Shadows on the Wall Chapter Sixty-Six

Chapter 66: In the Blood

by Nicky

(Voiceover by Humbert Allen Astredo): “This is a troubled time in the great

house of Collinwood.  For one woman has returned from a terrifying and

frightening journey to the past, back to the year 1897, and though things have

changed in the big house, even more things remain the same.  Something is

rising, something ferocious and old, and Victoria Winters may prove the key to

its banishment — or to the destruction of everything she holds dear.”

1

"Snakes,” David said, and yawned.  “Big deal.”

Amy’s face reddened, and she cursed the fact that she wasn’t tall enough to

even look Mr.  High and Mighty David Collins in the eye.  Perhaps, she thought

ruefully, perhaps a smart kick to the shin might help me feel better.  But then

she figured he’d only kick her back, or twist her arm behind her back, or

something else spectacularly awful, yet completely keeping in character,

because the littlest Collins was a monster. 

But he was also Amy’s only friend. 

“It’s more than a nightmare, David,” she said, and hated how her voice

squeaked.  He raised a bored eyebrow, and she thought furiously, I’m going to

be a woman someday, and then my voice won’t squeak, and you’ll want me so bad

it hurts.  Probably.  “It is!” she said, indignant. 

“Amy,” David said, in his most patronizing, aren’t-we-great-pals?  voice, “I

think we’re both a little too old for these silly children’s games.  Don’t

you?”

“This is not a game, David,” Amy said through gritted teeth.  “I heard Chris

telling Dr.  Hoffman that he was having snake dreams, and so was she, and after

I woke up the other night I saw one in my room.” The eyebrow went up another

notch.  Despair filled her like icy water.  “David, I’m telling you the truth!”

“Big deal if you are,” David said.  “What do I care about your dreams for

anyway?”

“Because something is happening here!” Amy cried.  “Something bad.” Her lower

lip began to tremble despite herself.  “I think someone might get hurt.”

“You know this because of your stupid dreams about snakes?” David sniggered.

“Wow, you’ve got some imagination for a girl.”

“I’m not just a girl,” she growled dangerously. 

“Keep telling yourself that,” David said, and jumped off the edge of the bed he

had perched on.  “Now get out of my room.  I got stuff to do.  Important stuff.

No girls allowed.”

She felt tears well up in her eyes, and stifled a sob.  But David had already

turned away, and began to fuss with something that looked like a disassembled

model airplane.  She wanted to tell him how there was a room in her dream, and

she knew that it was a real room, in a real place, but she didn’t knew how she

knew.  There was a voice, and it explained things to her, but it spoke in a

language she couldn’t understand.  She was supposed to find this place — they

both were, she and David Collins — but she couldn’t do it without him.  Except

she couldn’t tell him any of this because he refused to listen to her, because

he was a big dumb boy.  Amy stomped her foot furiously, then ran from the room

and slammed the door behind her. 

The minute she was gone, David dropped the plastic pieces back onto his desk,

then walked calmly to the door and locked it.  A smile, long and poisonous,

grew like a blade across his face, and his teeth gleamed white. 

2

Maggie frowned at her reflection in the rear-view mirror of the sporty little

red convertible Nicholas had provided her (a Solstice present, he assured her),

and adjusted her bangs.  Her hair was still coal-black, and that was fine with

her.  Better than that mousy red-brown color she’d inherited from her mother,

whoever the hell she was, because Maggie couldn’t remember her.  Pop only kept

one picture of her, framed beside his bed.  A saintly woman, or so Maggie had

always been told.  So boring. 

She was only a little disturbed at the changes about herself she noticed

infrequently, the ones connected, she was certain, with the magic she was

experimenting with.  The black eyes bothered her most of all — there was

something supremely creepy about them when they were like that, as if all the

light were sucked out of her, leaving her dark and cold — but the hair was

kinda neat.  And it hadn’t come out of a box either.  It just sort of ...

happened.  Just like her amazing array of powers had just happened. 

“Looking for flaws, my dear?” Nicholas purred beside her. 

“Checking my mascara,” she answered.  She wiped at the corner of her eye, and

only succeeded in smearing it.  “Damn,” she hissed. 

“You’re beautiful.” His sharp white teeth grazed her earlobe, and she shivered

with pleasure. 

“Stop that,” she said, and giggled a little.  “You’ll make it worse.”

“You look radiant,” he said.  “My own black goddess.”

“Thank you.” She beamed at him, pleased.  “Don’t be long.  It’s snowing again.”

“Make it stop.”

She rolled her eyes.  “Not into upsetting the balance of the weather today.

Sorry, Charlie.  If you want a hurricane or a tsunami or fire to rain from the

heavens, then you do it.”

He kissed her, and she felt his tongue squirming in her mouth.  “That’s my

girl,” he said when he released her, and slid like an eel out of the car.

