The Whisperer - by Valerie Tan

PART VI: BOUND TO THE DARKNESS

Sarah blinked, her vision adjusting to the sickly green glow surrounding her. She floated in a nightmare, weightless yet bound, suspended in a realm that pulsed with life—a heartbeat that wasn't her own. The ground beneath her feet writhed like flesh, echoing Elias's low, droning chant. Shadows twisted around her like living chains, their murmurs merging into a dissonant lullaby that made her skin crawl.

She struggled to move, but her body refused to respond. Tendrils snaked around her wrists and ankles, tightening, sinking into her skin like cold, skeletal fingers. She looked down and realized, with horror, that the ground wasn't ground at all—it was a tapestry of limbs and faces, the lost souls Elias had claimed, writhing beneath her, their eyes hollow and their mouths open in silent screams.

Above her, the faint outline of the chapel floor shimmered like a mirage, growing more distant with each second, the world she knew slipping further and further away. The edges of her vision darkened, and she fought to stay conscious, but it felt as though the darkness itself was leeching the life from her.

"Sarah..." A voice cut through the shadows, soft yet desperate, chilling her to the core. She recognized it immediately—Mark. She whipped her head around, searching for him, but all she saw was darkness and the sickly green light. The voice called again, louder, cracking with fear. She reached toward the sound, her fingers trembling.

Elias appeared before her, his form barely human, skeletal fingers elongated and twisted, his eyes blazing with triumph. His face was a grotesque mask, decayed and crumbling, yet his voice slithered around her, rich with malice. "Can you feel it?" he sneered, his voice dripping with satisfaction. "The curse has chosen you, Sarah. You're bound to it now—to me."

"Mark!" she screamed, but her voice was muffled, as though she were underwater. She strained against the tendrils, but they only tightened, pulling her deeper. Elias's laughter reverberated, low and mocking, filling the hollow spaces around her.

"Mark cannot reach you here. No one can," Elias whispered, his voice close to her ear, cold and inescapable. "You belong to me, to this darkness. This is your home now."

The ground shifted beneath her, sending a sickening jolt through her body, and she felt herself sinking, as though the earth were swallowing her whole. The green glow faded, replaced by an oppressive blackness that seeped into her skin, invading her mind. She could feel the shadows closing in, their whispers now a steady, maddening chant.

"Sarah..." Mark's voice broke through again, faint but clear, a lifeline in the crushing darkness. With every ounce of strength left, she focused on it, on the hope it offered.

Then, through the suffocating dark, she felt a warm, solid hand clasp her own—Mark's grip, impossibly strong, anchoring her to what remained of the world above. She clung to him, feeling hope surge through her, a flicker of light in the unending night.

But then Elias's face contorted with fury, his skeletal mouth stretching into a snarl. He raised his hand, summoning a maelstrom of shadows that twisted and writhed, spiraling toward them with deadly intent. Mark's face contorted with pain, yet he held on, his hand a lifeline she refused to let go.

"Sarah!" he shouted, his voice cutting through the darkness. "Don't let him win!"

The ground cracked beneath her, green light blazing through the fissures, casting Elias in an otherworldly glow. His eyes filled with horror, but in a final, desperate move, he lunged toward them, a snarl tearing from his lips.

In one last, desperate pull, Mark yanked Sarah with all his strength. Their fingers slipped, and as she was torn from his grasp, he shoved a small, silver charm into her hand. The charm pulsed with a faint, ethereal light, burning through the shadows with a vengeance.

The tendrils recoiled, hissing as though burned, and the darkness dissolved around her, retreating into the earth with tortured screams. Elias let out a piercing shriek, his eyes wide with fury and desperation, his skeletal hand reaching for her as the shadows disintegrated.

"No!" he howled, his voice a tortured, guttural roar, filling the air with an unholy rage.

Just as the last of the darkness faded and Sarah felt herself being pulled back to the chapel, Elias's voice slithered to her in a final, bone-chilling whisper. "This isn't over, Sarah," he breathed, his voice like a deathly wind against her skin. "I am bound to you now. And when the time is right, I will return."

With a flash, she was back in the chapel, lying on the cold, cracked floor, Mark's hand in hers. She gasped, her vision blurring, her body aching as if she'd been dragged through the underworld itself. She looked over at Mark, but his face was deathly pale, his gaze haunted, as if something—some part of his soul—had been left in that otherworldly darkness.

The chapel walls pulsed one last time, their once-powerful symbols flickering weakly, a dying gasp of the ancient magic. Silence settled over them, but beneath the stone floor, deep within the earth, something stirred.

A faint rumble trembled through the ground, and as they rose to leave, a sinister echo—Elias's laughter—lingered in the air, a grim reminder that he was not gone, only waiting.

And somewhere, far below the chapel's cold stones, a pair of eyes opened in the darkness, watching, waiting.

The curse was far from over.

Sarah's fight had only just begun.