Black Acres- The Complete Collection by Ambrose Ibsen

Author:Ambrose Ibsen [Ibsen, Ambrose]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-07-02T22:00:00+00:00

The dreamscape opened up before her like a projector screen. She was shown the basement stairs, glowing in an ethereal light. Then, descending as though disembodied, the hidden door came into view. Slipping into the inky depths of the chamber, Kim could see her surroundings with more clarity than she could in her waking life. The table of Virgin Mary statues sat to the right, near the strange control panel on the wall. The fractured crib, the moldy changing table.

There was something in this scene that didn't quite fit, however.

Standing in front of the far wall was the silhouette of an old woman. Naked, sprigs of coarse silver hair draping her bare shoulders, she seemed hard at work before the mural. The painted sun, even in this dream, seemed to grin back at Kim with great energy, and the colors appeared brighter, more vivid than they did in real life.

The sight of the woman, hunched and working at the mural, inspired caution in Kim, who stopped at the threshold of the room and merely watched. Her eyes were drawn to the painting, whose blank, open spaces had since been filled in. The woman was drawing, had some painting instrument in hand, and was making additions to the work she'd presumably started in life. Tall, black columns were sketched in, somewhat bent. She knew what the woman was drawing in an instant.

The woods.

Kim hated the sight of those trees, wanted to step forward and erase them, but she stopped in her tracks, not daring to move even a single inch. The woman at the mural had stopped, seemingly taking notice of Kim. This woman, naked and hunched, was fast becoming a fixture of her dreams. Kim had first seen her in the kitchen, making tea. The most recent sighting of the hag in the woods had taught her to use caution.

The woman was turning around to face her.

Kim tensed, looked away and wished she could hold up her hands in defense. She wasn't possessed of a proper body here, however. She was merely drifting through this environment, a spectator. The woman was going to look at her again with those dense, shadow-filled sockets where her eyes had been. She'd open her large and hideous mouth to loose that dread scream she now knew so well.

But instead, Kim saw Dakota's smiling face. The old woman had turned, growing several decades younger in the space of an instant. Dakota Reed, with her long, brown hair hanging low over her shoulders, turned, set down her brush and smiled at Kim warmly. She looked exactly like she did in the photographs Kim had seen. So... this mural is Dakota's work, then?

Kim remained silent, did not approach. For her part, Dakota, too, was silent. She continued to smile, still as a statue, until some other expression began to creep into her face. Kim recognized this, too, even if she'd never seen it with her own eyes before. Dakota's eyes began to widen, greatly, and her smile grew to exaggerated proportions.

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