GIFTED: CURSE OF THE DARK QUEEN

WELCOME TO THE LAND OF EVIL

"Ugh, I am so hungry." Vinnie declared as soon as we sat in our seats, there are two things that I fear in this world:

· lizards

· hungry Vinayak Banerjee

That boy can swallow the whole solar system when he was hungry and that's why we would try to keep him calm with food. 'TRY' being the keyword here. Avantika interrupted him "Vinnie, you stuffed 10 kachoris at the station and it's not even half an hour and you're feeling hungry again." Vinnie scowled "So? I ate the kachoris at 7:00 a.m. , it's 7:40 now." Avantika sighed and shook her head knowing she does not have the energy to show hangry Vinnie a logic, I giggled at both of them and said "Don't worry Vinnie I'll get you something from the next station, hopefully...you won't swallow the whole train by then." Vinnie scoffed and stuck his tongue out at me in a childish manner I laughed at him and went back to my book, oh yes! books! the only non living thing that is closer to my heart. Believe it or not...even a extrovert like me loves to get lost in the pages of the books, apart from these three, books has been my best friend as long as I can remember. Ishika let out a loud yawn and leaned back in her seat she glanced at her phone once and said "We should reach Rupalpur by 9:00 a.m. but...judging by the weather...I don't think we are considering walking in this scorching heat unless you want both me and my make up to melt off." I raised an eyebrow and asked "When did you even got time to do make up? Last I checked you were sleeping against the bathroom mirror and drooling all over it.." Ishika scoffed "Darling A fashion queen does not need a lot of time." I smirked "Yeah..she just needs a lot of over confidence." Ishika said "At least over confidence removed my dark circles...unlike yours." I let out a dramatic gasp and scowled at Ishika making her laugh at my reaction. I looked out of the window, the yellow fields of mustard and the blue skies were rushing past us , a small stream was following the train..the sunlight was reflecting on it's clear water..."Guys, check this out!" Ishika's excited voice broke me out of my thoughts and I focused on her phone screen, Ishika had opened a article She said "I was doing a little research on Rupalpur when I came across this article..." I started reading the article

THE ROYCHOWDHURY MANSION:HOUSE OF MYSTERIES

Zamindar Ranapratap Roychowdhury's beloved Roychowdhury mansion is now a tourist attraction! this massive British period's mansion in Rupalpur was once inhabited by rich and influential people...but without maintenance it's beauty started to fade away sadly. But a month ago some villagers claimed that a thunder storm took place in the village and the mansion's doors opened on its own. The villagers thinks that this is a sign from god to let the tourists stay in the house and enjoy their holiday. Tourists are free to.....

Before I can complete reading Ishika closed her phone and looked at us grinning, "are you thinking what I am thinking?" Vinnie narrowed his eyes and asked "Depends..I mean most of your plans if not all are shit so pray tell what you are thinking?" Ishika rolled her eyes and focused back on the topic "Guy's we can stay in that mansion! I mean..this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and we shouldn't miss it!" I asked "But wouldn't it be hectic? You know...we aren't going to get any room service there and who'd want to cook on their vacation?" Ishika replied in a excited manner "But it would be like a indoor camping experience, c'mon you guys please!" Ishika tried to give us her best puppy dog eyes and that bitch actually did it well! we three turned towards Avantika (yes, she is the mother bear of our group if you hadn't realized it by now) , she sighed and nodded at us. Ishika squealed in excitement and hugged Avantika.

The train came to a halt in the almost empty station, we jumped down with our luggage and looked around for some signs of a transport, "Great, a deserted station and not. a. single. rickshaw. in sight" Ishika groaned in annoyance , I checked my phone it was 9:30, our train made it to the station 30 minutes late...I stared at my surroundings and spotted a shopkeeper selling apples, I went up to him "Excuse me, kaka? Do you know how can I reach the Rupalpur mansion?" the man looked at me with a weird look in his eyes, like he was processing what I just said, he asked me with a hoarse voice "w-which mansion, baba?" "The Zamindar house..the Roychowdhury mansion?" I asked him again hoping he isn't high or something because by the way he looked at me, the man was definitely smoking on something but something in his eyes changed, his face became pale and a glint of fear was there in his eyes "I-It's no-t f-f-far from here..follow t-t-th-that r-r-road and you will reach there b-b-but..." the man gulped and continued "D-don't go there NO! it's dangerous, there are ghosts in that place." I can't help but chuckle at what he said, I said "Ok kaka, we'll do some spells and tell the ghosts to leave us." even if I joked at his comment his face was still pale, I walked back to my friends and announced "So I know how we can reach the mansion and I also know that the villagers are shit scared of that place because of 'ghosts' apparently." We all cackled at this ridiculous comment by the shopkeeper, Vinnie clutched his stomach and laughed loudly "man, a big house in a village is the brewery of ghost stories." "Anyways, we should start walking now I'm starving" Ishika huffed and I agreed, we picked up our luggage and started to walk when "I told you that this place is going to be deserted! you all never listen to me!" a familiar feminine voice spoke behind me , I turned around and spotted a familiar group of people talking among themselves. "Aindrik?" Ishika exclaimed turning their attention towards us, the boy with dark hair..tousled like mine, he was wearing a brown tank top and blue jeans..he was Aindrik, our friend from school. We four had another friend group in school consisting of Aindrik, Anaya, Aishik and Shivangi...even if we weren't a lot close we were close...Aindrik gave us a surprised look and asked "Guys, what are you doing here?" Before I can answer Vinnie answered "VACATION DUH! and I'm guessing you guys are here for the same reason? Great, you guys should join us!" Ishika joined Vinnie "Yes! it will be fun..have you guys booked a hotel?" Anaya shook her head saying no, Ishika told them about our plan to stay at the mansion and surprisingly all of them agreed with it so without wasting any time we started walking. The quiet lands of Rupalpur was now filled with our laughter and chatter, the sunny morning was warming and making our moods more cheery. Ishika wiped a sweat off her forehead and said "Guys, don't you think we should stop walking in this scorching heat and take a rickshaw? I'm practically melting." We looked around and saw two Rickshaws standing in a shade, the drivers were dozing off , we approached them and Aishik asked "Can you guys take us to the Zamindar house?" the drivers quickly shook out of their sleepy state at the sight of customers and one of them quickly answered "Why not? Get on, and we'll reach there in two minutes. The rickshaw's seats were large enough for four people to sit so we adjusted quickly and the Rickshaw's started driving, even if we were on different rickshaws we didn't stop talking , the once quiet roads weren't quiet anymore. I was enjoying myself when a cool breeze blew over my face and I heard a faint whisper "beware child...the danger is coming towards you..." I looked around myself to search for the source of the voice, but there was no one except us and the trees but a knawing feeling started in my stomach I gripped Vinnie's hand, he stopped laughing and looked towards me and one glance at me was enough for him to know that something was wrong but before both of us can do anything with a crack of thunder a big storm started , strong gusts of wind pushed our rickshaw's backwards! we all held onto each other but with a big gust of wind our rickshaw's toppled over throwing us all into a rocky trail towards the jungle and soon the wind and dust blinded my vision.

