Even Silver Rusts...

Chapter Three.

Chapter three.

Dark dreams disturbed Sterling’s sleep. She tossed and turned in her bed as her dream became even darker than before. She was running through a house, it was dark and cold. The floor boards squeaked under her light step, but in the silence of the house it was louder than a thousand screams. She ran down the broken and dusty stairscase. She didn’t know where she was or what she was running from but severe panic rose in her chest as she heard heavy footsteps following behind her. She didn’t turn around not even daring to see what was following her. She was at the bottom level of the house. She ran to the front door and twisted the handle. It didn’t budge, whether it was locked or just rusted shut she did not know. The footsteps were louder and she stepped back before ramming her shoulder into the door. It cracked and shuddered under the pressure, but didn’t break. She step back again and rammed her full weight onto the door. It burst open, spraying dust and splinters of wood in all directions. She ran off the porch and into the field, feeling the cold grass under her bare feet. She turned and looked at the house - it was her cottage. She gasped.

The place looked run down and old. Bits of its stone walls were chipped off and stained with what looked like blood in the dim light. The roof tiles were broken and the actual roof had a gaping hole in it, not to mention the destroyed chimney. Almost all the windows had been bashed out and she could see shiny fragments of glass on the floor boards of her porch which used to be a lovely sky blue and baby yellow but was now faded and almost completely chipped. The porch chairs weren’t in any greater condition. But that wasn’t what scared her most.

In the tree next to the cottage was a noose. It looked as if it was there just waiting for her. She began walking backwards. The sky darkened and she was left in pitch black hearing nothing but her own breathing.

Whispers sounded through the field, similar to that of chanting. She looked through the darkness willing her eyes to find some sort of light. Suddenly there was a loud crack of thunder and the whole sky illuminated. The lightning had set one of the trees on fire that cast a shallow light across the field. Sterling held her breath and turned back towards the tree. She began screaming hysterically.

There, hanging from the noose was her mother. Her eyes were rolled back in her head and blood was dripping from her face down her arms and off the end of her fingertips. Sterling stumbled backwards trying to run from the horrifying images. She knew what would come next; the dream had been far too frequent and even more vivid every night. In her mind she told herself not to walk backwards because it would only get worse. But her body didn’t listen. She continued walking backwards and tripped on something, the body of her father. She scrambled across the ground trying to escape the body. Suddenly she ran into something behind her, she swivelled around and was now faced with what she was always faced with at this point in the dream. Her brother, his empty eye sockets and his face distorted into his last scream.

These haunting images of her dead family hunted her each night in her dreams since the start of this year and they were only getting worse. But the dream wasn’t over yet.

Sterling got to her feet and ran into the forest. The fire was burning brightly and the chanting became louder. She tripped on the over grown forest floor and scraped her hands and knees. The stings felt so real. She burst into a clearing. She turned in a circle trying to figure out how to escape. Then she heard it, the chant.