24
Salem
The Angel
W hen we returned to the manor, Rayne drew a bath for me. She helped me peel off my filthy clothes and then gave me my privacy to soak in the hot water. I scrubbed away blood, dirt, and grime, and changed the bathwater three times.
I was so tired, I fell asleep in the water and awoke with a jolt before dragging myself out of the bath. My backpack, along with all of my belongings, was thoroughly soaked. But on the bed I found an oversized pair of sweatpants and a large, soft shirt. When I put it on, it smelled like her.
Luckily, my diazepam pills were still in my bag, undamaged. I popped one and curled up on the bed, managing to sleep for a few hours before nightmares woke me up again.
When I drowsily sat up, there was a note on my bedside table. Meet me downstairs. I’ll tell you the truth.
With the blanket from the bed wrapped around me, I shuffled down to the first floor. Following the distant sound of Rayne’s voice, I soon stood outside the common room, listening through the half-open door to the conversation within.
“Barry, come on, please, I’m begging you. Just one trip back here, I’ll pay you whatever you—”
I peered through the crack in the door. Rayne was on the phone, her lower lip clenched between her teeth as she listened to whoever was talking on the other end of the line.
“You’ll be fine, I swear, it’s just superstitions—”
The response was so loud, even I could hear a furious man’s voice as he said, “There’s a curse on that godforsaken island and there ain’t a seaman worth his salt that will bring a boat back there now. I’ve got a wife and family to get home to. Call the damn coast guard!”
“Barry—”
Rayne pulled the phone away from her ear and cursed. Whoever she’d been talking to had hung up, and she tossed the phone on the couch before flopping down herself.
But she jumped up when the floor creaked under my feet.
“Who was that?” I said.
She sighed, running a hand through her hair.
“Barry, the owner of the ferry that services the island. I asked if he could make an emergency trip back here to take you home, but...” She shook her head.
“We’re in for a stretch of really bad weather, he doesn’t want to risk it.
” She winced and added, “A lot of the shipman are superstitious about Blackridge. In the past, we used to get deliveries by boat through the winter months. But over a decade, half a dozen were sunk. Three others just disappeared. Some of the men say there’s a phantom beacon in the lighthouse.
Others claim they hear whispers and screams coming from the water. ”
She sat down again, wringing her hands and staring into the fire. She seized a glass half full of whiskey from the coffee table and took a swig, and I came to sit beside her.
“I need to tell you the truth,” she said.
Her voice was rough and uncertain. “After Mom was murdered, a lot of things changed. But the first thing was I started hearing voices—we all did. Then, people started dying.” Rayne paused, her mouth twisting into a grimace.
“Sorry. I’m not used to talking about this.
I’ve never told anyone.” She gulped her whiskey without a flinch. “Everyone here already knows.”
Even wrapped in a blanket, sitting on the couch across from her, a cold chill went over me.
Everyone on this island—except me—was already aware of the horrors.
They knew this monster existed. They knew it was capable of killing.
Their strange and lingering looks, their distrust of an outsider, their religious zeal; it was all beginning to make sense.
Sap popped and twigs snapped in the fireplace. I stared into the twisting flames, as if I could sear what I’d seen out of my head.
Those bodies in the trees had been living, breathing people. People with families, friends, entire lives. People who felt fear and pain just as sharply as I did. To die like that, so cruelly, so brutally, and then be hung up like some kind of warning...
Fighting back my nausea, I briefly closed my eyes. When I opened them again, Rayne was leaning toward me in concern.
“We can talk later,” she said. “You need rest.”
But I shook my head and forced myself to sit up straighter. “I’m okay. I want to know the truth. All of it.”
She sat back, nodding slowly as she swirled her whiskey in her glass. I could smell the spice of it in the air.
She stared into her glass instead of at me.
“I started hearing voices in the house the winter after Mom died. I was lonely. So fucking lonely.” She trailed off.
I could feel her pain in every word she forced out.
“But the voices scared me. They whispered about pain. Blood and bones. I didn’t understand.
I tried to tell my father and he...” She sniffed, bitterness etched into her face.
“He told me I was hearing evil things, and if I listened, I would go to Hell. He told me to pray and shut his door in my face.”
“Rayne...” What could I say? What words could possibly comfort her?
She cleared her throat, finished off her drink, and abruptly got up to pour herself another.
As she stood at the bar cart, her back to me, she said, “Dad changed after Mom died. He’d never been affectionate, but he turned angry.
And cruel. He didn’t even talk about her at her own funeral; he talked about the Devil.
About judgment and damnation. He didn’t want justice for what happened, he wanted punishment.
He would get behind the pulpit every Sunday and remind us that God is judge and jury over all, and that God’s judgment was coming. ”
“God’s judgment? What did he mean?”
“I’m not sure he knew. Maybe if he did, he wouldn’t have preached that way.
” She finally looked at me, and in her eyes was the reflection of a years-old horror.
“I don’t believe in God, Salem. But I believe there are things in this world we don’t understand.
Some of those things are harmless, but some are predators.
And when a predator senses weakness, they’ll come hunting.
” Lowering her voice, she went on: “My father prayed and prayed for God to send an angel, a messenger, a holy soldier. He finally got what he prayed for.
