Chapter 2
II
Whitmore woke me with agonizing urgency.
Sylvie responded to our visitor, but unlike the stranger, her words were muffled and anxious.
I sat up, unease coiling cold and taut along my spine.
Who could it be? We had no neighbors for miles.
It was what had initially drawn us here: a quiet so profound it felt sacred.
Hidden behind the forest, the road to the estate left to ruin, Whitmore House was not a place anyone stumbled upon by accident.
You had to be looking for it. Or you had to be invited.
Sylvie’s voice shifted, sharp now, and she screamed, “No!”
Glass shattered. A heavy crash followed. Then a violent, structural bang that shook the very foundation.
I lurched to my feet, dizzy with panic, trying to shake off the last remnants of sleep and wrest control of my body.
I scanned the room for anything I could lift, swing, or use to defend myself.
The heavy old wardrobe, not built-in. A matching chest of drawers.
Two armchairs. A lamp. The bed. I cursed silently that we didn’t own a gun, or at least a baseball bat.
The violence below reached a crescendo before receding. They were outside now.
I reached the window in time to see Sylvie, barefoot, sprinting across the lawn.
Her robe trailed behind her like the wings of a broken bird as she vanished where the porch light failed.
I pressed my face to the glass, peering into the night to see who was after her.
No one came out. Her frantic screams continued to tear through the dark, but no one was chasing her.
What was happening?
Inside the house, everything suddenly settled.
The grandfather clock in the hall took up the slack, its metronome tick-tick-ticking at an artificially slow pace.
Was someone still in here with me? If so, they weren’t moving.
I knew the anatomy of Whitmore—the specific, splintering groan of the third step, the hollow rattle of the ceramic slabs in the kitchen.
No one could move through these withered arteries without announcing themselves.
I pried open the bedroom door, careful to avoid the creak, and stepped into the hallway. Biting air nipped my skin, and the floorboards protested under my weight as I crept downstairs. Each sound felt magnified, but I could do little to suppress the old wood. Sylvie needed help.
The kitchen was empty. The back door yawned wide open, admitting the damp exhale of the night.
Beside it, everything looked normal, which made it feel all the more wrong: the way a single cupboard door hung ajar, the bruised fruit in the bowl, the scattered breadcrumbs on the counter.
It all felt like the scene of a crime yet to happen. I stepped back from the exit.
Pain sliced through my foot.
Glass protruded from the sensitive arch, and I bit back a cry.
Walking on my heels, I limped across the room and yanked a handful of paper towels from the counter, crouching to remove the shard.
My fingers shook as I stifled the blood, and my throat was so tight I thought I would pass out. I couldn’t stand the sight of blood.
Fragments of broken plates were scattered across the tiles.
They had been sitting on the counter for days.
We had taken the cabinets down weeks ago to start renovating, but we never went any further than tearing things apart and covering them in plastic.
I had the time now that I didn't have a day job, but not the skills. That had always been Sylvie’s strength.
Then I heard it.
Footsteps.
Not mine.
Not Sylvie’s.
Beyond the exposed kitchen lath, in the black of the adjacent rooms, someone was displacing the silence. The soft ripple reminded me of wading through water. I froze, every muscle rigid. My heartbeat thrashed so hard it hurt.
Whoever this woman was, she hadn’t chased Sylvie, and that thought alone made me feel slightly better. Perhaps Sylvie could hide and call for help.
But she didn’t scare easily. If she ran, it was for a reason. A weapon? If the intruder was armed, I had to be ready. I needed a way to protect myself long before any help could arrive.
My instinct screamed at me to flee, but I stayed, tethered by the need to find Sylvie or call 911.
My phone was upstairs, abandoned in the panic.
I cursed silently.
Heavenly Father, if we survive this, I’ll change. I’ll install the alarms. I’ll stop relying on the remoteness of the estate to protect us.
Today, the isolation was a betrayal.
There was a chef’s knife forgotten in the sink. My hand gripped the handle, my palm slick with sweat. The weapon felt too light, too thin, against the unknown.
But it was all I had.
As I shifted, a loose tile clattered.
Whoever plagued the sanctity of Whitmore had surely heard me through its weakening walls.
Then, the steps: loud, fast, someone sprinting.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
In my haste, I stepped on glass again. The sliver bit deep, carving worse than the last. Hot blood colored the slats like glittering jewels.
I bolted for the back door, no longer caring if I was heard, or about my phone—only my own safety. But as I approached it, the murk on the other side of the glass curdled. A silhouette materialized out of the night, cutting off my exit.
Someone impossibly tall and bulky, their shape distorted by gloom and fog. Male. The woman hadn’t come alone, of course; this was a planned attack. But that wasn’t the worst part.
The giant figure dragged a limp body behind him like a broken toy.
Sylvie.
Her skin was a deathly, translucent pale, her hair tangled into a matted crown of thorns. Her eyes were closed, her mouth hanging open, and her arms stretched above her head as the beast hauled her through the dirt. I couldn’t tell if she was still alive.
I collapsed to my knees, pushing myself backward over the glass. The grinding of grit and skin made my pulse race. I had to get out of there. I had to—
Panic was a suffocating kiss. I scrambled, dragging myself from the kitchen before being noticed.
My vision had tunneled to a single point, my route: living room, hall, front door—the only path to safety.
Miles of road didn't matter. I needed to get help.
The police. Anything. The only thing that mattered was breaking the threshold and reaching the night.
Then, a shadow passed the entrance like a wraith. It didn’t even turn to acknowledge me. No, no, no, no, no.
Someone was in the living room, cutting off my escape.
It must have been the woman I’d heard, the one Sylvie had spoken with. My legs locked, but momentum propelled me forward. I stumbled, fell, and the knife clattered to the floor.
