Dawns Everlastin' (former title: Dusk Before Dawn) Book 2 (22 page)

Alby began to
cry.

"Shh!" His hand trembling,
Kahl gripped the knob and slowly opened the door. Beyond was inky
darkness.

"Alby, there's stairs here,
remember?"

"Don't wanna go," he
whimpered.

"Quit being such a baby. If
we go this way, we can sneak up on Aunt Laura. Wouldn't that be
fun?"

"Yeah."

"Then come on."

Gulping, Alby held tightly
to his brother's hand, and followed closely at his heels. He didn't
like the dark. He didn't like the stale smell in the stairwell,
either. But he did like the idea of scaring the wits out of his
aunt.

Four cautious steps down,
the door at the top closed. Terror gripped both boys. Then another
sound, a soft swish, filled the narrow passageway.

Both boys released a cry.
Then something lifted Alby and painfully gripped Kahl's arm, and
led them away into the darkness, away from the stone stairs. Kahl's
quick mind soon determined that they were being hauled between the
walls. While Alby wept, he inwardly struggled to clamp down on his
fears. Lachlan had told them never to fear the unknown, but he
would feel better if Kevin were with them. It was upon him to
protect Alby.

The coldness of the fingers
pulling him along could be felt through his pajamas. The grip hurt,
and he was sure it was meant to.

Another swish was heard. He
was harshly jerked forward then shoved. A cry escaped him when he
hit the floor. Another shriller cry was released when he realized
that he'd been left in one of the bedrooms, and that the intruder
had continued on in the passage with Alby. Jumping to his feet, he
pounded his fists on a wall, and screamed Alby's name over and
over.

Alby was beyond crying. Fear
paralyzed him, paralyzed his vocal cords. His teeth remained
clenched against the jarring stride of his abductor.

Another wall opened. The
three-year-old felt himself being abruptly lowered. His abductor
hissed, a sound that conjured up monstrous images in the boy's
mind. He was roughly thrust away, struck the floor, and rolled into
depthless blackness.

On the third floor, in a
closet in one of the bedrooms, Kevin's fists frantically drummed at
the locked door.

* * *

It seemed to take forever
for the milk to warm. Rubbing her arms to ward off the chill in the
kitchen, Laura impatiently paced in front of the stove. Her temples
throbbed with pain. Her eyes burned. Queasiness churned in her
stomach.

She wondered if she would
ever feel warm again, safe again, normal again. Come morning, she
and the boys were leaving this house. She was determined to put
this nightmare behind her and get on with her life. Once she was
settled back into her previous mundane existence, she would then
try to sort through everything that had happened in this house. She
would sort through the imaginary and the real, neatly categorize it
all in her mind then relegate it all to a lesser plane of
importance in her memory.

With a start, she remembered
the milk. A groan escaped her at the sight of the liquid bubbling
over the brim of the pan.

"Damn," she muttered,
testily turning off the gas burner. Tears filled her throat, adding
to her frustration. "To hell with—"

Her muscles tensed at a
faint sound. Keening her ears, she remained perfectly still for
several seconds.

Nothing.

She was releasing a sigh
when another sound, of scurrying, alarmed her. Her gaze riveted on
a closed door to the left of the stove. She went to it, hesitating
for several seconds before she could bring herself to turn the
knob. The door opened inward. The soft light in the kitchen
permitted her to see but two stone steps. The rest of the stairwell
was pitch dark.

"Boys?" she
croaked.

She gulped and lifted a hand
to the base of her throat. A cold stirring draft swept against her
skin. She shivered.

"Boys?"

A soft swooshing sound could
be heard moving in the close darkness somewhere above
her.

A frown of impatience
creased her brow. Alby wouldn't attempt to frighten her on his own.
It could only mean that one or two of his brothers had also gotten
up.

"Come down here," she said
firmly.

No response.

Muttering beneath her
breath, she returned to the kitchen, lit the wide candle centered
on the table, and returned to the foot of the steps. The flickering
light awarded her partial visibility of the lower half of the
passageway, but it also cast long eerie shadows on the rough rock
walls.

"Alby? Kahl? Kevin?" She
paused in hopes one of them would respond. "I'm warning you. I'm in
no mood for games. Come down here this instant!"

Silence.

Determinedly, she started up
the steps, the stones beneath her bare feet shockingly cold. She
held a hand in front of the flames to prevent the draft from
extinguishing her light source, but it also lessened its
luminance.

"Alby, you promised to stay
in—"

An odor teased her smelling
sense. She inhaled deeply. Recognition birthed sheer terror in the
very core of her.

Gas!

"Alby!" she wailed, then a
scream ripped from her throat when a dark mass unfolded and rose
from the steps a short distance ahead, looming like a giant bat,
its massive wings lowering toward her. Before she could release
another scream, pain exploded in her left shoulder. The candle fell
from her grasp as she pitched backward. She hit the stairs, tumbled
in a complete turn then crumpled in a heap on the
landing.

Agony radiated through every
atom of her being. Blinding lights danced in front of her eyes,
preventing her from seeing the advance of her attacker. A thud
struck her at the base of her skull. Unconsciousness made a fierce
bid to claim her, but she fought to remain alert.

Coldness washed across her
prone body. Dimly, she realized she was being dragged across the
floor, then hoisted up, and cast off. As if in slow motion, she
felt herself landing amid an undulating sea of burning
ice.

Darkness closed in. The
blinding lights faded.

Boys,
she silently wept, then slipped into blessed
oblivion.

The cloaked figure returned
to the stove and switched on all the top burners, and the oven,
then fled past the threshold into the night, barely avoiding
Laura's head with the heels of the thickly-soled black
boots.

