CH 5
Upstairs, the wolf man was nowhere to be found.
After emerging from the air vent and ascending to ground floor, the child wandered cautiously down the carpeted hallways, peeking through the cracks of several doors that had been left ajar. So many were bedrooms that she wondered whether the estate was a hotel. There was a leisure room, furnished with petite white tea tables and iron-spiral chairs on the spacious terrace. A crystal grand piano stood in the center, nestled among crackling bouquets of withered flowers and encircled by lavish sofas. The instrument's intricate hammers and strings, gilded in gold, seem to have cheated the passage of time. Curiously, the most memorably peculiar room was not the piano chamber, but the one neighboring it. The child peered inside the musty room and saw nothing but a single white marble coffin. The minimalist casket sat, lonesome, amid wilted brown bouquets in the center of the chamber as if it were a parody of the piano.
The ambiguous hues of twilight overcast the mansion in orange and blue. The child's hand tightened on the dagger, and she resolved to finish the job before nightfall.
Maybe after that, she could have a chance at a better future for herself.
However, the mansion was tortuous and winding. Hunger began to gnaw insistently at her stomach. The primitive biological drive overshadowed her most distinctly human thoughts and senses, exterminating everything superfluous to the most foundational need to eat. Dizzily, the child realized that she still clutched the two scraps of paper that guided her out of the underground prison. She uncurled her fingers and stared at them. The little girl pursed her lips, held them up hesitantly, then put them in her mouth and swallowed, grimacing in disgust at the salty taste of sweat and grime.
"RUMIA—?"
A masculine drawl resonated up the corridor. The child froze mid-step, heart thrashing madly in her chest. The blood drained from her face as a dark figure lumbered into view at the far end of the hall. Scrambling the other way in panic, the child nearly dropped her weapon as she bolted down the hall like a hare. The madman tailed her with crazed glee.
"I'VE BEEN SO WORRIED ABOUT YOU, RUMIA!"
What do I do? What do I do?! What—I don't—
The wolf man's intrusion was so sudden that the child's wits and resolve deserted her in an instant. Tripping over her own feet, she took a turn and nearly skidded into the wall. Regaining her balance, she made a blind, mad dash from room to connecting room, flinging open and flying through random doors. Eventually, she found herself rattling a doorknob that would not budge. Her blood ran cold.
Locked?!
She shook it in vain again and kicked the unrelenting wood in frustration. The child's short-lived escapade ended inside the large, windowless storage chamber stacked with dusty boxes and unused furniture. The door she came through flew open and the wolf man thundered in, close behind her. They locked eyes, and the ecstatic shine in the madman's eyes transformed into a frightening fury. Looking over her shoulder, the child watched helplessly as his face morphed from joy to a terrible vehemence.
"It's YOU. YOU'RE NOT MY DAUGHTER!" bellowed the demented beast as violet veins bulged grotesquely on his sweaty forehead. "TELL ME WHERE SHE IS."
The little girl actually did know where his daughter was now. Her mind raced and she pounded desperately at the locked door, screaming dreadfully on the top of her lungs and begging for help from some higher existence as the wolf man cornered her.
A blast of frigid air blew past her face and she fell silent. Something has changed.
"TELL ME WHERE SHE IS. TELL ME!" the wolf man lunged for the child's throat when she did not answer him again. She peered over her shoulder and saw him, leaping forward with bloodshot eyes and outstretched fingers, gaze riveted on his trapped prey. The little girl observed him with a calm acceptance of her fate, a rueful acknowledgement of the path on which she has walked and the destination at which she has arrived.
But the path has not quite ended yet. Just past the pouncing hunter, the child saw a bleached, ghostly figure flicker weakly in the doorway.
"Hee hee. Hi there."
"You've found Rumia, haven't you?"
"We know."
"We've been looking for a long time too."
"She also tried to help us when we were alive, but only you have gotten this far."
"Thank you. We were trapped until now."
The child gasped, seeing for the first time the owners of the phantom voices.
"Jesus, stop gawking."
"Go! Hurry!"
"It's been awhile since we were able to leave our bodies. We're here to help!"
"That dagger freed us all! Please. Now let us return the favor."
Click.
Mystified, the little girl whipped her head around and rattled the doorknob again. At the last second, she threw the door open and dived through, slamming it shut in the madman's face.
Click.
