Junayed Hossain
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The shadow of death
It was 2:03. When Arjun got out of the shaky old rickshaw, there was a lot of silence. The driver quickly turned around and disappeared into the night, murmuring something about not going any further near the old house. Arjun took a look ahead. The silhouette of his ancestral home was obscured by creeping vines, broken windows, and the weight of time at the end of the village lane. He had not been here for more than a decade. The loud, prolonged creak he heard as he opened the rusty iron gate sounded like the house itself groaning. He stopped. A breeze seemed to carry whispers that vanished as soon as he tried to focus on them. The night air was unusually cold for early summer. He entered with a head shake. The residence had not changed. The brass knocker with a lion design is for the same wooden door. The identical veranda with loose tiles. However, dust covered everything, as though time had stopped since his parents left. Arjun entered the house after unlocking the front door. His nostrils were filled with the familiar musty scent of mold, aged wood, and something else—something metallic. He turned on the phone's flashlight. The electricity had been cut off a long time ago. As the beam moved from one corner to the next, shadows moved along the walls. Like an unwelcome guest, every step disturbed the silence. The furniture remained stationary like icebergs. The ceiling was draped with cobwebs. He exhaled. Simple was the strategy. Stay the night there. Check the house's condition. Sell it after having it evaluated. Then depart. But the house wouldn't let him sleep as the night went on. Strange noises started around 3 a.m. The first sound was a gentle knock. Continue to tap. In bed, he froze. This time it came from the old wardrobe, and it was louder. He approached it with courage and flung the doors open. Nothing. He laughed tremblingly. Arjun: "You're losing it." But then his phone's lights started to blink. A second knock came from behind him, this time. He abruptly turned. No one. That's when he saw a new thing: a handprint. Visible but faint on the mirror in front of the bed. He is not. Too much, and covered in what appeared to be dried blood. His spine began to shake. A whisper suddenly broke out in the room. He didn't recognize the voice, but it was loud and terrifying. "You shouldn't have returned..." The temperature went down. His breath came into focus. He also caught a glimpse of it out of the corner of his eye: a shadowy, tall figure at the end of the corridor. Arjun ran out of the room quickly. He sprinted down the stairs, stumbled in the pitch-black, and nearly fell, but he managed to escape the house. His flashlight flashed rapidly. He dashed through the front gate and down the dirt path to Uncle Basu's house, where he had lived since childhood. He slammed the door shut. The door squeaked open, and the light turned on in a matter of seconds. Uncle Basu, groggy but alarmed, opened it. "Arjun? Is that you, God? At this hour, what are you doing here? At first, Arjun didn't say anything. His hands were shaking, and his face was pale. "There's... something in the house," he just said. He was allowed inside, seated, and given water by the elderly man. Basu sighed after a few minutes of silence. He said quietly, "I was afraid this might happen." I warned your father never to return to this location. But you... you don't know everything, do you? Arjun went up. "What tale?" An unspoken fear filled Basu's eyes. Ratan, your great-uncle, the one who lived in that house before your family moved in, did not simply pass away. He is said to have lost his mind. He killed his wife one night and hanged himself in the room you were trying to sleep in. Arjun's heart sank. But why not? "Nobody is aware. The idea that someone in the family had betrayed him became his obsession. And just before he passed away, he said something to you that your father never said: "Blood must pay for blood." Arjun's voice was shaking. "Are you saying that his spirit is still present?" Basu gave a slow nod. On this night every year, someone hears a knock. sights things. Senses things. Your father was skeptical of it. But after that night, he said he would never come back. On this ghastly night, you are the first person in twelve years to enter that house." The table candle flickered violently at once. Although the windows were closed, a gust of wind passed through. The voice then appeared. “Arjuuuun…” Both of them froze. Basu became pale. "He knows that you are here," He handed Arjun an old, rusted iron trident from the corner without saying a word. It was an artifact from a long-forgotten shrine. He dislikes iron. Your only defense is this. Do not return tonight. However, Arjun had already gotten up. He was being pulled inwardly, not by fear but by an odd compulsion. as though the house had not yet finished with him. Despite Basu's protests, he left. The front door was open when he got to the house. It was quiet inside. Too silent. While tightly securing the iron trident, he made his way upstairs. The air was thick enough to almost be liquid. Every breath was full of force. Strange echoes came from each step. He then saw it once more in the mirror in the hallway. the gloom, standing in his direction. However, this time it spoke. "His blood is in you." Arjun raised the trident as he turned to face it. The shadow didn't move at all. "You deserted us. Let us perish. Blood has to pay..." Arjun said, his voice trembling, firmly, "No." "You lost control and died." Nothing had anything to do with my family". The shadow drew nearer. The walls started to leak blood. The floor split. But Arjun did not back down. He frantically lowered the trident into the ground after raising it. The house was shattered by a shrill, irate, and ancient scream. The shadow jerked, screamed, shattered into a thousand black smoke fragments, and then vanished. Then, nothing. The air became clear. The broken windows let in morning light. The curse had... ended. ---Epilogue: Arjun was standing in front of the freshly painted house months later. It reappeared to be alive. He had chosen not to market it. Not in light of what occurred. Some tales and legacies cannot be handed down to strangers. Even though the nights were quieter now, he occasionally thought he heard a whisper when the wind came from the east.
