The Mammoth Book of Halloween Stories Page 15

  The October Widow had slept for two solid days in the ashes and bones, the dirt and cinders, while the land and her body re-knitted themselves, made themselves anew, the debt called in with the blood of the young king.

  She shook her head. Her memories were loose, scrambled, rattling around in her head as though her skull were too big for her brain. Lying back in her cold charcoal bed, Mirabel closed her eyes, breathed deep, trying to center herself, to pull the core together.

  No. Not the young king. Not her consort, not her sacrifice.

  Someone else. A man, yes, but not Henry. A man, older, soft and lost, barely holding on to his life. A man weak and whimpering, clasping her as if she were a mother who’d failed to love him.

  A man who didn’t know what he’d done.

  Slowly she raised her hands, examined them. Brown-spotted, dry, fingers twigs, nails broken and brittle, joints swollen. She put them to her face and felt the damage there: skin corrugated, furrowed like a field before planting. The eyebrows bushy, the dips beneath the eyes so soft they felt like decayed fruit, and the chin—oh, the chin! Raised lumps … not moles, nothing so benign, but warts. With stiff sharp hairs growing from them.

  Slowly she rolled to one side, drew her legs toward her chest, then rolled onto hands and knees, as if to search for something in the cinders, as if to beg. When at last she found her feet, she dug them through the clinkers and soot, ignoring the sharp bits of broken, unconsumed bone, until she found the ground proper. Looked down at her naked body as she waited, saw first-hand the damage done by an inappropriate forfeit: stretch-marked skin, empty dugs for breasts, scrawny arms, a hollow pelvis, thighs destined never to meet, knees like knucklebones, calves no more than long ankles. The October Widow shuddered. She closed her eyes again, concentrated. Listened. Felt.

  She’d always known where to travel next for the pulse of the world directed her. But now … now it was weak, so weak she could barely feel it beneath the soles of her feet. She had to kneel once more, press her ear and her palms to the dirt, heedless of the gray-black that coated her flesh, to try and find it. To hear its voice more clearly.

  She straightened. There was a message, yes, but it wasn’t a location, not yet. The world wasn’t strong enough to know, for everywhere the slow decline that a lesser offering brought was beginning. That man, she thought, that stupid sad little man had dumped all his grieving, all his pain into the sacred fire, into her, into the earth. Left his mark behind and it would not be easily erased.

  But it could be done.

  She would do it.

  In that renewal would be her own, the little man’s stain washed away with a tide of young blood.

  BEFORE THE PARADE PASSES BY

  MARIE O’REGAN

  Marie O’Regan is a British Fantasy Award–nominated author and editor. Her first collection, Mirror Mere, was published in 2006 and followed a decade later by In Times of Want, while her short fiction has appeared in a number of genre magazines and anthologies, including Best British Horror and Great British Horror: Dark Satanic Mills.

  She is coeditor of the bestselling anthology Hellbound Hearts, The Mammoth Book of Body Horror, and A Carnivàle of Horror: Dark Tales from the Fairground (all with Paul Kane), and she also edited The Mammoth Book of Ghost Stories by Women and Phantoms.

  “When I first considered submitting a story to this anthology,” reveals the author, “I was a bit lost—I’d only just written a Halloween story and couldn’t come up with anything. Then I saw a picture of early Halloween ‘pumpkins,’ except they used turnips, and they were terrifying. You may have seen the same images cropping up on your own Twitter feed.

  “That seemed to cross with the idea of a haunted house, and with the image of kids having fun on Halloween. Then there was the idea of a parade, except now it wasn’t fun, and all the children were scared. After that the story seemed to gel quite quickly, and at a certain point Hannah seemed to take over.

  “And all the while I was writing, I had that old song ‘Before the Parade Passes By’ in my head—as if it were telling me it should be the story title. I think it was right.”

  HANNAH WATCHED AGHAST as she saw her daughter flying toward her across the playground while she stood waiting at the school gates. Her blonde hair was whipping around her head as if she were Medusa, its fine strands caught and toyed with by the wind that was seeping in through Hannah’s coat.

