The Watcher in the Shadows (Niebla 3)

Slowly, he stood up and tried to put his thoughts in order. Intense exhaustion washed over him. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened them again, he noticed a small mirror hanging on one of the walls. He walked over to it and stared at his reflection. Then he crossed to a tiny window overlooking the main façade. He noticed two figures stealing across the garden towards the front door.

Irene and Ismael stepped into the beam of light coming from deep inside the house. The echo of the merry-go-round and the metallic rattling of thousands of cogs that had been brought to life chilled them to the bone. A whole world of impossible creatures jiggled about in glass cabinets or dangled from the ceiling. It was impossible to look in any direction and not find one of Lazarus’s creations in motion. Clocks with faces, dolls that looked as if they were sleepwalking, ghostly faces with teeth bared like hungry wolves . . .

‘This time I’d prefer it if we didn’t separate,’ said Irene.

‘Wasn’t planning to,’ Ismael replied.

They’d only gone a couple of metres when the main door slammed shut behind them. Irene screamed and clung to Ismael. A gigantic man stood before them, his face covered with a mask depicting a ghoulish clown with green eyes. The monster’s pupils dilated and it began to walk towards them, a large carving knife in its hand. Suddenly, Irene recalled the mechanical butler that had opened the door on their first visit to Cravenmoore. Christian. That was his name. The figure raised the knife in the air.

‘No, Christian!’ she shouted. ‘No!’

The butler stopped and the knife fell from its hand. Ismael looked at Irene, confused. The motionless automaton was watching them.

‘Quick,’ Irene urged, and moved off towards the centre of the house.

Ismael ran after her, but first he picked up the knife Christian had dropped. He caught up with Irene in the stairwell that rose towards the high domed ceiling. Irene looked around and tried to get her bearings.

‘Where now?’ asked Ismael, looking over his shoulder.

Irene hesitated, unable to decide which way to go.

Suddenly, they felt a gust of cold air blowing along one of the corridors. With it came the sound of a deep, cavernous voice.

‘Irene . . .’ the voice intoned.

Irene’s stomach tied itself up in knots. The voice came again. She stared at the end of the corridor. Ismael followed the direction of her gaze. And there, floating above the ground, enveloped in a cloud of smoke, was Simone, advancing towards them with outstretched arms. There was a diabolical glow in her eyes and two lines of steely fangs appeared behind her pale lips.

‘Mum,’ moaned Irene.

‘That isn’t your mother . . .’ said Ismael, drawing the girl away from the creature’s path. As the light caught its features, the full horror of the beast was revealed. Only half of its face was finished; the other half was just a metal mask. It turned to confront them once more.

‘It’s the doll we saw before, not your mother,’ Ismael repeated, trying to waken his friend from the trance into which she seemed to have plunged. ‘That thing, the shadow, moves them as if they were its puppets . . .’

The mechanism inside the automaton made a clicking sound and it rushed at them, its claws bared. Ismael grabbed Irene and fled, without quite knowing where they were going. They ran as fast as their legs could carry them, through a gallery with doors on either side that opened as they passed.

‘Quick!’ shouted Ismael, as he heard the shrill of mechanical cables behind him.

Irene turned her head. The wolf-like jaws of the replica of her mother snapped shut only twenty centimetres from her face. Needle-sharp talons reached towards her. Ismael pulled Irene to one side, into what looked like a large, dark hall, and closed the door behind them. The creature’s claws sank into the door like lethal arrows.

‘My God . . .’ Irene gasped. ‘Not again . . .’

She was as white as a sheet.

‘Are you all right?’ Ismael asked

.

Irene nodded vaguely and then gazed around her. Walls of books seemed to spiral towards infinity.

‘We’re in Lazarus’s library.’

‘Well, I hope there’s another way out, because I’m not going back there,’ said Ismael.

‘There must be another exit. I just don’t know where . . .’ she said, heading towards the centre of the room.

Ismael wedged the door shut with a chair. If his defences lasted more than two minutes, he thought, he’d start to believe in miracles. Behind him, Irene murmured something. He turned and saw that she was standing next to a table, examining a book. It looked ancient.

‘There’s something here,’ she said.