Evil Origins: A Horror & Dark Fantasy Collection (4 page)

Samuel
continued past the creek until the forest felt as though it tipped upward
toward the sky. He knew he was moving to higher ground, even though Major’s
trail had disappeared. As he made the ascent, the trees thinned, and the air
felt colder. Samuel kept moving to keep warm, exhaling plumes of breath into
the forest. Samuel struggled to determine whether it was day or night. He could
no longer see the horizon above the trees, only more trees on an
ever-increasing slope headed skyward. He leaned on the north side of a tree
trunk, resting his legs and lungs. Samuel rubbed his eyes, certain that the
structure he just spotted in the distance was a figment of his imagination. He
would not be convinced the cabin nestled in the trees was real until he touched
it with his own hands.

Chapter 4

Moss-covered
shingles clung to the pitched roof. A lonely brick chimney jutted out of the
roof at an angle that threatened to pull it over. Weathered, wood shakes
covered the front and side, their stain long since dissolved. One lone window
sat to the right of the door, a glaze of time covering the glass and giving it
an opaque finish. Three steps led up to a door with a single brass knob and no
lock.

Samuel came
within five feet of the cabin and stopped. He looked over his shoulder,
expecting the occupant to arrive and chastise him for trespassing.

“Major?” he
called out.

No response.

“Major, are you
in there?”

The surrounding
forest swallowed the sounds like a muffling blanket of snow. Samuel strained to
hear noise coming from inside the cabin, but he heard nothing. The rest of the
forest remained silent as well.

He took another
step closer, scanning the ground for any sign of activity. A long spider web hung
diagonally across the top right corner of the door, and other webs clouded the
corners of the front window.

Samuel walked
to the right, circling around the cabin. The wood shakes covered the other
exterior walls, although some had fallen to the ground in clumps of rotted
wood. He bent down and sniffed the crumbling shingle, expecting an earthy,
organic scent. He caught the slightest hint of mold and nothing more. Coming
around the other side and back to the front, he did not find a cistern, privy,
or any other evidence of habitation.

He looked up at
the gloomy ceiling above and felt as though night was coming again. Though he struggled
to find the rhythm of the day, he could not determine whether the night was a
few hours off or perhaps minutes away. He saw the leader of the pack in his
mind’s eye and decided he was not ready to face the alpha male again. Major
said he would be back. Had it been one night or two since the attack? Samuel
could not remember, the time becoming stretched and thin like warm taffy.

The front door looked
back at Samuel, unmoving and uncaring. He placed a foot on the first step and
heard the wood crack under his weight, the first noise registered by his ears
in a long while. He felt a tingling in the bottom of his foot that climbed past
his ankle, over his knee, and bolted up to his shoulders. He pulled his foot
back instinctively, and the electric buzz faded. When Samuel put his foot back
on the step, it returned again like a low-voltage electric current. He looked
down and his eyes widened. A crisp, brilliant, blue line outlined his foot and
extended to the outer edge of the step. The line glowed with an intensity that
made Samuel squint. It cut through the drab grayscape of the forest and the
dreary sky. The wood beneath Samuel’s foot felt solid, smooth. He became aware
of a scent of fresh paint that reminded him of summers spent painting fences in
the neighborhood.

Samuel closed
his eyes as the memory rushed back.

He
sat on the ground in plush, green grass. An aluminum paint tray cradling a
puddle of pure-white paint sat next to him, a wood-handled brush resting on the
edge. He stared straight ahead at a picket, one half bare, smooth, and sanded
while the top half sat glistening with a coat of fresh white.

“Hurry,
Sammy. It’s almost time for lunch. If you finish by one, we can head to the
pool for the rest of the afternoon.”

“I’m hungry.
Whatyer makin’?” asked his ten-year-old self.

“Grilled
cheese and yogurt.”

“I’ll be in
soon, Mom.”

Samuel opened
his eyes, and the childhood memory dissipated like a balloon carried away on
the wind. He looked down, and the blue outline flickered. He could see the
rotted step fading through the painted one of another time and place. The
tingling feeling in his body disappeared until he was left standing with one
foot on the step and another on the ground.

The
patch of illumination slipped lower in the sky as the darkness pulled it down
to force another night. He thought of the wolves again and placed a hand on the
doorknob, willing to risk entering the unknown instead of facing the wolves
again. He turned the knob and pushed, but the door did not open. The howl of the
wolves rose again, as if Samuel’s touch had triggered their bloodlust.

The shudder
worked its way through Samuel’s body until it triggered the Major’s words in
his head.

They will
return.

A cold sweat
broke out on Samuel’s forehead, and he felt a rumbling in his bowels. The
howling ceased for the moment, but he knew that the next time it broke the
unnatural silence, the pack would be much closer. He tried again, his hand
gripping the doorknob with white knuckles. Samuel felt like the Arthur of old,
trying with all his might to remove Excalibur from the stone. The knob would
not move, so he pushed with one shoulder on the front of the door. The lazy
spider webs dangled on his head, but the door did not give. He stepped to the
side and used the palm of his hand to wipe the pane of the window. The next
burst of howling made him shiver. The pack was closer. Much closer.

Samuel backed
away from the window, spinning around and conducting a quick survey of the
landscape surrounding the cabin. If he used a rock to break the window, the
wolves would follow unless there was something inside the cabin he could use to
bar it. He shoved his hands into his pockets but found nothing that might gain
him access.

The howl that
came next froze Samuel. He turned in the direction of the noise and swore that
he saw the yellow eyes bouncing between the scant trees of the elevated forest.
Samuel placed both hands on the knob and shook as hard as he could. He leaned
back, pulling with his body weight. The paws of the wolves rustled the leaves
on the forest floor. Samuel looked over his shoulder without releasing his
grip. The alpha male was back, and the light in his eyes spoke to Samuel
without the need for words.

