Canadian Horror Story

Raven-Wood

For Iliana it all started in 2003, she was walking home from school, like she did everyday, because she lived so close to it the bus wouldn't pick her up. But this day, it was different, something was different. Iliana felt like she was being watched, the absurdness of that.
She looked over her shoulder, a feeling of dread creeping over her, no one was there, but the feeling was still present. Iliana adjusted her book-bag, and picked up speed, her walking becoming fast strides, and her heartbeat picking up equally as fast. Come on she thought, just the next street, one more turn, and I'll be home.

An eerie sensation was filling the air around Iliana, making her shudder. Her fast strides, became an even faster run, she was panting as she held the strap of her backpack, what was that?
Her heart was thumping in her chest, and she could hear the sound of her footsteps clacking off the sidewalk, but was it only hers that she would hear? No, don't look.

She couldn't run any faster, but God knows she tried. Her legs were burning now, she didn't even run this fast in PE, but here she was, running from a person, that may or may not be there. Dammit, Iliana couldn't stand it, she had to look, she wasn't going to run away from a invisible person. She slowed her pace, and turned her head, sure enough there was no one. She froze, what the hell? It couldn't have been no one at all, someone was messing with her, someone-

"Hello?" She jumped out of her skin, her brain was screaming RUN, but her feet just weren't moving from the ground. Her forehead was damp from sweat, and her fair blond hair was smeared to the sides of her face.
"Girl?" He said trying to catch her attention, but her sea green eyes were fixed on the house behind him, it was old, she could tell, from the chipped paint, broken windows, it looked like it was imploding in on itself. Wait, was that... Gravestones in the front-yard, morbid. The grass surrounding the house was brown, and grey, completely lifeless.

"Hey!" He said forcefully, her eyes snapped to him, he was old, like the house. Bent over, and wrinkly, with skin so paper thin she could see the veins underneath. He had a main of hair, and bald on the top, but white, and stringy around the sides going down to his shoulders. He had a wrinkly underbite that made him look even more aggressive, his eyebrows were grey, and bushy, and his eyes were small, and angry.

"Uh-I" Iliana stuttered, his eyes were dark, like the black coat he was wearing, "Sorry." He cocked an eyebrow at her, and leaned further onto his grooved cane, "For what? Almost running me down..." He gummed on his lip, then spit on to the brownish-grey grass, ewww, "I'm Ravenwood." He eyed her up, and down.

"Iliana..." Then she said after a pause, "Is that your last name, Ravenwood, I mean." He didn't respond at first, but glanced back at the old house. "First, last, and only." He said in a gruff voice, Ravenwood was still looking at the house, there was something in his eye, and the way he looked at the house like murderer who had just killed an infant, that made her want to get as far away from the place as she could.

"H-how?" She said without thinking, she wanted to take it back as soon as he looked at her with the same distaste he'd shown the house. "I live in Ravenwood manor, that's why!" He said harshly, he grumbled to himself, and looked at the house again,"I live there." Ravenwood could of told her he was a cheese riding hog-monkey, that's how much she believed he lived in that house he thought so despicable.

"In that house? But you hate it." He shot het a glare, and she swallowed. You don't know that, he might just think it looks ugly, Iliana though, "I mean, I, um, just... The way you look at it." He gummed his lip again, and his eyebrows knitted together, causing even more harsh wrinkle lines. "The way I look at my house isn't any of your concern!" He spat venomously, then looked at the ground, "Sorry, my shrink says I shouldn't be yelling at nobody." Ravenwood shook his head, and signed.

Iliana pushed some hair behind her eye, and bit her lip, looking at the house. It was at least three stories, the front door was large with yellow and blue stained glass windows, tinted grey with age, and the dark mahogany paint was almost all chipped off. The outside siding was no better, it was a reddish-brown colour, that had turned more of a rusty vomit colour with all the weather damage it had sustained over so many centuries, well, two centuries. Sure Iliana had heard the stories about the house, people saying it was haunted, that there had been a fire and the family that lived there died... It did look a little burned up. But Iliana walked past that house almost everyday, and she always saw it as some old house that they would one day demolish, and put a spanking-new one in its place.
But somebody lived there, and that was a story she had only heard once.

Iliana sat reading, normal for her, she didn't have many friend, okay she had one friend, her cousin, Opal, but that's all she needed, really. It was a gloomy day, foggy, and rainy. Iliana was sitting on a park bench, there were big trees behind her.
"Hey!" She looked up, it was Noel McKenzie her school's popular boy, he was standing there, with his friends Shawn, and Shane, he was standing there, 5'7, short brown hair, and icy blue-eyed, smiling, and showing of his pearly whites.
"What?" She said, with more enthusiasm than she intended, it wasn't often someone like Noel talked to her.
Noel pursed his lips together, like he was thinking a about what to say, Shawn was standing with his arms folded, leaning up against a dark green dumpster, and Shane was smirking, and flipped his blond hair to the side.

"You know that creepy house?" He asked her, and of course she knew, it was all anyone could talk about in grade eight, Iliana nodded, "Yeah, there is some old dude living there." She wanted to say no, that there couldn't be, but there was a part of her that logically knew that; yes there could be someone living there.

"Didn't that place burn down...  Or something." Iliana responded, the reason everyone in grade eight was talking about that house was the fact that the kids on that street used to say, and still say they see it burning at night, not just one night, almost every night there was a new story of how the place burned down.

"Nope, they always say it do, don't they?" Shawn said, running his had through his rust coloured hair. Noel shrugged, "Couldn't be, not after what Shane saw..." Noel looked at Shane, "He said the old man that was living there, chased right after 'em. Almost caught him, and everything." Iliana looked at them, perplexed. She never heard of anyone living in Ravenwood Manor.

"Who do you think it is?" Iliana murmured to the, she had now folded the corner of her page, and put her book down. Shane frowned, "Just some creep, I'd bet ya." But there was something in the way he shifted his weight from foot-to-foot that told her differently, who was this, really? Noel rolled his eyes,"We know exactly who it is- Carsh Raven, the sole survivor of the Raven-Wood curse." He moved his hand side to side from the word Raven to the word Wood, indicating separation.

"Are you Carsh Raven?" Iliana asked him, his eyebrows raised, and he mumbled like he was trying to form words.
"Where'd you hear that name?" He snapped, spit flying from his gums.
"I-uh." Iliana tried to think of what to say, "My friend, he told me about the curse." She wanted to know now more than ever what he meant, Ravenwood looked at her intensely, then, suddenly his boney right hand left the cane, and wrapped around her her arm.

"No!" Iliana screamed, and tried to squirm away, but his grip was tight, and his fingers dug into her arm, "Please, let me go." She begged, and wiggled helplessly,"I don't-I didn't mean to-" he kept a firm grip on her.
"Please!" He pleaded in a crass tone,"You have to come with me!" She pulled her arm relentlessly, the old man looked at her pleadingly. "I-I can't!" Iliana exclaimed,"Let me go!"

Iliana gave a firm pull of her arm, the old man made a "nargh." Like sound, and released her. She ran fast, even faster than she had before, she looked back at Ravenwood, he had a worried expression on his face, "It's too late!" He yelled after her, "It saw you... Run girl! Leave this place!" Iliana didn't need to hear that twice.