Gianfranco Mancini’s Reviews > Prince of Nightmares > Status Update

She recognised the tranquillity for what it was—a façade, a cellophane disguise masking the scars of sin. It might be enough to trick an ignorant visitor, but Evelyn knew better. The insanity of a place beyond Ballador had crept through the building like a disease, poisoning every grain and fibre. It was a sickness for which she could conceive only one cure.

Stepping back from the top of the stairs, Victor turned toward the open door of the Honeymoon Suite and saw the Drowned Maid standing just within. She stared back at him without eyes, smiling without a face, basking in the glow of accomplishment, proud of the mutilation she’d wrought. His eye caught the suggestive curl of her tendrils, coaxing him back into the room.

The lights in the stairwell flickered sporadically, but hadn’t gone out. For a moment, Victor was stunned by how peaceful and quiet it was, seeming to invite him to forget the supernatural visions he’d witnessed. They didn’t seem possible when confronted by such banality. Then the screams began again.

Don’t,he tried to say to them, without breath in his body or a pulse in his veins. Please don’t . . . He didn’t see what they did to her. In the next moment he was falling into darkness, away from the room, away from the hotel. Life a bitter memory.

His door opened into a wall of black. Victor held his ground, staring into the room, waiting for his eyes to adjust. Waiting for the shadows to take shape. Nothing. The void remained a formless abyss that light seemed fearful to penetrate. Yet he knew it wasn’t empty. Somewhere in the darkness, something waited for him.

He was watching one of the girls. The brunette. He was thinking of how much she reminded him of Josie when she was young. The long dark hair. The slender, almost fragile arms. The way she sat, the way she held her wine glass, the way she laughed. When the girl threw her head back, mouth open in a broad smile, Victor caught sight of a bullet hole in her temple, leaking a thin stream of blood down her cheek.

Mrs Dempsey’s voice was a whisper in the darkness. “What did she do, Mr Teversham?” Victor licked his lips. His whole mouth felt dry. “Hours—maybe just minutes—before she killed herself, she went online and made a reservation here. Booked the Library Suite for four nights. In my name.”

In a moment he was moving again, gliding across the darkness, the dream carrying him where it wished, back out into the corridor, which had warped itself across time and space into the top floor of the Ballador House Hotel. The doors to each room were open and he graced them in turn.

It made sense that he’d dream of her in this place. And he’d much rather be with her in nightmares than without her in reality. But he didn’t get Josephine, did he? What he got was a date with the Drowned Maid, her diseased tongue twisting in his mouth, her tentacle fingers cutting through his skin. Vivid, yes, but more than that. The pain felt real. The violation felt real.

I lay me here to sleep;

No night-mare shall plague me,

Until they swim all the waters

That flow upon the earth,

And count all the stars

That appear in the firmament.

Thus help me God Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.

—Traditional German charm against nightmares