Stars Aligned (Tronnor AU)

Prologue

There had always been something abnormal with the old house on the outskirts of town. Something strange, uneasy perhaps. Most locals tended to stay away, claiming it gave them "the chills". For generations the citizens of Linville had avoided the little shack.

In some cases, there were reluctance to call it a house. It was small, the wooden frame rotten and some windows were broken, causing icy wind to whisper through them during autumn. The red paining was peeling off at the edges, as if trying to escape from the rotten planks underneath.

Despite the poor condition, the locals often reported sightings of light illuminating the patches of grass outside the windows. Some nights you could even hear screams or see shadows through the fraying curtains, but from a distance of course, no people ever walked close unless they could avoid it.

The children in Linville made up ghost stories and fables they told around campfires during summer camps, or underneath duvets with flashlights stuck under their chins during sleepovers, but only when there was no adults around. Most adults tended to go quiet, purse their lips and demand them "not to speak of such nonsense", before they quickly changed the subjects and started talking about the weather or gossip over a steaming cup of coffee.

Rumours went around about a killer who lived there, who had lived there ever since the house was erected, two hundred years ago. He had, according to the rumours, killed his wife and three children, and it was their ghosts who were screaming in the middle of the night.

Now, since this was a small town, there was only one school. It dealt with children from the age of five to eighteen, and you would have to move a couple of hours away to attend university or any form of further education.

Linville was a quiet small town, and everybody knew everybody. Or so they thought until a new boy showed up one morning in Connor's math class.