Quarter to Midnight: Fifteen Horror Short Stories Read online

  Grinning at my stupid anxiety, I gave my hands a quick shake to loosen my trembling fingers. I started to turn away from the coffin then stopped myself. It wasn’t completely empty after all; as I’d turned, my light had caught something pale in the corner of the box. It looked like paper. I reached in and plucked it out with two fingers.

  The sheet of yellowed, stiff, grainy parchment felt as though it could crumble in a strong breeze, so I unfolded it carefully. I squinted in the low light to read the black ink scrawled across the paper.

  “By decree,” I muttered to myself, trying to comprehend the challenging scrawl. “On this day, the fourteenth of March, 1879, the White family is to be interred living in their tomb, for crimes against God and against their fellow people. The council has concluded that Lord Fitzwilliam White has contrived to bargain with the dark powers to grant his flesh immortality and take on the form of the vampire. We pray his entombment will grant the town reprieve from its suffering and that the White family may eventually find forgiveness in the next life.”

  The paper was signed with five names, presumably the council that had written it. I shivered, feeling as though a cold wind had rushed through my clothes, and gently replaced the paper. The decree explained a few things, at least.

  Julie Haze had said no one knew anything about the people who had lived there before the current town was founded. It was only an hour’s drive from the next city, but the original town would have been much more isolated in 1879. It had probably been a pioneering town, settled too far away from other cities to receive supplies reliably. If it had fallen on hard times—possibly failed crops or an exceptionally harsh winter—it wasn’t difficult to imagine the desperate townspeople had looked for someone to blame. Jokes would become rumours, and rumours would become truth; drowning in stress, hunger, and grief, the suffering town could have easily turned into a Salem replica… except, instead of crying “Witch! Witch!”, they had screamed “Vampire!” as they carried Fitzwilliam White, his wife, and his child into the crypt.

  And they’d been buried alive. For a second, I imagined what it must have felt like to be pressed into the stone coffin then watch as the unmovably heavy lid dropped into place, blocking out light and sound. I shivered again, crossing my arms over my chest, and pushed the thought out of my head.

  The human sacrifice hadn’t done the town much good, anyway; it had still fallen, probably succumbing to disease, or starvation, or cold. The Whites’ fate was horrible, but it might have actually been merciful compared to what their peers had endured as they struggled to survive in an unforgiving and hostile landscape.

  Another thought occurred to me then. I imagined two boys, one set on adventure and the other begging to go home, entering the tomb. Of course Jack Suffle would have looked into the open coffin; that sort of morbid mystery held an allure he would have found impossible to resist. He’d picked up the parchment and read it, and the word vampire had stuck in his mind.

  Then something had happened to little Charlie on the way home. Maybe the gun had gone off accidentally or the child had slipped into the river and drowned. Either way, Charlie had died, and Jack had been unable to save him. Grief, fear, and guilt had crawled into Jack as he ran for home, and his mind had created a coping mechanism. He’d built an alternate reality based on the most memorable part of the note he’d read. A vampire got Charlie. It wasn’t my fault; I couldn’t have saved him. It was a vampire.

  If he’d lived in modern times, Jack might have had a chance of being treated with therapy and counselling. Instead, he’d been ignored, ridiculed, and accused. The psychosis had taken hold, and as the years passed, it had deepened until he believed it too completely to be dissuaded.

  Of course, he’d returned to the tomb to confront the vampire he was convinced existed. But instead of fighting a fictional monster, he’d found the note in the empty coffin. It might have been enough to bring up the suppressed memories of what had actually happened that day… and so he’d walked into the woods, gun in hand, unable to tolerate the truth. The depressing narrative was pure speculation, of course, but it answered the mystery of Jack’s obsession and disappearance.

  I turned towards the room’s exit, thinking I might pay a second visit to Julie that afternoon so I could share my discovery. She would love to know the full story, though she would probably swear she’d never actually believed in the vampire, either.

