Arsenic for the Soul (14 page)

Perhaps if the brick façade didn’t
resemble rotting teeth, she might have appreciated the Baroque
Gothic charm. Instead, it echoed sentiments of a world where the
sun didn’t rise.

“
Shall we?” Milo said and
the gates floated open at his touch. Steeling her nerves, Vivian
followed her lover to the strange building.

The stone mullioned windows
were caked in frost, all but concealing the interior. Vivian
stopped short of the entrance as soon as she realized her
mistake.
This isn’t a manor at all. This is
the sanitarium Camilla warned me about.
The
engraving above the door confirmed her worst fears: St. Ignatius
Sanitarium.

“
Maybe I can scavenge some
parts inside for the car. I know a thing or two about fixing spark
plugs, if that’s the issue. They must have some spare tools,
right?”

“
I don’t think you should
go in there.” Milo chuckled and leaned elegantly against the
doors.

“
Maybe it’s haunted. You
strike me as the kind of girl who would fancy a first date in a
Gothic mansion, am I wrong?”

“
Any other Gothic place
besides here.” Milo looked at her quizzically. “I have a really bad
feeling about this, just trust me. We shouldn’t separate out
here.”

Ever the adventurer, Milo didn’t heed
her and wandered ahead.

“
It’s okay if you don’t
want to come inside. Wait in the car for your friend. I’ll be back
in a few minutes.”

“
I don’t want you to go in
there either. It’s an abandoned asylum.”

“
I won’t be gone
long.”

“
Milo, please don’t. You
have no idea what could happen to you—”

His next move caught her by surprise.
Suddenly her mouth was pressed hotly against his and his hands
touched the curves of her waist. It ignited passions in her that
she struggled to pin down. Part of her wanted him to throw her on
the courtyard and make love in the rain and thunder. She hungered
for his touch more desperately than anything in life.

Their lips finally parted.

“
I promise I’ll come back
in one piece.”

Vivian was speechless. Thus, she
couldn’t protest when he set foot inside the tuberculosis asylum.
It was surreal as she watched him fade into the shadows like an
apparition. When at last he was gone, Vivian studied the daunting
asylum rearing before her. The forest sang a melancholy song as the
wind scraped across the courtyard.

Panic chanted in her head as the
minutes passed. She expected Milo to emerge from the sanitarium
intact any moment now, but no such solace greeted her.

It felt like an eternity passed before
she heard footsteps whispering against the stones behind her. She
spun around to see Camilla walking through the curtain of
rain.

She chuckled nervously as the wind
showered her with scorn. The sanitarium loomed against the
blistering sky like a mansion that crawled out of the forest.
Despite the fact that it was condemned, it still existed as a
woeful reminder of her family’s sins.

“
Of all the lovely spots in
the forest to meet,” Camilla said.

“
How did you find me?”
Vivian asked.

“
I happened across your car
and it didn’t take me long to pick up your trail in the mud. I see
your date is mysteriously absent. Don’t tell me he…”

Vivian nodded.

“
He went
inside.”

“
And you didn’t hit him
over the head to stop him?”

“
I tried to stop him but
he…” She didn’t want to explain how he made her whimper with a
decadent kiss. She was already furious with herself for yielding to
his advances. She didn’t need Camilla adding her laughter on top of
that insult. Luckily, Camilla didn’t push for details. Perhaps she
already suspected the truth from Vivian’s smeared
lipstick.

“
Never mind, we’ll save the
stories for another time. Let’s find him and get the hell out of
here.”

The slick courtyard shifted under
their heels as they approached the façade of St. Ignatius
Sanitarium. Vivian slipped on the rime but steady hands caught
her.

“
Thanks,” she smiled,
seeing Camilla behind her. A light drizzle pattered against the
flagstones as they bore down on the entrance. Camilla’s hesitation
screamed as she reached for the doors. Hideous gouges marred the
surface. What instrument could possibly render those?

“
Aren’t we going inside?
Milo could be anywhere in there by now.” Vivian couldn’t stand
another second in the rain while Milo strolled the forbidden
halls.

“
Sorry, I just have a
strange feeling about this.” Camilla cleared the ghosts of her
family from her head and pushed the doors open. A winding corridor
beckoned them from beyond the antechamber.

It felt like stepping into the Vesely
Manor again for the first time. She remembered that haunting day
when she explored the cellar and discovered a hidden passage to the
gardens. How strange that she should think of it now when faced
with the sanitarium.

“
Milo must have come this
way,” Vivian said, indicating the gas lamps burning on the
wall.

“
What do you think we’ll
find in here?”

“
Hopefully clues to the
tuberculosis outbreak. This is the only link we have between the
disease and your mother. They must have had an infirmary here. It’s
a sanitarium, after all.”

They carefully navigated the halls and
followed the trail of light left by Milo.

“
There’s no more. It stops
here.” True enough, darkness awaited them at a crossroad of
corridors. Where Milo ventured was anyone’s best guess.

The walls were glazed yellow and bore
the texture of rot. Holes were gouged into the plaster. Vein-like
structures dribbled out and latticed the walls like black webs. To
one as imaginative as Vivian, it looked like someone carved lips
into the surface.

Groans penetrated the corridors like
an onslaught of guilt drilling through flesh and bone. Camilla had
no way of knowing if her imagination invented them or not. Just
when she turned a corner and expected to see a misshapen surprise,
the noise evaporated. A door creaked under Vivian’s hand and she
peeked inside rooms replete with beds and meager
furnishings.

“
The dorms,” Vivian
indicated. “Milo! M—”

“
Don’t!” Camilla almost
clapped a hand over Vivian’s mouth. “We don’t know who else might
be in here.”

