Chapter 203

Ava

We made our way back to the parlor, the music box clutched tightly in my hands. Its weight felt significant, as if it carried more than just metal and mechanics inside of it. That strange scream still seemed to echo in my ears, sending a shiver down my spine.

Zara was waiting for us in the parlor, now surrounded by sigils and small bundles of twigs and twine that resembled the effigies she had been placing around town. She sat on her knees in the middle of a circle of salt, her eyes closed—as if in a deep meditation.

“Will this work?” Chris asked as we strode into the room.

Zara snapped her eyes open. I held the music box out to her.

“You found it,” she said, reaching out to take the box. I hesitated before handing it over, and she turned it over in her hands.

“Are you sure this belonged to the spirit?” Fabian asked.

The witch nodded. “Yes… I can feel a strong magic connected to this box. This was a good find.”

I glanced at Chris before asking, “What exactly are you going to do with it?”

Zara’s lips curved up into a small smile. “This will draw Maria to us,” she explained as she began to light some candles that were scattered around the circle of salt. “Then, I will perform the ritual to trap her in this bottle.” She held up a small glass vial that was strung around her neck.

I raised an eyebrow. “Trap her in there? Won’t that just make matters worse?”

The witch shook her head. “It will only be temporary. I’ll release her and guide her to the afterlife once I’ve prepared the rites.”

“The rites,” Chris muttered, raking a hand through his hair. “She probably never had a funeral.”

“Precisely.” Zara stood, leaving the salt circle and placing the music box where she had been kneeling. She instructed us to sit around it and link hands. I felt ridiculous, like we were kids playing at seances, but the gravity in Zara’s expression kept me from voicing my doubts.

As Zara began to chant in a language I didn’t recognize, the atmosphere in the room shifted. The air grew heavy and thick, pressing against my skin like cold, damp fingers.

The windows and doors began to rattle, the sound growing louder with each passing moment. The lights flickered erratically, casting dancing shadows across the walls. I suppressed a shudder, that tiny voice in the back of my mind—my mother’s voice—repeating the words I had been telling myself my entire life.

Ghosts aren’t real… It’s not real…

But then I heard it—crying. Not just from one direction, but all around us. It started as a soft whimper and grew into a heart-wrenching wail that seemed to come from the very walls of the house.

Despite my inner mantra, I felt my heart racing, fear clawing at my throat. It’s not real, it’s not real… It had to be some kind of trick, an elaborate hoax. But as I looked at the others’ faces—Chris’s set in grim determination, Fabian’s pale with shock, Betty’s contorted in terror—I knew they were experiencing the same thing.

Zara’s chanting grew louder, her shrill voice competing with the cacophony of cries. The music box in the center began to tremble, its lid slowly opening of its own accord. The tinkling melody joined the chaos, a discordant harmony to the wails. I felt like I might be sick.

Suddenly, a strong wind tore through the room. The doors flew open with a bang, and that thick, white fog poured in like it had been waiting. It moved with unnatural speed, swirling around us, obscuring everything from view.

I felt it envelop me, cold and damp against my skin. I tried to call out to Chris, to anyone, but the fog seemed to swallow my voice.

And then, everything changed.

I was no longer in the parlor. Instead, I found myself in a familiar bedroom—my childhood room. The pink walls, the stuffed animals on the shelf, the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling—it was all exactly as I remembered it, even after all these years.

But something was wrong. There was a heaviness in the air, a sense of dread that didn’t belong in a child’s bedroom. And then I saw her. A little girl, no more than six years old, huddled under the covers.

It was me.

I watched, voiceless, as the younger version of myself peeked out from under the blanket, her big eyes wide with fear. She was staring straight at me, where I stood in the corner of the room.

“Mommy!” the little girl cried out. “Mommy, she’s here again!”

My stomach dropped, my insides turning thin and weak. No, no, it couldn’t be; I remembered this night. I remembered the terror, the certainty that there was something—someone—in my room night after night.

I remembered how my parents would come in, how they would tell me it was just a nightmare, that there was nothing to be afraid of.

The door opened, and my mother rushed in. She looked so young, so alive, her long red hair billowing behind her like fire. My heart ached at the sight of her. I wanted to reach for her, to call her name, but I was frozen and voiceless in the corner.

“Sweetie, what’s wrong?” she asked, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling the little girl into her arms.

“The scary lady,” my younger self sobbed, pointing straight at me. “She’s in the corner. She wants to hurt me.”

No, I wanted to say. No, I don’t want to hurt you; I am you. But I couldn’t. The fog was too thick and cloying in my throat, and when I opened my mouth, no sound came out.

My mother stroked the girl’s hair, her voice soothing. “There’s no one there, honey. It’s just your imagination. Ghosts aren’t real, remember?”

But as she comforted the child, I saw something I had never seen before—something that I couldn’t have seen with my face buried in my mother’s chest.

Behind the little girl’s back, my mother’s eyes met mine. Her face paled, her lips pressed together. Her free hand moved in a strange pattern, and I realized with a start that she was making protective gestures. Her eyes never left mine, burning with the sort of fury that only a mother could feel.

Witchcraft. I didn’t know that my mother had dabbled. Was this the first time?

Mom, it’s me, I thought. It’s just me. But it didn’t matter; to her, I was an intruder. To her, I was nothing more than a swirl of fog and eyes in the corner.

This... this wasn’t how I remembered it. My mother had always insisted there was nothing there, that it was all in my head. But now, watching from the specter’s eyes, I could see the truth. She knew. She had always known.

The scene shifted, and I was watching a different night. The little girl was screaming, scrambling away from something. From me. But this time, I could move. Still silent, I reached for her, trying desperately to convey that it was okay, that I was just her from the future. My long, white, misty fingers terrified her even more, and she pressed herself against the wall.

I remembered that night. I remembered wetting myself with terror.

Quickly, I pulled my hand back. Again, I was voiceless.

My mother burst into the room again, her eyes wild as they instantly locked onto mine. She scooped up the crying child, holding her close. “It’s okay, baby. It’s not real. Mommy’s here.”

But even as she spoke, her hands were moving, tracing symbols in the air. Her eyes never strayed from me, that fury burning me to my core. The fog grew so thick in my throat I thought I might choke, and my hands came up around my neck, clawing and scrabbling, and—

The scene began to fade, and the last thing I saw was my mother. Tears were streaming down her face, not of fear but exhaustion, and I could see the toll this was taking on her. She looked exhausted, drained, as if she had been fighting this battle for a long time.

No, mom, I wanted to say. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” my mother whispered, stroking the little girl’s hair—I remembered now that I had passed out from my own exhaustion in her arms. I had never heard her say these words. “I’m so sorry I can’t tell you the truth. But I promise, I’ll always protect you.”

The edges of my vision grew blurry, and my mother’s voice—a voice I had not heard in almost twenty years, as she had passed just months after this night—faded, replaced by another. Chris’s.

“Ava… Wake up…”