Page 7 of Corpse Roads

Each footstep outside the cage echoes like a gunshot going off. The floor is wet and slippery, laced with putrefied scents. Laura’s body has long since melted into festering lumps of matter.

I’m glad I can no longer smell my own stench. Blood and dirt are crusted to me like a disgusting second skin. Crossing the basement, all I can hear is my pounding heartbeat.

The boards of the narrow staircase creak beneath my meagre weight as I dare to take a step upwards. I freeze, too scared to even blink. Pastor Michaels will break every last bone in my body.

But they aren’t here.

Move, Harlow!

Reaching the top of the ancient staircase, I find the basement door unlocked. Why would Pastor Michaels lock it when his little pet is safely secured in her cage? He clearly never thought I’d try to run.

Feeling my way through the darkness, I emerge into a tight cupboard. Another door leads me into a wider space, the scent of mothballs and mildew heavy in the air.

It has a high ceiling, arched and adorned with empty candle holders. Dirty stone floors are occupied by an audience of destroyed chairs. This place looks like… a chapel. I’m not sure how I know that.

There are no personal effects or ties to the monsters that inhabit this place. It’s abandoned, the perfect killing field for their crimes. Silence wraps around me, deep and unnerving.

I am utterly, terrifyingly alone.

This is a mausoleum of my childhood.

Dragging my hand along the wall for guidance, I reach a wooden door. There are more empty rooms on the left, with the remains of a broken bed crumbling into ruin.

Past and present are superimposed over each other as I look around. Damp stone walls are replaced by peeling, rotten wallpaper, and empty candle holders rest within bronze chandeliers.

I know this place.

I’ve seen it before.

The cage is all I’ve ever known but that certainty is stripped away as I feel my scalp burning with the memory of being dragged through these rooms by my hair.

I shake the dark thoughts aside.

There isn’t time for this.

Facing the door, it’s littered with various locks and bolts. There’s no way I will get out of here. No matter how many times I slam myself into the slab of wood, screaming as my broken ribs twist and splinter, it doesn’t budge.

Sliding down the wall, I hug my knees to my chest, ready to succumb to death. It won’t take long. If I’m still alive when my parents return, they’ll reopen the healed scars on my body and let me bleed.

No, Harlow!

This isn’t what Laura wanted.

“Laura isn’t here!”

Yes, she is.

I look down at the bone in my arms. She’s still with me, her essence distilled into blood-stained calcium. Laura died believing that I’d get out one day. I can’t let her down.

Frantic, I search the chapel again. The stained-glass windows are high, and I’d certainly hurt myself trying to get through. If it buys my freedom, though, I’ll walk through fire and offer my soul for the devil’s fury.

I will do anything to feel the wind in my hair and finally see what the sun looks like. I’ve always wanted to know. Laura and the other girls told me such beautiful stories. I cried as they described the daylight.

Do something about it.

Let’s get out of here.

Heaving the last unbroken chair nearly kills me. I have no strength. Throwing it with a furious scream, the flimsy structure hits a wall beneath the window and smashes into useless pieces.

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