The Awakening Evil (2 page)

I hope you are as happy in your new life as I am in mine. I think of you often, and wonder how you are enjoying your travels. I miss you so much.

I haven't made any friends here yet. I had tea with a woman named Liza Teasedale, but she's a horrible gossip. All she wanted to do was tell me awful stories about the Fear family. She claims—

 

Bang!
The bedroom door flew open. Sarah gasped.

Thomas stood in the doorway, grinning at her.

“You're home!” Sarah cried. She felt so glad to see him. She wished they had more time to spend together. They had been married six whole months. Yet she sometimes felt as if she did not know Thomas any better than she did that first day they met.

“I have a surprise for you,” Thomas told her. “Michael!” he called. “Margaret! You can come in now!”

A loud clatter of footsteps erupted like gunfire in
the hallway. In raced Thomas's niece and nephew. They wore overcoats, and their caps were tied tightly under their chins.

“Aunt Sarah! Uncle Thomas says we can go rollerskating!” Michael cried. He grabbed her hand and gave it a squeeze. “Can we? Can we?”

“Oh, please say we can go,” Margaret squealed. She tugged on Sarah's other hand. The little girl bounced up and down so hard that her blond sausage curls shook wildly.

Sarah laughed. Such darling children. She hugged them both to her.

Thomas's eyes shone with excitement. “I kidnapped them from my sister's house,” he explained.

“But I thought you had to go to the bank,” Sarah said. She stared at her husband. He constantly surprised her. He had never shown much interest in his niece and nephew. But now he seemed eager to take them on an outing.

“Didn't you warn me that business would make you late today?” she asked.

“Nonsense,” he scoffed. “The bank can take care of itself. The roller-skating rink is the place I must go.”

Michael and Margaret pulled Sarah in circles. Thomas appeared almost as excited as they were.

“I would love to go roller-skating,” Sarah told them. “We had a roller-skating rink in the town where I grew up. There wasn't another one for miles and miles and miles. Now it seems as if no place is without one.”

“Hurray!” the children yelled. They tugged Sarah
out of the room and down the stairs. She stopped to put on her cloak, and then they all ran outside to the carriage.

“Faster, Uncle Thomas, faster!” Michael and Margaret yelled as the carriage rumbled down the bumpy road. They leaped to the ground the moment Thomas brought the horses to a stop near the rink.

“The rink is crowded for a weekday,” Sarah commented as she and Thomas strolled after the children. Men in suits and women in long dresses with bustles in back skated round and around in big, slow circles.

Sarah put on a pair of skates, then helped Margaret with hers. Thomas tied double knots in Michael's laces. Then they joined the other skaters in the rink.

The four of them skated in a row: Thomas and Sarah in the middle, with the children on either end. Margaret had a little trouble staying on her feet. But Sarah was a strong skater, and she helped the little girl keep her balance.

“Beautiful children, sir,” an old man with a bushy gray beard called out. He waved at them from his spot against the rink's wooden railing.

Thomas nodded his head. “Thank you!” he replied proudly.

Thomas glanced at Sarah, eyes twinkling. He moved closer and whispered in her ear. “I do believe that soon we should be starting a family of our own.”

Children! Sarah couldn't wait to have a family. She would love to have children running through
that big, empty house of theirs. Laughing and yelling.

But Thomas had never seemed interested in starting a family before now. He changed the subject every time she brought it up.

“Don't you agree?” Thomas asked.

“Yes,” she whispered back. “Yes! Yes! With all my heart.” She squeezed his hand.

It was a perfect moment. Better than perfect. She had never felt so close to Thomas.

“Why are you blushing, Aunt Sarah?” Margaret asked. Her blue eyes were wide with curiosity.

“Am I blushing?” Sarah asked.

Thomas grabbed Michael's hands and spun the boy in a big slow circle. Michael squealed with delight.

“Faster, Uncle!” he urged. “Spin me faster.”

“Faster? You say you want to go faster?” Thomas picked up speed. Around and around Michael went, grinning with excitement.

“Oh, spin me too!” Margaret begged Sarah.

“In a moment,” Sarah answered. “Thomas,” she warned. “Not so fast!”

Michael's face had turned pale. He uttered a long, low cry.

“Thomas!” Sarah called. “What are you doing? You're frightening him. Thomas! Stop!”

Thomas's eyes glittered. His mouth twisted in a crazy grin. He spun Thomas harder. And harder.

What was wrong with him? Sarah had to stop him now. Before Michael got hurt.

But she couldn't get close enough. He was spinning too fast. Sarah felt dizzy watching him.

“Thomas! You're too near the wall!” she yelled.

Several other skaters had stopped to watch. She could see them out of the corner of her eye. All staring.

Thomas swung the boy so hard his skates were lifted from the wooden floor of the rink.

Sarah heard gasps from the people surrounding her. Then she heard another sound. A horrible sound. The sound of Thomas laughing.

Thomas let go of Michael's hands.

“Nooo!” Sarah screamed.

Michael flew into the air. His head hit the wooden railing with a terrible
crack!

M
ichael crumpled to the ground.

“He's dead! Michael is dead!” Margaret wailed.

Sarah skated over to the rail. She pushed her way through the crowd, and stared down at Michael's body. Still. So still.

“Get a doctor!” someone shouted.

Sarah knelt beside Michael. She grabbed one of his hands in both of hers. It felt cold.

Someone crouched next to Sarah. She glanced over, and saw Thomas. He stared down at Michael—and smiled.

Sarah grabbed Thomas by the shoulders and shook him hard. “Thomas! Thomas! How could you do this?” she shrieked.

