Unhooked Page 3

  “Do you hear that?” I ask instead of giving Olivia the explanation she was expecting.

  Though she looks confused at the abrupt change in subject, she doesn’t question me. She listens for a moment before shaking her head. “I don’t hear anything. What does it sound like?”

  I stare at her, willing her to hear it too. Because the sound is so loud now, I can practically feel it vibrating against my skin.

  But it’s clear Olivia doesn’t hear anything. Just like she didn’t see the girl’s teeth.

  “Are you okay?” She steps closer, examining me with a concerned expression. “You look even more pale than usual.”

  I swallow hard. All around me, the sound has taken on a metallic edge and grown louder, like whatever is making it has surrounded us. “It was probably just the wind,” I force myself to say, but the words come out stiff and an octave higher than I intend. “Can we just get back to the house?”

  She cocks her head and narrows her eyes at me. “What’s going on, Gwen?”

  “Nothing,” I say, trying to pull myself together. “It’s been a long day, and I just got a little spooked or something.” I try to laugh it off, but I can’t force out anything but a dry cough. Not with the danger I still feel filling the air around us, not with the steady thrum of the metallic buzz surrounding me. I take a deep breath and make myself meet her eyes. “It’s probably just jet lag. Can we go?”

  She studies me for a minute longer, but she doesn’t push. “Sure,” she says, giving me space. Because she knows I’ll tell her when I’m ready, like I always do.

  Except this time I know I won’t.

  What could I possibly say? That I think I might be starting to see things and hear things, just like my mom? No way. I’ll get some sleep and enjoy the two weeks we have before Olivia goes back to her life in Westport. If I’m starting to lose my mind, Olivia never has to know.

  I force myself to follow Olivia down another block and then over one, the sound buzzing in my ears as I walk. It’s all I can do to keep moving. When we get to the house, she takes the stairs two at a time, but when I go to follow her, the sound goes completely silent, and my steps falter.

  Olivia turns back in time to see me catch myself. Her brows draw together. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  No. “I’m just tired,” I say, but I can tell Olivia’s not buying it. My whole life, I’ve seen people look at my mom the way Olivia is looking at me right now—like she doesn’t quite know what to do with me. “I’m fine,” I lie, glancing away.

  Olivia’s not stupid, though. She gives me a pointed look before she opens the door.

  As I follow her up the crooked steps to the porch, I look once more at the darkening streets for some sign of movement, for some indication of the danger that felt so real. Nothing is there, but that doesn’t make me feel any better somehow.

  Stepping into the heavy warmth of the old house, I try to leave the cold panic and all my stupid worry outside, but it doesn’t work. Unease still clings to me like a cobweb, sticky and thick. It follows me inside and trails behind me as I take the flight of steps up to our flat. As I climb, the memory of that sound scratches in a dark corner of my mind, like it’s trying to unearth something.

  I lock the door of the flat behind me, a second barrier against the night, but that isn’t enough to help me relax, either. There was something about that sound—something that scraped at my nerves, leaving them feeling raw and exposed.

  I’m almost all the way to our attic room when it hits me. It wasn’t just that the sound felt unnatural or imaginary. It was that it felt familiar.

  Dawn broke a familiar gray when his brother, the soldier, put the boy back on a train pointed toward home. With deep regret, the boy thought that his small adventure had come to an end. But as he waited for the train to depart, a soft voice startled him. He turned to find an old woman in a dark cloak looming over him, like a crone from the fairy stories of old. Her eyes were sharp, her expression damning. “A gift for a brave soldier,” she said, her scorn twisting her voice as she held out the challenge of a single white plume. . . .

  Chapter 4

  OLIVIA DOESN’T SAY MUCH TO me for the rest of the night. She’s giving me space and waiting for me to be ready to talk, but I know she’s also irritated because I haven’t told her what’s bothering me. I can tell by the way she spends the rest of the night with the fancy new international phone her parents bought her, checking in with people back home. Back in Westport, I mean.

