Shadows on the Wall, Chapter Sixty-Two

Chapter 62 - Chameleons

By Nancybe

“Karma Karma Karma Karma Karma Chameleon 

You come and go 

You come and go”

     "Karma Chameleon" by Boy George

Voiceover (David Selby): It is a night of transition at the Great House of

Collinwood.  A witch who has reigned over the Great Estate in the past, the

future and in the present takes desperate measures to ensure her survival while

a member of the Collins family learns that beauty is only skin deep.

Meanwhile, a young traveler from the future must stand and prepare to face her

destiny.

 

In her dream, she was beautiful again.  Her long blonde hair was piled

elegantly atop her head with perfect ringlets framing her smiling face.  Her

gray eyes shone brightly as she surveyed all of the handsome suitors who

anxiously sought to dance with her.  Swaying in her velvet gown, she cast her

gaze on the lucky gentleman who would be allowed to take her into his arms for

the next waltz.  She almost laughed at him, that tinkling laugh that could be

so musically cruel, when she saw how much like a puppy he looked, a puppy who

bounces up and down at his mistress’ feet for a scrap or a bone.  Perhaps it

would be amusing to let him try to kiss her-

It was the nauseating smell of her own vomit that wrenched her from the dream.

And once she was conscious again, the smell was overshadowed by the vile taste

in her mouth.  She coughed and hacked and spit trying to rid herself of that

taste, but she had all of the strength of a newborn kitten.  She snaked out a

hand and weakly scratched at the dirt and leaves, actually rubbing them over

her cracked and bleeding lips and into her mouth in an effort to taste

something, anything, different than that of her own regurgitation.

*I am lying here, a heap of garbage, with dirt in my mouth.  I have never been

so thoroughly vanquished, so completely humiliated.  * She started to sob

bitterly, but the motion caused her excruciating pain, and she sank back down

trying to remain as still as possible.  This was the end, finally and utterly.

Angelique was done.

Laughter.  Deep, mocking laughter that built until it reached a crescendo in

her ears.  She knew he wasn’t really in this time, but he was laughing at her

from outside of time and place, laughing at her failure *again.* It was

infuriating.

“Damn you, Nicholas Blair,” she murmured in as defiant a voice as she could

muster.

She was now not much more than smoking ashes in a fireplace, but his

condescension was enough to spark the last ember of survival instinct that

remained within her.  She would not give up.  There had to be a way.

*Jamison…*

*~*

The year 1897 had lost all of its charm for Count Andreas Petofi, also known as

Victor Fenn-Gibbon, also known as, well, he had forgotten all of the personas he

had adopted in his many years.  His current favorite had to be Petofi, The

Great and Powerful.  (He was certain that if that Baum fellow he had met in

Chicago would publish his Oz stories that he would be quite successful.  But in

the meantime, the Count was happy to purloin the “Great and Powerful” moniker

for himself.)

But the *man* known as Petofi was now in danger, and chameleon that he was, he

needed to change his colors yet again.  He needed to change from green to

plaid, to become someone else and go to *someplace* else.  He had come too far,

regained too much, to lose it now in the backwater town of Collinsport, Maine

at the end of the 19th century.  It was time to move on.

He knew but one man who could help him, who could provide both the new face and

the unique means of transportation he needed.  It was time to locate that dear

boy, the beautiful Quentin Collins.

*~*

Just to say the words, just to make the small necessary motions with her hands

took every ounce of strength and willpower she possessed.  But she refused to

listen to that self-satisfied laughter for a moment longer.  In her mind, she

could see the smirk of delight on his face and the way he rubbed his gray

silk-gloved hands together in glee at her predicament.  The vision reinforced

her desire to survive, and she did what was needed, although when it was done,

she lacked the ability to stand.

She clutched at the bedpost for support and glanced around the bedroom at the

furnishings, the things that were the pride and joy of a young boy.  Her eyes

settled on the replica of a sailing ship, and it took her back to the sultry

days in Martinique when she would watch the brilliantly white sails of the tall

ships appear on the sun-soaked horizon.  She remembered the warmth of the sun

on her face and the sand on her feet, the excitement in her heart as the

vessels brought strapping young men to her island. And she vividly remembered

the day that a dark-haired, dark-eyed man had appeared on the deck of one of

those ships.  His handsome face had looked down into hers and had smiled, his

eyes going gentle, and she had been lost.  And finally, the long nights spent

in his arms – nights that had eventually brought her here, to this.  If she had

had the strength, she would have swept the toy ship from its shelf and laughed

as it shattered into splinters on the floor.

