B. Larson - Creatures

“It’s some kind of flower,” I said. I touched a leaf to make sure it was real. It had a soft, slightly fuzzy to it, exactly as it should. “It’s not a fake plastic thing.”

“I think it’s an African Violet,” said Beth. “My mother never stops messing about in her garden every spring.”

For some reason, the flower made a chill run through me. What were we messing with? What kind of place was freezing cold in the dead of winter and closed up in darkness and still let a flower bloom?

“There something’s strange about the way time behaves in this place,” I said.

“Time?” asked Beth. She nosed closer to the flower and examined it. She touched a violet petal gingerly, as if it might bite her.

“Maybe time moves differently here. The telescope can see the future, and the flower can grow as if it’s springtime in the sun.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” said Beth.

“Not without knowing the whole story it doesn’t.”

Beth looked back to me. “Are you going to look into that thing?”

I eyed the telescope and the black rubber eye cup. Did I really want to know whatever it would show me?

“Open the slot where the lenses goes in,” I told Beth.

She blinked, and then nodded. She opened the slot and directed the beam of her flashlight inside. She slid out a disk. It was a greenish-tinged lens. It looked thicker and darker than the rose-colored lens had. It was as thick and dark as a green glass bottle.

We looked at each other. “It has to do something,” said Beth. She was whispering again. She carefully lowered the green lens back into the slot.

I slowly lowered my head to peer into the eye cup.

I almost screamed. As it was, Beth startled at my intake of breath.

“Don’t even tell me,” she said.

I gazed into the night sky, and I saw was there a figure there. It was not an entirely human figure. It was dark with a widespread cloak that reached far out from outspread arms, like the fluttering wings of a kite. I worked the focus knob and breathed hard. I zoomed in on the face. It was a human face, but there were fangs in its mouth. There was a scary look of intelligence in its eyes. The lips curled back over those long teeth and the fanged man looked at me, just as I looked at him. For a moment, the telescope seemed reversed, as if I were the creature being examined and all I could see was the eye of the scientist studying me.

I felt something pulling at me, and finally I fell back away from the telescope and into the chair. I gasped.

“It was holding onto your head like a suction cup!” said Beth. Her hands were on my shoulders. I realized she had pulled me back from the scope. She had ripped me away from it by force.

“Okay, tell me now, I’m ready,” said Beth.

“A man,” I said. “A face in the sky. I think-I think it was Vater.”

She looked at me quizzically.

“And,” I said slowly. “I think he saw me.”

We heard a creaking sound then. I knew what it was instantly. We’d made the sound ourselves just minutes earlier. Someone was out in the attic hallways, moving stealthily, but not silently. I waved wildly at Beth to put out the flashlight. She clicked it off. We both listened for a moment. I heard only the sound of my heart pounding in my ears and my breath puffing worriedly from my open mouth. I put my hand up and cupped my ear. It helps me to hear better sometimes.

Then I heard it, fainter than before, another creaking of old floorboards complaining under the weight of someone’s foot. I put my mouth to Beth’s ear.

“Someone’s coming. Let’s just run for it,” I whispered.

She gave my hand a single squeeze of agreement. We crept on hands and knees up to the square door and bolted through it. Out in the hallway, we could see a figure coming without a light. We turned the other way and ran with what seemed like thundering steps. I glanced back and saw the figure crouching and looking after us. Suddenly, as if coming to a decision, it came after us.

I turned back to look where I was going and slammed into Beth. She squeaked and fell against a door. We’d run out of corridor. We fumbled for doorknobs, rattled one then the one next to it, both were locked.

The third door wasn’t locked, however, and swung open groaning like a coffin lid in a scary movie. We fell inside another passage and slammed the door behind us. I felt around and found there was a twist-lock, and I twisted it.

We ran down another passage past windows that let in the light of the full moon that had risen outside. For the first time, I felt the moonlight as it touched my skin.

I pulled my hand back as if bitten.

“What’s the matter,” whispered Beth.

I shook my head, rubbing my hand, and then slipped it back into the moonlight. It was an odd sensation, the way normal people feel the sunlight falling on their bare skin. I knew the light wasn’t hot enough to feel it for normal people. But I had changed now. I was part animal. I was no longer a mundane. I’d always heard that our people did feel it. For us, moonlight was like the light of a hot summer day where the wind is silent and the sun is blazing hot overhead. I’d heard of people who had even been burned by moonlight. Even when it didn’t burn, we could always feel it.

We ran a good ways down the passage when Beth pulled me to one side. There was a curtain of some kind hanging down. We hid behind it. We could hear, back down the passageway, the doorknob rattling. Then we heard a jingling sound.

“They’ve got keys!” said Beth in my ear.

“I know, we’ve got to get out of here, but I’m lost.”

“We must have crossed most of the mansion by now. What if we come down in the adults section?” asked Beth. “Maybe we should just give it up.”

I looked at Beth. Even back here, in the shadows, I could vaguely see her scared, glinting eyes. What had I led her into? Her first week at a new school and she would be in all kinds of trouble at the very least. But there was much more going on here than just two school kids running loose at night.

“I want to know what’s going on,” I whispered to her.

“If it’s Urdo, she’ll hear us or smell us or something.”

I blinked in the dark, knowing she could be right. There was more jingling. Someone was fumbling for the right key. At least there was no sign they had any light or any desire to turn one on.

I broke out of my cover and went to the last window. The moonlight warmed my hands, just slightly.

I strained and the window crunched open. It was partly frozen shut and didn’t open easily. I trotted back to Beth and yanked her scarf from around her neck. Her hand jumped to her neck, but she didn’t complain.

I ran back to the window and reached outside, shoving the snow around. Then I tossed Beth’s scarf out on the roof a few feet away. Feeling I had only seconds to spare, I scooted back to our hiding place and fought to control my wild breathing.

We waited, but not for long before the hallway door clicked and swung open on squealing hinges. We felt the figure approach, but couldn’t see it hidden as we were behind the curtain. It came quietly, almost soundlessly. Still, it seemed like I could feel someone approaching, somehow.

There was a crack at the bottom of the curtain and a shadow fell over the narrow slice of the floor that I could see. I held my breath. Beth squeezed my hand very hard.

There was a scraping sound at the window sill. I dared to hope the bait had been taken.

Then we heard another door open, perhaps at the other end of the hall. Boots stepped firmly toward us. This step I knew. I knew the creaking of those black boots. It was Urdo, it had to be.