The Umbral Wake Read online

  THE UMBRAL WAKE

  The continuation of

  A LATENT DARK

  ~

  By Martin Kee

  ISBN: 9780990826804

  Copyright © 2013 Martin Kee

  Cover art by Daniel Johnson

  Editing by Tirzah Price and Julie Daly

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For Kim Ray, who told the truth.

  Praise for other books

  by Martin Kee:

  A LATENT DARK

  “…a rollicking adventure full of darkness and intrigue, a heavy dose of religious zealotry, and a satisfying ending.” - Patricia Eddy, AuthorAlliance

  “The image-laden style has its own great advantage. It renders the atmosphere of the novel both dense and immediate. The richly layered language evokes a myriad of pictures. They do not fail to let the reader take part in the vision of the setting the author had on his mind.” -Simon Brenncke, simonbrenncke.wordpress.com

  BLOOM: (Or, the unwritten memoir of Tennyson Middlebrook)

  “Completely entrancing....” – Amazon Reviews

  “…this book is also a good example of how professional a self-published book can be.” - Cate Baum, SPR Awards

  “Bloom is a story that is one part sci-fi, one part fantasy, and seasoned with a good dash of horror. I’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys these genres, or to anyone who is looking for an interesting and unique read. It’s definitely one of the best books I’ve read in a while and I’m glad to have found it.” -Sara C. Snider, saracsnider.com

  “BLOOM is an interesting mix of the Gothic and fairy tale, a world where the fantastic collides to examine the horrors of what happens when the past has been all but forgotten, thereby dooming it to repeat.” –K.J.Pierce, IndieReader.com

  Prologue

  Lassimir

  JOHN HAD BEEN chasing a dead girl named Elise. He laid on his back in the soft loam and wet leaves, his breath ragged in his chest as he stared up through the branches at the blue sky. From here, it didn’t even look like a sky anymore, but a window, a giant crack in reality where the world ended and nothingness existed. The branches became cracks in a mirror—the sky, the eyes of a lunatic. And that blue scared the hell out of him now.

  The girl who led him here had died years ago. That didn’t mean she wasn’t real. John knew better.

  Then he had lost her again, calling her name as he stumbled like a blind man through the grasping vines and slick mud. There had been the sound of a splintering branch, deep pain, and now nothing. He could run no more. His body needed rest.

  And my mind as well.

  Behind him, off in the clearing, the rhythmic sawing and hammering of tools echoed through the trees, the sounds of a village rebuilding. Now some of the hammering had stopped. He knew why.

  Men were looking for him now. The men of Lassimir had been suspicious of him from the beginning—John couldn’t explain to the men and women of Lassimir that there were preachers far madder than him. Lassimir was scarcely a city that could afford to refuse help, even from outsiders. To be a priest was worthy of suspicion alone, but a madman was dangerous. John’s helpful days were long over.

  “Where did you go?” he yelled at the sky. Tears ran from his eyes, sliding down his temples. “You wanted me to follow, and here I am. Where did you go?”

  A knot in a branch moved, shifting and bouncing along until a sharp point emerged. The raven looked down at him, wrenching its neck to get a better view. It tsk-ed at him, an almost human sound, the sound of a mother scolding her toddler. It hopped along the branch, stopping every so often to tilt its head and gaze, each time moving closer.

  I must be dying, he thought. Why else would it venture so close?

  With the sunlight behind it, the raven was less a bird and more some bent old man observing him. Sunlit feathers glowed iridescent blue.

  Croak. Croak, croak, croak.

  It blinked, twisting its head around to study John as he lay there on the ground, his leg twisted and bent in an unnatural angle, hot stabs of agony shooting up his thigh. The leaves felt nice, a luxury. He could just melt away.

  “I’ve no food,” he said to the raven. “You’ll have to scavenge into town. And I’m not yet ready to be a meal.”

  Feathers ruffled on the bird’s neck as it peered from the branch. It croaked at him again. “Food.”

  “Shoo,” he said. “No food. Shoo.”

  “Shoo.”

  “I said shoo.”

  The raven blinked.

  John could hear the footsteps approaching now. The men were closer. James would be with them, coming to defend John against superstitious accusations. James the once-hermit understood him, but he and Sarah were John’s only allies here. It wasn’t enough.

  Any movement brought pain shooting up his leg. He cried out and remembered everything in sudden, searing clarity—the girl calling his name, the chase, the fall, his leg twisting the wrong way as he slipped. How long had he been here? How long before this scavenger swooped down and plucked out his eyeballs?

  “I do think I may be losing my mind,” he said to the raven. Then, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, “Tell me, can you keep a secret?”

  The raven blinked, waiting.

  “I knew someone once. She would have known what to do. She could see the dead, you see... She could talk to them, or so she thought. She could have shown me where to go, how to follow Elise into the woods, how to save her. Everyone assumed she was mad as well, maybe even me. But now she’s gone and here I am instead, my leg broken, my mind lost.”

  The raven blinked again, then croaked. “SKY-la.” The voice sounded so flawlessly human, John had to stop himself from searching for the ventriloquist. “SKY-la.”

