Chapter 16
Wild Rose
Wicked Waltz
The road is tapered, winding like a twisted artery through the heart of a forgotten world. A rock-strewn pathway stretches ahead, jagged and uneven, like the edges of a broken dream. It leads to a jilted church, its silhouette haunting against a bruised sky, as if it, too, is waiting for something lost. The thicket of grass coils around our legs like whispers from the past, pulling at the fabric of my thoughts. Every step I take is punctuated by the crunch of cobblestones beneath our shoes, like the slow ticking of a clock counting down the days to some inevitable fate.
Three days. Three long days since I last saw Sebastian, and one week closer to the life I’ve unknowingly set myself on a course toward. The weight of time presses against me like a suffocating fog, thick and unnerving. Everything around me feels rushed, a blur of anticipation and dread, as if the world is spinning too fast and I’m trapped in its wake. I need a moment—a single breath—to grasp what’s coming, but there’s no room for pause, no space to steady myself. Change is an unrelenting tide, and I am swept along with it, powerless to escape the undertow.
I had once yearned for this moment, for this shift in my life to carry me away from the chains of the past. But now, as the days crumble away, that yearning has turned to a quiet aversion, a bitter taste that sits heavy on my tongue. I had dreamed of a patron, someone to carry me far away from here, to whisk me off to distant lands, and to bury my history in the dust of foreign streets. I had imagined an ocean of distance between my past and the woman I could have been. Free and untethered.
Sebastian—the man who holds the keys to so many of the answers I seek, and yet whose presence only deepens the shadow of my confusion. I should feel liberated by the knowledge that I am finally stepping toward understanding, but the closer I get, the further the answers slip from my grasp. I am standing at the precipice of something far darker than I could have imagined, and I can feel the pull of that abyss beneath my feet.
My life, it seems, has yet to turn its page, to face the light of a new day. Instead, it spirals deeper into a labyrinth of uncertainty, where each step forward feels like a step closer to a line I cannot cross back from. The truth is a noose, tightening with every new discovery, and I find myself caught in its snare. To know so much, yet to understand so little is maddening. Like a tarantula creeping along my neck, its legs brushing against my skin, sending chills down my spine. This is not just a mystery, it is a web of horrors waiting to ensnare me. And the more I unravel, the more I fear that the threads will only pull tighter, drawing me into the darkness that seems to stretch endlessly before me .
Yes, I am moving in with Sebastian. But even as the doors of his home swing open to me, I can feel the cold breath of Callum lurking just out of sight, a menace I cannot shake. My mother, too, remains locked away behind the gray walls of her mind, hidden from the world, from me, from everything. The past—my past—still walks beside me, a silent companion, whispering secrets I am afraid to hear. Greece, beautiful in its sunlit splendor, is stained with the weight of all that has happened, and all that will inevitably come. Its streets, though bathed in light, carry a heaviness, a sorrow that clings to the air like the salt of the sea. Everywhere I look, I see the traces of anguish, each corner of this place a reminder that the beauty here is merely a mask, and beneath it lies a rot that festers in the dark.
And so, I walk. I walk toward a future I cannot see clearly, but one that is drawing closer with each passing day. A future that promises to shatter everything I once believed. The road ahead is uncertain, its path obscured by terrors, but I know one thing for certain, there is no turning back now.
“I have matters that require my attention, but in a few months we shall leave Greece, perhaps to New York”
I want to believe him, yet something in me doesn’t give in like a shred of glass that won’t cut through silk. He wouldn’t lie. Well, not in the clear sense of it. But his words are his best deception, and that man must know how to play anyone like a fool. It’s in the way he offers silence in place of words, in the way his poltergeist guise speaks more than his voice ever will.
But does it matter? Once the truth is out, he too will become a memory.
I haven’t told Callum I’m moving. I hoped I could have easily packed my bags and left without a word. But this town is too small to remain in its shadows.
