I blinked a few times, unsure of where I was or what was going on. I knew this isn't where I went to sleep. But as I sat up, and looked around I couldn't remember where I fell asleep. With a cold shiver of apprehension running down my spin I took in my surroundings.

I was laying in long grass, like some kind of field with different kinds of wild flowers. It was pretty in a wild abandoned way. The field stretched into rolling hills as far as I could see. Behind me was a wild dark forest. It felt old, and dark. The shadows were dark and thick. I couldn't see past the first few rows of trees. The trees were old and gnarled, twisting around each. The roots and undergrowth of the forest were so thick, she didn't know if anything could walk through there.

I could feel the evil seeping from it. And not just Greek monsters, there was other evil things lurking in the forest. The evil mixed with the mist and fog that was coming from deep within the deep shadows. I shivered and looked away, trying to figure out how I got here, and where here was. There was a thin layer of fog over the grass. I was so confused. There was no memory I could grasp onto that would explain where I was and why I was asleep at the edge of this dark and evil forest. 

A branch snapped behind me, and I scrambled to my feet and backed away. Before my brain could think, I had two knives in my hands. One was a bronze colour the other looked silver. They looked identical, except for the colours, The silver blade had a crescent moon carded at the base of the blade by the hilt. The bronze one had the etching of a sun.  When I held them, I felt a tingle in my hands and it worked it's way up my arms. They were familiar to my hands. Why, I thought. 

Why I had them on my hip, I don't know. I raised them up with a spin of my wrists. It felt familiar. How I knew how to use them, I don't know. I slowly stepped backwards. Another branched snapped. My panic rose. Out of the murky darkness and fog something solid formed. Out of the forest stepped a deer. I paused. It was the strangest thing. Not just a deer, it was a fawn, still with it's spots and big baby eyes. But they were intelligent, and they she looked right at me, like she knew me. I slowly lowered my knives, dropping my arms to my sides. We watched each other for another minute. 

"Where's you mama?" I asked. 

The fawn cocked its head and cautiously stepped closer. I knew this wasn't normal. deer are normally afraid of humans, but this seemed to be very different. I stayed still, letting the fawn come closer. She sniffed my pants and then the back of my hand. I slid one knife into its holster at my hip, and she allowed me to slowly pet her soft head. Once she was satisfied with smelling me, she stepped around me and began to walk down the hill. She stopped halfway down the hill and looked back at me, like 'well are you coming?' 

I blinked a few times, and figured why not follow a fawn. And so I did. I followed behind the fawn. Every once in a while she would stop unmoving, only the twitch of her ears. I started to get the sense something from the forest was following us. Something evil.  I shivered. I turned and looked back towards the forest. It was now only a dark line on the horizon. I jumped almost out of my skin when a loud shrill caw of a crow came from above us. The fawn cocked her head again, her big dark eyes looked up. I saw the dark sleek animal circling over head. It cawed again, and took off. The fawn kept walking, in the same direction as the bird. I did my best to see where we were going, but the rolling hills kept anything from view. 

I was white knuckling the bronze knife now, (Which seemed to by my favored one, it was warm and comforting in my hand.)  I slide the silver one out now too. I had no idea what was behind us, but my danger alarms were going off. The fawn stopped again, only her ears twitched back and forth. She knew we were being stalked, but how could we be stalked, when the hills were empty of everything. The only noise I heard was the wind rusting the grass and flowers, and the beating of my heart and sound of me breathing. I heard nothing else. The fawn was more skittish now, her pace had picked up. I was ready to use my knives in an instant, I kept spinning my wrists, like a nervous habit. 

We came to the top of the biggest hill and I froze in shock, again. Nestled at the bottom of this hill was a big stone mansion. It looked old and dark. There was a big wrote iron fence that wrapped round the sprawling garden and house. It reminded me of those old haunted mansions from movies or vampire books. It looked like it should have been abandoned except the windows in the lower level of the house were glowing. I shivered. I didn't know if going that way was a good idea or not. 