  He felt his breath catch in his throat. “You… I know you.”

  How many years since he had seen this bird? How many years since it led him to safety as the city of Rhinewall turned inside out? He reached out to the raven, and froze. More shapes moved in the branches, hundreds of ravens in the trees, maybe thousands. They peered at him from hidden nests, their bushy throats puffed out as they sang their grating chorus, a choir of croaking, throaty voices. Smaller crows screeched through the leaves. Starlings, jackdaws, magpies, crows, and jays stared down from the heavens. It felt to John as if the entire forest were singing to him, screeching her name. “SKY-la. Sky-la. Sky-la. Sky-LA. SKY-la SKY-LA!”

  “Where is she?” he shouted into the commotion. “Where did she go? Why did she leave me here to go mad?” Footsteps were already approaching. His voice cracked. “Tell me! Please!”

  (“SKY-la!”)

  “Tell me where she is!” John grabbed a stick and threw it at one of the birds, missing. It tumbled into a bush.

  (“SKY-la!”)

  “Father Thomas!” That was James, the hermit come to save him yet again. “John!”

  (“SKY-LA! SKY-LA!”)

  Orrin looked up at the voice and took flight, but not alone. The trees themselves were taking to the air, every branch shedding feathers like falling leaves as the flock rose into the sky. John laughed aloud. Deep throaty calls filled the fading daylight, a million ragged shapes swirling into motion. Nests, feathers, claws, all twisted in madness as black shapes consumed the sky and clouds over the Lassimir Valley. He couldn’t even hear his own thoughts anymore. Nothing in the world existed but black feathers and the croaking of ravens, all yelling “SKY-la! SKY-la! SKY-la!”

  What had been footsteps could be the flapping of wings, or the beating of canvas sheets—all of it unreal now. H
e was sinking down through the grass, melting from reality. He couldn’t even be sure if the ravens were real anymore. Or were they just another part of losing one’s mind?

  (“SKY-la! SKY-la!”)

  He watched as the spots in his vision closed in and the azure window turned from blue to a fluttering, shifting black. In the end he thought it might have just been his voice alone, calling her name all along.

  Chapter 1

  Bollingbrook

  MILDRED WOULD MISS this apartment. The nighttime streets of Bollingbrook twinkled through her window, bringing with them that aching nostalgia from which she could not escape. This would have been her tenth anniversary with Buck, but once again she would be celebrating alone. A picture on the dresser showed a buxom brunette in a white gown. Her Buck stared back at her from the image, his squared jaw, smiling in that lopsided manner she’d teased him about. Now she missed his slanted smile. It hurt to look at.

  Beside her at the table sat a stack of bills, piled ten inches high. She’d heard them nailing the eviction notice to the door yesterday. If she left now, there would be no home to return to.

  And then what? Live on the streets? She scoffed at the idea even now. Mildred Kay McKenner did not live on other people’s terms, or their charity.

  With a fat hand she reached over and grabbed another slice of cake, pressing it into her mouth as crumbs fell along the sides. They spilled down her nightgown in a tiny avalanche, collecting in her voluminous cleavage (now much larger than in the wedding photo), and cascading to the floor. Mildred McKenner lived on her own terms.

  And do you die on them as well? She did not fear death. Death was the door that opened into the arms of Jesus. Death reunited you with your loved ones, a warm embrace while your body cooled.

  The idea had been coming to her regularly for a while, seeping in through the cracks in the walls while she slept. She thought at first she might be going crazy. It was still a strong possibility—those dreams of flying felt too real, her body too thin. She was her younger self in those dreams, light as a feather, drifting on the wind. And lately they had become more frequent.

  “I decide,” she said around another slice of cake.

  This was her annual celebratory cake, different from the usual cake, the “Welcome Home” cake she had made every day since he left for that Lassimir campaign. This one she had frosted white, a tribute to the last two years they should have spent together. This one read “Happy Ann” on the top—the “iversary” had already been consumed.

  Mildred was done waiting—she had waited at the train, waited down by the lower river docks, watched men disembark with their helmets under their arms. She watched the smiles, the hugs, the kisses of every reunion, wishing it was hers. Every time she returned to their apartment alone.

  Soon the troops stopped arriving as well, and she would simply stare at the river from the roads above as barges rolled by.

  Then the stipend had dried up—the money the Good Reverend was kind enough to pay all enlisting soldiers. She began to discover other ways to pay the rent. Those were dark days… and nights. Rough hands. Strong drinks. Dancing. Mildred woke up more than a few times in beds she didn’t recognize, with people she didn’t know. Every time she would grab her things, collect her money, and rush home.

  Home. This was her home now, the cake her roommate. Of course, the cake eventually made it harder to make money, and soon she gave up on that enterprise altogether.

  You never were much of an entrepreneur, the voices said again.

  She listened to them between mouthfuls. It was hard not to.

  Now it was just her and her roommate—and the needle. The needle had been her other favorite roommate, sending her to sleep, making her forget. But now she couldn’t even afford that anymore. The needle sat in the sink, unused for weeks.

