Shadows on the Wall Chapter Fifty-Two

Ch. 52: Vengeance Game

by Nicky

(Voiceover by David Selby) “Collinwood in the year 1897 is a troubled estate,

as it was a hundred years in the past and will be a hundred years in the

future. There is no rest for the wicked, and no one knows this better than

Quentin Collins, for he has returned from the land of the dead in perfect

condition ... except for his mind, and now he knows no peace. For there has

been sacrifice on this estate, and a bargain was struck with dark, primal

forces ... forces that may demand a payment Quentin will be unable to provide.”

1

The brandy burned the back of his throat like the acid he knew would rise in

his stomach when he awakened tomorrow morning (or afternoon, he mused), but

Quentin found he didn’t care. He sat in a chair that had once been plush but

was now thinning from years of use with one hand softly carressing the wine

glass he’d pilfered from Edward’s study. A fire crackled before him, limning

his face with red, accenting the clever planes and contours. The victrola

beside him crooned “Shadows of the Night” over and over, the sweet melody

haunting him now, as it always had.

Other things haunted him as well. The dream he’d just suffered, for instance,

marring his attempt at sleep on his first night back in his body. A whole new

world. He wondered how many other men were given his gift, to swim in the icy

oblivion that was death, only to be snatched back, poured whole into a body

that had been maimed but miraculously lost the wounds that had injured it so.

Not many, by his calculation.

“Miranda,” he whispered, and a small smile dappled his lips. She was a lovely

thing, he’d grant her that ... whatever she was. Not a human being, surely. She

sacrificed Dirk Wilkins as easily and cold-bloodedly as if he had been a

chicken needed for dinner, or a fish caught in a net. Quentin frowned, then his

mouth opened and his eyes widened as he realized, astounded, that he actually

cared. Not that he liked Wilkins at all, what with the infatuation he’d once

harbored for Beth, but the man didn’t deserve to die. Did he?

He saved you, Quentin, a voice whispered in his head. It was cold and scratchy,

like the crackling on the gramaphone record before the music began, like claws

drawn down a sheet of tin. He heard this voice often, and often he listened to

it, but now it perturbed him.

He smiled a little. Perhaps death had changed him after all.

Someone had to die for you to live, that voice continued,

scratch-scratch-scratching at his brain. More than one person, actually.

“Jenny,” he said, and the brandy flooded his throat and soured his stomach

again. Not my fault, he thought, now a petulant little boy; she stabbed me, it

was self-defense, she was insane, she had it coming, she ... she ... she ...

“She loved me,” he said, and his chest hitched. Tears scalded his eyes, another

first, for Quentin Collins did not cry. Quentin Collins never cried at

anything. She did love me, though, he thought, even at the end. She couldn’t

stand the thought of me with another woman, and I slit her throat so easily.

Vengeance. Petty vengeance, after driving her mad and leaving her to rot in

this castle when I took off after Laura. My god, but I’m a son-of-a-bitch. A

bastard. Once, this thought might have induced him to beam, to smile with

pride, but now he felt small and ugly. He felt ashamed. I’m a bastard, he

thought, and began to weep.

“That’s right, Quentin,” Magda Rakosi said, and Quentin looked up at her, his

eyes streaming, his cheeks blazing scarlet with shame. The Gypsy stood before

him in all her magnifigance, her chin thrust out like a lance, her black eyes

alive with fire, cold and hard as obsidian. “Weep. Weep for the one you

murdered. Weep for my poor Jenny.”

“Magda —” Quentin choked, but there was nothing to say, and then she was gone.

Faded away like a vapor, like smoke, and he dropped his head into his hands and

sobbed. She was real, all right, he knew, and vengeance would surely be hers.

Who wasn’t owed a bit of vengeance in this sickening game they all played?

That would explain the dream, he thought. Magda’s begun her work already.

Ah, the dream. In the dream he wasn’t Quentin. He wasn’t a human. He snuffled

and scouted and bayed at the moon. “I see an animal in you,” someone gloated

nearby, but his inhuman mouth, filled as it was with sharp angles like knives,

was incapable of answering. Everything around him was sharp and focused and

alive, and when he saw the young blonde girl, maybe sixteen, maybe seventeen,

alone in the clearing on the night of the hard white moon, he pounced and tore

her limb from limb. He awoke screaming, the writhing, coppery taste of her

blood still in his mouth. He had crawled out of bed and sat brooding in his

chair before the fire.

A dream, he thought now, and wiped away the tears from his eyes (coward’s

tears, he thought, bastard’s tears) and rose shakily to his feet. Only a dream.

The dream of a murderer. I’m a beast, he thought; why shouldn’t I dream a

beast’s dreams?

He froze, and stiffened. He wasn’t alone. The temperature in the room had

dropped, and goosebumps rose on his bare chest and arms. “Who is in this room?”

he called, and looked around. Terror sang silver inside him.

The air around him shimmered, and seemed to draw together in a stream of

white-gray light. He was rooted in place as the disparate streams seemed to

solidify, to form a nearly human figure. It glared at him angrily with empty

eyesockets and a gaping mouth, then levelled what he thought must be a bony

finger. “Quentin Collins,” it said, and its very words polluted the air. The

room reeked of spoiled meat gone old and gray, a clotted tang that wrenched his

stomach even as the temperature continued to drop and his teeth began to

chatter uncontrollably. It spoke in the language of tombs, the language of the

dead, and its voice was the grating of stone upon stone, issuing from the

deepest fissures of the earth. “Quentin Collins,” it said again, and it almost

seemed to grin, that formless, skeletal thing. Its words were a hiss. “You have

not escaped. Death comes for everyone, Quentin Collins. You have not escaped.”

“Get out of here,” Quentin whispered. His hands were clenched into tight fists,

and his fingernails began to dig deeply into the palm of his hand. Dime-sized

droplets of blood pattered to the floor. “Leave me alone.”

“Death is inevitable,” the specter rasped. “It comes for everyone. Why should

you escape?” It had continued to materialize, and seemed the hazy, indistinct

specter of someone drowned and long dead. What might have been flesh was

withered and lined and purple. Its face was an obscene mockery of humanity.

“Return,” it said, and beckoned him. “Return. Return.”

“No,” Quentin sobbed, but couldn’t move his hands to cover his face.

“There must be balance,” the thing intoned, swaying before him in the air. The

light from the lamp beside his chair glinted off the shards of frost that hung

in the air around it. “There must be equality. It is not enough. You must offer

payment or return with me. Return with me, Quentin Collins,” it said, and held

out one bone-thin hand, warped and gnarled. “Return. Return. Return ...”

“I said LEAVE ME ALONE!” Quentin shrieked, and flung the lamp at the thing, and

it winked out like the flame of a candle and was gone. The lamp shattered

against the far wall, and instantly the air was redolent with the heavy smell

of oil. Quentin used his robe to smother the flames, then collapsed into his

chair, shaking and shivering.

Magda? he thought. Is she to blame? Did she send that thing to me? To torment

me?

“No,” he whispered, and stared at his hands, the long, sensuous fingers.

“There’s no one to blame but me.”