Speaking of the brute, I haven’t seen him for a few days. When I first came to know of his ceaseless affairs, worry would simmer in my blood. He told me nothing of his nocturnal escapades, so I never quite figured where his nights would take him. Or frankly, what the man does other than drinking himself dry and leaving home for days.
But I have an inkling
He is much a mystery to me now, like he was then, yet somehow I believe he is tethered to something horrid. It’s only fitting because Callum does not have a bone in his body that screams decent.
“We can visit, right, Essa?” Naseria weaves through the shrugs and fallen branches as we approach St. Parish church or what’s left of it.
“Of course. I wouldn’t have it any other way”
My evening with Sebastian was more like a tryst than anything else. A candlelit dinner in a rose glass garden with wine and music. I danced for him and it was enlivening in the most toxic way.
I felt naked in his presence, as he rawly devoured me to pieces. It made me heady, a feeling I have never experienced before. One I fail to put words to.
At night when I close my eyes and the silence sheaths me, I let that all consuming spark light me up. And when he visits me at night, lurking in the darkness, I pull my blankets down to reveal myself to him.
My fingers slowly drag along my slit, coating in my wetness. And then I tantalizingly bring them to my lips and smear them, tasting my arousal.
I might not see him every night, but I always feel his heated gaze on me, those sea blue eyes marking me like a predator. And nor does he leave until my release shatters me and sleep clouds me.
Every night, it’s almost our ritual. One with unspoken words, yet a thousand said at once.
Later that evening, when he dropped me off, I never stopped watching our night play behind my closed eyes.
Dancing has always felt like a pain induced glory. A fine line between malign and glace. And that night in his music room, I had never felt so rhapsodic like I was in seventh heaven. So high off cadence and furor. He played so graciously, so trance-coaxing, so breath-taking. He curved the piano notes like an instrument he was unimaginably acquainted with. An instrument he had learned and debossed in his mind. The moment shackled between exultant and darkly dirty. It might have been his hands pressing against key notes, but it was the same hands pulling the strings to my soul. Not like that of a puppet, but that of cogency.
I played his mendacity, and now l want more. I thought dancing to the buried was intoxicating, but it is nothing compared to the man who pushes me past my limits until I’m crumbling and falling. But it’s a fall from grace I’ll gladly land to dust for.
“Good,” I hear the discontent in her tone. Naseria is like a guard dog, and she is just waiting to find anything to dislike Sebastian more.
“He is not holding her prisoner. You do understand that concept, right?”
“I do, I just—” Naseria’s gaze flickers to me, a worried glint passing through her eyes before a weak smile tugs at her lips. “—I just want you safe.”
I hook her arm with mine, pulling her close, offering her the reassurance she needs. “It’s not a cage, Naseria. It’s just an enormous fortress. And you’re more than welcome to visit anytime, yes?”
She nods and while her smile stretches to reach her eyes, it is not as bright.
A bare ground encircles the crumbling remnants of an ancient church, its once proud structure now splintering under the weight of time. Surrounding it, mountains of wild, untamed trees rise like dark sentinels, and a weathered pathway winds its way towards the ruins beneath our feet.
The ground remains untouched and devoid of life.
An ashy fog hangs low, casting a pall over the sky, turning it into a flat, oppressive white blanket that presses mere inches above us. From this distance, the temple appears vacant, haunted, as though the very walls are haunted by memories long forgotten. The closer we draw, the more I’m convinced these forsaken stones are crawling with sinister tales.
Instead of windows, wooden planks have been hammered haphazardly into the sides, each one leaving jagged holes through which a glance can be stolen. The walls are streaked in mismatched colors, once vibrant, now faded and blurred, like old memories bleeding into one another. But the two double doors—those remain holding their ground with their solid, weathered frames. Each door boasts iron handles that glint like teeth, and carved into the wood at the center is an ominous skull with horns and an upside-down cross. The sight sends a chill creeping up my spine, cold and unrelenting.
“This place seems like bad news,” I say
“It’s daylight, I’m sure it will be fine,” Miro signs, his fingers graceful in the quiet space between us.
