Love Among the Monsters

Award-winning author Margaret L. Carter was a member of Jewels of the Quill, an award-winning group of authors in all genres banded together to promote their books. The group also produced anthologies together. Dame Onyx Treasures: Love Among the Monsters is a compilation of three short stories Margaret contributed to Jewels of the Quill anthologies, plus five bonus stories.

CONTENTS:

The Unvanished Hitchhiker {horror} (originally published in Shadows in the Heart, A Jewels of the Quill Halloween Anthology) © September 2007; 978-1-59374-685-8 (trade paperback); 978-1-59374-686-5 (electronic)

In a twist on the Vanishing Hitchhiker urban legend, in which an unsuspecting driver picks up a hitchhiker and discovers the passenger is a ghost, a bereaved mother waits every Halloween night in anticipation of the knock on the door, bringing her lost daughter home yet again.

Little Cat Feet {Young Adult fantasy} (originally published in Christmas Wishes, A Jewels of the Quill Christmas Anthology) © September 2008; 978-1-60313-258-9 (trade paperback); 978-1-60313-259-6 (electronic)

In this tale inspired by the legend that animals can speak on Christmas Eve, a teenage runaway on the streets saves a stray cat from abuse. The cat helps her in return.

Mistress of the Shadow Hounds {paranormal romance} (originally published in Halloween Treasures, A Jewels of the Quill Halloween Anthology) © September 2010; 978-1-60313-569-6 (trade paperback); 978-1-60313-570-2 (electronic)

A sinister artifact handed down in her family forces a young woman into conflict with creatures from an alien dimension that threaten not only her life but the safety of the entire world.

Birthday Gift {horror} (originally published in Sepulchre, periodical) © 1999

A divorced mother meets with her estranged teenage daughter to pass on the secret of their not-quite-human heritage. Gift or curse?

The Wrong Hands? {fantasy} (originally published in Sorcerous Signals, periodical) © November 2010

An expert thief reluctantly accepts a job from a possibly evil wizard to save her brother’s life. But it’s never a good idea to steal from your old mentor, especially if he’s also a powerful sorcerer.

Beast Lord’s Captive {fantasy} (originally published in Sorcerous Signals, periodical) © November 2009

A sorceress goes on a mission to save a young noblewoman kidnapped by a monster. The swordsman assigned as her partner, though, may not have the purest of motives, and the victim may not want to be rescued.

Mercy {horror} (originally published in The Darkest Thirst: A Vampire Anthology)  Design Image Group, © January 1998

In Dark Ages England, a young mother in labor falls victim to a bandit with a demonic reputation. When she wakes up, she has to dig her way out of a grave, and her baby has been abandoned to die. She must try to save him while struggling with her strange new powers and cravings.

Fantasia Quest {fantasy romance} Exclusive to this volume!

Invited to beta test a cutting-edge virtual reality sword-and-sorcery game, so realistic it feels like being there in the flesh, Carrie sees the project as a way to improve her chance of getting a job with the company that invented the VR system. She wants to leave her current job at a hospital because it holds too many memories of her late fiancé, a doctor at the same hospital. Her partner in the game, known to her only as Rolf Shadowbane, is a designer with the game company as well as a long-time e-mail friend of hers. She’s attracted to him even though they’ve never met in real life, but she shies away from opening up to another man after the traumatic loss of her fiance. When both she and Rolf get trapped inside the game, the crisis pushes their relationship to a new level.

Borderline Magic {fantasy, in collaboration with Leslie Roy Carter} Exclusive to this volume! A stand-alone story in our Wild Sorceress world. Kalara, desperately eager to train as a sorceress, fails the test for magic twice, with her talent pronounced borderline. She recklessly decides to leave home and take her future into her own hands.

Author’s Foreword

Ever since I started reading horror fiction at the age of twelve, with Dracula, the main focus of my pleasure in horror and fantasy has been probing the viewpoint of the monster and exploring relationships between human and nonhuman beings. Why should a monstrous nature keep a person or creature from having the free will to choose between good and evil? And don’t vampires, werewolves, ghosts, and entities with tentacles need love, too? All the stories in this volume include characters and creatures who aren’t quite normally human (if you count magic-users as apart from ordinary humanity), including some that fall into the monster category.

As for love, only the novellas Mistress of the Shadow Hounds and Fantasia Quest are romances. All the shorter stories, however, also involve various kinds of love or affection: Mother and child (The Unvanished Hitchhiker, Birthday Gift, and Mercy); sister and brother (The Wrong Hands?); a potential romantic pairing seen through the eyes of a would-be rescuer (Beast Lord’s Captive); grandmother and granddaughter as well as girl and cat (Little Cat Feet); devotion to the sorcerous arts (Borderline Magic).

