Scent of the Pines
A Southern Gothic Short Story by Clint Rauscher
In 1984 rural Georgia, an evil hunger draws two boys into a decaying antebellum house that feeds on children—and their salvation comes from the last people anyone would expect.
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Scent of the Pines
October 1984 - Lake Sinclair, Middle Georgia
The screen door slammed behind me as I ran down the stairs of the porch, my velcro sneakers hitting the gravel driveway. I grabbed my bright yellow Huffy BMX bike, which was leaning against the side of the house. I’d saved up for months doing odd jobs around the lake to buy that bike. It was the first substantial thing I’d ever bought with my own money.
“Quinton!” Mama’s voice followed me outside. “You get your homework done?”
“Yes, ma’am!” I called back, already swinging my leg over the bike seat. Math worksheets and a book report on “Where the Red Fern Grows” sat completed on my bedroom desk—I’d rushed through them the minute I got home from school, wanting to waste as little time indoors as possible.
For the last six months, I hadn’t been allowed to have any adventures. Six months of being locked down like a prisoner because some kid went missing over in Sparta. Sparta! Might as well have been China, as far as I was concerned. But the grown-ups lost their minds—no woods, no bikes past the end of the street, home before dark.
The whole thing seemed foolish to me. The police had arrested a couple of freaks—locked ‘em up in the mental hospital over in Milledgeville. Case closed.
“Those two they caught might not have done it alone,” Dad had said when I complained about the restrictions. “Could be others out there. All these kids listening to devil music these days.”
Today was different though. Today, Mama said I could ride again—as long as I had a friend with me and we kept to the roads. First real taste of freedom in half a year, and I wasn’t going to waste it.
Molly came bounding around the corner of the house. She was a bird dog—part pointer, part something else w could never quite figure out—and she had this way of moving like she was always on the hunt for something, even if it was just me she was after.
“Hey there, girl,” I said, dropping to one knee as she skidded to a stop. Her tail whipped back and forth so hard her whole back end wiggled with it. I scratched behind her ears, and she leaned into my hand, panting happy dog breaths that smelled like dead fish, she’d probably found washed up on the shore somewhere.
“You wanna come exploring with me?”
Her ears perked up, and she gave a little whine that meant yes in dog language. Molly knew all my favorite spots around the lake and in the woods. She’d been my constant companion since wandering into our yard two years ago.
Mama appeared in the doorway, holding my lightweight beige Members Only jacket. “Come here and put this on. It’s getting chilly, and I don’t want you catching cold.”
“Awww… Mama, I don’t need a jacket.”
“Don’t ‘aw Mama’ me, young man,” she said, walking towards me with the jacket held open. “You begged us for this jacket, and you’re gonna wear it.”
I grudgingly slipped my arms through the sleeves, already feeling too warm. The jacket felt stiff and new, still smelling like the department store.
“And don’t you go getting that red clay all over it,” she added, giving me a once-over. “I’m not spending my Saturday scrubbing stains.”
“I promise, Mama. I’ll stay clean.”
She looked at me with that peculiar look of hers—the one that said she’d heard that promise before and wasn’t entirely convinced.
“Where ya’ off to?”
“The marina… to see if Jamal wants to ride with me.”
Her face softened. She liked Jamal—called him “that nice boy with the good manners.” His parents, Mr. Frank and Mrs. Beulah, worked at the marina, and Jamal had been raised with the kind of respect and politeness that Southern mothers appreciated.
“All right then, but you be home before dark, you hear? I’m making Steak-ums tonight.”
My stomach growled at the mention of those thin-sliced steaks she’d fry up with onions and peppers. “Yes, ma’am!”
I pushed off hard, gravel crunching under my tires as I pedaled down our driveway and onto the dirt road, with Molly close behind. The afternoon sun cut through the pines, casting long shadows across the clay. I glanced down at my Casio and saw it was just past five. That gave me a good two hours.
The red dust kicked up behind my bike as I picked up speed, and I could feel the familiar thrill of freedom that came with heading out on my own, the Members Only jacket flapping behind me like a cape.
The marina parking lot was mostly empty except for a few pickup trucks and an old Buick that belonged to Mrs. Henderson, who came every evening to feed the ducks down by the bridge. The smell of motor oil and old wood mixed with the fishy scent of the lake. I could hear the gentle lapping of water against the docks and the distant hum of a boat motor.
Mr. Frank stood beside a gleaming white bass boat, the gas nozzle in his hand as he filled the tank. He was a tall, lean man with graying hair at his temples and the kind of weathered hands that came from years of working around boats and motors. When he spotted me riding up, his face broke into a wide grin.
“You looking for Jamal?” he called out.
“Yessir!” I called back, coasting to a stop near the dock.
“He’s at the house!” Mr. Frank pointed with his free hand toward the back of the marina.
I gave him a wave and pedaled around the side of the marina building, past the boat storage area where dozens of vessels sat covered in blue tarps for the approaching winter. Pontoon boats, bass boats, and a few sailboats all lined up in neat rows like sleeping giants waiting for spring to wake them up.