  I don’t know how to make things right between us without explaining more than I want to though. I can only hope it’ll be easier to fix in the morning.

  She turns in before me and is dead to the world in a matter of minutes. But even though we’ve been traveling for more than a whole day, I have trouble getting to sleep. The notion that the sound I heard in the streets could somehow be familiar has taken ahold of me. Try as I might, I can’t place where I could have possibly heard something like that. And if I did actually hear it somewhere, I doubt I could have forgotten it. Still, it feels like the memory is there, waiting.

  I force myself to let go of the idea, because I know I’m obsessing, and there is nothing healthy about that.

  After changing into my pajamas, I check on my mom and find her asleep on the couch in the living room downstairs. Despite the lines that have started to etch themselves into her face, she’s still beautiful. I’ve always wished I had her fiery hair and fine porcelain skin instead of the wheat-colored hair and dull complexion my absent father must have given me.

  When I was little, I thought she was the most magical and courageous person I knew. All I wanted was to be as strong as she was. I’m not sure exactly when the way I thought about her changed. Maybe about the time I realized the monsters she was protecting me from couldn’t be real. Maybe when I started to grow up, and she wasn’t enough to be my whole world anymore.

  I let out a sigh. There are days when I almost wish I could go back. It was easier then, before I realized I wanted more. Before I understood there was something more to want. I pull a throw up over her shoulders, and she murmurs in her sleep but doesn’t wake.

  Back upstairs, Olivia’s snoring softly, her arms and legs all splayed out with a kind of awkward clumsiness she never lets the rest of the world see. I have to admit, I’m still a little surprised she didn’t run when she had the chance. Part of me wishes she would have, though. It’s not like it’s going to be any easier to say good-bye to her in two weeks, and now that she’s here, I’m always going to think of what London was like with her in it.

  The fairies in the mural seem to agree. The whites of their eyes glint as the gaslight’s glow flickers across them, like they’re mocking my regret with a ruthless glee.

  Which is, of course, an insane thing to think. I can’t—won’t—let my thoughts go down that path. I have to focus on what’s real—the rain that has started up again, drumming softly against the windows. The wind whistling past the house.

  Even if it does sound like something is trying to get in every time the wind rattles the ancient windowpanes.

  I climb into the bed, grateful that Olivia insisted on bringing her own linens. The sheets smell like the lavender detergent the Peels’ maid used back in Westport. If I close my eyes, I can almost imagine I’m back there. If I let myself forget. I can almost feel like I’m home. But the feeling doesn’t last long, and sleep does not come as quickly as I hoped.

  After a while, the room feels too close and too warm, so I get up and try to pry open one of the windows. It takes some effort, but finally I manage to jar it loose. Outside, London is quiet. Faintly I can hear the sound of the traffic in the distance over the soft patter of the rain that has started up again, but the neighborhood we’re in sleeps peacefully. The night doesn’t seem as threatening now.

  With a regretful sigh, I go back to the bed, but even with the cool night air drifting into the room, I can’t sleep. The glow of the stupid lamp isn’t helping any either. />
  I try to tell myself that the strange shadows thrown across the walls by its ornate bowl aren’t anything to worry about, but when I turn over, my eyes find the fairy wall. The shadows there look deeper, more menacing as they mask the fairies laughing faces.

  My mom was right about one thing—that mural has to go.

  The longer I toss and turn, the more frustrated I become. The angrier my thoughts turn. Because I wouldn’t be dealing with any of this if my mom didn’t believe we’re being chased by monsters no one else can see.

  And now I’m stuck in this stupid room, with these stupid fairies, because she can’t handle them. My anger lurches dark and sharp inside me.

  My eyes go to the gaslight. What could it really hurt? I wonder.

  Nothing. The answer comes as quickly as my panic did in the street. It won’t hurt anything at all. Because my mom’s fears are unfounded. Because the monsters aren’t real. Her superstitions have always been just that. None of her little rituals actually do anything. They definitely don’t protect us.

