The Caldwell Ghost (2 page)

I may have whimpered.

Feximal was delving into his black Gladstone bag. He produced a squat, wide-necked glass bottle which appeared to be full of sand and bits of dried plants.

"
Come here. Stop. Stay there." I stopped a few feet from the mirror as directed, and watched in alarmed confusion as he placed a candelabra by my feet then hastily walked around me, spilling the bottle's contents to form a circle. Pins and rosemary needles stuck out of the white sand.

"
You should be safe now. Do not, under any circumstances, leave or break the circle. Stay still and do not fear, no matter what you see." He gave me another, very swift smile. "Trust me. I shall keep you safe."

I nodded my obedience.
"But what about you?"

"
I'm used to this," Feximal said, and stripped off his coat.

Even in these most unpromising circumstances, I had to look.
There were only a handful of candles left alight now, except for those in the sand circle, and the rest were snuffed out as I watched Simon Feximal disrobe. He removed his plain dark waistcoat, threw down his cravat, and unbuttoned his white shirt.

I swallowed.
"What are you doing?"

He didn
't reply. He didn't have to. As he dropped the shirt, what I saw was answer enough.

He was covered in writing. It was scrawled in black and red ink, from wrist to shoulder of both muscular arms, across his broad, powerful shoulders and chest. None of it was in a language I recognised, or could read, but it was unmistakably writing...
and it was still being written.

I gaped. The lines, some spidery, some looping, still others jagged, etched themselves over his skin, a constant silent chatter of messages.

"What--" My voice failed.

"
The stories write themselves," he said, very matter-of-fact. "I serve as their page."

"
Er..."

"
Ssh," he added, quite kindly. "Try not to worry."

E
asy for him to say.

He stood, stripped to the waist, steepling his hands in an odd, almost prayerful posture in front of his face. He was still and silent for a minute in the dark room, and I could hardly help wondering how far down the writing went, what might be marked on
his powerful thighs and buttocks and even further into forbidden territory.

He
murmured a sentence in a language I did not know, and walked over to the mirror. He looked into it, and I looked too, and I uttered an oath as I saw.

In the mirror, the writing over Simon Feximal
's body was English. Huge angry capitals that looked nothing like the writing I could see on his body. MURDERED, said the reflected capitals, hastily scrawling themselves and sinking into his skin again. INJUSTICE. JAMES. JAMES. PLOT. HATE. UNDONE. UNFINISHED. JAMES. BASTARD.

"
He had a bastard?" I asked breathlessly.

"
I suspect -- that's an -- expletive." Feximal jerked the words out, and I realised his face was lined with strain. "He's -- angry."

The scream
ing came then, so loud and sudden that I leapt like a rabbit. Louder and louder it shrieked, the sound circling us like a gale. Feximal bowed against the force of it, a force I could not feel in my circle, muttering to himself. The moans were back, too, under the screams, and a terrible gibbering laughter, and I had never heard a noise I liked less than those sounds of pleasure, pain, and madness combined in that awful way.

Feximal stood straight, with an obvious effort. The writing on his
skin was frantic, tangling lines of incomprehensible scrawl. The writing I saw in the mirror was all too readable, and I gaped as I saw the words forming on his body in an old-fashioned script:
fuck me suck my cock spread your hole and take it

I
'm quite fond of that sort of literature in its place, but its place was not Feximal's chest. I looked away from the obscenity, and saw instead the portrait on the opposite wall.

My ancestor, Randolph, Lord Caldwell, was smiling at me. Not the faint smile I was familiar with, but a broad, lasciviou
s grin. As I stared at the painting in the mirror, he licked his lips.

"
Feximal!" I yelped, pointing, and the portrait lifted his hand and pointed at me in response. I staggered back, consumed with fear, and as I did, my heel breached the sand circle.

Immediately I was plunged into a vortex. Strange winds howled around me. The screaming was ten times louder, rasping on my nerves and skin like some saw-toothed plant.
I was buffeted by impalpable forces, heard howling in my ears and inside my head. I cried out in sheer terror, and Feximal's strong arms closed around me, pulling me to the shelter of his body, and I heard his voice in my ear, shouting over the unearthly noises. "Quiet, Robert. It's all right. I'll look after you."

And
it all stopped.

We stood together in the dark room
, he behind me, his arms pinning me close, his chest pressed to my back. The unnatural cold had gone. The silence rang in my ears.

"
Did you do that?" I whispered.

"
No," said Feximal grimly.

Then I heard the laugh again. A chuckle, now, a throb of amusement. With it, gently this time, the moaning began, little sighs and groans of carnal enjoyment
. Feximal had one bare, muscular arm around my neck, the other around my waist, holding me brutally tight, and despite my sheer, sickening terror, I realised, to my own astonishment, that I was growing hard in my drawers.

That was madness, I thought, but it was as if my body and mind were separate things. I was frightened, confused and desperat
e to run for my life, or soul, but my prick was being called, and it seemed to intend to come.

I felt, rather than heard, breathless grunts and groans. My mind threw up the faces and bodies of lovers I had never seen. My skin flared with the touch of fingers that weren
't there. I cried out, through fear or arousal, I could not tell which, and Simon Feximal shouted something aloud.

Now, with my hard-won experience, I know that he had begun the Third Line of the Saaamaaa Ritual, on which he and his fellow ghost-hunter Carnacki had done such perilous research. Then, I only knew that the guttural sounds of
those strange words in his deep voice boomed like a pagan gong, and the barrage of sensation was snuffed out as instantly as the candles had been.

