Running With the Shadows of the Night (Chapter 3)

Are you awake?

Yes. I was just resting my eyes until you came.

I see you have Teddy snuggled up already.

Yes.

Has it been a tough day?

Kind of.

I’m sorry.

It helped knowing you were coming back.

I hoped it might.

I’ve been thinking about Sarah.

Oh?

If I was Sarah, I’d want to know.

Know what?

Why Kenny killed her.

Ah. I see. Yes.

Maybe Sarah did want to know, but by the time she’s Senka, she doesn’t care anymore. Is that right?

It might be, yes.

Will the story say?

I think it will.

But it has to tell itself?

It does, yes.

So what does it want to tell tonight?

About what happened after Senka and Silas and Luna left the cabin.

Oh, good!

Yes? Are you up for that tonight?

Yes, please. I’m ready when you are. Senka and Silas and Luna.

Well, just to remind you…

Standing in the clearing, Senka gave one last look around. To the wreck of the cabin and to the trees she whispered, “Oh, please, let me go. Let me not be left behind.” She tucked her hand into the crook of Silas’ free arm and closed her eyes in wild hope.

For an instant, she felt intensely cold, colder than she had since her death. And then, sound changed completely. The susurration of the trees that she had heard unendingly for years simply ceased. The rustling of night animals, the chirping of tree frogs, even the angry snapping of the fire were gone. In their place, there was an eerie silence, a silence that spoke of a place completely devoid of life. Well, perhaps not all life. Underneath the smell of dust and stale air lurked the all-too-familiar odor of mouse.

Senka opened her eyes. She and Silas stood, arms still linked, in the expansive entry hall of a cavernous manor house. “I did it,” she whispered, looking up into Silas’ deep brown eyes. “Or we did it. I guess you did it. I wasn’t sure it would work. I didn’t know if I could leave there. I’d never been able to get out of the cabin before. This is amazing.” She surveyed the room they found themselves in. “This place is huge. It’s so…different.” Silas looked at her and smiled. It was the first time she had seen him smile, and she found herself hoping to see it more. Realizing that she still had a hold of his arm, she dropped her hand and took a small step away. Luna, nestled in the crook of Silas’ arm, surveyed the derelict state of the hall with an expression of disdain. He looked up at Silas and meowed once, requesting to be set down. Once on the floor, he sniffed delicately, then sneezed at the dust that tickled his nose.

“What is this place?” Senka asked. Echoes bounced back to her making her wish she had continued to whisper.

“It belongs—or at least used to belong to…to someone I know,” Silas said. “I was here for several days, perhaps a century ago.” He looked around and added, “It was in better condition then.”

Senka turned in place and gave the room a cursory three hundred sixty degree assessment. She hadn’t been outside of a one-room cabin for a very long time. The sheer size of the place was overwhelming to the point of almost paralyzing her. The one point of solace was the thickness of the shadows that clung to nearly every part of the room. A shaft of moonlight was the only illumination. It flooded through a window high above them and splashed across the faded, broken parquet floor. “It doesn’t look like there’s anyone here now,” she remarked. “It’s awfully dusty.”

Silas grunted, then said, “She usually doesn’t use the house at this time of year. Anyway, if there were anyone here, they would have come to…greet us by now. Still, I want to have a look around, just to be sure we’re safe. Don’t leave the entry hall. If it turns out we have to go, I’ll want to be able to find you quickly.” Senka nodded, trying to appear confident and very likely failing. Silas looked down at Luna who was licking dust from a front paw. “A good sign,” he said, “is that Luna wouldn’t be so calm if there were anything truly threatening.” Senka remembered his reaction to her and to the arrival of the creature and felt a little reassured. “Luna,” Silas was saying, “see if there’s anything we need to worry about on that side of the house.” He gestured toward one wing. “Billiard room, office, dining room, kitchens. I’ll take the other wing, the library, morning room, and music room.” Luna turned and stalked off to explore, leaving distinct cat paw-shaped prints in the dust as he went. Silas walked across the once-elegant patterned floor, his shoes clicking loudly, and disappeared into a side room.

