WALL MEN: A Haunted House (The Wall Men 1)

On that canvas are three warriors in loincloths, chained to a stone wall, their strong muscles straining against the metal cuffs around their wrists and ankles. Their long stringy hair partially obscures their tormented expressions and beards.

The painting almost reminds me of Jesus on the cross. But not the nice, pretty version you might see in a suburban American church. I’m talking about the Jesus one finds in the oldest Catholic churches—Italy, Mexico, Spain—where the man on the crucifix is in pain, dripping with blood.

“What is this?” I whisper to myself, noting that the hardwood floor is littered with the same crystals Grandma Rain planted around the property.

I stare at the oil painting, its bold brushstrokes and dramatic contrasts, trying to understand what I’m looking at. I never formally studied art, but it doesn’t take an expert to notice the angry, violent feel. The men are depicted in vivid detail, taking up most of the canvas, illuminated by light coming from my direction. Meanwhile, the background is a dark abyss with red swirls.

I can’t make sense of any of it. Who was speaking just now from this room? Because all I see is this painting.

“Hello?” I say, looking side to side.

The man in the middle on the canvas starts to move in a choppy, animated way, his head twisting in my direction. His blue, blue eyes fix on my face. “Help us, Lake. Free us. Undo our shackles.”

“What the…?” I stumble back and trip over the box, falling flat on my ass in the hallway next to Bard. I scramble to my feet and slam the door, locking it with the key.

“Fuck. Fuck.” I clutch my stomach, feeling like I’m going to be sick. “What was that?”

“You saw them, didn’t you?” Bard’s voice jars me.

I jump back, quickly relieved to see him standing. “Ohmygod. Are you okay?”

He nods, piercing me with his familiar blue eyes. “Did you see them?”

“Yes,” I mutter, completely spinning.

“Good. Now we can start getting down to business.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“I’m sorry, but what?” I’m sitting on Bard’s plain brown couch, in his no-frills cabin, listening to a story that sounds disturbingly similar to the one Grandma Rain told. Monsters. Wall Men. Both real. “Can you repeat that last part? I blanked out.”

“Your grandma wasn’t crazy,” he says. “Those men are the only thing keeping everyone safe.” He pours a glass of whisky and sets it on the handmade coffee table in front of me. Except for the couch, I think he’s constructed almost everything here. Not that there’s much: a small oak table with two chairs in the corner and a chandelier made of antlers from game he’s killed. The man is definitely a minimalist.

“So it’s all true.” I pick up the glass and cup it in my shaking hands.

“Yes, monsters are real.” With a muted groan, Bard flops back next to me on the couch, holding his hand to his forehead. He insists he’s okay—just a little headache. I keep insisting he go to the ER for a CAT scan. Why doesn’t he seem the least bit worried about his brain bleeding? It only makes me more worried on top of the crazy-ass information he just shared.

I polish off my drink in one gulp. The spicy heat burns its way down my throat, providing an unexpected comfort. I understand whisky: why I hate it and why I drink it anyway. This other crap I saw in the house, I do not understand.

“I’m going to need another.” I refill my tumbler from the bottle on the coffee table, throw it back, and set the glass down. “I-I don’t get how this is real. That painting was alive.”

“Their world cannot exist in ours and vice versa. The painting is merely an interface—like a window. That window is also a bridge connecting our world to theirs.”

“Those things can come here through that painting? Then why not blow up the bridge?” It’s the obvious choice.

“I’ve heard that Norfolks have tried and failed many times. The bridge merely pops up in another part of the house. The last time was in that bedroom. Rain put a frame around it.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” he replies. “Maybe she wanted it to look like a piece of art in case anyone ever saw it by accident.”

Not likely. She kept that door locked at all times. “I’m guessing the details were in the journals that went up in flames along with my house.”

“Probably,” he replies.

“So you don’t know why, when, or how the bridge opened in the first place?”

“I’m only aware that for over two hundred years, the Norfolks have been fighting to keep anything from coming in.”

So the bridge leads to the wall in Monsterland, where three men are chained up against their will, guarding everything. That sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

“And the Wall Men? What’s their story? How did they end up chained to that wall?”