“I’ll see what the illustrious Dr.  Hoffman requires of me, and when I return,

we can ...” He wagged his eyebrows at her suggestively, and then made his way

to the front door of Collinwood, whistling as he went. 

The smile faded from Maggie’s face.  Yes, she thought coldly, there are many

changes at work in me.  A new road unfolding before me, and I have to follow

it. 

And maybe I’ll follow it alone. 

Guess we’ll just have to wait and see. 

3

“You wanted to see me, Dr.  Hoffman?” Nicholas removed his jaunty teal bowler

and held it sedately with both hands.  He stood politely before the sofa in the

drawing room, where Julia reclined with one arm stretched across its back.  The

doors were locked, and a fire crackled merrily in the fireplace. 

“I did,” she said, maintaining a careful neutrality in her voice.  “Would you

care for a drink, Mr.  Blair?”

“I don’t have little vices, Dr.  Hoffman,” he said cheerfully.  “And why don’t

you call me ‘Nicholas’?  We’re neighbors, after all.  I really think we should

become better acquainted.”

“I’m certain we will,” Julia said.  “Mr.  Blair.”

“Dr.  Hoffman?”

“Why don’t we cut the crap, if you’ll pardon the expression.” Julia’s eyes

smoldered, and her mouth was drawn up tight, and Nicholas realized belatedly

that the woman was furious.  Her long white fingers drummed a heated tattoo

against the back of the ugly green sofa. 

“I’m not certain what you mean,” Nicholas said.  I’m so intrigued, he thought;

who knew that Julia Hoffman was so interesting?  Such a spitfire!  My kind of

woman. 

“I know what you are.” Julia’s voice was low and acidic, and rumbled, like the

warning growl of a lioness. 

“I’ve been described as a great many things by many people.  I’d be most

interested in hearing your description.  Most interested indeed.”

Julia rose and poured herself another brandy.  Her cheeks flowered with color,

and when she turned around to face him, her eyes threw out emerald sparks.

“You’re not human.”

Nicholas clutched at his chest.  “Dr.  Hoffman, you cut me to the quick!”

“You needn’t play games with me.  Cassandra Collins was a witch.”

Nicholas arched an eyebrow.  “And I’m her brother, therefore I’m a ...” He

cocked his head and tilted his eyes heavenward, as if searching for the proper

noun.  “...  warlock?”

“I knew Cassandra in the past,” Julia said, and her lip curled back.  “I knew

her when she was a simple serving girl named Angelique, when she blackmailed

Barnabas Collins into marrying her.  I was there the night she was stabbed, and

I saw what her curse did to Barnabas.” Julia strode up and glared up into

Nicholas’ face.  “I know you’re responsible for what’s happened to him somehow,

Mr.  Blair, and you’re going to tell me all about it, because I won’t let you

hurt him, I won’t!”

Nicholas’ eyes glared at her for a moment — the audacity!  he thought — then

the wrinkles in his brow smoothed out, and he smiled beatifically at her.  “My

dear, dear, dear Dr.  Hoffman.  Your imagination is boundless, I am certain,

and I must admit, I am vastly amused by these ...  ahem ...  accusations.  I

hesitate to call them flights of fancy, since you seem to believe in them

whole-heartedly, but honestly ...” He squinted down at her.  “You don’t really

believe any of that, do you?”

“Barnabas Collins has disappeared,” Julia hissed.  “I know you’re responsible.”

“Why would I want Barnabas Collins to disappear?”

“For the same reason you wanted Eliot Stokes out of the picture.  I know you

had a hand in that too, Mr.  Blair.  Eliot was on to something about you, and I

only wish I knew what it was.  But I think he had figured out a way to destroy

you once and for all, and you ...  you did something to him, and now you’ve

done something to Barnabas.”

“Dr.  Hoffman,” Nicholas said quietly, “if I were ...  er, what you say I am

...  why would I stand here, quietly accepting these verbal blows you insist on

volleying towards me?  If I had these great powers you ascribe me, wouldn’t I

simply wave my hands and make you disappear?”

Julia’s chin jutted out defiantly.  “You know you’d never get away with it,”

she said.  “You know that I’d be missed in this house, and that suspicion would

come around to you eventually.”

“I know no such thing.”

“You should.  Unless you’re a greater fool than I originally figured.”

Anger flared for a moment in the icy wasteland of his chest, and he was

startled to find that she had, indeed, touched a nerve inside of him.  She’s

threatening me, he thought, aghast, and said quietly, “I should be very

cautious if I were you, Dr.  Hoffman.”

“I wasn’t afraid to summon you here.”

“My curiosity, and my curiosity alone brought me here.  You are either

inhumanely brave, or a complete fool, if I am what you assume.”

“I care only about Barnabas’ safety.  You are dispensable, Mr.  Blair.”