Feeling wary but restless, Senka began to move around the entry hall, keeping to the shadows. Her footfalls made no sound and left no trace in the dust. She went first to the sweeping staircase, taking in the heap of broken-marble pebbles that had collected along the edges and the tattered runner that climbed the steps. She craned her neck to see up the staircase. Peeling paint and broken plaster. A section of the wrought-iron railing leaned precariously over the first landing. Two stories, at least, though the ceiling was lost in shadows so deep that her eyes couldn’t penetrate them. As she moved around the edges of the room, her hand trailed along the wall, brushing along hanging sheets of peeling wallpaper and exposed lathes, encountering odd push-button light switches and sharp shards of wooden molding. On one wall, an ornate golden frame oddly held just the top half of an oil painting, the ragged edge of the canvas showing where the rest of it had been ripped away. Senka peered up at it, trying to discern the subject. She was interrupted by Silas’ returning footsteps. “Find anything?” she asked.

“It looks like the house has been empty for a while.”

“Several years, at least,” she replied. “This didn’t happen overnight.” She gestured at the ruined canvas.

“Dust, spiderwebs, and decay.” He swept his hair back away from his face in a gesture Senka had come to think of as habitual. “She always kept a good library. Only a few of the books show water damage, at least on the first cursory look.”

A library, Senka thought. She was having trouble getting her mind around how much her existence had changed in the last hour. Would she spend her days reading now? Rattling around a house so large that her whole cabin would have fit in the entry hall with room left over to drive a car around the perimeter?

“What is it?” Silas was looking at her closely, concerned. That was another change; she wasn’t used to having anyone read her expressions. “I think we’re safe, for now,” he hurried on. “The creature is dead. It can’t report to my Master. Of course, when it doesn’t return, my Master will know his plan went wrong. He’ll start looking for me again.” Silas glanced around the ruined hall looking more like a hunted animal than a man. His focus returned to Senka. “Maybe you were better off staying in your clearing.”

She thought for a moment before answering, then said, “I had learned to be content there.” She saw his face fall. “There are many ways I’ve changed since my death,” she went on. “So much that my old name doesn’t fit me anymore. One way I haven’t changed is that being content isn’t enough. I told you, I want to see what you do with your existence now. And I’d like to see what I can do with mine.” She shook her head, unsure of how to put her thoughts into words, “Not everyone who dies becomes a ghost, right? I mean, otherwise, the planet would be packed.” She looked around the entry hall again. “How many people have died in this house, do you think? But still, no ghosts. I wasn’t sure before, in the cabin. But the fact that I’m still here has to mean something, don’t you think?” She could see that he wasn’t sure how to respond. “Shakespeare said that only death was the end of all, that until then, you have a chance to make a change, make a difference, whatever. But he was wrong, wasn’t he? We’re proof of that. Aren’t we?”

Silas looked tired. “I don’t know. I’ve had nearly three hundred years to make something of myself. I’m not doing a very good job.”

“Why is your Master angry at you?” she asked him. Silas turned his eyes to the floor, silent. “It seems to me,” she went on, “that you’ve managed to do something.” He laughed bitterly. “Laugh if you want,” she said, “but you’ve had an impact. I’d like to have an impact, too.”

“By making someone angry with you?”

“Maybe, but maybe not. I don’t know, Silas. Everything has changed more than I ever thought it could. One night, I watched my murderer drive away down an old logging road. Everything I ever thought was true…wasn’t. It was like the world slipped sideways, and I was left to put it, somehow, back on its axis. It was horrible. But finally, finally, I found comfort and some kind of normalcy in watching the animals come and go, the rain drops sliding down the window panes, the leaves turn red, and fall, and come back to life again. I came to terms with what my existence had become.” She paused, looking at him, hoping he was understanding what she was trying to say. He was very still, standing in the shaft of moonlight, his black hair almost glowing. “All that’s gone now, literally burned away. And right now, I have no idea what my new existence even is. Do you know what I mean? In lots of ways, this is as big a change as the one from living woman to cabin ghost. And now, I think I have to do something with this extra time.” She stopped. She was out of words.

Silas was silent for a while, long enough for Senka to hear a family of mice scratching in the wall behind her. Finally, he said, “As long as I am hunted, I can have no sense of any other purpose.”

