The Unknown by Kristina Stancil
The Unknown
By Kristina Stancil
The Unknown
Kristina Stancil
Copyright Kristina Stancil 2013
Message from the author
The Unknown is an extended sample of the forthcoming novel, The Terror Twins. It will be released in November via Thrillerz 13 Entertainment. For more information follow us on our website thrillerz13.com or on twitter, www.twitter.com/thrillerz13
1
“Look what I can do,” Drew chuckled as he tossed his baseball across the yard and his mitt mysteriously floated over to catch it with a loud smack.
“Not outside,” Andie hissed. She looked around nervously to make sure that no one was watching. She was scared to death of these things that were happening. It had been funny when they were little. They could pretend it was an invisible friend instead of something they were doing themselves. This was way worse than being able to talk to each other in their minds, everyone said it was a twin thing even the school counselor who thought she might need therapy because she refused to read The Hobbit for school because it was ‘witchcraft,’ and her mom had told her that her Daddy left when he discovered she’d given birth to abominations. They were evil and he’d fled as soon as he could. Even most of the kids at school avoided her as a freak. Her mom often demanded to know what she was doing to make people hate her when everyone loved Drew; not that she didn’t have any friends but she claimed they were only being nice for Drew’s sake. She sighed. God help her if her mom found out Nate’s older brother had kissed her. When she first saw her with Nate and Chase the twins’ mom had screamed she was a whore and had to be doing something to get them to like her. She demanded to know if this was why no girls came around her because they didn’t want the reputation. When Drew laid claim to Nate as his best friend then things were smoothed over somewhat. Andie rubbed her arm in reaction to the phantom pain of memory of her mother’s nails digging into her flesh not to ruin things for Drew. One day he was going to be famous or rich and it was her lot in life to be his assistant to be on his beck and call. She still had nightmares about how they’d come to have their powers enhanced from empathy, telepathy, and simple telekinesis…not this extreme control Drew had now.
“She’s a bitch,” Drew said rolling his eyes as her melancholy mood reached across their twin sense. “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. If she’s not causing problems she’s not happy.” He tilted his head to the side and assessed her. Something else was bothering her. He could sense her discomfort that centered in the pit of her stomach like a sense of foreboding. The nausea reached across to him and goose bumps rose on his arms. He frowned as he walked over to her. A vision of darkness rolled over him as he clasped her clammy hand. Something was coming for them and it wasn’t good. She couldn’t see it but as he reached for her other hand shadows came into sharper focus…….torches lit and hung on stone walls…….he was unconscious, tied back to back in ladder back chairs, but hooded figures would not allow Andie to escape into oblivion. Her screams echoed off the wall as his unconscious form seem to writhe against its bindings. Whatever they chanted over her was causing her great pain but his dream visage seems to feel nothing but warmth and power. His conscious self-broke out in a cold sweat as he felt the ghostly pain that pricked at Andie like thousands of needles attempting to suck out his twin sister’s soul. “NO,” he groaned jerking his hands free dropping into the grass. His voice was hoarse as he looked up at her. “How long,” he croaked.
She couldn’t meet his eyes. “As long as I can remember…..they chant some sleep thing over you and they hold an athame over your throat. They said they’d kill you if I didn’t float you to the car so they could I don’t know. I couldn’t move or scream into we were in the dark place.”
His face colored. Someone was powering him by sucking her dry. Suddenly his powers didn’t seem so cool anymore. They were going to be the death of the one person he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt who would never betray him. “You think you could counter act whatever it is that they are doing to me?” He tilted his head to the side when it seemed like her mind went blank. “You know,” he said hurt, “you know who is doing this to us.” Suddenly her guilt wafted to him. He jumped up and grabbed her shoulders. “You’re not going to die on me,” he yelled shaking her until her teeth rattled. “You’re all I got!”
*
Andrea could not move. She was held immobile by some unseen force but she wasn’t just frozen still. The air was extremely chilly and she knew light lay behind the blindfold she wore. She could hear and she could feel. As scared as she was of her powers this unknown paralysis and blindness drove her to near panic. She reached out her senses to discover her surroundings. She was in an examining room and her mother was pacing in the room near her. It was dark outside and the doctor who came in wore a full face mask disguising his appearance. Her mother looked up expectantly as the doctor forced Andrea’s legs apart. She screamed in fear and anger of what he planned to do. “No,” she cried out silently. “Drew…” she reached her senses out searching for her brother. He was not near her but she could not tell how far away. The spell or the drugs forced upon her were clouding her mind.
“She is unspoiled.” The doctor intoned. “She will make a fine sacrifice for the goddess.”
“Hold,” a woman with a smoky voice said entering the room in a scarlet cloak covering her face. “The girl may not be an utter waste. Even now she listens to us. Even now she knows what we do and what we plan. She fears her powers. She holds them at bay in a dark cage in her mind but for her to release them will require something drastic. What of the boy, does he yet yield to my will?”
“No, Goddess,” the twins’ mother said casting her eyes down in guilt and fear of retaliation. “He still shows loyalty to the one that survived the womb with him.”
