The Seven Whistlers Read online

  The Seven Whistlers

  by Amber Benson and Christopher Golden

  Copyright 2006 by Amber Benson and Christopher Golden

  This book is a work of fiction. All characters, events, dialog, and situations in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without the written permission of the author.

  Cover Art by Lynne Hansen

  Book Design by Lynne Hansen

  http://LynneHansen.zenfolio.com

  http://www.LynneHansen.com

  For more information, contact: [email protected]

  Visit http://www.ChristopherGolden.com

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  The Seven Whistlers

  About the Authors

  Excerpt From "Astray" From Ghosts of Albion: Collected Tales by Amber Benson and Christopher Golden

  Other Works by the Authors

  CHAPTER 1

  Rose Kerrigan stood in the sterile, white corridor of the nursing home, her eye drawn to the large corkboard above the nurse’s station. She scanned the board while she waited for the day nurse to finish dressing her grandfather. The corners of her mouth turned up in an uncertain grin when she caught sight of a flyer offering the sale of a “slightly used” set of Encyclopedia Britannica.

  She couldn’t help wondering where one of the guests at the Valley Glen Rest Home would put an entire set of encyclopedias. If she went by the size of her grandfather’s tiny room, they’d just have to pile the books right on the hospital bed with the patient so there’d be space to walk in and out the door.

  The image of her birdlike grandfather sitting up in his hospital bed surrounded by encyclopedias, a confused look on his grizzled face, caused Rose’s smile to grow even wider. She knew it was a horrible thought but, as with most horrible or silly thoughts, it just would not leave her brain.

  “What are you smiling at?”

  On the surface, the voice was rich and inviting, its honeyed contralto deceptively lulling. Only with experience could Rose detect the harsh note of condescension. Rose had spent her childhood learning every nuance of that voice because knowledge was power. And knowing what mood corresponded with what tone kept her safe.

  There was only one person whose very voice could brew so much tension in her — the voice of Isobel Hartung — the woman Rose called Grandmother.

  She turned, forcing a smile, and saw the old woman coming toward her down the corridor, heels clicking on linoleum. Her grandmother wore a neat, camel-colored sweater and linen pants. Her thick gray hair was pulled back in a loose bun that only seemed to highlight the fine bones in her face. She would have been beautiful, if she hadn’t been so cold.

  “Your grandfather had an episode last night,” her grandmother said. “I suppose the nurse has already spoken to you —”

  Rose shook her head. No one had mentioned anything to her about her grandfather having an episode the night before.

  “Well,” Isobel continued, “apparently it was brought on by a minor stroke, nothing that would kill him, but still, I don’t want you exciting him this afternoon.”

  Rose frowned. “I brought the book we’ve been reading; we’re on the last chapter. It usually soothes him. I can’t imagine Huckleberry Finn upsetting anyone . . .”

  Her grandmother ignored her as if she hadn’t spoken at all.

  “Just go in and tell him you have other plans for the afternoon. He mustn’t be overtaxed, Rose. If you weren’t so oblivious, you would see that.”

  The old woman’s words struck her heart like serrated knives. She hated that she let her grandmother affect her so strongly, but this was a cycle that had begun in childhood, something Rose could not seem to overcome.

  “But —”

  “I have to speak with the doctor then I’ll be back to make sure you’ve gone.”

  With that, her grandmother turned on her exquisitely-shod taupe-colored heel, and strode off down the hall. Rose watched Isobel’s retreating back, her own body sagging slightly as the tension flowed out of her.

  God, how the woman makes me want to scream, Rose thought miserably, a migraine starting to eddy around the edges of her consciousness. She slipped the book she had been holding tightly in her hand back into her backpack.

  Huckleberry Finn was just going to have to wait for another day.