“Then let’s see what we can do about that.”

Silas only shook his head. Senka knew she would get no further with him tonight. With an effort, she changed the subject. “That’s more words than I’ve spoken for ages and ages. I’m worn out!” He gave her a wan smile, then said, “Let’s see what Luna has found.”

They headed off in the direction that Luna had trotted and found themselves in a dining room. The table was easily big enough to seat twenty comfortably. Its top was liberally gouged and showed burn marks here and there as if someone had tried and failed to light it on fire. Three or four chairs still kept themselves decorously tucked beneath the table, though most were scattered around the room missing a leg or two. The many arms of the chandelier were empty, the crystals having been picked off at some point.

They moved through a butler’s pantry, now empty, and into a large kitchen. As they came in, Luna looked up from his spot on the baker’s block table in the center of the room. From his mouth dangled filaments of intestines. His paw pinned a sizeable rat to the wooden surface.

“Everywhere I go,” Senka sighed, “always with the rats and mice.”

“I take it you didn’t find anything to be concerned about,” Silas said to Luna. “Or did you just stop your explorations for a snack?” Whether in answer or not, Luna calmly dipped his head and ripped a chunk out of the rat’s side. “He’s just a kitten,” Silas said to Senka, as if in apology. “Stay here a moment while I check the other rooms.” As Senka waited, she watched the methodical deconstruction of the rat. Silas returned quickly. “There’s no sign of anyone. I think she’s abandoned the house. There’s evidence of burglary everywhere. Anything that was obviously valuable has been taken. If she still resided here, a human would never dare to enter the grounds, let alone the house.”

Senka nodded in agreement, then added, “I’d say even burglars haven’t been here for several years. For whatever reason, this house has been abandoned. Why do you think she would do that?”

“I don’t know.” He looked troubled. “Maybe—” He shook his head and clamped his lips tight as if to hold back the words. “I don’t know,” he said again.

“Was she…,” Senka began, then realized she wasn’t sure how to finish her question. She tried again, “Was she one of your kind?” Damnit, she thought, why can I still not say the word? Silas was looking at her, a deep frown making a crease between his eyebrows. “Why?” he asked.

“I’m just wondering if something scared her away. And if it did, just what it might have been. And whether it’s likely to come back. I mean, is that the only one of those creatures? The one we saw tonight?”

“No,” he said, then again, “No.” He rubbed his forehead. “There are many more creatures like that one, and others. But I don’t understand why she would leave. She was not easily scared.” He shook his head as if to cast off his worries. “I’m sorry,” he said, his energy changing. “I need to eat. It’s been a day or two. Honestly, I can’t quite remember how long it’s been, and I’m gut-foundered.” The thought flitted across Senka’s mind to ask him just what, exactly, he would be eating, but she decided against it for now. He went on, “I believe we’re safe enough for now.”

“You know,” she replied, straightening up from where she’d been leaning against the old kitchen range, “I just realized that there’s nothing they can do to me, is there? You didn’t even see me at first, and the creature paid no attention to me at all. I’m not sure he knew I was there. What can anything do to hurt a shadow?” Silas nodded, thinking. He said, “I believe that’s right. Yes,” he added, looking relieved, “you should be safe.” Senka considered Silas and Luna. “It’s the two of you that I need to worry about,” she said. Luna paused in his post-meal whisker cleaning and gazed at her, slowly blinked his eyes twice, then returned to dragging a damp paw along his cheeks. Silas, on the other hand, looked like he wasn’t sure how to respond. Finally, he said in a voice just above a whisper, “It’s been a long time since anyone was worried for me.”

Senka reached out and touched his elbow. “You’d better go find something to eat, being ‘gut-foundered’ and all. I’ll check out the upstairs while you’re gone.”

Silas nodded, then turned to Luna. “Do you want to come?” Luna merely gazed at him. “Perhaps next time,” Silas answered for him. With a half smile at Senka, he moved lightly to the back door, turned the lock, and was through and into the overgrown kitchen garden. Senka shut the door gently and turned back to Luna. The mostly-eaten rat lolled on the table next to him. “Are you just going to leave that there?” she asked him. “That’s kind of disgusting, you know.” The cat looked at her. All he said was, “Prrrp?”