A pause—then movement elsewhere in the house. That sound didn’t go unnoticed.
I snatched it up, grateful I hadn’t landed on the blade, and dodged toward the nearest doorway—the downstairs bathroom. The plumbing was dead, long forgotten. The door stayed slightly ajar, just enough for them to think the escape route continued toward the front of the house.
Carefully, I stepped into the basin. It yawned beneath me, a porcelain coffin deep enough to swallow me whole. I remained upright, nudging the yellowed curtain just enough to blur my outline. Stagnant air filled my lungs, heavy with rust and mildew.
I froze, straining my ears.
Every tiny sound swelled. It threaded through the walls. It bored into my skull.
Step. Step. Step.
Bare feet on the cold floor. Closer.
Step. Step.
A pause. The floor whined under their weight. Then, the tempo shifted.
Step. Step. Pause. Step. Pause.
Further away.
Tears carved hot trails down my cheeks. Nothing existed beyond this night, this need to endure, to cling to the thin, trembling thread of life inside me. I just wanted to live.
Please, let me live. I just want to live. I’ll be good, God. I’ll change. Just let me live.
I forced my breathing into a steady rhythm: inhale, hold, exhale. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. It worked. Calm replaced panic, the space around me sharpened, and a plan began to form.
The knife steadied in my grip. I was ready to protect myself. To attack. To fight. To kill. Whatever it took to survive. Whatever it took to save Sylvie.
I turned my attention outward once more.
Seconds passed. Or minutes. Or hours. The dark hummed with impatience. Time had unraveled completely. I existed only in the now, fear a drumbeat beneath my skin. Then timber shifted.
Just outside the bathroom.
They’d found me.
A soft creak. The door inched open. It was quiet enough to pretend it wasn’t real. But I knew better. It wasn’t just a draft. It was someone moving, carefully testing the silence for weak spots.
I couldn’t stand it any longer, couldn’t stay there waiting to be found. With a cry that tore itself free from my chest, I lunged from the tub, the curtain tangling around me like a funeral shroud.
My body collided with the woman in the doorway. We crashed together. I could see the pale blur of her face and the frantic, serpentine thrash of her limbs beneath me. She was stronger than she looked. I struggled to keep her down. I needed to act fast.
With every grain of will I had, I drove the steel home. The blade punctured the curtain, finding her throat. The yellow fabric masked everything but the wound, making it look like a surgery—a body draped and prepped for incision.
It didn’t slide in clean. There was resistance as it grated against cartilage and shoved through something hard. Blood began to pour, black in the absence of light. A gasp tore out of her, a wet, choking sound that bubbled and died in her throat.
She clawed at the curtain, trying to rip it away, but the more she struggled, the more the fabric tangled around her. Die, I thought, or maybe screamed. Just fucking die already!
Flailing now, hands cutting through the air in blind, desperate arcs. I didn't flinch. I kept the knife pressed in, leaning my weight into her.
Yet, her body refused to still. She was still fighting me. Through the partition, two black coals burned with a pure concentration of hate.
Why wouldn’t she die?
God, die. Die!
I screamed the word internally and shoved the steel deeper. Her lips peeled back from her teeth in a terrible grimace.
There was so much blood. It was everywhere, slicking the tiles, coating my hands, soaking into the bath mat. All I could think of was Sylvie. I needed to find her. I needed to know if she still lived.
The tension rod finally snapped under our combined weight, striking the side of my head with a metallic crack. Stars burst across my vision. I didn’t know a human skull could sound so hollow.
Involuntarily, I loosened my hold on the knife, and the advantage I held over her began to shift.
Hold it together! You’ve almost got her!
Then the memory struck like a lightning bolt—the man, the tall monster hauling Sylvie by the leg. My body recoiled on instinct.
But it wasn’t just the memory that hit me.
It was him.
Fingers tangled in my hair and yanked with a strength that sent me hurtling. I hit the porcelain hard. The back of my ribs took the force, and the air fled my chest. I slumped against the tub, gasping.
An unnatural cold poured from the man, spreading through the room like frost claiming a tomb. When he leaned closer, his long obsidian hair fell forward, the ends grazing my cheeks like the feathers of a dead bird, softly illuminated by the light spilling in from the hallway.
For a moment, I was certain Death itself had come to collect me.
A primitive terror opened its black maw and pulled me into its center. My limbs turned soft and useless. The cold tiles pressed into my skin. The world started to fade, and I struggled to gather my thoughts, my mind already swimming, slipping loose.
He let go of my hair, turning away to kneel over the woman. With slow, careful movements, he unwrapped her from the curtain. I watched them in a trance, captivated by the grotesque sight of two bloodied strangers in my home.
It’s a dream. Just a bad dream.
I almost laughed. Of course it wasn't real. It couldn't be. But the dead weight of dread in my chest didn’t go away.
“Help me,” the woman croaked, convulsing on the floor.
How could she still speak? The knife still jutted from her neck.
He wrapped one hand around the handle, the other pressing against her shoulder in a vice. And pulled.
A guttural roar erupted from her as the blade slid free. Blood surged in a violent wave. It poured over her breasts, splashed to the floor, and painted him red.
And then, impossibly, she sat up.
The skin writhed and peeled apart beneath her fingers, reopening the jagged wound with every twitch and shudder. She looked at me again, fuming, but too weak to exact revenge.
The man followed her gaze toward me. His face was long and still, but it was his eyes that held me. They were empty and endless, like twin voids that devoured light and hope alike.
The woman looked at me, too, and all I saw was a blood-smeared monster with a crevice where her throat should have been.
She rose to her feet and smiled, and the wound beneath her chin tore into a cruel grin of its own—splitting and splitting until it eclipsed her face entirely.
Soon, all I could see was that black, widening mouth stitching with the night itself.