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  Copyright 2015 Amy Cross

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events, entities and places are either products of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual people, businesses, entities or events is entirely coincidental.

  Kindle edition

  Dark Season Books

  First published: November 2015

  “There are stories about this place. It's said that something really bad happened here once, in the room where we're standing right now.”

  When Anna arrives in Norway to visit a long-lost friend, she expects to spend a calm, relaxing weekend at a remote cabin. Soon, however, she learns that some of the other guests are not what they seem, and the cabin itself has a dark history.

  As the weekend continues, Anna finds herself being drawn into a nightmarish situation. A girl died many years ago in the cabin, and now someone is out to repeat the events of that horrific night. By the time Anna learns the truth, she's too late to keep herself from being dragged into the darkness. Whether she escapes, and whether her soul survives, depends on her ability to survive a series of agonizing attacks.

  The Cabin is a horror novel about a girl who finds herself living a nightmare. Contains violent scenes and occasional adult language.

  The Cabin

  Prologue

  Three years ago

  As soon as the girl started screaming, Walter had to turn his hearing aid down to the lowest setting.

  “What's wrong?” he asked, leaning heavily on his cane as he stepped back from the door. Looking out at the porch, he saw nothing but snow stretching for miles under the night sky, with a single set of footprints leading to the house.

  “Shut the door!” the girl shouted, stumbling and dropping to her knees. Naked and covered in blood, her whole body seemed to be trembling. “Shut the door!” she screamed. “Lock it! They're coming!”

  “Who's coming?” Walter asked, limping to the door and looking out. He waited, his heart pounding faster than it had in years, but still there was no sign of anyone. The whole of the Berlenn valley seemed as calm and peaceful as ever, with rolling snow-covered fields bathed in moonlight, and a smudge of trees on the horizon. “I don't -”

  “They're coming!” the girl yelled, suddenly throwing herself against the door and pushing it shut, almost catching Walter's shoulder in the process. She fumbled with the locks for a moment before turning to him with wild, staring eyes. “Do you have a back door?”

  “In the kitchen,” he replied, “but -”

  Before he could finish, the girl pushed past him, limping around the sofa and into the next room. Still too shocked to really understand what was happening, Walter used his cane to hurry over to the kitchen door, where he saw that the girl was frantically checking the locks on the back door. Reaching around, Walter quickly found and flicked the light-switch, and a moment later he was able to see the horrific, thick cuts running vertically down the girl's back. In some places, sections of loose meat were hanging down in threads, while patches of skin were covered in bruises and burns. Parts of her right leg had been stripped almost to the bone and a piece of her right cheek had been worn away, exposing the teeth at the back of her mouth.

  After a moment, the girl turned to him, revealing the weltered cuts across her belly and the deep gouged section that had left one of her breasts almost torn away.

  “Call the police,” she stammered tearfully, slowly slipping down onto the floor as she drew her knees up toward her face. It was almost as if she was trying to hide herself, trying to make herself as small as possible, but her whole body was trembling with fear. “Please,” she whimpered, breaking into deep, heavy sobs, “you have to call the police.” She added something else, but the words were lost in her tears.

  “I already called,” he replied, shocked by the smeared blood she'd left against the wall. “It'll take them a while, though. They have to come from the next town and -”

  “Do you have any cameras?” the girl asked suddenly.

  He frowned, not sure whether he'd heard her right. “Cameras?”

  “Turn them off,” she continued. “Please, turn them off and destroy them.”

  “I don't...” He paused. “I have an old Polaroid camera, but that's in the closet.”

  “You don't have anything running?”

  “I... No, of course not. What are you talking about?”

  He waited, but the girl was sobbing now, muttering to herself as she held her head in her hands. Her whole body was shaking so violently, it seemed as if she might fall apart at any moment. Realizing there was little else he could do, Walter limped over to one of the kitchen drawers and pulled it open, before reaching in with trembling, swollen arthritic hands to take out a plastic box filled with plasters and paracetamol. All he could think was to try to patch the girl up a little, to deal with her injuries, but when he turned to her he quickly realized that a few plasters here and there wouldn't be much help.

  “What happened to you?” he asked finally. “Where did you come from?”

  After a moment, the girl turned to stare at him. Her mouth was moving, but her voice was too low and mumbled for her words to be heard properly.

  “Who did this to you?” Walter continued, leaning on his cane as he shuffled toward her. He grabbed a blanket from the breakfast table and held it out for her. “In the name of all that's holy, there's not another house for miles around. What...” He paused, too shocked by her glistening wounds to say any more until finally he remembered his hearing aid and reached up, turning it back to its usual setting. “What in the world is going on?”

  With the hearing aid turned up again, he could finally hear her whispers.

  “Turn off the cameras,” she was saying, her voice trembling more than ever as she kept her eyes fixed on him. “You have to turn off the cameras.”

