Someone Else’s Horror Story

Rebecca Crunden

Copyright ©2023 Rebecca Crunden

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be duplicated in any form without the written permission of the author, except in cases of brief quotations for reviews.

Cover by Rachel Bowdler

Proofread by Isabelle Wagner

ASIN: B0BWWXRH6W

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and not intended by the author.

Jace Venable liked to think of himself as a reasonable man. He took a methodical approach to things, preferring to avoid drama and excitement. Crazy adventures happened to other people, and he was perfectly content living a quiet life on the periphery of the rest of the world’s dramatics. And so, for thirty-one years, that was exactly what Jace had done. He worked, he paid his bills, he kept his head down and largely avoided the world where he was able. Even his unplanned move to St Thomas Point, a little hamlet hidden out of the way of the motorway, tucked into the hills of the countryside, was uneventful and fanfare-free. No tourists came, no out-of-towners. It was a town built by locals and only locals ever bothered to learn its cracked roads and shabby shops.

The house his father left him in St Thomas Point was rundown, overgrown, and could generally be considered dilapidated by the time Jace arrived one spring afternoon when the flowers were in full bloom and the shade from the trees contrasted sharply with the sunshine that struck through the wispy clouds. It wasn’t Jace’s childhood home, rather the one his father had retired in, and he didn’t know much about the place other than that the plumbing was atrocious. Yet, like his father, he quickly grew attached to the rugged landscape and unpredictable weather even after only a few weeks of living there, most of which he spent sorting through his father’s collection of stuff. Stuff encompassed the bookshelves, which were stuffed to bursting with old newspapers, magazines, and travel guides; it also included the closets overflowing with knickknacks, most of which were broken; and cleaning out the musty-scented garage that was filled ground-to-ceiling with bits and bobs that had accumulated over the years. His father hadn’t been the worst of packrats, but he was no minimalist.

The work was tedious, but in a therapeutic sort of way. Organising and cleaning his father’s home felt like a strange, muted form of bonding with the old man’s ghost. Sometimes he thought he felt his father’s presence beside him, advising him on what could stay (not a lot), what should be donated (more than a third), and what needed to be tossed out (most of it).

The overflowing, weed-filled gardens had over a dozen species of edible flowers, berries, and vegetables that he hadn’t seen in a grocery store in years – unless it was a place frequented by hipsters and health-nuts – and he enjoyed several adventurous meals. On days when the weather held, hiking was scenic and he noted that the lake down the hill would make for good summer swimming. Most helpful to his desire to never return to an office job again, the barn was a few months’ work away from being rentable. His goal was to get enough money from tenants to supplement his inheritance so that he could avoid returning to the city altogether.

For weeks after the move, all Jace did was clear out the brambles and bushes, the hornets’ nests and beehives, the weeds and vines. The work was solitary but not lonely, quiet but not empty. Just how Jace liked it.

Until the night he heard the keys.

Old country homes with large fields and few buildings allowed sound to travel much further and clearer than anywhere in the city. Eerily so. Things that were actually far away sounded much closer in the country. And it was exactly for that reason that he didn’t react straight away with alarm when, late one evening, he heard the jingling of keys outside his kitchen window.

He listened carefully. Hearing someone pass by on the hiking trail in the backwoods wasn’t totally unusual, although rarely was it so late in the day. Neighbours often brought their dogs down the trail when they had energy to spare for a longer walk than a workday allowed. But no local would go walking their dog in the backwoods so late at night.

And then the jingle came again. This time closer to the barn.

Sighing audibly, Jace pulled on his boots, grabbed his phone, and stepped outside into the blustery wind, the twilight hour making it difficult to make out more than dark shapes cast against the ever-darkening sky.

Turning on his phone’s torch app, he held it out in front of him to light the way and walked towards the black shadow against the sky that was the barn.

Muck from the morning’s rainstorm gripped at his boots with every step he took across the yard and a chilly, forbidding wind bit into his bones. There was no car or bike nearby, so he fathomed a guess that it was a local and prayed silently that it wasn’t Angus Todd, the local drunk, who was often found on neighbours’ front lawns or back porches sleeping off a bender.

Mindful of the berry bushes that spilled onto the path leading up to the barn door, ready to prick the skin of anyone unlucky enough to get near their thorns, Jace yanked open the door and stepped into the barn without hesitation, ready to yell at Angus to go home.

But it wasn’t Angus.

Inside, a young man stood hunched over in the middle of the room, unrolling what looked like an old sleeping bag. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen. Judging by the pack on the ground beside the lantern, he’d been planning to stay the night, too.

