Chapter IIII

Chapter 4

Sean

The first thing I noticed when I turned around was that mist had closed in around me, making my surroundings look like the set of a play. The second thing I noticed was a presence in the mist, not so much a person as the suggestion of a living thing.

“Who’s out there?” I called, feeling stupid for saying so. That was the sort of thing characters in movies said before they got snatched up and maimed or eaten or both.

A figure - not a suggestion - emerged from the mist, then, moving slowly toward me from who-knows-where. As it got closer, it began to resemble a very old, human man. Its - his features were friendly, which left me uncertain about whether or not to let my guard down, because friendliness was the sort of double-edged quality good people had and bad people faked convincingly.

“Who are you?” I said. The man was dressed and moved like he might’ve been a sailor or a blueblood in previous lives. Maybe he’d even been both. He pulsed in and out of focus as mist wafted around his silhouette.

Without warning, the man jumped forward and bent low in front of me. At first I thought he was going to attack me. Then, I realized he was bowing. “I am Charles A. Ravenswood VII,” he said grandly as he straightened.

“What are you?” I said. It struck me that this was not the sort of question ordinary people asked other ordinary people. But then I remembered his greeting words, and I decided Charles A. Ravenswood VII was probably not “ordinary people” - if he was “people” at all.

I asked, “You said ‘one of us,’ before. Are you dead?”

            Charles grinned. For a fraction of a second, something that didn’t look anything like a man flashed where he stood.

I remembered something Death had warned me. There would be creatures in the land of the living, creatures that were neither living nor dead and vengeful because of it. I’d always thought I was one of them, but for the first time, I wondered if Death had been talking about creatures beyond its grasp.

            I thought about the vision of my death. It had been so palpable and real, like I could have reached out and touched the auburn of my mother’s hair, like I would have really died if that knife had pierced my heart. Even when the memory had been fresh, I had not experienced it with such supernatural rawness.

            I looked at the way Charles became opaque and translucent to the rhythm of something in the atmosphere, and fear suddenly made itself a resident in my gut.

“You’re very bright for someone so young,” Charles said. “What are you?”

To be honest, I didn’t know what I was. “Very fortunate,” I replied, because that was, at least, true.

I began to walk away, and in a second, Charles appeared by my side. His voice beside my ear came as a surprise when he said, “Well, you’ve a dog’s luck, boy.”

I jumped away, more repelled by the smell of rot than by surprise or fear.

Charles laughed, crazed. I quickened my pace, muscles tensed to run, but he matched me step for step. Eventually, I realized he was leading me toward a statue of the Virgin Mary, changing my trajectory by pressing a bony shoulder to my arm. Beside me, he had gone very quiet, a thick haze of energy surrounding him.

I looked down at his hand and caught a glimpse of torn skin or cloth, before a heavy, navy blue jacket solidified around it. I looked away so as not to appear more suspicious than I already was, but I wondered what I would see if I looked at Charles’s face. A bare-boned skeleton. A rotting carcass. Something neither dead nor alive.

On second thought, I didn’t want to find out.

“I have to go,” I said, stopping in my tracks.

Charles stopped, too. I couldn’t help but stare at where his eyes were, imagining empty sockets in their place. Charles said, “Leavin’ so soon?” I continued staring. “Watcha lookin’ at, boy? Hmm?” He got closer, and I caught another whiff of rotting meat.

“I really can’t stay,” I said as I backed away. My voice sounded steady and calm, the inverse of how I felt inside.

Charles snatched at my hand. I felt skeleton fingers close around my wrist before I could jerk away. “Ahh!” I sprang back, shaking him off. I turned and began to run, but something hit me from behind.

Auburn hair flashed in front of me.

Blood on the ground.

A memory of my death that Charles had stolen from me.

Blinded, I tripped over a gravestone and fell on my elbows into the dirt. The smell of rotting flesh came at me again, stronger and more pungent than before. I heard a hissing in the night, and between one breath and the next, Charles appeared in front of me: one moment mist, and the next a man. Except he wasn’t really a man anymore, he was a corpse. Pieces of flesh hung from the holes in his skull and dark circles gazed hungrily at me from where his eyes should have been. It was everything I’d imagined, but so much worse in front of me than in my head.

His hand, now skeletal and unreal, grabbed my arm and brought it to his nose, sniffing. In a hissing voice, he said, “I was right, boy. You smell like the dead.” I tried to get my feet under me as he slithered over the gravestone. “So, what is a little spirit like you doing here? It doesn’t matter” - he brought his face close to mine - “I’ll eat you anyway.”

Without thinking, I brought my teeth down on his protruding nose and jerked away. He screamed in pain, releasing me, and I bolted. I spit out Charles’s nose as I ran, an ugly taste in my mouth. Another memory hit me from behind: the moon shining through my window, a knife catching its light. Behind me, Charles had begun to run, screeching in anguish. I headed toward the tree, but Charles had led me further off course than I’d realized.

I risked a glance back, but I didn’t need to. Charles had caught up, and he pounced on me, both of us rolling to the ground of the cemetery. I could feel his energy coming off of him in waves as he threw memories into my mind. My body drew on it and solidified, becoming more human…and more vulnerable. His fingers tore my shirt into ribbons; he cut my chest deep enough that blood reluctantly began to well up, dark red, smelling like iron. Pain clawed through me. There was never a worse time for me to start feeling things like a living person.

Charles raised his hand for the final blow. I put my arm up to defend myself.

Charles hesitated. I saw my chance and flipped him over, pinning his limbs down with my hands. I expected him to fight back, but instead, he didn’t move. “What are you?” I panted.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he hissed, “Death on your skin,” and I could feel his gaze on a messy hole on my chest, the puncture wound of a knife. It tingled at being remembered.

Suddenly, Charles vanished below me, man into mist, and I collapsed onto the ground. I heard a cackle in the night and felt thin fingers running up my back. In my ear, Charles whispered, “You made a deal with the devil, foolish boy! That’s worse than any fate in the world!”

Then, he was gone. Somehow, I knew he would not bother me again.

My hand crept to my chest, and I thought about the three black dots surrounding where I’d been stabbed and the nest of black veins creeping into the wound. The symbol of my bargain with Death. It would go away once I accomplished my mission, once I was alive again.

I’d always thought of it as a gift.

I found my way out of the cemetery as the fog disappeared, and walked back to my car.

            A deal with the devil, I thought as I leaned into the vinyl seat. No. A bargain with a god.

            But perhaps those were the same things.