  Ever since her grandfather had moved into the home six months before, Rose had made it her duty to visit him as often as she could. Though the Alzheimer’s, which stole his memory, made it difficult for her grandfather to even recognize the faces of his loved ones, Rose did not let it bother her. She just showed up every few days armed with a thick book. If they couldn’t share warm family memories, at least, she decided, they would share a good story. Even when old Walt Hartung didn’t seem to recognize her, or confused her with his own daughter — Rose’s mother — he seemed to take great pleasure in the sound of her voice and her presence.

  When Rose entered his room, her grandfather was sitting up in bed, a small frown on his leathered face. Cathy, the day nurse, was putting away the last of his soiled clothes, and gave Rose a wink as she stuffed a pair of dirty socks into a small white laundry bag.

  In a low voice meant only for Rose’s ears, she whispered, “I heard the witch outside. I was prayin’ she wouldn’t come in ‘til I was long gone!”

  Rose nodded wearily.

  “Sorry you got the worst of it,” she added, catching sight of Rose’s pale face and furrowed brow.

  “It’s all right,” Rose answered. “I’m used to it.”

  “T’aint right,” Cathy said, frowning as she pulled the string taut on the laundry bag, and moved toward the door. Again she shook her head, tight blond curls bobbing. “That’s no way to treat your own blood.”

  Rose tended to agree, but let the comment go as Cathy exited, leaving her alone in the Spartan room with her grandfather.

  “What’s that nurse yammering about?” her grandfather asked, his voice catching in his throat like the air was having trouble escaping his lungs. He was a bit hard of hearing, and was forever asking Rose to talk louder or repeat what someone else had said.

  “Nothing, Pappy,” Rose said, pulling a chair up to the hospital bed and settling in beside him. He reached out and took her small hand, holding it firmly inside his own weathered one. His skin felt like the papery outer peel of an onion, dry and crackled.

  “They’ll tell you I was sick last night,” he said, his rheumy eyes starting to run a little at the sides. He seemed more agitated than usual, making Rose afraid to answer him. He sensed her misgiving, and scowled.

  “Don’t listen to a goddamned thing they say, girl. It wasn’t sickness that had me last night,” he growled. “It was something else. Something far worse than what your own body does to you when you get old.”

  He clutched at Rose’s hand, almost hurting her with his strength. She was surprised by this outburst. It was the most lucid she had seen him in weeks.

  “I don’t understa —” she began, but he cut her off mid-word.

  “There’s evil in the world, love. Things your young mind can’t grasp, but believe me, they exist, lying in wait . . .”

  “For what?” Rose asked, fear beginning to twist in her stomach.

  “For your soul . . . your sinner’s soul.”

  He squeezed her hand, crushing the tiny, fragile bones that rested inside the flesh.

  “Ow! You’re hurting me, Pappy,” Rose said, her jaw clenching in pain. He seemed to hear her because the pressure on her hand eased a bit, but he still would not let her go.

  She stared at him, willing him to return back to
normal, but the glazed look in the old man’s eyes told her that he was far from okay. She followed his gaze, turning her head to where his eyes were fixed on something just over her shoulder, outside the window. She saw nothing out of the ordinary beyond the glass, just the skeletal brown of leafless trees and the muted gray of the storm-pregnant sky.

  “What is it, Pappy?” she said again. “What do you see?”

  He let out a low whimper, tears beginning to leak from the corners of his eyes. His face belied the strange memories that seemed to be washing over his brain. This was the kind of lost, delusional gaze she’d had to get used to with him. It broke her heart that she could not draw out from that shell the man he had once been.

  “Death’s on the hunt for me, Rose,” he rasped, fear trembling in his voice. Terror shook him, and in that moment he seemed like a small child, afraid of something in his closet, or the boom of a thunderstorm. He crawled from his bed and tried to hide behind his granddaughter, staring at the window. “They’re coming to collect, Rose, for all my sins. Please don’t let them have me.”

  Rose tried to calm him down, to make sense of his delirium. He was frightening her. Still, she couldn’t help but feel a bit of joy. It was the first time in over three weeks that her grandfather had called her by her given name.

