Revenge

Questions

That stormy night, I recall screaming. My brother looked at me with such cold eyes; I took off running into the woods. Sirens were screeching into the cold December night, the rain pounding in my ears. I did not stop. My feet hurt on the frozen ground, already going numb. I kept running. 'Faster, faster.' 'Why wouldn't they respond to me?' Lights from the emergency responders blinked through the woods. Were there people calling my name? I couldn't tell. I could see my breath, white puffs coming out at a quick rate. Where do I go? I couldn't think about that now. All I could think about was 'Run, run, faster' Why was I running? I did something.... I don't know what I did but I couldn't stop running.

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'BOOM' thunder rolled outside as lightning crashed along with its steady rumble. The light of the candles flickered with the draft in the rickety old house. James wasn't here yet, which wasn't odd. He had been arriving later this past week. Suddenly the wood of the house groaned and I could hear a loud knock on the door, I hurried over to open it and James stumbled in, soaked from head to toe.

"It's a down pour!" He laughed and noticed me stepping slightly away from him "Aw, c'mon Lilja!" He snickered with a mischievous glint in his eyes "Give me a hug!" at that I turned and tried to run but he quickly enveloped me in his big arms, chest rumbling with laughter "Caught you!"

I squealed and laughed as I felt icy cold water seep into my own clothing "Ah! I surrender you damn goof!!" he started tickling me and I could feel tears spring to my eyes.

"What did you call me?!" I heard him laugh.

"Nothing, nothing! I give in!" He then stopped tickling me and pressed his warm lips to my forehead.

"Oh that means I can't have any more fun, it wouldn't be right to attack someone who already surrendered.... anyway I brought food" He grinned as I perked up at those words, realizing he did have a plastic bag by his side when he walked in. I ran to it and found warm fresh spaghetti and a bottle of water, both which I devoured quickly. "Woah slow down..." he watched me happily and when I finished he patted beside him on the couch, he had already changed into the dry shirt he brought in without me noticing.

We sat there listening to the rain and the rumbling thunder. While I was leaning against James he had his arm draped over me, I could hear the steady thumping of his heart. "Why don't you tell me some more stories about Madeline? When the storm is over we can go to the public library to do some research."

At the mention of her name I was focused, we were doing all this to get her killer. I couldn't lose myself in this warm happiness, not now. "Well let's see... One time before Madeline had a job, this was about the time we had found this place and started living here. We didn't have very much money at that point; Madeline was doing odd jobs here and there for people in town, you know like mowing the lawn and watering plants. Anyway, we were running out of food at this point and it was starting to get cold. I was in town that night and I was waiting for Madeline to come over and pick me up so we could both walk back to the house together. While I was waiting this old lady sat down beside me, and she started talking to me about how she was waiting for her husband. She looked plump and well fed. Well, along came this scrawny old guy, his face lit up when he saw the old lady. I remember wondering if I could've had grandparents would they have been like that... Soon after they had started on their way home I noticed the old lady left her bag and inside there were two 50 dollar bills. Madeline arrived soon after and I jumped up telling her about how I had gotten my hands on enough money to last us all of winter and some of spring. One Madeline had found out the money was lost from some old couple she grabbed me and made me look with her all over town until we found the old couple. When we did find them we returned the bag and they seemed so thankful... do you know what happened?"

"What?"

"The old lady patted my shoulder and tried to give Madeline a 50, but Madeline refused to accept. When I asked her why, she said that they actually needed it more than us. The truth was the old lady was just as frail as the old man, she just looked plump because the old man had made her wear his coat with hers so she was warm while waiting for him."

He looked down at me and started smiling "Sounds like Madeline was a great person"

"She was the best... I don't know why she had to die, she was such a wonderful person.. she didn't deserve it..."

"When you pick flowers, you pick the most beautiful ones first" I could feel James's arms wrap around me as he pulled me into a hug. The rain had already died down to a soft drizzle. "Let's go get to work." He helped me up and we drove to the library. Once there he gave me an idea of what to look for and headed in another direction, saying that if we searched separately that we would get more work done.

I found a bunch of old newspapers and started searching through them, not until an hour later did I stumble upon something of interesting. The article read "Mysterious deaths in the Niall house hold 2 dead, 1 assumed dead" I started reading it.

The search is on for little Blaike Niall, presumed to be dead. Once authorities reached the scene they had found Heather Niall and Louis Niall dead on site in their living room along with any living plant. The eldest son, name withheld for his protection, was found in his room unaware of what was happening. The younger son Blaike Niall has yet to be found. "It's unlikely that he could live for very long in such cold weather, and is probably dead of hypothermia" says police chief Taylor. These mysterious deaths only leave one question, has the feared dark one returned?

'BANG' A stack of books hit the table as I jump in surprise. "Sorry did I scare you?" I looked over to find James smiling at me. "You must've been reading something interesting, you were completely zoned out!"

I could feel a nervous shaky smile appear on my lips. "Ah yeah you could say something like that"

That day I left with more questions than I had arrived with and the thought still raced in my mind who or what is the dark one?