When Senka left the kitchen, Luna followed her. They climbed the stairs together. On the first floor, the hallway stretched out in both directions. “Which way?” she asked the cat. Without hesitation, he turned right and trotted to the first closed door. Senka opened it and they peered in. Empty. “Brutal. They took the furniture and everything,” Senka said. Here, too, wallpaper hung in sagging strips. Several panes of the windows gaped in snaggle-toothed smiles. Below them, the floorboards were warped and stained where the rains had come in through the broken glass. She looked down at Luna, who turned and trotted to the next door, his tail held high so she would follow. She shut the door and moved to the next room. Also empty, as was the third. They moved on to the fourth. Senka opened the door expecting to see nothing.

Her hand jerked from the doorknob as if she’d been burned. This bedroom was fully furnished. Dust lay thickly on everything. Moonlight filtered through dirty window panes. Luna trotted in and sprang up onto the vanity table, stepping neatly between clustered perfumes and makeup containers. Senka joined him, and as he sniffed daintily at a silver-backed hairbrush and comb, she picked up the largest perfume and examined it. The contents had turned brown and murky from sun exposure and time. “I bet that smells rank,” she told Luna. “Why didn’t they empty this room like the rest?” she asked him.

She moved on to the armoire and opened the double doors. The moonlight robbed the colors of their vibrancy, but she could tell that the clothes inside were brilliantly hued. She ran her hand through them and felt silks and chiffons. A fur coat somewhat stiffened with age. She reached for a hanger at random. Orange palazzo pants. Another held a sleek jumpsuit splashed with oversized roses. Luna hopped into the open cabinet and nosed his way between the hanging clothes. “Careful there,” she said to him. “You’re playing in a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of designer couture.” Other than the fur coat that had stiffened from neglect and a fine coating of dust that had sifted its way through the closed doors of the armoire, the clothing that Senka looked at could have come from the designers’ showrooms yesterday. “I don’t get it,” she said as Luna popped his head out from between a Halston and an Emilio Pucci. “They’ve been hanging here untouched for something like fifty years. What self-respecting rodent wouldn’t have trashed them by now?”

Without warning, Luna arched his back and began to yowl. Senka froze, afraid to turn around. She knew what Luna’s yowls meant. An icy pit formed in her stomach. Slowly, carefully, she slid into the darkness next to the armoire. Luna’s voice dropped to a menacing growl, and he jumped to the floor. His back arched, his fur standing on end. Every part of him was on alert as he stared fixedly at the bed. Still growling, he crept to the nightstand, never taking his eyes from the bed. Senka soundlessly shifted her position to try to see what Luna was sensing. With great caution, he leaped to the nightstand. Again, he yowled, his voice climbing into a screech. Senka could see the bed clearly. Nothing stirred. The dust-laden sheet was still.

Slowly, noiselessly, Senka moved out of the shadow and towards the bed, illuminated now by only a hint of the setting moon. As she neared him, Luna’s yowling dropped to a growl, then a hiss, then silence. With his body still rigid with alarm, his silence frightened Senka more than his yowls. She stood beside the bed, Luna at her elbow, and stared down, waiting for some terrifying creature, claws and teeth flashing, to spring up and attack. Nothing happened. Biting her cheek to keep herself from full-blown panic, she reached for the edge of the sheet. Her hand was shaking so badly she could hardly grasp it. With infinite care, ready to flee if she had to, she pulled back the sheet.

Long, tangled, rotten brown hair clung to skin like dried-out leather. Teeth, oversized and protruding exposed by shriveled lips. Eye sockets, empty and ragged. The flesh of one cheek lay like a dead, curled-up leaf stuck onto the desiccated face. It was the essence of death, an image unlike any Senka had seen before. Luna growled deep in his throat. Senka drew the sheet down a bit farther, exposing the corpse in increments so that she could steel herself to each new revelation. The skull resting on the pillow lay separated from its neck by several inches. “Oh,” she whispered, “that’s not good.” Senka looked at Luna who returned her gaze, his eyes all pupils. “Do you think—” she began. She tugged the sheet farther down to expose the corpse’s chest. A cloud of dust rose and swirled with the movement. “Oh, dear,” Senka whispered as she regarded the dried-up body. “That explains a lot.”