“I don’t have the slightest idea of Barnabas Collins’ whereabouts,” Nicholas

said, and the fury in him boiled out in his voice, “and I wouldn’t tell you now

even if I did.” He slammed the hat down on his head.  “Good day, Doctor.”

“Step carefully, Mr.  Blair,” Julia called, and he froze with one hand on the

doorknob.  “Eliot Stokes figured out how to defeat you, and I will too.”

Nicholas bared his teeth in a silent snarl, then tore open the drawing room

doors and slammed them behind him. 

Maggie appraised him with wide-eyes a few seconds later.  “Didn’t go as well as

you’d hoped, huh,” she said.  He merely glared at her, but she shrugged it off.

“What did the old bitch want?”

Nicholas drummed his gloved fingers furiously against the dash of the car.

“She thinks she can threaten me,” he said, and his sharp teeth ground together,

and Maggie quailed for a moment as the pupils of his eyes began to grow, to

blacken, and his voice dropped until it because a deep, inhuman bass, like the

grinding of the earth’s plates.  “She thinks she can talk to me that way —

thinks she can make a fool of me, order me about —” The air began to darken

about them, and it felt heavy and oppressive, and Maggie began to smell the

distinct odor of ozone.  Thunder rumbled somewhere far away. 

“Nicholas —” Maggie said, her voice not quite a whimper. 

When he looked back at her, he was smiling again, and his eyes and teeth were

normal.  Or, she amended, as normal as they ever were.  “I’m sorry, my dear,”

he said, charming as ever.  “I was just thinking out loud.”

“Julia threatened you?”

“She tried,” Nicholas said.  “The poor dear is concerned about Barnabas

Collins, and apparently is as in the dark as we are concerning his whereabouts.

However, she did make some interesting points regarding my future, not only at

Collinwood, but on this planet.”

Maggie sighed.  “She did threaten you.  Honestly, Nicholas, you are so

sensitive sometimes —”

He ignored her.  “I think the time has come to deal with Dr.  Hoffman.  Yes, I

think that time is long overdue.”

“Deal with her?  What are you going to do?”

Nicholas chuckled.  “Oh, not me, my dear.  Oh no.  Too suspicious, as she

pointed out.” His eyes looked through the windshield and out to the sea that

sprawled, black and choppy, before them.  “I think I’ll call in a favor from an

old friend of mine.  I think a favor is just the sort of thing I need ...”

4

The snow had turned to rain by dusk, and Chris Jennings watched it fall in a

gray curtain from the leaden sky that grew darker and darker with every passing

minute.  So am I, he thought mournfully, and turned away from the window with a

scowl marring his face.  He gritted his teeth together.  The moon was racing

towards full, and in a little over a week it would ride through the sky,

bloated and a cold, winter white, and it didn’t matter if the clouds hid its

deathly face or not.  The moon would find him.  And change him. 

Not if Julia’s injections start having an effect. 

And when would that be?  Chris sighed heavily, and shook his head.  He wanted

to run away — that hadn’t changed — but where would he go?  Besides, he told

himself, I can’t let Quentin down.  He’s here for me even if no one else is. 

He poured himself a cup of coffee in the caretaker’s cottage’s little kitchen,

and added a dash of cream and two scoops of sugar.  He sipped it, and grimaced

a little as the bitter heat scalded his tongue.  He set it on the table, and

sank into one of the wooden chairs that had come with the place. 

Julia had stopped by to administer another injection about an hour before, and

also to fill him in on her plans for the evening.  She and Victoria Winters

were going to visit Eliot Stokes in his hospital room and try an experiment of

sorts.  Julia had explained that Vicki was exhibiting a phenomenal array of

healing powers, and Julia hoped that Vicki could use them to wake Stokes from

his coma.  “I had myself a little showdown with Nicholas Blair at Collinwood

this afternoon,” she told him after the needle was removed from his arm and a

hazy wreath of cigarette smoke encircled her head.  “I think I laid things out

for him pretty plain, but he claims that he doesn’t know anything about

Barnabas’ disappearance.”

Chris had raised an eyebrow.  “So you think ...”

Julia returned the expression.  “I’m not completely sure,” she said, “but I had

the most disturbing feeling that he was being completely sincere.”

“Julia,” Chris said, grinning a little, “the man’s an emissary of the devil.

One of the bad guys, I believe.  Why would you trust him?”

“I don’t.  It’s just a feeling I have.  I think Nicholas, for once, is as

clueless as we are.  Which bothers me more than it should.” She began to tug

restlessly on the sleeve of her blouse.  “I was hoping that he would know

something, be smug, or threaten to withhold information.  Something to go on.

But he didn’t.  And if he’s not responsible ...” Her voice trailed off, and she

took another drag off her cigarette. 

“Are you sure that confronting him was such a good idea?”