2

Another day dawned on Collinwood. The sun, for once, sparkled in the sky like a

rare jewel, and the sky was bright and blue. It was an exceptionally warm day

for spring in Maine, particularly for the end of March, and Laura Collins

basked while she could, because later, she knew, it would rain. She had spent

the previous evening moving all her luggage — the few meager possessions she

carried with her — into the old caretaker’s cottage, vacated now after the

strange disappearance of Dirk Wilkins. Edward would not allow her to remain at

Collinwood, and rather than fight, she had acquiesced. He was, at this very

moment, in Collinsport, conferring with that bumbler Evan Hanley, beginning

preparations to have their marriage annuled. No matter. She wasn’t interested

in becoming the mistress of Collinwood. Not anymore. Let Sister Judith claw and

scrap with her brothers to retain that position. Laura had her sights set

considerably higher.

“Great Ra,” she purred, lifting her round face to the sun. Her blue petticoats

suddenly seemed starch and stifling, and she longed to shed them, to run naked

under the sun as she had in Egypt.

She frowned. She didn’t like to think of Egypt. It was disturbing, really, how

few human emotions she still retained, but those remaining surged in her blood

like fire. Anger. Vengeance. Confusion. And love. Yes, there was still love.

She loved her children particularly, but she loved Quentin Collins as well. The

scoundrel. The blackguard. Why did she feel this way? Why was she hesitating

when she should be annihilating him, burning him to a cinder, at this very

moment?

Because Laura Murdoch loved him, and the ashes of Laura Murdoch remained, still

glowing red now and then, somewhere deep inside the Phoenix that she had become

when Quentin left her with the priests that had flung her mercilessly on the

funeral pyre.

An endless cycle, and an exhausting one, to be born again, and again, and

again, never quite remembering the past until the fire came, and once the

burning time was done there was only one thing she was interested in. Her

children. The sacrifice. Then the return to Ra and the waiting, basking in his

light and his warmth until the cycle began all over again.

Laura Murdoch had married Edward Collins so that she might become the mistress

of Collinwood, and that was why the idea still held a grain of appeal. In the

process she had fallen madly in love with his soon-to-be-estranged,

irreprescible, irascible younger brother, and they had fled to Egypt together.

Quentin’s appreciation for the occult had awakened something inside her,

something dormant that she hadn’t been aware of, and it had blazed to life,

nourished by the hot sun on the Nile. She had insisted this is where they would

go, and Quentin had only been too eager to follow. Until he found out what she

really was. Her legacy. The fire. And then he had betrayed her to the priests,

those who knew her as the wicked Phoenix of the Ages, and they had burned her.

She could still remember the pain as the flames licked at her sensitive mortal

flesh, the agony that had consumed her and that never ended, even as the flesh

fell away and her bones turned black. She was reborn as the ashes were sifted,

and a new Laura Murdoch Collins had emerged, naked and shining and golden as

the sun. She had slaughtered the priests with quick efficiency, and licked

their blood like rubies from her fingertips. Of Quentin there was no sign.

Perhaps this was a blessing. In her new state she might have killed him as

easily as she had killed the priests, and now, back at Collinwood, she found

that a more fitting punishment might be meted out to her erstwhile lover.

Yes, she thought, and returned to cool shadows of the caretaker’s cottage, HER

cottage. He shall join me. When the time comes, when I build my fire and take

my children to my breast, Quentin Collins will join me in the flames.

3

His eyes, Charity thought as she entered the Old House, furtively glancing left

and right. All I can see are his eyes, and they’re not right. Not at all. They

swam before her, great and brown, and when she thought of them, she heard

laughter, the trilling, malevolent laughter of an old, old woman. But she had

to obey him, more than she had to obey the man she loved, even though she still

bore the marks of his kiss on her throat.

She held the stake and hammer in hands firm and clenched into fists.

Though she had never been into the cellar of the Old House, she knew where to

look. Just as she knew that Sandor and Magda, the unpleasant, dark, shifty-eyed

pair she’d only seen fleetingly in the past few weeks, would be out of the

house, leaving their master alone. Oh, Barnabas, she thought, and felt tears

spring to her eyes. If only I didn’t have to do this. If only I could’ve loved

you, and time could’ve stopped forever, so there was just you and me, dancing

and dancing into eternity.

But she had to do this thing. She had to murder.

Again.

Tears slipped down her cheeks in hot rivers, but she ignored them. There was

the cellar door, on her left. It was easy — too easy — to open it, and glide

down the stairs on the pretty slippers her father never would’ve allowed her to

buy. Too easy.

“He’s using you, you know.” Tim had told her that last night. There had been

pain — oh, but his eyes were scary, and they hurt her so — and she had been

forced to tell him everything. It had all come pouring out in a torrent, and

before she knew it, he knew everything. He knew where Barnabas slept, and he

knew the things they’d done together, oh the dirty things, the passionate,

powerful things. Barnabas’ lips on her throat, the exquisite pleasure as his

teeth sank into her skin, her gasp as the blood bubbled up, how she had burned

down there, a place only she had touched, and now he was touching her, and

touching her, and touching her, and Tim knew all about it. He knew about the

fire, and she knew he was afraid. “He will discard you. Kill you when he’s done

with you. They’ll find you on the docks with your neck snapped. Don’t you know

that, foolish girl?” He’d pressed something into her hands. “Here. Take these.

Use them well, and do not miss. The heart. Do you understand?”

She did, only too well.

There was the coffin. In the corner, in the shadows, wrapped in darkness like a

shroud. Her heart turned over, and the tears stopped. He was dead, then. He was

a dead man, sleeping in a dead man’s coffin. He had stolen her blood to keep

himself alive. She hated him.

She loved him.

She couldn’t do this thing.

The lid was hard, smooth mahogany, mocking her with her own reflection. She was

a pale, wasted thing, a silly little girl with her stick and her hammer. She

screamed her anger as she threw open the lid of the coffin and stared into his

pallid, sleeping face. His cheeks were sunken and his lips were smeared with

traces of blood, and his white, dead hands were folded across his chest that

did not rise or fall. She was trembling, shuddering with nausea and fear as she

lifted the stake with a trembling hand and placed it gently, oh so gently, over

his heart.

“Oh Barnabas,” she whispered, and raised the hammer.

And it would’ve fallen too, and considerably changed the events that were to

follow, but a hand, white as marble and quick as death, snaked out of the

darkness and seized Charity by the wrist. She screamed, as shocked as she was

suddenly angry, and the hammer fell to the floor, and was joined a second later

by the stake.

“Who —?” she stammered. “Who ...?”

The woman in the dragon-green dress with drooping lace sleeves and high-necked

collar smirked at her diabolically. Her hair was pulled back at her neck, and a

cascade of ringlets spilled down her back. Her eyes were blue chips of freezing

ice, and Charity burned under them. “My name is Miranda,” the woman purred,

calm and collected, “and that is all you need to know.” She strode forward, and

Charity backed away, her heart slamming in her chest like a frightened

rabbit’s. “What I’d like to know is who you are ... and what you’re doing

here.” She laughed, tinkling, maddening laughter, like shattering glass.

“Actually, that’s fairly obvious, isn’t it. You came here to kill a vampire,

didn’t you, my brave girl.”

“I didn’t want to,” Charity mumbled.

Miranda raised an eyebrow, perfectly lucked. “Didn’t ‘want’ to?” she said. “Why

wouldn’t you want to? He’s a VAMPIRE, my dear.”

“I know what he is!” Charity snarled, then her eyes widened and her mouth

closed very tight.

Miranda smirked at her, then before the girl could move, her fingers flashed

out with that same, eerie speed and dexerity and plucked at the collar bunched

around her throat. She nodded, satisfied, when she saw the tiny wounds that had

yet to close up, directly over her jugular. “I thought as much,” she said, then

her eyes narrowed. “But that still doesn’t explain what you’re doing here. The

victim of a vampire — particularly this vampire — should be incapable of

destroying him. Unless ...”

