They didn’t wait until nightfall to look for a secure campsite. They’d taken an unmarked cutoff that wound toward the coast, down a narrow lane with high banks of dirt. The quake had shifted some of it, but heavy rain had washed much of it away, leaving a layer of fine sand and orange mud that was less than a foot deep. Treacherous, but drivable with care.
They passed a number of small cottages, every single one with broken windows and smashed doors. Most of them had tumbled roofs, opening up the rooms to the elements.
Eventually, with the leaden surface of the evening Pacific visible beyond a slope of dead bracken, Jim Hilton spotted a larger house. It stood alone on a bluff, looking relatively undamaged by either the quake or by looters.
“Spend the night there,” he shouted, pointing toward the building and receiving a wave in response from Carrie at the wheel of the second truck.
As they drew closer, he realized that the appearance had been deceptive.
The high, gabled roof had lost most of its shingles, which lay around the sides of the house like a shower of fallen leaves. The attic windows on the landward side were mostly broken, though those that stared blankly out over the sea were salt-stained but still whole. Dark green shutters dangled from their shattered hinges over the first- and second-floor windows of the abandoned house, and the large double front door gaped open like a sucking, toothless mouth.
“And whatever walked there, walked alone,” said Kyle Lynch as they stood together at the front of the building.
“Sure looks haunted,” agreed Carrie. “Still, there might be some dry floors, and we can find plenty of wood to burn. Going to be cold tonight.”
“Ghosts,” said Sly, shivering and hugging himself with a delighted grin. “Steve told me all ’bout ghosts and lampirons and stuff.”
“Lampirons?” Jim looked at his daughter, knowing that she was the best at interpreting the teenage boy’s occasional linguistic oddities.
“Don’t know, Dad,” Heather admitted, then asked Sly, “What’s a lampiron?”
“Me thinks it’s a bad man that looks like a bat and drinks blood.”
Everyone got it at the same moment, chorusing together, “Vampire, Sly. A vampire.”
Silently they filtered into the building, Jim going first in case some threat awaited inside. The desolation inside made them look around in wonder. “Looks like it was empty before Earthblood came along,” said Kyle.
“Yeah. Stripped.”
There wasn’t a drape or a carpet or a stick of furniture anywhere in the building.
An ominous crack ran down the northern wall, so wide that it was possible to put four fingers deep into it. Kyle was a fan of horror novels and vids and he remarked how it reminded him of some real old story.
“Great big house alongside a black lake, bottomless. Crazy lives in it, with his sister, who’s dying. Think it was Vince Price played the madman. Decides he’s buried his sister alive, and she comes back to life and they die together. The wall splits and the whole mess slides into the pool.” He snapped his fingers. ” ‘Course. Stupid of me. It’s Poe. ‘The Fall of the House of Usher.’ My memory’s getting worse.”
“We going in?” asked Sly, who’d been ignoring the conversation about the melancholy house.
“We are in,” snapped Heather.
“Oh, yeah. Me means we going t’eat?”
“Good question.” Jim grinned, ruffling the boy’s hair. “Get a blaze started and then we can have some supper. You and Heather go and pick up as many of those wooden tiles off the roof as you can and carry them in here,” he said, pointing to a wide carved fireplace.
MUCH LATER THAT NIGHT, Jim leaned across and ran the tip of his tongue down the angle of Carrie’s shoulder, tasting the salt of fresh sweat. He continued across the swelling top of her breast, finding the shrunken nipple and kissing it softly, laughing quietly with sheer pleasure as it roused at the touch of his lips, hardening against his tongue like a tiny animal.
“Man your age should be sated and sleeping by now,” she whispered.
“Woman your age shouldn’t rightly be copulating with a man my age. And me your commanding officer, as well, Second Navigator Princip.”