9 Dark Tales

By Richard Schiver

In The Shadows

Waking up from a coma Chuck stumbles upon the secret life of the shadows around us that reveal our true nature. For shadows cannot lie.

Till Death Do We Part

For Eddie the Zombie Apocalypse is just another blow in the long line of disappointments his life has become. Losing everything that ever mattered to him, he is left with but one choice.

Where The Dead Things Go

Sometimes the dead are given a second chance to apologize to their loved ones after their untimely death.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Richard Schiver
• Release date: Jun 16, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310892790

Richard Schiver

Richard is the author of eight novels, three novellas, and a collection of short stories. He is a member in good standing of the Horror Writers Association, and the Maryland Writers Association. During his life he has played a series of roles, husband, father, son, and lover, but his favorite by far is grandfather. He and his wife of twenty plus years have raised four children and helped raise eight grandchildren. They provide a secure home to a yellow lab named Max. His wife, Dena, has experienced firsthand the exasperation of living with a writer whose mind tends to wander at the most inappropriate times. Yet she manages to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground. Richard can be found online at: Facebook: http://www.facebook/RichardSchiver Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/richard-schiver Written in Blood is Richard's personal blog where he shares his writing, and whatever else might strike his fancy. https://rschiver.blogspot.com/ He can be contacted directly at [e-mail] and would be delighted to hear from you.

Book preview

9 Dark Tales

What secrets do the shadows harbor?

Richard Schiver

Abis Books

Author Richard Schiver

Copyright ©2014 Richard Schiver

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved.

No portion of this story may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the express written consent of the author and publisher. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the Author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to Actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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In The Shadows

Author’s Note: Have you ever wondered what your shadow is doing when you’re not looking? Scientifically speaking a shadow is an area where direct light from a light source cannot reach due to obstruction by an object. It occupies all of the space behind an opaque object with light in front of it Accordingly the shadow should be a lifeless reflection of ourselves, the true opposite of what we see in the mirror. It is our constant companion, ever present when there is light, a silent witness to our sins. For even when we believe ourselves to be alone, we are still accompanied by our shadow, and it knows all of our secrets

His reality was an infinite black space, a sea of ebony where time was a dream and direction an illusion. There was no up, down, left, or right in that vast expanse of nothing that cradled him in a cocoon of emptiness. There was no beginning, no end, just an awareness of self that stretched beyond forever. An awareness that comforted him with the knowledge that he did exist.

He also knew he was not alone. The void, for all its dark sterility, was not empty. He felt their presence all around him. Shadowy shapes that slithered over and around one another in a never-ending dance. Shapes he had never seen or touched. Yet he knew they were there the same way he knew he existed.

From a great distance away, a soft light penetrated the void. He didn’t see it at first, but he knew it was there, just as a blind man knew the sun burned in the sky above. As his awareness of the light grew, it became brighter, pushing back the shadows around him with a pale effervescence that washed over his featureless form.

New sensations stirred, heightening the awareness of his extremities, bringing them to the forefront of his consciousness.

Pins and needles danced along the flesh of his legs as his awareness grew. He realized he was lying in a bed, a hard mattress supporting his body. A thin sheet pulled up to his chest. The pillow under his head dampened by his sweat.

Slowly he became aware of a multitude of tubes and wires that snaked from both of his arms. He became conscious of the myriad sounds of the machines crowded around him to monitor his vitals and insure his survival.

He wanted a drink of water. His tongue lay like a dry stick in the cavity of his mouth, behind cracked lips that felt as if they had been glued together. With these new revelations came another, darker thought as the emptiness around him receded. Something had followed him from that shadowy void. He felt it hovering at the edge of his consciousness. Waiting just beyond view. An awareness of things yet to come.

It looks like he’s coming around. A man’s voice came from the edge of the emptiness.

The comment was punctuated by a sob and the fingers resting in his hand tightened around his own. It was a woman’s hand, soft yet strong, and from it flowed a familiar warmth. The weak muscles in his arm protested as he tried to squeeze those unseen fingers in response.

He squeezed my hand, a woman said on his left, her voice as familiar as the emptiness that was slowly receding around him.

I know that voice, he thought, as he struggled to lift eyelids that felt like they had been taped shut.

It’s okay, baby, you can open your eyes.

The voice released a flood of memories that washed through his consciousness like the waters of a breached dam. Of course he knew that voice, it was his wife’s, and with his mind’s eye he saw her. Soft red hair framing a perfectly proportioned, delicate face. Evenly spaced green eyes, and the cutest little nose, with just the slightest hint of an upward turn at the end.

