Inkwell of Shadows 14: Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

November 9, 2024. Moonlight Curiosities Antique Shop. Gloamstead, Alabama. Catching up with your better half, only to find out you’ve fallen behind…

Author’s Note: Inkwell of Shadows is a serialized fiction story in Moonlight Curiosity Mysteries, set in Blighridge County, Alabama. A quiet corner of the world where old ghost linger, cursed objects refuse to stay quiet, and some secrets never stay buried—at least, for long.

New installments or chapters will materialize every Monday…

Missed a chapter? You can find the full list here.

Previously. A conversation over pie opens doors and memories as Daniel and Dorian talk over recent events. But in the middle of the deductions, Daniel gets a hint at the bloodleech’s true motives—which, for now, seemed surprisingly honest. The two compared notes and clues, giving Daniel the hint of a picture he didn’t like at all. As Dorian left to pursue his own angle of questions in his own way, Daniel returned to the shop for peace of mind and life, or so he hoped…

November 9, 2024. Moonlight Curiosities Antique Shop. Gloamstead, Alabama. Catching up with your better half, only to find out you’ve fallen behind…

The brass bell above the shop door was a cheerful distraction from the uncanny gloom that rode my thoughts. It was a homey chime that promised nothing sharper than a quiet afternoon with my fantastic wife.

Honestly, it was the right tonic for what ailed me.

I felt the tension bleed out of my shoulders at the sight of the shop’s brass-and-wood interior. The door had barely shut when Cassidy spun past in a blue sundress, humming a pop tune I almost recognized. She was armed with silver candlesticks and a box of haunted house salt and pepper shakers. With a grin and a quick kiss mid-stride, she danced over to the shelves, storing the candlesticks and box with the care of a museum curator.

“There you are, trouble,” she teased. “Did you find Dorian or have to lure him out with bait?”

“More like tracked him down on the way to bait.” I stuffed my hands into my jeans pockets. “For future reference, pie works really well on Dorian.”

Cassidy snorted, brushing a strand of loose auburn hair out of her face. “Meat pies from Miss Milly’s?” She adjusted the candlesticks into a decorative double row on the shelf.

“No,” I grinned. “It was sweet potato pie. Still worked, though.” My grin wilted as I felt the specter of the conversation with Dorian shade my thoughts. “I learned a lot. Maybe even more than I bargained for.”

She looked over her shoulder at me with a puzzled expression, shoulders tense like a boxer expecting the bell. “That sounds dark.” Her eyes narrowed as she turned to look me over. “Okay, real dark. Damn, nothing’s ever simple with a bloodleech. What’d he say?”

I rubbed the back of my neck, hissing out a tight sigh. “Let me start a little earlier. I headed out to the old Rawls place, hoping to catch him there. He wasn’t, but I saw that he had another break-in. Glass was knocked out of the second floor onto the grass in the backyard.” I frowned at the memory, then raised my eyebrows at her. “I snooped around some and found footprints in the back hedge. They wound through the graveyard and into the cypress trees. I… er… found a clearing back there thick with withered squirrels, footprints, and some torn cloth.”

Cassidy’s face was a freckled mask of worry. “What? Did you tell Dorian any of this?”

“Yep. I did. He admitted someone broke in again, but he doesn’t know why. The rest was new to him.”

Her mask slipped from worry to green-eyed suspicion. “Really? Are you sure?”

“Positive,” I replied, then pursed my lips. “He admitted there had been a lot of bad blood between himself and Valeria. It’s at the heart of why he wants to help us; partly to dance on her grave, but also to pay some mysterious favor forward.”

Cassidy folded her arms. “I don’t entirely trust Dorian, but I trust you.”

I shook my head. “The withered squirrels really bother me, Cassie. Also, I remembered something about the attic attack. That ink stain I saw? It was fresh.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Fresh?” She waved a hand nervously at me. “Dead squirrels are bad enough, but the fresh ink changes things, Daniel. That pen could have been there when Fred Spivey was still alive.”

My expression mirrored her worry. “Exactly. Dorian and I talked that out a bit. If the pen was there when Mr. Spivey was alive, whoever attacked me might have hit Mr. Spivey. Then the curse on the pen might have killed him off.”

