a ghost story

by James Best

published October 31, 2023

From a young age, I’ve been fascinated by the work of Duke Arathmir D’Acheron XI.  Not only his paintings, his very life was a constant subject of wonder for me.  Much of Arathmir’s history has been lost to the mists of time.  Few know of his incredible accomplishments and fewer still truly appreciate them.  His undeserved anonymity came about from the religious authority of his day branding him a heretic after a string of scandals and wild accusations of murder and witchcraft.

His paintings were bizarre, often unsettling in nature.  Through a vivid imagination, he depicted surreal landscapes with such clarity it was as if he glimpsed them through his own window.  His portraits were especially marvelous.  Though they depicted the grotesque features of fairy, elf, goblin, or imp their rendering was so fully realized and naturalistic, the mind almost mistook them for living, breathing creatures that once stalked the Earth in eons past.  Such was Arathmir’s skill: making the incredible seem all too unnervingly real.

Unfortunately, as was so often the case with great artists, Arathmir’s talents were generally rejected in his time.  His work was seen as transgressive, demonic even.  The sight of his striking subjects sparked rumors across the land that he was a conjurer, exploiting dark arts for hellish inspiration and infernal models on which to base his opuses.  The public averted their gaze in horror while the aristocracy scoffed at what they deemed fanciful nonsense.  And yet, they permitted the mad painter to ply his trade without protest.

That was until the disappearances began.  One by one, people started to vanish in the night without a trace.  It started with homeless beggars who, were swallowed up by nocturnal mists only to be missed in the morning by their vagrant fellows.  Then common folk began were taken, even as they hid within their houses, leaving no sign of a struggle in their wake.  Then even the nobles suffered inexplicable loss as members of their own caste were spirited away.

Not long after, blood-curdling screams could be heard tearing out from the palace dungeons.  Naturally, suspicion fell on Arathmir.  There was little doubt he was behind the kidnappings.  It had to be him claiming victims to satisfy the unnatural hungers of his otherworldly guests.  Of course, he denied such allegations and even opened the palace to the scrutiny of all.  Not a trace could be found of any victims.  All the searchers ever found were paintings after paintings after paintings.

And so, Arathmir was allowed to continue his work for a time.  Within those few months, his paintings grew more uncanny and nightmarish.  The colors became especially vivid, more than the standard oils he used before.  None could account for the strange, rich hues his brush produced nor the indescribable textures left on the canvas.  It was as if he employed entirely new materials, mediums, and techniques from some far-off nation, utterly unknown to his audience.  Meanwhile, the kidnappings and the ghostly dungeon wailings continued.  The culprit remained uncaught. 

Eventually, the public could suffer their terror no longer.  They knew Arathmir was responsible for the kidnappings.  Even if there was no evidence, there could be no other explanation.  So it was, one dark night, a mob formed before the gates of the palace and stormed inside.  They killed what few servants gallantly defended their post and torched the entire building, especially the dungeons.  Nearly all the duke’s paintings were destroyed in the riot.  The man himself they dragged from bed to the public square where, after a mock trial, they burned him at the stake.  It was said he laughed throughout the execution, even as the flames consumed his mortal flesh, until only his charred, grinning skeleton remained.

That would have been the end of Arathmir’s tale if the mob had its way.   Thankfully, some of his work escaped the flames, having been given away to friends and family before his tragic death.  Nowadays, his work has found a better home among the more accepting minds of the modern millennium.  As for myself, I’m considered something of a disciple.  I’ve studied his works ever since I first saw one of his landscapes displayed in the Louvre.  After that, I did everything I could to track down and study my master’s surviving works.  I travelled the globe in pursuit of his paintings, snatching up whatever scraps I could.

Even after so many years of intense study, I’ve yet to faithfully recreate Arathmir’s methods.  In particular, the materials used in his paints and canvases elude me.  At first glance, one might assume he used the standard oils so common for his era, and indeed employed himself early in his career.  But the colors in his later works are far more vivid and saturated.  Furthermore, on closer inspection, one would notice each stroke of his brush carries a distinct, granular texture that is unknown to any medium I’m familiar with.  It’s not gouache, nor gesso, nor watercolor.  Still, I continued my research undeterred for many years, hoping one day to discover his secrets that I might paint with such vivid fullness as he once did and carry on his legacy.