  As I swung my light towards the exit, it caught on something bright and reflective above the doorway. I turned my mini torch toward the shape, squinting to try to make it out. Two circles a little smaller than my palm hovered near the roof, shining like the reflective posts spaced along the side of the main highway. I frowned and turned my head to the side, trying to figure out what they were.

  They blinked.

  My back hit the edge of the coffin as I leapt away from the creature, heart in my throat. What is that? An owl?

  It dropped from its perch with a soft thud. I stared, fixated, unable to believe what I was seeing. The creature, only vaguely humanoid and nearly as large as me, crouched on all fours. Its skin was leathery grey, just barely a shade darker than the stone walls that had disguised it so well, and its huge, owlish eyes bulged out of a smooth head. Those eyes, flashing crimson in my torch’s pitiful light, were the only colour on the creature. Its fingers were impossibly long, and its loose, wrinkled skin hung on what seemed to be little more than a skeleton. It quivered as it stared at me, and I swear I saw anticipation in its eyes.

  Faster than I could have ever imagined, it sprang towards me. The frail appearance was a ruse: it gripped my shoulders in its long fingers and hauled me off-balance, slamming me to the ground. I struggled, revolted and terrified as I tried to break out of its grip, and it bit my arm just below the shoulder.

  I screamed as a dozen needle-sharp teeth cut through my shirt and punctured my skin. The keyring was still clasped in my hand, so I twisted it around and stabbed the keys at the monster’s head. Without the light, I couldn’t see where I had hit it, but my attacker hissed in pain and released its hold, allowing me to squirm out from under it. I scrambled backwards until I hit the dais.

  Hot blood was running down my arm and dripping off my elbow. Fighting to keep my mind clear despite the searing pain, I fumbled to turn on the light.

  The monster had retreated to the corner of the room, crouching, its huge eyes fixed on my face. It seemed wary to attack me again; the keys had cut through the skin on its head, and a flap of the grey flesh hung loose, exposing a white skull underneath.

  I staggered to my feet. My breathing thin and panicky, I held the light held ahead of my body like a priest warding off a demon with his cross. The beast watched intently as I stumbled in a semi-circle around it, moving to get my back to the exit. Then I turned and ran.

  Thankfully, the pain in my shoulder was numbing as my feet slapped on the stone floor, carrying me away from the monster. A thought hovered in my mind, terrifying me, blocking out all reasoning. Vampire. That was the vampire.

  I glanced behind myself, shining the light over my shoulder, looking for the two reflective eyes, but the passageway was empty. My legs felt weak, so I slowed to a jog as I rounded the corner and saw the natural light coming from the stairway ahead.

  The pain had almost completely subsided, and in its place, a gentle heat spread from my shoulder, radiating through my body. My thundering heart slowed, my hands stopped shaking, and I reduced my jog to a walk.

  There’s actually nothing to worry about, I realised as my feet crunched the leaves littering the hallway. Yes, it was a vampire, but so what? Why did I let it scare me so badly?

  I felt tired and a little bit drunk as I reached the stairway and began to climb. My bleeding shoulder felt pleasantly warm, and my mind was going fuzzy. I thought I heard dragging footsteps from behind me, but they didn’t matter anymore.

  I need to rest for a bit, I decided as I lurched onto the fourth step. I had a shock, and I’m tired, but a little rest
would do me good. Just for a moment.

  The dragging sounds behind me grew louder. They were comforting, like the ocean lapping at a white-sand beach. My feet faltered on the steps, and I fell forward, hitting the stairs hard. I tasted blood in my mouth but, surprisingly, it didn’t hurt.

  This is nice. Maybe I’ll rest here for a bit. Regain my strength before going home.

  I rolled onto my back. My vision was blurry, but I thought I could see the creature crawling up the steps towards me. I smiled at it stupidly. I wonder what its name is. Maybe it’s actually Fitzwilliam White. Wouldn’t that be something? I’ll have to remember to tell Julie. She’ll find it so funny.

  The creature’s long fingers wrapped around my ankle and thigh, and it began dragging me away from the sunlight and down the stairs. Its lips were quivering with anticipation, and its lamp-like eyes bored into my face.

