Tormentor (14 page)
Authors: William Meikle
Skull and crossed bones.
He’d been interred with a cloak that had once been an animal skin but was now little more than fragments of tattered hide and fur. There was also a gold bracelet, finely carved and looking too delicate to touch for fear of it falling apart—and a two-foot-long tusk, ivory by the look of it and walrus at a guess.
Lying draped on the tusk was proof of the Spaniards’ presence—two silver crucifixes on long chains had been wrapped around the ivory. I could make a good guess at what had happened. The Spaniards had found the grave and given the remains a Christian burial in the rolls of leather—possibly in the hope of bringing peace to an errant spirit.
The fire flared and the drums beat louder as I bent for a better look at the tusk.
It was scrimshaw, carved with delicate strokes. I unwound the crucifixes and dropped them among the bones as I lifted it into a better light.
A ring of runic script circled the thick end, and there was a fine depiction of a warrior chief wielding an axe that showed clearly enough who the owner of the piece had been. The length of the tusk was carved in stick figures.
No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head, left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head
.
I looked from them, to the figure with the axe, and down to the grinning skull lying on the table. The figures weren’t a message at all, nor were they a code for a drummer to follow—they were depictions of a warrior’s exploits in battle.
No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head, left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head.
The drums got louder and the fire flared again. A single line of soot drew down the whitewashed wall to my left, then another. The stereo kicked in, full volume, and the house shook again, rocking to the beat. In my mind’s eye, I saw a bloodied axe swinging in time.
More soot figures appeared, marching across the wall in ranks. The drums pounded and the fire blazed, sending waves of heat through the room. My chest felt tight, breathing getting more difficult. I wrapped the crucifixes round the tusk and laid it back down among the bones.
The drums didn’t lessen. The pounding got heavier. A crack ran the full length of the ceiling above me; plaster and dust fell like fine mist. Beth’s urn danced on the mantel, threatening to topple. I moved towards it, but the heat of the flames drove me away.
More stick figures marched across the walls. The floor bucked and swayed in time to the beat, threatening to throw me off my feet. Beth’s urn did a final bump and grind and toppled to smash in the grate. Her ashes rose and swirled as the heat caught them.
The Spaniards had tried to make the chief stay down by giving him a Christian burial—but I knew a better way, a way that had kept Beth at peace these past years. She had just reminded me of it.
Ashes to ashes, stardust to stardust.
I swept the roll of leather, bones, cloak and bracelet into the grate where it took immediately, flames roiling beyond the confines of the fireplace and lapping up the walls. The drums pounded; it sounded like rage. I had to back away as the sofa caught fire, blazing like a small furnace within seconds. Something fluttered down from above—the girl’s notebook, dislodged from its spot in the rafters, catching fire as it fell and blackened to ash in seconds. The book of folk tales went next, falling from the mantle into the blaze, taking the tale of the Little Drummer Boy with it.
The whole room raged in red flame. A floorboard cracked beneath me, then another. The drumbeat pounded in my head threatening to drive me into oblivion. I staggered backward, reaching the patio doors as the flames found the curtains and sent them up in a sheet of fire. I backed out into the yard just as part of the roof caved in and sent a shower of sparks high into the air.
I threw the logs of my wood supply through the patio doors, stoking the fire further as the drums beat and the red rage screamed. The stoat’s frozen body lay at the foot of the pile, and I threw that in too; it blazed briefly before joining everything else in a conflagration that ate the house in time to the pounding beat.
I thought it would never go quiet, but as the last of the roof fell in and a huge shower of sparks was thrown up to be taken away by the wind, the drums finally fell silent. I was left on the shore, with only the whistling of the wind off the loch for company.
A thin plume of smoke rose from the wreckage. Fine ash fell around me, all that was left of my home, of the chief who had slept there all these years—of Beth.
Ashes to ashes, stardust to stardust.
5
I’m writing this some six months after those events. It’s summer, and here in Edinburgh the tourists have arrived with the sun. I’ve started painting again—abstracts mostly. It’s hard going as my hand wants to draw stick figures, and every so often I find myself drumming out the beat.
No limbs, no limbs, no head, no head, left arm gone, left leg gone, no legs, no head.
I keep in touch with Alan. He wants me to sell the land—he says I could make at least some of my money back. But the cash isn’t as important as my peace of mind. I cannot be sure I finished the job. Who is to say that I reached the center of the mystery? Was the chief the first to hear the drums? Or is there something deeper still on that loch shore, lurking, waiting for someone else to answer the call?
All I know is it will not be me.
I was lost in the dance, and no doubt I will be again, when I join Beth, wherever she might be.
But not yet.
About the Author
William Meikle is a Scottish writer, now living in Canada, with numerous novels, novellas and collections published in the genre press and over 250 short story credits in thirteen countries. His work has appeared in a number of professional anthologies and magazines. Previous works from DarkFuse include the novels
Night of the Wendigo
and
The Hole
and the novellas
Clockwork Dolls
and
Broken Sigil
.
About the Publisher
DarkFuse is a leading independent publisher of modern fiction in the horror, suspense and thriller genres. As an independent company, it is focused on bringing to the masses the highest quality dark fiction, published as collectible limited hardcover, paperback and eBook editions.
To discover more titles published by DarkFuse, please visit its official site at
www.darkfuse.com
.
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