Lady of the night

Chapter 2

A/N I have used Google translate on a few parts in this chapter, so if I have gotten it wrong I blame google ;)

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   As the team entered the guesthouse Nicolai was sitting in the kitchen waiting for them. He said he knew the site from before, since he lived in Transylvania after all.

Most of the team accepted this, but Casandra remained suspicious. They all shared a dinner consisting of steak and potatoes. They discussed what they expected to find during the dig and what the ruins could have been used for.

   The subject quickly changed though, and soon they were all speaking of what they had been up to since they last saw each other.

   Casandra left early to go to bed, she still didn't feel well, and decided an early night would recover her strength.

   During her sleep she had feverish dreams. She dreamt of her mother as she taught her to play the piano. They were playing Beethoven's Für Elise. Casandra was eight years old, she had her hair in a braid. She was happy and laughing, her mother laughed as well.

All of a sudden her mother stopped laughing and lowered her head.

"Mother? What is wrong?" Casandra asked and looked at her.

   She leaned closer to the keys of her piano, and tried to get a glimpse of her mothers face.

Her mother shifted a little in her seat and moved her head slightly towards Casandra.

   Casandra kept looking at her mother until her face was revealed. Instead of eyes there was two black holes, her hair was grey and had fallen off in great chunks here and there on her head. Her mouth was wide open, and her whole face seemed to turn into ash right before Casandra's very eyes.

   Casandra screamed and jumped up from her seat, and took several steps backwards. She held a hand over her mouth to steady her own breathing. Getting upset was indeed very bad for her health.

"What is wrong, dear?" Her mother asked.

"Y-you are turning... in-into a skeleton, m-mother." Casandra stuttered.

   Her mother laughed, causing the last remains of her once beautiful face to fall off. Suddenly she charged at Casandra, grasping her skeletal fingers around Casandra's neck. Gasping for air and with a fully fledged feeling of terror, Casandra screamed.

   Waking up screaming, Casandra sat up in bed and wiped the sweat of her forehead. She was shaking badly and her breathing was unsteady. She took a few deep breaths and calmed herself.

"Just a dream, Cassy. Just a dream." She whispered to herself.

   She heard a small creaking noise and looked up towards her door. It was slightly open and a shadow hastily retreated down the corridor.

"Hello?" Casandra asked carefully. "Silly, you saw it move away, like it would answer."

She laid back down and tried to sleep once again.

   The next morning Miranda woke Casandra carefully.

"Hey, you wanna sleep some more?" She asked.

   Casandra looked at her watch, she had overslept by an hour.

"No, I'm fine. I'll be right there." She said and got out of bed.

"We heard you scream, so we didn't wan't to wake you earlier." Miranda explained and left the room.

   Casandra took a quick shower and took her breakfast with her as she walked briskly towards the dig site. Nicolai was once again missing, but this time he had left a note saying he'd be in a nearby library. Casandra got a quick briefing on what they had found so far, which wasn't much. A small fragment of a pot and some shards of what could have been a bowl. Miranda was busy cleaning them and Esmeralda was already making a few sketches on how they might have looked.

   Jimmy took Casandra to the first hole they had made and showed her the ruins they were carefully exposing.

"They look Roman so far, don't you think." Jimmy said and nodded towards a wall Thomas was working on.

"They do indeed, but is they are they shouldn't be this shallow should they?" Casandra asked.

"Well, someone might have excavated here before, we don't know. Hopefully Nicolai can answer that when he returns."

"Ah, yes. I heard he had left early."

"Early indeed. No one saw him leave." Jimmy said and left.

   Casandra looked at the wall again. Her head was filling up with questions already. She brought out her notebook and started writing her questions for later.

"Ah, there you are!" John said behind her.

"Morning John." Casandra greeted.

"How are you feeling?"

"Better."

"Good to hear. Say I was wondering, would you like to join me in a small trip to the local museum?" John asked and corrected his glasses.

"Of course. I actually have a few questions to ask them." Casandra said with a smile.

   They got a taxi to pick them up, which it did almost half an hour later then said. When they finally reached the museum they took a small tour around the exhibits before returning to the office where they would meet the director.

   The museum had lots of medieval finds on display. None were Roman, and there didn't seem to have been any findings of anything Roman in the area so far.

"It's a bit odd." Casandra said to herself as they walked back.

"What is?"

"They have no information on anything Roman, yet the ruins we have found are so shallow in the ground they must have been dug up before."

"Odd, I agree. Maybe the director have any answers to that?" John said.

   They were left to wait for the director for an entire hour, before they were shown into his study.

Much to their surprise, Nicolai was already there waiting for them.

"I thought I could help in translating for you." He said with a smile as they entered.

   The director was a man of small build, with a large belly and a hoarse voice. He got up when he spotted Nicolai and greeted him like an old friend.

"Mă bucur să te văd din nou, Nicolai.” The director said and shook his hand.

”A fost prea mult timp, Serghei.” Nicolai said and turned to us.

”This is the director, Sergei. He's an old friend of mine.”

   Casandra just nodded and shook Sergei's hand lightly, John bowed and took a seat.

   The meeting took in all two hours and didn't reveal much. Casandra got the feeling he wad hiding something. He had said they had no Roman ruins in the area, and should we find any we had to be skeptic and consider them being fake or not.

   It all seemed odd to Casandra. The others didn't say anything on the drive back to the mansion. Nicolai was driving, he had shades on and leather gloves. It looked too warm to wear on a warm day like this.

   Once they returned, the team was waiting in the sitting room. Nicolai briefed them on his findings, which was nothing, and John told them of the meeting with Sergei.

   Casandra once again got to bed early. She sat in her bed reading a book from Agatha Christie, but she couldn't concentrate. Something was very off about the whole place. And so far no one had any answers to any of her questions.

   She put her book down with a sigh and turned her light off. Outside was small crack from a twig, Casandra spun around but saw no one.

”An animal maybe?” She whispered and laid down to sleep.