Simon Keller had four keys jattached to a rusty ring. The one for the cellar was the largest and oldest, made of bronze. But it wasn’t hard to steal. Before dawn, feeling both guilty and excited, Marlene had taken it from the rucksack Simon Keller always carried when he went out.
Then she had made breakfast, chatted to Simon Keller once he had woken up, and witnessed his usual morning ritual. The greatcoat done up to his neck, the snowshoes, the rifle over his shoulder. With her heart in her mouth, she had said goodbye to him and watched him vanish over the horizon, expecting him to turn back any minute and ask her for the key that was burning a hole in her pocket.
It had not happened.
She was alone and would be for hours, as usual.
She got down to work. She prepared the pig slop, poured it into the buckets and, defying the cold, went down into the sty. She fed the animals, first the boars, then the females, as usual leaving the silver bowl inside Lissy’s grille, and went back to the Stube. Without giving herself time to think, she inserted the key in the lock and turned it twice. The door opened wide.
No creaking. Not like the one . . .
Stupid woman.
Marlene turned back, searched until she found a candle and lit it.
With that faint flame to guide her, she felt ready. The air of the cellar snatched at her throat when she was only halfway down the steps.
The dirt. The chaos.
The monolith.
The top of the covered object almost touched the ceiling. There were spiders’ webs over it, although not many, as if the spiders kept away from it. Marlene huffed impatiently. The fairy-tale world again.
Marlene the Brave would not let herself be intimidated by this . . . this . . . What was it?
Time to find out.
That was when she heard it. The roar, loud and hollow. A kind of subterranean thunder. Marlene froze and looked around.
Boom.
The thunder had sounded again.
The candle flame swayed from side to side. Marlene was bewildered. She could not locate the origin of the sound – or figure out what was making it.
An earthquake? Impossible.
Boom.
Not thunder, she thought, but the thumping of a gigantic heart. She shuddered.
Boom.
Then an unmistakable squeal.
Lissy.
Marlene almost dropped the candle.
The squeal had come from her right.
Marlene understood now. Nine steps down to the pigsty, nine down to the cellar. The cellar and the sty were part of the same room, divided by a wall.
The wall from where the squeal had come. From where the thumping was coming. The wall to which Marlene now turned, shielding the flame with her hand, barely able to breathe.
The thumps were turning into a rhythmical beat. Boom. Boom. Boom.
About half a metre from the ground, there was a small window, protected by metal bars, connecting the cellar and the pigsty.
To reach it, she only needed to take a couple of steps, taking care not to trip over the junk strewn all over the cellar floor. That was where the thunder was coming from.
And a strange glow. It was green, as if covered in mucus, or moss. The light vanished and . . .
Boom.
Marlene bent forward and looked. Behind the bars, Lissy was bleeding, her forehead cracked open, her fangs dripping with blood.
Marlene felt faint.
Lissy withdrew into the darkness, emitted a squeal and charged, hurling her black, menacing form at the barred window with such force and fury that the metal rippled and creaked. She shook her head and rolled her eyes, as if stunned by the impact. But that did not deter her. She withdrew again into the shadows, emitted another long squeal and struck the metal again. Then again, and again. Harder each time. Angrier each time. Spraying blood around her each time.
Darkness. Squealing. Impact.
Boom.
The metal rippled, as if about to give way.
Lissy is hungry, Marlene thought.
Blood spattered her face and she pulled back in disgust, narrowly avoiding a fall. It was a miracle the candle did not go out. The prospect of being plunged into darkness filled her with terror.
On the other side of the window, Lissy was staring at her with hatred. She brought her snout close to the bars, sniffed the air and snorted, squirting blood and mucus. Then she sank her teeth into the metal.
The sharp fangs rasped the iron, which bent under the force of her bite.
Marlene could not stand it anymore. “Please, Lissy, stop it. Stop it.”
Lissy obeyed. She threw her one final glance, then withdrew and again hid in the shadows.
Marlene collapsed.