"Me three," said John.
Everyone else chimed in with a number, even Gilley. "Me six," he said, pushing himself off the ground to sit up and look around.
And that was when it hit me: There were seven of us in the group. "Where"s Gopher?"
Heath looked at me and blinked. "Isn"t he here?"
"No." I pointed the flashlight all around the hall, looking for our producer, and finally called out to him, "Gopher!" My voice echoed through the large hall, down into distant corridors, but no reply came back to us.
"Isn"t that his pack?" Meg asked, pointing to his signature silver backpack.
I hurried over to it, and discovered it was indeed his, and next to it was his camera. I looked back to Heath as an unsettling foreboding sank deep into my bones. "He"d never leave his backpack," I said.
"Maybe he"s off taking a whiz," said John.
"Gopher!" I shouted. Again, my voice echoed out of the room down into the corridors, but no sign or sound of our producer could be seen or heard.
"Where could he have gone?" Gilley whimpered, looking especially frightened.
"We need to find him," I said, getting up and wiping the wet hair out of my eyes.
"We also need to see about drying out our clothes and maybe starting a fire to get warm," Heath advised.
It was then that I noticed both Meg and Kim standing with their arms wrapped tightly about themselves, shivering with cold.
"Right," I agreed, rummaging around in my messenger bag for the lighter and the small notebook I never went without. Tossing both to John, I said, "You stay here with Gilley, Meg, and Kim. See if you can find some wood for a fire, and use the notebook paper for kindling. I think you should try and get one started by the door, "cause I don"t trust that hearth"s chimney."
We left the main group and Heath and I worked our way deeper into the castle. The storm was still raging outside, and the walls reverberated with the sound of thunder, but no flashes of lightning made their way inside. The only illumination was our flashlights. "Gopher!" I called as we moved into the first main corridor off the front hall.
Somewhere in the distance a loud creaking sound made Heath and me both pause to listen. "Where"d that come from?" Heath whispered.
"I think from that hallway down there," I whispered back, motioning to a separate corridor that opened up all the way at the end of the one we were in.
"Gopher?" Heath shouted.
His voice echoed along the walls.
And then ...
... something something growled back. growled back.
"What was was that?" that?" I whispered. The sound we"d heard was deep and guttural and not at all human. I whispered. The sound we"d heard was deep and guttural and not at all human.
Heath didn"t answer me. Instead, he pulled out a magnetic grenade and popped open the cap. "Whatever it was," he said, bending low to my ear, "I don"t think it"s friendly."
I pulled a grenade out too and uncorked the top. Tipping out the spike, I held it high, like a knife, ready to stab it into anyone-or anything-that approached. After a moment I asked Heath, "Should we continue down that way?"
"Do we have much of a choice?"
Mentally I cursed Gopher for wandering off. "Okay. Let"s keep going but quietly. No calling out to Gopher until we know what we"re dealing with."
Heath and I proceeded cautiously down the corridor. I could still hear the storm, and the dripping of water and some sort of scuttling noise I attributed to something like a mouse or a rat, but nothing else disturbed the darkness.
As we walked forward, I began to get a terrible feeling. It was like I was thirteen again, watching a scary movie well past my bedtime. I couldn"t seem to shake the creepy shiver seeping along my spine. I leaned over and in Heath"s ear whispered, "I really really don"t like this!" don"t like this!"
He paused.
I paused.
And for several heartbeats neither of us moved even to breathe. The longer we stood there, waiting, the more unsettled I became. I was about to tell Heath that maybe we should double back-and quick-when a wave of something terrifying wafted through the ether and washed over me with tremendous power. I sank to my knees and closed my eyes as every nightmarish monster I"d ever seen on TV or conjured up in my worst dreams flooded through my mind and wiped away all reason.
It was as if a force that knew everything that had ever frightened me as a child or an adult had kept a record of it, and was filling my mind with all those images at once, while clearing away any ability I might have to form a rational thought. It was an onslaught of horror, and I was powerless to stop it.
The effect crippled me both mentally and physically, and I couldn"t seem to form a thought of my own. I was aware only of danger, terror, and panic until I felt something crash into my shoulder, and it knocked me to the ground. That just increased my terror and I screamed, and screamed, and screamed.
