Free The Haunted Sultan (Skeleton Key) by Gillian Zane, Skeleton Key Page A

focused. She had a feeling if they fell back into each other’s arms there would be no coming back.
    They would be like that couple who appeared to be from the 1920s. Stuck in this house for eternity. They couldn’t let that happen. They had to fix this house. How they were going to do that, though, was a mystery.
    “Help me.” The voice came from the back of the house. It was close, but low and distressed. It was the voice of the Sultan, the man they had met earlier.
    Sierra and Owen stepped over the body propped in the doorway. The look on the dead’s faces would haunt their nightmares forever, but they were determined to end this. They walked farther and farther into the house, down a long hallway, uncovering horror after horror. They found a room full of women. All of them were dressed in beautiful fabrics and beaded tops with long flowing skirts. All were dead. Their bodies had been run through with swords, their legs were red with blood from atrocities done to them. Two were completely nude, they were decapitated and scratches covered most of their bodies. These women were tortured before they were killed.
    “Help us.” One of the women abruptly sat up, her eyes staring blind at the pair in the doorway. A sword was still stuck in the woman’s chest, the wound now seeping blood, it ran down her body in thick rivulets.
    “Fuck,” Owen cursed after they both nearly soiled their pants, the woman’s sudden movement making them jump out of their skins.
    “Help us.” Another one sat up from her position on the floor and reached out her hands like a toddler wanting to be picked up.
    “What did this?” Sierra’s voice was wavering; she was staring at the women coming to life around them. She looked down at the body of a young girl, she couldn’t be more than fifteen. A child. Dead and possibly raped.
    Her eyes shot open and she wailed. She wailed a death keen and Sierra clutched at Owen’s hand in terror. It was pain, terror and longing all wrapped into one sound. Owen and Sierra flung themselves back and away from the women. Owen almost tripped over another body in the hallway and he had to steady himself on the wall. A wall that was dripping with blood.
    “Shit, shit, shit,” he cursed, wiping his hands on his jeans. “This is crazy. This isn’t real. Crazy, this has to be a nightmare,” he repeated and Sierra grasped his hand, pulling him close to her.
    “We can do this, c’mon.” She pulled him away from the room and the girl’s wail cut off. The women’s bodies fell back into their death positions. They were done for now.
    The pair heard a clatter of noise. It was close, through a pair of doors. Owen and Sierra opened the doors and stepped out into a courtyard. From death to life in one small step over a threshold. The paved courtyard was teeming with flowers and tropical plants, potted ferns were in every corner and lush banana trees reached to the second story. Honeysuckle and jasmine vines crept up trellises, and the smell washed over them as if it was a hot summer night. Birds of paradise and gardenia bushes teemed with flowers, the fragrant gardenia almost overpowered the underlying smell of blood. But the smell was still there. Still lurking in the recesses and the cracks. No amount of flowery smell could overpower death.
    Something dark loomed here.
    Sierra slipped her hand into Owen’s as she felt him shudder at her side. He felt it too. Something wasn’t right. Whatever it was, it was hungry, so very hungry. The sky above them was dark, stars by the millions could be seen above, the city lights not bright enough to filter out the weak light of the stars. She wanted to look up and marvel at the difference, try to figure out which constellation was which, but a darkness lingered close and she couldn’t let her guard down. Something lurked in the back of the courtyard. Sierra could feel it.
    A loud clatter came from the back of the courtyard and both of them startled, jumping from the