The Furry Forums
Creative Arts and Media => Creative Writing => Topic started by: ✡ on November 15, 2010, 01:04:17 AM
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I've had this brewing in my brain for awhile after I had a nightmare about it. This story is about a supernatural disease that drives its host completely insane and they become murderous, stereotypical right? God I hope not..
The working title so far is Cabin Fever and it looks to be a novella...
Police Report, April 14, 1977
Homicide
Investigating Officer: Lt. Nancy Jaax
Loveland, Colorado
Case Description: Body of eighteen year old male found on side of highway on the date of April 13th, 1977. Body ID’d as one Jerome Tyler of Boulder, Colorado. Slashes and multiple lacerations to the face and upper body. Major concussion and cracked skull. Near the body were personal effects including a journal, audio tape recorder, and a headlamp. Body appears to have been frozen in the ice since sometime in January 1977. Journal soaked but intact, audio recording fragmented. Tyler has been reported as a son of Rose and Grant Tyler who took winter residence in the ancestral Tyler Manor, an isolated manor for rent up in the deep mountains. An investigating team sent up to the Manor found evidence revealing that-
The following are the contents of the journal documenting the last days of Jerome Tyler. It reads as follows:
December 1, 1977
Found this journal just lying up in the attic. Very old-looking, but at least it's a distraction from my family. This place seems so empty for a manor, I can't hear anybody downstairs, perhaps I'm alone. I wonder what I'm doing here anyway, my parents have a ridiculous notion of reconnecting with the past. I suppose the only thing I can do is write the series of events that led us on this misadventure.
-Denver, Colorado
I woke up this morning in a cold sweat. The nightmares were back again. They had plagued my sleep again. They seemed so vivid in the midst of them but now back in reality, the morning light obliterated the details. Fragmented images of dark rooms with blood-smeared walls and snowy peaks danced through my head.
Suddenly a memory of the date crashed into my head. Shit, today was the day we forcibly isolated ourselves from society. My parents, my lazy cousin, and I were to travel up to the ancestral Tyler Manor in Loveland and stay the winter in stead of the usual caretaker.
To say that us Tylers were rich would be a gross misconception. Back in the 1836 century my ancestor, Aaron Tyler, had struck his fortune in the gold business in California. What followed was 100 years of ridiculous wealth and indulgence. Tylers were among the richest socialites in America during the Depression. The lavish Tyler parties in the mountains of Colorado took their place in the legends and hearts of America's upper class. That was where the monolithic Tyler Manor came in.
Built in 1926 in Loveland for the purpose of pleasure, the Tyler Manor became host to hundreds of parties hosted by the then-owners of the estate Zachariah and Lilly Tyler. Surviving the hell that was the Depression, the Tyler Manor became the center of the hopes and dreams of the upper class. But then came the Second World War Two and Zachariah's son, my grandfather Keith, was drafted into the Army. He was killed in combat in Kyoto and that proved too much for Zachariah. They found him on VE Day with a shotgun shell in his head, no note left.
This also proved too much for my grandmother Lilly. The parties of the olden days had left the Tyler family impoverished. When Lilly realized that the days of the Tylers were over, one night in the winter of 1946 she drunkenly stumbled away from the Tyler Manor and froze to death that night.
This ended everything for our family. Keith's sister, Leanne, ran away from the legacy of her family and gave birth to my father Grant Tyler. Tyler Manor was left to decay. The city of Loveland, determined to keep Tyler Manor alive (at minimal cost of course) and hired one man to care for the Manor in the winter months. He died last year, and my father, Grant, nostalgic for the old days of Tyler supremacy (which he never personally experienced) agreed to take on the job for this winter, dragging my family and I with him.
I groaned and rolled out of bed. My short, spiky, blonde hair was matted down this morning with the sweat of my nightmare. No time to fix it, I combed it out and pulled on ripped jeans and a faded black t-shirt.
I grabbed my duffel bag and headed down to the kitchen to meet the rest of my family. On the way down I ran into my cousin, Vic.
Vic Magnus was nothing but a twenty three year old slacker. He had come to live with us after his parents became sick of his act and threw him out. Being the generous person my dad is, we decided to take him in to see if a winter in Loveland would be the kick start he needs. I highly doubt that, ever since he came to live with us, he's gone from bad to worse. Many a night he would stumble home smelling of cheap weed and filthy bars and collapse on the kitchen floor until we found him the morning after.
