Page 10 of Scary & Bright
My heart sank for the funny little horse. It was clear she was a toy who enjoyed talking, and she was quite good at it. I couldn’t imagine being stuck down here, of all places, so my next move seemed obvious.
“If you’d like, I’d be happy to carry you up the stairs so you can come along.” I smiled genuinely for the first time since my arrival, although it was also the first time I had a reason to.
“You can totally say no if you don’t want to,” I added, afraid that my offer might be too forward. “I mean, it sounds like you’ve got a whole thing going on down here. Wouldn’t want to disturb you or muck up your plans or anything.”
Starlight’s painted eyes widened as large as they could, and her expression turned upward with such happiness that she looked borderline insane.
“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!” she cried, her voice growing shriller with every repetition of the phrase. “Please take me with you! You’d take me with you? Oh my god. I might be too heavy! What if I’m too heavy?”
Starlight’s words fired from her mouth one after another like a machine gun, her voice now so high pitched and quick moving that she sounded like she was speaking in fast-forward. She began to rock herself about the room with such excitement that I was afraid she might topple all the way forward or backward.
“Now look what you’ve done,” Tuff muttered to me out of the side of his mouth as the rocking horse continued firing words like someone was holding down a trigger. “You’ve gone and broken her.”
“It’s really not a big deal.” I chuckled, watching the rocking horse spiral with excitement. “But if you didn’t want to be down here, why did you stay down here so long? Surely, Krampus would have helped you get back up the stairs…” My suggestion was partly to get the answer out of genuine curiosity and partly to feel out just what kind of creature Krampus was. Was he genuinely cruel across the board, or was that just something he saved for his guests?
“She’s been too afraid to ask him for help,” Tuff answered on her behalf as if he knew the horse wouldn’t be entirely honest with me. “I kept telling her repeatedly that he’s really not too bad of a guy, but she never listened.”
“Well, can either of you honestly blame me?” Starlight sighed in defense of herself. “Look at the guy. He’s not exactly putting off the vibe that he’s a kind and helpful soul. And I don’t like being a burden!”
“You’re not a burden,” I said confidently as I hoisted the wooden horse into my arms. It was awkward to carry her, but she definitely wasn’t too heavy. “Honest.”
I began to carry her up the stairs and was surprised to see that Tuff chose to join us anyway, despite him not needing to be my exclusive escort to the upper floors.
“Now, I’ll be honest with you, uh, Holly, was it?” the wrestler inquired as he pulled himself up the stairs one step at a time behind me. “I don’t know what the hell Kramp’s whole schtick is with letting you move into the castle proper, and I’m not going to try to make sense of it.” His breath began to heave with every step, and I wondered if I shouldn’t offer to carry him as well. Something told me he might not take kindly to someone suggesting he couldn’t manage on his own, though. “The only advice I’ll give you is this: keep an open mind. I’ve been here for quite a while—since the late seventies. Since before you were even a twinkle in your father’s eye. So, I can tell you Krampus is, uh, he’s a touchy type, but there’s more to him than most are willing to discover.”
“I’ll do my best, but considering I just woke up in a basement cell with old blood on the walls, I’m afraid my opinion of Krampus might be a little skewed in a particular direction,” I said in response as I pushed open the door at the top of the steps.
When Tuff mentioned the word castle, I had definitely braced myself for a grander reveal and was a smidge surprised that the door led to what reminded me of the mudroom in my parents’ house growing up. There was a heavy wooden door, and the chill that came from it made me believe it was a door to the outside. The walls were bleak gray stone, and another few steps went up to the right before the space appeared to open up again.
“It’s all comin’ back to me, now!” Starlight exclaimed as she looked around. “I remember this place!”
“Don’t be so dramatic. It hasn’t been that long since you’ve been stuck in the basement,” Tuff groaned as he joined us on the landing. “Speaking of, why don’t you tell Miss Holly how you ended up down there, to begin with?!” The wrestler slapped his rubber knee with his good hand and bent forward in laughter. “I swear if I hadn’t seen it happen myself, I wouldn’t have believed it.”
The horse glared backward at Tuff from my arms before snapping her gaze back to me with a painfully sweet smile.
“It’s not that funny,” she said, rolling her eyes. “It really could have happened to anybody.”
“But it didn’t happen to anybody!” Tuff coughed between laughs as he forced the words from his chest. “It happened to you!”
“Well, now I have to know what happened. It’s been so hyped up that I might die of disappointment if I don’t get the full story.” I chuckled as I continued to carry the horse up the final couple of steps.
“It’s really nothing,” Starlight insisted. “I heard a rumor there was toy repair equipment in the basement—which there was, obviously—and I wanted to see if there was anything I might like down there. You know, sequins maybe, or perhaps some lace I could have one of the dolls glue to my saddle.”
“Right, sure,” I said as if this was a totally relatable story.
“But once it occurred to me that I could get stuck downstairs, I changed my mind,” Starlight continued. “I was only standing on the landing, mind you, so I would have only needed the help to get back up the final three steps.”
“Which is where I come in,” Tuff interrupted. “She’s hooting and hollering down there on the landing looking for help, and before I can stretch my arm down to help her, the door—the door—” He was laughing so hard he couldn’t get the words out.
“The door wasn’t shut all the way, and a gust of wind blew it open and sent me sailing down the stairs,” Starlight said with a straight face as Tuff continued to roar with laughter.
“She went whoosh, and then, and then, she totally disappeared. I’ve never laughed so hard in my life,” Tuff finished before taking a deep breath to gather his composure. “I did genuinely feel bad, though, so some of the other more capable toys and I would make points to visit her and try to cheer her up. Try to encourage her to ask the big guy for help, but she wasn’t having any of that.”
“Good news is you’re out of there now,” I said with a smile. Despite my current circumstances, I had to admit it felt nice to be surrounded by conversation and laughter. My life back home had been lacking in any sort of friendly banter outside of what I was forced to perform for the customers at my job. “Now, I have no idea where I’m going, so some kind of directions or even a tour of sorts would be phenomenal.”
“You got it, girl,” Starlight said happily. “Also, you can set me down now. I can tackle this floor by myself, but I’ll definitely need some help if we tackle any more stairs.”
I set the horse down on the ground as we entered the first open area I’d seen of the castle—a kitchen—but the most intimidating kitchen I had ever stepped foot in. The ceiling was tall, with exposed wooden beams running across. A massive stone counter set up like an island in the center was decorated with evergreen boughs, cranberries, and skinny white candles situated in a gold candelabra. There were, surprisingly enough, modern amenities, and I couldn’t help but wonder how they got there. I couldn’t imagine there were retail appliance stores available in the South Pole—let alone one that would have no problem delivering to a stone castle inhabited by a horrifying holiday monster. A wood-burning stone oven erupted from the wall, and a copper tea kettle sat merrily on the range. It felt like I was walking into the most unorthodox episode of MTV Cribs.