Shards of glass clung to the floor like dying stars, their faint glow trembling before surrendering to the dark . The silence that followed was not empty, it pressed against her, heavy, listening, as if the room itself had drawn it breath and would not let it go .
Suddenly everything disappeared into the dark. It was still, with no evidence of living beings in their. The room was devoured by the unfamiliar fog . Eliora turned her head right and left hoping she could see even a glimpse of someone around her. But there was none. It felt like the fog has swallowed every single thing in the room when it came.
All of a sudden the cold air in the room felt alive. Eliora felt something whispering directly into her ears, it was so close enough that it seemed someone was breathing in it . She was frightened and tapped his ears with both of her hands as if to remove the air that just went in .
A sound rises from within the room , it was not quite voices , not quite wind this time . A melody . It was a melody like a hymn for the dead . " LA LA LA.... Mmmhhhh...Mmmhhhh". The tone was sweet enough to attract one's soul. The softness of it nature made it appealing to one's heart. But to Eliora, it felt familiar to her , like a forgotten melody.
Her body reacted strangely to the melody. Her chest started aching as if strings are being pulled from her heart . The veins in her body popped up and it was visible on her skin. Tears rolled down on both of her eyes, one at a time. Her brain struggled trying to remember the familiar sound but nothing came.
She gained the courage to stand up and face it . "Who are you ? And why are you tormenting me this much ? What do you want from me ? ." Those were the words that came out of her mouth. One could feel her pain in every syllable of her words when she spoke. The was no reply. Silence increased in the room. She started to breathe heavily and it echoed the entire room.
Still there was no response from it . Suddenly a beam of light torched on the wall. The imaged that was formed was visible enough for one to see with naked eyes. It was a woman singing lullaby to her baby carring her on her arms while rocking the chair. The woman was wearing a long thobe. She was from a royal family as her cloth seemed lavish.
Her face was not visible enough for one to see as it was covered by her long black hair. The hymns which she just heard were the same as the lullaby she once knew and engraved in her heart till to date. . The woman felt familiar to her by just her appearance. Eliora walked towards the image shown on the wall with her heart racing a thousand miles as she took each step forward. She stretches her hand towards the wall to touch it . Suddenly a word came out of her mouth :
"MUM"
Tears rolled down her eyes once again as she touched the woman's image. She did not know why she called her that , but this time it felt like her soul was controlling her not her mind. The forgotten bonds were reconnecting again to her . A past that seemed to be swallowed by the shadows were once again crawling and crying to her . The owner.
"Please make me to believe you ", she said hopelessly facing the image. Then another image was formed beside it , it was a woman's image with her daughter. It seemed that she was teaching her daughter how to write on a white piece of chart with a pen that looked like a thin brush with a black ink beside it.
Eliora felt a sharp pain in her head. It felt like it wanted to slice down her brain. "Ahhh", she cried in pain as she held her head with both of her hands. Suddenly she saw a flicker, it was the same image she just witnessed back on the wall. But this time , it was something more. The little girl in here felt happy as she was writing on the chart, "MUM", she called out , "Did l do it right this time?". The little girl said while looking at the woman. "You did perfectly well my sweetheart " , she replied .
It felt so real that Eliora was assured that those flashbacks were hers. She owned them . And the little girl with the woman image on the wall was her mother and herself when she was young. But something felt strange, the face of the woman on the wall image and in her flashback was not visible. It felt like the heavens did not want to reveal her face . But she knew for sure that it was her mum. They were not wrong when they said that blood is thicker than water.
A strong wind invaded inside and swept all of the image on the wall like ash. "No!!! wait !!!", she said, with a helpless tone . She continued touching the wall hopping it will stop the image from fading, " l still need more answers, don't leave me just yet, please mum " .
The walls pulsed faintly beneath her palm, as though it was alive, breathing with her grief, humming with secrets to heavy to hold. Eliora's voice cracked, half prayer, half demand as she pressed harder, desperate to anchor what remained.
"No!" , Eliora's cry was swallowed whole by the chamber. She stayed with her palm against the wall, as if the touch alone could re- rewrite fate, as if her need could bend the cruelty of the world. But the silence answered her with nothing but it own weight.
A rhythm, steady and relentless, crawling through the walls. It was not her imagination. Something had heard her plea . Something has stirred. Eliora stepped back , her breath shallow, her hand trembling on her side . The chamber grew colder, the air was wet with the scent of iron and damp earth . And in that darkness, she heard it , soft , melodic , almost beautiful . A whisper not in words but in a tune once again .
Tears blurred her sight as the melody coiled around her like a caress, yet beneath its sweetness was a dissonance, an undertone that made her bones ache . She staggered back , gasping, her fingers slick with blood where the shattered lamp's shards had cut her skin . The blood dripped onto the floor, spreading in thin streams that wound together, forming patterns she did not recognized. The floor dranked it eagerly, glowing faintly with a sickly crimson light .
Eliora froze . Every instinct screamed to run , but her legs refused to obey . Her blood sang in rhythm with the darkness, pulling her closer ,binding her in a place . Her vision blurred, her heart slammed once, and the world tilted violently.
She staggered back towards the broken lamp, clutching her chest. Her lungs refused to draw in air .
And then - before she could scream, something cold and unseen gripped her wrist.