When The Darkness Sets In

Chapter Six

Kassandra's Point Of View:

Andrew parks his car infront of a chocolate brown house with a wooden porch. I get out of the car and stand awkwardly as the others get out quickly. Andrew leads us through a pebbled pathway with a row of flowers on the either side of it. An elderly woman sits on a wooden rocking chair with what looks like a sketch book in her hand.

The group and I stand together, feeling out of place. "Grandma?" Andrew calls out, getting her attention. The elderly woman peeps at us and smiles warmly even though our faces show our distress. "Who are they?" She questions politely and curiously. Andrew introduces us and his grandmother kindly invites us into her home.

It's a simple yet beautiful home. We all sit on the leather couches as Andrew's grandmother makes us tea. She said it's rude not to offer guests refreshments. My eyes wander around the room and it gazes upon a picture. A little boy with a toothy smile is swinging from a tree branch. I'm pretty sure that's Andrew. Damn even as a kid he looked freaking gorgeous.

Andrew's grandmother enters the lounge and sets a tray on a brown coffee table. "Help yourselves. There's tea, coffee and hot chocolate." She says and gives us a sweet smile. I smile back at her, "Thank you so much. You really didn't have to go through all of this trouble."

She waves her hand at me, brushing the matter of, "Nonsense. It was no trouble at all... Now tell me what seems to be the matter?" Her face becomes serious. I look at the others, not sure where to begin. Everyone looks just as unsure as I am. I inhale deeply and exhale slowly. Well since no one wants to do the talking, it's looks like I'll have to. "This is all going to sound weird and incredibly strange but I guess we should start with last night. Today's my eighteenth birthday and Jane wanted to do something fun. She suggested we should explore the forest. We made it to the forest and everything seemed normal, nothing out of the ordinary. Eventually it began raining and we needed shelter so we found this old cabin. We went in and we did snoop around and found no one to be there. Around twelve o'clock things started to turn dark. I was looking at this strange photograph and then the next thing I know is that there's this creature in the corner of the room, staring at us. It chased us and of course we ran but then suddenly it was right in front of us. I didn't know what to do except say the words that grandma told me to say whenever I was scared or in danger. My ruby necklace, it glowed and the creature got scared and just turned into black mist and disappeared right in front of our eyes. It follows us wherever we go. I can't explain the things I'm seeing or hearing. Everything feels so overwhelming and confusing. I don't know what to make of this anymore. I have so many questions and not one answer. I just want all of this to stop." By the time I'm finished, my face is buried in my hands and I'm sobbing. Jane rubs my back and soothes me.

After I finally calm down, Andrew's grandmother studies and my cheeks tint red. She's analysing me. "This is going to be strange and it won't make sense to you but I'm going to need all of you to have an open mind and try to understand what I'm saying. What you saw last night was a demonic entity. It's somehow gotten attached to you all and I'm not sure why. Tell me, what else have you seen?" She asks me. "Today we went to the forest and I saw people but they looked so pale and just walked aimlessly around the forest, like they had no place to be. I locked eyes with a woman and she charged at me. The group couldn't see her, only Andrew and I did. And also during break there was a little kid and the uh...demonic entity grabbed him and just disappeared with him. Why is it that only Andrew and I could see the little boy and not the rest of them?" I ask her while chewing my bottom lip profusely.

"Andrew has a gift. His had it ever since he was a child. He has the ability to see the dead even communicate with them. It seems like you have the same gift but why did it just appear now? I can't seem to understand that part.", She explains. She looks deep in thought while the rest of us probably have our jaws dropped to the floor.

You're seriously telling me that the bad boy can see ghosts! Holy moly!

"So grandma, what should we do now?" Andrew questions her.

"Stay away from the forest. Under no circumstances should you all go there. It's too dangerous. We have no idea what lurks there. There could be more than one demonic entity. You need to be careful, extremely careful. In fact we need to conduct a prayer ceremony to ward off this evil before it's too late." She warns us. My heart thumps in my chest, I'm beyond terrified.

How much danger are we in?