Lanell Manor Ch. 01

In the mid October sun, a willowy young woman, in her early twenties by appearance, heaved fruitlessly on a worn bronze door handle. The lock, a 1970s replacement, had yielded with suspicious ease but the door, as old and daunting as the Victorian Manor it was attached too, was stuck. Heavy with warn away carvings that may have once displays divine and mythic scenes adorning it and a bronze goat head knocker, the door was an impressive gateway—Certainly not the type to be opened by frazzled youth before it.

Jen Fields wore an old boyfriend's plain grey sweatshirt that was two sizes too big for her small frame and a tired paint-stained pair of jeans that had survived years of art school with the kind of look that reminded passers-by of gulf war veterans and old reality show stars. Her auburn hair was cut short and loosely fell over her ears. If not for her C sized breasts an observer would have mistaken her for a vagrant teen boy trying to break into a seemingly abandoned home.

Not that there was any observers. The home, called Lanell Manor according to faded sign that greeted visitors half a mile down the road was located in the middle of nowhere. A suburb of nowhere, in fact. On the outskirts of an already laughably small summer town in Massachusetts, Lanell Manor was surrounded by a young forest that had been allowed to grow in the once cleared hill the mansion was built on. The town, called Sheppard's Green, was a bustling attraction in the summer, housing middle class vacationers from around the country. But come Autumn the cheery drunk faces of bourgeois comfort gave way to the bitter yet stalwart frowns. The adults simmered in grease and television while the youth revolted with mid quality cannabis and smuggled wine. It was a Sadness. Not a kind of sad felt after some tragic but the kind which makes and entire bus of strangers sigh at once—or in other words: a Sadness.

"Fuuuuuuuuck," sighed Jen, dejectedly leaning her forehead against the wood door. "Fuck!" she shouted again, this time with shameful jubilation as the felt the door give way to the slight pressure. In an effort to avoid thinking about the fact that she had never seen a front door that opened outward, Jen picked her up her large duffel bag and threw it in before her. Holding her breath for fear of dust she took in the visuals of the room, which for the most part, looked exactly as she would have imagined. A large curving stair climbed one side the tall foyer. Except for the doors upstairs and one built into the side of the stairs, which presumably led into the basement, most of the rooms were accessible by tall gilded openings. Long rugs covered the old floors and the decorations matched the style with various tapestries, landscape paintings, wooden furnishings, and an actual suit of armor equipped with lance. Between these hung several portraits of thin, pale men and women all with green eyes and blank expressions.

Jen released her breath at the sight of herself in a mirror. "Oh God, I look homeless," She said. For a moment she tried to justify her shabbiness with the long drive that her taken her here from Poughkeepsie but she knew that the similarly contents of her duffel bag would render the argument pointless. "Well, advantages of self-employment..." Her voice had been a comfort to her during the long stakeouts outside of motels of suspected cheaters and hours spent in her Poughkeepsie apartment alone, but the house seemed to silence her.

It wasn't that it was creepy in the traditional sense; she had expected dusty armor, creaky floors, and portraits with eyes that followed her around the room. She could handle those. Clichés out of movies couldn't frighten her—too easy to be rationalized. But the house was off in another way. There was no layer of dust on anything and the floor, though visibly scuffed, was entirely solid. The way everything was so well maintained was unexpected, unexplainable, and frankly wrong. Enhancing this effect were the portraits; their eyes didn't follow her but instead all seemed to be looking at a point just twenty feet behind her left shoulder.

Like all people made uneasy by the unexplainable, Jen set out to do something. Slinging her bag over her shoulder she made way upstairs for a bedroom so she could get set up and review her job order. The hallway was lite by the long window that hung over the foyer and a single window at the furthest end of the hall. Unconcerned with comfort she walked into the first room at the end of the stairwell.

Inside was a room clearly inspired by 1950's Frank Lloyd Wright and a stark contrast from the rest of the house. Later generations of Lanell's had made sure to improve and change the house to their style. No doubt they each had planned to make the whole of the manor in their ideal but for whatever reasons none had managed to complete more than a few rooms or additions. What was left was an eclectic chaotic and all together bizarre hodgepodge of radically different rooms. The garden was modeled after a Roman courtyard by Jonathan Lanell who had a taste for the classics. Other rooms had various styles from the ages. Some had two as they were left half finished by one Lanell and completed by another.

Jen's room felt neutral and calm, as intended probably; it was a guest bedroom. The only furnishings were a wardrobe, a bed, and a small desk. On the walls were no portraits or tapestries but prints of French impressionists.