“Don’t hurt me,” the girl whispered breathlessly. “Please! I didn’t want to do

this ... you don’t understand ... I love him!”

Miranda’s eyes widened, and a sinister smile wreathed her crimson lips. “Love,

did you say?” She threw her head back and cackled fiendishly. “Yes of course.

How perfect. How perfect indeed.” Her face hardened. “That you love him, I have

no doubt. But this was not your decision to destroy him, was it?” Charity shook

her head, and limp, blonde strands of her hair flew in her face and were

plastered there, glued to her skin by her tears. “Then it was sorcery that sent

you here. Only magic could’ve broken his hold over you. Magic ... or Barnabas’

death. And we both know that didn’t happen, thanks to me.”

Charity was quaking. “Who are you?” she gasped.

“I am ageless,” Miranda said. “I am the beginning and the end of the world. I

am the Dark. I dwell in the shadowed places and the flames of the Underworld. I

have cursed the Collins family with my presence, and I will haunt them for the

rest of eternity ... and you will help me. You will bring suffering upon them

... what was your name again?”

“Charity,” she quivered. “Charity Trask.”

“Trask!” Miranda exclaimed, then clapped her hands, delighted. “Oh, it’s too

perfect. A direct descendent, I’d venture. How marvelous indeed. Yes, my dear

Charity, you will aid me in my revenge ... and Barnabas will have no one but

himself to blame. For I vowed long ago that he would never love another living

soul, and no one may love him.” She advanced on the girl, who backed away until

her back struck the far wall of the cellar, and she collapsed to her knees.

“And that means you, dear girl. You must pay. You must pay for daring to love

such a monster.”

“Don’t hurt me,” Charity sobbed. “Please don’t hurt me ...”

“It won’t hurt much,” Miranda purred, very near to her ear. “Not after awhile.

And when you awaken, maybe you’ll like me better.” She drew back, and red

witchfire crackled between her fingers. Charity screamed, for the woman’s eyes

were coal-black, as smooth and obsidian as the sky at high midnight, starless

and empty. “Agency of Ineffable Name and Vast Strength,” she chanted. “Ancient

dark One, thou whose word is as stone; thou ancient and alone impenetrable One!

Thou old and cunning, supreme in artifice, bringer of ruin and despair, be

present here and lend thy aid! Be propitious to me in my undertaking and do my

bidding as I command!”

Charity could only sob as she felt the marks on her neck begin to throb, and

twin trickles of blood began to run down her neck, and she was cold, so

dreadfully cold.

And then all the lights went out.

4

Magda Rakosi stood at the grave of her sister, and the rain drenched her and

jagged shards of cold pierced her to the bone. Her eyes were dark and stormy,

but not wet with tears. Magda Rakosi never cried. She couldn’t cry for the

terrible life she was now forced to lead, and she couldn’t cry for the

miserable death that had awaited her sister.

The tombstone read JANNA ROMANO COLLINS, 1870-1897. There was no epitaph. She

had been buried in haste. Damn Edward Collins.

She should never have come to this place, Magda thought sadly, and shook her

great mane of black hair. She followed us here after she ran away from the

tribe, followed us because she knew HE was here. Her face drew into a lupine

snarl. That monster. That beast, that Quentin Collins — that bastard who I

thought was my friend. He ruined her, and I thought it was for the best that he

ran away with that cold fish with the blue eyes and the fire in her skin. I

thought it better Jenny learn then what a man she married, for can a man help

his nature? She should’ve known better. I couldn’t blame him for that, for his

roving eye. I couldn’t hate him. I could only hope that my baby would run far

and fast away from this accursed place where her feet never should’ve tread.

After she disappeared, I thought she was away for good, safe and far away. I

never suspected she had gone mad. I never knew —

She smothered the sob that struggled to free itself from her chest.

Sandor, her huge rock of a man at her side, squeezed her hand. “Is it bad,

Magda?” he asked her roughly, speaking in the old tongue.

She shook her head, then nodded. “No,” she said. “And yes and yes and no. I

never saw this coming, Sandor.”

“You can’t blame yourself. You can’t see everything.”

Her lip drew back in a contemptuous sneer: contempt for herself, contempt for

her “powers”. “I am to blame. I was too busy looking for those damned jewels,

too busy playing palm reader to Mrs. Collins, that I stopped looking for Jenny.

I thought she would never come back here. I should’ve known that she’d never

left.”

“Miss Judith hid her well.”

Magda nodded. “Too well indeed. Hid her away like an animal in that tower of

theirs. Oh yes, Sandor, I see it all now. Too late, too late.” She sighed.

“Like an animal ...”

Thunder rumbled menacingly above them, and Sandor cast an uneasy glance at the

western horizon. “The sun will be setting soon, Magda. We had better return to

the Old House. Mister Barnabas —”

“I don’t care about Mister Barnabas,” she snarled. “Today Mister Barnabas can

wait. Today my sister is dead, and I will never see her again. If he don’t

understand that, then he really is a monster.” Her face darkened. “All of them.

Monsters. But especially him. That Quentin. My friend.” She spat the word.

“You’ll settle with Quentin.”

“Have no doubt, Sandor. And with her too.”

“Judith?”

“The new mistress of Collinwood. I’ll see her suffer as well. She’ll suffer for

my Jenny, just as my Jenny suffered when the knife was drawn across her throat,

as she suffered in madness, locked away in the tower room. They think I don’t

know, but Magda sees far when she wants to, oh yes. They’ll never prove it was

murder, and who would cry for a poor murdered Gypsy girl? That’s all they see

her as, you know. A Gypsy. No one knew, not even Edward. Only Quentin knew what

she was, and he didn’t care.” Her voice softened. “My poor Jenny. Mi tikni ...”

Sandor tugged at her arm. “We’d better go,” he said in English.

“Yes,” Magda said, and tossed the rose she held onto her sister’s grave. It

glowed redly at them in the murky twilight. “I’ll return, Janna. And when I do,

you will be avenged, I promise you. I promise you ...”

They stumbled back to the Old House wordlessly, Sandor with his eyes fixed on

the earth that was quickly becoming mud, and Magda with her eyes straight

ahead, blazing with purpose. The shadows grew longer and longer, and it was

nearly dark before they reached the Old House.

Sandor stopped, and gripped Magda’s arm. “The door,” he whispered. “The door is

open. Why? We left it closed.”

“I don’t know,” Magda growled, “but we’re going to find out.” She charged on

ahead, and together they entered the house, which was brightly lit by the fire

merrily blazing in the fireplace. The woman seated on the purple plush pouf

turned to look at them coldly, with one eyebrow raised appraisingly. “Well,

well,” she purred, “don’t you two make a fine pair indeed. Soaked to the bone

and frightened as rabbits. For yourselves, I wonder, or for your master?”

“Get out of here,” Magda snarled. “You don’t belong here, chiovani. Witch! What

you doing here anyway, huh?”