For more tales of love among the monsters, please visit Carter’s Crypt. If you’ve previously read some of my vampire fiction, please note that the undead in Mercy belong to the traditional type, not the vampire species in most of my stories and novels. If you haven’t encountered the latter before, you can find out about them under the Vanishing Breed link on my site: http://www.margaretlcarter.com

THE UNVANISHED HITCHHIKER

The six-foot-tall werewolf and his chalky-faced vampire girlfriend in a flowing white gown trudged down the driveway with their pillowcases full of candy.

It’s after nine, Leah Trent said, watching them leave. They should be the last, shouldn’t they? Teenagers, you’d think they’d feel embarrassed to go trick-or-treating. She shook her head in wry amusement and glanced at Alice Wade, who sat on the couch with her fingers entwined in her lap.

Yes, that’s probably all we’ll get. Her voice quavered. She cast sidelong looks at the front door, the shadows under her eyes making her appear older than her fifty-some years. 

Leah took off the black cardboard witch’s hat and plastic cape she’d worn over her jeans and blouse all evening. Then I guess I should turn off the porch light.

No, don’t! The tone of shrill urgency startled Leah.

Puzzled, she peered through the open door at the deserted street. She hadn’t expected as many visitors as they’d actually received, on this dead-end lane away from the center of town, with houses isolated in their spacious yards. Wood smoke from a neighbor’s chimney scented the air despite the weather, warm for the end of October in Maryland. Maybe the kids had ranged farther than usual because of the clear, mild evening, not at all a spooky Halloween. Only a tangle of overgrown trees on a vacant lot across the street lent an atmospheric touch to the view. Again, she wondered why Alice had asked her to spend the night. For protection against rowdy pranksters? Leah hadn’t seen any.

After closing the door and fastening the chain, she took a seat on the couch next to her friend and picked up her cooling cup of mint tea from the coffee table. Want to watch something on TV?

Go ahead, if you want to. Alice’s eyes, behind the glasses that looked oversized on her thin face, flickered toward the door again, as if she were waiting for someone despite what she’d said. I usually sit up and just read or something for a couple more hours. She opened a magazine and flipped through it seemingly at random, her head with its frizzy halo of straw-colored hair bent over the pages. 

Maybe she was afraid out here by herself. Leah didn’t mind staying over, since her husband’s reserve unit was deployed, leaving her no reason to hang around her own house. Still, she couldn’t help wondering. A colleague at the library where she worked and Alice volunteered had mentioned that Alice’s daughter had died on a Halloween several years past. She’d also said, though, that she’d never known Alice to ask anybody to stay with her on this night before.

I wonder what’s changed? At thirty-one, Leah, having no children yet, couldn’t pretend to understand the stages of grief involved in losing a teenage daughter. She switched on the TV with the remote and clicked through the channels to a black-and-white vampire film on the classic movie network. Not that it’s any of my business. She asked me to keep her company, not be nosy.  Is this okay with you?

After a moment’s blank stare at the screen, Alice said, Sure. Just don’t turn it up too high, please.

Watching the other woman out of the corner of her eye, Leah got the impression she was listening for something. Now and then she tilted her head as if straining to pick up sounds over the movie’s dialogue. When a car roared past outside, Alice jumped. Several times Leah considered asking what preyed on her mind but decided against it.

The doorbell rang at about quarter to eleven. Alice drew in a hissing breath. Her left hand crumpled a page of the magazine. She darted another glance at the door but didn’t move.

When the bell rang again, Leah said, Would you like me to get that? Alice responded with a rapid, jerky nod.

With the chain still attached, Leah opened the door just far enough to peek out.

The wind had picked up, lending a slight chill to the night, although the half-moon still shone in a clear sky. Dry leaves skittered along the sidewalk. A man stood on the porch holding a length of crimson fabric. Sorry to bother you, he said, but when I dropped off your daughter just now, she left this in the car.

Daughter? Leah shook her head. You must have the wrong address.

Then maybe that girl was visiting here? He thrust the garment he carried through the crack between door and frame. His hand trembled. Anyway, this was the house where she told me to stop, no doubt about that. I have to get going.

Automatically closing her fingers on the piece of cloth, which she noticed was wet, Leah murmured a confused thanks. The man scurried down the driveway to the car he’d left running at the curb.