Andrea’s consciousness turned to her….one who survived? What did she mean? Did the imaginary friend that they’d swore they’d both created, pretended that it was him who moved things who did things when it was kinda scary cool that things moved when they wanted them too without touching them……they called him Adrian.
“She knows,” the one they called Goddess said in her intoxicating voice. “Be wary of which you speak Amanda,” she admonished the twins’ mother. She tilted her head to the side and analyzed Andrea. “What secrets do you keep hidden in the dark recesses of your mind, little one? You could be of much use to me in the coming days….much more use than that of your brother. Trust, he will have his uses, the spirit of his touch lingers deep within those who despair and ache with illness but you, little one, you have the power to bring me back to power. A powerful handmaiden to a Goddess,” the head tilt again as she feels the indignation of servitude. “Perhaps,” she snickered, “you wish to reign with me,” she turns away to face her mother. “Do no more harm to this child. I take care as an offering of your servitude.”
“But Goddess,” she sputtered. “She’s the runt….she barely survived. Andrew holds great power….”
“He’s male,” she spat. “Only through female kind shall my legacy survive. A binding of her to a male of proven breeding stock will produce a child of unfathomable power; as will the binding of her brother to another of my chosen daughters. You have done well, Amanda. The sacrifice of binding yourself, ever so briefly to such a man will not go unrewarded.”
“Thank you, Goddess,” Amanda said eyes still on the floor.
*
Andrea struggled. She was trapped in darkness again. Only when she wiggled she realized she could barely make out her toes. She frowned at the cotton candy glittery nail polish. She had stopped wearing that at nine years old when…
“HOLD!” A smoky seductive voice cried. “The next to strike the child will suffer a most unpleasant death.”
Andrea watched as the cloaked figure’s head hung in shame and pulled back into the shadows. “Who are you?” She whimpered in her little girl’s voice.
The cloaked figure lowered her hood to reveal a woman with long dark hair and perfect olive skin. The crowd murmured at her beauty and then fell silent. “For the sake of the masses little one, know me as….Sorcha.” Her hand fluttered like a small bird. “Bring forth the mother.”
“Mama,” Andrea’s little girl self-cried out despite the teenage consciousness’ warning.
“Silence child, do not embarrass me,” her mother admonished as she stepped forward head bowed in the presence of the one called Sorcha. “Forgive me, Goddess, she has always been the unruly one.”
“Having twins on the Equinox is an excuse for the occasional outburst, Amanda,” Sorcha said. “It is no reflection on you. There is forever a balance. You have the perfect specimen in the boy. The girl is bound to have defects as you noted.” Her hand fluttered again and her eyes turned to Andrea.
Andrea cried out as her thin body was suddenly nude. Now her heart raced and goose pimples broke out on her skin as fear and the chill in the air hit her. “Please,” Andrea begged.
“Silence,” Sorcha roared. She flung her hand so that Andrea’s mouth was forced closed. “We begin the ritual.”
“The marks, Goddess,” Amanda said quietly. “How do we hide them from the outsiders?”
“You offering has been accepted, Amanda,” Sorcha said irritated. “I will protect you. All of the runes to be etched into her skin will not scar even though they will spill her blood. It is her blood we need to strengthen the boy. He will lead us into the new age. Through him we will have a strong male hand on the world. Thus we shall rule the world through him.” From the folds of her cloak she removes an intricately carved athame. “Let the ritual begin.”
Teenage Andrea knew what was to come and she screamed inside her consciousness to wake up. She knew the basics of horror movie logic from Liv’s obsession but she’d never been lucky enough to escape the bindings that Sorcha put on her. She would suffer along with her nine year old self trapped and unable to protect herself as a child. She tried to kick and bite but she was held down now by the power of Sorcha’s will. ‘Come on, babe, fight,’ she begged the little girl, ‘we have the power. We just have too,’ her inner coaching was cut off as the first rune was cut into the tender inner part of her thigh. Her throat ached from the agonizing pain, the helplessness, and the unshed scream. Tears flowed down her cheeks as she felt her child eyes turn to her mother to plead for help. She didn’t understand what she’d done wrong this time. She’d tried so very hard to be a good girl and stay out of her sight. She never brought home less than As and Bs but it still wasn’t good enough for their mother’s love but it at least was enough to keep from being hurt. Her mom’s favorite form of torture since hanging out with Mr. Holmes, Chase’s dad was not to leave a physical mark. Her mom would sneak in while she was sleeping or bathing. She’d almost drown or suffocate her…and then allow his dad to revive her. He seemed to get off on her almost dying and she’d hear them down the hall with their hoarse grunts and heavy breathing. She hadn’t realized what it was….but Drew told her because he was disgusted. It did bring them closer to Chase though. Mr. Holmes would talk about ‘his boys,’ as if Chase and Drew were the only two that existed but even though he advised Amanda against leaving marks on Andrea, Chase would be beaten almost daily. Andrea felt her bile rise as they continued to cut deep within her flesh. When her body began to spasm she blacked out as she suffocated on her own vomit.
*
“Pathetic,” Amanda screamed as she slapped Andrea awake. “I curse the day I was forced to carry you in my womb!”