Miranda rose to her full height, and in the emerald green dress she was

impressive indeed, a dragon waiting to strike. Wrath flashed in her blue eyes,

but Magda did not back down. “You don’t dare speak to me like that,” she said

in a calm, threatening voice that did not betray the anger gathered around her

like the black clouds in the heavens outside. “Remember your place, Magda, and

remember who has more power here. Do you think it is you, you with your paltry

charms and cantrips? You, with your palm reading and tarot cards?” She sneered,

and spat, “You rank, miserable amateur. I could destroy you this minute, Magda,

blast you to a cinder, and don’t you ever forget that.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Magda said, and dropped her eyes to the ground and scuffled her

boot-clad foot. “You said all that already.”

Miranda stared at her expectantly. “I think I want to hear you say it, Magda,”

she said. Sandor’s eyes darted nervously from one woman to the other. “Yes, I

think an apology is quite in order.”

“All right!” Magda cried, flinging her hands into the air. “I’m sorry. Magda is

sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry! Happy now?”

“No,” Miranda said. “No, I am not. I think it’s a little late for your concern,

Gypsy, even if you had shown any. I came to this house this afternoon and found

Charity Trask with a stake over Barnabas’ heart. Fortunately I put a stop to

that nonsense in time, but only just in time.”

“Charity Trask?” Magda frowned. “The governess at Collinwood?” Her expression

filled with horror. “My god! She’ll tell! She’ll tell them all!”

Miranda smirked. “No,” she said, “no she won’t. Miss Trask belongs to me now,

and she’ll do and say only what I tell her to.”

Magda stared at her suspiciously. “What did you do?”

“You’ll find out soon,” Miranda said enigmatically. “You’ll also discover how

pleased Barnabas will be when he learns that you were off duty — that you left

him, alone and helpless, so that anyone could enter this house and put an end

to him.”

“He’ll understand,” Magda said, and terror made her whine. “I was visiting my

sister ... my dead sister in the graveyard —”

“I don’t care for your excuses,” Miranda said coldly, “and neither will

Barnabas. I don’t think he’ll be as sentimental or as understanding as you’d

like. It is my feeling, Magda, that he will kill you.”

“No!” Sandor cried. “No, he musn’t find out ... he can’t —”

“He won’t,” Miranda said, silencing him with a glare. “I won’t tell him, and

neither will you. But you must do me a favor as well, or you’ll join your

sister in the boneyard.”

Magda squinted her eyes. “And what is that?” she growled.

“You must not tell Barnabas that I was here in the house this afternoon,” she

said, “nor will you tell him that you’ve seen me at all. No, for the moment I

want Barnabas Collins as in the dark as he can possibly be ...” She laughed

again, wicked, cawing laughter that was utterly diabolical, and Sandor and

Magda exchanged frightened looks as she faded away before their eyes

completely.

5

The shadows at Collinwood were long, and the nearly full moon flitted through

ragged tears in the cloud sheath that covered most of the sky. Dinner was over,

the children were in bed, Edward was holed up in his study with his paperwork,

and Victoria Winters was sneaking into an abandoned room in the East Wing with

a vampire. If only the family knew, she thought, and half-smiled, but her smile

faded a moment later. If only they knew half the things that are going on in

this house, she thought, or are going to go on. Things I — we — have to

discover now, before it’s too late.

Barnabas closed the door of the room behind them. It was dusty and dark, and

the flickering light from the candle she held didn’t do much to dispell the

gloom. When he turned to face her, she almost gasped. His face in the

candlelight was grim and gray, lined and sunken, and his eyes burned at her

like those of a wolf. “Are you all right, my dear?” he asked, and his voice

wasn’t human.

“I’m fine,” she said, and thought, Oh lord, what if he can’t control himself?

What if he attacks me now? She scolded herself a moment later. You know that

won’t happen, she thought. He was a vampire when you knew him before, before

his cure, and he never did anything to you then. But her mind wandered

momentarily, and she remembered the attacks on girls on the docks, and how

Sabrina Stuart had disappeared, and even though she knew that it was Elizabeth

who had ultimately caused the girl’s death, it was Barnabas who had attacked

her and left her for dead. “Just fine,” she said, and shivered a little.

“You’re cold,” he observed, and she wondered if his eyes were like a bat’s,

capable of piercing the darkness, and decided it was safer not to ask.

“A little,” she admitted. “This part of the house isn’t heated. No one comes

here anymore.”

“Just as no one will come to the West Wing in decades to come,” Barnabas said.

“I wonder that no one ever thought how strange it was to abandon two whole

wings of a house as great as Collinwood.”

“No one thinks at all, it seems,” Vicki said with only a trace of bitterness.

“So many secrets, Barnabas, so many things that go unsaid ... unseen ...

unheard ...”

He took her hand for a second, and it was cold, the grip of a dead man, but she

smiled and let him squeeze it before he released her. “You mustn’t worry about

that now,” he said. “Has there been no word about the governess?”

“Miss Trask?” Vicki asked, then frowned. “None at all. She’s disappeared

without a word. But she left behind all her clothes and her other personal

objects.”

“Perhaps she’s met someone in town,” Barnabas said, more to himself, and Vicki

knew then that he knew something about Charity Trask. He wasn’t sure where she

was, but he knew that something wasn’t right. What do you know, Barnabas? she

wondered. What aren’t you telling me? And why? But again, she decided it was

safer not to press.

“What exactly are we planning to do here, Barnabas?” she asked, and glanced

around again at their surroundings. “I’ve no doubt that no one will find us

here, but still ...”

He rummaged in the folds of his cloak, and when his hands re-emerged they held

a small portrait that he handed to her wordlessly. She stared at it, and

gasped. “It’s her, isn’t it,” she said. “It’s Laura Collins.”

“Yes,” he nodded. “Laura Collins. My father’s mistress, and Edward’s wife. But

look at the date on the portrait.” She held it up to the candlelight and

squinted, and when she looked at him again, her eyes were wide and wondering.

“That can’t be,” she whispered, knowing full well it could. “The date says

1692. Two hundred years ago.”

“And three hundred years from the time you knew her in 1967,” Barnabas said.

“Laura Collins has plagued this family for three centuries all told, maybe

more. I found this in the attic of the Old House earlier this evening. I’d

forgotten about it, though I can remember reading about her now, when I ...

when I was alive.” He blinked. “Laura Pendleton Collins was married to Amadeus

Collins, my great-grandfather, in the town of Bedford, Massachussetts, in 1692.

She was burned as a witch later that year, and Amadeus, one of the greatest

witch-hunters of the time, was burned with her.”

“Fire again,” Vicki said, and her brow furrowed. “Always fire.”

“Yes,” Barnabas said. “And always that name. ‘Laura’. No matter who she is, no

matter what family she’s born into, always the same face, and always the same

name. The Laura Stockbridge I knew as my father’s mistress died mysteriously,

on this estate, just before I became a vampire. I never knew how. As I said, I

only saw her once.”

“And you want me to ...” Vicki shrugged. “What? Contact Laura Stockbridge? I

don’t know what you mean, Barnabas.”

He frowned. “I’m not sure I do either. I don’t know what we’re dealing with,

Victoria. Laura Collins could be a witch, but that doesn’t feel right to me.”

“No. Me either.”

“I brought you this picture for a reason. Magda is convinced that you’re what

she calls a ‘Seer’.”

Vicki sighed. “Right,” she said. “That I ‘see’ things. Maybe I do and maybe I

don’t, but Barnabas, it isn’t a talent that I can control. Sometimes things

come to me in dreams, but I can never really remember them, and they don’t ever

make sense when I can.”

Barnabas laid a comforting hand on her shoulder, and it was all she could do

not to shudder. He didn’t seem to notice. “It’s all right, Victoria,” he said.

