Love me or kill me

Prologue + Chapter 1: The man who can't be moved

            Prologue

 

The door isn't going to hold much longer. I managed to make a run just as it saw me and take a last stand in this room. I believe this is the study. Right now I can hear it scratching the door. My heart is about to explode. I feel very weak and tired but I cannot stop now. Right in front of me, by the window, there's a desk. Just as I walk towards it, I feel my diary safe in its pocket. Damn it.. If I only knew this would happen, I would've turned back at the moment I encountered that woman..That devil even warned me to turn back! That's it! I've got to warn the others who will come to this wretched town. Luckily my pencil was sharp and my hand was steady.

I don't know how much time I've got so I'm going to write this down pretty fast.

Just as I started writing down the first words, a shadowy figure came out from the darkest corner of the room. His hair was messy, his face was deep, and his eyes were tired. He was wearing a long dark blue coat, which was partially drenched in blood. Whose blood was that, I do not know, but that person looked a lot like me. In fact he was me, but his eyes were different. They glowed in the dark in an unnatural way. He came straight to me talking with a worried voice.

-         You know that you may die horribly this night, right? Said that person. And if you die, I die too...

I knew that he was right. There was no tomorrow for me. I looked up through the small window. The full moon was glowing more intense than usual and thus lighting the room way more in a silvery color.

The study wasn't so big. It had a couple of bookshelves, a table and a chair. There weren't any means to defend myself in this kind of room. Once again, the shadowy figure told me that I would die and once again I realized that I HAD to write down these words. Like a warning.. or.. maybe a guide for the next person who discovers this ugly truth. There's no much time left.. This is how it all started..

Chapter 1. The man who can't be moved

I was born in a dreadful little town called Blakewood, in the heart of Romania. Many visitors were attracted to this town because it had something special.

Every Friday, an eerie fog was covering the town and the woods around it at the exact same time; 19:03. Nobody knew where the fog came from and it didn't have any effect on the townsfolk but just standing in that fog was enough to give you chills down your spine. Chills that were saying that you were not alone. Like someone or something was lurking within the fog just beyond our eyesight. This was the first touristic attraction.

The second one were in fact the buildings. They were black or grey in some cases and the reason for that was because the wood from which they were made was black on the inside. Nobody could explain why. Not even the  scientists that came to visit our town and make tests on the trees of the forest. It really was a sight to see. For us, the ones that lived there, everything seemed as normal as any other thing. This was the second attraction.

But the final and most mysterious of them all, was the legend about the Lady of the graves. It doesn't sound so scary but it is. The Lady of the graves was once a townfolk of Blakewood. She lived in the Black Manor on the hill at the far side of the town. Nobody knew much about her history other than the fact that she was beautiful and had one hobby. That is to make tombstones. The legend says that she was a witch who killed to survive and she couldn't dispose of the bodies without alerting the people so she made a lot of graves and tombstones for each one of them in the town's cemetery, tricking people into thinking they were empty. But as time passed the cemetery was getting too big and the people of the town grew curious. One night, some men decided to go to the cemetery and dig out some graves, and what they saw in them was beyond horror. The bodies of the people killed were torn to pieces and sewed back together with different pieces of cloth all over the body, making them look like human sized dolls. After that event, she was hunted down and burned. And now, it is said that even if she died, there are a lot of empty graves in the cemetery that need tombstones. And the thing is that even today, there are some people that disappear to the wrath of the Lady of the graves. Mostly this is a story that mothers scare children with if they disobey and its used to attract tourists.

But in fact, this legend is actually true. The so called "Lady of the graves" is as real as me or you.  She really did live in the Old manor on the hill, and she was beautiful and she did had a hobby of doing tombstones, but she wasn't a blood thirsty witch. She was a kind lady. Her name was Konstantine. I know that because she was friends with my mother, and whenever my parents left town with business, they were leaving me in Lady Konstantine's care.  I loved spending time with her. She was very good to me. As a matter of fact, there wasn't a soul in Blakewood that wouldn't know of Lady Konstantine's kindness.

The sad thing is that one day, when I was supposed to be left at the old manor In the lady's care, my parents canceled their work trip and stayed home with me. That was the first time when the fog started to appear in our town at exactly 19:03. The same hour that the "Lady of the graves" and all of her maids and butlers disappeared without a trace from our peaceful little town. The first thought was that they left town in a hurry but when the police investigated her house, they discovered that fresh food was left on the tables. The police case lasted some weeks, but at some point it closed under the classification of unknown mass disappearence because they couldn't find any sort of evidence.

That was the first time I wanted to leave. Don't get me wrong. At first I loved that town. I had many friends and everything was quite peaceful, but after Konstantine's disappearence and the starting of that unknown fog phenomenon, my perspective changed. Or should I say that the town changed? Either way, I wanted to leave. And the moment I glimpsed an opportunity, I took it. When I reached the age of 18, I enrolled in the army.

I had some training at Iasi and after, I was sent to Afganistan because there were many terrorist attacks and the bases there were in need of as much soldiers as possible. In all this time, my mother sent me letters as often as she could. My mother loved me a lot. Truth is that both of my parents loved me, but my father was very strict and he barely showed it. From my mother's letters I found out that a lot changed in Blakewood. The town became a touristic attraction. People from all over the world came to see the fog, our black houses, Lady Konstantine's graveyard and the mysterious sight of a long haired blond woman dressed in white that walks the town's streets at night bare footed. Above all that, the letters from my mother said that there are cases of people who come visit the town to disappear without any trace just like the happening at the Black Manor.

These letters were life changing for me. Hearing from my parents made my staying in Afganistan a lot more bearable. But one day, the letters stopped coming. At first I thought that mother was busy with her work, but days turned to weeks, and weeks turned to months.  I was nervous and worried at the same time. I sent back a lot of letters back but nothing came back.

Luckily, a friend was sent home earlier and I asked him to make my town a visit and see what happened to my family. After a while I received the worst news possible. My mother died in a car accident. I was devastated. I couldn't even attend to the funeral. My rage was growing in me because my father didn't sent a word. As soon I was getting released from duty, I was determined to settle things with my family...