Where was the brat?  Shouldn’t he be in bed?  She needed him now, desperately.

She needed his essence to repair what that demon Petofi had stolen from her.

“Jamison,” she hissed softly.  “Come to me.  I need you.”

She listened carefully for the sound of his step although it was difficult to

hear above the uneven beat of her failing heart and the hitching of her ragged

breath.  But the mansion was silent, unnaturally silent, without even the usual

settling sounds of so large a structure.  Spying a dilapidated rag doll that

sported sagging and torn rabbit ears, she clasped it to her, using its

connection as a beloved toy to lure in the prey that she needed.  She wrinkled

her nose at the smell of it but knew that she herself must smell even worse.

“Jamison,” she repeated.  “Come to me NOW.”

She closed her eyes and waited.  A satisfied smile spread over her face as she

heard the door opening.

“You!” From the sound of it, young Master Collins was none too pleased to find

her waiting in his room for him.  “What do *you* want?  Get out of here!  This

is *my* room!”

“You won’t need it much longer, young man.” She cringed at the sound of her own

voice – its usual lilting tone had been replaced by a cracked and slithering

sound that sounded vaguely reptilian.  “Come closer to me.”

Just his presence had reinvigorated her, and she moved toward him.  The boy

gasped as he got a better look at her, and he shrank back with a cry of disgust

“What’s happened to you?  You’re a monster!  Get away from me!” he screamed.

Angelique reached out and grasped Jamison’s shoulder, and he fell to his knees

with a whimper, paralyzed by her touch.  “What has happened to me is nothing

that you cannot cure.  Look at me, Jamison Collins.”

The boy tried to resist, but the witch’s voice was as hard as ice; her command

caused his head to jerk up like a puppet’s on a string.

“All that you are, Jamison Collins, all of that which allows you to live, now

belongs to me.”

His eyes grew wide as his jaw involuntarily fell open at her words.  She loomed

over him and began to chant words and names that meant nothing to him except

for one final command: “Come forth!”

A silver mist began to rise from the boy’s mouth, spiraling and twisting much

like a cobra dancing to the tune of a snake charmer.  As the boy’s strong and

vital life force climbed higher, Angelique opened her own mouth to capture and

utilize it to heal her debilitating wounds.  She wanted to laugh as she felt

the strength and power begin to seep back into her body; Petofi would never

defeat her.  She would always-

“My * God *!  Jamison!  What in * hell * are you doing to him?”

The harsh cry from the doorway caused her to lose her concentration and thus

her hold on the child.  The weakened boy slumped face first to the floor, and

the loss of his life force made the witch fall backward away from the advancing

Quentin Collins.

“Get away from him, you witch!” he screamed at her.  “Have you killed him?”

“Quentin, I…I-” The effort to defend herself along with the abrupt loss of

Jamison’s life-giving essence was too much for the struggling Angelique.  Her

last stand had failed.

Collins watched in horror as her flesh rapidly faded from her body.  In mere

seconds, all that was left of her were stark white bones which promptly fell to

the floor with a crash. Miranda, the witch Angelique, was no more.

And somewhere, a debonair creature with a gray silk handkerchief in his pocket

was rocking back on his heels in laughter.

*~*

Quentin Collins wiped the sweat off his brow with one arm.  He wasn’t used to

such physical work, but this time, the effort had been well worth it.

“Good riddance, witch,” he said, rubbing his hands together to rid them of the

dust and mortar as he surveyed his hasty but effective work.  He was anxious to

get back to Jamison who was now safely tucked into his bed.

He turned and promptly sucked in his breath.  Two oversized eyes glowed back at

him through the gloom of the West Wing.

“Well, well, well,” boomed a voice laden with gravel.  “I didn’t know you were

a bricklayer, my boy.  And a fine job, I must say.  Do you think it will hold

her?”

“What do you want, Petofi?” the tall man growled.  Quentin Collins was not

afraid of very many things, but the man before him was one of those things.

“It is time to pay the piper, Mr.  Collins.  And I am the piper.

“I want the I Ching.”

*~*

Petofi ran one thick, gnarled finger over the smooth surface of the wand.  It

reminded Quentin of a lover’s touch, and he struggled not to gag.

“So these are the I Ching.  Fascinating.”

The set of mystical wands were laid out on a small cherry end table in

Quentin’s room. How he wished the whale of a man in front of him would just

take them and be gone.  But the old Count did not seem to be in any hurry.

Instead, he turned his attention from the table to the handsome Collins’ face.

