Page 15 of Magpie
I remember what felt likedying.
I want to pull away from him, scared of these images that keep rising in my mind, but at the same time I find myself bewitched by his touch. He must have found whatever answer he waslooking for in my face, as he releases my chin and moves instead to grip my hand.
“Follow me,” he says, his voice soft and soothing, but he gives me no option to protest as he pulls me after him. He tugs me into the hallway, grabbing his top hat on the way out, and together we descend the stairs.
I cannot fight the feeling that I am walking willingly into the mouth of a beast.
One of the final few patrons in the library is a college student surrounded by a pile of books and papers, lost under a mountain of homework. I peer over the top of the small cubicle I’m in, training my eyes on them. I’m careful to keep my hood down, to try to keep the decay that wafts off me in waves hidden. I don’t want to infect anyone else, but I can’t help but watch the student. A quick glance at their textbooks has me guessing they’re a science major. Thoughts of the college degree I left behind in another life sour my stomach. Yet another thing I gave up, another sacrifice laid at the feet of a monster.
I can’t stand to watch the student any longer. I sink back into my chair. Even with my eyes trained on the bright screen in front of me, my thoughts stay with the student, and the life ahead of them. I hear their harshly whispered curse in the quiet of the library, and I assume they just noticed the time as they begin to hastily pack up. I don’t need to flick my eyes to the softly ticking clock above the exit to know the time. I am keenly aware of it. Only too well in tune with the night, and the many creatures it hides.
The student stands, and I can’t stop myself from glancing at them as they pull their bag over their shoulder and move to the exit. I wonder if they’re going to meet a friend, or maybe even a date. I can’t help but imagine a younger, less tainted version of myself walking excitedly beside them. I wonder if I would be preparing for a night out with friends, or even a weekend visit to family.
Sighing, I turn my eyes back to the screen in front of me. It’s no use wondering what my life would have been, because itisn’t. My family, my friends, my past, none of itisanymore. I grimace, clenching my hands tightly, my knuckles whitening at the thought of the void I left behind, the erasure of my life before I methim.
Fiery rage fills me. My life may have been stolen from me, but I am determined to get it back.
Finding nothing helpful on the message boards, I put my laptop away and drag over one of the many stacks of laminated newspapers I’ve been studying all day. The librarian I approached was so engrossed in her work that she barely took notice of me when I asked for old newspapers. She waved a hand at me, pointing me in the right direction, never once meeting my eyes. I’m glad of it; she doesn’t deserve the effect of my aura.
Unfortunately, the newspapers are proving to be just as useless as my attempt to escape him. Truth be told, I’m not entirely surewhatI’m looking for. I entered the library for the free internet, and in the process I stumbled upon a forum dedicated to the Wandering House, filled with posts about various hidden clues and easter eggs in local newspapers, all hints pointing to the location. Most of the posts are badly photoshopped images, advertisements with a creepy, but stereotypical, haunted house. I roll my eyes at all of them. The very idea that the House would advertise itself is ridiculous. It doesn’tneedto try to draw people in. Its essence alone is thehypnotizing nectar that calls stray souls to it, drowning them in its sickly-sweet embrace.
I almost closed the forum, until I scrolled by one comment in particular. It was hidden so low at the bottom of the thread, I almost overlooked it. My body froze at the picture on the screen, fear and panic seizing me at the mere sight of him. The image of that white-gloved hand, concealing the face of a devil, and that blinding white smile. Before me on the screen was the exact newspaper clipping that sits stuffed in the back of my journal.
The user who posted it mentioned finding the piece in their grandmother’s scrapbook full of old clippings. She had labeled the picture “Darkness Himself,” and I can’t help but agree with the description. The other users were only too quick to dismiss it as fake or having nothing to do with the Wandering House. The original poster tried to argue that the man fit the description of the rarely seen actor who is said to live in the attic of the House, but no one was willing to believe them.
Except me.
So, with no plan, and nowhere to go, I remain in the library, looking through old newspapers. I don’t need to study the pages too intently; I know if there is any sign of the House hidden within them, it will call out to me. The clipping the user posted on the forum, and the one I have hidden in my backpack, are both old. Stained brown with age, faded by time. The newspaper I’m flipping through is from 1923, and I only have a few more stacks left to look through. So far, I have come up empty-handed.
I groan, leaning back in the chair and rubbing my hands over my tired eyes. They’re stinging and scratchy from staring at a computer screen and old typefaces all day, and it’s all been for nothing. I hoped, uselessly, that if I could find a tangible image of him, I could track down who created it, who knew him outside of the House, hoping stupidly that it would lead me to the onlyother person who escaped him. It isn’t much of a plan, but it’s the only place I could think to start.
Sighing, I drop my hands from my face and crack my neck, stretching my arms. I’m careful to not draw too much attention to myself, which is hard to do anyway in a mostly empty library. The more people aware of my presence, the easier it will be for him to find me. He will feel the darkness calling out to him, and he will come for me once again. I scoff. Not that he needs to find me. He has my key. He knows, just like I do, that it is only a matter of time before I have to return to him.
The library door dinging as another patron exits startles me from my thoughts, and I realize I am the only person left. I swear under my breath. I need to find a place to hide for the evening.
Scooting my chair back quietly, I peek over at the counter. I can just see the librarian. She moves out from behind the desk, and I duck down as she begins clicking lights off. I am all at once glad for my presence dripping from people’s memories like melting wax; it makes it only too easy to be forgotten. Taking the opportunity, I dart behind a bookshelf, silent as a ghost.
With one final flip of a switch, the librarian plunges the place into darkness. The jangling of keys and the click of a lock let me know she is gone, but I still give it a few moments before coming out of hiding and walking back to my workstation. The newspapers are still spread out, and I am just grabbing the back of the chair when—
“You’re just delaying the inevitable.”
I hear the soft tapping of his shoes as he moves through the shadows, creeping toward me like a coming storm. My eyes are wide, my body taut, as I feel him stop behind me.
No, no, no, no. He can’t take me. He can’t turn me back into Magpie.
But I am powerless to move, powerless to stop him. Fear grips my mind and has complete control over it. All I can manage isto pull in one ragged breath after another. His hands, encased in those soft leather gloves, glide onto my shoulders. Warmth spills from his touch, and I cannot stop the sigh that escapes my lips, cannot stop the desperation to melt into his touch. To let him control me entirely, toownme entirely.
His grip on my shoulders is tight, verging on painful, before he relents and begins to slowly trace his hands down my arms. His touch is somehow featherlight and entirely caging as he tugs me against him. His arms encircle me, a too-tight embrace, and his lips trail a series of frigid kisses down my neck. My eyes flutter closed at the feel, as that slithering numbness begins to fill me. He kisses his way up my neck, until his lips are directly next to my ear, and he whispers, “Come back to me, Magpie. Come back to where you belong. Aren’t you tired of being left in the cold without me?”
A tear slides down my cheek as his hand reaches up to circle my throat, gripping it tight.
“Aren’t you tired offeeling?”
A cry escapes my lips, a desperate sound, the only fight I have in me. He chuckles, his rumbling laugh vibrating through me.
“How much longer do you think you can resist me? How much longer do you think you can be withoutit?”
At once my eyes snap open, and I yank myself out of his smothering hold. I will not sink into that dark hole. I will not allow him to bury me in the grave of his embrace—never again.