Behind the storage area sat the small house where Jamal’s family lived. It wasn’t much to look at from the outside—a modest brown frame house with green shutters and a small front porch—but Mrs. Beulah had made it comfortable. Flower boxes hung under the windows, filled with mums that blazed orange and yellow. A wooden porch swing hung from chains on one end, and a couple of rocking chairs sat at the other.
Jamal was sprawled in one of those rocking chairs, a leg over one armrest. His Trapper Keeper balanced on his lap, and a pencil was in his hand. He wore jeans and a red t-shirt with a picture of Pac-Man on the front. His brown eyes were focused intently on whatever problem he was working through.
I sped up and then slammed on my brakes, letting my bike skid sideways in the dirt right up to the bottom of the porch steps. Dust swirled around my tires, and I grinned up at my friend.
Jamal looked up from his workbook, completely unimpressed by my dramatic entrance. He didn’t even crack a smile until he saw Molly running up the stairs.
She rushed onto the porch, her tail wagging so hard her whole back end wiggled. She planted her front paws on Jamal’s lap, nearly knocking his Trapper Keeper to the porch floor. Her pink tongue lolled out as she panted happily in his face.
“Hey there, girl,” Jamal laughed, scratching behind her ears. “Someone needs to give you a breathmint.”
“You wanna go for a ride?” I asked, still straddling my bike.
“I’m still workin’ on our math homework,” he said, tapping his pencil against the page.
“I could give you the answers. I just finished mine.”
Jamal’s eyebrows scrunched together, and he gave me that look—the one that said he thought I was being shifty. “That wouldn’t be right, Quin.”
I rolled my eyes. Jamal was such a goodie-two-shoes. “Well, can ya’ finish it later then?”
He glanced down at his workbook and then back up at my expectant face. I could see him wrestling with the decision. Finally, he closed the Trapper Keeper with a snap and turned toward the front door.
“Mom!” he called out. “Can I finish my math homework later? Quin wants to go for a ride.”
The front door opened, and Mrs. Beulah stepped out onto the porch. She was a petite woman in her early thirties with kind eyes and an apron tied around her waist. She was drying her hands on a dish towel, and I could smell something delicious—maybe cornbread or biscuits—wafting out from the kitchen behind her. She looked down at me with a mixture of amusement and mild disapproval.
“Hey there, Quinton,” she said, her voice carrying that particular tone mothers used when they already knew you were up to something. “You trying to steal my boy away before he’s done with his homework?”
I put on my most innocent expression, the one I’d been perfecting since I was old enough to get into trouble. “Why, no ma’am, Mrs. Beulah. I’m just tryin’ to make sure he gets his exercise in too. We young boys need healthy bodies as well as healthy minds.”
She crossed her arms and looked down at me, shaking her head slowly. A smile played at the corners of her mouth despite her stern expression.
“Dear God, boy, you sure can come up with some nonsense, can’t you?”
I tried to keep my innocent face on, but I could feel a grin starting to break through.
Mrs. Beulah looked down at Jamal, who was gazing up at her with hopeful eyes. His bottom lip might have even stuck out just a little bit. She sighed, and I knew we’d won.
“Okay, boy,” she said, reaching down to ruffle Jamal’s hair. “Go have fun with your ne’er-do-well friend, but don’t you boys get into any trouble.”
Jamal jumped up from the rocking chair and threw his arms around his mother’s waist, squeezing tight. She laughed and hugged him back, then took his Trapper Keeper from him.
“But this will be waiting for you when you get back, little man,” she said, waving the workbook at him.
“Yes, ma’am!” Jamal bounded down the porch steps and disappeared around the back of the house.
I waited, rocking back and forth on my bike, feeling the excitement building in my chest. Mrs. Beulah stood on the porch watching me with those knowing eyes of hers.
“Don’t you be gettin’ my boy into no trouble now,” she said. “I mean it.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
She gave me one more look and went back inside, the screen door closing with a gentle bang behind her.
A moment later, Jamal came racing around the corner of the house on his blue BMX bike, pedaling hard. His bike was newer than mine, a birthday present from his parents earlier that year, and the blue paint still gleamed despite the red dust that seemed to coat everything in Middle Georgia.
“Come on!” I called out to Jamal and Molly, pushing off down the driveway.
The three of us tore down the gravel drive together, our tires crunching and spitting rocks behind us. When we hit the main road, I stood up on my pedals and pumped hard. Jamal pulled up beside me, and we rode side by side down the empty road, the late afternoon sun warming our backs and the whole world spread out before us.
“So what should we do?” Jamal asked, coasting alongside me as we picked up speed down the empty road.
This was always the most challenging part of any adventure. Deciding what type of adventure you were going to have. Were we going to look for hidden treasure buried by old bootleggers? Hunt some mysterious animal lurking in the deep woods? Run from criminals who’d spotted us where we shouldn’t be? Or were we the criminals, on the run from the law after some daring heist? The possibilities stretched out before us like the dusty road itself.