On the third floor, Kevin
curled up in the corner, hacking coughs weakening him.

Below, Kahl used his pocket
knife to unlock the bedroom door. His eyes burning, disoriented by
the fumes eddying around him, he blindly made his way to the
staircase. He wept within. He didn't know where his brothers were,
or his aunt. Or Roan. Or the ghosts. He had to find help. His aunt
had gone to the kitchen.

Stumbling through the
darkness on the first floor, he made his way to the kitchen. Tears
stung his eyes. He could barely breathe. Something smelled
horrible, but he couldn't place it. He groped for the door,
desperate to reach the outside. Ignoring the hiss of the gas
pouring from the vents on the stove, he staggered down the three
steps to the snow-covered ground.

And tripped over his aunt's
sprawled motionless form.

C
hapter 8

Laura didn't want to keep
rising through the layers of pain but something urgent was forcing
her to accept consciousness.

From far, far away, she
could hear someone calling her name. She became aware of her body
jerking, although she was sure she was not moving of her own
volition.

"Aunt Laura!" Kahl wept, his
tugs on her arm growing weaker. "Laura, I'm scared! Wake
up!"

Scared. One of the boys is
scared.

Her lids fluttered
open.

White.
Painful...cold...whiteness.

Lowering his head to the
small of her back, Kahl bitterly wept. Its sound penetrated the
dullness in her head and awakened primal instincts. Despite the
pain and her stiffness, she lifted a hand and gently squeezed the
boy's leg. His head shot up, his red swollen eyes searching hers
with disbelief.

"Kahl," she hoarsely
murmured.

"Get up, Aunt
Laura!"

An explosion rocked the
ground. Amid a shower of shattered glass, Kahl screamed. Laura
curled into a fetal position then cranked herself up into a sitting
position. She couldn't think straight. Pain radiated through her
shoulders and back. An invisible vice tightened and tightened on
the back of her skull and neck.

"Kevin, Alby!" Kahl cried
wretchedly, tears streaming down his face, his arm raised in a
pointing gesture toward the house.

Through the swirling haze of
her dizziness, Laura focused on flames shooting out from the
kitchen and tower windows.

"My...God," she rasped,
floundering to her feet.

Her eyes widened in horror.
Summoning almost inhuman strength, she snatched Kahl into her arms,
turned and fled. She didn't feel pain, or the cold, or anything but
overwhelming terror. Another explosion jettisoned the kitchen door
out into the side yard. A whoosh of flames extended outward as if
coughed from the throat of a ferocious dragon. A blast of air
plowed into her back, lifting her and the Kahl and sending them
flying. She somehow managed to twist around and land on her back,
sparing Kahl the brunt of her weight.

Kahl was screaming, a raw
sound of such anguish, Laura's instincts superseded everything
else. Her eyes riveted on the burgeoning flames, she got to her
feet and hastened the boy to his. She took him by the arm and led
him to the front of the house, staying back what she hoped was a
safe distance of sixty-plus feet.

Flames were visible on all
the floors. Laura's gaze swept the front of the structure, again
and again, a scream bubbling from the pit of her stomach, up into
her throat.

"Roan! The boys!"

Half of her delirious mind
wanted to chance running into the house to search for the
occupants. A saner half warned her to remain with Kahl.

Her world began to spin,
faster and faster until she fell to her knees. Anger and fear
helped her to retain a tenuous hold on to consciousness.

Kahl repeatedly whimpered
her name.

She'd failed them
all.

What’s wrong with
me?

The milk!

No, God, please don't let
it be I left the stove on!

Had the pilot gone
out?

No, it wasn't the time to
find a safe little niche to place the blame.

If she didn't know better,
she would swear she was dying. Her energy was draining away. She
was slipping into the darkness. The damn pain! It made her want to
die!

Voices invaded her ears,
stampeded through her head. She groaned silently when she felt
herself being jarred and lifted, jarred and carried—

"Roan?" she rasped,
straining to open her eyes.

He was safe. And he would
have saved the boys.

Her knight in tarnished
armor.

She attempted to laugh.
Searing pain in her lungs forced her to cough. The cough seized her
muscles with raw agony.

"She's near fruze to daith!"
cried a feminine voice.

Laura felt herself sinking
downward until a hard surface formed across the back length of her.
A semblance of warmth enfolded her.

"Roan.... The
boys...."

"Lie quiet, lass," a
matronly voice crooned above her. "Fetch me ma bag. Hurry,
Tommy!"

Tommy? Where am
I?

"Let these delight the
throng.

For her o' duskier
lustre

Whose favour still I
wear,

The snow be in her
kirtle,

The rose be in her
hair....

The words humming through
her mind brought warmth to the marrow of her bones.

"You remembered, Robbie,"
she said feverishly. "You still love me, dinna you?"

A wistful smile appeared on
the chubby-faced woman leaning over Laura. "Take a whiff o' this,
lass."

Ammonia fumes seared the
insides of Laura's nostrils. She fully came to, gasping for air,
her wild gaze riveted on the stranger staring down at
her.

"You'll be okay," the woman
smiled then cast the house a furtive look.

Laura's gaze riveted on the
engulfed structure. Her heart rose into her throat, but she
managed, "Kahl? Where's Kahl?"

"Wi' Farley Campbell,
lass."

Shouts rained around her.
Despite the woman's hand trying to anchor her down, Laura sat up,
clutching the wool blanket she'd been laid on, about her.
Everywhere she looked, there were people. People silently watching
the house, their expressions ranging from horror to indifference.
People running about, shouting orders. People and more people
covering the landscape.