  Tilly’s cheeks were rosy, her eyes bright—she was delighted about something, that was plain. As Hannah waited, she started to take in details: Tilly was carrying something that looked quite heavy, wrapped in a creased and well-used Bag for Life. She was running leaning slightly to one side, balancing whatever it was in the bag, and the excitement on her face showed Hannah she couldn’t wait to show it to her mother.

  She smiled and leaned down, arms opening wide to scoop Tilly up and contain her excitement.

  “What have you got there?” Hannah asked as the mini-dynamo hurtled into her arms, knocking her backward.

  “It’s for Halloween!” the child shouted, and then there was a barrage of words that Hannah could barely make out, too many for such a small child to release in one breath.

  Hannah waited for her daughter to wind down. At this speed that wouldn’t take long at all, and then she could find out what this was all about. Sure enough, less than a minute later Tilly was staring at her expectantly, gasping for breath, her face blazing with excitement.

  “Well?” she asked. “Can I?”

  “Can you what?”

  Tilly pouted, her eyebrows drawing down into that familiar thundercloud. “I knew you weren’t listening!” she shouted. “You never listen!”

  “That’s enough, Tilly,” Hannah snapped. “I was trying to listen, but you were going too fast. Tell me again, but slower this time.”

  Tilly sighed, and started to repeat everything as Hannah took her hand and they began to walk home.

  By the time Hannah unlocked the front door and eased it open, following the whirlwind that was forever Tilly down the hall to the kitchen, she knew all about the school’s (and Tilly’s) plan for Halloween. There was going to be a Halloween Parade, and a party, and it was in a haunted house, and … the list went on.

  Tilly slammed the fridge door shut and barreled past her mother, clutching a juice and trying to force the straw into the carton while running.

  “Tilly, slow down!”

  Too late; she was gone. And if Hannah knew her daughter there’d be a purple stain on the tastefully neutral hall carpet outside her bedroom when she went upstairs to check on her later. She sighed. Tilly was lovely; she was kind, funny, interested in absolutely everything—but she was exhausting. Hannah had often been called “a force of nature” by people who admired her efficiency and drive, but she knew she had nothing on her daughter.

  “Shit!” She tripped over something and righted herself quickly, glancing over her shoulder as she did so, hoping she hadn’t been caught out swearing by Tilly. The stairs were empty, and Tilly started singing something tunelessly above her head, still caught up in the day’s events.

  Hannah grinned. So far, so good. Now what had she tripped over? Looking down, she saw the heavy-looking Bag for Life Tilly had been lugging as she left the school building, unwilling to let her mum help with carrying it or even putting it in the car. Hannah nudged it with a toe and stepped back when it appeared to shift, as if something inside were moving.

  The bag stared back at her, motionless, and after a few moments Hannah chided herself for her fears. She prodded it once more, just in case, and then bent down and eased the edges apart, revealing what was inside.

  It was just some black cloth, surely, nothing that could shift like that. Hannah shook the bag, and was relieved to hear something knock against the floor—so it wasn’t just cloth, then. She reached in, careful not to disturb anything, and pulled the material out. Examining the length of what looked like black velvet she was holding, she saw it was a cloak of some kind—
rich, black velvet, with black satin ribbons hanging from an embroidered fold-over collar.

  Hannah buried her face in its warmth and inhaled; it smelt of smoke, and something else she couldn’t identify—something unpleasant. She put it down, sniffing, wondering why she felt scared, suddenly. Something tickled at the back of her mind, some fragment of a memory, and she shivered.

  She remembered then that there was something else in the bag, and almost reluctantly she leaned forward and felt inside it again, rummaging around (surely it was bigger than she remembered?) until she found it. Something hard was lurking at the bottom of the bag: its surface was uneven, and appeared to have holes or some kind of shapes cut into it. She got her fingers around it and pulled, surprised by how heavy it was. Then she saw what it was, and sat down hard with a shriek.

  It was a face. Hannah stared at it, shocked. It was pale and wizened, with hollows for eyes and mouth that somehow showed pain and fear, and even tiny teeth. Who’d make such a thing?

  “You found it!”