I decided we’d start with some basic exploring. The utility company had been installing poles along a new road that would eventually connect our area to the main highway, and their staging area sat just a mile down from where we were riding. No fence surrounded it, and all the workmen should’ve knocked off by now.
“Let’s go check out that utility company site,” I suggested, standing up on my pedals to get more speed. “See what kind of equipment they got.”
Jamal nodded his approval, and we set out down the road together, Molly trotting behind us with her tongue hanging out.
“Hey, you heard about those two accused of taking that kid?” Jamal asked, his voice carrying that tone he used when he had some particularly juicy piece of information.
“No, I ain’t heard. What about ‘em?” I glanced over at him.
“They escaped from Central Georgia last night.”
Central Georgia was the mental hospital over in Milledgeville, about thirty miles from where we lived. Everyone in Middle Georgia knew about that place.
“If my mama had heard about that, she wouldn’t ‘ve let me go out today,” I said. “How’d ya’ hear about it?”
“My Uncle Jerome works there.” Jamal’s voice dropped to almost a whisper, even though we were the only souls on the road. “Said they just up and disappeared from their rooms, and no one saw a thing.”
I laughed and shook my head. “That sounds like something I would come up with. Your uncle’s just messin’ with ya’.”
Jamal seemed to consider this before saying, “Maybe, you’re right. He does like messin’ with me.”
“Besides, we got nothin’ to worry about,” I said, trying to sound more confident than I felt. “We’re a long way from the hospital. It’d take them a good two days to walk here. But we should keep our eyes out for ‘em. Maybe there’s some reward or sumthun.” I glanced over at him. “Your uncle say what they looked like?”
“Just said they were a man and a woman. Oh, and that they were both super tall and skinny.”
We arrived at the supply site just off the main road. A weathered sign out front declared “NO TRESPASSING - GOVERNMENT PROPERTY” in bold red letters. I rode right past it without giving it a second thought, but Jamal stopped his bike and stared at the sign.
“We shouldn’t go in there, Quin. The sign says not to.”
I circled back to where he’d stopped. “Nobody’s here, and we’re not gonna take anything. We’re just gonna look around. Besides, all the workmen are gone for the day and won’t be back ‘til tomorrow.”
Jamal chewed his bottom lip, looking between me and the sign. Finally, he sighed and followed me past the warning.
We spent the next thirty minutes searching the site. It was full of equipment for removing debris and digging holes—backhoes, trenching shovels, and machines I couldn’t even identify. But the main area was stacked with utility poles, piled maybe ten feet high in neat rows that stretched across the cleared lot.
“Come on,” I said, grabbing onto one of the lower poles. “Let’s climb up and get a better view.”
“I don’t know about this, Quin.”
“It’ll be fine. I bet we can see the road from up there.”
After some coaxing, Jamal followed me up the stack. The poles were solid under our feet, and the view from the top was cool. That’s when we heard the crunch of gravel as a car turned off the road and onto the staging area’s driveway.
“Now look what you done!” Jamal hissed. “We’re gonna get arrested!”
“We don’t have time to argue,” I whispered, scrambling down the pole stack. “We need to hide.”
We grabbed our bikes and ducked behind the supply shack just as a beat-up pickup truck rolled into the lot. Molly joined us, and I looked at her, putting my finger to my mouth. She seemed to understand as she closed her mouth and stopped panting.
I peeked around the corner and saw three young men in their twenties climb out. My stomach dropped when I recognized them—the Potter boys. They had a bad reputation around the county, as they had long hair, liked heavy metal music, and were often in trouble with the law. My mom always said if I saw them coming, I should head the other way.
Ricky, the youngest of ‘em, began unloading a wheelbarrow from the back of their truck. He had shaggy long hair and was wearing an Iron Maiden t-shirt.
I leaned back against the shack. Jamal’s eyes were wide with worry.
“Security guards?” he asked.
“No. The Potter brothers.”
“What are they doing here?”
I peeked back around the corner and watched as they surveyed the pole stacks. “I think they’re trying to steal a utility pole.”
“Why would they do that?”
“I don’t know. Maybe to put an antenna on it or sumthun.”
“But they can’t fit a pole that long on their truck.”
I looked again. The three brothers were struggling to load one end of a telephone pole onto their truck bed, but it kept slipping out of their hands and falling to the ground. They finally got that end on the edge of the truck, but they didn’t push it far enough back. So when they tried to put the other end in the wheelbarrow, the end on the truck slid off. It was like watching a Three Stooges routine—they’d pick that end back up and push it further back, only to have the other end slide off the wheelbarrow. Tommy, the oldest brother, wearing a Slayer trucker’s hat, threw his hands up in frustration. I had to stifle a laugh.
After a few more attempts, they got it loaded up. The three of ‘em huddled together, and I could see that they were playing rock, paper, scissors. Probably to figure out who’d have to follow behind the truck with the wheelbarrow. The youngest brother lost and started cursing loud enough for us to hear from our hiding spot.
