knives.”
I nodded. “Kitchen. Got it.” Dammit all, we had just been there, and I'd tried to drag Lydia out the front door! Now it was three, four rooms away, which might as well have been five miles if we had an angry ghost on our case the whole time. But still, I thought we probably had some time. We needed to get to the kitchen, and see what Harry didn't want us to see, and since he hadn't yet started trying to actively kill us we probably had at least a few minutes.
Sometimes it hurts my faith in a fair and just universe that I am so often so very wrong when I try to be optimistic.
A boot, sopping wet with blood, slammed down in a nearby doorway. The man wearing it did not step through fully. After all, he wasn't here to be seen. He was here to imply, to build fear, to let our imaginations see just enough to make them run away in a blind panic. Something else rounded the corner, at roughly the height to imply whoever was holding it was at least eight feet tall; a long, rusted sickle that scraped idly across the wooden door frame, making a sound like a cat being tortured.
Shit. He'd manifested. Already. Ten minutes from Lydia arriving to the ghost being powerful enough to take physical form? Forget all-state, this guy had been in the frickin' Ghost Olympics. I had never heard of one that could build power so quickly, even with a source of emotional energy as freely available as Lyd, here.
“Well, this is gonna suck.” I said.
“Trespassers,” said a deep, guttural masculine voice that did not appear to be emanating from the figure still partially hidden in the next room. It rebounded off the walls, full of righteous fury and sounding a bit like the speaker was gargling with gravel. “Hoodlums, vandals, common thieves! Come onto my land, will you? Come into my home? You'll pay. You'll pay. You'll pay. You'll pay!”
The hook and boot simply vanished, and the world went totally silent for several long seconds.
“I don't suppose he just wanted to chat, and he isn't coming back?” I asked nobody in particular. “Maybe stopped for lunch. Lots of people like lunch.”
Lydia, through her blind terror, turned to look at me. “Are... are you quite sane?” She asked.
“Well, that was rude of you. It's possible he just left.” I said, my feelings just a tiny bit hurt. Really, that had been uncalled for, I hadn't done anything really crazy yet.
And then things got a bit weird.
The blood pouring from the walls had been a trickle; it now suddenly and without much warning (which I felt was rude) a flood; cold, sticky, nauseating liquid up to our ankles and rising rapidly. The thick, coppery scent of it assaulted my nostrils; I'm used to the smell of blood, but not usually to this extreme, so thick it was almost more smothering than the liquid. This alone would have been bad, though also, I had to admit, still pretty cool. I had to give Harry credit, he had a flair for old-school drama. Blood and moans and rusty hooks. Classic stuff! But my admiration was tempered by the fact that the rising liquid also featured a disturbing number of rippling contrails beginning to move toward us. So not only was there blood up to my fucking shins, something I couldn't clearly see was swimming in it. Lots and lots of little somethings.
Okay, so the ghost had in fact not gone to get lunch. But I maintain that the possibility had, at the time, existed. We didn't know for sure, and someone had to venture a theory. Science is important!
“Lydia?” I said, grabbing her hand. “Run.”
This was easier said than done. The liquid around our legs was knee-high before we'd made it five feet, and it wasn't like running in water; nasty, viscous stuff, somewhere between tar and molasses in consistency. And then the pain started, of course... each time a ripple of something tiny and fast and sharp reached me through the red pool, there was a bite, like being prodded by a razor. Each painful, sloshing step brought on half-a-dozen tiny bites.
Not bad. Just barely breaking my skin through the jeans. Lydia had been right, Harry did like to play; this wasn't a trap to kill anyone. This was designed to hold them still and hurt them. Sap strength, destroy will to fight back, and just inflict a million tiny, pointless little agonies for no reason other than sick amusement. Good. Gives me time to think, time to plan, time to run. Every step brings me closer to a plan, focus on that. I just need to keep moving and hope that- ouch! I thought, my mind kind of side-tracked by the sudden stabbing pain. Again. Douchebag, I will seriously hit you in the ghost-face for this. My pants are ruined, and I like these pants!
Every step brings me closer to new pants. Focus on that.
Everyone needs to have their priorities.