  Hannah jumped visibly, then forced a smile and stood up, wiping her hands on her jeans as she did so. “What is it?”

  Tilly grinned. “It’s for Halloween. I have to make a mask, but that’s my cloak and Jack.”

  “Jack?”

  Tilly gestured at the pale head on the floor. “It’s a jack-o’-lantern. The teacher said to call it ‘Jack.’”

  Hannah stared down at the thing, wondering what to say. It was hideous. She tried for humor, and thought she almost pulled it off. “Ugly, isn’t it?” she said, her tone bright and cheery—or as near as she could manage.

  Tilly moved forward and picked it up, brushing her hand over the top as if dusting it, her face thoughtful. “I suppose so. I think he looks sad.”

  “He?”

  “Jack.” Tilly placed the head carefully on the kitchen table and pushed it forward, away from the edge. “See?”

  Hannah looked, wondering what her daughter saw. She didn’t think Jack looked sad; she thought he looked angry. And ready to get even. She could see now that he’d been fashioned from some kind of vegetable, but was off-white rather than the flashier orange of a pumpkin.

  “He’s made from turnip,” Tilly said, as if she’d heard what her mother was thinking.

  “I see,” Hannah answered, stepping forward and reaching out to touch the vile thing again. Its surface wasn’t quite smooth, there were ridges here and there, and even tiny holes that looked like pockmarks. And it smelled stale, almost rotten, although it looked dry enough.

  “His head’s hollow, see?” Tilly was in front of her mother now, and lifted the top of the turnip’s head to reveal the hollowed-out inside. The inner walls of the thing were blackened, presumably by candles, which probably accounted for the faint whiff of old smoke.

  “Why did the teacher give you this, Tilly?”

  Tilly replaced the lid and whirled round, smiling up at her mother. “So I can wear it in the Parade, silly. Before the party, there’s a parade. We go from the school, through the village, to the haunted house.”

  “Where’s the haunted house?” Hannah asked, frowning. “I’ve not heard of that since we’ve been here.”

  “Amy says it’s at the back of the church,” Tilly answered, absorbed now in tracing the contours of Jack’s “face” with her fingertips. She appeared to be trying to force its mouth to grin. “You know—up the hill from here.”

  And Hannah found she did know. They’d been here three months now, and settled in pretty well, she thought. But she could never forget the massive, decrepit old house at the top of the hill their cottage stood on, looming over them like some kind of threat. The shadow it cast on bright days was immense, and Hannah always felt like it was trying hard to reach them. To reach her.

  “They’re having a party in that?” she asked, aghast.

  Tilly nodded, oblivious to her mother’s anxiety, absorbed in tracing Jack’s features. “Fun, eh?”

  “I hope so,” Hannah muttered, going to the window and staring up at the broken-down house her daughter would be playing in in just a few short weeks. “Do the teachers need any help, do you think?”

  “Maybe. Want me to ask?”

  “Please.”

  Tilly nodded and, picking up the head, skipped over to the window, where she placed it reverently on the window-ledge. “There. He can get the sun, now.” She turned to her mother, grinned, and said, “Can I go play till dinner?”

  Hannah nodded dumbly, unable to tear her gaze away from Jack—who stared back at her, in turn, with blank eyes that seemed to see straight through her. It was going to be a long two weeks.

  The rest of the evening passed slowly. Tilly was quiet during dinner, and Hannah found herself getting terse in response—it didn’t make for a relaxed meal. After they’d eaten, Tilly excused herself and wandered into the living room, where she switched on the TV. Within moments, Hannah could hear the sounds of Tilly’s favorite Disney movie—her version of comfort food. She was upset, and it was Hannah’s fault: she’d been far more cross than the situation warranted—being quiet wasn’t being naughty. She went to the living room door and looked in at her daughter. Tilly was lying on the sofa with a blanket over her, and she was sucking her thumb, a sure sign she was upset.

  “Room for me?” she asked, and was rewarded with a smile as Tilly scrambled to one side of the sofa, taking her blanket with her. Hannah smiled back, and went to sit beside her, hauling Tilly and her blanket onto her lap. “Sorry, button,” she whispered into the child’s ear, “I guess I’m tired too.”