I wanted desperately to get away, and so I scuttled and crawled along the floor, trembling from head to toe and barely able to hold on to my flashlight. I must have left the spike behind because very slowly I became aware of things other than the parade of terrifying images surging through my mind-like my empty right hand.
And then, with unexpected abruptness, the onslaught vanished, and I was left gasping and shaking all over but once again in my right mind. "M. J.!" someone whispered urgently to me. "Sugar, please, look at me!"
With effort I lifted my chin and realized Gilley was squatting down in front of me, attempting to get me to my feet.
His sweatshirt sagged on him, and I could see in the dim light how the dozens of magnets he"d secured to the inside of the shirt were bulging right through the fabric. "Gilley!" I croaked, clutching his arms and getting up shakily.
"What happened to you?" he asked, his face filled with concern. "And where"s Heath?"
I blinked and for the first time I was able to take in my surroundings. John, Meg, and Kim were hovering close, each of them holding several spikes and eyeing the hallway nervously. "I-I don"t know," I said, trying to spot Heath"s face among those gathered around me. "He was next to me, and then ..." My voice trailed off as I tried to remember what had actually happened.
"And then what, honey?" Gilley asked.
I focused on his face again, still struggling to form linear thoughts. "Something attacked us." And then, my lower lip began to tremble, and the shivering increased, and a tear or two leaked out of my eyes.
Gilley and John exchanged a look and John said, "Let"s get her back to the front hall. I can get that fire started, and I"ve got some water and a protein bar in my pack. Maybe that"ll help calm her."
I realized I was still trembling and my hands were shaking so hard that the light from my flashlight was bouncing all over the floor. I took a deep breath and attempted to steady the ray, and that was when I saw two spikes illuminated several yards down the corridor.
I pointed to the spikes, and Gilley and John both looked to the spot. "Those yours?" Gilley asked.
I shook my head. "Only one. The other was Heath"s."
"Heath!" John shouted.
We all waited breathlessly, but no reply came.
Tears were now streaming steadily down my cheeks as I began to consider that whatever terrifying force had produced such a crippling and mind-altering effect on me had likely done the same to Heath, and without his spike, he was completely at its mercy.
The five of us waited another few heartbeats, shining our beams down the long hallway, waiting for Heath to appear or call out, but nothing disturbed the steady rays of our lights or the eerie silence in the hallway.
"Come on," Gilley said reluctantly. "Let"s get back and take care of M. J. Then we"ll talk about what to do next."
The guys helped me to our makeshift camp in the large hall. John was able to get a good fire going from several pieces of wood he"d pulled from a nearby door, and we all huddled eagerly around it as much for the warmth as for the small comfort it brought to this awful place.
"So what happened?" Gilley asked me again when I"d calmed down a bit.
I shook my head, closing my eyes against the flood of memories. "I don"t even know how to describe it," I whispered.
"Try," he urged. I opened my eyes again and saw him staring at me with concern. I knew that I"d better get it together and explain what I could in order to help us find Heath and Gopher.
Taking a deep breath, I told them all about what had happened, and the last moment I could remember seeing Heath next to me before being attacked by that terrible force.
"So you think something actually physically physically attacked you?" Kim asked. attacked you?" Kim asked.
"Yes. Yes, I do. I think some insanely powerful spook was able to call up my worst nightmares and parade them through my mind as if they were reality. The magnitude of that onslaught was like nothing nothing I"ve ever experienced. Not even the demon we encountered in San Francisco or the Witch of Queen"s Close could even touch the power of this ... this ... I"ve ever experienced. Not even the demon we encountered in San Francisco or the Witch of Queen"s Close could even touch the power of this ... this ... thing thing."
"It must be the phantom everyone"s been talking about," Gil said, his eyes large and afraid.
"Is that what knocked you over?" John asked.
I thought back. "No. I think that might have been Heath."
Gilley leaned toward me. "So he was next to you right up until then?"
I nodded. "Yeah, Gil. I think he was."
"Can you remember anything else after that?" he pressed.
I sighed, feeling suddenly exhausted. "Not much, buddy. I mean, I remember falling to my knees, then being knocked over by Heath, then crawling away down the hall where you guys found me, and that"s when reality clicked in again."
"What do you think made the attack stop?" Meg asked.
My eyes moved to Gilley"s sweatshirt. "That," I said, pointing to his chest.
Gil looked down. "Me?"
"Your sweatshirt."