The blood, disturbingly enough, vanished almost literally as soon as we finally managed to slog out of the room. It still clung to me, of course, making every movement cold and sticky and nasty, which didn't help the fact that I already had to drag a hundred-thirty (Heyyyyyy, she was in pretty good shape if I was judging her weight right!) pounds of mindlessly terrified dead weight in a deeply impractical dress behind me.
“Huh.” I said. “Well, that sucked, but it wasn't the worst thing ever. Looks like he isn't planning to drown us, good, never been a fan of drowning. Still, wonder why the whole pool just vanished? That doesn't make a whole lot of sense.”
The floorboards shattered, and what appeared to be a rotting, blood-covered hand burst from beneath them to clamp onto my ankle.
“Oooooooooh, so it's like, every room has something different in it.” I said, using my powers of logic. “Well, I guess the variety stops us getting bored? And it's kinda cool, like a game show, only with death.”
Lydia screamed. This was... I dunno, maybe she thought it was helpful. I can't speak for her. She just seemed kinda skittish in general.
Oh, well. The hand clamped around my ankle felt solid enough, what with the grip like a fucking vise and the nails that I was pretty sure would be drawing blood if I didn't follow the basic and essential monster-hunting strategy of “Wear thick boots.” And, it just so happened that I had a knife! When in doubt, try stabbing. Works well on a surprising number of things. I let go of Lydia's hand, bent down to hack away at my new ankle accessory (I was thinking of naming him Roger), and was treated to the sight of several more seemingly disembodied, very much rotting limbs bursting from the floor around the room.
I rolled my eyes as I stabbed the arm around my ankle a few times until it let go. This was probably more scary to someone who had never dealt with whole zombies before. Just the arms didn't have the same impact, y'know? Plus, unless this house was built on a burial ground, they weren't even real zombie arms, just some kind of ectoplasmic manifestation. I would have had to cut off the whole wrist to make a real zombie let go, while this sissy imitation gave up after a few jabs with a silver-plated dagger. Tenacious bugger, your basic zombie, very keen on brains.
Granted, there were a lot of these things, so I guess I could forgive a lack of tenacity.
“Um.” I said. “There really doesn't seem to be a path. Do you remember how you got through this last time, Lyd?”
“I turned back.” She whimpered.
“Oh, goody. Well, screw that, I am not changing my plans just because some spooky hands say so.” I said. “Okay! Count of three, we run through it.”
“What?”
“Did I stutter? We are totally going to run through that bunch of zombie arms.”
“Are you quite sane, sir?”
“I am super sane! This will work, I'm seriously like 65% sure.”
“That is not very suEEEEEEK!” She said, as I started running without actually counting to three and grabbed her hand while I did.
Spoiler Alert: Sometimes I am a huge, huge jerk. But I swear, I always do it for a good reason. Almost always. Usually. Sometimes.
Secondary spoiler alert: Sometimes the 'good reason' is that I find it funny.
Tertiary spoiler alert: That is almost always the 'good reason'.
But hey! This was probably going to work.
You saw the percentage, right? That's more than a one-in-two chance of success! That's pretty good, right. Good solid plan, running.
Lydia is going to get dragged to the ground and pulled to death by zombie ghosts, and you're probably gonna join her. This is really, really stupid. Said the part of my brain that exists solely to depress me. I threw a rude thought in its direction and kept running, cold, jagged talons tearing at my poor pants. They were good, solid pants that had done nothing to deserve being shredded by blood-dwelling spirit beasts, or to be rent by spectral hands.
Also? This hurt. Quite a bit. The first hand had clamped onto my boot, and further on the boot that was laced up over my quite thick and well-secured ankle holster. The rest of them weren't getting near as firm a grip, but many of them were also impacting on denim. They had really, really sharp nails, and they were very cold and strong as Hell. It was a bad experience. I had to give props to Harry, he ran a solid ghost-house. Maybe a tad bit more old-fashioned than I would have pulled, blood and disembodied limbs and ghastly voices, but it did its job. If I had been a normal, inexperienced sort who had never run into this kind of situation before, I would have been a useless, gibbering wreck by now.
Like Lydia. Who seriously would not stop shrieking. Something is wrong when you are surrounded by the wails of a damned soul, and yet the most annoying