When Silas returned from his hunt, he found Senka and Luna sitting together in one of the library chairs. He walked with a bounce in his step, and Senka could see that he looked healthier, more robust. She wanted to be happy for him, but the fear that had begun in the bedroom upstairs didn’t leave room for that. “This looks cozy,” he remarked as he sat down in the chair opposite them. He smiled, but then a look of doubt clouded his features. He glanced between Senka and Luna, a frown creasing his forehead. “What is it?” he asked.

Senka regarded him with concern. “We found something upstairs.” Silas looked alarmed. “Yes?” He leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. She went on, “I think it’s the, uh, former resident.” Silas jumped up, looking more desperate than she had seen him since the creature had appeared in the cabin. She sat forward, reaching out to him and spilling Luna from her lap. “She’s dead! She has a stake through her heart.”

His relief was obvious and immediate. He sank back into the chair. Luna hopped onto Silas’ lap and stretched himself along one leg, purring. Senka wasn’t reassured. “Who do you think staked her?” she asked.

“People everywhere hunt my kind. And many of us deserve it. I have no doubt at all that she did.”

“Will they come back?” Senka pressed. “Are you in danger?”

“Not from humans. I think coming to this house was a luckier choice than I realized at first. It isn’t likely that my Master would think to search for me here. Especially if he knows that she is no longer here.”

“It’s time to tell me who she was,” Senka said. Silas slumped in the chair, one hand massaging his forehead. At last, he let his hand fall to the arm of the chair. With the other, he absently stroked Luna.

“It’s not an easy story for me to tell. It’s complicated.” He paused.

“Start anywhere.” Senka drew her feet underneath her and settled back into the oversized chair.

“The simplest place to start is to say that she was my sister,” he said at last. Senka let out an exclamation of sympathy, but Silas raised a hand. “We weren’t close any longer,” he said. “To be honest, I've rarely thought of her in years. The last time I saw her…it ended badly. That was when I visited her here, thinking that she would keep me safe, at least for a season. I hadn’t realized that her loyalties had changed. I managed to escape in time, but I lost Luna.” He looked down at the kitten in his lap. “The Luna of that period.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Senka exclaimed.

“I imagine,” Silas smiled, “that his descendants people the farms for miles around. I hope so, anyway. My Master would have had no interest in killing him.”

“Your Master found you here? How?”

“Aguya. My sister. She sent word to him that I was here. ”

“But did she know that he wanted to end you?”

Silas nodded. “As I say, her loyalties had changed.” For a moment, he watched Luna, snoozing on his lap. “We had been close once. As children, certainly, and even after we were made. But we lost touch and drifted apart over the centuries.” He met Senka’s eyes. It was like a confession when he said, “We were created by the same Maker, you see. In fact, he created her first. And while he came to revile me, he almost worshipped her.”

Silas stopped his story and looked toward the tall library window. Senka was suddenly aware that the shadows in the room had melted into the soft pearl gray of predawn. At the same time that Senka asked, “Do you need to rest?” Silas asked, “Do you sleep?” They laughed, and Senka felt a warmth of companionship that she had not felt in a very long time. She said, “I don’t know what’s legend and what’s fact.” Silas nodded his understanding. “I could say the same, but I haven’t heard any legends about shadow women.” Senka smiled. “No, no sleep.” Silas grunted his acknowledgment. “Nor I. The tales about sunlight are true, but as long as I keep away from windows, I’m safe.”

“Will you go on with your story, then?”

Silas looked down at the sleeping kitten and nodded.

He began to talk.

But that will have to wait for tomorrow night.

I thought you’d say that.

You’re tired.

Yes.

Will you sleep now?

Yes, I think I can.

This story isn’t too scary for you, is it?

No, I want to know what happens to them all.

There will be scary parts to come.

That’s alright.

You’re very brave. Are you comfortable?

Mm-hmm.

Close your eyes. Good night. Sleep well.

‘Night.

__________

Go on to Chapter 4