  It pulled me off the last step, and something cool bumped my cheek. I glanced at it; it was hard to see clearly, but I thought it was one of the animal bones that littered the entrance.

  The creature was strong, and it pulled me quickly, dragging me back towards its room. I was vaguely aware of how cold the stone was under my back, but I didn’t mind. All I wanted was to close my eyes and let sleep take me. I could worry about everything else when I woke up.

  The motion stopped. We were back in Fitzwilliam’s room. I still held the torch loosely in one hand, and it gave enough diffused light to let me see the broken coffin to my right. The creature circled me twice, inhaling deeply through the slits of his nose, then nestled his face into the crook of my neck. He bit me again—I was pleased it didn’t hurt at all this time—and I turned my head to give him better access as he lapped at the blood that flowed freely.

  I wonder if he’ll let me float down the river when he’s done? I thought sluggishly, as the blood drained from my body and flowed into the creature’s swelling, faintly translucent stomach. Either way, I’ll have to remember to tell Julie about this. She’ll enjoy it so much.

  I smiled to myself as I let my head loll to the other side. There, in the corner of the room, only visible once my discarded light fell directly onto it, was a small pile of bones. Femurs, ribs, and a cracked skull lay in a haphazard pile, throwing twisted shadows over the wall behind them.

  Oh good, I found Jack Suffle, I thought as I let my eyes drift closed.

  WHOSE WOODS THESE ARE

  Morrow Woods, an ancient tangle of conifers at the edge of a rural town, sprawled in front of Anna, and she slowed her car to get a better look. She hadn’t seen the forest in over a decade, but, amazingly, it was almost exactly how she remembered it.

  A few things had changed, though. She’d tried to find the parking lot where her family had always left their car in when they’d come there to camp, and she was surprised to discover it no longer existed. A gate blocked her access to a weedy field that had once been a dirt patch studded with markers.

  Anna glanced from the cordoned-off parking lot to the mass of trees behind it and shrugged her seatbelt a little higher on her shoulder. She turned her car back onto the gravel road that ran along the edge of the woods and followed it for a few minutes. When she found a shrubby stretch of grass, she eased her car off the road and carefully parked it where it was hidden behind a thick clump of bushes.

  The trees loomed above her as she stepped out of the car. She inhaled deeply, savouring the light scent of the pines and organic decay, and listened for familiar birdcalls. The air was a far cry from the lazy smog of the city, and it pulled her back to childhood memories of hiking through the trees and struggling to set up tents on uneven ground. Anna grinned at the forest, feeling as if she were greeting an old friend.

  Something else was new about the woods: a chain-link fence, nearly two meters high, stood between her and the trees. It ran as far as she could see in both directions.

  Anna couldn’t remember seeing a fenced-off wood before, and it made her pause. She wondered why a small, quiet town like Gillespie—which she’d left just a few kilometres behind her, hidden by the rolling hills and scrappy patches of trees—would spend what must have been a small fortune on segregating itself from nature. Perhaps the forest had become a restricted area or they were trying to keep people, like her, from damaging it.

  Or are they trying to stop something from getting out? The area was too far south for wolves, and there weren’t any bears in that part of the country. What else, then? Wild boars? Exceptionally annoying squirrels?

  Anna snorted with laughter and pulled her backpack out of the car’s boot. She couldn’t imagine a single creature in the region that needed a fence to keep it contained, which meant the forest must have been turned into a protected area. She felt slightly guilty about her plans to trespass, but a childhood full of camping had taught her how to respect nature. She knew she could leave the woods as clean and healthy as it was before she’d entered it.

  Besides, she needed this. The hike was like a closure somehow—a final goodbye to her father, the nature lover, who had brought his family to the woods every year until Anna had turned fourteen. The catharsis was too important for her to turn back just because of a fence.

  Scaling the chain-link barricade turned out to be harder than she’d expected, though. The fence was only a little taller than she was, but it took a good bit of heaving to throw her heavy bag over the top. It hit the ground on the other side with a hard thump, and Anna cringed, hoping none of the equipment had been broken.

