Orpheus - Haunting the Dead.pdf - Dice

HAUNTING THE DEAD
RICK CHILLOT
other, groping for each other. The air is intensely cold.
The floor beneath his feet feels uneven, lumpy. Victoria’s
shrieks echo strangely.
He passes through a door and into a room in which
every corner, every angle seems to be distorted and
askew. The floor is tilted. Two smilers hold Victoria
between them while a third places its hands on her
head. A gray arm skitters across the floor, its fingers
wriggling like insect legs, and oozes into a wall.
“Help me, Ed. Please,” Victoria moans.
Ed steps toward the smilers, afraid he’ll slip if he
moves too quickly across the slick floor. He feels
himself smoldering with helplessness, and this makes
him angry. He’s tired of fear.
“Stop,” he says aloud. It’s as if something inside him
is speaking through him. “Stop!” A force from his chest,
he can feel it move through his throat and push itself
out his mouth. His voice bounces through the room
like thunder. The three monsters raise their blind faces
toward him, then fall back as if struck. Victoria slips to
the floor, catching herself on her hands and knees.
“Stop!” Ed shouts again, feeling the power release, a
bit weaker this time. The smilers scurry away to a far
corner. Ed reaches Victoria in careful steps, helps her to
her feet.
“Can you walk?” he asks, keeping his attention on
the smilers. They’re crouching, motionless, their hands
splayed out in front of them for protection.
Victoria doesn’t answer him; she’s leaning on him
for support. Ed glances down at her. Her long black hair
has fallen from its arrangement and is spread around
her head and shoulders.
“Are you alright?” he asks her. “Are you hurt?”
Suddenly she pushes her body upright and throws
her head toward him like a snake. Her lips press against
his Adam’s apple and his entire throat is gripped in ice.
The pain makes his eyes water, and now it’s he who
must lean on her to remain upright. The numbness
( 260 )
6