The Devil Next Door

One of the woman’s daughters-Elissa-stumbled down the stairs with a spear punched clean through her. She clutched it and clawed at it, her own blood that was very dark in the firelight gushing from the wound, dripping off the shaft. There was more than just pain on her contorted face, but surprise. Absolute surprise.

A group of savages rushed down the stairs.

They were children.

Louis saw them and was amazed, though he shouldn’t have been by that point. Just kids. Most of them were grade school age, a few teenagers amongst them. All naked and painted up with blue, brown, and red stripes, brandishing spears and hatchets, their eyes flat black and predatory.

They converged on Elissa and brought her down with their hatchets, chopping on her until she was a writhing, red-splashed thing, her head split open, her face hanging by a thread, one arm on the floor.

The children went wild.

They screamed and shrieked their primal delight, hacking on the girl and splashing themselves with her blood. The oldest amongst them, a boy, shoved the others aside and peeled the girl’s scalp.

Louis knew they would see him by the fire.

He was next.

Where was the woman and the other girl?

Good question and one soon answered. For now they charged out of the shadows with axes. Four children had split skulls before the others could organize themselves. Maddie and Kylie, still painted ash-white, were soon spattered with blood and meat. The other children were terrified as these ghosts attacked them. They could see the scalps at their throats. The meat and limbs hanging from the rafters, the human remains and refuse scattered over the floor, smell the gut sack that smoked over the fire.

While Kylie swung her axe from side to side, Maddie hobbled about, circling the invaders who bunched together. She sang a high, shrill song that clearly frightened the children as she lumbered about them, her axe held high for the taking of lives. Even though Louis knew she was no ghost, he wondered if the children were frightened of her for that very reason.

By the looks of them, they weren’t exactly the passive, non-violent types.

But the woman had struck dread into them.

She circled them, singing her song louder and louder and something about it even chilled Louis. He did not know what any of it meant-it did not even sound like English or any other language that he had ever heard-but the threat behind the words was without question.

He fought at the ropes that held him.

If somehow he could convince the children to attack.

But they were submissive now, terrified. Several had even urinated. Who or what did they think the woman was? Granted, smeared with white ash, red bands enclosing her eyes and mouth, her teeth yellow and sharp, and her eyes like two windows looking into a madhouse…she was a real horror.

“ You kids!” he called out. “She’s not a ghost! She’s not a spook! Kill her! Do you fucking hear me? Kill the bitch!”

Kylie hissed at him and Maddie broke off her song, snarling in his direction and there was absolutely no doubt in Louis’ mind that he was no longer the favored, coveted plaything, but a shank of meat to be slit and deboned, salted and cured. She would slit his throat, disembowel him and bathe in his blood, wear his skin and gather his bones in a red-stained heap.

He was definitely a dead man.

But then…he hadn’t been brought down to this awful place to be treated as a favored guest now, had he? And murder, violent and brutal as it would be, was far preferable to being used for the amusement of the witch and her daughters.

“ Kill her!” Louis cried.

It was a terrible chance to take, but if he could goad the children into fighting back then maybe, just maybe, he had a chance. Regardless, his shouts disrupted the spell that Maddie was putting on them.

“ Kill her! Goddammit, kill her!”

Maybe it was an authoritative adult voice, but one of them jabbed his spear at Kylie. She deflected it with her axe. But the others took the cue. A spear sank into Maddie’s leg and her axe nearly cleaved a girl in half. Now it became a nightmare of blood. Spears thrusting, hatchets slicing, axes chopping. Louis watched it momentarily with insane glee, wanting the blood like somebody watching a football game secretly wanted blood. But unlike sports, he truly got it as the children clashed with Maddie and her mother who fought with insane, raging hysteria.

That’s it, kids, Kill the witch. Slice her right fucking up.

Louis rolled closer to the fire, ever aware of that grotesque sack of human entrails smoking on the tripod. There was a carving knife on the other side of the pit and he planned on having it. Maybe he was going to die, but he was going to die with a knife in his hand, he was going to go down fighting.

A window shattered and something exploded on the floor, spraying flames over the wall and up a stack of cardboard boxes that started to burn right away.