“Goddamnit,
open up!” Samuel screamed at the door.

The alpha male
growled low, fifty yards from the cabin. The wolf downshifted from a full
sprint to a light gallop, its ears up and fangs bared. The rest of the pack
came into the tight clearing in front of the cabin, the other hunters behind
the alpha male. The females and cubs remained safely at the edge of the tree
line.

Samuel smelled
the wet fur, the odor more pungent than any others had been since he fell from
the noose. He felt the low, moaning growl emanating from the hungry beasts. They
spread out until the cabin was surrounded. He turned and placed his back on the
front of the door. Samuel pushed his heels into the wooden step and drew a deep
breath.

“I’m not giving
in,” he said to the alpha male. “I’m not dying without a fight.”

The alpha male’s
ears twitched. He strutted closer to Samuel. The others took tentative steps
closer, careful not to infringe on the territory of their leader. The wolf
snarled with saliva dangling from his fangs. Samuel bent his knees and leaned
forward until his rear pressed on the front of the door, and he raised his
hands up to his chest in a defensive position. The alpha male ducked his head
and lunged forward. He took two bounds and opened his jaw in midair as Samuel
closed his eyes and braced for the impact. At the moment he expected to have
teeth tearing at his throat, Samuel fell backward into utter and complete
darkness.

***

Speckles of
dust hung in the air, dancing on thin strings of light that penetrated the
cabin through gaps in the shake. Samuel blinked twice, feeling his eyes burn
from lack of moisture. He lifted his head and turned to face the door while his
body remained on the floor, his chest against the bare planks. Cobwebs dangled
from the corners of the ceiling and stretched from underneath the cracked
plaster. A narrow strip of light framed the door, leading Samuel to believe
that it was day, or the closest thing to daylight that existed in this world.

An image of the
alpha male snapped into place. Samuel closed his eyes and saw the feral, yellow
eyes coming at him. He looked into the beast’s empty recesses, not believing
such a creature could ever possess a soul. He remembered the teeth, bared and
hungry, ready to tear at his flesh. Samuel even recalled the alpha male’s scent,
which had overpowered any lingering odor present.

Samuel shook
his head and dispelled the memory. He sat up, stood, and surveyed the cabin. A
rickety table stood in one corner, the old-fashioned type meant for writing
with a quill and inkwell. The wood appeared gray in the darkened room, and
Samuel would have been surprised if it looked any different in the full
daylight. A wooden chair with a three-rung back sat tucked beneath the
tabletop. A rudimentary bunk filled the opposite corner. Two rough-hewn legs
extended to the floor on each corner, while the long side tied into the wall. A
thin, lumpy pad covered the top of the bunk, which did not hold a pillow or
blanket. Like the desk, webs crisscrossed the bunk. The only other item in the
room hung from a single nail protruding from the crown molding.

At first,
Samuel thought it was a mirror. Ages of dust covered the surface, which hid the
item’s true identity. An ornate, carved frame encapsulated a piece seemingly
out of place with the other basic furniture inside the cabin. Samuel approached
it and wiped the length of the frame several times until he stood in front of a
portrait.

The darkness
and age of the portrait made it difficult for Samuel to determine whether it
was a painting or a photograph. He could make out the profile of a woman, but
not much else. Samuel walked to the desk and pulled the chair out from
underneath it. Four dark circles sat on the floor where the dust could not
settle. He wondered how many years it would take for the dust to fill those
spaces. Samuel placed the chair on the floor in front of the wall and placed
his right foot on it. He pushed down, and other than a slight creak of the
floorboard underneath, the chair felt sturdy. Standing on it brought him eye level
with the fastener and cable holding the portrait on the wall. He reached out
and lifted the cable off the nail until the full weight of the portrait rested
in both hands, and he stepped back down to the ground. Something flickered deep
within the recesses of his mind. Something stirred. Something familiar and yet
just beyond his reach. Samuel walked toward the lone window, and the ambient
glow of the anemic sun filtered through the grime. He wiped off more of the age
covering the portrait until his eyes met those in the photograph—the eyes he
knew almost as well as his own.

***

The woman in
the photograph stood, positioned in the lower-right corner of the frame. Dark,
long curls spilled about her shoulders and rested on her arms. She wore a black
top, which, combined with her dark hair, framed a pristine, youthful face. She
wore makeup and eyeliner in a way that made her look trendy and hip rather than
cheap. Ruby lips pressed together into a thin smile that radiated warmth and
good-natured teasing. But it was her eyes that ensnared Samuel the way they had
many years earlier. The woman’s green eyes called to him, made him forget his
name. They sat evenly spread on her face, and the eyeliner around them
accentuated the contrast between her porcelain skin and emerald irises. Samuel
used his finger to draw a trail of dust from her cheekbones to her neck, as if
he would somehow feel the warmth of her skin under his touch. He smiled and
looked to her long, thin fingers cradled around a set of keys. With her head
tilted to the side, he could almost remember what she had been saying when the
photograph had been taken. Almost.

His eyes moved
toward the top-right corner of the frame, where another figure stood. The man
stood behind the angelic form. He wore his hair slicked back without the creep
of a widow’s peak. The man wore a white T-shirt beneath a black jacket, and his
waist disappeared into the black background of the photo. He appeared to be
leaning against a wall, his body behind her but his face turned toward the
photographer. The man wore a fuzzy beard, spotty and uneven. Like the woman, he
too sealed his lips into a slight smile, as if the photographer had told a joke
at the moment the camera shutter opened, capturing both subjects before the
remark would force them into open laughter. The man’s left arm disappeared
behind the woman, while his right hung at his side.