  Tilly didn’t answer, but as she nestled against her mother and buried her head in her shoulder to watch the movie, Hannah had her reply anyway. All was forgiven. Hannah kissed the top of her head and relaxed, let the movie wash over them both. Peace restored.

  It was dark. Hannah opened her eyes slowly, groaning at the ache in the back of her neck. The television had long ago gone into standby mode, and Tilly was a dead weight across her lap, snuffling gently as she breathed.

  Something creaked in the darkness, and Hannah froze in the act of trying to ease Tilly sideways onto the sofa so she could get up and carry her to bed.

  There it was again, a scraping sound off to the side of the living room. Was someone tapping at the window? The sound stopped, and Hannah waited for almost a minute before finishing her repositioning of Tilly and easing herself upward without disturbing the child. She looked down at her daughter, a bundle of blankets with a tuft of white-blonde hair poking out of it, and smiled. It didn’t matter how bad things got, at least she had Tilly.

  The scraping came again, and Hannah shifted position without even thinking, standing between her daughter and the direction she judged the sounds to be coming from. Tilly sighed behind her, and Hannah felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle as they stood proud.

  Slowly, Hannah moved toward the window, wishing she had some means of protecting herself if there should be an intruder. Don’t be stupid, she told herself, it’s probably Mrs. Evans’s bloody cat again. When she reached the window, she pulled the curtain open, fast, hoping to surprise whoever it was scraping on the glass. A shaky laugh escaped her when she realized the window had come open, or hadn’t been latched properly—the metal rod that held the frame shut when pushed down over a peg was loose, scraping against the window-ledge as the soft breeze pushed the window back and forth.

  She quickly pulled the window shut and pushed the latch firmly down. It wouldn’t move again tonight. Then she reached up to grab the curtains, ready to pull them closed for the night—only to stop when she noticed that the jack-o’-lantern had moved.

  It hadn’t moved far, only an inch or so, but now it seemed to be gazing out at the night beyond, its expression slightly darker than the crazed grin it had held initially. Now its mouth seemed to hang a little straighter, its eyes a little narrower, as it stared into the blackness outside.

  Hannah shivered, and pulled the curtains firmly together. It was too
late to be this stupid—she was just going to spook herself and if that happened, it was going to be a very long night, on her own in that big bedroom staring at the ceiling, alone with her thoughts and fears.

  “Stop it,” she told herself. “It’s just a lantern, for God’s sake.”

  As she turned away from the window and went to pick up her daughter so she could put her to bed, she tried not to listen to the little voice in her head whispering that God had very little to do with the horrible thing on the window-ledge.

  Hannah frowned at the kitchen clock—they were going to have to hurry now.

  “Tilly!” she called. “It’s eight o’clock, we’ll be late!”

  She was rewarded with the sound of a door slamming over her head, and feet clomping to the bathroom. Tilly was not happy, that much was clear, but Hannah wisely refrained from yelling up that she shouldn’t stamp her feet like that; now was not the time. Ten minutes later a bedraggled-looking Tilly appeared in the doorway, frowning up at her mother.

  “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

  Hannah blinked. “I did, at half-seven. Don’t you remember?”

  Tilly’s frown deepened, staring at her mother. “I didn’t hear you.”

  “You did, love,” Hannah said. “You spoke to me.”

  Big blue eyes stared up at Hannah in disbelief. “No, I never.”

  “It’s ‘no I didn’t,’ not ‘no I never,’” Hannah corrected absently, searching her daughter’s expression for signs of illness. Or perhaps she’d banged her head? She ruffled the child’s hair with affection, but couldn’t feel any bumps.

  “Whatever.”

  As her mother stared at this unexpectedly adult response from an eight-year-old, Tilly stomped forward and scraped a chair backward.

  Hannah clenched her teeth at the screech and chose to ignore the attitude for now. Anyone could have a bad morning—perhaps Tilly hadn’t slept well. Thoughts of her own inability to escape the feeling something was watching her from the shadows came back to her, and she shook her head. Enough. All they needed was a good breakfast.