The Boy with Words for Skin

Chapter 18: Into the Basement

I stopped on the landing and looked back up. The beam Light shined down the stairs was bright, but the darkness pressed in on it and kept it from spreading very far.

There was a railing that ran around the outside edges of the landing. Not much was visible beyond it. I could make out a few stacks of boxes a few feet away, but that was it. Not being able to see far made me feel paranoid and jumpy, a little claustrophobic. Someone or something could've been a few feet away and I wouldn't have known.

Because the stairs turned and doubled back at the landing, I needed a candle to go any further. My hands shook as I pulled the candle and lighter from my pants pocket. I lit the candle and waited for a few seconds to see if it'd blow out. It didn't.

A single candle was pathetic when compared to the thick darkness of the basement, but it was better than nothing. The weak light might have even been a good thing. The less light I gave off, the less likely the thing down there would see me and come after me. I was safer in the dark. Or, at least, that's what I told myself.

I took a deep breath and started down the second set of stairs. When I stepped down from the final step, I felt cool, packed dirt underneath my feet. The air was almost chilly and smelled of old water and something else that can only be described as age.

A few feet in front of the stairs was an old, wooden rocking horse, the kind that's held up by springs that connect each leg to a frame. Half of the face was splintered off. It made the horse look like it was sneering.

With the candle held out in front of me, I made my way around the frame of the stairs past stacks and stacks of cardboard boxes. Most of the boxes seemed to be in good condition, but some were beaten up and a few were falling apart. One box was split wide open and old, dirty clothes spilled out of it. Other things were mixed in with the boxes, too. I passed a tall metal birdcage with a domed top, a grandfather clock with no face, and a tangle of nightstands that had their legs pointing outward in every direction.

Light's beam of light shot over the landing and slanted down to dirt floor. The air it sliced through looked gray and cloudy. I moved into that dim light and gave a shaky thumbs-up.

"What do you see?" It was Kit. Her voice drifted down to me through the light. It sounded weak and scared.

I needed to be brave, or at least look like I was. I stood up a little straighter. "Not much." I called up gently. I looked around quickly. Had that thing heard me?

"Are you sure you're okay with this?" she asked.

I was in the basement. The basement. Just minutes after something in the basement had roared. I thought of the House Rule about being buried down there. My sister. She was down there somewhere. Would I come across her grave? Other graves? Would I find her bones picked clean of their meat? There was also the fact that Face and Tang didn't want me down there.

No, I wasn't okay what it. But as scared as I was, I wouldn't have been able to let her go down there and just wait for her to come back, not knowing what was happening, not knowing if she was safe or if I'd let her go to her death.

"I'm fine," I called in the loudest whisper I dared.  "I'm going to go find them now."

"Be careful!"

I moved out of the beam of light and came to an opening in a wall of boxes. I slipped through the gap. There was another wall of boxes that stretched out in front of me. I looked to the right and then the left. In the dim light, I could see another opening in the wall of boxes a few feet down. It hit me. I'd just stepped into a maze.

Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something move. I spun in that direction and squinted, but I couldn't see anything. I took a step forward to push the light a little further. Another wall of boxes pressed its way out of the darkness.