From behind me came a loud long bellow. Whatever was hunting us finally showed itself. Almost like it materialized out of the fog itself was a huge bull. It was absolutely bigger then any bull I could remember- which given the fact I couldn't remember much, the bar was pretty low. But I could almost guarantee bull's eyes didn't glow red, and they weren't normally the size of an elephant. It's nose was wet with snot, there was a big silver ring hanging from its nostrils.  It's tail swished back and forth. The bull bellowed again and charged. The fawn took off towards the haunted looking stone house. 

I didn't know what to do. But I figured, maybe the gate was strong enough, despite how bent and twisted it looked. Maybe I could find refuge in the creepy glowing house.  I was shocked how fast I could run. I caught up to the fawn with no problem. Unfortunately, the huge extra large beefy bull was quick. I felt the ground vibrating as its hooves thundered. We were almost there. I glanced behind me and yelped. The bull was inches from me. It's huge head swung back and forth, it's sharp horns just about ripped me to pieces, but I managed to twist around, using the silver blade to block the horn. My blade cut through its one horn, like it was made of butter. I hesitated for a second, completely bewildered. That hesitation wasn't smart. It's huge body slammed into me, making me fly back a few feet and land hard on my back. The Bull bellowed in victory, as it charged towards me. I got to my feet an dove to the side, rolling I came up onto my knees, somehow drawing the silver knife at the same time, and by the time I was back up on one knee, I had both knives raised, ready to attack. The stupid bull turned. For being a giant beef cake, it was agile. It turned sharply and stormed towards me with another loud bellow. 

"Bring it beef cake!" I yelled back. Then I muttered under my breath, "Great, I thought I follow a deer and I'm yelling insults at a bull. I've lost my mind." 

I held my ground, waiting...waiting. The ground shook so hard my teeth rattled. This thing must weight at lest a few thousand pounds of pure raw muscle. The thing's coat was black and shinny, almost blue in the dying sun. It's red glowing eyes looked crazed, more snot poured from its nose. It opened its mouth, like haha puny human I win. I released my arm back, and with all my strength I tossed my knife. It spun end over end towards the animal. The blade sunk into the back of its throat, the thing stumbled and then exploded. I screamed. Gold dust rained down all over me. 

I stood up and scrambled away, coughing out gold dust. 

"Eww! Eww! Eww!" 

I cringed, trying to swat the dust off my arms and out of my hair. I shuddered. But the bull was gone, only thing left was dust that was sprinkled over the long grass. And my knife lay in the grass, along with the bull's nose ring. I stood staring at them. I had a sharp pain in my head, right behind my eyes. How did it explode...why did it explode. Why wasn't I more freaked out that a 2 thousand pound bull, the size of an elephant exploding into dust freak me out more. I bent down and picked up my knife, cleaned the dust off in the grass, and slid it back into its holster on my hip, and I cautiously picked up the ring. It was big enough I slid it onto my wrist, like some weird trophy. 

I looked around and saw the fawn. She was standing at the gate of the house. I swear I saw the fawn nod at me, like it approved, and then she turned and headed deeper into the garden behind the gate. I looked around, and saw the raven again. There was definitely something weird going on. But then, I had just killed a bull that exploded into dust, how much weirder could it get? 

It definitely got a lot more weird. 

As I followed the fawn, the raven swooped down, and landed on her back. Apparently this was normal, because the fawn didn't react at all. I passed through the gates and felt a strange tingle in my stomach. I wasn't sure if it was good or bad. But the creak of the gate as they mysteriously clanged shut gave me the creeps, though. I gulped, and pulled my knives back out. This probably wasn't smart, following an animal into a haunted house. But the danger alarm inside had settled. I cautiously followed. My senses on high alert. My head swiveled back and forth. I felt some kind of power coming from the big old gothic looking house. And the garden to the side of the house drew me. I stepped off the old stone path, I wanted to go explore. The crow snapped loudly making me flinch. I looked around. The fawn and crow were both looking at me sternly. 

"Uhh, sorry?" I said. 

