seen. Still trembling, she hurried home to the sanctuary of her bedroom and locked the door behind her.
     Later that night, Anna found herself wandering inside the land of dreams once again, but the landscape that surrounded her was now strangely familiar. She was back in the attic of the abandoned house, but her view was altered, as if she were observing the scene from a higher perspective. The dusty floor was now a mesh of webs, not unlike the pattern of shadows that were cast nightly upon her own bedroom floor. The rest of the room was pitch black.
     A strange buzzing noise emanated from somewhere in the darkness and Anna took a step toward the sound to investigate its source. As she began to move, she now noticed that she had the long, spindly legs of a spider, which enabled her to crawl along the web of shadows that covered the room. As Anna drew near the buzzing sound, she could see an enormous fly caught in the confines of the web. As she crept closer, the insect shrieked and flailed wildly, but was unable to free itself. For a long moment she stared into the honeycomb pattern that covered the fly's glowing red eyes, transfixed by her own reflection—a reflection which revealed her own form to be that of a giant black widow spider. Without further hesitation, she quickly advanced upon her trapped prey and began to weave a suffocating net of webbing around it to muffle its shrieks. She climbed on top of the helpless fly and tore into its abdomen with her fangs, injecting her deadly venom into the the writhing creature and drinking its blood.
     Anna awoke in a fevered sweat, her young heart pounding. Sitting up in bed, she peered out of her window into the dead of night. Once again, a candle was burning in the attic window of the house next door. A moment later, she heard the voice call her name, just as it had the night before, and as if under a hypnotic spell, she heeded the beckoning call. Wearing only her nightgown, she snuck out of her house.
     She made her way into the spider house and up the attic stairs. When she reached the top, the attic door opened with a creak. A flickering glow emanated from the opposite side of the attic. Anna paused for a moment, allowing her eyes to adjust to the gloom, then slowly stepped toward the dim light. Across the room, a hunched figure sat in the rocking chair, silhouetted by the auburn candle glow.
     An old woman sat in the rocking chair, swaying rhythmically back and forth. At the old hag's feet, a young boy lay bound and gagged by thin silken cords that tied his wrists to his ankles. The old woman turned her gaze toward Anna and spoke to her in a gravelly voice.
     "Welcome my dear."
     Anna stood frozen in place as the old crone continued speaking. "I've been watching you for quite a while...patiently, silently, watching and waiting. Now the time has come for me to guide you. Your parents don't understand you, and they never will. They still treat you as a child. But they can't even begin to imagine the things you're capable of." As the old woman spoke, Anna felt strangely at ease and an eerie calm swept over her.
     "Come closer, my dear."
     Anna had lost all will to resist. She glanced down at the captive boy again. His eyes conveyed a desperate plea for help. He reminded her of a fly caught in a spider's web. Anna returned her gaze to the old woman and took a step toward her. The crone leaned forward out of the shadows. The woman's face was withered and wrinkled, and her eyes were glazed with cataracts. Her flesh was pale, but her lips were a deep glistening red.
     "Who are you?" Anna whispered.
     The old crone leaned in close to Anna's face and whispered, "We are one and the same, you and I. We are the widows of the web."
     Anna slowly began to take notice of a legion of ghastly faces peering out of the shadows behind the mesh of spiderwebs on either side of her. As her eyes finally became accustomed to the darkness, she could see several skeletons tied to the attic's support beams, covered with webs and spiders.
     The old woman spoke again, "There is much work to be done. All I ask is that you stay with me and allow me to guide you. Stay with me Anna," the crone whispered, "Anna... Anna..."
"Anna," The young nurse called her name again, "Anna, can you hear me?" But the old lady didn't respond. Instead, she sat in her rocking chair, transfixed upon the spiderweb in the corner of her window. A fly struggled to free itself from the web as a large black spider descended upon it. A smile formed on the old woman's crackled face as she watched the spider devour its prey.
     A husky male orderly entered the psychiatric wardroom and offered his advice to the nurse. "It's no use, she won't speak to anyone. As far as I know, she hasn't uttered a word in all the years she's been here."
     "Why the restraints?" She asked, glancing down at the thick leather manacles that bound the old woman to her chair.
     "Just a precaution," the orderly whispered, then continued in a hushed tone, "The police found her in the attic of her home, surrounded by dead bodies that she had bound and tied to the rafters. We call her the Black Widow. She killed her entire family and anyone else who wandered into her parlor. She poisoned them all, then kept their bodies tied up in her attic as macabre mementos. She lived in that old house for nearly sixty years before the police finally discovered her."
     "She doesn't talk, she just sits there. Who knows what goes on inside her head. If you ask me, I say the old bird's still got a few spiders in the attic." He laughed at his own pun, but the nurse didn't crack a smile.
     "It's actually very sad," the nurse replied. "She'll never leave this place."
     But Anna didn't hear their words. She had already returned to the morbid dreamworld of her youth where her mind wandered free and unrestrained by the reality of her physical bonds. Spiders crawled across her hands and she lifted them high, laughing and dancing, twirling off into the shadows of her twisted imagination.