For a second the air felt icy cold. With a fleeting shiver, Leah closed the door. When she turned toward Alice, the other woman was clutching the edge of the couch cushion like a slippery ledge from which she was afraid of falling.

It’s nothing, Leah said, just somebody who had the wrong address. He left this before I could make him take it back. She held up the cloth. A silky cashmere shawl.

He? Alice whispered. A man?

Yes, just some guy who was lost, I guess. She sat down, watching Alice with concern.

No, he wasn’t lost. She took the shawl and pressed it to her cheek. I thought with another person here it might turn out different. I thought she might come herself this time.

She? What’s going on? Do you know this man? Were you expecting him?

Not him, specifically. But I knew somebody would show up. And I knew he’d bring this. She rubbed the loosely knitted material between her fingers. If only I could at least keep it. But it always vanishes overnight, even if I fall asleep holding it.

Alice, what are you talking about? Leah was starting to wonder if her friend was mentally unhinged.

With a weary sigh, Alice said, I’ll tell you about it. You’ll think I'm crazy, though.

Wincing at this inadvertent echo of her own thoughts, Leah shook her head. Of course I won’t.

I haven’t talked to anybody about it since my husband left. She wrung the shawl between her hands. A few drops of water trickled from it. You probably heard I had a teenage daughter who died.

Yes. I’m sorry.

Joanne was seventeen. We had a fight, actually a marathon series of fights, about the boy she was going with. I knew all along he was bad news. Her lips tightened. Her dad and I ordered her to stop seeing him. I even took away the bracelet he gave her. She disobeyed us and sneaked out to meet him at a Halloween party. He drove her home drunk. It was raining hard. The car crashed on a curve about a mile from here. You know the one?

Leah nodded. Every town had at least one dead man’s curve, and the main drag into this neighborhood had earned that nickname.

The boy was killed instantly. Joanne fell into a coma she never woke up from. She died on the third night after.

I’m sorry, Leah whispered again. She couldn’t think of anything else to say.

She took my shawl for her gypsy costume, without permission. This one. She held up the twisted length of fabric. Out of spite, I think, because I confiscated that bracelet.

Before Leah managed to stifle her reaction, she knew her friend must have noticed the look of horror and pity on her face. 

Don’t worry, you won’t offend me if you decide I’ve lost my mind. My husband had the same idea. That’s why he left. After the second year, he couldn’t handle what he called my obsession. Alice’s eyes glazed over for a few seconds. It started on the anniversary of Joanne’s death. A strange woman came to the door with this shawl and claimed a girl she’d picked up had left it in her car.

Didn’t it occur to you that she was hoaxing you?

Of course, Alice said in a sharper tone. I may or may not be crazy, but I’m not stupid.

Leah murmured an apology, which the older woman waved away. Naturally that was the first thing I thought of, though I didn’t know anybody who hated me enough to play such a cruel trick. Later it crossed my mind that it might be somebody’s weird idea of comfort, maybe one of Joanne’s friends, but when I asked around, I came up blank. Besides, I didn’t really believe any of them would do anything that brainless, let alone get an adult to go along with it.

What about the shawl? Where was the real one all that time?

This is the real one. Alice’s bleak stare challenged Leah to doubt her. Originally, it must have been ruined in the crash, because I never got it back. Impounded as evidence or thrown away by the—the coroner or the mortician, maybe. This one isn’t just a look-alike, though. It has a flaw in one corner, see? She thrust the shawl at Leah, who noticed the patch of irregular weave immediately. Who’d go to all the trouble to make three new duplicates for six years in a row?

Three?

Alice let the garment fall into her lap. She tries to get home on Halloween night and the two nights after. The three nights she lingered between life and death.

And you say the shawl just vanishes overnight every time?

Alice nodded. I’m not worried that you’ll call the men in white coats on me. Even my husband didn’t do that, though he tried to get me to see a therapist. When the same thing happened the second year, I knew it wasn’t a trick. He wouldn’t consider for an instant that it could be real.

So he left? Leah knew the loss of a child sometimes drove bereaved parents apart instead of drawing them together, but she still had trouble imagining a man who would desert his wife in a crisis like that.

There was more to it, of course, but for him this was the last straw. She sighed and rubbed her eyes beneath her glasses. For each of the three nights every year, I’ve prayed this would be the time she’d come all the way home. It never happened. This year the calendar’s cycled around to the same day of the week when the accident happened. I thought if I had another person in the house as a witness, my daughter might make it home. I should have known it wouldn’t be that simple.

