When Irish Eyes Are Haunting: A Krewe of Hunters Novella by Heather Graham Page B

Aidan Karney. He kept coming.
    Devin shrank back into the vault, heading behind the tombs of Declan and Brianna and sinking low.
    Aidan came into the vault. He stood there, letting his eyes adjust.
    Aidan had been smart enough to come with a flashlight. He played it over the tomb.
    Devin stayed low.
    Aidan let out a sound of impatience and disgust.
    He turned around and left the vault.
    Devin waited. And waited.
    She realized that he would have seen her rental car.
    But, when she carefully emerged at last, he was nowhere to be seen.
    She hurried back to the car and drove on to the castle.
    When she arrived, activities around the courtyard were already in full swing. She saw that Father Flannery was on the stage by the western wall, surrounded by musicians. He announced that they were praying for Brendan Karney, who was holding his own. Then he announced the St. Patrick’s of the Village band and singers and stepped aside, leading the audience in applause.
    The band and singers began a beautiful version of Danny Boy.
    She continued on into the castle.
    No one was in the great hall and Devin walked up to the master’s chambers. She found a note from Rocky telling her to head on down to the crypt via the tower stairs and follow the instructions on the note.
    She knew the crypt and the dungeons, of course. She’d been awed and amazed when she’d come as a teenager.
    The foundations of the castle were vast. They held a scent that wasn’t exactly bad, and wasn’t exactly rot. But the sea roiled near the castle and deep in the ground, everything smelled verdantly of the earth.
    The main room, beneath the great hall, had once had cells where prisoners were held.
    A few of the barred cells remained.
    There was also a display of torture instruments used throughout the centuries. There were thumbscrews, brands, pinchers, an Iron Maiden, a rack, and all manner of chains and shackles.
    There were creepy, bad mannequins on the rack, in the Iron Maiden, and held to the wall by chains.
    There were, however, electric lights and when they were turned on—as they were now—the mannequins simply displayed a lack of talent in their creation.
    And yet Devin felt oddly as if they were watching her .
    “Stop it!” she told one, shaking her head as she walked by.
    “Rocky? Will?” she called.
    For a moment, she thought that no one was going to answer her.
    “This way!”
    Rocky’s voice urged her toward the crypts. She walked in that direction.
    Here, there were no mannequins.
    There were coffins—and there were the mummies of the very ancient still aligned on their eternal beds of wood and stone.
    There were only a few lights strung overhead; they weaved with heavy movement from above casting weird shadows over the bones and shrouds of the long, long dead of Karney Castle.
    But Rocky was there, hurrying out to greet her with something like enthusiasm.
    “We’ve found places where the dust has definitely been disturbed. Someone has been down here with some kind of a device. Also, it looks like they were dragging something heavy, or something with a train of fabric. But, it all disappears into the crypt and we can’t figure out if they were perhaps coming and going through the pub—or what?”
    Will Chan came walking out behind Rocky.
    “Hey, newlywed,” he teased, coming forward to greet her with a hug.
    “Hey, thanks for coming,” she told him.
    “Not a problem,” he told her. “Here’s the thing so far. I believe—as Rocky suggested—that the sound that filled the castle came from here. You could create an amazing wail that reverberated through the stone with a simple amplifier. As far as actually appearing in the master’s chambers, easy enough as well. The dumbwaiter rises and falls from just above. Someone has definitely been on the stairs. The problem we’re having is determining where the someone is coming from or going to, as they must have had a way out of here for them and all that they used.”
    “They might