  ***

  “I told you,” Walter said a short while later, as he and Leonard Westengen stood in the kitchen. The lights from Leonard's patrol car were flashing red and blue outside. “I was in bed, just settling to sleep, and suddenly I heard someone outside, running through the snow. Then there was this frantic knocking on the front door. I took my gun down to go and answer, and this crazy girl just barged her way inside, naked and bleeding and yelling about being followed.”

  “And how long ago was that, exactly?” Leonard asked, keeping his voice low.

  “Just before I called you, so... Less than an hour.”

  Sighing, Leonard peered around the doorway and saw the girl still shuddering and muttering to herself on the sofa, rocking back and forth now with her head in her hands.

  “She seems completely crazy,” he continued, turning back to Walter. “Are you sure she didn't tell you her name?”

  “I think you need to get her to a hospital,” Walter replied. “She's been bleeding everywhere, although... Well, some of those injuries look a little old. Do you think...” He paused, as if he was too horrified to say the next words. “Do you think she escaped from somewhere? She seems absolutely terrified.”

  “It's a puzzler, alright,” Leonard muttered, scratching the back of his neck. “I guess we could try to follow the footprints in the snow, see where they lead.”

  “Take her to hospital first,” Walter continued. “The footprints will still be there in the morning. You've got to get her safe first.”

  Leonard nodded, still rubbing the back of his neck as he made his way through to the front room. He stood for a moment, watching the horrified girl as if he really wasn't sure what to do next, and then he walked over to the sofa and sat next to her, making sure to sit not too close. He waited a moment, not really sure what to do, before figuring that he had to do something. When
he reached out to put a hand on her shoulder, however, she flinched and pulled back, staring at him with terrified eyes.

  “It's okay,” he told her. “We're going to get to the bottom of this and make sure you're okay, but first I'm going to take you to a hospital so they can take a look at you, okay? Do you understand?”

  He waited for a reply.

  “Do you understand what I'm telling you?” he continued.

  She paused, before nodding.

  “It's about a ninety minute drive from here,” he added. “I'm afraid, but it'll be quicker than waiting for an ambulance. Once you're at the hospital, we can...” He paused as he saw that the girl's left ear had been partially sliced at the base, as if someone had begun to cut it off. “Well, there'll be other people there, people who are trained in helping people who've been through things, and they can talk to you. To be honest, I'm not really very good at this sort of thing, but that's okay, because at the hospital there are people who really know how to deal with... situations. Does that sound good?”

  He waited for a reply, before trying to touch her shoulder again.

  She immediately flinched and pulled away.

  “Can you at least tell me your name?” he asked. Looking down at her hands, he flinched as he saw that some of her fingertips were missing, and that her remaining fingers had lost their nails. “I want to help you, but if you can tell me your name, maybe there's someone you want me to call for you? Do you have any family or friends?”

  The girl stared at him for a moment, her lips trembling, and finally she whispered something.

  “I didn't catch that,” he said, leaning closer. “Can you say it again.”

  “Karen,” she stammered. Flakes of dried blood fell from her crusted lips. “Karen... Lund.”

  “Karen...” Pausing, Leonard began to frown. “You mean... Karen Lund from Arvbo town?” He sat back to get a better look at her. “Jesus, I didn't recognize you, not with so many...” His voice trailed off, before he got to his feet. “Okay, Karen. Everything's going to be okay. You're going to come with me, and I'm going to take you to the hospital, and no-one can hurt you. Do you understand? Whatever you've been through, you're safe now.”

  He reached a hand out toward her. Slowly, cautiously, she reached up and took the hand in her trembling fingers.

  “That's a good first step,” Leonard said, forcing a smile. “Now we just need to get you to the hospital and figure this whole thing out.” With that, he turned to Walter, who was watching from the doorway. “We're going to get on the road now,” he explained. “Do you have some more blankets or something for her, for the journey? The heating in my car isn't working so well and -”

  He turned as Karen let out a low whining sound, but he had no idea what to do as Karen finally broke into deep, convulsive sobs. Slowly, she lowered herself down until she was sitting on the floor, her whole body rocking as she cried out.

  Over by the doorway, Walter had to turn his hearing aid down again.

  ***

  The patrol car's sirens rang loud through the night as Leonard drove along the icy road, his headlights picking out the ghost-white landscape ahead with bare pine trees rising up on either side.

  “Not too far now,” he said after a few minutes' silence, glancing at the mirror and seeing Karen still shivering on the back seat, covered in the blankets Walter had provided. “I'm taking you to the main hospital in town, okay? It's a little further than the Bollesun health center, but I think it's best considering the extent of your... Well, it's only an extra ten minutes, so I think it's for the best.”

  He waited for a reply, but none came. All he could hear was the sound of Karen's chattering teeth, and all he could see in the mirror was her face poking out from beneath the blankets.

  “They have specialists there,” he continued, keeping his eyes on the barren road ahead as they flashed past a road sign warning of reindeer in the area. “There'll be women you can talk to, instead of me. These people are trained to deal with girls who've been...” He paused for a moment. “Well, who've had stuff done to them... Whatever you've had done to you.” He glanced at her in the mirror again and saw that she'd retreated further under the blankets. “You're completely safe now,” he added, even though he wasn't even sure she could hear him over the sound of the siren. He forced a smile, hoping it would help, before realizing it probably wouldn't. “You understand that, don't you?”