  She hooked her fingers through the holes in the chain-link and climbed it with less speed and much less grace than she’d hoped for. Still, she made it over the sharp wires at the top without cutting herself. She dropped to the ground on the other side, dusted the dirt off her cargo pants, heaved the backpack over her shoulders, and began walking.

  As she moved deeper into the trees, the gentle downward slope gave way to a pine-needle-littered forest floor pocked with holes and exposed roots. Anna picked a dead branch off the ground and used it as a walking stick to prod at the piles of detritus to make sure she wasn’t about to step in a concealed hole and break her ankle.

  The air around her buzzed with life; the scent of plants and organic decay was rich and heady, and the ground felt pleasantly springy under her feet. I should move somewhere like this, she thought absently, running a hand over a tree’s bark. The city’s killing me.

  She kept her pace slow, taking the chance to enjoy her surroundings and fill her lungs with fresh oxygen. The day was warmer than the forecast had predicted, and before long, she was too sweaty to keep her jacket on.

  Just over an hour into the hike, her surroundings began to change. The lush green grasses and vines started to disappear; sickly, spindly plants took their places. The pine trees seemed to grow taller, but their trunks were darker and had fewer low branches. What needles she could see were discoloured and looked unhealthy. A flicker of dark amber on one of the trees caught her attention. She stopped to look at it and found she was breathing heavily despite her slow pace.

  She had to step right up to the tree before she recognised the amber colour as sap. Dribbles of long-dried golden juice hung like stalactites from six-inch gash in the bark. Anna ran her fingers over the cool, smooth substance. What sort of jerk hacks into a live tree like this?

  She turned back to her path, but her steps faltered as she began to notice cuts in other trees. Some were only little nicks, but others were deep slashes that cut into the centre of the trunk. A few of the trees had been damaged so badly that they had died. Held in place by lifeless roots, they stood waiting for rot or a strong storm to bring them down.

  She’d never seen damage like that when she’d camped there before. It must be why the city put the fence up. Makes sense. She guessed clueless campers, bored teenagers, or possibly even someone with anger management problems had come in and cut up the trees, so they were protecting the forest until it could regenerate.

  But as she moved farther through the forest, she ha
d to wonder how much good the fence was doing. Some of the cuts looked fresh, as if they’d been made within the last month. Why, though? What’s the point of walking into the heart of a wood to spend hours cutting at trees?

  She stopped beside a tree with four deep slashes at her head height. They looked only a few days old. She stared at the honey-gold dribbles, suddenly feeling much less confident about spending the night alone in the woods. What if whoever did this comes back?

  Anna turned to look at the path she’d come from. It wasn’t too late to turn back, but that would mean wasting an entire day, not to mention the equipment she’d bought and the petrol she’d burnt driving there…

  “Jeeze,” she muttered, and the heavy air around her seemed to swallow her voice. She’d come to the woods to remember her father on the anniversary of his death. She could leave, but she knew she would hate herself if she did.

  The forest was vast, too, and her intended camping site was still a long way off. The chances of two strangers bumping into each other in the maze of trees had to be tiny. Besides, I’m not completely defenceless. I brought a knife.

  Comforted, Anna turned back to her path. She picked up her pace, stepping briskly, only pausing every twenty minutes to check her compass.

  She reached her destination, the river, late in the afternoon. The trees growing alongside it were healthier and less damaged, though they still grew taller than those at the entrance to the woods had. Anna sat on the rocky bank of the river for a few minutes, admiring how clear the liquid was as it rushed over the smooth pebbles. She caught flashes of motion in some of the more stagnant areas and was pleased to see that, no matter what had happened to the trees, the fish population was still thriving.

  The air was filled with birdsong and animal calls. She closed her eyes and listened, trying to pick out sounds she recognised. She caught the high, light trills of treecreepers and thought she heard a hawk’s screech in the distance. Other calls she couldn’t identify, though: some cackling, some trilling, and one especially strange noise that sounded like broken laughter coming from a long way away.