Jen relaxed her shoulders and fell onto the bed. "Well, it's not so bad." She was talking freely to herself again. "Not actually all that creepy and surprisingly well maintained," she laughed. "Of course, that's what's wrong. The job letter mentioned that no one has lived here since the late 1980's."

She was chewing on her lip. Warning signs appeared all over this case, but she couldn't resist the paycheck. No, not the money. It was the adventure pulling her into it. Everything about the job was just slightly off. A small wealthy pair of siblings had hired a private detective from Poughkeepsie to investigate the condition of their newly inherited family estate for a week at a whopping fifteen-hundred dollars a day.

"I just being paranoid. The Lanell's are hiring a private detective because they don't want to do it themselves. They hired from Poughkeepsie for the same reason they offered to pay so much money: their spoiled uninformed ignorant trust funders who are shit at geography." Jen was getting excited from the rationalizing. "And they hired me because..." That stopped her. There was absolutely no rational explanation as to why anyone would hire Jen.

Trust funders and idiots maybe, but even the Lanell's should have been able to tell that Jen was the classic example of a failure. A daughter of hippies she had followed her whims to a sub-standard art education. Failing to kick off a prospering career of sculture and fine art, Jen began to craigslist PI, offering to do background checks and relationship checks for money. After a year she had established herself in a studio apartment and small office next to a strip mall where she mostly met clients to talk about why they still had to pay her even if their spouses weren't cheating and that, no, she couldn't fake pictures for the court. In fact, there was only one reason why anyone would hire Jen Fields Private Investigator and the thought of it made her cringe. She was, effectively, disposable.

Jen, discomforted by her thoughts, tried to take her mind off of them—something she was getting very good at. Kicking off her shoes, she pushed herself back on the bed and bathed in the afternoon sunlight. The heating must have been maintained over the years, for suddenly the room became very warm. Realizing how tiring the drive had been Jen eased into sleep, muttering to herself, "Still, not bad detective work to make me so worried."

Lavender and jasmine scented the breeze that tickled Jen's olfactories into waking. She opened her eyes and stretched her arms wide, disrupting the tuxedo clad man kissing his way up her legs. Neither his sudden appearance or her change of wardrobe bothered Jen; the thin white cotton summer dress was definite improvement and she knew that the man was the butler assigned to take care of her every need—the Lanell's were legendary hosts.

"Good morning, Mr. Pekus," said Jen, cheery and relaxed.

Mr. Pekus the butler smiled and continued his way up Jen's calves. "You are in a dream, Ms. Fields," he said in between kisses.

The private detective bent forward and played with her butler's hair. "Yes, yes I am," she gasped as he ran his hands over her thighs.

"You misunderstand, Ms. Fields," he said grinning. "You are literally in a dream." Nodding his head towards the open windows before returning to his deliberations, he moved into the insides of her thighs while slowly pushing her dress up with his hands.

Jen tore her eyes away from Pekus and looked out the windows for the first time. Three red suns hung over white sand dunes that rolled into distance. Shock threatened to break her mood, but Pekus's tongue flicking over her clit quickly intensified her lust.

"I'm dreaming?"

"Of course not, how could you dream of the dessert plane of Harunn?" spoke the voice of the butler in Jen's head. Meanwhile, the rest of Mr. Pekus continued to eat her out, tongue now licking quick circles around her clit. "Besides if it was your dream, you probably would have been wearing panties."

Pekus moved his right hand over and began to rub her sex maintaining a rhythm with his tongue which was now licking a constant motion around her clit. Reaching with his left, he began to play with her breast, playing with her nipple through the soft white cloth. Jen through her head back, lost completely in the ecstasy of the dream.

She was moaning audibly now. Chest flushed, she propped herself with her hands and began to rock her hips. Pekus responded by inserting his finger into her tight slit, pumping it slowly, speed mirroring the movement of his tongue. Lust and desire made Jen's sex grow wet, and the butler inserted another finger in. Lights were beginning to flash behind the detective's eyes. Her lithe body began to twist and grind. Jen had never experienced such a pleasurable attack yet she could feel the release coming—an orgasm stronger than what she could ever have imagined.

"Ah, God!" she called out. So close to climax her voice began to call out with every moan. Pekus moved his left hand down, grasping her lower waist to steady her writhing body. Jen moved one hand forward to play with her own breast, and rocked faster.

A soft chuckle sounded in her head. "How eager? But, I've only just begun."

The voice began to ring inside her head. Sound and vibration began to move through her entire body sending psychic energy into every pleasure zone in her body, rocketing her into orgasm. Sweat exaggerated her thin sinewy abdomen as it twisted and flexed.