“No.  But I was fresh out of ideas, and I was enjoying an adrenaline high at

the time.  I may have ...  said some things that ...  perhaps ...  I shouldn’t

have.”

“Uh oh.  Such as?”

“I may have threatened to have him destroyed.”

“Oh, Julia.”

“Which is why getting Eliot up and out of that hospital bed and back into the

real world is so important.  If anyone will know how to combat Nicholas Blair,

it’ll be him.”

She was pretty confident, Chris thought, sipping his coffee, and he smiled.  He

had grown quite fond of Julia Hoffman over the past few months. 

“You have such a beautiful smile, baby.  I don’t know why you hide it so much.”

The smile froze on his lips, then curdled.  Chris dropped his head in despair.

It had been almost a week since Quentin had chased Joe away, and yet here he

was, popping in out of the blue with his faux witty remarks and his bad little

boy smile.  When he came around the table and sat down directly across from

him, Chris could see that the smile was very much in place. 

“Miss me?”

“Like the plague,” Chris growled.  “What the hell do you want?”

Joe blinked his large blue eyes.  “Do you even need to ask that?  I want you,

baby.  Only you.”

“I don’t think we have anything left to say to each other.  I think we’re

done.” Chris’ voice was cold, but his insides were alive and trembling.  He

felt like he wanted to vomit.  Why does he still make me feel this way?  Chris

thought, despairing, and unbidden, his eyes left Joe’s face and wandered over

his body, drinking in the way the tight blue teeshirt he wore clung so lovingly

to every curve of his muscular —

No! 

He dragged his eyes away with an effort, aware that Joe knew what he was

thinking, and hated him for it. 

“Done?” Joe sounded shocked.  “Because of one little scuffle?  One little

fight?  Christopher, you need to develop a thicker skin than that.”

“I want you to leave,” Chris said carefully, looking deeply into the black

depths of his coffee.  “Now.”

“Doesn’t matter what you want.  I’m not going anywhere.”

Chris stood up.  At just over six feet, he was three or four inches taller than

Joe Haskell.  “Then I’ll have to throw you out.”

Joe smiled up at him.  “Is that what you really want?”

“Yes,” Chris said instantly. 

Joe stood up.  “Fine,” he said, and thumped Chris companionably on the back.

“I’d hate to move you to violence.  An outburst like that just might make you

turn into a werewolf right here, and who wants that?” He snickered a little at

the look of shock that had rolled across Chris’ face like a thunderclap.  Joe

put a finger in his mouth and stared skyward.  “Or is it only sex that makes

that happen?  Or the full moon?  I wasn’t quite clear on that.”

Color filled Chris’ cheeks like red bricks.  “You ...  you can’t know any of

that — how do you ...?”

“Of course,” Joe continued as if he hadn’t heard, “we’ve been pretty hot and

heavy for the past three months, and my face is still intact, so it can’t be

sex.  And the moon won’t be full for another week or so.  So maybe the violence

is it.  If that’s the case, I’ll just show myself out.” He paused, and looked

deeply into Chris’ wide eyes.  “If you’re sure that’s what you really want.”

“How can you know any of that?” Chris’ voice was hushed, strangled. 

“You should really tell your friend Dr.  Hoffman not to leave her toys lying

about.  Anyone might just happen along and push play on her little tape

recorder and learn all kinds of things about their friends and neighbors.

Werewolves, vampires, time travel ...  anywhere else in the world it would be

unbelievable.  But we both know it’s very believable, don’t we, Christopher.”

He came closer, and Chris could smell the sharp tang of Joe’s cologne.  He

shivered involuntarily.  “We both know what you are.  What you’ve done.  What

you’ll do again.”

“Shut up,” Chris said miserably. 

“You’re a murderer, Christopher,” Joe purred in his ear.  “You kill people.

You eat them.  And it doesn’t matter what Julia Hoffman is doing with these

stupid experiments, because you know they’ll fail.  Science isn’t magic.  You

know that too.  How can science combat something out of legend?  Your body

changes into an animal’s, and you murder and you shred and you rip people to

pieces, and there’s not a damn thing Julia Hoffman can do about it. 

“She’s going to fail. 

“There’s not going to be any cure. 

“And you know it.”

“Shut up!” Chris roared, and lashed out.  His hand, curled into a tight fist,

struck Joe above the right eye, and knocked him to the ground.  Chris stood

over him, fists clenched, panting. 

Joe smiled up at him angelically.  “I think you’re beginning to see how this

game is played.  It’s all about power, my friend.  Tit for tat.  Quid pro quo.

You scratch my back and ...” He raised his eyebrows suggestively.  “...  I’ll

scratch yours.”

“Get out of here.”

“Not gonna happen.  I’m in your blood, Christopher.  I’m here for good.