The second thing that drew Jace’s notice was that the lantern, like the boy’s pack, was old. No doubt sourced from the very back of someone’s garage; someone who kept things from other generations. But there was something decidedly odd about seeing a teenager using such archaic items and Jace was immediately oddly charmed – rather than annoyed – by the runaway.

‘Hi,’ called Jace, deep voice sounding louder than normal in the silence of the night and causing the boy to whip around, eyes wide and fearful. ‘You know this isn’t an abandoned farm, right?’

Several seconds of silence passed before the intruder spoke.

‘I presumed as much,’ came the defeated reply. ‘I was praying I would get away with it, but I suppose that was overly optimistic.’ The kid’s voice was raspy and he coughed wretchedly after he spoke, his whole body racking with the effort of trying to drag air into his lungs. His accent, too, was hard to place. Northern, perhaps. But he didn’t speak like any teenager Jace had encountered. He sounded like he’d had an expensive – and decidedly not local – education. The sort that put as much emphasis on enunciation as pronunciation. ‘I am so sorry,’ he continued. ‘I’ll leave. Please don’t contact the authorities.’

Jace hesitated. The request wasn’t an unexpected one, and he knew of too many good reasons why someone would want to disappear to expend too much worry about the request. Besides, he’d never trust the police with a runaway. Kids needed shelter, not cuffs. If the boy’s family were abusive, calling the police was as good as signing him up for a beating.

‘What’s your name?’ he asked instead, leaning against the door frame but not moving any closer.

‘Gabriel,’ said the boy. The name fit the accent. ‘My friends call me “Gabe.”’

Jace’s mouth curved into a smile. ‘You alone, Gabe? Or is someone else hiding back there?’

‘I’m alone.’

Jace glanced over his shoulder, squinting up at the darkening sky. The forecast was for a bad storm and he knew he couldn’t in good conscience leave a teenager alone in a barn during a thunderstorm. Let alone kick him out onto the unsheltered roads, which weren’t well lit and had no signs.

‘Come on,’ he said, cocking his head towards the house. ‘You can stay in the guestroom for tonight.’

While he’d meant this offer to be comforting, Gabe immediately stepped back, poised to run, like a deer caught in an archer’s crosshairs, judging the likelihood of escape. ‘Why would you do that?’

‘Because I’m nice.’

Not waiting to see if Gabe followed, Jace turned and headed back across the grounds and into the house. The instant warmth kissed his skin upon entry, pushing away the threat of a chill, but he turned the ancient radiator on all the same. The boy looked like he could use it.

Jace had just kicked off his boots when Gabe appeared in the doorway. Under the bright light of the hallway’s lamp, the sight of him made Jace blink rapidly. He didn’t look real. There was no other way to describe it. Like someone out of time. Someone from a photograph, all possible imperfections erased. Not a trace of acne or a hair out of place. The effect was entirely disconcerting, and it took Jace a second to shake his reaction.

‘Come on,’ he repeated, waving Gabe after him. ‘If you’re worried I’m a serial killer, all the doors have their own lock and you can bolt them from the inside. I’m also honestly way too tired to be a decent serial killer.’

Gabe stepped tentatively over the threshold and placed his sleeping bag, lantern, and backpack on the ground. His clothing, like his affects, were peculiar. His buttoned coat would have better suited a gentleman in the 19th century and was likely some new hipster trend Jace hadn’t kept up with, but the clothes didn’t look newly bought or purposefully distressed. And when Gabe took his hat off, even his hair cut looked out of date.

Confusion mounting, Jace buried his questions in the back of his mind and opted instead to give Gabe a quick tour of the house. He gestured to the rooms as they passed, showing him the bathroom and study, until he came to the guestroom and flicked the light on. He had only just cleaned out the room the week before and it still smelled like wood polish and carpet soap.

‘You can stay in here,’ he said. ‘Bathroom’s through there. I’ll go get you a towel. Want to toss your stuff in the washing machine and I’ll find you some pyjamas or something?’

Gabe eyed him, still visibly uncertain. ‘You sure you’re not a killer?’

Jace chuckled. ‘Make me watch reality television for an hour and then get back to me.’

The joke scored a laugh and both relaxed a fraction.

‘I never understood reality television,’ said Gabe. ‘Adults debasing themselves for money.’

‘Greed, I suppose.’

‘I suppose.’

Jace eyed him curiously for another few seconds, still thrown by how articulate the young boy sounded, before clapping his hands together, trying to go over a mental checklist of what all a runaway might need. ‘Let me get you that towel. You hungry?’