Her worry lines doubled. “If that’s true, you walked in not long after the murder actually happened.” Her emerald eyes went distant, tracking through the details. “But you found the safe closed without the pen. Sheriff Branham didn’t mention Spivey having a pen.” Her eyes locked on mine. “So, the killer was trying to kill you because you found the safe? That doesn’t make sense. They could’ve ducked out when you were busy.”

I shook my head a little. “No idea. There was plenty of time for it, too. I got attacked once the safe was open, not before. It wasn’t quick to open.”

Cassidy’s fingers curled nervously at her sides. Had she been in her human-bat form, I’d have expected her ears to be frantically twitching. Nerves won her over, and she paced.

“Okay, the dried-out squirrels are bad. Still, there’s a lot of things that do that. I’ve heard bloodleeches will if they’re desperate.” Cassidy’s frown darkened. “Daniel, I really don’t like this. It feels like that person who attacked you was after something in the safe.”

I nodded a little, then shrugged. “There was a lot more in that safe than just the ink stain.”

Cassidy fixed me with a worried look, then stopped pacing halfway down an aisle. “Yeah, but if the ink was fresh, that means that pen went somewhere. If the killer got the pen, why break in twice?” She pursed her lips. “Did you notice anything else at Dorian’s place?”

For a moment I glanced around, sifting my memory for any loose details.

“The bushes,” I said. “In the clearing, I could’ve sworn I saw some thorn bushes shiver. They didn’t sway with the breeze but on their own. There weren’t any living animals nearby, either. Right when it happened, I had a really bad feeling hit me, so I bolted for the car.”

Cassidy’s worried frown went fierce and protective. “Dryad. That had to have been a dryad. Most of the ones around here are holly or kudzu dryads, but still…” She shook her head. “That doesn’t explain the squirrels. Dryads don’t eat things in that way.”

“Well, it wasn’t Dorian. He said he doesn’t eat squirrels.” I blinked, then a sigh ran after it. “Cassie, when did this turn into the eating habits of dryads versus bloodleeches? We’re supposed to be tracking down a set of old fountain pens.”

She walked down the aisle and rested a hand on my arm.

“When people started dying, and a certain odd bloodleech named Dorian Callix asked for help.”

“There’s that.” I snorted lightly, pinching the bridge of my nose. Then a sudden thought hit me. “Wait… what if Fred Spivey pulled the pen out of the safe but dropped it when he was attacked? That attic’s a huge mess.”

Cassidy tilted her head and squinted into the middle distance. “Maybe. If that’s true, the sheriff’s office might have it as evidence… which, I doubt they’d tell us if they found it.”

I raised my eyebrows at that. “Speaking of which, what do we tell Sheriff Branham? He asked us to let him know if we found anything.”

Silence, save for the ticking grandfather clock, rushed to answer. I decided that was a problem for future us and changed the subject.

“So, um, find anything else in the office downstairs?“

Whether by accident or purpose, the air felt lighter as Cassidy smiled, tugging me by the arm to the front counter. One of my uncle’s journals lay open on top.

“Yes! Daniel, just—” she shook her head “—oh my God, your uncle, I swear. He wrote a lot about Valeria. I’m trying hard not to read between the lines and think they dated for a bit…”

My right eye twitched as I swore I felt my brain reboot. Once we reached the counter, I put my face in my hands.

“Beloved, I did not… just not… need to know that.”

She gently squeezed my arm and giggled lightly, more with nerves than humor.

“Okay, fair.” She flushed and not-so-subtly flipped a few pages in the journal. “Anyway, I think this has to do with that Bestiary of the Uncanny on his desk.” She grimaced at my pained look, wiggling a hand at me. “Now, wait. I’m going somewhere with this. The Bestiary is old; really old. It already had information about bloodleeches in there, but it looked like it had been updated. Two notes were added after Uncle Elias went missing.” She licked her lips. “Daniel, it wasn’t his handwriting.”

“After? Wait. What?” I echoed in stunned surprise, then shook my head. “All right, so someone else knows about the room. Was there anything written there after we changed the locks?”

“No.” The word hung like an omen in the air.