“
What are you talking
about? You think someone else would be lurking in this madhouse at
this time of night?”

Camilla nodded.

Vivian felt as though she was shifting
through a dream. Dust shimmered in the rare streaks of light that
parted the darkness. All sound may as well have departed from the
world because it felt like Vivian and Camilla didn’t speak for
hours.

Only the sense of sight remained in an
atmosphere drenched in dread. It was strangely alluring for all the
wrong reasons. Camilla could barely feel her body as she, too, was
sucked into this nightmare.

There was a haunting beauty in the
colors, silence, and solitude. Emerald light streamed through
stained glass windows in the resident hall. Every surface seemed to
contort under the moon’s absinthe-colored caress.

She felt like one of the last
stragglers on earth before oblivion came for them. It was
frightening and soothing in equal doses. That beauty turned to
revulsion in a few steps.

Rust-colored splotches on the barren
walls alluded to violent skirmishes in the past. The mystery behind
those spots only agitated the fear in their hearts.

Vivian peeked into the infirmary as
she strolled past. Streaks of blood lacerated the beds and
walls.

“
Oh my God…” Camilla’s jaw
dropped at the sight of the gore. Her brain struggled to piece
together what must have been the last moments of the former
tenants’ lives.

“
What did they do to the
patients here?”

The unseen horrors left the fresh wake
of paranoia in her mind. She inspected every shadow in anticipation
of rapid movement. There was simply no telling what lurked in the
dark beyond the confines of her imagination. She could only sense a
hideous and enthralling presence that refused to depart this
place.

Camilla dashed the silence with four
ominous words.

“
I can hear
something.”

Vivian tuned out the pounding of her
heart and listened avidly.

A scraping noise called out to them
around the corner. Against her better judgment, Vivian stepped into
the infirmary. Camilla would have cried out in alarm but she didn’t
dare break the silence. Instead, she grabbed Vivian’s
arm.

“
I have to find
Milo!”

“
You have to stay quiet—”
Vivian slipped free and turned the corner into the
infirmary.

The spectacle looked like a
slaughterhouse. Sharp lengths of steel were scattered on the
floor.

Vivian had a flashback of the botched
surgery in the ER. She imagined the young man, Dominik, sprawled in
the emergency room as surgical instruments clattered and cardiac
monitors squealed. It built to a crescendo of ungodly sounds that
eroded her happiness.

She almost fainted as the acidic scent
of blood rushed to her brain. The obscene scarlet color was inhuman
and carnal, almost sexual in essence.

Then she saw the naked figure standing
in the heart of the chaos. Its body was a seven-foot-tall canvas
bathed in crimson. It was an appalling contrast with the
green-tinged light. Whatever provided the blood was long gone from
the room or pulped beneath the man’s heels.

She thought of Milo. She wanted to
vomit at the sight of the gore. She prayed to God that he didn’t
wander in here and…

The figure’s hairless head reared up
and looked at Camilla.

It was the same man who had been
following her in the Black Atrium.

He clutched several blades in each
hand like crudely-fashioned machetes. The edges dug deep into his
palms, salivating into a cesspool.

One of his arms was strangely longer
than the other and it reminded Vivian of an ape. Cords of muscle
rippled across his body slick with the blood. His shark-like eyes
practically swallowed Camilla. Anguish welled in her like she had
never known before.

She and Vivian were destined
die.

The man hefted one of his hands as a
grin twisted his face. Camilla tensed and waited. Vivian tried not
to show her fear as her throat clamped down. She would stand
defiant in the face of this monster even as he eyed Camilla
hungrily. Suddenly she noticed his wiggling fingers working through
jerking movements. Was it trying to communicate with
them?

She tried to make sense of it to no
avail.

“
Camilla, stay back,”
Vivian warned.

Faster than she could blink, he
snipped off three of his fingers. Blood sprayed from the sheared
stumps. The grin never left his face.

Time froze before hell unleashed upon
them.

Vivian and Camilla screamed as he
lunged across the infirmary faster than a two-hundred pound
behemoth should be capable of.

It howled and stabbed at Vivian with
strokes that would wrench out her bowels. She heard Camilla’s
screams as the blade zigzagged across her chest. The wicked steel
grazed her skin. Vivian threw herself backward before the blade
could hook around her rib cage and tear her open.

Vivian bounced off the wall and
reached for something to defend herself with. Her hands only
slapped at the wall as the blades arced down again. With an angry
scream, she floundered out of the way. The heels she wore specially
for her date cracked against his shin. To her surprise, it didn’t
do much to stall the attacker.

A burbling sound rumbled from his
throat and he lunged. His reflexes were lightning fast and fueled
by frenzy. Another kick to his face bought her a few precious
seconds to flee.

Vivian stumbled to her feet, losing
her heels in the process. It was just as well because they would
only slow her down. Camilla waited for her at the other end of the
infirmary. She looked paralyzed at the sight of the brute.
Strangely, he didn’t immediately pursue Vivian. Instead, he
approached the red cesspool and picked up a grotesquely long length
of steel—just perfect for impalement.

“
Go!
” Vivian grabbed Camilla and bolted into the halls. The man
wouldn’t take long to catch up to them with his uncanny
speed.

Camilla cried out and fell. Vivian
whirled around with eyes glazed in fear, expecting to see the
stalker towering over Camilla. He hadn’t caught up to them yet. She
could hear his blade hacking against hard surfaces in the distance,
progressively growing louder and closer.

Camilla stood up on her twisted ankle
but she yelped in pain and fell again.

“
I’m trying to get up… it
hurts,” she said between gritted teeth. Vivian saw the purple
bruise glowing on Camilla’s ankle.