Imagine my surprise and delight when, one sunny March day, I received a letter from a colleague in Vienna.  At first I could scarcely believe what I read.  He claimed to have found one of Arathmir’s paintings hidden away in a storage unit, a portrait no less.  Though not much of a connoisseur himself, he recognized it from the signature.  Arathmir signed all his paintings with a distinctive, unintelligible scrawl, likely a cipher of his own invention.  It resembled Sanskrit, though the characters were more harsh and jagged, like a wild animal had raked its claws across the canvas.  But what amazed me most about my colleague’s find was that he claimed it was the Arathmir portrait, the elusive Sanguine Prince.

The Sanguine Prince was Arathmir’s final painting, finished the very night of his untimely demise.  Unlike his other works, it depicted no surreal panorama or monstrous devil, but was a self-portrait, the only one to survive through the ages.  The subject was depicted in full regalia, with a resplendent scarlet uniform.  His face bore a winning smile that beamed across the canvas.  Curiously, the entire work was made using various shades and hues of his peculiar red paint.

Needless to say, I flew to Venice as quick as I could, so eager was I to catch a glimpse of this mythical wor.  When I finally arrived, it did not disappoint.  The Sanguine Prince was easily Arathmir’s magnum opus, a staggering testament to his artistic skill and mind.  The crimson hues were of unbelievable richness, no doubt achieved through the use of his as-yet unknown medium.  The subject was displayed with such life-like detail that it nearly seemed a photograph.  His rich uniform gleamed with encrusted rubies, scarlet tassels, and russet epaulettes.  His expression was so genial and welcoming, that one could scarcely believe that it was the face that whipped the mob into a murderous frenzy.

I was moved to tears by this incredible find.  Though there could be little doubt as to its veracity, I wanted to be absolutely certain and, with my colleague’s agreement, sent it to a friend of mine, who was an art appraiser in London.  His assessment did not take long.  After a few days, he attested its validity and I eagerly purchased the painting the very instant his appraisal was in hand.  Despite the considerable expense, it was one of the happiest, most momentous occasions of my career.  Finally, I alone had access to one of my master’s greatest works.  I was free to study it to my heart’s content and my body’s limit.  At long last, I could finally discover the secrets behind Arathmir’s medium.

Before the painting could be delivered to my personal gallery, however, tragedy struck.  The very next morning, my friend, the very appraiser who had verified the portrait, was found dead in his office, his corpse sprawled directly beneath The Sanguine Prince.  The autopsy revealed he died from acute blood loss, though authorities could not explain the cause.  There was no wound, no internal hemorrhaging, and yet it was as if he’d been sucked dry.  My friend had suffered from a long history of anemia, but that did little to explain the suddenness and totality of his blood loss.  

My friend’s death certainly cast a pall on what was otherwise such a happy occasion.  But once the portrait was at last delivered to my home, I put off my mourning aspect and made the best of things.  I knew my friend wouldn’t want me to put off this grand opportunity simply to wallow in misery.  Life goes on, after all!

To my surprise, when I opened the shipping crate and beheld The Sanguine Prince once again, I found it had changed somewhat since our last encounter.  Somehow, the crimson hues had grown even deeper and richer for its journey across the continent.  Even the subject’s visage seemed to have changed slightly.  It bore a fuller, rosier tint, as if he’d just consumed a rich, filling meal.  The expression also struck me as more self-assured than before, with the slightest hint of an upward tilt to the head.  I ascribed the change to a difference in lighting and thought nothing more of it.  Directly from the crate, I moved the portrait to its proper place: displayed prominently over the hearth.

The next day, I wasted no time in delving into my studies of Arathmir’s final masterpiece.  I poured over every immaculate inch of that canvas and then plied myself to recreating his medium, the strangely textured paint.  I tried using all manner of colors, materials, techniques, and combinations thereof: ochre, cadmium, vermillion, alizarin, watercolors, oils, acrylic, horse hair brushes, mink, sable, squirrel, pig, wolf, even synthetic.  No matter what I tried, however, nothing came close to matching those masterful brushstrokes.  It was tiring work made all the more wearying by its utter fruitlessness.  I found myself wore out after just a few short hours.  Not wanting to overexert myself in my excitement, I decided to go to bed and rest.

That night, I had a dream.  I awoke, or so I thought, to a frightening moan.  The cry seemed to come from the gallery.  My first thought was that someone had broken in, but what thief gives away their presence with such loud noise?  I lifted myself from my bed with a struggle.  Apparently, the hours of rest had done little good.  I felt as tired as ever.  But I had to make sure the gallery, The Sanguine Prince in particular, was in no danger, so I forced my muscles to bear regardless.