You’d think if you were breaking the law and stealing from the government that you’d be quick about it, but they weren’t the brightest. Instead of leaving with their stolen pole, they decided to have a smoke break right there in the middle of their crime.
The oldest brother pulled out a cigarette. He lit it up and took a drag before passing it to his brother. They leaned against their truck, acting like they had all the time in the dang world.
The smell drifted over to our hiding spot behind the shack, and their cigarette smelled funny—not like the Marlboros my dad occasionally smoked on the back porch.
That’s when Jamal, who was allergic to smoke, sneezed.
The sound cut through the evening air like a gunshot. All three Potter brothers turned toward our hiding spot, and the oldest one pointed directly at me.
“Hey! You kids get over here!”
We didn’t wait to see what they wanted. Jamal and I grabbed our bikes and took off running toward the tree line, pushing our bikes through the tall grass. Behind us, I could hear heavy footsteps and shouting.
“Get ‘em!”
I glanced back and saw the youngest Potter gaining on Jamal, his long legs eating up the distance between them. Just as he reached out to grab Jamal’s shirt, Molly came out of nowhere like a furry missile. She latched onto his forearm with her teeth, and he screamed, spinning around trying to shake her loose.
“Run!” I yelled, and Jamal and I crashed through the undergrowth into the safety of the thick Georgia woods, our bikes bouncing over roots and fallen branches as we disappeared into the gathering darkness.
Molly ran past us, her tail disappearing into the underbrush ahead. We kept pushing our bikes deeper into the woods, branches whipping at our faces and catching our clothes. The sound of our own crashing through the forest was so loud I couldn’t tell if the Potter boys were still chasing us or not.
After what felt like forever, we figured it was safe to slow down. We stopped and listened, our chests heaving. Nothing but the normal evening sounds of the Georgia woods—crickets starting their nightly chorus and a whippoorwill calling somewhere in the distance.
We collapsed against the thick trunk of an old oak tree, our bikes clattering to the forest floor beside us. Molly trotted back to check on each of us, her tongue hanging out.
“Good girl, Molly,” Jamal panted, scratching behind her ears. “You saved my hide back there.”
She gave him a big slobbery lick right across his face, making him laugh despite everything.
“We need to head back,” I said, looking up at the darkening sky through the canopy. “It’s gettin’ late, and mom’s gonna have my hide if I’m late for dinner.”
“Which way though?” Jamal asked, spinning around. “I’m all turned around.”
I looked in every direction, but one patch of woods looked pretty much like another. We knew not to go directly back the way we came—not with the Potter boys probably still hanging around the staging area. But we weren’t used to entering the woods from that side. Usually, we came in from my house or from the Marina Road.
We picked what seemed like the right direction and started walking our bikes through the trees. But after twenty minutes of pushing through undergrowth and climbing over fallen logs, nothing looked familiar. The shadows were getting longer, stretching between the pine trees like dark fingers reaching for us.
“I think we’re going in circles,” Jamal said, his voice tight with worry.
The temperature was dropping as the sun sank lower, and every rustle in the bushes made us jump. An owl hooted somewhere overhead, the sound echoing through the trees in a way that made the hair on my arms stand up.
“Maybe we should—”
Molly let out a small bark and growl that cut me off mid-sentence. Her ears were perked up, and she was staring deeper into the woods with that intense look she got when she’d caught a scent.
“Molly, come back here,” I called, but she was already moving forward, her nose to the ground.
“Molly, no!” Jamal whispered urgently.
But she was on the hunt now, following whatever trail her nose had picked up. We tried calling her back, but she ignored us completely.
“We can’t leave her out here,” I said.
“But where is she going?” Asked Jamal.
We stood there for a moment, watching her white fur disappear between the trees. A branch snapped somewhere behind us, and we both spun around.
“She’s the only protection we have out here,” I said finally.
Jamal nodded reluctantly, and we abandoned our bikes, following Molly’s path through the darkening woods. Every step felt like we were walking deeper into something we shouldn’t, but the thought of leaving Molly was worse.
The trees seemed to close in around us as we walked, their branches creating a canopy so thick that hardly any of the fading daylight filtered through. Our footsteps sounded unnaturally loud on the carpet of dead leaves, and I kept thinking I heard other footsteps matching our pace.
Then we emerged into a small clearing, and both of us stopped dead in our tracks.
There was a house.
Not just any house—a big two-story white house with tall columns supporting a wraparound porch. It looked like something from an old plantation, sitting there in the middle of the woods like it had grown up from the forest floor itself. There was no road leading to it, no driveway, no power lines. Just this grand old house sitting in a circle of cleared land like it had been dropped there by magic.
“Have you ever seen this place before?” Jamal whispered.
I shook my head. The house looked old—really old. The white paint was peeling in long strips, and some of the shutters hung crooked on their hinges. Vines had started climbing up the columns, and the porch sagged in places like it was tired of holding itself up.
But the strangest thing was that the big front door stood wide open, like someone was expecting visitors.
“We must be really lost,” I said. “I’ve never seen this house in my life.”
