Neidpath Castle (Sam and Colby short story)

Queen Bloody Mary

"Jean?!" I demand. There was silence until screaming happened. I swam through the solid walls, getting as close as I could to the screams. "JEAN!" I scream, just outside of my reach, a woman in white clothes tainted with red blood was somehow killing Jean.

"Who the hell are you!" I scream. The woman slowly turns towards me, easing her physical assault on Jean. Her dark ginger-almost brown- hair was slicked under a headpiece that was almost a velvet piece, pearls placed along the edges, a gold and silver cross hung above the woman's forehead, "Who are you!" I scream, pushing through her attempted assault to hurt me also. "Queen Mary." Whispers had floated all around. I shook my head. The whispers converted to screams "BLOODY MARY! QUEEN BLOODY MARY!" I held my ears, blocking out the screams. I look dead into her full black eyes, standing tall as she stepped closer to my barrier. "Leave." I demand. She laughs diabolically.

"Oh my dear girl. For this is my castle."

"Not anymore. This is now mine. You have never deserved this castle."

"Oh child-"

"No, how are you here?!" I demand, watching as she came even closer to me, looking dead into my eyes.

"It feels liberating to be awakened once more."

"What does that mean."

"A different place in time. As they have travelled, My old self from my ship has converted into my much more youthful personage. I am in rage my dear child."

"No wonder why your cousin murdered you. You're crazy." I spit.

She laughs, throwing her head back. The action throws me into a vision.

She was kneeling in front of a thick piece of wood, her neck exposed to the twenty some-odd people in the room. "Any last words dear cousin?" A man reading from a paper states. Mary throws a look at him, not saying anything. "Forgive me." A man in a black hood holding a huge axe begged Mary. Mary looks back at the thick piece of wood, "I forgive you and all the world with all my heart." She answered with a smile. "For I hope this death will make an end to all of my troubles." The hooded man nodded, and then swung the axe down. The vision was cut off with me flooded back into the ghost world.

"What happened to forgiving?" I ask the Bloody Queen.

"Forgiveness is for the weak." She spits. Blood started to seep from an invisible wound from her neck. I back up from the gruesome sight. She steps forward, and then grabs my neck, tracing my 'youthful' neck.

"Why did you come here?" I spit, yanking my head out of her murderous tracing.

"The boys. They are my ticket to living." She says, blood pouring on her dress.

"How?" I demand, backing up even more.

"Those adolescent boys are the only way I get out of this hell hole of a world. The whole reason why I've been following them around and haunting those four..." She trails off, watching as the sun was setting.

"Excuse me as I let my presence be known in my room." She hisses, stepping through the solid stone wall. I release a breath, collapsing to my knees. Watching as Jean shakily stood back up, floating to where I was kneeling.

"Are you okay?" I asked her, looking up with a strain in my neck, I could feel dripping blood down my neck where Bloody Mary had touched me. I stand back up, holding my head high. "Let's save those boys from that bitch." I tell Jean.

Her eyes go hard, a determined look dominating her irises. We hear the group start freaking out from the stairwell, they are coming up to the balcony, I run through the wood door, swim down to where Mary was looming them, where the EMF reader was going ballistic. I tackle her to the hallway, watching as Jean restrain the old soul with demon shackles. "The shackles will give us a few minutes at most, we need to make a game plan." I tell Jean, internally guesstimating the time. 

She nods, standing up from the thrashing sociopath. I look towards the staircase, the boys had already made their way to the balcony. I made sure that the group ascended before I turned back to the dark room 

"Ummm, Tori!?" I hear Jean's scared voice. "What happened?" I demand, peeking my head back through the wall. Jean was standing with her head not. . . . . attached to her neck. "She got angry." Jean told me, I put a hand over my mouth, watching as her head slowly turned grey, Jean's black blood spilled over the dark wooden planks. I float over to her head, pick it up, walk over to her fallen body, I line up her skull to the rest of her body, watching as the blood stops spilling, "It was nice being dead with you, Tori." Jean tells me.

"Yeah, you made death so much more fun." I tell her, my voice cracking a little.

We'll meet again in the end." She says, closing her eyes.

"The end is where it Begins." Jean smiles at my words, her eyes still closed.

Jean started to deteriorate, her cheeks breaking off in black flakes. I hum a familiar song for her, one that I used to play on my cello all the time. 

"Londonderry Air." Jean recognizes, her jaw beginning to flake. 

"I know you loved it." 

"I can't remember." She whispers. Is that what death after death is like? you forget everything beside what is happening in the present? What an awful way to finally go. I would at least like to commemorate and relive my life before I head to my demise. 

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do." I try and joke, tears slipping out of my eyes. 

"No promises." 

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