"But why didn"t your spikes work?" John said. "I mean, if Gilley"s sweatshirt was able to stop the phantom from attacking you, then why didn"t your spikes stop it in the first place?"
I leaned over and felt Gil"s shirt. It was packed with magnets. "Have you seen inside his shirt? He"s probably got two dozen magnets glued to the inside."
"Three dozen," Gilley corrected.
I sat back and regarded the group. "I think there might have been just enough magnetic energy radiating off Gilley to thwart even the phantom."
I could see the small bit of relief in Gilley"s eyes. I knew he was terrified of being in the castle with a powerful phantom on the loose, especially since he"d seen the state I"d been in just twenty minutes before. But knowing he was wearing enough magnetic power to keep the phantom away probably lent him a bit of comfort.
"So what do we do now?" Kim asked softly.
I sighed again, because a tiny idea had come into my mind that was incredibly risky, but perhaps the only choice we had. The problem was that I was so tired, both physically and mentally, that I wasn"t sure I could pull it off, and I certainly knew I"d have to make myself a target again in order to try it.
Gilley seemed to notice I had a plan in mind, because he said, "M. J.? What"re you thinking?"
I didn"t look at him when I spoke, because I didn"t want to see the fear in his eyes. "I think I need to try and find a ghost within this castle to communicate with. I might be able to find a spirit who knows where Heath and Gopher are and maybe even to help me figure out what this phantom thing is and how to deal with it. And to do that, I need to be well away from all of you, because while I"m gone, you"ve got to keep your spikes out in the open and huddle around Gilley."
We argued for at least ten minutes about my idea. No one in the group thought it smart, wise, or something I should even consider. In the end, we settled on a compromise: I would head into one of the corridors off the main hall and attempt to find a ghost to communicate with, and John would accompany me carrying a fistful of capped grenades. At the first sign of trouble, he"d uncork them and let the magnets rip. The part about John accompanying me was nonnegotiable, or so he and Gilley both told me. I argued that he could become a liability if the phantom found us, and I worried that he wouldn"t have time to uncap the spikes. "I"ll get to them," he a.s.sured me, his face hard and stubbornly set.
In that moment I gained a new level of respect for him, because I knew that deep down he didn"t want to go anywhere but off that stinking rock. "Fine," I relented. "But don"t uncap anything unless either I give the signal or I go down."
"Got it."
Before we left the group again, Gilley pulled me aside out of earshot of the others. "What happens if you don"t come back?"
I looked out the door at the storm. Much of the worst of it was over, but it continued to rain very hard outside. "Give us an hour, Gil, then get Meg and Kim out of this castle, and back down those stairs. Try to find shelter anywhere you can along the sh.o.r.e until the storm blows itself out and you guys can cross the causeway again."
Gilley eyed his watch. "We missed our window for crossing."
"You"ll have another shot later tonight."
"Not if the storm surge keeps up."
"Then use your cell to call for help."
Gilley pulled out his cell phone and showed me the display. "It"s been drained," he said. "All of our phones are dead, in fact."
My heart started to hammer as I anxiously pulled my cell out and tried in vain to switch it on. Was nothing nothing going to turn out right on this hunt? With a sigh I put it away and focused on Gilley again. "Do your best to stay safe, buddy. We"ll be back as soon as we can." going to turn out right on this hunt? With a sigh I put it away and focused on Gilley again. "Do your best to stay safe, buddy. We"ll be back as soon as we can."
I turned to go then, but he caught my arm and whispered, "Please come back, okay?"
I gave him a brief hug, promised to do my level best, then motioned for John to follow me.
Chapter 4.
As Heath and I had traveled the central corridor off from the main hall, I thought it might be wise for John and me to try to avoid the phantom by taking one of the lesser pathways all the way to the right, where I guessed the kitchen or cooking hall might have been. Luck finally gave us a break, because after only going a short way, we came out into a large open room with an enormous hearth and black tar stains against the brick. "What kind of a room was this?" John asked.
"It served as the castle"s kitchen," I told him, relieved to have found it.
"Should we try another corridor?"
I shook my head. "Nope. This is exactly where I want to try to connect with a spook." When he looked at me curiously, I explained, "Lots of large old castles like this are home to the ghost of a kitchen maid or cook. I"m hoping to find a nice, gentle female spirit to communicate with. Someone who would have looked after the castle and its occupants."