I could already tell that Vic was high, his bloodshot eyes stared out at the world in almost a boredom towards reality.
I held no delusion that this trip would do anything to reform Vic, all he saw in this was a fantasy getaway, but so did I. My dad's drinking had picked up again. He longed for the days of the wealthy Tylers as well. Reality is not something my family tolerates well.
Outside, our '72 Cortina began to sputter to a start.
Shit, I thought, overslept again.
Vic seemed in no mood to miss his ride/ meal ticket, so he shoved me out of the way and stalked out of the house. I followed him outside and we all piled into the car.
My mother was already in the front, her crimson curls pushed back into a bun this morning.
"Late again Jerome?" she berated me, "let's get this drive over with, I intend to be sipping a merlot and laughing at all the poor bastards who have to spend the winter in their...poor people houses!"
I snickered, more of my mother's humor. She knew very well that as of now we were struggling to make ends meet. That seemed about it for any conversation, this wasn't the occasion for it. One was not often forced to abandon civilization for months just to earn a bit of cash.
My dad stuffed my duffel bag into the trunk last and clamored into the drivers seat. I looked at his eyes reflected in the rearview mirror. Funny, he didn't appear to be in the grasp of a hangover. Maybe this trip's nameless magic was already working on him. I didn't even hear the expected clink of beer bottles in the cooler as we lurched out of the driveway.
The hours after we left passed swiftly. The streets of Denver gave way to the sun drenched foothills and the monolithic Rocky Mountains. the town of Loveland rose up in the Cortina's windshield and I sighed in submission.
This one sight of Loveland was going to be my only taste of civilization until April. The Cortina swung to the right and Loveland spun away from the windshield and that nameless frozen mountain which housed the ominous Tyler Manor filled my vision.
The Cortina sped through the (frozen hellhole) forests that dotted the mountain's side and above the treeline, there sat the Tyler Manor. The Cortina pulled up to the ornately carved front door and we all piled out.
The dark figure of the Manor towered above me.
Almost like a beast ready to eat us
I brushed the thought off. Where did an odd thought like that come from? The Manor was built in the style of mountain men, with a moose head mounted right above the front door.
I'm sure that's not a traditional style, I thought.
I was broken out of my reverie by my father pushing his way past me to the front door and pulling out a large brass key. He fit it into the door, and with a click, the door slid open to reveal the darkness inside.
LIke a maw of a beast, came that errant thought again.
The rest of my family passed by me and disappeared into the Tyler Manor, leaving me out on the front porch alone. The feel of this place just wasn't...right. I took a deep breath, threw my caution to the wind, and went forward into the maw of the ominous beast.
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Its good, drake! Reminds me of The Shining, which is no bad thing in a horror at all! Personally I've never been good at fictious stories, they come out... Odd. :o
Anyhow, can't wait for more *favorites the page*
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Cool stuff indeed Drake!
I love your sense of literary devices and vocabulary. How it starts seems reminiscent of Quentin Tarintino films, where the end comes first, then everything goes back to lead up to the who, what, when, where, how?
Pretty good read.
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Wow!
Great work, can't wait for the next part!
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second part that I wrote just today! And as a bonus we get to see the appearance of one of my main antagonists in a weird existential moment...
December 1, 1977 (cont.)
Looked over everything I just wrote. When did I become that kind of author? I'm guessing it's the overall design of this building, I'd feel like a plebeian if I didn't write like that! I'm shaking as I write this, as I'm getting to quite a recent and terrible memory, it's like I'm taking a dive into my own sanity...
I found myself in a dark cavern of a room, the Main Room. The rest of my family stood around the round room gaping at the manor around us.
I looked at the floor and was surprised to find myself standing on a gargantuan mural. The entire floor of the Main Room was painted with the image of a dragon coiled around a flaming sword in a cataclysm of colors.
Obviously the old wealthy Tylers were quite the showoffs, the notion occurred to me. I walked past my family and came to the grand staircase that curved up into the austere ceiling of the Main Room to the levels above.
I cursed the old Tylers for not springing for a new elevator and began a seemingly endless climb to my room. I reached the top panting and found myself looking down a hallway of endless doors.
Damn... I thought, which one is mine?
An immediate answer to my silent question came in the form of Vic's shout, "Three doors down and to the left, moron!"