Moments before she blacked out from the pleasure, the ringing stopped. Instead her body was paralyzed, frozen in its passions—head up towards the ceiling, on her back, hands grasping her breasts. Pekus moved his face, pale as the sands outside the window, directly over hers. And for a single second before her soul and mind were pulled through into and out of the demon's mind, Jen could see him clearly. Eyes with ruby like pupils shined on her with a strange pride, like a father would a daughter, or a priest to congregation.

Then chaos. Like a beast his eyes had swallowed her essence. Ruby became blood and fire into which her soul was infused. Hatred and sorrow, that kind that lay inside of every demon, overwhelmed her. The ringing began again, sounding more like a howl, this time bringing fear and pain. Images from the demon's past flashed into her mind. She watched herself torture the lost souls under the dessert sun, put on puppet shows for children using the eyes of their parents, and turn dreams to nightmares. Her own nightmares continued for hours, each uniquely horrifying.

Jen woke to damp sheets and a headache. The sheen of sweat on her naked body and the comparatively mild wetness of the sheets told her that she had been been stripped and cleaned while she slept. Her mind processed these facts with passive objectivity, causing her to lay blinking for a minute. With sudden aplomb she leapt from the bed to the closed windows.

Outside was a moonlit view of the walled garden. Trees grew close to the building now, hanging their branches low and well over the farthest wall. In the pale moonlight she could make out statues surrounded by overgrown hedges. A part of her wanted to believe that this view was a comfort, that everything was just a dream. But she was naked, had clearly slept for hours and she could remember every detail of the nightmare.

"Listen," said a female voice behind her.

Jen froze.

"It's okay. I'm not here to hurt you."

A proper detective, Jen reminded herself, would take this opportunity to detect. With her fear temporarily dwarfed by insecurity, she turned to find a young blonde woman in a white dress standing in the corner of the room.

"W-w-what—," Jen stopped to compose herself. "What is going on? Were you sent by the Lanell's?"

"Mr. Pekus sent me to tell you that he removed your clothing and changed the sheets earlier. He has also moved the papers in your bag to the desk and burned the clothing."

"Burned the clothing!" shouted Jen, suddenly remembering she was naked. "Hang on, Mr. Pekus?"

"Yes, Mr. Pekus the man whose dream you were just in." The girl managed to keep a consistently calm tone. "You are more than welcome to the clothes in the wardrobe. They were tailored while you slept and are more appropriate for Lanell Manor."

"Dream..." Jen mumbled. Details from her sleep were beginning to sleep but she could remember the feelings, both ecstasy and horror. Her breathing began to quicken as she realized the implications of what was happening. Sitting down on the windowsill, her sense of 'proper detectiveness' left with the strength in her legs.

The girl in white moved forward to comfort her, but when she moved into the moonlight her body appeared translucent, which had the opposite of desired effect on the now shuddering detective.

"Okay, look, I'm going to tell you what I can, but you have to promise to stay quiet; there isn't much time. Do you understand?"

"Ye—"

"Shut up, just nod when you understand. The Lanell Manor is a bridge between this world and another. Understand?"

Jen shook her head.

"That's okay, you'll figure it out soon," the girl continued. "As you release more sexual energy the worlds are going to begin to bridge. The more you release the more things from across the bridge are going to come over and the more the house is going to change. Eventually, the bridge will be complete and your entire essence will be pulled across and you'll be forced to live in the other world's version of Lanell Manor for eternity."

"Ca—"

"You can't escape," said the girl, undaunted. "The orgasm you've just had was already powerful enough to trap you here."

"How do—"

"I know because it happened to me and I'm using the same sexual energy to talk to you. Now listen because I can't hold on for much longer. There is only one hope for you. If you leave this room you will be at the mercy of the other residents of the Manor. They are cruel and will be looking to find a way to make you their personal slaves for all eternity. However, if you stay in this room and continue to sleep in the bed, Mr. Pekus will let you live in his dreams with me."

"But, that...thing he did. The thing at the end of the dream..." Jen trailed off. She wasn't too sure of what to make of the rest of what the girl said, but she knew that she didn't want to feel Mr. Pekus running her through his head again.

"Yes, its... horrible", said the girl, frowning. "But it isn't supposed to be mean or cruel. Mr. Pekus needs to run his own horrific past through other's minds so he doesn't go mad. And he does make sure to do it while you're climaxing so it isn't as harsh."

Jen's mind had finally begun to catch up to the fact that she was in a haunted house. She could feel her Holmesian Deerstalker hat of detectiveness clamping down again. "How do I know I can trust you?"

"You can't. But know this, the rooms on the second floor cycle around. If you leave, it is going to be nearly impossible for you to find your way back." And with that the girl vanished.

"Well," Jen said, standing up from the windowsill, "fuck."