Gabe bowed his head belatedly.

‘Cool,’ said Jace. ‘I was going to make pasta. You’re not allergic to anything, are you?’

‘Just greed and money.’

Chuckling again at that, Jace left the room and went to the linen closet located halfway down the hallway. He took out clean sheets, pillowcases, and blankets, and then stepped into his room and grabbed a pair of pyjama trousers and a long sleeve shirt.

When he returned to the guestroom, Gabe had started the shower and steam was billowing out of the bathroom. He’d left his clothes in a pile on the floor. Jace picked the clothes up without thinking and carried them away. Yet his questions multiplied as he began to load the washing machine: the shirt was stiff with dried blood. Gabe’s coat had hidden it from view, but the stain was too big to be from a scrape or cut in the forest.

Raising it up to the light only revealed another horrible discovery: on the back of the shirt was a bloody handprint. Smeared diagonally, like the hand had slid down the length of Gabe’s torso.

Heart hammering, Jace shoved everything into the machine before going to wash his hands. Profusely. Five times each, and under the fingernails. Jace did not do blood.

Was it from an accident? An incident? Was someone after Gabe – or had he done something himself? Some of the options were less sickening than others and Jace tried to tell himself that he would get his answers once Gabe was out of the shower. But he could not quiet his mind entirely and his heartrate did not slow.

Once he had all but scrubbed his hands raw, he went to the kitchen, far from hungry now but in want of a distraction from the looming question mark about the boy’s flight from whatever place he’d been before arriving at Jace’s farm. Cooking provided a decent distraction and at least gave him something to do with his hands.

As he preferred his pasta dishes baked, preparation always took a little longer than a normal meal of spaghetti bolognese, but he saw no reason to rush things. Once the pasta was boiled to a soft, chewable state, he poured out the water, tipped it into a large dish, and added the faux-meat sauce on top. (Jace had not eaten meat since he was a child and watched a harrowing documentary on factory farming.) Covering the sauce and noodles with a layer of cheddar cheese, he placed the lid on top and pushed the dish into the oven. The bread he’d baked earlier in the day was sitting on the counter and he added a thick layer of garlic butter to the inside, wrapped it in foil, and stuck it into the oven under the pasta dish. By this point he’d managed to kill about half an hour, but he could still hear the shower running and there was no sign of Gabe.

He just hoped Gabe wasn’t quietly tending to unseen cuts and injuries linked to the bloody handprint.

When the runaway finally wandered in ten minutes later, Jace was sitting at the table twiddling his thumbs and reminding himself that prying led nowhere good. Nor would a teenager offer answers if they felt caged in.

Instead, Jace pushed a large glass of orange juice across the table as Gabe took the empty seat. The kid looked like he needed a lifetime supply of Vitamin C. It was even more obvious now that he had scrubbed the dirt and grime from his skin, brushed his hair back from his face, and taken off his bulky coat. Gabe was as frail as he was pale, and both extremes made Jace wonder where he had been living and what had happened to him. His skin didn’t look like it had seen sun in … ever.

‘You treat all your guests this well?’ Gabe eyed the contents of the glass before taking a tentative sip. ‘This is good. Thank you.’

Jace shrugged. ‘I’d want someone to give me clean clothes and a hot meal if I ran away from home. It’s the least I can do.’

Gabe offered a small, tentative smile at this.

There was no good way to ask if he’d witnessed a murder – or was a murderer himself – and Jace didn’t want to scare him off, so he gestured to the oven instead. ‘It’s almost ready. Not quite up to Italian standards, but it should be palatable.’

‘It smells amazing.’

‘Do you want to watch a movie or something during dinner? We can sit at the table, but honestly it makes me feel old.’

Gabe grinned. ‘That sounds good.’

‘If there’s anyone you need to call, you can use this.’ Jace took his phone out of his pocket and slid it across the table.

Sadness shuttered Gabe’s smile and he shook his head. ‘No, there’s no one.’

‘Not one single person? A friend, even.’

Gabe drained the glass and set it down carefully before replying. ‘My parents are dead.’

Words like buckshot, and Jace opened and closed his mouth soundlessly, rendered speechless. He’d braced himself for bad news, but this was another level. An image of a faceless murderer killing an entire family before going after Gabe, grabbing him by the shirt with bloodstained hands, flashed through Jace’s mind. He felt sick.

‘I ran,’ Gabe continued, a foggy look in his eyes. Like the world’s saddest life-sized doll. ‘I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since it happened. I found them and … I ran.’