“All we can do is try. This will be an experiment. I have a feeling that we

must learn as much about Laura Collins as we can. She may be an enemy.”

“You’re right,” Vicki said. “I’ll — I’ll try my best.”

“Good girl.” He handed her the portrait again, and she held it in her hands and

stroked its texured, bumpy surface with her fingers. She could feel the whorls

and and ridges in the ancient oil that the painter’s brush had left in its

wake, swirls and rigid lines. She closed her eyes.

There was darkness for only a moment, and then she gasped and stiffened as a

cold breeze washed over her. She thought she heard Barnabas calling her name,

but he sounded far away, and his voice faded into the dim shrieking of the gale

that surrounded her.

Before she could see, she could hear, and a woman was shrieking, “She murdered

my husband! You all can see, can’t you? This woman is a beast! A murderess!”

Then the darkness parted, and Vicki could see that she was standing in a

crowded square, and all the people were dressed strangely, like Pilgrims from

Thanksgiving dioramas she had constructed at the Foundling Home. There was a

woman at their epicenter, and she was tied to a stake. Her blonde hair was all

but hidden behind a cap, and her sea-green eyes scanned the crowd with what

seemed to Vicki to be bored disdain. Then Vicki recognized her. She was the

woman she had come to know in 1967 as Laura Collins, David’s mother.

“Burn her!” the crowd roared. “Burn her!”

“Burn me,” Laura intoned, and the scene shifted, and suddenly Vicki was in a

jail cell, standing beside Laura, who obviously couldn’t see her. Another

blonde woman stood without the cell. Her arms were crossed over the blue,

starched fabric of her dress, and her bonnet did nothing to discourage the

gorgeous golden ringlets that hung near her shoulders. Her eyes were icy blue,

and they laughed maliciously. “Aye, but you’re a fair one this morn,” the woman

cackled, and Vicki recognized her as well. It’s Cassandra Collins, Vicki

thought, amazed. If her hair were black as a raven’s wing, then that’s who

she’d be. This is no vague resemblance, like Carolyn’s to Millicent Collins,

when we held up that portrait of her we found in the attic last summer. This

woman is Cassandra Collins.

The woman in the cell said nothing, and the woman Vicki knew as Cassandra

placed her hands on her hips and cackled her infernal laughter. “What’s the

matter, Laura Collins?” she purred. “Does the cat have thy tongue?”

“Begone from this place, Miranda DuVal,” Laura said, and her voice was flat and

dead. “I have no use for thy taunts.”

“To be certain,” Miranda DuVal said, beaming. “Thy husband is dead, art thou

aware of that? They burned him this morning at dawn. I was there, watching.”

“Enjoying thy triumph?” Laura hissed, and real emotion entered her voice for

the first time.

“Aye,” Miranda said simply. “And why shouldn’t I? After all the old bastard did

to me —”

“Thou art a fool,” Laura said coldly. “Thou hast thy revenge now. Why destroy

me as well?”

“For that ‘tis the frosting on the cake,” Miranda said, and her eyes sparkled.

“I wanted old Amadeus to die knowing that thou wouldst follow him shortly

thereafter, and that there was nothing on this earth he could do. After he

plundered my virtue, forced himself upon me ... why, this was the least I could

do!”

“Fool,” Laura repeated, and shook her filthy head. “Can it be that thou knowest

nothing of what I be? Of what my fate be? I am doomed to the fire, idiot child.

It craves me, and I it. Thou must be only a paltry witch at best if thou can

sense that not.”

Miranda’s face darkened. “Thou had best keep thy tongue, Laura Collins,” she

said in a low, terrible voice. “For I will see thy destruction.”

“Thou wilt see more than that,” Laura vowed, and rose from the rickety bench to

face her rival outside the bars. “Thou wilt see my face again, Miranda DuVal,

so mark it well, my sister, mark it well.”

“I am no sister of thine.”

“But thou art. Save where I crave fire, it repells thee.” Her mouth trembled on

the brink of a smile, and she added mockingly, “Witch. I will mark that as

well, and wilt not forget so easily.”

“I sent Amadeus to his death with my testimony, just as I will do for thee ...

‘sister’.” Miranda’s voice trembled with hate, and her face was red and spotty

with rage. “And then my vengeance towards the Collins family will be complete.”

“Thy revenge will never be complete,” Laura said. “That is my curse upon thee.

Thou wilt be as bound to the Collins family as be I. This I promise thee.” Her

eyes bulged from her head, and she screamed, “Now get out, get out, get out!”

The words shrilled in Vicki’s ears as she was plunged out of the scene, and she

drew back, gasping, unable to force enough air into her lungs, and she was

aware that Barnabas held her by the shoulders and was shaking her, shaking her,

shaking her, and suddenly she was thrust back into her own body, and she drew

away from him, shuddering. “No, I’m all right,” she gasped, and brushed

sweat-soaked strands of hair out of her eyes. “Just ... just give me a moment.”

He watched her respectfully until she had gathered her wits back, and then she

told him everything. “But that woman I saw,” Vicki said, “that Miranda DuVal

... she was Cassandra Collins, Barnabas, I know it. I recognized her

immediately.”

“Except for her blonde hair,” Barnabas said, and Vicki nodded. “You are quite

right, Victoria. The woman you saw in your vision is Cassandra, although I knew

her as Angelique.”

“The woman who made you a ... a ...”

“A vampire,” Barnabas said, and smiled thinly. “She was a witch, Victoria,

powerful, cunning, and deadly. Obviously she is much older than I suspected,

but I can’t say that I’m surprised. She is immortal, it seems, and has tortured

this family for generations.” He swallowed, and stared into the shadows

surrounding them. “She’s here now, Victoria. Under the same guise of Miranda

DuVal. She has a particular sense of humor, you see.”

Vicki’s eyes widened. “Here? How? How is that possible?” She shook her head

bitterly. “But I should know better than to ask that question, shouldn’t I.”

“From what I can gather,” Barnabas said, “she was always a part of this time,

though you and I weren’t. Our being in this time didn’t affect her appearance,

though I have no doubt it will affect her actions. I told you that Quentin

suffered an accident, but that he was fine now. I didn’t tell you that

Angelique was responsible for raising him from the dead.”

“But why, Barnabas? Why would she help you?”

“She has always demanded a price in the past. For this feat she requested my

silence, and for me not to interfere in her plans.”

“But Barnabas,” Vicki said, “if we didn’t change the way that Jenny killed

Quentin, then wouldn’t Angelique have had to resurrect him originally?”

“I thought of that,” Barnabas said, “and I think you’re right. But Angelique

doesn’t know how the future has played out. She isn’t aware that we come from

1967, and I think it would be safer for both of us if she didn’t find out.”

“She might be able to help us, though,” Vicki said thoughtfully. “She and Laura

have been bitter enemies since 1692. We don’t know what Laura’s plans are, but

odds are Angelique will interfere.”

“We must watch and see,” Barnabas said, and held the portrait of Laura before

him. His eyes darted to Vicki’s, and he smiled. “You have performed your part

excellently, my dear. Now allow me a try.” Vicki watched wordlessly as he

closed his eyes and clutched the portrait tightly. “Spirts of time,” he

intoned, “spirits of the past, of death and darkness, I conjure thee now. Hear

my voice, and obey my commands. I summon a spirit lost to the past, a woman who

lived on this estate a hundred years ago. Let her hear my voice ... bring her

to me as I call to her ...” He opened his eyes, and they glowed redly. Vicki

shrank back. The air around them began to pulse, and she thought she could hear

the calling and cackling of strange beings that she couldn’t see and could only

half-perceive. “Laura Stockbridge Collins!” Barnabas called. “I summon you!

