by
Walter Lazo
ISBN 978-1476106434
Published by Lazo Consumer Products, LLC. for WerewolfWinter.com at Smashwords
Copyright © 2012-2022 Lazo Consumer Products, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
The kids arrived at the gates of the old mansion after ten, way past the time they should have been out. There were three of them: two girls, both 14, and a boy, 12. The two girls were Jenni and Michelle, best friends; the boy was Tommy, Jenni’s little brother whom she was babysitting. They were here, at the old mansion, because of a curious website Jenni and Michelle had recently found called ElvenLore. In it they had discovered that elves really walk the earth, but only once every three hundred years. If the calculations offered on the website were correct, tonight was going to be very special. Jenni and Michelle couldn’t believe how lucky they were; not only was tonight the special night, but it was going to happen here and not in some obscure faraway place. They were going to get to see elves!
“Wait til we tell them at school what we seen,” said Jenni in a giddy voice, shaking with excitement.
“I know,” said Michelle, giggling. “I brought my camera for proof.”
Of course, Tommy felt left out in all this. Tonight was the first time he had heard about elves, and he did not want to see any stupid elves. He wanted to be home, lying snuggly in his bed, asleep.“Wait til we tell them at school what we seen,” said Jenni in a giddy voice, shaking with excitement.
Most definitely he did not want to be out at night past his bed time. If Mom and Dad found out, they would throw a fit, and he would get it too, even though none of it was his fault.
Today was Mom and Dad’s anniversary, their one night of the year when they would stay out late, and they trusted Jenni to babysit, something that they had never done before. Obviously, Jenni couldn’t be trusted. And that word babysitting, Tommy hated it. He did not see himself as a baby. Well, the point was that the first time Mom and Dad had trusted Jenni with responsibility she had totally taken advantage of it. And for what? To see stupid elves.
“Why couldn’t you just have left me home?” he whined, stomping his feet.
“Oh, stop being such a baby,” said Jenni, rolling her eyes.
“I’m not a baby!” screamed Tommy, his eyes bulging, threatening to pop out of his head.
“Be quiet, you two,” hissed Michelle. “Tommy,” she said, turning towards him and offering that kind smile that always worked on him,
“you’re going to remember this night forever. If we had left you behind, you would never forgive us. Isn’t that true?”
Tommy was still sullen but had to admit that it was true. He just hated being left out of anything. Had they left him, he would have been complaining all day about it.
“Okay,” he said, “I’ll be good.”
With that bit of drama over, Jenni turned to Michelle and said, “I bet they’re really beautiful.”
Both girls giggled. Tommy was the one who rolled his eyes this time.
“The pictures in the site were so beautiful,” said Michelle, dreamily.
“Ah, they were drawings, not pictures,” said Jenni with a mischievous smile.
“Duh, I know; that was like three hundred years ago. It’s just an expression.”
“I know. I’m just pulling your leg.”“you’re going to remember this night forever. If we had left you behind, you would never forgive us. Isn’t that true?”
Both girls giggled again. Tommy sighed. He could tell it was going to be a rough night.
The three walked up to the gate, prepared to climb over it, and found it unlocked. Michelle became somewhat suspicious.
“That’s kinda weird,” she said.
“What’s weird?” Jenni asked.
“That the gate is unlocked.”
“That’s not weird, it’s just good luck. Come on; let’s go find us a nice spot to hide in.”
The kids opened the gate, stepped inside, looked around, spotted a nice row of bushes on the east side of the mansion facing the front porch at an angle, and hid behind them.
Jenni was exited. This was so cool; and if their timing was correct, the elves would be showing up any minute now. The site said something about our reality being a bridge between the two elven worlds. The opening, whatever it was, opened only once every three hundred years. They were so lucky.
“What if it’s not real?” asked Tommy, ruining her reverie.
“Well,” said Michelle, “no harm, no fault, we’ll just go home and pretend nothing happened.”
Jenni was about to say something, mostly about what a brat Tommy was being, when she heard a sound. Tommy and Michelle heard it too. All three of them went as silent as mice.
Jenni looked at the old mansion, trying to make out were the sound had come from. As she looked, she really paid attention to the mansion for the first time and noticed how spooky it was. Funny how she hadn’t really noticed it before, even while googling it. It was a big old thing, standing two stories highthree if you counted the Attic. The house was an old Victorian design-Jenni knew this because her mom loved that particular style.
The mansion was in a state of severe neglect; all of its first floor windows had been boarded up, and two out of four columns were missing from the front porch. A full third of the roof tiles were missing, and two windows on the second floor had been broken. The house was painted white, but all the dirt and grime accumulated over the years
gave it a greyish tint. Even so, it was a magnificent behemoth that looked to Jenni as if someone very fond of wizard hats had designed it-or, at least, had designed its roof.
The kids heard a louder sound as of something thumping, thumping. They got very still, straining their eyes to see in the dark. Suddenly, there was a bright purple flash, and a vortex formed in the middle of nothing. Out of the vortex elves poured through.
Jenni and Michelle were positive that they would remember this night as one of the greatest in their liveseven Tommy felt that way.
Though they could not make out the elves’ faces since they had their backs to them, they could see that the elves were tall, had pointy ears, long and beautiful white hair that cascaded down their backs, and wore robes of a variety of subdued colors.
The vortex closed and opened again like an eye blinking, and people came through it-human beings. These were dirty, undernourished, half-naked people, and they were in chains. The elves led their human captives into the old mansion.
The people seemed terrified beyond description.
The kids lost their sense of wonder, and fear crept in. Jenni noticed that Tommy was getting ready to scream. She slapped her hand over his mouth, stifling his scream. The movement, however, attracted the attention of one of the elves. It turned around, and now the kids understood that it was not an elf. What stood before them was a horror beyond their wildest imaginings.
Tommy knew what the thing was but at the moment could not speak, not because Jenni was covering his mouth but because fear overwhelmed him. The thing now sniffing the air with its long sharp nose on its angled face was a vampire. Of course, the teeth did immediately give it away, but so did the rotting grey skin and red eyes. Tommy had seen something like this before in an old movie but could not for the life of him recall the movie’s name.
The vampire sniffed the air some more but could not catch the scent of the kids. Michelle wondered why it could not smell them out—surely, if it had an animal’s sense of smell, it shouldn’t have any trouble sniffing out three frightened children—and then it hit her. The stench of the dirty captive
humans reached her nose, carried by a gentle breeze. It was awful; a smell like of sewage boiled in mustard. No wonder the elf thing could not sense them, even a bloodhound would find it impossible.
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When it did not smell anything it could interpret, the vampire turned and entered the Old Mansion.
After the vampires had all entered into the mansion with their victims, the kids just sat there stunned. They would have stayed like this all night, but Jenni happened at that moment to look at her watch. It was late, almost eleven. Mom and Dad would be home soon. That woke her up. She seized Michelle’s hand—and Michelle grabbed Tommy’s—stood up and quietly led her friend and brother to the gate.
Cautiously and very slowly Jenni opened the gate and led Michelle and Tommy out; then, without bothering to close the gate, Jenni began to run. Michelle and Tommy followed.