The whole place was dark—no lights in any of the windows, no glow from inside. If there was no electricity running to it, that would explain the darkness, but it made the open door even more unsettling.
“Maybe there’s a phone inside,” Jamal said, though he didn’t sound convinced. “Or food. Or a CB radio we could use to call for help.”
“Or maybe there’s nothing good in there at all.”
We stood at the edge of the clearing, arguing in hushed voices about whether we should approach the house or try to find our way home in the dark. That’s when Molly made the decision for us.
She trotted right up to that open front door like she owned the place and disappeared inside.
We looked at each other and shrugged. Molly had made the decision for us.
The front door groaned on rusted hinges as we stepped inside. The smell hit us like a physical blow—something rotten and sweet that made my stomach lurch. But it wasn’t just one smell. Each room had its own particular stench, as if different parts of the house were rotting from different diseases.
“Jeez,” Jamal whispered, covering his nose with his shirt.
The hair rose along Molly’s spine, and a low growl rumbled from her throat. She moved ahead of us, head low, like she was trying to warn something away from us.
The whispers started almost immediately. Soft voices, just at the edge of hearing, seeming to drift through the walls themselves. When we stood in the front parlor, the whispers came from the kitchen. When we moved toward the kitchen, they seemed to echo from upstairs.
“You hear that?” I asked.
Jamal nodded, his eyes darting around the peeling wallpaper. “Sounds like people talking.”
The kitchen held the worst smell yet—something like spoiled milk. A rotary phone sat on the counter, its black plastic faded to gray. I picked up the receiver, hoping to call for help, but heard nothing. Not even static. Just dead silence.
“Line’s cut,” I said, hanging up.
That’s when we heard it. A child crying somewhere upstairs. The sound drifted down through the ceiling, weak and pitiful.
Molly’s ears perked up and she bolted for the staircase.
“Molly, no!” I called, but she was already bounding up the steps two at a time.
I started after her. “Come on, Jamal.”
“Are you crazy? We need to get out of here!”
“I’m not leaving Molly.”
“No way, I’m going up there. I’m staying right here.”
The stairs creaked and gave way slightly under my weight as I climbed toward the sound of crying. At the top, a long hallway stretched before me like a dark tunnel, each doorway like a dark mouth open wide. I peered into the first room and my blood went cold. Sleeping bags lay scattered across the warped wooden floor. Empty food cans and water bottles cluttered the corners.
The second room held more sleeping bags, but the walls were what made my skin crawl. Crude charcoal drawings covered every inch—small bodies with their heads cut off, upside-down crosses, and ancient-looking symbols I didn’t recognize. Some of the charcoal lines looked recent, while others appeared much older.
Each room pulled at me as I passed, like invisible hands reaching out from the darkness. But the strongest pull came from the end of the hall where Molly had gone. It felt like a magnet, drawing me forward.
The crying grew louder as I approached the last door. My legs felt heavy, like I was walking through thick mud, but I couldn’t stop moving toward whatever waited in that room.
I found Molly standing, growling in the middle of what must have been a library long ago. The windows were covered with black paper, making it nearly impossible to see. The only light came from the hallway behind me, casting my shadow across the floor.
I walked to the nearest window and grabbed the edge of the paper. It tore away easily, and the early dusk light seeped into the room, revealing what Molly was growling at.
A giant pentagram covered most of the hardwood floor, painted in something dark and flaky that looked like dried blood—in the center sat a goat’s skull, its empty sockets staring up at the ceiling.
My hands started shaking as I turned to look at the walls. Writing covered every surface in the same dark substance. Messages sprawled across the faded wallpaper in jagged letters:
DELIVER THE CHILDREN UNTO US
LEAD THEM HERE AND WE WILL DELIVER THEM TO YOU
THE YOUNG ONES FEED THE DARKNESS
The same message appeared to be repeated over and over again all over the walls in hundreds of different languages:
Trade Pueros Ad Nos
Доставьте Детей К Нам
Παραδώστε τα Παιδιά Σε Μας
子供たちを我らに届けよ
Entreguen los Niños a Nosotros
Molly suddenly wheeled toward another window and erupted in barks so loud they hurt my ears. I ran to the window and ripped away the paper as two figures emerged from the tree line.
A man and woman, both impossibly tall and thin, moved across the clearing with jerky, unnatural movements. Even from this distance, I could see their faces were gaunt, almost skeletal. They walked slowly but deliberately toward the house.
“Jamal!” I screamed. “Run! Get to the woods and hide!”
I heard him yell something back, but couldn’t make out the words over Molly’s frantic barking. I grabbed her collar and pulled her toward the stairs.
“Come on, girl. We gotta go.”
I hit the staircase running, taking the steps three at a time, Molly right beside me. Just as we reached the final step, I heard a loud crack beneath my feet. The rotten wood gave way, and I felt myself falling through the broken stairs, then through more rotted floorboards underneath. I landed on another set of stairs and rolled to the bottom.
Everything went black.