I silently thanked Vic (if I did it out loud it would only puff his oversized ego) and walked up to my room. The door was emblazoned with the symbol of the Tylers (I found it again in some books up in this attic, turns out the dragon coiled around the flaming sword is the symbol of the Tylers).
I pushed the door open and found quite a simple room. A large double bed was situated against the black wall next to a desk that was empty, probably had remained empty for decades now.
With a groan I flopped onto the bed and closed my eyes. This was going to be quite the long "vacation". God I needed a cigarette, I was thinking about where I had left my Marlboros when I suddenly heard music.
Music? I exclaimed to myself, who could be playing music? Maybe Mom's just messing with the grand piano.
But then I realized that there was more to this music than just piano. It was a waltz from the days of postwar America! How could Mom be playing multiple instruments at once. And with such skill!
I tried to sit up to inspect the music, but as if this situation was pulled from every nightmare I had ever had, I found that I couldn't move. I tried to struggle against the titanic force holding me like an iron suit, but to no avail.
(it's coming)
That nasty thought! It was back! Formed like it was a separate entity now! It was neither male nor female, but it had a terrible coarseness to it that seemed to wreak havoc on my hold on sanity.
(What? What's coming?)
I tried to speak back to this new voice, even as I did, I noticed the music steadily growing louder. The music played on all of my senses, penetrating my deepest thoughts. Darkness seemed to flood into the room.
This is it, I told myself, getting ready to wake up from the dream.
(he's getting closer)
The voice taunted me, teased me.
(Reaper...reaper)
What was the voice on about now? Who or what was the Reaper? As I asked myself these questions, the door to my room seemed to slide open. A hand comprised of shadows folded around the oak of the door and pushed it open. A massive hooded figure, like the Grim Reaper of old legends, began to advance into the room. But this was not the same Reaper of death, it was something far more mysterious....
How did I know these things? Even now, I don't know the answer to that question..
(Reaper Reaper!!)
The voice had reached a higher intensity now, and the cloaked figure (The Reaper) reached towards me. I felt the hands of ice grab my frozen body.
(Reaper!! It has you!!)
The voice was not taunting me now, I couldn't pinpoint what it meant anymore.
The thing turned me over with inhuman strength and I gazed into the eyes of my demise.
The voice again...
(REAPER REAPER!!)
And then I knew no more.
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Interesting stuff Drake. Again to you I say well done! I speak for all of us when I say, I look forward to more!
*Pats on the back*
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wow......that's really good. hope the rest is as good (if not better) than what you've already got. keep up the good work. ;J
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I love this story!
You use really good word choice, it actually had me excited! :D
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Sweet! Man your writing is like an addiction...
I need....
More.
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future updates coming soon, I'm gonna try tomorrow :D
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wow, drake. your really making me think of typing up my own story. its great
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you really like it tim? thank yew :D
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UPDATE:
sorry for the delay guys, finals and my mom's illness have really put a damper on my creative spirit, but I hope to be back to work as soon as I can :3
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RL comes first Drake!
I look forward to the next one. :D
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take all the time you need, hope your finals are going great and your mum gets better.
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I love the 'journal' style of this... I can't wait for the rest! :)
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NEW SECTION IS FINALLY FINISHED!!! I hafta warn you guys there's a bit of profanity towards the end, but I've censored it out of respect for the mods :3 enjoy, this has to have been the most fun to write out of everything yet! :D
I woke up sweating with the voice echoing still in my head. I tilted my head to listen, all was quiet. The music (did I really hear music?) had faded into silence. I looked at the clock and saw that three hours had passed, it must have been a nightmare.
Then why was it so real? The thought permeated my mind.
I slid off the bed and found that my suitcase had already been transferred to my room, Mom must have been kind enough to take care of my luggage. I hurried out of the room as if the (Reaper) thing of my nightmares was still at my feet and I slid down the master staircase. I heard human activity coming from a hallway to my right and I found myself in the dining room.
Seated around the table was my family, eating some leftover pizza probably found in the kitchen's pantry. My father seemed to be on a non-drunken rant about the locale.
"Damn rednecks," my dad growled, "nothing but rednecks in that town. They actually scoffed at me when I asked where the damn pay phone was while I was down there."
"C'mon Grant, it can't be all that bad," my mother retorted, "what with the snow tomorrow, we won't have to deal with your so-called 'rednecks' again!"