Eternal shade of Laura Stockbridge Collins ... wherever you are ... in whatever

form you now dwell ... come to me ... now ... now ... now!”

Vicki smothered a scream. The air shimmered before them, and a form began to

waver into a view. It was a woman, dressed in a full, heavy blue dress of the

eighteenth century. Her face was regal, aristocratic; her blonde hair fell

about her shoulders in gentle ringlets; her eyes were a delicate, sea-foam

green. She flickered like a moth in a flame. When she spoke, her voice was

strange and unearthly, and echoed about the room. “You have disturbed me,” she

said.

“I have summoned you,” Barnabas said. “Tell me your name.”

“I am Laura Stockbridge Collins,” she said.

“Do you know me?”

“I do know you,” the spirit said, “We met only once. You are the son of Joshua

Collins. And yet you live.”

“I do not live,” Barnabas growled, “and I do not die, and apparently neither do

you.”

“You speak in riddles.”

Barnabas ignored her. “Are you the same Laura Collins that lives here now?”

She smiled enigmatically. “I am Laura Stockbridge Collins.”

“You died in a fire,” Barnabas said. “How was the fire started?”

“I am the immortal Phoenix,” the spirit said with a haughty toss of its golden

head. “I am eternal, fool. The fire sustains me. It does not destroy me.”

“The Phoenix!” Barnabas gasped, his face suffused with recognition. “Spirit of

Laura Collins, tell me why you have returned to Collinwood!”

Horribly, it laughed, a shrieking, inhuman cackle like the screaming of a giant

bird. “The children will yet be mine,” it said, and spat its laughter at them.

Vicki screamed, “Barnabas, the fire! The fire!” Flames had sprung up around the

laughing entity, consuming it even as it continued shrieked wicked laughter.

Barnabas sprang forward and covered Vicki with his cloak, but the flames had

already begun to fade away, and they took the ghost of Laura Stockbridge

Collins with them. After a moment she was utterly gone.

“The children,” Vicki cried, “oh Barnabas, the children! She’s going to take

them away with her!”

Barnabas’ face was set and grim. “It is worse than that, Victoria,” he said.

“I’ve read of these creatures. A Phoenix is a mortal who has sold itself to the

Egyptian god Ra in exchange for immortality. Ra will grant this request, but in

return, the Phoenix must sacrifice itself over and over, only to return to

earth again, fully restored. But this is not the only sacrifice it must make.”

Vicki stared at him, horrified. “The children?” she whispered.

“Yes,” Barnabas said. “The Phoenix is compelled to sacrifice its offspring to

Ra. It takes them into the flames, and they die together. But only the Phoenix

itself rises from the flames unharmed. That is how it sustains its own

immortality.”

Vicki buried her face in her hands. “Disgusting,” she whispered. She lifted her

eyes back to him, and he was relieved to see they were filled with fierce

determination. “We have to stop her, Barnabas. She can’t go through with this

... this insane plan.”

“We will, Victoria,” Barnabas said. “Have no doubt of that ...”

6

The whispy, empty-eyed horror reached for him again with its bony, blackened

fingers, and Quentin recoiled in horror. “No!” he screamed, fear tearing his

drunken reverie to shreds, and sobered him in an instant. He had just awakened

from another dream, a dream of howling and ripping and death and blood, rich

hot blood, and had poured himself another shot of whiskey, when the ... the

thing had appeared again, reaching for him, trying to draw him back into the

grave. “No!” he screamed again. “No, I won’t go with you!”

“You have no choice, Quentin Collins,” the thing said in its choked, bubbling

voice, and leered at him with it’s death’s head grin. “You must come with me,

with me, with me —”

“Get away from me,” he sobbed miserably, and turned away from its awful,

staring face. Beneath the thin, purple skin he had caught a glimpse of

something moving, like a nest of worms beneath its surface. His stomach roiled

uneasily.

“You must offer payment,” the thing said. “Tribute. A die for a die is not

enough. There must be more payment, Quentin Collins, more payment. No one

escapes death. No one. Pay me, and I will go away. Appease me, and I will go

away.” Its bony fingers traced his skin, leaving behind burning welts in their

wake, and he screamed, the high, animal wail of the damned.

But when he looked, it was gone, and he was alone, gasping and sweating with

his face streaked with his coward’s tears.

“Such a baby you are, Quentin,” the rasping voice of Magda Rakosi said behind

him, and he spun around.

“Is it really you,” he asked wearily, “or another ghost to torment me?”

Magda stared at him blackly, and laughed. “Would that I were a ghost,” she

said, “and torture would be too good for the likes of you.”

“Get out of here, Madam Gypsy,” Quentin said. “Leave me alone.”

She stood facing him defiantly, her hands behind her back. “I will never leave

you alone,” she said. “Not after what you’ve done to Jenny.”

“Jenny,” Quentin whispered, and stared into the flames of the fireplace. “Is

that what you’ve done, Magda? Is that why you sent that ... that thing to

torment me? Revenge?”

“I don’t know what you talking about, Quentin,” Magda said. “You must be crazy.

The look on your face says you are crazy as a loon.”

“You’d like to think so, wouldn’t you,” he snarled. “That’s what you’d like to

do ... to drive me to insanity. But it won’t work, I tell you, it won’t work!”

“I ain’t drivin’ you nowhere,” Magda said. “I come to warn you, Quentin. You

gonna be sorry for the thing you done.”

“I am already sorry, Magda,” Quentin said. “You have no idea how sorry I am.”

“Pathetic,” Magda spat. “What you got to be sorry ‘bout, huh? At least you got

your miserable, rotten life. What has my Jenny got, huh? Nothing but darkness.

She feeds the worms now, and why? All because of you, Quentin. You sorry

bastard.”

“I am a sorry bastard,” Quentin said, and his laughter was jagged and cutting,

like shards of glass. “And as for my life ... I wouldn’t say that I even have

that. No, Magda my dear, I would say your assesment is most inaccurate.”

Magda glared at him. “What are you talking about?”

He glanced at her morosely, and she saw with a shock how dead his eyes were.

“Jenny killed me,” he said simply. “She stabbed me a few times with the butcher

knife sister Judith left around. Hell, she probably put her up to it for all I

know.”

“Jenny killed you,” Magda said, her voice rife with disbelief.

“Oh, I was dead all right.”

“Then how did my Jenny die?”

“I killed her before I went,” Quentin said. “Why should I lie to you now? I’m

damned, aren’t I?”

“Are you?”

“You’d know if you’d seen the thing I have,” he said, and shuddered. “I don’t

know what it is, or why it’s here. I thought you called it up, but maybe it has

something to do with her.”

“Her? My Jenny?”

“Not your Jenny,” Quentin growled. “Miranda. Whatever she is, whoever she is —

she brought me back to life. I’m not even sure how she did it, or why she did

it. I don’t know what her stake in all this is.”

“I wouldn’t trust her as far as I could throw her,” Magda said, and tossed her

head.