As the memories sluiced through his mind, he recalled the accident that had brought him to this junction in his life.

It had been a Friday and everyone was as anxious as he was to get home and start their weekend. The crowd around him pressed against his back as he stood on the edge of the curb. He wanted to be the first on the bus, to snag one of the single window seats. He hated sharing a seat with a stranger. In most cases the person sitting next to you had absolutely nothing in common with you, yet they insisted on acting as if you were long-lost friends.

From the back of the crowd came a scream, followed by a jostling that moved through the crowd like a wave and propelled him from his perch into the path of the approaching bus. The very last thing he remembered was the hissing of air brakes, and the squealing of wheels on pavement. Then that black emptiness enveloped him. It was all he could remember between then and now.

I know it hurts, baby, but we’ll get you better, his wife said, and he searched his mind for her name, coming up blank; panic flashed when he realized he’d forgotten her name.

How bad is it? he wondered as he sought out his own name and again came up blank.

He renewed his struggle to open his eyes, wanting so much to see his wife once more. Slowly the black emptiness faded to a featureless gray that grew brighter as his eyelids rose to reveal a softly lit world beyond the emptiness he’d inhabited.

Everything was blurry and out of focus. The light hurt, driving into his eyes like daggers, and he tried to shield them from the growing glare.

Let me get the shades, the man on his right said, sensing his discomfort.

The harsh light vanished, to be replaced by darker shadows that moved about him with a sinuous ease.

They know. The thought came unbidden from the depths of his memory. The shadows know many secrets. Where had he heard that before? he wondered as the presence of the shadows awakened a growing sense of despair.

He turned his thoughts away from questions about the shadows, and sought out the blurry image of his wife on his left. She held his hand in her own. The flesh-colored blob of her face hovering above a soft green that faded into the black shadows around them

She’d always liked green.

How long? he croaked through chapped lips. He tried to wet them with his tongue, but there was no moisture to be found within the cavity of his mouth

How long? she asked.

How long have I been out? He had to know.

Her sob told him more than he wanted to know. How long had it been? A day? A week? A year? More?

Jenny turned six last week, she said.

Jenny was six. That meant he’d been out for nearly four years. What about the promotion he’d been in line for? The Morton account he had been set to close? The bonus that would have taken them to Tahiti for two weeks? He had been on his way up through the ranks at one of the biggest home mortgage lenders in the country.

Who took over my job?

He felt her tears on the back of his hand.

The house? he asked, already aware of what the answer was going to be. His employer had offered long term disability. His mortgage lender had also wanted to include it in his mortgage, but he had scoffed at the idea. After all, he was only twenty-eight, what could possibly happen to a twenty-eight-year-old that would cause him to need such things?

But now he knew. Eight tons of steel and glass had introduced him to cold reality. And to add insult to injury, he was no longer twenty-eight. He was now thirty-two, and this realization brought it all home to him.

He had lost four years of his life.

I’m sorry, his wife said with a sob, I did everything I could. Took on a second job, worked every extra shift I could, but I couldn’t keep up with the payments.

She’d never wanted the house to begin with. It was too big, too much money and work to keep up. Too uppity, is what she had called it. But he had overridden her objections as he rode the wave of his success. He wanted to make sure she had everything she could possibly want.

Briefly, he experienced a flash of anger at his wife for her obvious weakness. She could have done more. He had slaved to get her that house, whether she had wanted it or not.

She came into focus then, momentarily, before dissolving into that frustrating fuzziness. For a second he saw her worried features, her brow furrowed with lines, her eyes alive with hope.

But it was what moved in the space behind her that drew his attention. A shadowy form lurked within the deeper shadows of the room. Pulsing with a malignant life of its own that reached out to caress his psyche and fill him with a cold dread unlike anything he’d felt before.

He watched the shadow, fascinated, unable to turn away as it moved across the room with a sentient purpose. It got closer, and as it did his fascination turned to terror as he could now make out a form at the center of this throbbing darkness. The shadow had molded itself to resemble a person. A single head above broad shoulders. Its barrel chest deep and wide, narrowing to a slim waist that vanished into a cylindrical form that ended in a point much like an artist’s rendering of what a Genie was supposed to look like.

What’s wrong? his wife said. She shook his hand but he was beyond hearing as the shadow slithered across the floor towards him.

No, he moaned, as he tried to back away. He pushed himself back against