“That’s not promising at all,” I can’t help the uneasy chuckle that escapes me, though it does little to ease the knot in my stomach. The sun means nothing, not when evil never rests.
We went digging, which we should not have but what can I say. We’re clearly young and cretinous.
Naseria lost her sister a few months ago. Her death, like my parents, was arcane and left more questions than answers. In truth, there weren’t any immediate answers. Just like the other deaths that have been dropping around us. Hence why we’re here, once more in a questionable place, because of our dubious choices.
Nova, her name was Nova. Most mistook them for twins, with their strawberry-ashy blonde hair and chestnut eyes, but Nova was the older sister, the one who watched over the rest of us. She was the heart of our group, candid and precious, with a soul much like Naseria’s—unapologetically free-spirited.
Nova’s disappearance, followed by the grim discovery of her body in the river, sent their mother, Estella, into a downward spiral. Grief turned to substance abuse, and Estella lost herself in drugs and alcohol, numbing the pain until, tragically, the very thing she thought would dull her heartache ended up claiming her life.
Kimberly, Nova’s lover, though I say that term lightly, as I often wonder if Kimberly truly understood the weight of the word, was the one who led Nova toward darker paths. Transgressions we were too innocent to understand back then, until Kimberly’s guilt became too much to bear. She confessed her sins, an unburdening of the soul that ended with her hanging herself, the guilt and grief swallowing her whole.
“I—I did not know they would, I thought— they wouldn’t take it that far.”
“Who, Kim? Who took it too far?” Naseria asks, her voice steady but edged with frustration. Kim fidgets with her hands, her eyes darting nervously around the room, unable to meet any of our gazes.
“I’m sorry, I—I, ah, I should not have allowed them to get to her.” Her voice trembles, and at this point, her body shakes with the enormity of her guilt. Tears spill from her eyes, the fear in them loud and palpable. “The Stamatoties Clan, it was meant to be—I don’t know, fun, I don’t know.” She pushes herself to her feet and starts pacing, the restless energy in her movements only adding to the tension. “I loved her.”
“You did not think they would what, Kim?!” Naseria’s voice rises in desperation, the wheels turning in her mind. She stands, pushing off her chair, and grabs Kim’s shoulders with a force that makes Kim flinch. “What did the Stamatoties Clan do to my sister, Kimberly?”
Kim’s tears turn to full-blown cries, her shoulders shaking with the force of her sobs.
“They sacrificed her,” she gasps through her tears. “And it’s my fault, it’s...”
She collapses to her knees, her cries raw and guttural as she weeps, her body racked with the overwhelming burden of what she has done.
Two days later, Kimberly’s body was found hanging at Haven’s Academy in one of the classrooms. She was a ballerina, so perhaps she found it fitting to show her last act in a place where she showed her talent.
Ever since then, we’ve gathered fragments that the investigators couldn’t piece together. Kim orchestrated Nova’s unwitting descent into a cult that ultimately led to her death. The Stamatoties, according to archived files, had died many years ago, yet their influence had been subtly revived, slowly reweaving its threads until people had begun vanishing from the town. And this church is one of the documented places where they conducted their rituals.
Nova didn’t deserve to die. Her death, along with the deaths of my parents, is a sin etched deep into my bones, a sacrilege we’ve vowed to avenge with every breath we take. To the world, we may appear as just three disillusioned souls, aimlessly seeking trouble, but they fail to see what we see, the shadows of anguish that cling to our hearts, the bitter thirst for vengeance, driven by the loss of someone irreplaceable.
Miro pushes open the heavy church doors, their rusted hinges groaning in protest, the screech slicing through the still air like a blade through flesh. On either side, rows of pews stretch out like forgotten prayers, and ahead, the long aisle leads to the tabernacle. The candles are unlit, their waxen forms cold and lifeless, a stark contrast to the darkness that fills the room.
There’s an oppressive sense to this place, a thousand years of sorrow and blood woven into its walls, and I feel the darkness close in around me, whispering things only the broken would understand.
