A Vote For Death: An Urban Gothic Horror Tale

By Edwin Brightwater

Can a child win against a world gone evil?

A mysterious vote. A rural town under siege. An old slaughterhouse ready for the unspeakable. And one nine-year-old girl who risks everything to stand against evil.

When her small town must enforce the result of a mysterious referendum, Mei-lin Johnson’s life is turned upside down. The town is blockaded by foreign soldiers, there are government spies in her school, and no-one’s allowed to talk about it. Although she’s just nine years old, Mei-lin is sure that something terrible will happen. And she’s right—though the barbarity will take a gruesome form wildly beyond even her darkest fears.

The life of her beloved companion Anna Katz, an elderly war veteran living with Mei-lin’s family, is at stake. Now the young girl must decide whether to risk everything against a strange, invisible, all-powerful enemy. What happens when a feisty nine-year-old girl takes on a world that’s gone evil?

This horror-suspense novella by Edwin Brightwater is set in rural New Zealand during an alternate version of the 1980s. Tensely paced in gripping prose, its characters must confront hard issues of personal courage, morality, and abuse of power—with a stunning ending whose final twist you won’t see coming!

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Publishdrive
• Release date: Jul 23, 2023
• ISBN: 9789574395590

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Edwin Brightwater

A Vote For Death: A Novella

First published by Niels Jensen 2021

Copyright © 2021 by Edwin Brightwater

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

Edwin Brightwater asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Edwin Brightwater has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publishers and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.

First edition

ISBN: 9789574395590

This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy

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In memory of how we used to be

Contents

1. Broken Glass

2. French Lessons

3. Crime

4. Punishment

5. Falling Apart

6. Heavenward

7. The Real Truth

8. Three Visitors

A Note From The Author

First Chapter Of To Kill A Demon: A High Balcony, Before Christmas

1

Broken Glass

The screaming sounds of destroyed glass—cracking, bursting, shattering, smashing—charged the girl’s ears roughly, without warning, in two tight bursts. The first burst came very loud, its destruction done with screeching, high-pitched brutality. The second shrieked lower down, more distantly, and for this seemed all the deadlier. It had a snap and crunch that made her think of something priceless being ground to dust.

In fright she leaped from bed and, wearing only pajamas, ran directly from her room to the landing at the top of the staircase. That evening her parents had sent her to bed much earlier than usual. The sun still hadn’t properly gone down, though, and sleep was impossible. What she’d heard, the loud crash of shattering glass, had been, she was sure, no dream.

The girl stared down the flight of wooden stairs. The pale door that connected the base of the stairwell to the kitchen and dining room was shut tight. Through the door and up the stairs to her place on the landing, she could hear her parents slinging back and forth angry sentences. This scared her more. Ordinarily, they never argued.

She turned from the staircase and, as though this were her only option, went to the other bedroom on the upper floor of her two-story house. That was where Anna lived. The girl tip-toed inside and eyed Anna cautiously. The old lady was already in bed, eyelids clammed shut, snoring softly, though the bedside lamp hadn’t been turned off and the old lady’s library book lay open uselessly in her lap.

Anna? pleaded the girl. Anna? Something’s wrong. Are you awake?

Slowly Anna opened her eyes and, after removing her glasses and using both palms to rub her sun-kissed face, looked back at the girl. Mmm, said Anna. It’s all fine. Everything’s fine. What’s bothering you, dear girl?

There was a huge sound. Really loud. Like all the windows in the house breaking at once.

That’s peculiar. I didn’t hear anything. Mind you, Mei-lin, my hearing’s not what it used to be.

You were asleep, Anna. That’s why you didn’t hear it.

Anna nodded thoughtfully, then asked, Did your parents hear it?

I don’t know. They’re downstairs. That’s where the sound came from. They’re fighting.

Oh my, said Anna, raising her eyebrows. I … well … uh, you tell me, what day is it? Today?

The girl, Mei-lin, told her. It was Sunday.

Well, that’s it, then. The government, they’ve announced their decision. I thought they’d do it later in the week, but the scoundrels—she pronounced this word with gusto—have got in early. Nothing we can do about it. She shook her head. We’ll get through it. Don’t worry, my dear. And Anna smiled gently.

Mei-lin wondered whether Anna really understood all that was happening. Still, the old lady’s answer left the girl feeling rather less concerned. That was better than nothing.

Right, said Mei-lin. So the decision that was made by the government, by the prime minister, it’s about the, uh, the—it’s about the referendum?

Before Anna could answer, Mei-lin heard the door downstairs, the one that connected to the first story’s kitchen and dining room, wrench open. Her father’s voice boomed up the stairs.

Mei-lin! he cried. Get your things. We’re leaving. Anna, you too. We need to get out before they close the roads. Your mother will help you. I’ll get the car ready. Then the girl heard her father stomping across to the house’s attached garage.

Mei-lin’s mother jogged up the stairs. With customary efficiency, not giving Mei-lin or Anna a single moment to ask questions, darting from one bedroom to the other, she organized their things in several small bags. Anna’s pills, Mei-lin’s documents (especially the adoption papers), warm clothes, plenty of socks, a couple of Anna’s old photos, a book for Mei-lin: all these necessaries were packed away to join them on their escape.

Mei-lin offered up a composition book she used at school, explaining that she could use it for extra homework while they were away. Her mother rebuffed this. You’re only nine years old, she explained. You don’t need to do homework. Leave that behind.

Using her foot, Anna tapped the large and circular plastic container under her bed. Fran, should we take this? she asked Mei-lin’s mother.

Fran, the mother, shook her head. Nope. Not at all. You don’t use it anyway. And once we’re out of here, we won’t need it for … well, what they’re going to do.

But what are they going to do, Mum? said Mei-lin, her eyes big and fearful.

Don’t let’s talk about that right now, OK? answered Fran. We need to get going.

And so the girl, her mother, and the old lady went downstairs and, after collecting a few extra items from the large bedroom used by Mei-lin’s parents, clambered into the car. Mei-lin’s dad was already restlessly installed behind the wheel. The female passengers clutched tightly onto their handful of bags. Anna’s circular chamber pot stayed behind, a dead mass of polymer under the elderly woman’s bed.

* * *

As the family car pulled out into their small street and heaved toward the main road that ran out of town, Mei-lin could see that, though one or two other families seemed to have the same idea of escape, most were staying put. A couple of cars were parked out in their driveways, trunk and doors open, moms and dads and children filling them with essentials and then themselves piling inside. But everywhere else, their street looked as it would on