“A man died that winter: Greg Kennison. He was found disemboweled and beheaded outside his barn, along with most of his animals. He was kind, a good man. But he struggled with drinking.” She lifted her glass in a miserable toast. “Who doesn’t?
But my father said he was wicked. God had judged him and found him lacking. He was the first.
“More followed every winter. Rumors started that there was a beast in the woods, a predator. A creature that hunted at night, in the rain, in the snow. People said they could hear their dead loved ones calling to them from the forest. Soon enough, a group of hunters got the thing on video. My father called it Blackridge’s angel.
Sent by God to enact his holy judgment.”
I listened with growing horror. “How can they believe that thing is holy?”
“It comforts them,” she said. “They have faith in their own righteousness. When someone is killed, they can justify it. It’s God’s will.”
Clutching the blanket tighter, I thought of Martin and George, their friendly banter and silly jokes. They didn’t deserve to die like that. An act of God couldn’t justify such horror.
Rayne put down her drink and scooted closer to me. She put her arm around me, and I leaned my head against her shoulder. My heart rate was rising again, my legs beginning to shake. I needed another pill.
But I wanted the full truth out in the open.
“So you’ve learned to live with it,” I said.
Rayne nodded. “More or less. As the years went on, people learned the beast’s habits, its weaknesses, its fears.
It rarely comes out during the day, unless clouds are covering the sun.
We never see it in the summer. Bright lights and fire can spook it, but won’t scare it off completely.
It has no eyes, but it can see. And it mimics.
” She hugged me tighter. “You heard it.”
I nodded, recalling that awful voice with a shudder.
“It imitates the voices of its victims, using them like a trap,” she said.
“The sheriff started a coalition of volunteer forest rangers to patrol the roads, set up cameras. Some of us have tried to fight it. No one could kill it, but we eventually figured out we could injure it. Andy blew one of its limbs off with a shotgun one winter, and we didn’t see it again for the rest of the season.
But the next year, it had grown the damn arm back. ”
“If you can injure it, you can kill it,” I said, with as much conviction as I could muster. Frankly, I didn’t know if that was true. I had no idea if the rules of reality applied to this situation, but I had to believe they did. I had to find hope.
Rayne was nodding in agreement. “Yeah. I think it can be killed. I’ve tried. So many of us have tried.” She sighed. “But there has to be a way.”
“Why haven’t you left?” I said. “So many people are still here.” I sat up, gripping her arm urgently. “We can find a way to leave together. You and me. You don’t have to stay here!”
She smiled gently, but the expression was sad.
“I’ve tried,” she said. “Many of us have tried.”
I frowned. “Tried?”
“The voices follow us.”
She got up and began to pace back and forth, biting her thumbnail.
“Others have left. Entire families have tried to escape. Within a few weeks, they come back. Those that force themselves to stay away... they die.” She released her ragged nail from between her teeth.
“I stayed on the mainland for a week. By the fifth day, all I could hear, day or night, was screaming. It’s like something was clinging to my back, screeching bloody murder in my ear.
I couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t eat. I would have flung myself into the ocean to make it stop.
” She looked at me grimly. “It happens to all of us, to anyone who stays here too long. The red woman, the whisperer. The one you’ve seen. She won’t let us go.”
A strange sound, like a soft breath, made us both flinch, and we turned to stare at the door leading out into the hallway. Even Loki raised his head, staring with his ears pricked up. I swallowed hard, cold waves of fear running up my back.
“Do you mean...” I could barely get the words out. “Even me...?”
She didn’t answer at first. The silence was painfully heavy, settling on my stomach like a boulder.
“I don’t know,” she finally said.
My heart thumped painfully, every beat reverberating in my tight chest. My legs shook, and I tried to still them, but it was no use. I drew my blanket tighter around me, but the cold couldn’t be chased away.
“Who is she? A ghost?” I said, the words coming from between my clenched, chattering teeth.
“Sometimes I wonder if it’s her,” Rayne said.
“Or whatever is left of her. My mom.” She swallowed hard, taking a deep breath.
“Salem, I never wanted you to know any of this, I didn’t.
.. I know it’s taking a risk to bring people here in the first place, to host guests at all, but I didn’t know what else to do.
This house is falling apart and my father’s money was gone long before he died.
So during the summer, I pretend everything is fine.
I host, I keep up the grounds. Then, when everyone leaves, I start hunting. I help keep watch on the roads.”
“What about the police?” I said desperately. “Sheriff Keatin, can’t he report it and get help?”
“He tried. He nearly got put on mental health leave for even suggesting to mainland authorities that these aren’t simple wild animal attacks. We deal with it alone. Some people don’t think we should deal with it at all. People like Ruth.”
Confused, I said, “But why? How could she—”
“It’s God’s judgment. Who are we to question God? No matter who dies, they’re sinners. Dig deep enough into their life, and you’ll always find a reason they deserved it. Unfaithful. A liar. A thief. Drunk. Pervert. No one can be spared because no one is blameless.”
“The angel isn’t judging anyone,” I said. “It isn’t picking and choosing with purpose. It’s just hunting.”
“Exactly. There’s nothing holy about it, it’s just a beast. A monster.” She took a deep breath. “I’m going to kill it. Somehow. Someday. I’ll fucking kill it.”