When I opened the gallery doors, I found someone had indeed broken in.  There was a man in the room, but I could plainly see he was no thief.  He was stark naked and his skin, which was absolutely white, devoid of even a drop of pigment, was shorn entirely of any noticeable hair.  His gaunt visage hung slack-jawed as he stared with empty eyes directly up at Arathmir’s portrait.  But the most striking and terrifying detail about the intruder was that his torso was split wide open, from the base of the neck through abdomen.  But there was nothing inside the gaping cavity, not even a drop of blood.  He was entirely hollowed out!

Thank goodness I woke at that moment.  I knew it must have been a dream as I found myself back in my bedroom with the morning sun streaming in through the window.  I can scarcely imagine how I might have dealt with the apparition.  My next thought was a strike of worry that the nightmare was an ill omen portending some terrible fate of my precious portrait.  Just as in the dream, I rushed to the gallery to ascertain its safety.  Sure enough, there was no hollowed ghost in sight and the painting remained untouched.

After calming my nerves with a quick breakfast, I dived right back into my studies.  As before, even my best efforts proved fruitless.  I passed many hours in Sisyphean toil.  Each day ended in tired frustration as I wearily and defeatedly resigned myself to bed, vowing the next day would be different.

Each night was plagued with a new nightmare.  Whenever sleep claimed me, I would find myself roused and wandering aimlessly through my home.  There were always voices.  I could hear their groans echoing through the halls.  Sometimes I would follow the sounds, at others I would avoid them.  No matter what I did, I always crossed paths with these spectral intruders.  They were of all sorts: men and women, elder and child.  And just like the ghost from that first night, they were all pale, naked, shaved, and hollowed.

I could never bring myself to speak with the apparitions.  Whenever I happened on one, the mere sight of it was enough to shock me out of my rest and leave me incapable of falling asleep again that night.  Of course, the lack of restful sleep took its toll on me.  Narcolepsy troubled me throughout the following days.  Often I would doze only to find myself haunted by the hollowed ghouls even in the daytime.  It was a miserable experience made all the worse by my continued failure to recreate Arathmir’s medium.

This continued until one especially tired day.  As I was experimenting and mixing paints, I accidentally cut my hand with a palette knife.  My senses were so dulled, I failed to realize my injury until I noticed my blood staining the canvas I was working on.  Even when I did, I felt so little pain, I could scarcely muster the effort to treat my wound.  I half-heartedly bound my hand in a thin layer of gauze that did little to staunch the flow so I might return to my work as soon as possible.  Before I knew it, the grandfather clock in the hall tolled the midnight hour.  As if by its soporific tones and the loss of blood from my still-bleeding hand, I was suddenly struck with intense weariness and could barely keep my eyes open that second onwards.  Sleep cast an inexorable wave over me that drowned me despite my efforts to keep my head above water.  I’m not certain when reality ended and the nightmare began.  I staggered.  In an effort to steady myself, I heedlessly placed my injured hand upon The Sanguine Prince, marring it with a streak of blood as I fell.  There I lay, sprawled out on the floor in front of the portrait.

I’m not sure how much time passed, but the next thing I knew a darkness fell.  I was still in the gallery, but I was no longer alone.  The ghosts from my previous nightmares congregated around me.  A great multitude of them surrounded me on all sides, blocking any means of escape.  They stood still and silent as statues in a graveyard.

Trapped as I was, I had no choice but address them.  After overcoming my initial terror, I asked who they were and what they wanted.  They gave no response.  I wondered if they could even hear me above their own miserable voices.  I then realized the phantoms were no longer looking at me and were instead gazing over my shoulder.  I turned around and saw they were staring at Arathmir’s portrait, which had taken on a new aspect in this nightmare.  The subject now looked down on me with an imperious, demonic glare.  The lips were lifted in a cruel smile.  It was as if he demanded something from me, something he fully expected to receive whether I offered it or not.  And I was powerless to resist him.

Then I noticed the streak of blood I left on the canvas when I fell.  A sting of bitter distress pricked my soul.  For a moment I feared I ruined my precious masterpiece.  But even as I looked at the stain, it began to shrink, almost as if it were being absorbed into the canvas.  As this happened, the portrait began to glow with a hellish, crimson flame.

Before I could concoct an explanation for the unsettling change, icy hands grabbed me from behind.  The ghosts were swarming against me, forcing me toward the portrait.  I tried fighting back, but the strength of the ghastly mob was overwhelming.  They pressed me up against the canvas even as they pawed at it themselves.  It was as if they were trying to get at something within and were completely heedless of my presence.  I only had the misfortune of being caught in their way.