  A sharp claw dug into her shoulder, pulling her up and away from her grandfather.

  “What have you done?” Isobel cried, a loose strand of hair falling forward across her flushed face. She pushed Rose into the far wall, not caring that the girl’s head slammed painfully against the windowsill.

  ‘I didn’t do anything —” Rose began.

  Her grandmother fixed her with a glare malevolent enough to stop Rose’s protests cold in her throat.

  A doctor and two nurses burst into the room behind Isobel. One of the nurses — a tall, dark-skinned man with a wild afro — slipped a sedative filled syringe into her grandfather’s arm, pushing the drug into his vein with cool efficiency.

  “Go!” Isobel screamed as she pointed a bony finger in Rose’s direction.

  No one else paid attention to their interaction — the doctor and nurses were still intent upon sedating her grandfather — so they didn’t see the hatred that played across the old woman’s face, but it chilled Rose to the marrow.

  She didn’t need any more encouragement — the look was enough. She turned and fled from the room.

  CHAPTER 2

  There were no dreams while he slept. The sedatives kept them at bay. His sparse white hair stuck in sweaty clumps to his scalp, his head thrown back haphazardly against a pillow. Long, low snores escaped from the back of his throat, almost waking him. From somewhere in the room came the sound of a chair being pushed backward, its legs squealing against the cold linoleum of the floor, and Walt Hartung awoke with a start.

  The old man looked around, unsure of where he was. The room seemed familiar, but he could not place it. Gradually, scraps of memory flowed back, and he remembered this place. Other things came back to him as well, and the fear returned.

  He turned his head, saw that he was not alone, and found his fear abated, if only for a little while.

  “Bella . . . ?” he said his voice hoarse.

  “I’m here, Walter.”

  She still looks as beautiful as she on our wedding day, he thought as he stared at Isobel, who sat primly in a nearby chair. He reached out his hand, and she took it in her own, massaging his fingers. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the beginnings of a large purple bruise starting to form underneath the skin of his arm. Then he remembered the huge needle, and the grim determination in the male nurse’s eyes as he jabbed the syringe into the soft flesh.

  “Don’t leave me,” Walt croaked. “Please stay with me, Bella.”

  She smiled at him, but her eyes were sad beneath long, mascara-covered lashes. She squeezed his hand again, but did not reply.

  “They’re coming for me,” he whispered, his heart hammering inside his scrawny chest.

  A sob escaped him, and great tears began to leak down his face. Helpless to stop them, he turned his face against the pillow, wiping at the tears as best he could. When he looked up at her again, Isobel pulled a tissue from the box on the night table and dabbed at his face, careful not to hurt him. There were no more words.

  Finally she leaned forward and brushed her lips against the cool of his forehead. She stayed like that for a moment, breathing in the smell of his skin, then stood and pulled her hand from his, leaving the room.

  Rose walked as quickly as she could through the trees, cursing herself for taking the short cut through the cemetery. It was getting darker, and she was usually coward enough to avoid the place during the light of day, so why she had chosen to dare it when the moon was rising like a ripe peach in the sky above her, she had no idea.

  She had been on autopilot ever since she’d left the nursing home. The scene she had witnessed there, and the hateful look in her grandmother’s eyes, lingered in her mind, and she replayed the incident over and over in her head. The worst part was that she didn’t even know what she had done wrong. She hadn’t even read from the book. She had simply come in to say hello to Pappy, and then all hell had broken loose.

  Deep in her backpack, her cell phone began to buzz, nearly giving her a heart attack. She didn’t bother to stop and dig it out because she knew it was only Jenny calling to make sure she remembered they were meeting at The Pennywhistle at six instead of the usual seven o’clock.