There’s no way to get rid of me.  Because you want me.  You like it.  You like

all the nasty things we do together because you know you deserve them.  Because

you’re bad.” Joe grinned at him savagely. 

Chris snarled like an animal. 

“That’s it baby,” Joe purred, and beckoned him.  “Give us a kiss.”

Chris threw himself at Joe, and rained blow after blow on him.  Joe laughed,

and forced Chris beneath him, and struck him across the face, still grinning

ferociously.  Chris was panting, his nose was bloodied, but his eyes were on

fire ...  and they had begun to blaze a ferocious emerald green.  He threw his

head back and howled, then grabbed Joe by the shoulders and threw him off of

him and across the room.  Joe struck the wall and slid down it, then lay there,

blinking dazedly. 

Chris was on him in a flash.  Their mouths met, and their tongues dueled

ferociously, and Chris was tearing at Joe’s clothes, shredding them, pulling

them off, and their kiss in all its ferocity never broke, even when they were

both naked, and Chris turned Joe over and forced himself inside him, for the

first time, the very first time, and it was hot, and it was good, god so good —

— but deep inside, the human part of Chris Jennings covered his face and wept.

5

“Julia, I’m terrified.” Vicki’s face was pale, and she was trembling. 

Julia stood by her side just outside Eliot’s room.  Visiting hours were almost

over, but Julia was recognized at the Collinsport Hospital as the respected Dr.

Hoffman, taking a sabbatical from her own practice at Windcliff (or Wyndcliff;

Julia’s own understanding of the spelling of her own hospital was precarious at

best) asylum, and was granted a little more leeway at the hospital than other

visitors. 

The rain had begun to freeze as they left Collinwood, and made their drive into

town almost unbearably slow, especially since Vicki’s nerves were beginning to

frighten her, and the resulting twitchiness made Julia equally twitchy. 

“It’s all right, Vicki,” Julia assured her.  “You’ve used these powers before,

and look at the good you’ve wrought.  Roger and I owe our lives to you.”

“I don’t know,” she said.  Her eyes were huge and hollow and very dark, more

than doe-like.  “I can’t help it.  These powers come from Petofi, and when I

used them in the past ...” She shuddered.  “It was like a gate opened up inside

me, and there was a darkness there that I never knew existed.  All these

feelings, these terrible, dark feelings ...  more than just anger, Julia.

Something worse than hate.  A blackness that ...” She broke off, and held

herself as she shivered. 

Julia took her by the shoulders and stared into the young woman’s frightened

face, sternly, but not without compassion.  “I think we have to risk it,

Vicki,” Julia said.  “You may be Eliot’s last hope.” A little melodramatic,

Julia thought, but it sounded convincing, and she needed Vicki on board.

Because, she realized with a pang of fear, Victoria Winters — or, more likely,

the powers within Victoria Winters — were truly Eliot Stokes’ last hope.  She

would risk anything at this point.  “I’ll be right here with you, Vicki, in

case anything goes wrong.”

“I don’t know what will happen,” Vicki said lowly.  “But I’m just so afraid.”

She took a deep breath, and put her hand on the doorknob to Stokes’ room.  “All

right,” she said bravely.  “Let’s do it.”

The two women stepped into Eliot’s room, and Julia felt tears burn her eyes

instantly.  Eliot looked so small and wasted in the huge white hospital bed.

The machine beside him monitoring his vital signs beeped every few seconds

blandly.  His face seemed dreadfully lined, dreadfully old.  Julia stood beside

him and took one of his hands.  “I don’t know if you can hear me or not,

Eliot,” she said, “but I’ve brought someone to help you.”

“Hello, Professor,” Vicki said shyly.  She glanced at Julia, who merely

shrugged.  “I ...  um.  I came back from the past.  From 1897.  I saved the

Collins family by defeating Count Petofi, and I learned ...  um ...  I learned

that I’m capable of ...  of ...” She broke off and put a hand over her face. 

“It’s all right, Vicki,” Julia said, and put a hand on the young woman’s

shoulder, and gave her a reassuring squeeze.  “Just do whatever you can.”

“Right,” Vicki whispered.  “Do whatever I can.” She took a deep breath.  It’s

not like I haven’t done this before, she told herself; come on, Vicki, grow a

pair.  You know you can do it.  So do it. 

So Vicki closed her eyes and reached for the blackness she could sense lurking

inside herself. 

Julia watched her expectantly, and longed for a cigarette. 

For a moment nothing happened. 

Then the machine next to the bed shuddered of its own accord.  Julia’s eyes

widened.  The atmosphere of the room had changed, and she thought she could

smell something like ozone in the air.  The beeps from the machine came faster

and faster now, and the green spikes that delineating Eliot’s heart rate began

to leap.  Julia felt a spear of terror press into her heart, and wondered if

this wasn’t an enormous mistake. 

She wondered the same thing a moment later when the ground began to tremble

beneath their feet. 

