Arundhati's POV (Ann's sis)

The highway was almost uninhabited. The deep woods by the road looked so dark. There was not a single light anywhere except the light of our car's headlight. We drove on through the twisted highway and after a few minutes of awkward silence, Saikat spoke, "...um..so how are you feeling now?"

"Fine..much better in fact!" I replied but my voice came out as a faint one. 

"You looked so pale down there and you even had tears in your eyes!! What was the matter?" He asked concerned while his ash eyes were fixed on the road ahead. 

"Nothing much!" I managed to reply.

Flashbacks rushed to my mind as he asked me about the basement car parking area but I kept it all to myself and managed to fake a smile on my face just to hide my fears.

"Okay...but I just wanna tell you that if you wanna share you can trust me. Your secrets will be safe with me!" He said smiling at me with a reassurance look. I smiled back and looked ahead at the uninhabited road.

"..um..my house is up in the mountains! If you have any problem you can drop me at the end of the turn. I would walk myself home." I spoke a bit hesitant, breaking the silence between us. "You don't have to worry to take me to my house all the way up through the mountain then again you have to return to your home. Its already quite late-"

"Hey! Relax!" He spoke looking at me with comforting smile, "My house is also up in the mountains! I know where your house is." He replied smirking.

"B...but how? How do you know where my house is? Have we ever met before?" I asked extremely confused! 

"I thought you would recall! But I am kind of sad to see you don't remember at all!" He complained with a smile, making a disappointed face. 

"Sorry! But I really can't recall anything" I said looking at him a bit embarrassed and hopeful. 

"Well! Do you know Siddharth Chatterjee? Your sister's best friend!" He asked. I nodded in positive. "He is my brother! You came to our house once too. See I remembered you! " He said smiling. I smiled back recalling him to be the guy in bandages. 

"Yeah, I remember now! You were covered in bandages!" I said chuckling at him. He smiled back.

He dropped me at my house and I waved him goodbye. He too waved back and reversed back his car. As I turned around I came to face my gloomy house. The uncanny sound of crickets from the woods around made an eerie ambiance. I knocked on the door. Ann opened it at once and pulled me aside. She looked really tensed as she told me what happened today in the basement with her and about Rita's condition.

"How is she now?" I asked her worried as I hurried up to Rita's room to check on her.

"She is fine but it's just that her body temperature is slightly less than normal!" Ann replied a little confused as we walked, "and sis! Don't tell Rita what exactly I saw in the basement! She seems to know nothing of it and we should not make her anymore scared or worried." she said with a thoughtful expression. 

"Sure! I won't!" I replied as I reached Rita's room.

Rita was deep asleep. I checked her body temperature. She was cold yet she was sweating. As I was about to check her pulse I saw her wrist had few cuts and her hand had few bruises. 

"How did she got all these wounds?" I asked turning over to Ann and Pihu with some logical explanation, my eyebrows frowned. 

"We don't know and neither do Rita!" they replied worriedly. Around her neck, there was a faint line as if some kind of necklace was hung around her neck for a long time. But as much as I remembered she never used to wear any necklace.

"If her condition does not improve by tomorrow, we will take her to the hospital," I suggested after checking her pulse and went to my room to get freshen up. After I was done I went downstairs to have something to eat as I was really hungry. Pihu was feeling strangely too exhausted that it was hard for her to even keep her eyes open so went to her room to take a nap and I found Ann down here with me. I decided not to tell her about what happened in my clinic, I don't want to worry her or scare her any more than she already is.

I took a plate full of rice and paneer and a glass full of coke and gulped down the warm dinner. Ann was cleaning the dishes by the sink. She was so quite, only the sound of the clattering of the dishes and the flowing water in the sink accompanied us. After I was done, I went to helped her to clean the dishes. I don't know why but she looked really distressed and a little lost, as if engrossed in a deep thought. 

"What's the matter Ann?" I asked her while cleaning the dishes, breaking the silence that grew between us. She jumped at her place at my sudden question, startled. 

"Nothing...nothing at all!! But why did you ask?" She replied faking a smile covering her nervous voice. 

"You looked tensed! Is there something bothering you? then please tell me!" I urged her to tell me. I knew she was hiding something.

"I told you everything! There is nothing more to tell! I was just worried for Rita!" She replied stuttering a bit, avoiding eye contact. Her voice was enough for me to be sure she was hiding something from me...

Ann's POV

Sis asked me what was bothering me, but I thought it's better not to tell her anything now. I told her what I saw in the basement but I haven't said her anything about the hidden darkroom in the attic or the old worn-out diary I found today. She is already quite worried, I should not bother her anymore. I said to myself while placing the clean dishes in their places.

After we were finally done we went back to our room wishing each other good night. It was a long tiresome day. But my heart wanted to explore the darkness of that mysterious attic room. It was not that I wasn't scared, rather I was terrified, but I wanted to know, I wanted to unfold the mystery surrounding us, maybe be it will help us to get away from these unnatural frightning things that has been happening with us, I thought as I changed into a pair of comfortable nightdress and decided to explore the room tomorrow. I slid under my soft warm blanket, took that old diary which I found today, switched on the bedside study lamp, and started reading through the worn out pages.

Dear diary,

Today we shifted to our new house in Tezpur. It's a huge and enormous mansion!! I just love it! Snow is happy too!! And you know diary we even got a kennel for him.

I and Dave took the adjacent rooms in the attic. It's so beautiful. Moreover the backyard is perfectly visible from there and the distant mountains looked so beautiful surrounding us. It's so peaceful.

From tomorrow we are starting our school here. I need to unpack my boxes and arrange my things. Anyway, It's really amazing in here!

~with love
Nidhi

It was the first page of the diary. I checked the date on top of the page. It was 12th March 1949.

It must belong to the owners who lived here before the Agarwal family. I said to myself.

Nidhi..!! I think I heard this name somewhere! Whose name was it? As I was trying to recall, there was a sudden sound, like someone was walking, came from the attic. Immediately I looked up at the ceiling trying to focus in order to understand where the sound was going. The attic was right above my room so the sound was quite clear. Who is in the attic now? I asked myself, feeling pertubed.

I gulped down the cavity that had formed in my throat and decided to find out who was out there. I pulled out the drawer of my bedside table and took the torch from it. Removing the sheets, I got down from my bed. Switching on the torch I walked upstairs. I didn't switch on the lights of the corridors so that sis and the others are not woken up. I didn't want them to worry.

I walked up the old wooden stairs with the floor creaking beneath me, making a errie sound amidst the unsettling silence. As I was about to open the attic door I felt a presence behind me on the stairs. Immediately I turned around to find a shadow of a woman in the darkness. As I turned my torch towards it, Rita's face was illuminated from the darkness. Her head was hung low, her long open air gently flowing with the wind amidst the uncanny darkness which was coming from the window by the stairs. 

"What are you doing here Rita?" I asked shocked. But something about her made me feel agitated rather scared. Her lips curved into a sinister smile and she looked up at me, her eyes were completely black. My blood ran cold, fear gripping me as I gasped at her terrifying sight. Her face was pale with few cuts on her skin. I stepped back with my trembling feet to run away from her. 

"For doing what I should have done much before!" She replied in a sinister blood-curdling voice and all of a sudden lunged forward at me with a knife in her hand...

Hello everyone I hope you will find this chapter interesting. Please do vote comment and share.

-Anusree