Snow? I pricked an ear. Looks like isolation would be coming sooner than I thought. My mother, adequately annoyed by my dad's irritability, stood up and went over to the sink pressing her hand over her head.
"Damn altitude," she muttered, "giving me the headache of my life..."
Come to think of it, she did look a bit pale and drawn. Perhaps she was tired from the trip, or coming down with a little flu. Nothing that she couldn't handle. I didn't feel like dealing with my family's bitterness, so I decided to skip food for the night and search around the house.
Once again I ascended the grand master staircase and quickly strode past my bedroom door. That dream, it still was imprinting itself on my waking life. I shook my head and promptly bumped into a ladder that I hadn't seen in front of me.
I stumbled backwards. What the hell? Who left this ladder down like this? Must have been my father, poking around while I was asleep. My natural curiosity was piqued and I climbed the ladder only to find myself in a dank and dark attic room.
Books were littered all over the floor, their ornately designed covers glinting in the little sunlight coming from a filthy skylight. I kicked around a few of the books. All seemed to be in fair condition, the last caretaker must have kept them safe from the ravages of time. That service certainly wouldn't be provided by Grant Tyler.
I reached into the pile of books and pulled out a blank one. I flipped through the pages, there was nothing written anywhere in this book but on the first page, and the only thing there was the initials "Z.T.".
Z.T.? I thought, quite the odd initials, and then it hit me, this was the never-started diary of Zacharia Tyler himself. I was holding a piece of family history in my hands, no matter how incomplete it was.
An old yellow pencil was littered on the floor nearby, left by someone from a generation long-forgotten. Strange, I wondered, it's almost like someone or something wants me to write in this book. I brushed off that odd speculation, I'd been having a lot of those lately.
I sat down on the dusty floor, flipped to the first blank page in the diary and began to write the words, "December 1, 1977. Found this journal just lying up in the attic..."
As I wrote the words, outside the night sky was a nightmarish black and the first hint of snow began to fall from the sky. A storm was beginning...
December 2, 1977
It's funny how when new things come into your life, dreams always follow. First there was that nightmare and now this....
I remember being in the attic looking over everything I had written when I found myself in a ballroom. No, not just a ballroom, THE Ballroom. The one on the ground floor of the Tyler Manor.
When I had gone there yesterday in waking life, I had found it a giant austere room, it may have once hosted greatness and beauty but now it was just chilly and filthy. But now the greatness was back!
I was on the balcony at the far end of the Ballroom, and below me on the Ballroom floor danced dozens of couples, all dressed in post-war clothing. Smoke clouded the air as the ladies daintily smoked cigarettes and the men gnawed on cigars.
I felt a presence behind me and I turned to find myself staring at a middle-aged man with jet black hair with streaks of gray through it. He was dressed in the grandest suit of them all. The suit was a handsome affair, with large brass buttons lining the front and a monocle swung in front of the man's chest.
"Ah, you are enjoying my celebration are you not?" the man spoke to me.
I found strength in the midst of my astonishment to reply, "of course, it's very...grand." I felt foolish as those words left my mouth. This wasn't a place for people like me, only the privileged and the self-disciplined belonged here. They were posh, every one of them.
"Yes, it was a terrible war, but in the end it turned profit! In the end that is all that matters is it not old chap?" the man congenially ignored my lack of class.
War? I thought, what war is he referring to.. and then the realization struck me. This was none other than Zachariah Tyler I was talking to. But he was long-dead! No, this was his day and age, the post-war boom, following World War Two and Zachariah had lost his son recently.
A twinge of sadness seemed to pass into Zachariah's eyes, perhaps he was trying to forget the newly dead Keith. Realizing his sadness was coming back to him, Zachariah hastened to change the subject.
"Now young man! I must go and mingle with the crowd! They expect a good time and that is what I must give them!" Zachariah glided away from me into the crowd.
A woman separated herself from the crowd and ascended the grand stairs. Her eyes were focused on me. She wore a blazingly white evening dress and jeweled rings decorated her fingers.
The mystery woman finished her ascent and approached me. I stayed silent, no words were passed between us. As if something out of my control was driving me I walked forward to meet this new enigma and embraced her.
She accepted my grasp and our lips met just as the clock struck midnight....