Andrea came awake with a shrill cry. She looked around clasping the blankets to her. “Mama,” she whimpered. Her consciousness’ colliding with each other for control but the little girl’s fear was stronger than the older girl’s anger….for now.
“How dare you embarrass me, last eve? It is an honor to be chosen to be a member of Sorcha’s coven! You screamed and cried that they were going to kill you,” she passes a scathing look over her. “Is one hair of your ratty hair disturbed?” She jerked at the covers, “Are you even bruised in anyway? You are a spoiled selfish child! I just want to have adult friends is that too much to ask? Always its you that I have to deal with! Why can’t you be more like your brother? Everyone loves him! You are the trouble maker! You drive people away all the time! I’m so sick of having to pretend to care about your whims. You’re nothing but a disappointment.” She shakes her head. “If the Goddess didn’t think you were worth something, you’d be better off killing yourself and saving your brother and I the disappointment in having to be related to you.”
Andrea wanted to strike out as her younger self began to cry. Luckily the emotional torture she was under brought Andrew to her room out of curiosity. Amanda jumped up to embrace him and coo over her one perfect child. He frowned in confusion and looked at her. He seemed to know. Andrea tried to project to him and saw the startled look on his face. Was this a dream or had she gone back in time? ‘Drew,’ she prodded silently.
“Wake up,” he responded not in his little boy voice but his almost grown voice. “Wake up, Dre. Don’t let the bitch trap you there.”
*
“Where were you? Where did they take you? I couldn’t find you!” Andrew rattled off in a panic as he shook his sister awake.
Andrea shrieked and finally clung to her brother. After a few moments she looked around. She didn’t remember being brought back home. She didn’t remember coming out to the yard or getting dressed again. This time when she felt her body wretch, Drew turned her, and held her while she vomited over and over again. A few moments later as her body convulsed she felt something cool forced into her hand. Someone had handed her a wet wash cloth. Drew took it and washed her face. She couldn’t trust her voice or her body so she projected to Drew. “They took me to a doctor. They wanted to see if I was a virgin.” She could feel his rage begin to boil off of him. “They wanted too…..They want too.” She couldn’t bring herself to even mentally say it.
“Look at me,” He barked. He tilted his sister’s chin up so he could stare in her eyes. “You’re hiding something from me. You haven’t been like this since Chase’s dad disappeared.”
“He went back to Indiana right?” Liv frowned. She looked at Nate. “Didn’t your mom say you thought he went back to teach at Purdue?”
“That’s what she thinks anyway.” He turns to look at Chase.
“Yeah, he went back but I’m not sure if he’s teaching. I think he’s out working as like a hunting guide. He works all different kinds of hunting, fishing, and stuff like that….so it’s real hard to get in touch with him even if I wanted too….which I don’t.” He said avoiding their eyes.
Drew probed Andie’s mind and was horrified at the images he withdrew from her subconscious mind. He saw everything from the actually event that triggered the memory that had held her trapped in her subconscious mind. “How can she do this,” Andrew yelled. “How dare our mother pimp you out!”
Liv was studying Reiki and playing with the Druid Arts. She wasn’t sure she was so happy with the way she’d been raised. She felt suffocated in Catholicism. All the things they claimed were so evil in other religions often had roots in Catholicism so they could hide in plain sight. “Visions again,” she asked Andie sympathetically.
“No,” Andrew snapped. “My mother,” he spat, “plans to allow Andie to be farmed out to be raped by whomever her coven leader wishes.”
“Some mother,” Chase snapped. Andie had collected him as a child. They’d both be outcasts in first grade when for the first of many times Amanda had forced the twins to be separated at school. She alone had stood by him when he did not have anything for show and tell and was ashamed of how his family did not have the money to take a fancy vacation like the other kids. She alone had seen the bruises and the scars of abuse. To mortified as a child to speak out about the hell he suffered, he was the only one to know of how she suffered in another yet strange way. For him, she had shown her telekinesis for through her empathy she felt his pain and it amplified his. He was now, their brother out of tragedy, out of necessity, for survival. He turned to Andie, afraid that Drew would read him as weak.
‘We would be in a hell of a mess if your father had married my mother,’ Andie sighed as she projected to Chase. They had been close. Chase’s father had been a conquest of their mother, despite being married and how he’d abused Chase. He’d also been the first to fall to the coven, a sacrifice that none in their small camaraderie regretted. How he died was still a mystery to most of them. Andie looked away ashamed. She’d been poked and prodded. Runes scratched into her flesh with the dull edge of an athame so as not to leave noticeable scars. She had screamed until she was hoarse. She could feel Drew’s anger and frustration from wherever he’d been held but when she felt the piercing bite of his pain she’d snapped. She vaguely remembered the delighted purr of the coven leader as her eyes changed to know a color she knew not what. Chase father had made a choked sound and collapsed to the floor. The others pressed back to the wall, save the coven leader who praised her. Either she was a creature of great power or she was just a creature. It was a little hard to grasp her really being what they called her, a goddess even with the powers they possessed. If Drew had power to heal Andie knew she now had the power to kill and it sickened her. For what good could the ability to kill someone by looking at them be? Maybe she was the abomination……