Jace felt very cold all of a sudden. ‘Is that why there was blood on your shirt?’

A nod. And then, ‘My dad killed my mother and then killed himself.’

Nothing could have prepared Jace for that.

Gabe drew his thin legs onto the seat and into his chest, as if curling into himself would form some kind of protective force field.

‘You can tell me,’ said Jace softly.

‘He was always so unhappy.’ Gabe’s voice began to shake and his eyes darted around fearfully, checking the corners of the ceiling and the shadows cast by the furniture. ‘But I never saw this one coming. I should have.’

‘Listen to me.’ Jace leaned in and caught his eye, trying to pack as much conviction into his expression as possible. ‘You are not responsible for your father’s crimes. You are not responsible for your family’s deaths. None of this is your fault.’

Gabe’s eyes brimmed with tears. ‘Thank you.’

Jace offered the phone one last time. ‘Are you sure there’s no one you can call?’ He hated pushing the matter, but he had a feeling there was some kind of alert out for the missing kid of a murdered family.

Hand shaking, Gabe finally took the phone and dialled a number slowly, worrying his lower lip as he waited for the other person to pick up. ‘Yes, it’s me,’ he said when they answered.

Jace deflated in relief. Whomever it was, they sounded worried. Worried was good. It meant the kid had a place to go. Someone left who cared.

‘A farm,’ Gabe said to a question. ‘Some guy named Jace.’ His eyes flicked to Jace and he held out the phone seconds later. ‘My uncle wants to talk to you. Is that okay?’

Nodding immediately, Jace took the phone and put it to his ear. ‘This is Jace Venable.’

‘Hello, Jace,’ said a deep voice. One that was as oddly articulate as Gabe’s. ‘My name is Samuel. I’m Gabriel’s uncle.’

Jace nodded reassuringly to Gabe before stepping out into the hallway and lowering his voice. ‘I found him in my barn. He said his parents are dead.’

‘They are.’ Samuel’s voice came across clipped, clearly only just containing his own feelings on the matter. ‘It’s a very long, very sad story. Gabe found them this morning and took off.’

‘Jesus.’

‘Is he all right? Is he injured?’

‘Seems to be okay, yeah. Bit skinny.’

‘Where is your house?’

‘St Thomas Point.’

The town was named after a church that overlooked the cliffs on the bay. The tide at St Thomas Point was legendary for its brutality. Ships were even barred from nearing certain areas of the bay because of the number of historic wrecks. But as legendary as it was, few had ever been to the town, let alone heard of it. And Jace did not expect Samuel – going by his accent – to have any familiarity with local hamlets. Yet to his surprise, Samuel said, ‘Oh, that’s not far. I live in Hazelton. But I doubt the roads will be driveable tonight. Would you be able to bring him home tomorrow? I would come to you, but I don’t drive. I’ll reimburse you, of course.’

Swallowing the sixty new questions that had popped into his head, Jace simply said, ‘Sure.’ He had been to Hazelton once or twice; it wasn’t far. Leaning back against the wall, he tucked his free arm under his armpit. ‘I’ll bring him down first thing.’

‘That would be brilliant, thank you.’

‘Do you want to talk to him again?’

‘Yes, thank you.’

Jace returned to the kitchen and handed Gabe the phone. While he finished chatting to Samuel about where he’d been and promising to brush his teeth, Jace took the food out of the oven and doled out hearty portions onto two plates.

Soon they were in the sitting room watching an old mob movie. In a manner that fit Gabe’s entire demeanour, he’d asked if Jace could put on a film in black and white. The request charmed Jace, who at that point would have walked to the city for ice cream if the traumatised kid requested it.

Halfway through the movie, Gabe fell asleep. Not wanting to wake him, Jace put a blanket over his frail form and went to his bedroom.

Alone, the silence disrupted only by Gabe’s light snoring from the other room, Jace opened his laptop and searched local news reports for a recent murder.

An hour of searching every paper he could think of, from local to national, yielded no results. Not one single report. Had it just happened? Did he need to call it in? Surely Samuel or someone else would have contacted the authorities by that point. But a nagging question as to why no one had arrived to check on Gabe or interview him tugged at the back of Jace’s unquiet mind.

The questions going around and around his head kept him from sleeping the rest of the night and instead he listened to Gabe’s snores and hoped that the boy’s uncle would have more answers in the morning.

When the sun finally crawled into the skies, bringing with it birdsong and the distant call of neighbouring roosters, and setting in motion a dramatic colour show that swallowed the night, Jace threw back his blankets and went to make breakfast. He wanted to return Gabe to Samuel as fast as possible and put the whole strange night behind him, but even feeling that made his stomach knot with guilt.