I flashed awake in shock. The dream had been so real, just like my experience in my room. Daylight glowed through the skylights of the attic, I had been up here all night. My pencil was still grasped in my right hand, but it was worn down to uselessness. Almost as if I had been writing extremely hard with it, but I hadn't...
My eyes fell upon the previously blank page of my journal. Scrawled across the page in handwriting that was crazed and almost unreadable were the words...
Reaper....gonna kill them,
gonna f*cking kill them...gonna destroy them..
smash their skulls, burn 'em...Reaper....
won't f*cking leave me alone..Reaper...
getting closer...no,
Reaper...
Reaper...
REAPER!
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I love the 'journal' style of this... I can't wait for the rest! :)
i like it too.
man, drake. just reding good stories makes me wanna type up my own, but im afraid it wont be big enough.... 8(
so i dont....
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sorry for breaking the.......21 day rule. But drake you asked me a while ago if I wanted to read it and I said yes and now I read it and it is AWESOME.
Totally creepy here. And I feel like I am reading something Dean Koontz would write. You know? It's......suspenseful, and curious. and interesting. AND MORE PLEASE.
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more will come when I resolve the stuff going on in my life, all my writing is on my laptop aaannnnnd my mom has it D:
(ikerochu gave me permission to un-necro this thread anyways)
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new update finally! it's kind of crap but I felt i had to do something to update it, so...i hope you enjoy :D
I stood at the mouth of the mausoleum trying to forget what I had written here not two hours ago. After I had witnessed these depraved writings, I shut the journal in a nervous sweat and went downstairs.
My mother was sitting at the kitchen table, looking worse for wear. Her once flushed and colorful skin was now shockingly pale and she seemed withdrawn.
"Nothing but a little cold from this damn mountain weather," she reassured me, seeing my concern.
I decided that it was necessary to leave the mansion, too many bad things had already happened in this place for me to stay cooped up in here before the winter snows trapped me in with my fears. I hiked out to the graveyard of ancient Tylers that resided on the side of a hill. The view of the graveyard may have been considered pretty in the summertime, but now in the dead of winter (well it wasn't wintertime yet but it very well may have been) the graveyard served only as a grim reminder of the fate of death.
I walked among the rows of graves. Not all of those buried here were Tylers, not by any stretch of the imagination. Most were cherished friends of the Tyler family who wished to have the honor to be buried among the legacy of the Tylers.
Many angry souls were interred here as well, many of the so-called "friends" buried here were merely bootlickers, trying to get a cut of the family fortune. Zachariah was well aware of this fact and as an ironic joke had them buried amongst the very people the "friends" were trying to bring down.
An old waltz song rose from the portable radio I kept in my pocket. Strange, I frowned, usually I had this thing set to a rock n' roll station. I checked the setting, nope it was still on the same station. Maybe the DJ was having an off day.
The sky began to cloud over as I sat down on a stone bench near the mausoleum. The radio suddenly rose in volume. I slapped it, what was it doing? I took out a pack of Marlboros and shook out a single cigarette to pass the time, and as I lit it and rose to go back to the manor, I felt a presence at my back.
The radio crackled in a sinister way, and for a second I heard what sounded like voices coming through the static. Almost as if this waltz were a recording of a gala event, rather than just a studio recording.
I turned to see what had sparked my attention and the cigarette fell from my trembling hands as I saw what was there to greet me.
A statue of none other than the Reaper itself from my dreams stood there with its arms out as if to greet me.
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Keep it coming! I love it so far!
Brotip: You might want to space out you're paragraphs a bit. It'll be a lot easier to read that way.
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yes, i'm sorry, i'm kind of dumb at formatting today X3
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I can tell you get your influences from Stephen King.
My suggestion- it doesn't sound like a first person description. When I'm thinking/writing to myself I don't describe myself in that manner. However it's very good. I'm sad you've never showed these to me, not even when I'm stoned B) 0:)
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unrelated to the story, but I was bored so I wrote a little thing for my novel in the works. it's a description of my character falling off a roof (dark I know XD)
http://zguidetoeverything.blogspot.com/2011/05/tiny-excerpt.html
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Drakey, Drakey, Drakey! I just read through... Man, you're good bro.
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thread has been retitled to be more appropriate to its purpose :D
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Very effective!
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Hell of a way to tell a tale man. Your usage of parenthesis is very unique indeed, but lends a realistic "sound" of digression with inner thoughts. I'm very impressed, and you do well with architectural descriptions; I'm lacking in such a department. Overall a very great story, and a great start!