The overlapping voices chattered in hushed relief as the door was locked once more. The child winced as the wolf man's vicious roars resounded on the other side. He battered at the barrier so ferociously that she feared the door may not hold.
No, but I won't be afraid.
The atmosphere became cold and crisp. Numerous translucent, white silhouettes flitted down the from ceiling and walls, surrounding the little girl in an icy vortex of apparitions. She gripped the mysterious dagger with one hand and held out the other, feeling the soft, airy caresses of the pallid phantoms as they brushed past her, murmuring indistinctly. They were friends, and she did not need to fear the wolf man as she had done before. These whispering spirits were the long line of victims before her, a cursed lineage that could finally end with the child. She had done something that freed them from their bodies, and now they want to help her. Rumia herself wanted to help her.
"What must I do now?" she consulted the languorous apparitions.
"Rumia said she could save you."
"Go to her. Now!"
"No, b-but I thought—" sputtered the child, "I thought she wanted me to kill—"
"No, she needs you now!"
"She apologizes, but circumstances have changed. Go to her, please!"
"That's why we are here. To tell you—"
"We are all depending on you."
The little girl fumed, "Changed? What does she mean—changed?" Where was Rumia's phantom now? What was she even doing?
The ghosts offered no discernible answer. Instead, the lazy white silhouettes gathered together in a foggy cluster and began migrating away. The door across the room creaked open, and they streaked through in a soft puff of wind.
"What? Wait!" the child cried, stumbling after the ethereal bunch. She too streaked from room to room, snaking through hallways and down stairs and landings in blind pursuit. An ear-jarring explosion of wooden splinters reverberated from the floor above, but she barely noticed. The little girl found herself descending lower and lower beneath the mansion, until she came face to face with the cellar dungeon where the pipe opening was.
Her pupils dilated as her eyes slowly adjusted to the sinister gloom. She squinted at an object lying on the floor, realizing it was the metal grill that had covered the air vent. The child narrowed her eyes and scanned the surroundings for the whispering spirits.
"Come! Come!" Overlapping murmurs echoed from the air vent.
"Rumia is here."
"Why can't she get down here?!" the child hurled the dagger angrily and it landed somewhere with a metallic clink!
"Because she," hissed a voice, "freed us instead of herself!"
"She's still trapped in her own body!"
The ghostly chattering faded up the pipe, and the last of the sleepy white phantoms flitted out of sight.
The little girl sensed that there was still much she did not know here. Seeing the lack of better options, she took a deep, tired breath and stepped towards the pipe once more, slowly feeling her way into the entrance and shimmying upwards. The air was silent and still. Sighing, the child grabbed at a groove above her head wiggled mindlessly forward. She wondered whether, in an exact hour from now, she would still be alive.
Somehow, the pipe walls began to slide past her as if she were a train cartridge clattering backwards through a tunnel. The little girl watched in soundless astonishment before realizing that something had a vice-like grip on her left ankle, pulling her down. She realized that she was in danger and began kicking vigorously, fumbling for holds in the pipe walls and struggling to cling on. Despite these efforts, her small body tumbled out of the pipe entrance, but never hit the ground. The wolf man dangled her at eye level by the ankle, grinning with sinister satisfaction at his prized game.
"THERE YOU ARE!"
Swinging helplessly in the air, the child's tears rolled up her forehead and soaked her short, straw hair. Waves of shock and nausea washed over her as her vision blurred. Her fingers burned from gripping and scraping the sides of the pipe, and she went limp in the air. At that moment, the child ceased struggling. Chuckling delightedly, the wolf man dropped her on the floor, and the child squeaked involuntarily in pain. Her fingers brushed the floor weakly, searching for the dagger. However, it lay several feet beyond reach and she wished with substantial regret that she had not tossed it there.
The wolf man seized her neck and rattled her failing body. Eyes staring dazedly at nothing at all, the little girl did not move or react. Quaking in frustration, the madman shook her up and down, trying to rattle an answer out of her.
"WHERE'S MY DAUGHTER? WHERE IS SHE?"
The child wondered passively where the babbling apparitions were.
Seeing the futility of his interrogation efforts, the wolf man finally stopped. He tossed her to the ground like a broken doll and howled in fervent rage. With blood flowing freely from her bruised nose, the little girl gurgled brokenly, turning her head shakily to look at the pipes. The vent was open and the wolf man had released her, but she was too weak to move.