“Vicki?” she whispered, and Victoria Winters opened her eyes. 

Julia thought, She’s not Vicki at all.  Not at all.  Oh god, what have I done?

Vicki’s eyes were black, polished and black, and ...  and they glowed.  Her

face had become chalky white, and her ordinarily auburn hair tumbled down her

shoulders in a cascade of ebony.  Her mouth split open into a devil’s smile,

and Julia could see that her teeth had become needle-sharp fangs, like the

teeth of a piranha.  The air around her began to crackle, and Julia could see

black veins of electricity jump and snap. 

Vicki’s grin grew, and she hissed, “Power.” The word fell from her lips like a

burning coal. 

Oh dear god, Julia thought, paralyzed with fear, oh dear god, oh dear god —

Vicki’s hair had begun to whip around her head in a scorching breeze that had

sprung up from nowhere; the water in a paper cup beside Eliot’s bed began to

bubble and churn; the window across the room coughed its glass onto the floor

with an unbearable shattering sound.  Vicki threw back her head and bellowed

with triumph, and lifted her hands into the air.  They crackled with black

energy. 

No, Julia thought, but it was too late. 

Vicki dropped her hands onto Stokes’ chest. 

The wasted man in the bed convulsed, and his eyes flew open.  Julia was

horrified to see they crackled with the same black energy that glowed in

Vicki’s eyes.  His mouth opened, and a torrent of words poured out, but they

were in a language Julia couldn’t understand, and it wasn’t Eliot’s voice at

all. 

“Ia ia Shub-Niggurath,” the voice growled from Eliot’s throat, “hastur tuatha

gub-na shan!  Urdulak hastur danu, en cantua shub-yog ia ia cantu shub-rogth!”

Then the black fire of Vicki’s power exploded upwards into a pillar of

darkness, and within its swirling confines, and for just a moment, Julia saw

something that froze her heart. 

Huge, eyes like fire, something inhuman, a monster, a demon, and my god it’s so

close, so close and so HUGE —

Then it was gone, and the dark power dissipated, and Stokes was sitting up and

blinking, and looking around confused, but his cheeks bloomed with health and

he no longer appeared to be a dying old man.  In fact, Julia thought, he looks

as if he just woke up from a spectacularly reviving nap. 

His eyes lit on Julia, and he began to beam. 

“Julia!” he exclaimed.  “My goodness, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes!”

“Eliot?” Julia whispered, then looked to Vicki. 

The other woman leaned against the wall, gasping for breath.  At first Julia

thought she was exhausted with the effort of the power she had channeled

through herself, then she realized that Vicki wasn’t drained.  She was

exhilarated.  The experience had put color into her cheeks as well, and her

eyes sparkled with vitality. 

“Miss Winters,” Stokes said, but he sounded less pleased to see her.  He sounds

as disquieted as I feel, Julia thought. 

Don’t be stupid, Julia, she chided herself.  This was your idea, after all, and

Vicki is fine.  She wasn’t harmed at all, and Eliot is awake.  Everything is

going to be all right. 

But deep down inside, she wondered. 

“Professor Stokes,” Vicki breathed.  Her voice was low and husky, not like her

normal voice at all, but she looked like herself; the black eyes and matching

hair had completely disappeared.  “I was so afraid it wouldn’t work.  I —” She

bowed her head, and smiled shyly, the same old Vicki smile.  “I was afraid that

I’d killed you.”

Eliot turned to Julia, his eyebrows arched, and Julia explained everything that

had occurred while he languished in the coma.  When she finished, Stokes looked

back at Vicki with awe in his eyes ...  and something like fear.  “That was an

enormous thing you just did, Miss Winters,” he told her, “and please don’t

think I’m being ungrateful, because I assure you I’m not, and I realize I owe

you my life.  But you took a great risk invoking those powers.  A great risk

indeed.”

“I know,” Vicki said.  “But Julia thought it was the only way.  And I did too,

Professor.  When I touched you just now — I felt you.  I felt inside of you.

And you were dying.  Terrible things have been happening at Collinwood, and you

were a part of fighting them, whether you know it or not.  You sent yourself —

your astral self — to help Barnabas, before all of this was changed.  You

helped to send him into the past, and by doing that, you left yourself drained.

Weakened.  You were dying, Professor Stokes.  And Julia was right.  It was the

only way.”

Stokes opened his mouth, but before he could rebut, Julia, inspired, said,

“Eliot — what happened to you?  Who attacked you while you were still in your

coma?  Do you remember?”

His eyes narrowed.  “Oh yes, Julia,” he said.  “I remember most clearly.  And

before we attend to Mr.  Nicholas Blair, the man responsible for putting me

here in the first place, I’m afraid we have a much more pressing problem.  The

woman who attacked me — the murderess responsible for the deaths of Tony Trask

and Mr.  Wells, and god knows how many others — is still here.” Julia and

Vicki’s mouths had become gaping o’s.  “Right under our noses.  At Collinwood,

at Collinwood all the time.”