“I don’t think I came back alone,” Quentin said, and turned his white,

frightened face to his sister-in-law. He was pale, and his eyes were circled

and haunted. He swallowed convulsively. “Don’t you see, Magda? This thing ...

it’s been haunting me for the past two nights. I’ve had visions — dreams —

things I don’t understand. It has something to do with Dirk Wilkins, but I

don’t know what.” He dragged his hands through his tangled hair, and then

peered at Magda from between the bars of his fingers. “I see an animal in you,”

he whispered. “That’s what she told me.”

“An animal, huh,” Magda grunted. “Quentin, what you been jabbering about? What

have you seen? What thing are you talking about?”

“It’s dead,” Quentin said, “and it wants me to come back with it, back to the

Land of the Dead. It says I have a price to pay. I owe a debt.”

“A debt,” Magda said, and in the dimness of the room Quentin couldn’t quite see

how her face had curled into a smirk.

“It told me that I had to pay tribute.”

That same devious smile played on Magda’s face as she stepped closer to him.

“Tribute?” she purred. “Sounds good to me.”

“Magda, what have you got behind your back?” he asked. Fear lanced at him

suddenly, and he found that he was frozen in place. The atmosphere pressed down

against him oppresively, as if the air were full of thunder about to break, but

he was cold again, deathly cold.

“La, Quentin,” Magda said, and held out the tiny earthen jar she carried. It

was old, ancient even, and carved with tiny runic symbols and figures. The

liquid inside of it was thick and black, and looked like animal’s blood, or

something worse. “I think I have the answer to your problem.”

He swallowed. “What is that?”

“This?” She examined it critically. “It is old. Very old. Held by my people for

generations and generations. But rarely used, and only for very special

reasons. It’s Egyptian, you know. The Vessel of Anubis. I stole it years ago,

and have been keeping it for just such an occasion.”

“What occasion? What are you talking about?”

“There’s an animal in you?” Magda whispered into his ear. “So be it.” She

thrust out the jar, and the thick black contents splashed out and spattered

across his bare chest. He threw back his head and screamed. It was hot and cold

at the same time, and foul, incredibly foul, running down his skin like living

fingers, clutching him and stroking him, and burning him as well. “Ave adencia

carate,” Magda intoned, and thrust out her spell-casting hand. “As within, so

without.”

A rush of cold air screamed around him, whipping his hair and frosting his

skin. The air rippled, and that deathly figure stepped into reality, still

grinning at him. Blue and white energy swirled between its bony, purple hands,

and its eyes were black and bottomless, and crackled with the same blue energy.

“Yaa ru indihabii!” it chanted in a high, warbling voice. “Yaa Nafs indihabii!

Yaa shaytann, inna nafsak Laa ta’ut bac ba’ad! Yaa Ruufukayl al-Azim!”

“No!” Quentin screamed, and as he was consumed by the white-blue fire the

demon-spirit wielded, he could hear Magda’s high, evil laughter echoing around

him like the screaming of a crow. He sank to his knees in agony, because he

could stand on his own two feet no longer; and he stretched out his hands to

support him, and he no longer had hands. His eyes, through a crimson haze, saw

huge hairy paws descend and spread out before him, and when he opened his mouth

to speak, only a hoarse, gutteral growling would emerge.

“I am appeased,” the spirit said. “The price has been paid.” And it faded back

into the darkness.

“This curse I place on you,” Magda spat at the monster before it, “and all the

men who follow in your line. The demon inside of you I have brought to the

surface; the demon inside of you I have given form and substance; the demon

inside of you will infect them all, all your first born sons. As I will it, so

shall it be. For all eternity.” Then she was gone, and the beast, the wolf,

Quentin Collins, threw back its head and howled its rage and its loneliness.

7

Edith Collins was pleased. As she closed the door on her grandaughter, she

smothered a wicked laugh that would’ve been quite inappropriate emerging from

the throat of the wholesome Mr. Shaw. “Goodnight ... Tim,” Judith had said, as

breathlessly as a woman rapidly approaching middle-age could sound, and had

waved a little at him. “You’ve been so kind,” she continued, “so understanding.

I want you to know my deep appreciation.”

Oh, I’ll know it all right, Edith thought as she returned to Tim’s room. Her

grip on this body had tightened, and she was loathe to let it go. Not when she

was preparing such marvelous and devious plans. I should’ve become a man years

ago, she thought, and allowed herself a wicked witch — that is, wicked

warlock’s cackle as she entered Tim’s room and closed the door behind her. Yes,

she thought, rubbing Tim’s palms together, soon Judith would succumb to Tim’s

advances, completely convinced it was her idea all along; marriage would

follow; Tim would become a widower soon after that; dear Edward would find

himself at the bottom of Widow’s Hill, and that cow-eyed, simpering fiancee

with him; and with Jamison and Nora safely disposed of, Edith would rule

Collinwood once again. A new dynasty. A new chance. Oh, the power she would

accrue, the power —

“Counting your chickens before they’re hatcheted,” a mocking voice said from

the shadows in the corner of the room, “is that it? You’ll have to forgive me.

I’ve never been good with popular phrases.”

“Who dares —?” Edith snarled, and whirled around.

A green witchlight illuminated the room, and a woman with blonde curls

bouncing, clad in a dress the color of a serpent’s hide, emerged, hips swaying

seductively. Edith glared at her, completely confounded. She’d never seen her

before in her life; perhaps she was one of Tim’s conquests? “Get out of here,”

she snarled, “whoever you are. You are breaking and entering.”

“I doubt that very much,” the woman said. “Considering that I’ll be part of the

family very, very soon.”

“Who are you?”

The woman sighed. “Such a tiresome question,” she said. “You wouldn’t believe

how many people have asked me that in the last twenty-four hours.” She smiled

with false congeniality. “You may call me Miranda if it suits you. Or Master. I

think I prefer the latter. It’s quite amusing.”

Edith snorted laughter. “Now you amuse me,” she said. “I don’t think you know

who you’re dealing with.”

“I know much more than you think,” the woman said, still wearing that enigmatic

smile. “You are Edith Collins, otherwise known to your multitude of rebellious

grandchildren as ‘Grandmama’.” Edith’s mouth dropped open and her eyes bulged

in shock and horror and utter disbelief. “Oh, but I love to see that expression

of shock on your face. Except it really isn’t your face, is it dear? Not

really. I believe it belongs to a Mr. Timothy Shaw. Don’t you suppose you

should be returning it to him shortly?”

“I don’t know who you are,” Edith said furiously, and began to wave her hands

in the air, “but you’re going to regret your boldness in approaching me, I

swear to you.” Red waves of magic hung in the air in the wake of each pass of

her hand.

Miranda trilled mocking laughter, and held out one hand, and Edith found that

she couldn’t move. The crimson energy dissipated as quickly as she had summoned

it. “You are not as powerful as you thought,” Miranda said, “and a good deal

weaker than you were in life, I’d reckon. I stopped you with an easy spell; a

novice could’ve done better against me than you.”

“Who are you?” Edith cried out in frustration.

“Your better,” she said, and her smile dropped. “Your superior, actually. And

your most deadly enemy.”

“Why?” Edith said. “We have never met.”

“Not face to face,” Miranda said, “but I’ve been keeping my eye on you for a

long, long time, my dear. You were quite lovely in your day. Your power grew

like a poisonous black pearl, but what did you accomplish? You became a fat,

bitter old woman, bound to your bed and waited upon by your selfish

grandchildren, even as they waited for you to die. And still you couldn’t let

go of your hold on this earth. Well, I cannot fault you for that.” Her eyes

grew wintery. “But I can fault you this. If Charity Trask had succeeded in the

task you appointed her, you would be dead this moment, you and the body you

have stolen.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Edith growled.