I gasped for breath,
and slumped back against his bare chest, held by that hard, unwavering grip. My legs were shaking, but my prick was still rigid as a tentpole.

Then
I became aware of a hard length pressing against my arse, and I realised Feximal was in the same state.

"
I think I know what it wants," I whispered.

"
So do I." His voice was strained. "The power of this thing... I cannot master it and protect you at once. I can hold it off a little longer. You must run to the window. Break it. Climb out. Otherwise..."

"
Otherwise what?"

His breath
came hot against my ear. "Damn it, man, you can feel what it wants. I can feel it. It is old, and powerful, and it has a way in. It is very easy for a spirit to direct the actions of the living as it desires, if..." He tailed off.

"
If the living share the same desires?" I asked.

He stood, absolutely still and silent, holding me pinioned against him. Then he murmured
, very softly, very deep, "It's coming upon us. You really should run away."

I was bewildered, terrified. I was aching for his touch, for more than touch. I could hear the moaning starting again, beginning to build.
Most of all, I was not leaving him alone in this house of madness.

"
Is it evil? What it wants?" I panted.

"
No. It's... angry, betrayed. Lonely. Frustrated. It wants satisfaction."

"
So do I." I leaned back against him so that my head was on his powerful shoulder, my prick, restrained by close-fitting trousers, trying to push upwards and out.

"
Robert... You can still run," he rasped.

"
No."

"
This will not be gentle." His voice held clear warning, and clearer desire.

"
Please, Simon. Please."

Feximal
-- Simon -- took a shuddering breath. Then his hand on my waist moved down, stroking over my arousal, pulling me hard against his hips, his own stiff prick. His other arm was wrapped over my shoulders, forearm against my throat, and he increased that pressure too.

I was held there, trapped, in a haunted house, with a strong arm
gripping my neck and a strong hand opening the buttons at my waist.

My cock sprang free. I groaned aloud.
Simon gave a little exhalation of satisfaction and took it in his hand, rubbing his thumb over the tip, spreading the dampness that already beaded there. I rubbed back against his hips, in wanton invitation, and he pushed at my drawers and trousers, shoving them down, tucking my shirttails out of the way.

"
Kneel," he ordered me, and I fell to my knees, or tried to. His arm was hard against my windpipe, and I grabbed at it, for balance or freedom, as for a second I was held off the floor by that pressure.

He was strong as an ox, and he was going to fuck me.

I whimpered, and he let me down to the floor so that I knelt obediently before him. I did not look round, or into the mirror, for fear that I might see what was written on that thickly-muscled body now.

Simon reached a long arm for his bag, without releasing my neck. He fumbled within, pulled out a little bottle, flicked open the stopper one-handed. I smelled an unfamiliar perfume, one that
made me think of the Arabian Nights.

He was slicking his cock, readying himself.

I tried to bend forward, to get on hands and knees. He didn't let me. His finger slid down the crease of my arse, his knee nudged my legs apart into a wider stance, he moved his free hand forward once more to control my hips, and his cock shoved forward into my entrance.

I gasped aloud. I was no virgin, had had a fair few men ride my arse, but never with so little preparation. I bit my lip as he pushed again, not too far or too fast for what it was, yet it stung painfully. I shut my eyes.

Simon pushed again, and this time my arse took the invasion with a little more readiness. I grunted, breathing in and out, feeling the burn recede with each breath. He rocked into me, a little further each time, until I made a small sound of pleasure that somehow rang out clear against the ghostly moans.

Simon
shifted his arm from my hips to my chest, encircling my own arms, hand closing over one wrist to hold my arms tight by my sides. He pushed again, then, and this time he slid all the way in, thick cock stretching me wide, until I felt his hips pressed right against my entrance. I was trapped by his arms round my neck and chest, by every inch of his erect member inside me, pinioned and stuffed like a Christmas goose.

I groaned aloud. As if in answer, Simon
pulled out, slowly and carefully, till only the head of his thick member was inside me, leaving me feeling empty.

Then he began to fuck me in earnest.

I am no Goliath, but neither am I a small or a weak man. I had never felt the urge to submit to another man's will, let alone to force. I had always approached physical satisfaction as I did everything in those days of youth: as a pleasant game.

This was no game.
Simon held me captive and buggered me ruthlessly. My legs were splayed, my arms trapped, and I could do nothing but groan and grunt and take the forceful fucking he administered. I was hopelessly mastered, utterly subject to his will, and I had never been so hard in my life. I thrashed against him with a dark, unspeakable joy at the commanding usage, my prick thrusting at the ceiling, and as I cried my pleasure aloud, I felt something else.

A tongue in my mouth. A pinch to my erect nipple. A hand gripping my cock.

Not Simon's. Not anyone else's; we were miles from the next human being. Nobody's, in fact, because as I opened my eyes and stared, I saw nothing but the dark and empty room.

I shut my eyes again, and
felt something rub against my erection. It was, without question, a stiff prick. A hand closed around me, pushing them both together.

"
The ghost," I gasped. "It's touching me."

Simon didn
't respond. He simply lifted me slightly to change the angle of his attack, and as he drove into me now, he hit that spot that sends ecstasy leaping through a man's flesh. I cried out for more, and he gave me more, more than I thought I could take, harder, again and again, forcing his solid cock deep as the ghostly member thrust and twitched and jerked against mine.

Simon came,
buried in my arse, with a savage grunt as his seed spilled. I came a second later, spending in jet after jet, crying out with my release. And the ghost came too, cool and silvery, splashing against my belly, and as it did so, the spectral moans died away.