Sangriala

Chapter 8: The Foxgloves

The empty-eyed girl I saw no more, but I found myself seizing the door's handle and desperately trying to open it. It seemed as if it was stuck. Yet it had been unlocked just a moment before, when I had checked the corridor and found it empty. Now I felt someone grabbing my arm and then taking my hand off the handle.

"Mikael", I heard. "What's wrong with you?"

I recognized the voice. It was of no threat to me. It was friendly. I released my grip from the door handle and faced the one who had spoken to me.

"Roland?" I asked when I saw his face next to mine. "Where's she? Where did she go?"

"Who?" asked Roland. "You mean Mary? She's in the next room. Calm down."

I looked at the mid-floor and there was indeed nobody there. No pale, black-eyed girl. I looked back at Roland. He looked puzzled, slightly worried.

"I saw a nightmare", I sighed.

"What's going on?" I heard Max's voice. He had sat up on his bed. He opened the windowpanes and I saw there was weak light coming in from outside. The night was slowly turning to a morning.

Roland grabbed the door handle I had gripped, and now it opened with ease. It was unlocked.

"You tried to open this?" he asked. "Is there something wrong?"

"The girl", I whispered. "I saw a little girl. In the dream, I mean. She was here. In this room. I wanted to get out, to check on Mary."

"Was it... that scary?" asked Roland when he studied my face. "You look white like a ghost."

"Maybe she was a ghost", I said, hesitating. "But ghosts are not sent from outside", I added promptly. "They come from our heads."

"Just what I always said", said Roland. Max was now up and joined us.

"We go together", he said.

We stepped out into the dark corridor outside. I showed a finger on my lips to make us fall quiet. There had been sounds.

Now I heard it again. Like sudden coughs. Puff, puff. But there was something very ominous about these sounds. I saw the eyes of the boys scared.

Another sound made us turn around, and we saw someone staggering along the corridor. "Help", whispered a man's voice, weak.

We rushed to the figure, and we saw it was a young man we hadn't seen before. "Alarm them... The house is under attack", he whispered. "They shot me..."

When the young man collapsed on the arms of Max and Roland, I saw his shirt was all covered with blood.

"Must be the man from the roof!" I said and tried his pulse. There was none left. He had just died on our arms. "We need to warn everyone!"

"We've been betrayed", said Roland, and I heard he was genuinely angry. "I knew something was wrong. Is there nobody we can trust here?"

"You guys", whispered Max. I could see he was pale too. He lowered the dead man's body to the floor. "You're the ones I can trust."

I rushed to the neighbouring room – thank God, this door was unlocked, too – and straight to the beds of the girls. Mary was in the first one I checked, and while I shook her up from her dream, I saw Bry jump up from her bed. By the time I had woken up Mary and Zoria, Bry was on her feet and in arms, rushing out of the room.

I made Mary and Zoria follow me, though they protested over their dress-up.

Back in the corridor, I saw Max and Roland had picked their weapons from our room, and Roland handed my sword to me. I grabbed it and heard Mary sigh in fear.