Whispering Shadows

Chapter Seven: Echoes in the Calm

The weeks following the closing of the gateway brought a sense of calm to Windmere Cove. The lighthouse, once a brooding sentinel over the cliffs, seemed to radiate a quiet serenity. The beam of light that stretched out into the sea no longer carried the weight of sorrow; instead, it felt like a beacon of hope.

For Claire, however, peace was elusive. The experience beneath the lighthouse lingered in her mind, filling her dreams with shadowy figures and whispers she couldn’t quite decipher. Ethan stayed close, grounding her as she tried to make sense of what had happened.

“You’re not the same,” Margot said one evening, as they sat on the inn’s porch watching the sun dip below the horizon.

Claire looked up from her notebook, where she’d been scribbling ideas for her book. “What do you mean?”

“You’ve changed since you closed that gateway,” Margot said, her gaze piercing. “It’s like a part of you stayed behind.”

Claire’s chest tightened. She had felt it, too—a strange emptiness that no amount of writing or reflection could fill.

Determined to move forward, Claire threw herself into researching the lighthouse’s history for her book. She visited the local archives, interviewed long-time residents, and even ventured into nearby towns to gather more information.

But as she pieced together the lighthouse’s story, she uncovered a troubling pattern.

“It’s not just Thomas and Mary,” she said one evening, as she and Ethan pored over her findings. “There have been other disappearances linked to the lighthouse. A fisherman in 1924, a tourist in 1957, a young couple in 1983. None of them were ever found.”

Ethan frowned, leaning over the table to examine the records. “You think the gateway was responsible?”

Claire nodded. “It makes sense. If the lighthouse was a crossing point, anyone who got too close might have been pulled through.”

“But the gateway’s closed now,” Ethan said. “That’s over.”

Claire hesitated. “Maybe. But what if closing it didn’t fix everything? What if there are still… echoes?”

Late one night, as Claire sat alone in her room, she heard a soft knock at the door. Startled, she set her notebook aside and opened the door to find an elderly man standing there.

“Can I help you?” she asked, unsure of who he was.

The man nodded. “I heard you’ve been asking about the lighthouse. I think I have something you need to see.”

Claire glanced over her shoulder, debating whether to call Ethan, but curiosity got the better of her. She grabbed her coat and followed the man outside.

The man led Claire to a small house on the edge of the village, where he retrieved an old, leather-bound journal from a chest.

“This belonged to my grandfather,” he explained. “He was a lighthouse keeper before Thomas Gray. He always said there were things about that place no one should know.”

Claire opened the journal carefully, the pages brittle with age. The entries detailed the grandfather’s experiences at the lighthouse—strange lights in the water, disembodied voices, and a recurring dream of a dark figure standing at the top of the stairs.

One entry, dated just weeks before he quit his post, caught her attention:

I cannot stay here any longer. The lighthouse calls to me in my dreams, whispering secrets I do not wish to hear. I fear if I stay, I will lose myself entirely. To whoever takes my place—beware. The light guides more than ships. It guides souls.