The younger man felt his flesh crawl as Petofi’s eyes, magnified to an

unnatural degree behind the thick lenses, caressed him from head to toe.

“You really are a magnificent specimen, Quentin.  What more could a man ask

for?”

Collins struggled to keep his voice and his fear of this abomination under

control. “You’ve got the wands, Petofi.  Take them and go.  I need to see to

Jamison.”

“The boy will be fine.  She didn’t get what she needed from him.  Such an

arrogant, silly little witch.” He brought his hand – The Hand – up to his face

and surveyed Quentin again as if trying to make a decision about something.

“Yes, yes,” he murmured to himself, “ I know I should hurry.”

Quentin’s hopes rose at these words but were quickly dashed when Petofi spoke

again.

“But there is still too much fun to be had here.  Don’t you agree, dear boy?”

“I don’t know what you are talking about, and I don’t care.  I’m busy, and I-”

“Oh, but you should care,” the old man said, wagging a waxen finger at him.

“You *really* should care.”

Quentin’s eyes fixed on the intricate silver ring that Petofi wore on that

finger, its robin egg-sized ruby mesmerizing and drawing him in.  *Look away!

Look away!* his mind cried.  But it was already too late.

With a speed that Collins would not have thought the Count could possess, he

had crossed the room and placed his hand – that horrible appendage – on

Quentin’s head.  His grip was like a vice, and his victim cried out in pain.

Efforts to free himself from that loathsome hold were fruitless; Petofi held

him in place like a bug on a pin.

“Have you any idea what it is like to survive in a body such as mine, Mr.

Collins?  Of course, you would not.  You have been blessed by nature with

beauty and grace, with a charm that has no doubt granted you entrée into an

infinite number of ladies’ boudoirs. Well, you are going to know now, sir, what

it is like to go through life as I have.  For what you have is going to be

mine, and you will inherit that which you see here.  To the victor go the

spoils, Quentin, and after all, I *have* been known as *Victor* Fenn-Gibbon!”

His laugh ground into the younger man’s ears.  It was surpassed in its horror

only by the foulness of his breath which invaded Quentin’s nose and mouth like

a contagion.

Petofi’s hand suddenly closed into a fist, pressing his atrocious ring against

Quentin’s forehead.  Collins was aware of a sucking sound and then vast

darkness.  A freezing cold paralyzed him making it hard to breathe; he thought

that this was what it must be like to fall below the ice of a lake in winter

and not be able to find your way out.  In the next moment, he had been

propelled out of a cannon, and the impact sent him sprawling into the chair

behind him, out of breath and covered in stinking sweat.

Only there had * been * no chair behind him.  The chair had been behind

*Petofi*.

Disoriented, he pushed his glasses (*I don’t wear glasses*) up his sweat-

slicked nose and looked around the room.  The mirror in front of him showed a

Quentin Collins with a broad grin spread across his face - but he knew that he

definitely was *not* smiling.

“Oh, this is marvelous!” the Quentin in the mirror laughed at him with gusto.

*Since when do mirrors talk back to you?* he wondered for a moment.

He watched as the mirror Quentin twirled and preened, almost giggling as he did

so. *Bad whiskey,* he told himself.  *Must have drunk some bad whiskey.* He raised

his hand to rub his aching forehead, and that is when he screamed.

*~*

Something was wrong.  Victoria Winters could feel it in the air at Collinwood,

could feel it under her skin.  It was a buzzing – not like bees but like the

hum of a current coursing through electrical wires.  It was making the fillings

in her back teeth ache.  She wanted to talk to Quentin, to be with him, but the

closer she got to his room in the West Wing, the more she was sure that danger

was nearby.

Her fears were alleviated for a moment when she heard his raucous laugh

floating down the corridor toward her.  She cocked her head and listened

closely.  It *was* Quentin’s laugh - yet it wasn’t; it had the wrong

inflection.  Her momentary relief disappeared. There was something almost

unnatural about that laugh, something almost…*inhuman*.

She quickened her pace and arrived at Quentin’s partially open door where she

stood hidden in the gray shadows.  His back was to her, and she started to call

out to him.  But when she realized what was happening in his room, his name

died in her throat.

*~*

“How do you like it, dear boy?” his own face taunted him.  “How do you like

being a bloated old man?”

Quentin/Petofi was staring at the liver-spotted hands he held in front of his

face, listening to himself scream in Petofi’s voice.  He couldn’t seem to stop.

“You can scream all you like, Quentin.  Or shall I call you “Count” now?  I

suppose I should for appearances although it won’t matter for very long.”

