THE LANDLADY by Jay Jay.

Flat Party.

The alcohol had flowed freely. The music had been thumpingly loud and solid. The odd joint had been passed around. Jacob and his girlfriend Jess had something stronger in their loft bedroom, if you were discreet. There were drunken couplings to be regretted later, or rarer leads to greater things. There were things that happened that were best forgotten about.

But few of them would ever forget what happened next.

Morning. The rooms were untidy. Bottle caps littered the grounds and continued inside. Bottles were everywhere, not all of them empty. The smell of alcohol, stale cigarettes, stale weed, body odour, and a strong smell of wet dog. 

And blood. Who could ignore the salty smell of blood.

Rock, the police alsation, had been puffed up like a scared cat the moment he had come out of the police van. Not like him, not like him at all. Shane, his handler, felt the unease. Rock was a darn good dog, he'd faced bullets, water and fire, what would set him off like this?

"I reckon he's smelling a dog and reacting to a rival," opined Constable James. "Looks like some sort of animal attack in here."

They left the bodies lying outside. Nothing to be done, for now. More important to see if there were any survivors. Search and rescue, if possible.

"Lets see if anyone is still alive," Shane said grimly.

The house was eeirily quiet. The three policemen and the dog moved quietly down the blood spattered hall, leaving the first body for the following forensic team. Two more bodies on the bed, naked, in the first room, throats ripped out like the other victims. 

"No guesses what they were up to, before they died."

"If that's a joke, Stan, it's in poor taste." Shane instantly regretted snapping at Stan, it was a sign how on edge he was feeling.

"Sorry," Stan said. "Just like the other guy, their phones burned right out, lightbulbs shattered, strange sooty marks on the walls."

"Lets get to the main room."

The old house had a typical Victorian lay-out, a bit modified over the years. There was a long hall leading to the kitchen and dining rooms at the end. What would have been the show-off living room had been converted into a bedroom, still with its fancy ornamental fire place intact. Bedrooms came off the hallway, four in all. A stairwell that originally probably had started at the front door had been moved to the back of the house, maybe to make a bigger bedroom? Shane had been in many of these old houses, and sometimes the renovation work just didn't make sense to him.

The living room had probably been two rooms in the original house, a wall had been taken out. There were seven bodies in here. They had tried to barricade the door, as there was furniture piled up behind it. The door was a heavy, wooden original feature, yet it was hanging from its hinges, as if something or someone very strong had barged straight through it.

Rock was snarling and foaming at the mouth and very agitated. He started jumping around and snapping.

"I think I better take him back to the van. I don't know whats got into him."

"There's a vibe, can you feel it?" Stan said, and the other two nodded grimly.

Shane pulled the dog back towards the hall, but the animal suddenly hauled him to the stairway, barking furiously. Shane let him out on a longer lead, and the dog dashed up the steps. At the top, more blood, another body, the dog ignored this and went on to the short ladder to the loft, barking and looking up.

"O.K., good dog." Shane took out his torch. "Lets have a look. Up you come lad."

He hoisted the dog up first.

The smell of wet dog was very strong up here. There were two bodies, a young man and woman. The smell of weed was very strong, and white powder was partly mopping up the red blood. But the bodies. They were...

Shane quietly took the snarling dog down, took him to out the van. On the way, he said, "Be warned, you'll need a strong stomach up there. Something had a quiet dinner party of those poor souls up there."

Shane locked Rock into the back of the van. He sat for a while in the cab. He had to admit it, he was shaken.