  She squinted, looking at herself in the reflection of her window, trying to imagine herself as she had been three years ago, never knowing when Buck might walk through the door. Over her shoulder, Mildred could almost imagine he was there, smiling back at her.

  “I miss you Buck,” she said, a tear rolling down her cheek. “I’ve made a mess of it all.”

  We can be together, you know? Buck smiled.

  “Don’t lie to me,” she said. “You were always a terrible liar.”

  She giggled just the same, blinked. When she opened her eyes Buck was still there.

  “Is that really you, Buck?” she asked. “I mean… you… I waited.”

  Don’t turn around, Buck said. Just listen to me.

  Her brown eyes wide with wonder, Mildred simply nodded.

  I miss you terribly. It’s wonderful here, he said. It’s anything you want it to be. We’d have all the time in the world. It… just isn’t heaven without you.

  “Dead,” she said, her voice flat.

  He shrugged in his white suit. It doesn’t feel dead, Millie. It feels wonderful.

  A knock at the door made her jump and she almost turned around.

  Don’t! Buck shimmered. Don’t turn around. Once you turn around I’m gone.

  Mildred nodded, staring at her reflection in the darkened window. The suggestion of Buck’s presence still persisted. Young, radiant, and just out of frame, only visible if she stared straight ahead.

  “You wouldn’t want me anymore,” she said, her lip quivering. “You wouldn’t ever want me like this.” She brushed a hand absently at the crumbs.

  Here you can be anything you want, Millie, he said. You can be just as you were. I lost half my face in the campaign and look at me. I’m fine. Everything’s fine.

  She bit her lip. The door thudded again. She heard the jingle of keys.

  “I’m gonna lose our home,” she said. “They’re gonna come in that door and I’m gonna lose everything…”

  Don’t whine.

  Glistening lips snapped shut. “I’m sorry, Buck. You always did hate it when I talked like that.”

  Now isn’t the time to feel sorry for ourselves, Millie. We’ve got this one chance and that’s it. I can’t visit you after this.

  “Why not?” she felt her voice whining again and fought to keep it in check. “Why Buck?”

  Because they are coming to take you away. They are going to lock you away in a deep hole in the ground, deep below the Bollingbrook Sanitarium. And there they won’t ever let you see me again. They’ll drug you, and they’ll beat you, and they’ll shoot lightning into your brain and make you forget me.

  Mildred gasped. She could hear the key rattling into the lock, turning, catching. The man on the other side swore, tried a different key. Other voices argued with him. “It’s one of these!” he snapped.

  Millie, listen, this is your chance. You’ve screwed everything else up. This is your one chance for us to be together. Are you hearing me?

  She nodded, oily locks of hair flopping in the reflection.

  Then you know what to do. You’ve always wanted to fly.

  “I love you Buck!” she yelled as the door opened behind her. Men appeared in the doorway, the outlines of uniforms backlit by the hall light. One of them drew his gun and Mildred rushed at her reflection. There was impact, pain, and then, for a single moment, she was flying.

  *

  And oh, how she soared! As the sidewalk rushed up to greet her, Mildred closed her eyes, pretending she was an angel.

  And then there was pain. More shattering. Glass again.

  Then she was through it, born into a new skin and a new world as if nothing had happened at all.

  She stood in her nightgown, bare feet on sand as she looked through the window. A pane of gray green glass spread out before her, stretching to eternity in either direction. Beyond the window stood a crowd gathered around a pile of gore wearing a nightgown. Mildred realized it was her body they were looking at. From somewhere a woman screamed, but it sounded underwater and faint.

  Time lurched with every blink. A journalist’s camera flashed, painting the crowd’s shadows against the opposi
te wall, a mural of twisting shapes. And in those shadows Mildred saw faces staring back at her. She stepped away from the glass, a tiny squeak escaping her lips.

  Her foot caught on something and she looked down, squeaking again, her hand going to her bosom. Buck gazed up at her from the ground, his face a limp sock puppet shaped like Buck. She tapped it with her toe and the mop of blond curls waved in a breeze she could not feel.

  “Hello Millie,” said a male voice.

  Mildred spun around. It had all been a misunderstanding. Her real Buck was behind her, this mask on the ground just a… just a shed skin, a corporeal vestige… she had simply misunderstood. A man stood before her, encased in glass. It fit around his body like a coffin as light illuminated him from above. He wore the same white suit Buck had worn in her dreams. He smiled at her and tipped his white fedora.

  “Quite a fall,” he said and pursed his lips in a low whistle.

  She knew him, of course. That face had been in all the papers, the same man who afforded her a home, the same man who organized that Lassimir raid, the operation that was supposed to cure their city.

  “I know you,” she said.

  “Isn’t that nice,” the Reverend said from his glass box.

  “You took Buck from me.”

  The Reverend frowned a little. “I believe your Buck volunteered.”

  “Are you dead too?”

  He lit a cigarette and took a puff, staring at the butt in his fingers. “That’s an excellent question Mildred. I’ve been asking that myself for quite some time now.” He looked at the glass surrounding him. “I don’t see a fish tank around you, though. And judging by the mess you left on the sidewalk out there, I’m guessing you are most definitely not alive.”