  When she didn't reply, he reached up and flicked a switch at the top of the windshield, silencing the siren.

  “I guess we don't need that now,” he explained. “I was just explaining how you're safe now, in case you missed that part. They have these kits at the hospital, they can use them to tell what was done to you, and sometimes they can tell who did it, if the person left something behind. I don't really understand how it works, to be honest, but it's very reliable.” Again he waited for a reply, but she remained silent. “Well, you know how it is,” he added finally. “I'm just trying to make you feel a little better, that's all. I'm sorry, I'm not used to... Around here, there's not usually so much bad stuff going on. Our part of Norway is pretty quiet for most of the year.”

  He kept his eyes on the road.

  “I usually just deal with thefts, you know? People steal some crazy things around here. Just last month, a man called to say someone had been in his barn overnight and stolen... Now what was it again? That's right, a chainsaw, a bag of potting soil, a rose in a pot, and a big roll of foil. Another time, this great big adult moose got drunk on rotten fruit and had to be rescued from a trampoline. I'm telling you, it -”

  He paused, and after a moment he realized she was sobbing under the blanket.

  “I was just...”

  Another pause.

  “Just trying to make you feel better,” he muttered, turning the wheel as the road veered around to the right, rising gently through the forest. They drove on in silence for a few minutes, with Leonard trying to think of something else to say, before finally he muttered a few words under his breath and reached up, switching the siren back on. Out on the deserted roads, he preferred to have at least some noise other than the sound of the engine and the sobbing that continued on the back seat. He glanced back at Karen a couple of times, feeling as if he should say something to comfort her, but eventually he just focused on the road ahead until, a few minutes later, he took a right turn along a bumpier route that wound up on a steeper path through the forest.

  A short while after that, he took a left turn along a dirt road. He had to slow right down this time, since the ice hadn't been gritted.

  Finally his headlights picked out the yard up ahead and he pulled the car to a stop. After cutting the engine, he leaned back and waited, seeing the vapor of his own breath in the air as he listened to the sound of Karen still sobbing on the back seat. It took fully two minutes for the sobs to die down, and when he looked at the mirror he was just about able to make out the sight of the blanket shifting slightly in the darkness, as if the girl was starting to sit up. As if she'd finally noticed that they'd reached their destination.

  Swallowing hard, Leonard looked straight ahead. Several silhouetted figures were making their way toward the patrol car now, having emerged a moment earlier from the cabin.

  “I'm sorry,” he said, as Karen saw where they were and began to scream again. The figures were crowding around the car now, reaching out to open the doors. “Please, you have to believe me. I'm so, so sorry...”

  Chapter One

  Today

  The bumpy road woke Anna immediately, causing her to sit up in the back of the car and glance around in something of a daze.

  “Hey there, Sleeping Beauty,” Marit said with a smile. “Nearly there. Welcome to the real Norway.”

  Still not quite fully awake, Anna turned and looked out the window. When she'd fallen asleep earlier, the car had still been on a motorway heading away from Oslo's Gardermoen airport, and the Norwegian countryside hadn't seemed that much different from her
usual surroundings in England. Now the car was bumping along a twisty dirt track in the middle of a vast forest, with huge pine trees rising up on either side and a gentle summer sun struggling to break through, and she was starting to feel a little more separate, a little more as if she was in a foreign country. She sat up properly, while feeling a twinge in her back after sleeping in an awkward position, and when she turned to look at Marit she saw that her friend was grinning at her.

  “What?” Anna asked cautiously.

  “What?” Marit replied.

  “What?”

  Marit started laughing. “What?”

  Anna frowned. “What?”

  “We're about five minutes away,” Joe said from the driver's seat. “Are you girls ready for a weekend to remember?”

  “Don't worry about the culture shock,” Marit told Anna. “I'm pretty sure you don't have anywhere like this in Britain, do you?”

  “Uh, no,” Anna replied, forcing a smile. “Britain's not really a cabin kind of country.” She looked out at the vast pine forest that stretched as far as the eye could see, and for a moment she was mesmerized by the sheer scale of the scene. The forest seemed to stretch to the horizon in every direction. “I've never seen a place like this before in my life.”

  “This cabin has been in my family forever,” Joe continued, in almost perfect English. “My great-grandfather built it in, like, the thirties so he had somewhere to sleep when he was out hunting. I saw a photo of the place once, back then it was just a shack with a hole in the floor so he could go fishing in winter. My great-grandfather was a bit of a recluse, apparently. He liked getting away from the world and being by himself. Used to catch a lot of moose and salmon, though!”

  “Don't worry,” Marit added, nudging Anna's arm, “the cabin been way modernized since then. It's actually pretty cool, I've been here a few times. Joe's family is loaded, so they've made the place completely amazing.”