I came to with Molly licking my face. My head pounded like someone was hitting it with a hammer. I had no idea how long I’d been unconscious. I reached up to my head, and my hand came away bloody.
I was lying at the bottom of what appeared to be the stairs to the basement. Thin streams of light filtered in through a row of small windows near the ceiling, barely illuminating the basement around me.
Children’s clothing hung everywhere. Dozens of small shirts, pants, and dresses draped over clotheslines strung from wall to wall. Some looked recent. Others were yellow with age. A pile of small shoes sat in one corner—sneakers, sandals, dress shoes. All child-sized.
Footsteps creaked across the floor above my head. Slow, deliberate steps moving from room to room.
I spotted a chest of drawers pushed against the wall beneath one of the windows. If I could climb up there, maybe I could get out. The window looked just big enough for me to squeeze through.
I pulled myself onto the chest, my ribs screaming in protest. The window was stuck, painted shut, but I managed to work my fingers under the frame and push. It opened with a grinding screech that seemed loud enough to wake the dead.
My boots scraped against the basement wall as I tried to find a foothold, but there was nothing to grip. The footsteps upstairs moved toward what sounded like the staircase.
A cardboard box sat near the workbench. I dragged it over to the chest of drawers, the contents rattling inside. When I lifted it up onto the chest, it gave me just enough height. I grabbed the windowsill and pulled myself up, working my shoulders through the narrow opening.
The footsteps found the stairs and began descending. Slow, deliberate steps that seemed to echo through the entire basement.
I was halfway through the window when Molly erupted in the fiercest growl I’d ever heard from her. Then a woman’s scream split the air—high and piercing, filled with rage and pain.
I pushed harder, my chest scraping against the window frame. Almost free. Just needed to get my hips through and—
A hand clamped around my ankle like a steel trap. I felt myself being yanked backward with inhuman strength, my shirt tearing as I scraped across the rough window frame. I hit the basement floor hard, my shoulder taking the worst of it. Stars exploded behind my eyes.
Molly had stopped attacking and now stood between me and the two figures in the middle of the room. Her hackles rose along her entire back, and she bared her teeth in a snarl that made her sound more wolf than dog.
The woman clutched her arm where Molly had bitten her, dark liquid seeping between her fingers. But it wasn’t the wound that made my stomach drop. It was how they looked.
Their skin became more translucent as they approached, like old parchment held up to a light. I could see the dark outline of their skulls beneath their faces, the hollow spaces where their eyes should be. When they moved, it was in sudden, jerky motions, like marionettes controlled by a drunk puppeteer.
The woman was impossibly tall and thin, her limbs too long for her body. Her hair hung in greasy strands around a face that seemed to shift and blur when I tried to focus on it. The man beside her looked similar—gaunt to the point of being skeletal, with fingers that ended in what looked like blackened nails or claws.
I pushed myself up from the floor, my shoulder screaming in protest. There had to be something I could use to defend myself. My eyes swept the basement and landed on a workbench against the wall to my right. Tools hung from a pegboard above it, and among them, a small hand axe with a wooden handle.
I lunged for it, grabbing the axe just as both figures started moving toward me with their unnatural, stuttering gait.
“Stay back!” I screamed, swinging the axe wildly in front of me. “Leave me alone! Go away!”
They both stopped mid-step and looked at each other. Then they began to laugh.
It was the most horrible sound I’d ever heard—like wild animals. The woman’s mouth opened too wide, revealing rows of rotted teeth that seemed to extend further back than a human mouth.
The man approached me first, his movements becoming more fluid, more predatory. I raised the axe above my head and brought it down with every ounce of strength I had. The blade bit deep into his chest with a wet thunk, right where his heart should be.
He looked down at the axe handle protruding from his sternum, then back at me. No blood. No cry of pain. He simply fell backward onto the floor like a toppled statue.
The woman kept coming, apparently unconcerned about her companion.
I looked frantically around the basement for another weapon, but there was nothing within reach. The woman’s skeletal fingers stretched toward me when Molly launched herself through the air, aiming for the woman’s throat.
But she was ready this time. Her arm swept up in a vicious arc, catching Molly mid-leap. Her hand closed around Molly’s throat. With casual indifference, she hurled my dog across the basement. Molly hit the concrete wall with a sickening thud and crumpled to the floor. She didn’t move.
“Molly!” I screamed. “What did you do? Who are you? Why are you doing this?”
The woman’s lips pulled back in what might have been a smile, revealing those terrible rotted teeth. She said nothing, just leaned over the man and wrapped her fingers around the axe handle. She pulled it from his chest like she was removing a splinter. The wound sealed itself instantly, leaving no mark.
The man sat up as if he were miraculously healed. His hollow eyes fixed on me, and he moved with renewed vigor towards me. His hand closed around my throat, lifting me clear off the ground.
My feet kicked uselessly in the air as he moved me backward. The cold stone wall pressed against my spine, and I felt the pressure building in his grip. He was going to crush my windpipe against this wall.