He stared at her as if he had never seen her before in his life.

“Thomas, what is happening?” Sarah cried.

He blinked rapidly. He shook his head as if he were coming out of a daze.

“Michael!” Thomas wrapped the little boy in his arms and rocked him back and forth.

And then Sarah heard the most wonderful sound. Michael began to moan.

♦ ♦ ♦

“It is simply a crime that you have not come to see me sooner,” Liza Teasedale rasped in her scratchy, old voice. “I enjoyed our last tea party so much.” She ushered Sarah into the drawing room.

She grasped Sarah's arm with surprising firmness as she guided her across the plush Persian carpet. “How many times have I invited you to see me since then, my child? Three? Four?”

“Oh, I hope I have not passed up as many invitations as that,” Sarah said. “If I have, I must beg you to excuse my rudeness.” She sat down at the small table across from Mrs. Teasedale.

A maid brought in a silver tray piled high with steaming johnnycakes and set it in front of them. She couldn't seem to stop staring at Sarah.

“Thank you, Regina,” Mrs. Teasedale said curtly, “that will be all.”

Lowering her gaze, the maid hurried from the room. But not without another quick glance at Sarah.

This happened wherever she went. Most people in
town were fascinated by the Fear family. Fascinated and frightened.

She'd overheard a few whispered comments about how dangerous the Fears were. How evil.

She never believed them. Until the day at the roller-skating rink.

Now she wasn't sure. Thomas behaved so strangely that day. Sarah didn't want to believe he would intentionally hurt Michael. But she couldn't forget how Thomas smiled as the little boy lay motionless on the ground.

Sarah wanted to know more about the Fear family. She wanted to hear every rumor, every story. She needed to know if anything could explain what Thomas did to Michael.

That was why Sarah had come to visit Mrs. Teasedale. The woman had been eager to tell her strange stories about the Fears on their last visit. But Sarah kept changing the subject. This time she would encourage Mrs. Teasedale to talk.

“Um, I suppose you heard about my nephew, Michael,” Sarah said.

It had been several days since the … the accident. But she couldn't shake the images from her mind. Michael hitting the wall. Michael lying so still. And Thomas smiling down at him.

Later Thomas told her he felt paralyzed when he was swinging Michael. He said he felt as if he had no control over his own body. But how could that be?

“Yes, what a horrible thing,” Mrs. Teasedale murmured.
She leaned across the table and laid a hand across Sarah's. “Is he all right?”

“He is fine, I am deeply relieved to say,” Sarah told her.

“And how are
you?”
the widow asked. “I worry about you terribly, you know.”

Sarah felt her stomach tighten into a knot. “You do? Why?”

I came to visit Mrs. Teasedale because she knows so much, Sarah thought. But now that I am here, I feel almost frightened to hear what she will say.

“Living alone in that big castle of a house.”

“I'm not alone,” Sarah replied, forcing a smile. “I have Thomas.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Teasedale said quietly. “That is better than being alone … I suppose.”

What was she hinting at? Sarah wondered helplessly. How could she find out what Mrs. Teasedale knew?

“You must be a brave and bold young woman,” Mrs. Teasedale said, clucking her tongue.

“What do you mean?” Sarah asked.

“To marry a man you had never even met.”

“I suppose so,” Sarah agreed.

Her gaze drifted briefly to the window behind Mrs. Teasedale. In the distance she glimpsed the turrets of her own home. She shivered.

Sarah took a swallow of hot tea. “Actually, Mrs. Teasedale, besides paying a social call, there is something I wanted to ask you.”

“Oh?” Mrs. Teasedale studied Sarah with shrewd eyes.

Sarah forced herself to go on. “On our last visit, you began to tell me something of, uh … my husband's family. I wondered if you would mind telling me more about the Fears.”

Mrs. Teasedale took a sip of tea. “Mrs. Fear,” she finally said, “have you ever asked yourself why Thomas Fear, a rich and handsome young man, would arrange a marriage with a woman from another town? A woman he had never met? Surely you can see that there is only one possible explanation for such a strange event.”

“And what explanation is that?” Sarah asked. Her voice had become almost a whisper. For Mrs. Teasedale was asking a question she had asked herself many times.

Mrs. Teasedale smiled sadly. “No woman from these parts would have him. And do you know why?”

Sarah set down her teacup. Her hand shook. Hot tea sloshed onto her skin. But Sarah hardly felt it.

“Why?” Sarah whispered. Now she would learn the truth. Now she would learn the secrets Thomas had been keeping from her.

“The Fear family is cursed,” Mrs. Teasedale answered.

Sarah opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.

“Some people say that hundreds of years ago a Fear had a young girl burned at the stake. The Fears
managed to convince the whole town that she practiced the dark arts. But she was innocent. The girl's family put a curse on the Fears, a curse that is still strong and powerful.”

Mrs. Teasedale's eyes were bright with excitement.

She's enjoying herself, Sarah realized. She's enjoying telling me these horrible things. What an awful woman.

“Others claim that the Fears practice the dark arts themselves. That they have brought suffering, madness … and death into the lives of too many people to count.”

Sarah squeezed her eyes shut. Then she forced herself to open them and look at Mrs. Teasedale. “Go on,” she said.

“I do not know if the stories about the dark arts are true. Or if there was a girl who was burned. But I firmly believe the entire family is cursed. And that evil follows them.”

Mrs. Teasedale reached across the table and took Sarah's hands. Sarah could feel the old woman's fingers shaking.

“And I also firmly believe if you do not leave that house, you will die there before much time has passed.”