Tania Carver: Cage of Bones

‘Bit too old for comics, aren’t you?’

Cam blushed. ‘Read it when I was a kid. It was a… a horror comic. These two brothers. Cain and Abel. Abel lived in the House of Secrets. Cain lived in the House of Mystery. With this graveyard between them.’ He paused. Gav hadn’t said anything, so he continued. ‘Cain was always killin’ Abel. But he was always back to life for the next issue.’

He expected Gav to say something, insult him in some way. Take the piss. But he didn’t.

‘Cain and Abel,’ said Gav. ‘That’s the Bible, that. First murderer, first victim.’

Cam just looked at him, eyes wide in surprise.

‘What? Just ’cos I work in demolition doesn’t mean I’m thick.’ Gav looked away from Cam, beyond the fence, across the path.

‘Hey look,’ he said, pointing. He laughed. ‘There’s another. That must be your House of Mystery.’

Cam looked. Gav was right. There was another building further down the road in even worse repair than the one they were standing in front of. It looked like a row of old terraced houses, boarded up and falling apart, the foliage reclaiming it. Eerie and isolated. Even the graffiti that covered it looked halfhearted.

And in between , thought Cam, the graveyard .

They stood in silence. Cam eventually found his voice.

‘Creepy place,’ he said, ‘innit? Like… like somethin’s happened here.’

‘What, like an old Indian burial ground or somethin’?’ Gav laughed. ‘You’re too sensitive, you. An’ weird.’ He sniffed. ‘Now come on,’ he said. ‘We better get crackin’. ’Cos it’ll be bloody murder if you don’t get a move on. We ain’t got all day. Let’s get inside.’

Gav stepped in front of Cam, crossed towards the boarded-up doorway. Cam followed reluctantly. As he did so, he saw something on Gav’s face that he hadn’t seen before. Something that the mouthing off and bravado didn’t cover.

Fear.

Up close, the house looked – and felt – even worse.

The back wall was covered with tarpaulin panels. Over the years, the edges had peeled away from the wood and brickwork, and now they resembled a line of hooded cloaks hanging on a row of pegs, just waiting to be worn to some sacrificial black mass.

Cam shivered again.

In amongst the cloaks were the remains of a doorway. Frame rotted, eaten away from the ground up, paint flaked off and blown away. The door it held looked flimsy enough too, missing paint showing wood that looked like shredded wheat.

‘Go on, get it open.’

Gav’s voice behind Cam.

Cam reached out, turned the handle, pushed. Nothing. Pushed again, slightly harder this time. Still wouldn’t budge. And again, more force this time. Nothing. He stopped, turned to Gav. Hoping that would be the end of it. That they could leave now. Return to the sun, the warmth.

Gav had other ideas. ‘Useless twat, give it here.’

He twisted the handle, pushed. Hard. Nothing. Anger, never far from the surface of Gav’s steroid-addled psyche, was rising within him, reddening his face, making him tense his arms. He stepped back, shoulder-charged the door. A splintering sound, but it held firm. The sound was encouragement enough. Gav did it again. And again.

The door resisted, but eventually, with a loud crack and a shriek of breaking timber, gave.

Gav stood there, bent double, hands on knees, panting.

‘Go on then, kid… in you go… ’

Cam looked between Gav and the darkness. Reluctantly, he entered.

It took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust to the gloom after the bright morning sunshine outside. And once they had, it was pretty much as he would have expected. Razor blades of dusty light cut through the gaps in the wood and brickwork of the walls, illuminating a desolate, dank space.

The boards beneath Cam’s feet creaked as he put pressure on them. He was wary about entering further in case the floor gave way beneath him. A shadow loomed behind him.

‘Come on, get movin’.’

Cam stepped further into the house.

‘Jesus Christ… ’ Gav again. ‘That smell… ’

Cam hadn’t noticed he had been holding his breath. He let the air out of his lungs, breathed in. And immediately gagged. The stench was awful, almost physical in its putrid power.

‘God… ’ said Gav. ‘Smells like someone died in here… ’

‘Don’t say that.’

Gav looked at him, about to make a joke. But Cam could tell he was becoming just as scared. Gav said nothing.

‘Let’s look around.’ Cam was surprised at the strength in his voice, the bravery of the statement. But it had nothing to do with bravery. He just wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. The sooner this house was demolished, the better.

Cam, still wary of the floorboards, moved further into the room. The smell was overpowering. Cam hated to admit it, but Gav had been right. It smelled like someone had died in there.

There was a set of stairs off to the left of the room, leading upwards. They looked, if anything, even riskier than the floorboards. Directly ahead was a doorway through to another room. It had no door, and Cam was aware of quick, darting movements in the shadows at his feet as he moved slowly towards it. Rats. He hoped.

The remains of a kitchen were decaying in the next room, cabinets empty, doors missing or hanging by half-hinges, lino underfoot broken and missing.

‘Anything there?’ said Gav from the main room.

‘Kitchen,’ said Cam. ‘Or it was once.’ At the far end of the room was another doorway. Cam moved towards it. There was a door in this one. Closed. And it looked newer, sturdier than the rest of the inside. He reached down. The handle looked newer too.

Heart skipping a beat, he turned it.

A sudden light came from behind him. He jumped, screamed, shut his eyes.

‘It’s a torch, you soft bastard,’ said Gav.

Cam forced his heart rate to slow down. Gav swung the torch round the main room. The small black shadows scuttled away. They were rats. But something else had been there. Among the debris of the falling-apart building, the bricks, old concrete and cement, pieces of wood and broken furniture, were more recent leavings. Pizza cartons. Fast-food wrappings. Newspapers. Gav shone his torch down on them.

‘Look at that,’ he said. ‘The date. Couple of weeks ago. Recent… ’

The bad feeling Cam had been harbouring increased. ‘Let’s get out of here, Gav. Come on. This… this isn’t right.’

Gav frowned angrily, fighting the fear inside himself, not wanting to show it. ‘Bollocks. Just some old tramp or somethin’ been dossin’ down here. Come on.’ He pointed to the door. ‘What’s in there?’

‘Toilet?’

‘Open it.’

Cam, sweating now, turned the handle.

It wasn’t a toilet. It was another flight of stairs, this time leading down. The darkness sucked away what light there was like a black hole.

‘Gav… ’

Cam stood back to let Gav see. Gav drew level. The two of them in the cramped kitchen filled it, made the place seem claustrophobic. Gav shone the torch into the dark stairwell. The two of them looked at other.

‘Go on then,’ said Gav, licking his lips.

Dry from the steroids, thought Cam. Or fear.

Cam opened his mouth, wanted to complain, but knew it would be no use. Putting his hand out to steady himself against the wall, he began to make his way downwards.

The wall was clammy, cold. He felt damp flaking plaster and paint beneath his palm. The steps creaked as he placed his feet on them, felt soft at times.

He reached the bottom. Felt hard-packed earth beneath his boots, a low ceiling above his head. The smell was worse down here; corruption allied to a pervasive dampness that made his skin itch and tingle unpleasantly.