“Who, Eliot?” Julia breathed.  “Tell us who.”

“She looks like Carolyn Stoddard,” Stokes said firmly, “but I don’t think

that’s who she really is at all.”

6

“This has to happen,” Amy told David in her sternest, most severe schoolmarm

voice.  “This is the way it always happens.  It’s because of who we are, you

and I.” He was looking at her meekly, and that was just the way she liked it.

She was filled with purpose, with a knowledge far beyond any she had ever

possessed, far beyond any anyone in this miserable house possessed.  She had a

dream, and this time it told her everything.  She was quiet, calm, filled with

joy.  And purpose.  She knew what she had to do. 

And David knew it too. 

“This is the way it has always been,” she continued.  They could both hear the

water from the sea not far away; the room she had led them to was only a stop

on the tunnel’s meandering way, and she knew instinctively that it also led to

the Old House before it branched again and led to the angry Atlantic.  Pirates

hid here, she thought dreamily, and men and women in hoods and cowls crept

along this stone path with their guttering candles and their daggers drawn.

She sighed. 

“How did you know to bring us here?” David’s voice was small without his

ordinary pomposity.  He’s going to be just like his father someday, Amy thought

wisely, unless someone knocks that out of him before it’s too late. 

“Because of my dreams,” she told him airily.  “I told you they meant

something.” Her voice sharpened.  “You had one too.  Tell me about it.”

“I’m afraid —”

She slapped him, lightly, but enough that the cracking sound reverberated

through the room and echoed down the path of the cave.  He cried out and

clutched his cheek, and stared at her, trembling.  Her eyes blazed.  “I said,

tell me,” she breathed. 

“All right.” He rubbed his cheek.  “All right.  There are torches.  Men and

women, and they’re wearing these robes, and I can’t see their eyes, and only a

little of their faces, but they’re white, white as salt.  They’re chanting, or

singing.  Incanting, maybe.  Calling on something.  We’re in the forest, and

there’s this ...  this thing, this great monument-thing, all made of stone, and

it’s huge.  It towers above them, bigger than any building.  There are carvings

all over it, and they’re all snakes.  It’s horrible.  And then the air starts

to hiss, and the ground is shaking, and the ...  the cairn starts to glow.  It

glows with this awful, sick green light, and it spills over everyone, and makes

them green too.  They keep chanting, and it isn’t in any language I know, but I

can understand it anyway, and they’re saying ...  th-they’re saying —”

“From the sea,” Amy said calmly.  “It will come to us from the sea.”

“Y-yeah.  The cairn glowed brighter, and they all threw their hoods back, and

...  and one of them was me.  And that’s when I woke up.”

“And you knew what you had to do.”

“I knew.  I’m sorry, Amy.  I’ll help you — you know I’ll help you — but why?

Why is this happening to us?”

“Because it has to,” Amy said.  “I told you that.  It’s about blood, David, and

power, because there is power inside us.  Both of us.  Something inside us

makes us special, and they know it.  They’ve been calling to both of us.  They

need us.  Their time is coming.”

“Amy,” David whispered, “who are they?”

Amy Jennings could only smile.  She turned away from him — boys, she told

herself, can be so dense sometimes — and picked up something from the floor.

When she turned back to him, David saw that she held a book in her hand, a slim

volume with a broken spine that had certainly seen better days.  It was bound

in green cloth, and David saw the image of a serpent emblazoned on the cover,

but no ordinary serpent.  It glared at him with two heads, and two tongues

flickered in the air.  “This is their book,” she told him.  “It’s important.

It has been badly treated, just like them, but its time has come.  Just like

them.  We have to keep this, David, and hide it, and make sure it stays a

secret.  Until the time is right.  Until he comes for it.”

“Who?”

“We’ll know him, just as he’ll know us.  He’s coming.  I can feel it, David,

and so can you.  He’s coming, and he’ll be here soon. 

“All we have to do is wait.”

7

Julia was tired of waiting.  Quentin was supposed to have met her at the Old

House half an hour ago, but there had been no sign of him.  She had smoked

another pack of cigarettes since leaving Vicki at Collinwood, and she had just

torn open the top of another.  Three of them spilled out and pattered gently to

the floor.  “Damn,” she hissed, and scooped them up.  Two were unharmed, but

one hung broken in her hand.  She exhaled noisily and stuffed the broken

cigarette into her purse.  One of them she lit, and waved it about distractedly

as she paced up and down the drawing room of the Old House. 

