Her Blood Ran Cold
The final chapter from Thorne: The Withering Shore.
Welcome to the sixth and final chapter for Thorne: The Withering Shore.
But Thorne’s story doesn’t end here, so stay tuned for more adventures.
Thorne: The Withering Shore
I was always told that the day belonged to us but the night belongs to them. It was never a truth I wanted to unfurl but all paths are leading me there, down to the pier at the end of the line. Down to the darkness that bleeds into the withering shore.
Chapter Six - Her Blood Ran Cold
Thorne woke in the warehouse on the pier. Her last moments swimming back in a haze. She had tracked Alina down to stop her from opening the door. She thought that she had found her alone but then Yasmin had knocked her out cold.
When she opened her eyes it was dark - how long had she been out?
Thorne didn’t know what she was expecting, a crowd of people? A faceless hoard of black capes and masks? But when the room came into focus, she found three people watching. She recognised them all.
Yasmin Knox.
Brian Ellison.
And, of course, Alina Bray.
Yasmin was still holding the piece of wood that she used to strike Thorne down. Threatening her to make a move against them. But Thorne couldn’t even try. Her head was throbbing from where she had been struck and it took all her strength just to focus. Her wrists had been bound and hung above her on a meat hook. Her toes where just grazing the floor. She couldn’t help but groan as she looked down to find that they had set her in the centre of the Artach.
Shit.
That can’t be good.
'There she is,' said Alina.
‘That’s the second time you’ve tried to kill me,’ said Thorne.
‘And yet, here you are,’ said Alina, as if this was all part of her plan. As if she wanted Thorne to find her.
Thorne tried to loosen the rope on her wrists but she was tied tighter than she would have guessed Alina capable of.
‘Rose, darling. I spend my summers on yachts - if I didn’t know how to tie a knot I would be an idiot. You don’t think I’m that stupid, do you?’ She didn’t. She had never believed Alina to be dumb but even clever people make mistakes. She was more concerned that her intelligence was getting in the way of seeing the bigger picture.
They weren’t playing things that shouldn’t be touched.
‘You don’t know what’s on the other side,’ said Thorne. ‘I do. I’ve seen it. You don’t want to do this.’
‘Yes, I do. Besides I have something that you didn’t.’ Alina pulled out a book, no larger than the size of her hand. From a distance, Thorne could see that the pages were yellowed with age and the covering leather was cracked and peeling. ‘You gave me the means. But I found the words years ago. Then all I had to do was wait. I had to be sure that what I was doing would work. I wanted Alice to open the door but I made do with you. With your sacrifice.’
‘So you are going to kill me?’
‘Sacrifice is always a dramatic word. These things need blood and sacrifice is just the blood of someone else. Yasmin tried with a dog but that didn’t work and when Brian tried to open the door he used his own. But sadly, that didn’t work either. Then you came sauntering through the door - saved us time finding someone else. And this will be nice and poetic, don’t you think?’
‘I think we’re all about to die but I doubt that will stop you.’
She opened the book and started reading. The words were in a language that Thorne didn’t understand. It sounded almost like Latin but she couldn’t place the words. She had nearly forgotten that Yasmin and Brian were in the room but their voices joined in the chorus. Something shifted deep inside Thorne as she listened, a sadness that was overwhelming.
It was going to work.
Alina closed the book and walked to Thorne, careful not to smudge any of the Artach that surrounded her.
‘Alina, please,’ said Thorne. ‘Don’t do this.’ She didn’t hesitate. She drew her knife and cut Thorne across the arm, blade following bone. The blood flowed fast and fresh, falling to the ground and marking the Artach. Thorne couldn’t help but cry out in pain but Alina paid her no notice. She was watching the ground, waiting for something. An earthquake? A siren of trumpets? Some sort of signal that her plan had worked.
But it would never sound like that. The first time they opened the door, it was quiet. Luring them into thinking that it was a good idea to open it at all.
Alina grew impatient and cut Thorne down so that her blood would fall directly onto the mark. She landed with a thump and when nothing changed, Alina stood over Thorne and screamed: ‘Where is it?’
A low bellow answered her call. Alina’s eyes lit up with excitement but when Thorne had opened the door it had been silent. Which meant that the words that they had spoke had called something else to greet them.
Thorne looked to the tip of the Artach and found the door. She recognised the familiar gleen of the world next to her own. The slight mirage of the beyond that mimicked where they stood. And in the centre of the door she found the yellow gaze of the bellowing monster staring right back.
Thorne dragged her attention away from its gaze and saw that its body was covered in scales like a snake. Even though its head was completely still its body wavered behind it, readying itself to strike. It had lowered its ears against its pointed skull so it could get closer to the door and bared its glistening teeth as it bellowed again. The sound reverberated through Thorne’s body, pinning her in place.
‘The Krakos,’ said Alina in awe.
‘We did it,’ said Yasmin and Brian laughed in reply. A maniacal call of someone who only just started to believe that it would work now that he could see it with his own eyes.
Alina stood tall, faced the monster through the door and boomed: ‘Krakos, you belong to me now. You will do as I bid.’