  It was an age-old ritual — every Tuesday night she and her friends met to share a few pints at the local pub and gossip about the happenings in town. It was a nice way to keep in touch, and to blow off a little steam in the process. Actually, Tuesday was a rule, never to be missed. But the Pennywhistle was sometimes a two or three night a week habit.

  Tonight, though, Rose had almost gone back up to her parents’ cabin instead of downtown. Her nerves were shot, and her head was a throbbing mess. The idea of brushing down horses, saddling them, carrying bags of feed, and dealing with tourists who’d never been on horseback before make her head hurt even more. But then she remembered that she wasn’t on the schedule for tomorrow. She loved working the stables at the Red Oak Inn, but tonight, the idea of a day off tomorrow was bliss.

  Plus, her car was parked near her apartment. Whenever she was down in Kingsbury proper, she walked instead of drove. So she had to pass within a few blocks of the Pennywhistle regardless.

  Tuesday night. It was a ritual.

  So she’d found herself taking the short cut from Valley Glen through the woods — and cemetery — the fastest way to downtown and the warmth of sorely needed friendship. She could not help feeling afraid, but she tried to fight it.

  Picking her way through the dead leaves that littered the ground, Rose felt keenly aware of every sound that plucked at the silence of the night. She recognized most of them, could attribute them to the wind and the comings and goings of different animals and night birds. She knew she just needed to keep walking, that the little creatures skittering here and there around her were more terrified of her than she was of them.

  She kept telling herself that, keeping her fear at bay.

  Then the night filled with a strange, ear-piercing whistle that shook the air around her, and stilled all the other wildlife in the woods.

  Rose stopped, frozen in place. She stood rigid, waiting for it to come again, wondering what the hell had made that eerie, shrieking whistle. She’d never heard anything like it before, and she’d walked the wooded mountains around Kingsbury all her life. Now, she heard only silence.

  Her body started to relax, only to be jarred by another shriek. She wanted to run, but she couldn’t make herself move. She tried to swallow, but found there wasn’t a drop of saliva left. Rose could taste the cool of the air around here, and the vast empty space of the woods, which was even now threatening to engulf her.

  It began to rain.

  Somehow, the cold droplets released her from h
er fear, and she could move again. She hurried — not quite running — out of the cemetery, and soon the lights of downtown were ahead, and she felt safe enough to begin to feel foolish for her fear.

  The old man pulled the covers even further over his head, the transparent whiteness of the sheet barely blocking out the green cast of the fluorescent lights above him. His whole body shook — small tremors making his teeth chatter and his bowels liquefy in his gut. He had known fear before, had stood on the edge of the abyss more than once in his long life, but somehow this was different.

  He’d heard the whistle.

  Time was no longer on his side.

  Outside, the water lashed against the windowpane and thunder bellowed a drum roll for what was about to come. The first shriek had sounded almost ten minutes before, and the second only moments after that.

  “Bella . . . !” He didn’t want to be alone now, at the end. He couldn’t bear it.

  There was another loud burst of thunder and he shuddered, his teeth gnashing together so fiercely that his jaw ached with the effort. In the silence that came after each thunderclap, a new sound pierced the air. The old man screamed, his hands clutching at his bedclothes for the protection they could not provide.

  “Go away!” the old man screamed, hysterical now with fear. The shrieking came again, then silence, followed by the sound of something deathly sharp scratching insistently against the glass pane of the window.

  Dropping the covers, the old man threw himself from the bed. His scrawny legs barely able to hold his weight, he stumbled toward the door.

  “Damn you to hell. You won’t get me!” the old man screeched, before grasping the doorknob. His breath caught in his throat, and he gasped, unbelieving, as his hands pawed clumsily at the door — which would not open.

  From the outside, someone began to bang on the door.

  “No . . .” he said, his voice barely a whisper. He turned, letting his back rest against the doorframe. His gaze was drawn toward the window once more, and Walt Hartung caught sight of what was waiting for him outside. Frail and half-mad, having already lost so much of himself, he knew he could fight no longer.