She had lit the fire herself upon her return; Willie Loomis was spending more

of his time in Portland, and she couldn’t blame him.  He and Barnabas had

developed a growing affection for each other after her cure had taken hold, and

Barnabas couldn’t fault the young man his trips away from Collinwood.  He had

even set him up with an apartment there.  Still, she mused, it would be nice to

have someone around who could chop wood and vacuum the upstairs hall once in

awhile.  Julia tittered.  She had forgotten that the Old House was not equipped

for electricity.  Maybe, she thought, if I work on Barnabas really hard —

Her smile faded.  I can’t work on him for anything, she thought desolately; I

don’t know where he is. 

There has to be something I can do, she thought.  Some kind of spell or

something.  Angelique was a pain in the ass, but at least she had some power.

She could always find Barnabas with no problem. 

Angelique ... 

No, Julia decided.  Better not to have to deal with that blonde hell harpy

again.  Besides, she had no idea where she’d taken off to.  It had been months

since Julia had even thought of her, and more since she’d disappeared into the

night, the Cassandra/vampire disguise broken, her spells shattered, and she had

left this very house a mortal.  No one spoke of Cassandra, especially not Roger

or Elizabeth, who had apparently decided to uphold the Collins tradition of

sweeping under the rug any unpleasantness no one wanted to acknowledge. 

The only link to Cassandra was Nicholas Blair, and Julia found herself

wondering what kind of conversations he and Elizabeth shared.  They had become

extremely chummy recently, and that in itself was disquieting.  He couldn’t

actually be planning to marry her, Julia wondered, and had to chuckle again. 

Well why not? 

The laughter died in her throat.  Elizabeth wasn’t blind.  She wasn’t dumb.

She had to know, along with everyone else in Collinsport, that Nicholas was

shacking up with Maggie Evans in Seaview, that disreputable dump supposedly

haunted by the ghost of Gregory Collins and his million feral brats.  She had

to know.  And since she wasn’t the serial killing murderess she was before

Vicki’s trip to 1897, what was she planning to do about it? 

Julia felt cold all over.  There was still one serial killing murderess left at

Collinwood.  She was there right now, and Julia wondered what kind of madness

drove Carolyn Stoddard to kill.  Eliot seemed to feel it was some kind of

possession.  By a French spirit, of all things.  But it hadn’t sounded crazy at

all when Eliot reminded her of the day when a spying Carolyn had some sort of

fit at the Old House, the very day that Barnabas had stopped Tom Jennings’

reign of terror with a silver-backed mirror shard thrust through his heart.

That was the night Tony Trask disappeared, Julia realized, and Stokes had

nodded his affirmative.  “Indeed,” he had said dryly.  “Julia, have you ever

heard of a French murderess by the name of Danielle Roget?”

Now she was waiting for Quentin, who possessed more arcane knowledge than

anything Julia had ever read or studied.  I just know about vampires and

werewolves, she had told Stokes, and they had laughed together.  It didn’t seem

so funny now. 

Where in the hell was Quentin? 

Julia ground out her cigarette, threw its corpse into the eager flames in the

fireplace, and nonchalantly lit another, and inhaled its charred smoke

greedily.  “Quentin,” she growled, “Quentin —”

She was afraid. 

Someone was in the room with her.  She could sense an icy presence, and two

eyes stared at her back. 

She whirled around. 

There was no one there. 

She exhaled a ring of blue smoke, and closed her eyes.  “Julia, you old fool,”

she whispered, then cried out as three steady knocks sounded at the door. 

“Quentin,” she breathed, and strode angrily towards the door.  She threw it

open, and snarled, “Honestly, this is the last time you keep me —”

The words died in her throat. 

Barnabas Collins stood before her, and his eyes glowed from dark sockets,

red-rimmed, haunting, haunted.  His face was like paper, and his bangs, tossed

carelessly across his forehead, were like smudges of ash.  His mouth was drawn

and lined.  And he was cold.  She could feel it from where she stood, as if icy

fingers reached from him to grasp at her.  Something is wrong, she thought

amidst the whirl and rush of every other thought clamoring in her brain.

Something is terribly, terribly wrong with him. 

“Julia,” Barnabas said.  His voice was soft and frayed, like autumn leaves,

like the winter wind.  “Oh, Julia.  It’s been so long —”

She reached out to touch him, just to brush her fingers against his face, and

he flinched away from her.  Hurt bloomed inside her chest, and she swallowed

rawly.  “Barnabas,” she said.  It was the only word she could think to say.

“Barnabas?”

He opened his mouth, and then closed it again, and the pain carved in his face

made her forget her own, as she had always done, as she would always do.  His

pain was monumental beside hers, forever dwarfing her own.  She didn’t resent

it; she wanted only to hold him. 

There was something on his face beside his pain, and for a moment she didn’t

recognize it.  Then her eyes widened, and she began to understand. 

“I’m so afraid,” he said.  “Oh Julia, I’m so very, very afraid.”

TO BE CONTINUED ...