Gabe appeared in the kitchen a little after seven and they agreed to leave for Hazelton after breakfast. And so, as the day began to warm, their bellies fully, Jace and Gabe got into his small car and drove through the winding backroads to Hazelton.

The entire time, Gabe fidgeted, tugging at the seatbelt or biting his lip, or clasping and unclasping his hands.

At a fork in the road, one way leading deeper into the countryside, the other leading towards the city, Jace hesitated. ‘Are you sure I can’t take you to the police? Or to see a doctor?’

‘No,’ said Gabe, although his voice was pitched low. ‘Samuel will take care of everything.’

Jace’s stomach twisted. ‘If you don’t want to go, you don’t have to go.’

‘I want to go.’ This time Gabe sounded firmer. ‘I … I have a lot on my mind is all.’

‘That’s fair.’

Not feeling entirely at ease with this declaration, Jace acquiesced to the boy’s decision and turned the car in the opposite direction to the city.

Several miles down the road, at Gabe’s direction, Jace steered off the main road onto an unmarked property. The entrance was surrounded by grass and bushes and there was no indication that it functioned as a way to someone’s home. Despite this, a short drive with scenery on both sides brought them to an enormous building, well out of time. The kind with sprawling gardens full of non-native species placed in deliberate positions so as to instigate pointed conversation for elite dinner guests. He didn’t know what the family did for a living, but as they approached the house, he couldn’t help but wonder. It was the sort of place that would suit a sultan or a tsar, not someone without family money. Generations of wealth.

‘Your uncle lives here?’

‘Everyone’s always lived here.’

Not wanting to broach the subject of the boy’s father, Jace let the conversation rest there.

He parked in front of the stone steps that led up to the front door and the pair got out.

The air around the house smelled peculiar. Not the mix of flowers that should have dominated the aroma of the place. It smelled like an attic, one filled with cobwebs and ancient paper and old soaps, and the combination of the austere nature of the house, the story that lurked inside its wall, and the odd scent of the place sent a creeping feeling across Jace’s flesh. He decided on the spot to leave sooner, rather than later.

The door even had an aged, rather cliché bronze knocker; a curved talon of some mythological creature whose wings pressed points into Jace’s hand when he knocked.

Jace was so distracted by the bronze knocker and the overpowering smells wafting up his nose that he almost didn’t register the door opening, nor the man who answered.

‘Hello.’

With that single word, the man stole the breath from Jace’s lungs and left his insides feeling like blocks of shuddering ice. There was something about him that was immediately disconcerting. Perhaps it was feeling like he’d walked into someone else’s horror story ever since learning what had happened to Gabe and his family, but Jace couldn’t help thinking there was something innately off about the man standing before him. Like he was made of stone. He had dark brown hair, styled so perfectly he might as well have been made of plastic; his eyes were like jade, but the colour was too bright, and his skin was too perfect. He was also ridiculously handsome. The kind of handsome that belonged in a drawing, not on a man he was meeting to deal with a murder-suicide and a runaway.

‘Are you Jace Venable?’

‘Samuel?’ he guessed. Somehow his voice didn’t tremble, but when he held out his hand, it shook slightly.

‘Yes.’ Samuel grasped his hand. His skin felt cold, unnaturally so. He turned to Gabe next. ‘You ran away.’

‘Sorry.’

Jace’s brow furrowed and he glanced between them. ‘Did you call the police?’

‘It’s all handled,’ said Samuel. ‘My brother was long a troubled man.’

Gabe shook his head at this and walked inside, disappearing up the stairs.

Samuel sighed before redirecting his attention to Jace. ‘Would you like to come in?’

‘Of course, yeah,’ said Jace, following him inside awkwardly. He wished he wasn’t so curious about the strange sequence of events, but he would be lying if he denied it. There was something missing and he wanted to know what it was.

The inside of the house was as ornate and austere as the outside. Everything looked centuries old yet was in pristine condition. Where Jace battled dust and mould almost weekly, Samuel’s home looked like it had never even seen a germ or housed clutter of any kind.

Samuel brought Jace to a large library and gestured for him to sit. All the furniture looked like it cost more than Jace’s house and barn combined, and he sat down gingerly, afraid to damage anything.

‘Thank you for bringing him home.’

‘Of course,’ said Jace. ‘He’s a sweet kid.’

‘He is. So, what do you do?’ Samuel appraised him curiously. ‘You’re not on social media.’