Quentin/Petofi lumbered out of the chair he had fallen into, and just the

effort of standing made his heart race in his new horror of a body.  “You’ve

stolen my body, you bastard!” he yelled at his adversary.  “You have no right

to it!”

“Ah, but you knew there would be a price to pay for my services when we made

our bargain,” he heard what used to be his voice say.  “There is always a price

to pay, Mr. Collins.”

It was surreal; he thought he would go mad.  He took a shambling step toward

himself (*Not me, not me!  Petofi!*) and swung his fat fist awkwardly toward

the handsome face, but Petofi/Quentin sidestepped him easily.

The old man in the young man’s body began to laugh uproariously.  “You are

trapped, Quentin.  Trapped forever,” and grinning, he scooped up the wands and

put them into his pocket.  “While I, on the other hand, am off to a new

century!”

“You can’t…you can’t just leave me like this!” his victim rasped.  “I’ll stop

you!  I’ll get some help – my family won’t stand for this.  You are not the

only one with powers.  I’ll find-”

The body snatcher’s face had darkened to a dangerous shade of crimson, and in

that instant, Quentin became aware that the man who now inhabited his body was

hopelessly insane.

“Your family!” the thief roared.  “They are powerless against me.  Do not

harbor any hope from that front.  But, I will tell you a little secret, my dear

Quentin,” he chuckled monstrously before lowering his voice conspiratorially.

“I am going to delay my departure just long enough to slaughter your entire

family and all who live at Collinwood, including that meddling pig of a gypsy.

Ah, yes, I will enjoy squeezing that whore’s neck until my fingers – your

fingers actually – puncture her skin and her thick blood flows down my arm.

Her tongue, twisted and black, will pop out of her mouth, and I will bite it

off and-”

A horrified gasp interrupted his reverie, and the thing that would be Quentin

Collins whirled around.  Victoria Winters stood framed in the doorway, her

white face a mask of fear and disgust.

She had arrived in time to understand all that had happened in this room of

funhouse mirrors.  Petofi had taken over Quentin’s body; her own father now

lived inside of her lover… *Oh God, this *did* just happen, didn’t it?  He

wasn’t in Quentin when we…I didn’t really sleep with my own…What if he got me

preg-…Oh GOD!*

And she had gone from that horrible possibility to listening to this demon

pledge to destroy all of the family… It was too much.  She had tried to stay

quiet, to see what she could do to help Quentin get out of this mess but

hearing this atrocity speaking with the voice of the man she loved, hearing him

planning to turn Collinwood into an abattoir… Her terror had bubbled out of

her, and she had not been able to contain it.  And now, he had her fixed with

those terrible eyes, eyes that still seemed to swim on his face despite the

fact that it was no longer *his * face at all.

Vicki did the only thing she could.  She ran.

*~*

She flew down the hall, down the stairs, all the while damning the long skirt

this century’s fashion mavens decreed that she must wear.  She could hear him

behind her, right on her heels it seemed.  She knew that as Petofi’s daughter,

she had the ability to stop him.  It had to be her.  Oh, why did it always have

to be her?  Why was she so lucky as to be the offspring of that creature of

iniquity?

Magda had told her to stop feeling sorry for herself, that the tears wouldn’t

help, and the gypsy was right.  Yes, she could stop her father, but she needed

help.  She needed more magic than she knew how to muster by herself, and so she

had only one thought as she ran pell-mell from Collinwood:

* Find Magda.*

*~*

He did not have time for this interruption.  He needed to catch and dispatch

this foolish girl and get on with his plans.  It was liberating to run in this

young, lean body, but as he found himself careening through the woods in search

of the troublesome Miss Winters, he realized two things.  Number one, Quentin

Collins had a lovely physique, but it was not accustomed to sustained strenuous

physical activity.  The girl was fleet of foot, and he was quickly becoming

fatigued.  And number two, transferring into this body was not quite as

effortless as he had assumed it would be.  He felt a little clumsy using this

vessel as if he hadn’t yet acclimated himself to maneuvering Quentin’s long,

lanky limbs.

He stopped in a clearing – Victoria had veered off the worn path and had headed

through a dense copse of trees – and bent over with his hands on his knees

trying to catch his breath.  He had little chance of catching her, he realized

now.  He did not know these vast woods, and she obviously did.  He had no idea

where she was headed.  Perhaps she was headed nowhere at all considering how

she had bolted from Quentin’s room in a blind panic.