  And she doesn’t even have to know. I can wake up early and fix the lamp before anyone even realizes I’ve touched it.

  A strange sureness settles in me. This is a good plan. A sane plan.

  I stand on my bed and examine the lamp. There’s a small wheel on the side, which I figure must control the flow of gas. Maybe I’ll just turn it down a bit. I only need to dim the room so I don’t have to contend with the shadows and the damn dancing fairies with their too-knowing eyes.

  I just want to find some sleep. Tomorrow I can wake up refreshed and be back to my old self again. Tonight doesn’t have to be anything more than a random blip, a bad dream.

  But the tiny wheel is hot when I touch it, and when I jump at the unexpected bite of heat, it moves too far and the flame goes out.

  The feather was still heavy in the boy’s pocket when he found his brother at the station later that day. “I’m not going back,” the boy said, showing his brother the papers freshly signed and stamped. The other soldiers had not questioned the small lie he’d told about his age. No, they had seen him as one of their own—as brave and ready. “I’m coming with you,” he told his brother, and he could not stop the joy of it. Only when his brother’s hands began to shake did the boy begin to think something was wrong. . . .

  Chapter 5

  THE SOUND COMES SOFTLY AT first. It starts as a whispering scrape that scuttles dry leaves across the pavement of my dreams. But then it builds to a throbbing buzz until it finally tears me from my hard-won sleep.

  When I open my eyes, our bedroom is still clad in night. The only light comes from the soft glow of the city beyond the smudged and cracked windows, but there’s enough light for me to see that nothing in the room could be making that sound.

  It was just a dream, I tell myself as I nuzzle under the covers and close my eyes against the noise. If I can just slide back into the warmth of sleep, maybe it will go away.

  I’ve almost drifted off again when I hear something else—a rustling that almost sounds like words in a language I don’t understand. This sound is closer, more immediate than the humming buzz. Like it is coming from inside our room.

  My eyes fly open, and I realize that somehow the room has turned darker. In the corners, the shadows seem to gather and creep as though they are alive. Their dark shapes crawl up from the corners and out from under the bed, cloaking the room in darkness. In a few moments, all the light is gone, and the room is so dark, I can’t see anything. But the buzzing sound hasn’t stopped. It is still ringing in my ears, unmistakable in its warning, like the wind picking up velocity as it rustles through a forest before a storm.

  I cover my ears to block out the sound, but the memory of it remains, teasing at me. Taunting me. The thought I had earlier rises again—the noise is strangely familiar. Slowly, I pull my hands from my ears, and the sound rushes in again, brushing against something deep inside me. It sets off a slow-burning fuse in my mind that throws light across the dark corners of my memories.

  Something is waiting there. Something I’d forgotten.

  And then, all at once, I’m overwhelmed by an image so startlingly clear, it feels as though the room has dropped away and I’ve found myself in another place. . . .

  Only a thin shaft of moonlight penetrating through the trees. All around me, the forest smelling damp, half rotten. And my heart pounding in time with my running feet. Slipping on the slime of the forest undergrowth, the cadence of my heartbeats slipping as well.

  I sit up in bed, shocked by the intensity of the images. It’s like I am there again, in that forest, running from—or maybe toward—someone. Or something? But I don’t know where there is. And I don’t know where that image is coming from, because I don’t remember living anywhere so cold or so damp.

  A cold night. The scent of winter in the air.

  I shut my eyes again and force myself to focus on what is real—the soft brush of cotton sheets, the comforting scent of lavender, the soft snores of Olivia. I focus and concentrate and—

  A broad, cold hand covers my mouth before I can scream, and the weight of an intruder’s enormous body presses me into the mattress. The roughness of his damp clothing scrapes against my exposed skin.

  I am not imagining this.

  I know I couldn’t have imagined this, just as I know with unerring certainty that for as long as I live—however short that time may be—I will never forget how this moment feels. Like I am being pinned down by night itself.