Black spots danced at the edges of my vision when I heard the thunder of footsteps on the stairs. Multiple sets of boots pounding down the wooden steps.
Three figures emerged from the stairs—the Potter boys, all of them breathing hard. They stood behind the dark couple, and my heart sank as everything clicked into place.
Dad had been right all along. The couple had not worked alone. They had accomplices. The Potter boys had probably helped break them out of the hospital and brought them here, to this house. They were all in on it together—a bunch of heavy metal listening satan worshippers who used this place for their sick rituals.
And I was their latest victim.
The youngest Potter spoke first, his long greasy hair hanging in his face. “Well, well. Look what we got here.”
The pressure around my throat increased, and I could feel consciousness slipping away. The basement began to fade around the edges, but I could still hear them talking, their voices seeming to come from very far away.
The dark man dropped me and I crumpled to the floor, gasping for air as my throat burned. Through watering eyes, I saw the oldest Potter step up and say, “So, you like hurting children huh? Well, let’s see how you match up against us.”
What happened next was like watching a hurricane tear through a trailer park. The oldest Potter brother, Tommy, launched himself at the skeletal man with a roar that echoed off the basement walls. His fist connected with the thing’s jaw with a crack like splitting wood, sending it staggering backward into the workbench.
The middle brother, Billy, grabbed a length of chain from the floor and swung it at the woman. She moved with that jerky, unnatural gait, but Billy was faster. The chain wrapped around her ankles and he yanked hard, sending her crashing to the concrete.
Meanwhile, the youngest Potter, Ricky, had picked up a two-by-four and was swinging it like a baseball bat. “Come on, you freaks! Let’s dance!”
I crawled across the floor toward Molly, my knees scraping against the rough concrete. She lay motionless against the wall where the woman had thrown her, and my heart hammered against my ribs as I reached for her.
“Molly? Girl, please be okay.”
Her fur was warm under my trembling fingers, and I felt the steady rise and fall of her chest. Relief flooded through me as her eyes fluttered open, brown and confused but very much alive.
“That’s it, girl. Come on back to me.”
Behind us, the fight raged on. The skeletal man had grabbed Tommy by the shirt and hurled him across the room like he weighed nothing. Tommy hit the far wall and slumped to the floor, but he was already pushing himself back up, blood trickling from his nose.
“Is that all you got?” Tommy spat, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
Billy still had the chain wrapped around the woman’s legs, but she was clawing at him with those blackened fingernails, leaving deep scratches across his forearms. Blood oozed from the wounds, but Billy held on.
“Ricky! Hit her with that board!”
Ricky swung the two-by-four like he was trying to knock a home run clear to Atlanta. It caught the woman across the side of her head with a sound like a melon dropping on pavement. Her head snapped to the side at an angle that should have broken her neck, but she just turned back toward him with that horrible rotted smile.
Molly shook her head and struggled to her feet, swaying slightly. When she saw the fight still going on, her lips pulled back in a snarl and she charged toward the woman.
This time, the woman was not ready for the attack. The impact sent both of them tumbling across the floor in a tangle of limbs and fur.
The skeletal man had Tommy pinned against the wall, those claw-like fingers wrapped around his throat just like they’d been around mine. But Tommy was bigger and stronger than me. He drove his knee up into the thing’s midsection, doubling it over, then brought both fists down on the back of its skull.
“Billy! The rope!”
Billy spotted a coil of heavy rope Tommy was pointing to hanging from a nail and grabbed it, tossing one end to Ricky. “Wrap him up!”
Working together, the three brothers managed to get the rope around the skeletal man’s arms and chest. He thrashed and bucked like a wild horse, but they held on, pulling the knots tight.
The woman was still wrestling with Molly when Ricky joined the fight. He grabbed her by the hair and yanked her head back, giving Billy the chance to loop a chain around her neck like a collar.
It took all four of us—three Potter brothers and me—to get both creatures properly restrained. We dragged them to a thick iron bar that ran along the basement wall, probably part of the house’s original foundation. Using every piece of rope and chain we could find, we tied them to that bar like they were wild animals.
When it was over, we all stood there panting and bleeding, staring at our captives. The woman and man sat slumped over, their hollow eyes still fixed on us with that terrible hunger.
“Earlier,” I said, my voice still hoarse from being choked, “I hit him with that axe. Right in the chest. Should have killed him, but he just got back up like nothing happened.”
Tommy nodded grimly. “These ain’t exactly normal folks we’re dealing with here.”
As we climbed the stairs and walked out of that nightmare house, Jamal came running out from behind a cluster of pine trees at the edge of the clearing. His face was streaked with tears.
“Quin! Thank God you’re okay!” He threw his arms around me in a hug that nearly knocked me over.
Tommy clapped me on the shoulder. “You can thank your dog and your friend here for saving you. We were still looking for y’all in the woods when we heard your dog barking earlier. When a dog barks like that, it means real danger.”
Billy wiped blood from a scratch on his cheek. “We was running toward the sound when we found your friend here. He told us you were in trouble, so we came to help.”
