Page 124 of Eldritch

The sound of a woman. Many women. All brought to their last nerve, their last tolerance, their last chance filled with all the anger that had come before and existed now.

Heat and energy bucked out of Sybil, and she staggered back just as the ceiling collapsed and the floor buckled under Heysooth and Clarice and they plunged into the cellar.

Doug grabbed her hand and raced toward the front door. The mansion wailed an almost human protest, its structure feeling, seeing and hearing enough over the decades. Time to die.

They dashed out of the front door. They turned and stopped to look at the house as the ladies piled out of the van.

The house shuddered, and the anger and terror inside Sybil hadn’t eased. Her whole body trembled with that power, undiminished. Not finished.

She heard a rumbling, but this time as if a beast bellowed, determined to acquire revenge.

“It’s not dead,” Sybil said.

She didn’t care if it killed her. She wasn’t letting it devour Doug or her crew.

She held up her hands and allowed all her wrath to surge toward the building. She staggered as the effort expanded and surged from her in waves toward the structure. Again, the house moaned, creaked, shivered as if the wrath of a goddess seized it in a terrible tantrum. The house crumbled inward. A loud groan echoed from the forest. Trees nearest the building moved forward, their enormous branches battering the walls.

The house collapsed in on itself.

Doug and Sybil linked hands and rushed past the van.

The other women scampered after them, and they plunged into the knee-deep snow to put over fifty yards between them and the structure.

An incredible roar, so loud it hurt Sybil’s ears, echoed from the building. She put her hands over her ears and watched the mansion disintegrate. Doug’s arms came around her, and she savored the shelter. The other women clustered collected and linked arms. Sybil closed her eyes, her entire body shivering with a bone-rattling cold.

With a last groan, the house stilled. When Sybil opened her eyes, the mansion had collapsed down to less than a full story. The constant clank and wheeze of the settling building heralded the end. Enormous trees eased back from the rubble, their branches swaying and moaning.

Letisha came over as Doug released Sybil. Sybil noted her friend’s tearful face, and they hugged tight.

“Jesus, girl,” Letisha said. “Did you do all that?”

Sybil pulled back just as Maria and Pauline came up, their expressions a mix of shock and fear.

Sybil managed the smallest relief-filled laugh. “I think I did.”

“I hope I never get on your bad side,” Pauline said with a lopsided smile as she wiped away tears.

“Me either,” Maria said.

A tremor still thrummed like a tuning fork inside Sybil that couldn’t yet settle.

Sybil returned to stand near Doug. “We need to go.”

“Where?” Pauline asked.

Sybil gave the ruined house one more look. “Estes Park.”

Doug held up his phone. “Still no signal.”

“Wait.” Maria looked alarmed. “What do we tell them when we get there?”

Sybil locked gazes with Doug and said, “That the building collapsed, killing Clarice. She was in the cellar when it happened and the rest of us barely escaped.”

Doug nodded. “Let’s go. The snow has stopped.”

Doug and Sybil led the way in his truck, while Letisha, Maria and Pauline took up the rear with the van.

As they turned onto the snowy road leading back to Estes Park, Sybil and Doug held hands.

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