She did not matter; she was inconsequential.  If she reappeared, he would

squash her under his heel like an insect.  He started back toward Collinwood

(at least he hoped he was headed in the right direction) intent on carrying out

his promise: he was going to annihilate the mighty Collins family - tonight.

As he walked along placing Quentin’s legs one after the other, he reassured

himself that Victoria did not matter.  Just an insect to be crushed.  But he

could not rid himself of the nagging feeling that she was more dangerous than

that.  That she was an insect that could, perhaps, * sting *.

*~*

“Vicki, Vicki, dear, you must calm down,” the wizened gypsy crooned to her.

Victoria had collapsed on the divan in the Old House drawing room, her hair a

wild nest of ebony, her dark eyes dilated with terror.  Magda had never seen

her look so desperate, and the older woman was struggling with the fear that

was inching its way up her throat.  She’d had a soft spot for the girl since

she had first welcomed her to this time, and more than a little of her

affection stemmed from the courage this young one had shown from the beginning.

To see her this frightened scared Magda more than she cared to admit even to

herself.

“Oh Magda, he’s going to destroy us all!  He has so much power; I could feel it

flowing out of him!  The feeling – it’s horrible, filthy.  It’s pure evil,

Magda!  I have no other way of describing it.” Vicki sucked in her breath and

clamped a hand to her side where a vicious stitch from her sprint through the

woods was sawing at her insides.

A brown hand extended a glass of brandy, and Vicki swallowed it with a grimace.

Why did everyone on this estate always assume that liquor could solve all of

their problems? She took a deep breath, and it was the scent of candle wax

burning in Barnabas’ house that soothed her more than the brandy ever could.

The gypsy woman sat down beside her and gently took her hand, trying to still

her own trembling.  “Now you tell old Magda what you are talkin’ about.”

And so Vicki told her what she had seen and heard in the West Wing.  When she

was done, Magda’s copper skin had turned an ugly shade of gray, and Victoria’s

hand ached from the gypsy’s increasingly tight grip on it.

“Magda, I know that I am the one who must stop him.  But I don’t even

understand the powers that I have or how to use them.  Is there an amulet or

something, *anything*, that you know of that can help me?”

“Poor gadje,” the gypsy whispered.  She knew the young woman was holding her

fear –and her tears – at bay, but the effort was taking a toll on her.  Magda’s

admiration for this creature from the 20th century grew as she watched her, and

she knew that if they got out of this alive, that she would miss Miss Victoria

Winters when she returned to the future.  She briefly wondered if the old tales

were true – could people be reincarnated as someone else?  Might she know Vicki

again in the future?  She had always wanted to be a healer…Maybe, just maybe

she would see Vicki again someday…

Magda, wife of Sandor, sister of Jenny, enemy of Count Petofi, turned her

crocodile smile on Victoria and stood in a swirl of purple skirts.  “Magda

knows just the thing!” she announced, tapping her chest vigorously with her

fist.  “You, Victoria Winters, are going to send that fiend, that *Petofi*,”

she spat the name like the vilest of curses, “into the *nowhere*!”

“The nowhere?”

“I am going to teach you a binding spell, Miss Victoria, to trap him someplace

where he can’t get out.  You is going to bind him so tight that he will wish he

had the prune juice to drink!” The gypsy threw back her long, black locks and

barked out a wicked laugh.

She just hoped that she sounded more confident about the spell’s success than

she felt. For Vicki’s sake.

*~*

The man who now breathed with Quentin Collins’ lungs, who now saw with

Quentin’s eyes and heard with his ears, burst through the front door of

Collinwood.  His blue eyes blazed with a madness and a hatred that Quentin’s

eyes had never possessed.  He stood in the foyer with his arms outstretched

above his head and extended his hand – his Hand – toward the sky.  It was

Quentin’s Hand now that throbbed with the power, but it did not totally

resemble the hand that the handsome Collins would have recognized as his own.

The blood that coursed through this Hand was black as a bat’s wings and writhed

with an identity all its own.

A growl started low in his throat.  He shook his fists while the savage noise

that he made steadily built into a roar.  The walls of the sturdy mansion began

to rattle, and the foundation quaked.  Sparkling chandeliers fell from the

ceilings with ear-splitting crashes scattering crystal and glass over rugs and

polished wood.  Portraits of long dead, sour-faced Collinses were ripped off

their nails and skittered down the walls tearing their canvases into thick

shreds.  Those inside the house fled from their rooms in terror while below

them, a crazed madman bellowed his revenge:

“Woe to all who bear the Collins’ name!  For it is I, The Great and Powerful!”

TO BE CONTINUED ...