I drew a breath. Thoughts rotated in my head, snapping into place. The whole thing painted one hell of a dire picture. I read the entries Cassidy pointed out twice; my jaw clenched the more I read.

“He could have been talking to Meredith Rawls,” I said thoughtfully. “It would fit with what we found in our storage unit about the pens. But the timeline is wrong because Meredith had passed away by the time he wrote this.”

Cassidy tapped her fingers against the counter.

“Speaking of pens, had a couple of visitors today while you were out. Mrs. Adelyne came by again, really beside herself with worry. She wanted to know if we were all right.” I blinked in surprise as Cassidy added, “She said her husband sent her to check on us.”

“But she’s a widow,” I said slowly, feeling out the shape of the words. “Didn’t her husband die—”

“—years ago, yeah,” Cassidy finished for me. “Died out in the bayou late one night. She, ah, invited us tomorrow night for dinner.” She flushed again. “Given all that’s happened, I agreed. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to check on her. She’s always been really nice.”

I nodded. “Makes sense. Who was the other visitor?”

Cassidy shrugged. “An antique buyer. Sort of a customer. I first thought he was from over in Craigbrook, but thinking back, I’m not so sure. He smelled and sounded human to me, but I think he was from way out of town. Thin guy, a little younger than us. He was really eager to know about any antique desks for sale. Said his name was Caleb Hayes.”

“Hayes?” I frowned a little. “Dorian mentioned somebody named Hayes. That’s… oh, I’m not sure I like that.”

“It could be nothing—”

The bell at the front door interrupted Cassidy with a cheerful jingle as our usual mail carrier, Emily Spenser, grinned and waved. She swept inside, a weathered mail satchel slung over one shoulder.

“Package!” she called cheerfully. For Emily, that was her usual approach to the day.

I exchanged the usual pleasantries, then signed for the large box. Emily departed with another wave, as I headed back to Cassidy.

“A pair of Victorian brass letter sorters,” I explained. “I’ll put them in the office so we can inventory them later.”

Cassidy nodded, looking thoughtful. “Love? Speaking of the office. I was thinking… maybe we should keep Dorian’s pen downstairs?” She paused. “You know… because of Dorian’s break-ins.”

I stopped at the office door, glanced down at my uncle’s journal, then at her. She shrugged slightly in quiet reply.

“Okay. I’ll get it. Out of sight, out of mind,” I said with a smile, opening the door.

I froze two steps inside.

The strongbox on the shelf was open, and the pen—the only thing I had in there—was gone. There was just a small ink stain at the bottom.

“Cassie!”

We searched the office twice. Windows, doors, and anything with a lock at least four times. Just for good measure, we even checked downstairs in the hidden office. Nothing turned up except panic. Finally, Cassidy and I huddled behind the desk in the shop’s main office, reviewing outside security footage from earlier that day and into yesterday evening.

The moment we dreaded happened last night when we were in the hidden basement.

“That thin guy in the blue jacket and cap… it looks like he knows where the cameras are,” I muttered, leaning closer to the tablet’s screen. “Doesn’t show how he got in. I wish the camera had caught his face.”

As the man vanished around the corner, a second figure slipped into view. I instantly went rigid, staring wide-eyed at the screen. Cassidy clutched my arm in a death grip. It was the figure from the attic—tall, impossibly lean, wearing a long dark coat and dark hat, covering its features.

The most we could see were those horrifically pale, thin fingers.

“Cassie…” I whispered, glancing at her.

She had her phone out to call the sheriff’s office before I finished saying her name.

“Yes. This is Cassidy Hawthorne. We’ve got a serious problem…”

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Moonlight Curiosity Mysteries is a work of pure, unabashed fiction. To be honest, it’s a bit creepy, if not spooky, when is isn’t beside itself with nerves. It tends to be a little shy. Did I mention it likes to needlepoint because there’s lots of stabbing? Names of characters, places, events, organizations and locations are all creations of the author’s imagination for this fictitious setting. Which means, really, he gets all the blame.

Any resemblance to persons living, dead, undead, or why-aren’t-they-dead-YET is coincidental. The opinions expressed are those of the characters and should not be confused with the author’s, since the characters and the author tend to disagree a lot. Like daily.