Chapter 4: The Whispering Letters

The letters sat on his coffee table, a small, fragile bundle tied with a faded silk ribbon. For two days, Alex had circled them as if they were a venomous snake coiled in the center of his apartment. He had the facts, the cold, stark newspaper text about the Malarial Werwolf fire, but the facts were a skeleton. These letters, he knew with a gut-deep certainty, were the flesh and blood of the horror. They were Caroline Davis's final words, a descent into the madness that had ended with a bottle of sleeping pills.

Finally, he could bear the silence no longer. With trembling hands, he untied the ribbon. The silk was so old it felt like it might crumble to dust. He slid the first letter from its envelope. The paper was thin, almost translucent with age, and covered in a neat, youthful cursive. It was dated August 15th, 1968, three days after the fire.

Dearest Brit,

I know your parents are probably watching you like a hawk. Mine are treating me like I’m made of glass. They keep asking what happened out there, and I just shake my head. What could I tell them? That we were stupid? That we got more than we bargained for?

I can’t stop thinking about Robby. They said it was his asthma, but we know better, don’t we? He wasn’t having an attack. He was screaming. And Kyle… I saw him at the hospital before they took him away. He just stares at the wall, Brit. He won’t talk. He just keeps making this little clicking sound with his tongue.

We have to talk. Soon. I need to know you saw it too. I need to know I’m not crazy.

Yours always, Caroline

Alex’s breath hitched. You saw it too. The words confirmed everything he feared. This wasn't a campfire gone wrong. Something had happened in those woods, something that stole a boy’s breath and shattered another’s mind. He quickly opened the next letter, dated two days later. Caroline's neat cursive was already starting to fray at the edges, the loops wider, the letters leaning at an anxious slant.

Brit,

Why haven't you called? I know you got my letter. Please, you have to talk to me. I haven’t slept. Every time I close my eyes, I’m back in that clearing. I see the rock. I hear us chanting those stupid words from that book Robby found. It was just a game, a spooky thrill. We weren’t supposed to actually… wake anything up.

I can still smell it. That smell, like a storm and old graves. It’s in my room sometimes at night. And I keep seeing it in the corner of my eye. Just a flicker. Tall and thin, like a stick figure made of smoke. You saw its face, didn’t you? Or the place where its face should have been. I can’t get the image out of my head.

Please call me. I’m so scared. Caroline

Wake anything up. Alex’s eyes darted to the charcoal drawing propped against a stack of books on his desk. The stick figure made of smoke. The place where its face should have been. It was a perfect description. His skin prickled with a cold dread. He was no longer just reading a dead girl’s mail; he was reading a witness statement.

He tore open the third envelope. The paper inside was crinkled, as if the writer had clenched it into a fist multiple times. The handwriting was a spidery scrawl, barely legible. Ink was smudged in several places, stained by what could have been tears.

It marked me, Brit. IT MARKED ME.

I woke up this morning and it was on my cheek. A little rash. I thought it was a bug bite. But it’s not. It’s a line. A perfect, thin line starting to curl. It’s a spiral. Just like the ones we saw on its face. It’s faint, but it’s there. A brand. It’s claiming me. Does… do you have one too? Look in the mirror. Look closely. Did it mark you too?

It knows my name. I hear it whispered when there’s no one there. It’s not a voice. It’s more like the sound of a fly buzzing, but it forms my name inside my head. It’s hungry. I can feel it. It’s feeding on… me. On my fear. I feel so weak, Brit. So tired. Robert wasn’t the sacrifice. He was just the appetizer.

Alex dropped the letter, his heart a frantic drum against his ribs. A spiral. On my cheek. He scrambled to his feet and stared at his own reflection in the dark screen of his television. His face was pale, his eyes wide with terror, but his skin was clear. A wave of dizzying relief washed over him, so potent it made him nauseous.

He took a deep breath, trying to steady his shaking hands. The air in his apartment suddenly felt heavy, charged with static. He glanced at the thermostat. The heat was on, but a profound chill was seeping into the room, raising goosebumps on his arms. He dismissed it as a psychosomatic reaction, his anxiety feeding on the chilling text.

There was only one letter left. It was a single, unfolded page, crammed with frantic, overlapping script.

It’s here now. In the house. I can hear it in the walls. A wet, insect-like clicking. It doesn’t hide in the corners anymore. I saw it last night, standing at the foot of my bed. So tall its head almost touched the ceiling. The spirals on its face were glowing. Not bright, just a sick, pale light. It just stood there, watching me. I think it likes to watch. It likes me to know it’s there. It’s savoring this. The fear tastes better that way. My spiral is darker now. It burns. I can’t do this anymore, Brit. I can’t let it finish its meal. The pills are on my nightstand. It’s better this way. It’s the only way to starve it. Forgive me.

There was no signature.

A floorboard creaked in the hallway just outside his door.

Alex froze, every muscle in his body seizing. He lived on the top floor. There was no one above him, and his neighbor was out of town. He strained his ears, listening to the suffocating silence of his own apartment. Nothing. It was the building settling, he told himself. Old pipes. His imagination running wild.

He stood up, his legs feeling unsteady. The chill in the room had intensified, clustering in the corner by the window, a pocket of air so cold it was almost visible. He could feel it, a palpable pressure, a silent weight.

The feeling of being watched.

It was no longer a vague paranoia. It was a concrete certainty. His gaze was drawn to the darkest corner of the room, the space between his bookshelf and the wall. He couldn’t see anything, just shadows. But he felt a presence there, an intelligence. Patient. Predatory. Ancient.

Click.

The sound was soft, almost inaudible. A wet, chitinous little noise. It was the exact sound Caroline had described. It sounded like it came from right behind him.

Alex didn’t dare to turn around. He stood paralyzed in the center of the room, surrounded by the ghosts of 1968. The letters on the table were no longer a historical record. They were a warning. A prophecy. By unearthing this fifty-year-old secret, by reading these words, he had done more than just learn about the monster. He had called its name. He had let it know that someone else was listening. And now, the chilling presence that had haunted his grandmother for a lifetime had finally found its way into his apartment.