Its body stopped moving as if at attention, seemingly waiting for her command. As its gaze locked onto Alina’s, its arm shot out towards Brian. It cracked through the door like a whip and wrapped its hand around his face, smothering his laugh that had wretched into fear.
‘What the - ‘ Started Yasmin and a second arm whipped through the door, silencing her.
‘That’s enough!’ Shouted Alina but the Krakos answered to no one. Thorne groaned as she rolled onto her stomach, determined to crawl away. There was no stopping this but Alina was still trying. Uselessly pleading with it as it dragged her two comrades through the door.
‘I made the sacrifice. I opened the door. I told you to stop!’ Shouted Alina desperately as it unhinged its jaws and consumed Yasmin and Brian whole.
Alina abandoned her knife, drew a gun and fired. The bullets flew through the door only to pass through the Krakos liked smoke. She couldn’t stop it.
‘Shit,’ she breathed as her blood ran cold. In a last desperate attempt she turned to run. She didn’t make a step before the Krakos grabbed her and yanked her through the door.
It all happened so fast that time seemed to slow down, as if the fabric of the world was struggling to catch up to itself to contain the breach.
Thorne looked back to see the limbs of the Krakos coming through the door to claim her as its final target. She could see it shedding its scaly skin as it stretched into a hand with fingers reaching towards her. She could hear the flesh tearing apart and stitching back together as it grew closer and closer.
Thorne wanted to hide.
She had spent her life learning to hide. She could build the illusion around her and become invisible to prying eyes. But she had lost too much blood already. She could barely keep her eyes focused on the Krakos. It would reach her. It would take her like the others.
She was about to die.
She resigned herself to her fate and closed her eyes. The limbs of the Krakos grew longer and she felt a wet spray against her skin as it gripped her neck like a viper and squeezed. It pulled her across the ground, dragging her forward.
Her body smudged the lines of the Artach and the Krakos screamed as the door began to close.
Thorne strained her eyes open, the glimmer of the door was shrinking but its yellow eyes were open wide with fury. Saliva dripping down its jowls, ready to swallow Thorne whole.
Even with the door closing, she was going to lose.
It all happened so fast.
She closed her eyes against it once more when a hand grabbed the back of her coat and pulled, struggling against the grip of the Krakos. Thorne couldn’t tell if it was one hand or many but they were holding her back from the door.
Then a voice spoke, strained from holding her back:
‘I thought we agreed to stay away from this shit!’ Thorne recognised the voice but couldn’t place it. She thought that she was alone and done for but they were trying to save her.
‘Help,’ she whispered, her breath strangled from the grip of the Krakos.
‘I’m trying!’ They snapped, pulling uselessly at Thorne’s coat. ‘Wait - ‘ Thorne felt them let go. She tried to scream but the Krakos beat her to it.
A loud, piercing wale sounded around them as black blood sprayed in all directions. Its grip loosened around her neck and Thorne fell free as the limbs of the beast flailed.
She watched her rescuer holding the piece of wood that Yasmin had used to knock her out, only now it was being used to stab the Krakos. She seemed to move faster than time itself as she appeared at different parts of its body in a blink to stab it again and again.
The screams of her rescuer raged against the Krakos until a final blow sent it back through the shrinking door where it finally shut. When the door was closed they turned back to Thorne and knelt before her. They pulled back the hood of their jacket and Thorne saw a face that she hadn’t seen in ten years.
Not since the last time they had opened the door.
‘Alice?’ said Thorne before she passed out for the third time that day.
Thorne woke in the warehouse alone. There was no sign of the door or the clever idiots that had opened it. No sign of the Krakos or of Alice who had saved her.
Her head throbbed still from where she had been struck but her arm had been cleaned and bandaged.She felt her other wounds and found them the same. She had been cared for while she was passed out. But there was no one around to thank.
Her blood still marked the floor along with the remnants of the Artach. She found a note scrolled on a card next to a bottle of water and an aspirin.
‘You owe me one.’ - A
Her number was printed on the other side. A phone call for another day. Thorne tossed back the aspirin and gingerly got to her feet. Audrey would be furious; the insurance claim would be a nightmare. But Thorne tossed that thought aside into a bucket of who-gives-a-shit. The nightmare was over before it had a chance to any damage to those who didn’t deserve it.
Now it was time to go home and maybe pour a stiff drink to ease the pain.
She hobbled back through the warehouse where she found the collection of cars waiting for her. All abandoned by their owners against their will as they waited on the other side of nowhere.
Thorne recognised Alina’s Porsche and found the keys in her bag that had been tossed onto the passenger seat. She grabbed what she needed and dumped the bag itself on the ground.
Thorne considered them square as she took control of the car and the engine roared to life. She had survived another encounter with the Artach and the Krakos that it called. There would be others, she supposed. Idiots that stumbled upon the same passage that inspired Alina. But she would face that problem when she came to it.
She drove home from the warehouse in search of a drink and on days like this she reached for something a little higher on the shelf.
Thorne: The Withering Shore is the latest fiction project for verse. While this is the end of The Withering Shore, Thorne’s story doesn’t end here. Make sure you’re subscribed so that you don’t miss a sentence.