As I was crushed against the portrait, I felt searing claws tear into my chest.  I could not see them, but I had a terrible feeling they were emerging from the painting.  As the burning talons pried my chest open, I felt blood and viscera being drawn out and into the painting.  More than just my flesh, I could feel my very soul being pulled out from its mortal frame along with my innards.  My skin quickly lost its vitality and turned deathly white.  I was being hollowed out.  I was turning into one of them!  Meanwhile, the portrait began to change before my very eyes.  Arathmir no longer seemed a mere painted facsimile of the man who lived hundreds of years ago.  He was terrifyingly lifelike.  No, it was no painting, it was Arathmir D’Acheron himself, in the flesh! 

I screamed as loud as I could, pitifully crying out for help as the specter of death ripped out the remaining shreds of my life.  As my head rolled limply to the side, I noticed one of the ghosts pressing against me looked vaguely familiar.  For a moment, he looked exactly like my deceased friend, the art appraiser who had examined the portrait!  Instinctively, I called his name in a final, desperate plea for mercy.

So great was my distress and loud my cry that I woke myself at that moment.  I found myself leaning against the portrait, but the ghosts had all vanished.  The painting no longer bore its hellish aspect and the stain of my blood was nowhere to be seen.  Had I even left it in the first place or had it merely been part of my nightmare?  

The Sanguine Prince returned to his normal, smiling self.  But I was too mortified to take comfort.  What I had once admired, I now equally loathed and feared.  The final vision of that nightmare haunted me: the sight of my lost friend’s dead, hollowed, soulless face.  I couldn’t help but wonder if the painting was the cause of his death.  Had it succeeded in draining him of life as it nearly did me?  I vacillated between skepticism and belief.  The Sanguine Prince was only a painting.  Surely it didn’t have that kind of power.  And yet…

In my wretched turmoil, I couldn’t bring myself to look on the portrait a second longer.  I grabbed a nearby oilcloth and threw the cover over it.  But not even that was enough to calm my nerves.  Even from underneath the tarp, I could still feel Arathmir’s gaze boring into me, draining me.  

It was then I realized I was too involved in my studies.  I had pushed myself too far and now my sanity was beginning to slip.  I needed to get away.  So I left the house that very instant, though it was still the dark of night.  I wandered aimlessly, with no destination in mind.  I was cold and sick, with my skin awfully pale and jaundiced.  I wondered if I should go to the hospital, but was afraid my frantic demeanor would rouse more concern than necessary.  I wasn’t ill.  I wasn’t mad either.  I just needed time and space to rest and clear my head.

I’m not sure how long I wandered the streets.  It felt like an eternity before the sun rose and my mind started to recover.  I was still on edge and could not bring myself to return home to face those hollowed specters and look on that loathsome portrait yet again.  And yet, try as I might to scrub it from my thoughts, I could not escape Arathmir’s malicious, grinning visage.  I saw it amidst passersby, leering back at me in reflections, and stamped on every poster that was plastered to the surrounding walls.  My master was haunting me, mocking me wherever I went, taunting me with his incomprehensible superiority.  It demanded everything: my blood, my soul, my very life.  And it would have it even if it had to dog me to the very ends of the earth.

I tried turning my thoughts elsewhere, but all I could ask myself was “why?”   Why couldn’t I replicate Arathmir’s medium?  What was keeping me from the exact formula?  What materials hadn’t I experimented with?  What combinations had I yet to try?

As I feverishly contemplated my problems, fear and loathing gave way to intense anger.  I began to despise my master and his contemptuous expression.  As if guided by an invisible hand, I found myself returning home in wrath.  I tore through my own house like a wild animal, throwing aside anything that impeded my direct path to the gallery.

Once there, I ripped the cover off the portrait.  Arathmir was still there, still smiling down at me condescendingly.  My fury came to a boil at that moment.  I ranted and raved before my master’s likeness.  I begged him to divulge his secrets.  But no matter how hard I pleaded, his lips remained sealed, locked in the same cloying grin they’ve always had.

That was the last insult.  My patience finally shattered.  I grabbed the palette knife that lay on my desk, still marked with my own dried blood, and stabbed the wretched portrait.  Repeatedly, I raked the blade across the canvas till the loathsome thing hung in tatters.

The fit left me exhausted.  The knife slipped from my trembling hands as I struggled to catch my breath.  It was then I noticed something strange.  The canvas glittered as if wet.  From the tears in the cloth ran reddened rivulets.  I daubed a finger in one of the streams and licked the ruddy substance that stained it.  The bitter taste of iron stung my lips.  There was no doubt in my mind.  It was blood.  The portrait was bleeding!