This church, this hollow, harrowed place, reeks of charred wood and memories too foul to name. It is abandoned, yet strangely well-kept. As though it is visited often, but by whom? By what? The air hums with dread, the silence of a predator coiled in the shadows, watching, waiting for the inevitable.
“What exactly are we looking for?” I murmur, the question heavy in the air, pressing down on my chest.
“Anything that might matter,” Naseria replies, her gaze shifting to the confessional room, as though it holds the answers to everything. “I’ll start there.”
Miro and I exchange a glance, our footsteps echoing in the vast emptiness as we move toward the altar. The air grows colder with each step, a chill creeping into my bones, thickening the silence like a suffocating fog.
“This place isn’t just dusty, it’s too clean. Too still.”
“I thought as much,” I whisper, a sense of dread creeping under my skin. The images from that night—the man, the blood, the scream, the sickening thud of the body hitting the ground—have never left me. They haunt me every waking moment, an inescapable nightmare that tightens around my throat.
The altar table is covered in… dried blood. The stench of burnt wood and metallic sting my nose and make bile rise up in my throat. On the table there is a book with a plain red cover. It’s thick and worn out. A circle is drawn around the wooden table with upside down cross symbols and greek wording written along the black line.
I flip open the book on the altar, it’s sight garnering my attention. The pages rustle, brittle and fragile, like they might crumble away at the slightest touch. The ink is fading, as if the words themselves are trying to escape or vanish. The first pages are in Greek, their symbols so alien to my mind I can’t grasp their meaning, but then I find the English. And when I do, the room feels smaller, as if the air itself has grown thick, suffocating.
“Serpents of the river, sigil of the moon, sacrifice of blood, servants of the dead, we must die...”
What does this mean? My fingers tremble as I try to absorb the meaning, but before I can decipher more, Naseria bursts from the confessional room, clutching a wooden box, her eyes wide with panic.
“Someone’s coming,” she breathes, her voice barely above a whisper, thick with fear. The blood drains from my face, cold dread seizing me .
We scramble to hide, crouching behind the pews. My heart pounds in my chest, fast and frantic, like a drumbeat in the still air. The doors creak open, and we freeze. Every muscle tightens, the silence deafening, the anticipation of what’s to come making it impossible to breathe. Footsteps grow louder, deliberate, slow—each one a reminder that we’re running out of time.
The figure steps into view, a silhouette draped in shadows, moving with purpose toward the altar. He sets something heavy on the table with a dull thud, the sound like the finality of a coffin being sealed. A phone rings, like the scream of something dying and for a moment, my breath catches, praying that he doesn’t hear the quiet gasp that slips from Naseria’s lips.
When the man answers, his voice is rough, guttural, growling through the stillness. The tension in my body grows, coiling, but there’s something unnerving in his words that makes my blood run cold. “Speak–” he pauses “ –take care of the situation. We no longer have time.”
The man leaves whatever he dropped onto the table and turns, disappearing into the confessional room, leaving behind an unsettling quiet.
“Let’s go,” I sign, my fingers shaking, my eyes darting around the room. Naseria hesitates, but I pull her close, urgency pulling me forward. There’s no time to lose. However, I snatch the book and the bag he left, our only clues to the twisted reality we’ve found ourselves in.
We slip from our hiding place, but the door groans, its hinges protesting. The sound cuts through the tension like a blade, loud and unforgiving. I feel the blood drain from my face as we move, panic rising like a tide in my chest. The man bursts out from the confessional room, his footsteps pounding behind us. We don’t stop. We run. We run as though the hounds of hell are closing in on us, our bodies moving on pure instinct, the sound of pursuit heavy in our ears.
We don’t stop until we reach Naseria’s house, our legs aching and our breath ragged, but the terror won’t release us. The night feels endless, the shadows thick with something watching us.
Running through the forest has become a nightmare, a twisted rhythm that we can’t escape. It’s no longer just a chase—it’s survival. And I fear that soon, the very darkness we’ve stumbled into will consume us whole. The past is a chain around our necks, dragging us down, and I’m beginning to think it will never release us.