Have you tried looking for her—out there? Leah could hardly believe she heard herself talking as if this tale were true.

Yes, of course I thought of that. On Halloween of the third year I cruised up and down the road for most of the night. She never appeared. Ten minutes after I gave up and went home, that year’s messenger came to the door. She took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. She hasn’t forgiven me.

Guilt-induced insanity, Leah thought. How could someone who functioned so well in everyday life be so disconnected from reality that she’d persuade or pay an accomplice to show up at her door with a prop to provide concrete support for her delusion? What else could explain that detail?

Would you let me do something? Leah asked hesitantly. She had to help if she could. She owed Alice that much for the friendship she’d offered when Leah’s husband had been shipped overseas so soon after their move to this area. Could I keep the shawl for you tonight?

Alice said with a thin smile, Think you can disprove my crazy story that way? And then I’ll get psychiatric help so I can move on? I know you mean well, but it won’t work. Go ahead, though. She held out the crimson shawl.

Leah accepted it, letting the smooth fabric slide through her fingers. Thanks for trusting me.

We might as well go to bed. Nothing else is going to happen tonight.

Once she’d put on her nightgown in the guest room, Leah locked the door and folded the shawl under her pillow, regardless of the wet spot it left on the sheet. When she woke in the predawn darkness to visit the bathroom, the garment was still there. She carried it with her across the hall and back.  Just as I thought. Alice made it appear and vanish all along. She silently laughed at herself for wasting one second on the notion of a genuine haunting. Not that she thought her friend was fooling her deliberately. Alice’s grief made it clear that she believed her own story. Leah drifted back to sleep with her hand tucked under the pillow, touching the shawl.

When she woke a couple of hours later, it was gone.

She blinked in the sparkling autumn sunlight filtered through the branches outside the window. How could Alice have possibly sneaked the thing out of the bedroom without waking her?

Leah followed the aroma of coffee to the kitchen and sat down, snagging half of a cinnamon bagel from a plate in the middle of the table and spreading cream cheese on it. She mumbled a greeting to Alice, unable to think of anything coherent to say.

It’s gone, isn’t it?

Leah nodded, staring into her coffee cup.

And you think I took it somehow, don’t you? How? Drugged your tea? Alice gave a brittle laugh. Well, I can’t blame you. I’d believe the same thing in your place.

After choking down a quick breakfast, Leah made an excuse to leave. She feared she wouldn’t be able to have a relaxed conversation with Alice for a long time.

* * * *

On the way home and off and on through the day, Leah mulled over the events of the night before. She searched the library’s newspaper files for a report of the accident. The article confirmed what Alice had told her. It included a high school picture of Joanne Wade, a girl with a heart-shaped face and long, blonde hair.

By evening, Leah decided she had to try the one experiment that might settle whether Joanne’s spirit actually lurked along that road. Or, rather, prove it didn’t. Leah clung to the conviction that any other solution to the mystery was more likely than a supernatural one. She had to uncover the truth, to cram her own world view back into its orderly box as well as to help Alice. Putting on her jacket at eight that night, she debated whether to tell Alice what she planned. No, she decided. The test wouldn’t be valid if the dead girl’s mother knew about it.

The chilly, damp evening felt more like Halloween than the previous night had. Leah suppressed a shiver as she stepped outside and ordered herself not to expect anything but hours of boredom. 

She drove the few miles to Alice’s neighborhood, prepared to cruise back and forth along the curved stretch of road where the accident had happened. With a light rain sprinkling the windshield, she turned the wipers on at the lowest speed. Tuning the radio to the local oldies station, she crept along the street to the site of the crash. There was nothing to see, of course, certainly not a dead girl waiting for a ride. The lighting was poor, with lampposts widely spaced. She repeatedly drove around the curve, stopped before she came within sight of Alice’s house, then made a U-turn and retraced the route. She encountered few other cars. Her eyes began to ache from squinting through the raindrops at the splintered beams of the headlights.

Over an hour passed before she glimpsed the girl standing on the shoulder. Dressed in a long skirt and peasant blouse, with a necklace that sparkled in the headlights, she waved at the car. Slender, with long, honey-blonde hair, she matched the photo in the newspaper.

Leah slammed on the brakes. Her heart leaped. Lightheaded, she gulped a deep breath. A second later, her pulse slowed as rational thought took over. It’s a scam, of course, even if it doesn’t seem to have any sensible motive. This teenager had copied Joanne’s hairstyle and