‘You looked?’

‘My nephew was at your house. Of course I looked.’

Jace nodded at this, his disquiet ebbing somewhat. ‘I don’t do anything really,’ he admitted. ‘Not right now anyhow. I worked in an office back in the city, but my father died and left me the farm and some money, so I thought I’d take some time off. Get away from things.’

‘Do you miss the city?’

‘I never did much like the city.’

Samuel appeared thoughtful at this. Before he could reply, the door opened and Gabe reappeared. He lingered in the doorway, a strange expression on his face. He looked like he wanted to say something but didn’t know how. Stranger still, Jace couldn’t figure out if it was Samuel who made Gabe uncomfortable or him being in the house.

‘Hi, Gabe,’ said Jace cautiously. ‘You doing okay?’

‘I’ll be fine.’ Gabe stuffed his hands into his pockets. ‘It’s going to take some getting used to. Everything’s about to change.’

After a beat, Jace nodded. ‘Right.’

‘Would you like tea, Jace?’ Samuel’s curiously perfect smile was both inviting and disquieting.

If he was being honest, Jace wanted to leave, but he also wanted to ascertain that Gabe was actually okay, which he wasn’t remotely sure of yet.

‘Sure,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll stay for tea.’

A door at the other end of the room suddenly opened, as if someone had been waiting for an invitation, and a woman came in with a large tea tray. The kettle and cups were a matching set, blue and white pottery that looked – like so much of the house – from another century. The designs showed an ocean with a boat sailing through the waves. The ink had faded slightly with age, but the set was evidently well cared for.

As the woman poured the tea, the ticking coming from the clock on the wall filled the silence like an ominous visitor. She didn’t introduce herself, nor did she remain in the room. She left instantly, not meeting Jace’s eyes, and closed the door behind her.

‘She’s not the most social of hosts,’ said Samuel a few seconds later.

‘No worries.’

‘I assure you she’s nicer than she seems.’

Not certain why that mattered, Jace inclined his head. ‘To be honest I’ve never been in a house with a cook. The whole thing’s a bit strange to me is all. So it goes both ways.’

‘Oh, she won’t let us into the kitchen. Very protective of her space. I’ve been smacked with enough ladles to know to stay out of her way. But she’s an amazing cook.’ Samuel smiled at this, clearly fond of the woman.

Gabe, who had yet to move from the doorway, was watching Jace and Samuel with narrowed eyes, but his expression wasn’t open enough for Jace to discern what was bothering him. It seemed like something more than grief, though. Of that much he was certain.

‘So,’ said Jace, looking back to Samuel, ‘how old is this house?’

‘Old,’ said Samuel. ‘It’s been in the family for generations.’

‘We’ve always lived here,’ said Gabe quietly.

Jace frowned. ‘You said you ran away from home.’

‘I did.’

‘So … your father lived here?’

Gabe nodded.

Jace’s eyes darted from Gabe to Samuel.

‘Albert killed himself in the barn,’ said Samuel. ‘He killed my sister in their bedroom. Gabe found them.’

Jace’s mouth opened to reply, but he couldn’t think of a single thing to say. It didn’t seem to add up to the story he’d learned the night before, but perhaps it did. Perhaps he was remembering everything wrong.

He tried not to automatically start inspecting the woodgrain of the table and floor for traces of blood or wonder if the strange fragrance in the air was to cover up the smell of copper.

Samuel trailed his finger over the edge of the table, tracing the engravings in the wood. Odd as he was, there was something deeply captivating about him. Like his presence consumed the world around him, always making him the focal point. ‘Do you want to know the family story?’

Jace stared at him. ‘There’s a story?’

‘It’s like a fairy tale,’ said Samuel quietly. ‘The old kind of fairy tale.’

Jace’s stomach tightened with unease. ‘I never liked those.’

‘No,’ agreed Samuel. ‘But if you want to understand Albert and Matilda’s deaths, you have to understand the story.’

‘Okay …’

‘The legend goes back to my grandfather’s grandfather. The man who bought this land. How he came up with the money is anyone’s guess. Our ancestors were not rich. He was born a chimney sweep. And then one day’—Samuel snapped his fingers—‘suddenly he had money, a house, a beautiful wife, and two children. This house became the grandest in the country for a time. People came from all over to attend their parties. Gerry wrote books and his editor picked them up. It was years before anyone realised that from the day Gerry got famous, he never once left the house.’

‘Maybe he was agoraphobic.’

‘He wasn’t,’ said Gabe.