  I thrash wildly, trying to get away, but the intruder holds me easily, and then, pressing his face into the curve of my neck, he inhales—a sharp intake of breath—like an animal scenting its prey. When he exhales, his hot, fetid breath crawls against my skin.

  Instinctively I jerk back, but his body cages me in, and his scent overwhelms me—he smells like the damp underside of old leaves, earthy and a little sour from decay. Like hunger and wanting. But as close as he is to my face, I can’t make him out. The room has grown so dark, there isn’t enough light for me to see him.

  Without warning, something warm and wet traces the length of my exposed neck with excruciating thoroughness. He’s licking me. Tasting me. Bile rises hot and acidic in my throat, and I understand I am not going to make it out of this untouched. I don’t know if I’m going to make it out at all.

  Olivia whimpers nearby as another rasp in the same unfamiliar language comes from across the room—there must be at least two of them. But the darkness refracts the sound, and her panicked cries surround me, teasing me with my own helplessness.

  And I am helpless. Even as I struggle to get away, my legs are being secured, and then my arms. In just a few seconds I’m trussed up. That hot breath crawls against my neck again, and I flinch, trying to pull away. But he doesn’t lick me this time. With a voice like cracked parchment, he lets out a low growl.

  When his hand eases away from my mouth, I take a breath to scream for help, but he lets out another rattling growl that makes me swallow my scream. I don’t want to die. Not yet.

  The dry rasp of another string of unfamiliar words grates along my skin as he says something to his partner, and then he hoists me up as easily as a rag doll, flopping me over his large, broad forearm.

  When cool, damp air rushes against my bare legs, I know he’s climbing out the window and onto the rickety balcony, three stories up. A guttural moan sounds from somewhere close-by. But it’s not Olivia, and it’s not the intruder making that noise. The sound, desolate and defeated, is coming from me.

  I force myself to take a breath, to calm down, but instead I inhale the musty scent of him, and my fear spikes again. I have to force myself to focus—I need to think. I will never get out of this alive if I can’t think, but for a long and terrifying moment, it’s all I can do to breathe.

  Outside, the night isn’t as dark as the inky blackness that saturated the room. I can almost make out my attacker. He’s huge, which I already knew, and dressed all in black, but I still c
an’t quite see him. There’s something wrong with him, or maybe he’s drugged me somehow, because no matter how hard I try to focus on him, he remains fuzzy and indistinct.

  Once we’re outside, the steady London drizzle begins to soak through my pajamas, and it’s not long before more than fear causes me to shake. But I force myself to hold perfectly still, to think. To plan.

  It takes everything I have not to struggle too soon. I want to writhe, to try to get away, but I know I need to wait. Because I know that if he drops me now, I’ll fall three stories to the cracked and uneven sidewalk below.

  As soon as he climbs down, I will fight.

  No. As soon as we’re close enough to the ground that the fall won’t kill me, I’ll fight. I’ll do anything I can to get myself free. I will not let him take me.

  The buzzing suddenly starts again—the same low, metallic scraping I heard earlier in the streets. The same sound that woke me from my dreams with strange memories of a place I don’t recall ever being. Then the wind kicks up, making my skin go colder and my hair whip at my face. And then, without any warning at all, and before I can do anything else, my attacker leaps, and the air rushes around me as we fall to the ground below.

  Of course his brother demanded the boy return and tell the other soldiers the truth—that he was not yet of age. He must return home. But the boy refused, for he was sure that his brother was not the only one who was brave. Not the only one capable of a great adventure. And besides, the challenge of the feather was still heavy in his pocket.

  He would not be seen as a coward again. . . .

  Chapter 6

  I CLOSE MY EYES AS we plummet, preparing for the moment when we will hit the ground. But that moment never comes. All at once a strange heaviness surrounds me, like the air is pressing inward, squeezing me into an impossibly small lump of barely alive flesh. Until the pressure becomes so strong that I want to die. But still I don’t.