"She's up the pipe," rasped the child. "Up…"
The wolf man whipped around and squatted before her. "Pipe?" he demanded, "WHAT PIPE?!"
Unbeknownst to the seething madman, the silver dagger seemed to pick itself up and twirl languidly one or twice in midair. The child blinked in disbelief as it defied the natural laws. However, as she looked closely, she saw the faint, flickering outline of a young ghost child holding the weapon.
"Hold on," it mouthed, and dissolved into thin air. The levitating dagger soared across the floor and vanished soundlessly up the air vent. The little girl gasped and rolled on her back, confused and uninformed, but praying that the whispering spirits were still actively planning to save her. The situation was dire, and she needed to stay alive as long as possible and talk to the wolf man.
"She took her own life," the little girl wheezed, "because of you."
Scoffing in disbelief, the wolf man stood and rammed his fist against the wall, sending a shower of dust and grime into the child's face.
"I am neither gullible or a fool. MY DAUGHTER LOVED ME. SHE WAS HAPPY HERE, AND I WAS THE WHOLE WORLD TO HER." He lunged and wrapped his trembling hands around the little girl's neck. "DON'T YOU LIE TO MEABOUT MY OWN DAUGHTER!" His fingers tightened maliciously.
Writhing weakly in his hands, the child realized she had just effectively sealed her fate with wrongly chosen words. Fatigue latched onto her like suckling leeches, gradually draining her soul of vitality. Black spots swam shakily across her vision, and the child ruefully humored herself: she was, as a matter of fact, not going to be alive an exact hour from now.
"Thank you."
A slight, chilly breeze pirouetted idly in the air.
"Thank you."
The pressure on the little girl's neck lifted considerably and she slumped prone onto the stony ground, unconscious.
"Thank you."
The wolf man dropped to his knees in awe.
"RUMIA—!" he gasped breathlessly. "MY DAUGHTER—!"
"Father."
Hot, joyful tears gushed from the madman's eyes. "RUMIA! MY LOVELY CHILD—"
"I hate you."
The wolf man gurgled incoherently, completely dumbfounded.
"I HATE YOU, FATHER!"
Panting breathlessly in the foggy gloom, the child found herself traipsing through dark oblivion, chasing a feeble, silvery flicker in the distance. As she neared, she saw that it was the silhouette of a young figure in a black dress, gazing soundlessly into the distance with its back towards the her. The child huffed with sweaty effort, blundering through the fog—arriving closer, closer, and closer—until she was able to lay her hand on the figure's shoulder.
It turned its head—and sunken bloody sockets stared back. The little girl screamed soundlessly and tumbled backwards.
Short, straw-colored hair grew in wasted tufts out of the figure's skinless dome, hanging down over uneven chunks of blackening fatty flesh stubbornly glued to the blanched cheekbones. The left nose was completely decayed past the bridge and into the eye socket while its respective, deformed nostril leaked a sickly lime fluid that ran down into the mouth. Parts of its lips remained, with brittle skin dangling precariously at the tattered edges and flapping softly with each rattling breath. A gaping void yawned in the figure's chest, lethargically discharging rivulets of viscous maroon and other bodily fluids into a sticky puddle at its feet.
"Thank you," a childish voice resonated from the upright corpse, though it did not move its lips. "I am Rumia. Thank you for trying on my behalf."
"B-b-but—" stammered the child, "Why—"
"That dagger isolated me from the other spirits so that they weren't able to reach me. However, thanks to you they did, and I am no longer alone."
"W-who—?"
"Friend, do you want to make a deal?"
See no other option, the child nodded cautiously.
"Father is going kill you. However, if you allow me to merge with your corporeal body, my supernatural essence will give you the power to save your own life—and kill him. I will blend into you so that even you won't notice my presence. All I ask is that you kill him."
"Are you proposing revenge for my life?"
"I'm proposing revenge for your life, one where you will be continuously reborn and acquire paranormal powers no human could naturally have. You will be a supernatural phenomenon owned by nobody but yourself."
The little girl gazed thoughtfully into the dark, already aware of her answer before Rumia finished the proposal. Gathering her resolve, she thrust out a hand.
"I accept!"
The upright corpse stared back at her without expression. Suddenly, it cracked a crooked smile and leapt at the child's body.
"I DID NOT SAY THAT WAS A BLESSING."