“I’m too scared to say much,” I admit. “But should the desire arise I’ll control my urges.”
“Ok, lets begin,” Juniper nods at Kayla. “Do you remember what you said that night?”
“The whole night is etched into my brain,” Kayla says, pausing to breathe deeply. “There is nothing about it that I could ever forget.”
Before she can begin, a chill creeps over my shoulders and looking around I can see that it hasn’t just affected me. Kayla has begun shivering and her eyes are darting around in a vain attempt to see the invisible cold front. The freeze rolls over my arms, leaving goosebumps in its wake, and I look curiously at Erik who breathes out frost while his eyes widen.
“Kayla, ignore it and begin,” Juniper orders.
Kayla jumps a little and I can see her visibly try to quiet her own fears and remain in control as we all hesitantly place our hands on the planchette.
“Spirits, welcome,” she begins shakily. “Is anyone here?”
We collectively jump when the planchette begins to move almost violently, but none of us lose our contact with it, even as the cold becomes biting on our exposed fingers.
“Always here,” it spells out, and despite our light touch we can hear it grinding against the board and I remember her salient claws.
I blow out a frightened breath, seeing it take shape and frost like a cloud in front of my face, and feel my ears begin to uncomfortably burn with the freeze.
“What do you want?” Juniper asks, mirroring Kayla’s phrasing from so many years ago.
“Everything,” it responds as all the candles begin flickering rapidly.
“You are not welcome here,” Juniper says firmly. We are now in uncharted waters, as we had stopped the session abruptly the first time after it said it wanted Erik.
There are collective gasps as the flickering candles abruptly sputter and everything goes dark.
“Do NOT remove your hands from the planchette no matter what happens,” Juniper hollers out as the house begins quaking once again. “If you do, it will be much worse.”
“The candles are out, Juniper,” I yell back. “We can’t see anything.”
As though treating my comment as a request, the candles pop back on again, invisible hands willing them all on in tandem as the house becomes still again.
I stifle a scream as the low light reveals a humanoid creature crouching in the corner of the room that only I can easily see from where I’m sitting. I squeeze my eyes shut in desperation and force my hands to stay on the board.
“You will remove yourself!” Juniper screams.
Where is it now? Don’t look. Don’t look, I’m chanting in my mind, trying to squeeze out the fear that is urging me to run.
There is a cacophonous rapping on the floor and my eyes pop open reflexively and I see her, body crouched unnaturally, hugging the walls in a crab walk across from me.
I am helpless to watch her in the flickering light, the shadows being cast around the room resemble knives as they react unnaturally to her presence, stabbing at any moonlight that seeps through the curtains. Her shoulders are hunched and her clawed hands act as more feet as she skitters towards Cara, who is huddled in a chair, arms wrapped around her body and eyes shut.
I hear mumbling and realize it’s me trying to croak out words of warning as she edges closer to her unknowing victim. Juniper’s yells are bleeding together as I try to quiet the roars in my head telling me to break away and run.
Mary stops abruptly only feet away from Cara and she begins to raise her head, the gnarled black vines of hair matted together, obscuring her cheeks and forehead, but her burning eyes zero in on me. In the coal of her iris there are glints of rubied red, as though candles are lit in her very body.
I am paralyzed watching this scene no one else has noticed, and it’s as though the world has stopped with only Mary and I still moving. My eyes dart all over her body, taking in the dingy gown she wears, frayed and smeared with dark matter. It gathers at her greying feet, where she crouches at Cara’s side.
I start stumbling for words again as Mary’s blackened maw opens to flash a sickening grin at me, teeth so discolored that they blend in with the dark.
“Cara!” I finally shriek.
Erik turns around and almost jumps from the floor after beholding the gnarled entity, but Juniper grabs his hand viciously. “Do not stop.”
I fight to not pull my hands from the board to place them over my ears as Mary opens her mouth and screams. An ear splitting and vibrational primal howl that plugs directly into my brain, lighting up my fear and instinct to flee.
Kayla throws her head to the side to see what is happening, but as she does Mary disappears entirely. Cara is looking around with burgeoning panic and begins to move from the seat, but is jerked fiercely back into the chair by the now unseen force.
“Leave this house,” Juniper hollers as Cara’s hair is pulled like a handle into the air by invisible hands. As she’s forced to rise, her yowls of pain ring through the den like a siren, and Kayla looks as though she is going to break the circle.
Cara slowly raises into the air, hoisted by her luxurious hair. Her tiptoes are the only thing keeping her in contact with the ground as her squeals intensify and tears run down her face.
“You are banished!” Juniper finally yells. “Slide to the goodbye on the board,” she barks at us.
We all move to the word fluidly without further instruction as I try to block out Cara and concentrate.
“GOODBYE,”Juniper says, which we all echo and then chant at Juniper’s prompting until Cara drops to the floor, free of the unseen claws and the room