‘No,’ agreed Samuel. ‘He wanted to leave. Tried to. But he couldn’t. For years everyone came to him. He paid them, so they had to, and he had the money to do it, too. But it made him angry. Resentful. What good is a life of immortal wealth if you can’t leave your own house? But what could he do?’ Samuel made a dark noise. ‘It was his eldest daughter who figured out how to leave. One day Gerry came down to breakfast and found his wife, his youngest daughter and the daughters’ tutor at the table. The eldest lured him there and locked him in the broom closet. And the house let her leave.’

Jace was having trouble keeping the derision from slipping out, but something about the pair’s solemnity made the conversation more eerie than funny. After the pause dragged on, he prompted, ‘Did she die away from the house?’

‘No.’ Samuel’s voice had taken on a faraway quality. ‘No, she wrote them letters for years. She aged normally until the end of her days. Normal days. But she never returned to the house. She was afraid she’d be trapped again. Which, given how furious Matthew – the tutor – was, was probably true.’

Jace’s stomach twisted further. ‘What does this have to do with what happened yesterday?’

Samuel held out his hand as if such a question was silly. ‘Albert and Matilda couldn’t leave. They wanted to. More than anything. But they didn’t have the heart to trap someone else.’ This time, Samuel exchanged a look with Gabe. ‘When the only options for those born into this house are a cage, a death or a trade, it’s not so much of a choice in the end, then. Horrible as it is.’

‘It’s the rule,’ said Gabe in that quavering, haunting voice of his. ‘One we have no say in. The only way out without dying is to bring someone in. We can leave for a day – we’ve learned that much over the years – but if we delay it, we die.’

Jace’s blood drummed painfully in his ears, making it difficult to hear anything but his own fear. Pushing back from the table, he stood on legs that did not feel sturdy. ‘I think I should probably be going. You guys have been through a lot and—’

‘I’m afraid that’s not possible,’ said Samuel.

‘I’m really afraid that it is.’

‘You can’t leave, Jace,’ said Gabe. The sweet, innocent boy with the doll-like face now looked jaded, almost menacing. Deep, dark circles bruised his face; circles that hadn’t been there the night before. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘You should go,’ said Samuel, looking at Gabe. ‘You’re almost out of time.’

Bowing his head, Gabe turned and left the room. Jace followed him, ignoring Samuel’s calls to wait.

He caught up with Gabe in the front hall, grasping his arm just before he stepped outside. ‘I don’t know what you guys are playing at, but it’s not okay.’

Gabe pulled out of Jace’s grip. ‘I’m sorry, Jace. I really did like you.’

‘What—’

But Jace couldn’t grab his arm this time. Couldn’t even reach out of the doorway. It was as if something had formed in front of him, like trying to push the wrong sides of a magnet together. And he knew instantly that he couldn’t leave. Worse, his clothes were no longer his own. He hadn’t changed, hadn’t blacked out. But now he was wearing a suit like Samuel’s, one that did not belong in this century.

Jace stared at Gabe in horror. ‘What is this?’

‘A trade.’ The confession left Gabe in a breathless whisper, edged around a sob, and he turned away quickly. ‘I’m sorry. I can’t stay here any longer.’

Jace tried to step outside, to follow him, but his feet wouldn’t lift. Something was keeping them sealed to the ground.

‘What is this?’ he roared after Gabe, shivers scuttling like spiders over his skin.

Gabe did not turn back.

‘Our curse,’ said Samuel, stepping up beside Jace. He leaned against the door, watching Gabe get smaller and smaller until the treeline swallowed him. ‘Don’t be too hard on the kid. He’s been trying to leave for hundreds of years. His parents’ deaths finally pushed him over the edge. They never had a life. He wants one.’

‘How old are you?’

Samuel cracked a laugh. ‘Old.’

Jace felt sick. ‘Do you not age?’

‘We do. But we can control how old we look.’

Before Jace could ask, Samuel transformed from a handsome young man to an old, white-haired man; seconds later he looked younger than Gabe.

‘So Gabe isn’t a teenager,’ Jace concluded when Samuel was back to looking like a thirty-year-old.

‘No. But to me he’ll always be my little nephew. Usually he looks about twenty, but he aged himself down before he went to find you.’

‘Because strangers are more likely to help children than adults?’

‘Something like that.’

Jace cursed under his breath.

‘I’m impressed he even found your farm. It’s not just anyone you can convince to come back here.’ At the look of dismay on Jace’s face, Samuel added, ‘Give it a century and you’ll want to trade places with someone, too.’

‘I would never trick someone like this.’ Jace tried to raise his hand, his foot. But he couldn’t go past the entryway.

