“What is happening, Nora?’ Naomi asked.
Nora wished she knew. She was as lost as they were and even more terrified than they could ever be.
“I don’t know about you, but your freaky aunt scares the living crap out of me and I think it is time we left!” Daren jumped to his feet and held Naomi up with him.
Naomi seemed too stricken with fear to speak as she agreed with a nod. They picked up their bags and immediately headed for the door. Daren reached for the doorknob, paused and took another look in Nora’s direction before sighing softly.
“Thanks for having us”, he manages to smile.
Nora waved and responded, “The pleasure is all mine”.
Naomi walked onto the front porch first, gasping aloud as she stopped dead in her tracks.
“Oh my God!” she screamed atop her voice, clenching her hands over her mouth to prevent herself from screaming any louder.
Daren turned around and looked away from Nora to catch sight of the disturbing image before them. ‘Nora! Nora!”
Nora raced out of the room and shoved them both aside to see what was getting them both riled up. Her eyes widened with fear and disbelief, while her lower jaw dropped. She motioned forward, but Naomi yanked at her arm and prevented her from foraying ahead any further. Their breaths soon took a synced rhythm, heaving out from their chest heavily, and causing them to pant as they drew backwards.
“I don’t think we are being permitted to go home”, Daren noted.
The message was clear and the sight was pretty much glaring.
“Go and call my father!” Nora ordered Naomi.
Naomi hurried away, leaving the duo on the porch to stare down on what they could tell to be no less than fifty dead bodies surrounding the house with their faces plunged into the earth.
“Do… do… do you think that damned card has anything to do with this?” Daren asked nervously.
It was a question even Nora was too scared to give an answer to. Scared and worried in almost eeuql mix, she wondered if ever coming across the tarot card was a good idea.
Laura came running out of the house with a wild smirk on her face. “Do you people believe me now?”
She giggled and smiled at Nora, before patting Daren hard on his back.
“They have been sent this early… looks like things will be tougher this time around”, Laura spoke in completely ominous tone.
CHAPTER SIX
Fueled by confusion and completely taken aback by the blinding scene around their house, Muzin, Nora and Lama stood side by die, almost with no meaningful expressions on their faces as they tried to decipher what exactly they ought to do next. Muzin looked to his daughter, who suddenly seemed to be drowning in the reality that her life wasn’t going to be in any way the same with other girls her age.
“What have we done?” Nora asked, staring at a dead raven with deep darkened eyes just at her feet.
The ravens asides, the dead bodies lining the yard around their house was the more disturbing debacle to figure out.
“Are they dead?” Daren asked. “I mean… is this some kind o sick prank or something?’
Laura leaned against the wall and smiled eerily without uttering a word. There was the sense amongst the others that she might be trying to play some bizarre prank or possibly even be the one who had orchestrated the entire ordeal. Yet, the reasons behind her action towards doing so baffled everyone and continued to leave them in loss.
“Before any of you point accusatory fingers towards me, I have to say that I had nothing to do with it”, Laura declared immediately. “I warned you, but you wouldn’t listen… it has begun”.
Daren scoffed, trying his best to remain and seem brave as he made the first step towards the eerie sight before them. One step after the other, pretty nervous and almost without any understanding as to what he was doing, he stopped before a bald looking figure whose face was sunk into the sand just like the rest of them.
On his back was a picture of a bird, disturbingly scary and in no way peaceful in sight as it stretched along the pale white skin with no sign of life in it.
“I think they are all dead”, Daren sighed in relief.
Laura shrugged, smiled and ran her finger along her lip while she watched Daren keenly. He smiled and wove back at Naomi, seemingly trying to show off as he struck the dead body with his foot and felt it remain still and unwilling to move under his pretty heavy kick. He struck it once again, feeling the body remain on the spot as though it had been nailed down.
Naomi shrieked, “Daren, stop goofing around and get the hell out of there!”
He shrugged, smiled and waved her words away without any intention of listening to her.
“Pretty tough thing… it isn’t even… “, he turned to look at Naomi once again just before a tightened grip around his right foot made him squirm and halt his words.
Their faces bore grimaces and their expressions suddenly sent shiver mixed with fright down his spine. He could tell something was definitely not right and he didn’t need much to ascertain such fact.
“Daren… whatever you do, please don’t make a sound”, Muzin pleaded with the boy.
Daren nodded his head while drops of sweat fell from his face unto his chest. Slowly, but carefully, he looked down at the body whose face remained embedded in the soil, and motioned to take his foot out but it remained unmovable with the dead man’s grip not easing off regardless.
Nora turned to Laura with a saddened and frightful expression on her face. ‘What is going on?”
Laura smiled. “That kid is stupid…