“You needn’t pretend with me,” Miranda said. “When you tried to have Barnabas

Collins murdered this afternoon, you made a great mistake, and thus I have

become your most mortal enemy, Edith Collins.”

“Kill me then,” Edith laughed, “and have done with it. If you can.”

Miranda’s lips twitched in a smile most gruesome. “Oh, I’m not going to kill

you,” she purred. “No, my dear. The punishment I have in mind for you is much

more fitting, I promise you.” She stepped back, and another woman emerged

soundlessly from the shadows. Edith gasped despite herself. It was Charity

Trask, but how changed. Her face was porcelain white, and her eyes glared red,

like fiery rubies, from the sunken pits of her eyes. Her hair hung lank and

blonde in her face, and her lips drew back from her terrible teeth, and Edith

saw how long and sharp they had become, like the teeth of King, her loyal

German Shepherd, dead these many years.

“No!” Edith cried as Charity stepped foward, and held out her white, white

hands imploringly. “What have you done to her?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Miranda tittered. “She’s my masterpiece, though I really

should give most of the credit to Barnabas. All I had to do was open the wounds

on her throat, and she bled to death. Simple, really.” Her eyes sparkled. “I

hid her body away in a lighthouse on the coast, and she came to me when she

rose, about a half hour after sunset. She is my complete and utter slave, Edith

Collins ... just as you will be.” Her voice became cold again. “I can afford no

interference in my plans, not even yours.”

“No!” Edith cried, but it was Tim Shaw’s voice that emerged, cracked and

terrified, and Tim Shaw’s hands she held out in a warding off gesture that did

no good. The hungry, newly-minted vampire prowled forward, growling a little

like a great cat, and her tongue slipped out of her mouth and licked her wicked

little teeth. Edith tried to dislodge herself from the body that now felt

clumsly and helpless, a prison of flesh far more constricting than any cell,

but found, too late, that her magic had worked only too well. Miranda laughed

and laughed as Edith screamed “No!” over and over until at last her voice gave

out, and then there was only a weak gasping ... and the sucking sounds.

8

Miranda was quite pleased with herself. After the vampire’s disgusting repast

was at an end (how awful it must be, she thought for a moment, to be such a

vile creature; I don’t know how on earth Barnabas does it), she levelled a

finger at the snarling, inhuman thing, and said coldly and firmly, “Go back to

your coffin, Charity Trask. Back to the lighthouse, where you will wait for me

until I summon you again.”

Charity had said nothing intelligible until now, and in a slobbering, wheedling

voice she growled, “More. Want ... more.”

Miranda eyed the unconscious man on the bed with a critical eye. “You very

nearly drained him tonight,” she said, “and that would be a mistake. We don’t

want Mr. Shaw dead, my dear. Just under my control.” She tittered. “Him and the

parasite inside him.”

“More,” Charity panted. “Need more.”

Miranda nodded sagely. “And you will have more, have no doubt of that. But not

tonight. Go. Return to your coffin, and let no one see you, or you will face

the daylight when the sun rises.”

The vampire showed her teeth in a cheated hiss, but her body became misty and

indistinct, and a few seconds later had faded away entirely. Miranda beamed.

This couldn’t be going more smoothly. The potential threat of Edith Collins had

been neutralized, Barnabas Collins was helpless before her, she had a pet

vampire to play with, and Quentin Collins, already intrigued by her tantalizing

promises of dark power, would soon be completely under her thrall.

All in all, she decided, a very satisfactory day.

*You will never leave this room.*

Miranda froze. The air around her suddenly shivered with cold, and her eyes

darted back and forth frantically in her skull. It was a voice she almost

recognized, but a spirit’s voice was always difficult to identify completely

until it materialized. Too late she remembered the ghost of Jeremiah Collins,

and how it had foisted its will upon her, how it had carried her off on the

night of her wedding to Barnabas and buried her in the grave that still held

its rotted, fetid corpse. She remembered how she had stared, panic-stricken as

she was now, into the one visible eyeball in its rotting skull, glazed and full

of horror, as the ghost above her shoveled handful after handful of dirt over

her, until the black, rotten mud filled her mouth and choked off her screams.

That won’t happen now, she vowed. You were young and stupid back then, and knew

nothing. You are powerful now, much more powerful. No ghost can threaten me.

“Who are you, alien spirit?” Miranda called, her voice sharp with challenge.

“Appear to me, in the name of Charon and all the spirits of hell. Appear to me

... identify yourself, lowly shade!”

Mocking laughter followed this, and her hands clenched into fists of

frustration.

*Witch. Sorceress. You have the spirit of evil within you.*

“You don’t know me,” Miranda said. “Appear to me, I command you, in the name of

Beelzebub —”

*He has now power over me.*

“He will,” she swore, “just as I will.”

*No. You have deprived me of my lawful prey, those who are rightfully mine to

punish. I shall mete out my own justice to you now.*

She forced herself to laugh. “You dare to threaten me? Don’t you know what I

can do to you? I can sentence you to walk the earth in agony for the rest of —”

*I will show you my powers. I will show you our powers.*

Before Miranda’s horrified eyes a figure began to materialize. “I know you,”

she whispered. “You’re like him ... but you’re not.” The ghost with the

spectacles and the gray mutton chops smirked at her, and the smile coiled on

his face like a serpent. “You’re a Trask!” she cried. “You must be!”

“I am Gregory Trask,” the ghost boomed, “and you have taken my murdering,

treacherous daughter from me. Mine was the right to destroy her. I shall have

satisfaction.”

“As shall I.” Another ghost materialized, and stood beside the first, and

Miranda moaned in terror. The resemblance between them was uncanny, but this

man’s face was drawn and pale, and his black hair peaked in a vicious spike

above his wide, domed forehead. His blazing eyes were not sane. It had been a

hundred years since she had last seen him when, as a terrified servant girl,

the Reverend Trask had accused her of witchery, and Angelique had been forced

to destroy him in a cleansing burst of flame.

“This is not possible,” she said, but gathered her powers. She felt the energy

begin hum inside her, and trills of power ran up and down her arms like skeins

of electricity. “But I shall deal with you both as easily as I could’ve with

one.”

“Not so easy,” the Reverend Trask smirked, and Miranda screamed as a firebrand

appeared in his hand, crackling gleefully. “I’m going to destroy you now as I

should have a century ago. You were able to overcome me then, but I have grown

powerful over the years, and I know now what your weakness is. The same element

that you used to destroy me will destroy you as well!” Miranda opened her mouth

to begin an incantation, but Trask thrust out his free hand, and she clutched

her throat, gasping. “You are mute,” he grinned. “You cannot speak. Isn’t that

what you said to me, Angelique Bouchard, before you condemned me to an

agonizing death?” The two spirits had merged now, and flickered before her, so

that she couldn’t tell which was which, and when they spoke, they spoke in two

voices.

*My daughter and her lover, the fools —

— the flames of hell will feed off your flesh as —

— thought they rid themselves of me, but I —

— they fed off mine —

— came back, and you robbed me of my prize —

— and you’ll —

— pay, you’ll —

— pay —

— witch —

— witch! —

— WITCH! — *

Miranda threw back her head to scream as the Trask ghost hurled the torch at

her, and the flames began to lick and paw eagerly at the crisp fabric of her

dress. Within seconds she was consumed inside a white wall of righteous fire. 

TO BE CONTINUED ...