‘Once your intention isn’t to leave, you can go near the property line,’ said Samuel. ‘It’s not so bad. And if you mean to return and don’t run late, you can spend a day elsewhere.’

‘Fuck you.’

Samuel cocked his head to the side, a smile curving his mouth like a crescent moon. ‘You’re going to make a nice change around here.’ He laughed darkly to himself.

‘Who’s the cook?’

‘Beth’s stuck here like the rest of us. My father traded places with her. She was a real estate agent once.’

‘Really great of her to warn me.’

‘She can’t,’ said Samuel. ‘None of us can. Can’t go against the curse.’

‘Which is what, exactly?’

‘A happy family who never, ever leaves.’ Samuel stared at the distant trees where all sign of Gabe had vanished. ‘Sometimes I even feel bad for old Gerry. I mean, we still don’t know why the curse exists. Maybe the dead conjured it. Maybe the living. Maybe he went to a crossroads and made a deal. Who knows? We all want company, don’t we? We all want wealth. Now we have that forever. It’s like living in a very nice snow globe. And we can have anything we want delivered. Gerry’s novels still earn millions and pay for everything. I tried writing once and sent the book off. It became a best seller overnight. But I can’t leave. I can’t do anything else. So I haven’t written again.’

Jace tried once more to raise his arms, resigned to what was happening. This time, he could without trouble. He sighed. ‘Why me?’

‘Chance, I suppose. Gabe wouldn’t have asked someone to take his place if they had a family.’ A breeze picked up, tousling Samuel’s too-perfect hair.

When it had been Jace’s choice, he didn’t mind stepping back from the world and hiding away on his own land. The freedom was in knowing that he could leave, even if he didn’t want to most of the time. But being forced to stay, locked on a property he didn’t know, with a family that wasn’t his?

‘This isn’t fair,’ he whispered.

‘I know,’ said Samuel. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘But you won’t let me go.’

‘I can’t. None of us can. The only way you can leave is if you bring someone here to take your place.’

‘I don’t deserve to be dragged into this.’

‘Neither did we. I didn’t ask to be born into this family. I haven’t stopped hating my parents since the day I found out. My mother left first. She traded places with Gene. You’ll meet him later. He spends most of his time in the garden. My father traded with Beth. They left me behind and told me that I was welcome to join them if I traded places with someone. But I never have. I can’t.’

The finality in Samuel’s tone made Jace’s gut plummet, if possible, even further.

As he stared at the threshold he couldn’t cross, at the world now cut off from him, his mind drifted to all the horror movies he’d ever seen, all the books he’d read growing up filled with monsters and curses and ghosts. Monsters were easier to understand in fiction, when you didn’t have to live with them and the traumas they inflicted. Having to live with them was another story altogether. One he’d never thought he’d experience – one he’d never wanted to experience.

‘Do you regret it?’ Samuel’s voice was uncertain. ‘Helping Gabe?’

Jace shot him a sidelong glare. ‘No. But I also want to punch both of you in the face.’

Samuel nodded. ‘I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t wish this fate on anyone. But I don’t begrudge him leaving, either. Perhaps that makes me a terrible person. I wouldn’t know. Sometimes I wonder if I’m not a ghost myself.’

Jace nudged Samuel’s foot with his boot. ‘You feel real to me.’

Oddly, this brought a smile to Samuel’s lips. ‘You’ll hate me more for this, I’m certain, but I’m glad if he had to pick anyone, it was someone like you.’

‘Someone like me?’

‘Someone kind.’ Samuel’s jade eyes grew even more melancholy. ‘It would be a terrible thing to exist alongside someone cruel.’

Jace didn’t know what to say to that. He didn’t know how to process any of the last day. He knew that soon he would be furious, scared, frustrated, listless. He knew that the strangeness was only just beginning. But in that moment, he felt an odd surge of compassion for the man beside him who had never left his house. Who had never had the chance. Samuel and Gabe had been living this nightmare for centuries and Jace had only come in at the end of Gabe’s part of the story – and inadvertently started his own.

‘Well,’ he muttered. ‘Perhaps there was a way out of this old Gerry didn’t think of.’

It wasn’t a promise or a guarantee, nor did Jace have the first idea of where to begin – and it was likely that if none of them had found anything in centuries, there was nothing to find. Yet the remark made Samuel’s ageless face light up with hope and Jace didn’t regret saying it.

‘Kind,’ Samuel affirmed again, smiling at him like Jace was something of a marvel. ‘How unexpected.’

finis