By Junayed Hossain 9 months ago in Horror
The Dollmaker’s Curse
Briar Manor was a house that had been abandoned for a long time in the now-defunct town of Greystone Hollow. There, the mist clung to crumbling stone fences, and dead leaves whispered secrets down crooked paths. It was cursed by the locals. According to them, no birds ever perched on its eaves, no animals ever wandered nearby, and no one ever left the building the same. Miss Evangeline Blythe owned the house for decades. She was a reclusive dollmaker who ran a shop selling porcelain creations that were so lifelike they made your skin crawl. Her dolls were works of art with rosy cheeks, glass eyes that blink, and delicate dresses that were stitched with uncanny precision. However, their eyes never left the room. Her shop was once frequented by children and their parents, who were captivated by the dolls. However, something changed over time. The kids started to withdraw. Quiet. They sometimes just vanished, whispered to the dolls, or held the dolls too tightly. one at a time. Eventually, the town turned against Evangeline and stormed the manor with torchlight and a look of fear in their eyes. However, she was gone. There was nothing left behind but hundreds of her dolls that were left staring from every corner. No one dared come back. up until Halloween evening. Seniors Lena, Jake, and Marissa, who were sick of small-town legends, decided to look around the manor. Jake said, "Just for fun." They bravely and with flashlights pushed through the overgrown, iron gates that were covered in thorny vines. In the moonlight, the manor loomed like a corpse. The air inside was covered in snow-like dust. Walls were covered in peeling, faded wallpaper. Doll-lined shelves lined the walls of each room. Small, large, elegant, or crude. The dolls seemed to follow the teens wherever they went, their eyes shimmering in the night. Marissa mumbled, "This is creepy as hell." They discovered the workshop in the basement, which had a large glass cabinet in the middle, tools scattered across a long table, and walls covered in old sketches. A doll that stood out from the rest was inside: a tiny girl with blonde curls, a crimson velvet dress, and praying-like hands. Clara was her tag. Lena said, half-joking and half-daring, "Let's take her." They took Clara home, despite Jake's protests. That night, Lena placed Clara on her desk and fell asleep. She awoke to a soft thud at 2:47 AM. The doll was lying on the ground, her head pointing at her bed. She thought she had it in her head. However, Clara got closer and closer each night. The cold air got colder. The shadows remained longer. Even though the windows were closed, Lena discovered that one morning her mirror was fogged. The words "I miss my family" were written with a child's finger on the glass. Visions of a twisted workbench, a woman whispering spells, and glassy eyes blinking from cabinets entered her dreams. She saw children trapped in wooden bodies, pale and motionless. One resembled Marissa. Lena begged Jake to accompany her to return the doll out of fear. After two days, Marissa hadn't turned up to school. She had not been heard from. The door creaked open on its own at the manor house. Something sickly sweet and decaying wood were the inside odors. They went down to the basement, but this time it was different. Cleaner. as if it had just been used recently. Evangeline Blythe's dusty journal was on the table. In its pages, rituals, soul transfers, and a chilling line were described in detail: "The vessel and the soul must match. The transformation is pure only then. Names were listed on the last page. Marissa. Clara. Lena is also at the bottom. The glass cabinet broke behind them. Dozens of dolls simultaneously turned their heads. The temperature in the room dropped to freezing. “You took her place,” a whisper floated through the air. She now takes yours. Clara had vanished. As porcelain hands clawed at his legs and dragged him into the shadows, Jake screamed. Lena tried to run, but she was held down by hands that weren't there. A chilly, unnoticeable force was pressing against her mouth, drowning out her screams. In the broken mirror, she saw that her eyes were no longer her own—glassy and unblinking. Her hands stopped moving. Her joints became stiffer. Her throat was holding her breath. Then—silence. The following morning, Briar Manor was once more quiet. Still. A new addition was a doll with wide eyes, chestnut hair, and a red dress in the basement cabinet. As if praying, she had her hands tightly clasped. Lena was never seen again. However, if you pay close attention outside the manor on certain nights, you can hear the whispering dolls waiting for their next visitor and the soft clink of porcelain feet on wood. --- Want a second part? Lena may be sought out by a new individual, or the curse may begin to spread beyond the manor.
By Junayed Hossain 9 months ago in Horror