"HOLY SHIT! WHAT WAS THAT?" Shivangiexclaimed, we all were standing on the road where our rickshaw's were stilltoppled but there was no sign of the Rickshaw drivers. After falling down, werecovered from the initial shock and found our belongings, which were scattered all over the ground. In hopes of finding the Rickshaw drivers, we came up following the rocky trail only to find the rickshaws and the drivers disappeared , Vinnie said "Did that storm really had to fuck us up this bad?" "Well at least we didn't lose anything.." Anaya tried to cheer us up while we were all sulking, Ishika dusted her hair and asked"So..how are we going to reach the Roychowdhury mansion now?""G.P.S's are a thing." Aindrik passed a comment making Ishika frown,she snarled at him "I know that dumbass I just don't know if Google will recognize a place named 'Roychowdhury mansion'. Don't you think I already tried that?" Aindrik looked at Ishika with a glare "Learn to talk politely." Ishika wasn't showing any signs of backing down "Learn to SPEAK with respect." Avantika stopped them "Guys Enough! Stop fighting among yourselves and try to brainstorm something so we can get out of this place." I wasn't listening to their conversation, my mind was going back to the whisper that warned me...was it real or was it just me being delusional or something? I mean it's not a everyday occurrence where you see a weird dream and then hear whispers out of nowhere, I definitely wasn't high on anything or drunk "What are you thinking about Adi?" I turned around to see Vinnie looking at me with a concerned expression, I debated on telling him what happened with me because after all...the sunshine boy had his dark moments too leaving his best friends with trauma and a cautious behavior around him...I decided on not to tell him and said "Nothing..just..that if we don't plan something quickly I don't know about y'all but I am definitely going to die on spot from the heat." I chuckled nervously so that Vinnie won'tread through me but he didn't seem to buy my lame attempt at pretending that everything was fine, He looked at me with a questioning gaze and asked "On the Rickshaw, before the storm started..why did you grip my hand?"  I froze, shit! I should've known he was going to ask me this question and sadly,I don't really have a good answer. Before I had to say anything , Ishika'svoice turned our attention towards her "Guys, I found the directions towards the mansion..just a bad news ..it's a long way away from the station." We didn't wait after that, after picking up our luggage we started walking following Ishika's direction, after walking for 1 hour straight we luckily found a auto willing to take us to the mansion and by 3:00 p.m. we found ourselves standing in front of a old station. Aishik asked "This place had another station?" Ishika stared at her phone screen then said"This one is abandoned for a long time..no one comes near it and the village people claims that this place is haunted." I looked at the station, it wasn't really huge probably the reason why it was abandoned, as accommodating trains and huge crowds is not easier in a small station...the station had burnt marks on its walls indicating that a fire occurred here.Ishika said "Guys, we have to walk again..according to the directions, the mansion is just a few steps away from here." we started walking again, and soon we were in front of the huge Roychowdhury mansion, the rusty iron gate opened easily when Vinnie gave it a push. There was a huge garden which once was beautiful but now it's nothing but dead and dusty shrubs except one tree,in the corner of the garden a tree was growing, it's green leaves cascading alight-dark shadow over the ground and it showed no sign of drying up. The mansion had cracks on its walls, debris growing out of it but it still stood proudly... a fountain was in front of the mansion, it's marble statue broken in half and debris and vines were growing on it. We went inside the mansion, it was dark but the light from the setting sun gave us a good look at the interior. A majestic staircase has went upstairs, towards the rooms, and on the lounge various antique items were kept here and there all covered in dust and cobwebs I joked "Well, this definitely checks the boxes on the list of top 10 "five star haunted house". We all started laughing while going upstairs

The Second chapter is out and about and waiting for you to read it! What do you think is going to happen in this house? Better find out in the next chapter ;)

Ishika is such a girl boss though and honest opinion: Aindrik is annoying :(