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Thank you so much! ^_^ this damn story has taken me months to finish but with any luck I can be completely done by the end of the summer
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You're entirely welcome! A good story takes time to make; as over time you develop more depth and realism to the telling.
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Don't tell anyone but *leans in close and whispers* I have a novel in the works
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As do I! Several ideas I've put on the back burner, but what I'm going for is a fantasy story about my life if I were to have had a dragon familiar. It's kinda like a "what if" autobiography; I love to toy around with the millions of possibilities that are as of yet untold. And no, the main dragon is not my 'sona; rather his cousin. (http://a.deviantart.net/avatars/d/r/dragonnod2.gif?1)
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I'm keeping stuff about my novel a secret right now because the plot needs major developments
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I'm finally managing to get the kinks worked out of mine; I kept it secret from the majority of the internet and I've only leaked minimal information.
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Same here :3 it won't be ready for years though...
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I'm aiming to get half of it done by next summer; it won't be short, that's for sure.
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I want to make mine a trilogy ^_^
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That's very ambitious of you! I need to really develop Fame and Infamy (the story of my 'Sona) and maybe distribute it. The idea is very solid and well set, as I'm told by many. I even have this idea for a Star Wars fan-fiction that, so far, every sci-fi fan I've asked has enjoyed my description.
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As a rule I don't write fanfic, but I have a lot of the basic framework for my novel worke out. I expect that to change during the process of writing it X3
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I'd really just be using it to get myself heard of. Especially amongst fellow Sc-Fi fans; I have yet another story I'd like to publish called Renegade Hero. That one's set far into the future and features an entire race of anthropomorphic animals. The main villains are very NAZI reminiscent, and some of the tactics are very much like those employed in WWII; and yes, it's humans versus anthros, but there are plenty of humans on the anthro side as well. The idea, too, has been well received.
I have so many ideas, I really have no clue where to start. (http://a.deviantart.net/avatars/d/r/dragonxpplz.gif?1)
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I have ideas that need to undergo some changes before they ever make it to paper X3
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I've been working on the revisions on my works for... hmm... about a year now? I think that's it; but I'm just now managing to establish a complete base for each of them.
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I haven't had the time to do anything :'( hopefully people will let me work this summer :D
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Lately I haven't either; but I should be completely free up this summer for writing as well. If you'd like, I could share with you a test chapter for Fame and Infamy.
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I'd like to hear it :3 if you want I think I have an old (unrefined) copy of the first few chapters of my novel, but those are the ones that I haven't edited.
the one I did major edits on is on my laptop...which is not in my possession right now.
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Sure! PM it to me; I'll do the same for F&I.
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Excellent work Drake, your pacing and story devolpment is really what keeps making me read, it's what keeps me interested in a story for sure.
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woof, it's been a while since I've updated my story. I bet nobody even remembers what the story is about after all this time XD this part I wrote I wrote at 2am so it's crap, bear with me X3
I stumbled backwards in shock. The Reaper leered down at me in sheer malevolence as I fled back to the manor as if the manor could protect me from that ominous demon. I staggered up to the front door and dug in my pocket for my key. There had to be at least one place in this world where I was safe from the Reaper.
The lock clicked and I opened the door to find Vic standing there staring at me with a feverish look upon his face.
"Oh Vic, I wasn't expecting you to be..." I never got to finish my sentence as Vic slammed me against the wall.
"What the hell Vic?" I exclaimed as I was held in Vic's iron grip.
Vic seemed to be gasping for air now, as if he had run a marathon as he kept me pinned.
He began to mutter to himself, "won't leave me alone, he won't leave me alone, please leave me alone,"
As fast as he had appeared, Vic released his hold on me and retreated back into the shadows that blanketed the manor. I fell back against the wall holding my chest where Vic had assaulted me.
I sank to the floor. I no longer attempted to convince myself that nothing lurked within the shadowy confines of Tyler Manor. Something waited...but for what? Why did it intend to harm us? Could any of us escape from it?
I was dragged from my thoughts by a shout that sounded as if it came from my father. I leaped up and rushed into the kitchen to find my mother collapsed on the ground, pale and convulsing. I glanced up at the terrified face of my father and realized that my questions would go unanswered, but whatever lived inside this manor would have its victory soon enough.