I looked up at Tommy, confusion mixing with gratitude. “I thought... earlier at the utility place... I thought you wanted to hurt us. And with all the devil worship stuff in that house, I figured you were part of it.”
All three brothers burst out laughing, the sound echoing across the clearing. Tommy reached out and tousled my hair with a grin.
“Kid, just ‘cause we got long hair and like heavy metal don’t make us devil worshipers. We get that a lot, but we ain’t gonna hurt nobody. Maybe we would’ve tried to scare you into not telling on us for stealing that pole, but we’d never actually hurt you.”
Ricky nodded enthusiastically. “When y’all ran into the woods, we got worried. Been looking for you ever since, trying to help get you home safe.”
I felt my face burning with embarrassment. “I’m sorry, I thought that about you guys.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Tommy said. “What the hell were those two things anyway? They didn’t seem human.”
“I have no idea,” I said, glancing back at the house. “But we need to go to the police. Don’t worry, though, we can leave the part about the utility pole out of it. After today, you guys are going to be heroes.”
Tommy’s grin widened. “I like the sound of that. Our mom’s gonna be real proud.”
We emerged from the woods back at the utility supply area just as the last traces of daylight were fading from the sky. The Potter boys immediately set about putting the utility pole back on the stack, working together to hoist it up without saying much about it.
“Y’all hop in the back,” Tommy said, dusting off his hands. “We’ll get you home.”
Jamal and I climbed into the bed of their pickup truck with Molly, who seemed to have recovered from her ordeal but stayed close to my side. The ride back felt surreal after everything we’d been through.
When we pulled up to my house, I could see the warm yellow light spilling from the kitchen windows. Tommy came to the door with me while Billy and Ricky waited with Jamal in the truck.
“Mrs. Patterson,” Tommy said when my mother answered, “we need to call the police. And Jamal’s parents too. Something happened tonight that they need to know about.”
My mother took one look at my torn clothes and the scratches on my face and arms, then at Tommy’s blood-streaked shirt, and her expression shifted to pure alarm.
“What on earth happened? Quinton, are you hurt?”
“I’m okay, Mama, but you need to make those calls.”
Twenty minutes later, my kitchen was crowded with people. Mr. Frank and Mrs. Beulah had arrived looking worried sick, and two sheriff’s deputies sat at our kitchen table with notepads out. We told them everything—the house, the creatures, how the Potter boys had saved us.
But I could see it in their faces. They didn’t believe a word we were saying.
“Now, boys,” Deputy Morrison said, leaning forward with what he probably thought was a kind expression, “sometimes when we’re scared, our imagination can play tricks on us. Are you sure these Potter boys didn’t just take you somewhere and scare you? Maybe as some kind of prank that got out of hand?”
“No, sir,” I said firmly. “They saved us.”
Deputy Barnes, the younger one, kept shooting glances at Tommy and his brothers. “These boys are trouble. Quinton, Jamal, you don’t have to protect them. If they hurt you or threatened you, we can make sure they don’t bother you again.”
“”They didn’t hurt us!” Jamal spoke up, his voice getting higher.
“They fought those things, and tied ‘em up,” I said again.
“What things, son?” Deputy Morrison asked. “Describe them again.”
We went through it all again—the skeletal appearance, the supernatural strength, the way the axe wound had healed. With each detail, I watched the deputies’ expressions grow more skeptical.
“Boys,” Deputy Barnes finally said, “there’s no such thing as monsters. Now, I’m going to ask you one more time, did these Potter boys take you somewhere and do something to you?”
“No, sir,” I said, my jaw clenched tight.
The next day, Deputy Morrison called my mother to report that they’d searched the woods thoroughly. They’d even flown a helicopter over the area, he said, and there was no clearing and definitely no house anywhere in that section of forest.
“Must have been some kind of abandoned hunting cabin they took them to,” he told my mother. “But we can’t do anything without the co-operation of Quinton and Jamal.”
But Jamal and I knew what we’d seen. We also knew we’d never set foot in those woods again.
Over the years, developers came and cleared that entire area, building a whole subdivision of new houses. I watched them work, hoping they’d uncover some evidence, like foundation stones or maybe a basement. But they never found anything. Not a single trace of that plantation house.
When the internet finally became a thing in the mid-nineties, I spent hours searching for similar stories. What I found chilled me to the bone. Hundreds of accounts from around the world of children encountering an old house that shouldn’t exist, strange figures that looked more dead than alive, and unexplained disappearances. But no one had answers. No one knew what these things were or where they came from.
I printed out dozens of these stories and took them to Ricky Potter, who’d surprised everyone by becoming a GBI agent. He read through them carefully, his face growing more serious with each page.
“I still have nightmares about that night, Quin,” he said quietly. “I’ll never forget those things we tied up. But you know what’ll happen if I try to open an official case about a disappearing house with skeletal monsters living in it?”
I nodded. “They’d think you were crazy.”
“They’d do more than that. They’d end my career.” He handed the papers back to me. “The truth doesn’t matter much if no one’s willing to believe it.”
The End