The fawn turned and walked up the big grand stone steps. Which were adorned with busts of different people. When I looked closer, I saw that they were the same two, over and over.  There were also a lot of old dark stone statues of many other Greek and Roman inspired things. There were all kinds of plants growing everywhere. Many of the plants I couldn't even name. Old stone, plants and dark iron. I had no idea what I was walking into. The crow took off and flew through the wide open front door and into the house. The fawn followed. 

"I'm going crazy. What am I doing?" 

Yet my curiosity got the better of me. I feel like that was going to be how I died, "Curiosity killed the cat." I rolled my eyes at my self and stepped into the house. I cautiously walked down the hall. There was a big sweeping staircase that went up to the second story. The hallways was dark, yet all kinds of flowers and plants grew, veins wrapped around almost every surface. The inside of the house was just as odd as the outside. A mix of Greek, Roman and haunted Victorian Goth. As dark as it was, I liked it. The fawn had disappeared into a room at the end of the hall, the same one that had a warm flickering glow. I took a shaky breath and steeled myself and hesitantly stepped up to the door. 

"Do not be scared my sun child, Lady Kore is waiting." 

I jumped at the voice. It was smooth as velvet, it was soft and airy.  I gulped and slowly stepping into big vaulted doorway. It took a moment for my brain to adjust to what I was seeing. I had stepped into a study. But it also looked like a cross over of a green house. Dark purple grabs grew in huge clumps all over the place. There was a big huge pomegranate tree, laden with fruit. A big old stone bookshelf with an assortment of old and new books took up one wall. The shelf was full of all kinds of dark coloured flowers, in pots, some in old skulls (Which i hoped weren't real) stone statues, black candles burned, a huge fire place stood on another wall, with more dried flowers and skulls. The weirdest thing in the room though was the woman. Who sat in a big wigged high backed black chair. 

She was pale and slender, heavy eyes coloured with black eyeshadow, her lips were bright red, like she had just finished eating one of the pomegranates hanging above her head. Her hair was raven black, and her long painted black nails held a huge glass of dark red wine while the other hand gently stroked the head of a huge spotted cat. I blanched, when I realized it was a leopard. 

I said something really intelligent like, "What the-?" 

"Sun child, come in. Welcome to my home." The woman said, she swept a long thin arm around. "I am Lady Kore." 

"Your name is Lady maiden?" 

"Yes." She said simply. "It was Queen Persephone's original name." 

I felt another stab of pain when she mentioned Persephone. 

"The goddess of spring and the Queen of the underworld." 

"Indeed daughter of light." 

"Why do you keep calling me that?" 

"Calling you what?" She asked, raising her eyebrows as she took a generous sip of her wine. 

"Sun child and daughter of light." 

"Because that is who you are. My realm is of the dark, the dead and the underworld, and you are glowing." 

"I- I'm what?" I stammered as I looked down at my self. I didn't see any kind of glow, I looked normal. I was wearing jeans, yellow convers sneakers and a simple white t shirt. My wrists were covered in bracelets. I had my knives strapped to my hip other than that, I had nothing else. I looked back up at the dark death lady. It was only then I noticed the Raven sitting on the back of the chair, the fawn was curled up at her feet, which were bare and sitting on the other side of her chair was a big black Doberman.  The raven cawed, making me jump. 

"Shhh Diaval. Let's be kind to our guests." She scolded. The crow ruffled his wings and looked away, like a grumpy teenager. The Doberman growled. "Hush Cerberus. We don't need to start an argument right now." 

I stood with my mouth wide open and my eyes wide and glossy. I felt suddenly dizzy and lightheaded. I threw a hand out and caught myself on the doorframe. 

"Child you need to eat. Come sit at my table." 

She got to her feet and glided across the room. She had a long black flowing dress as she moved across the fire I noticed the pattern was black patterned leopard print on black lace. She had a dark red rosses, and purple and some kind of black flowers braided into a crown on her head. 

"Leopards...Mr. D had a Leopard named Seymour." 

"Who is Mr. D?" Lady Kore asked as she floated like a dark spirit down the fall in front of me. 

I stopped dead in my tracks. "I...I don't know. I don't remember." 

The lady looked over her shoulder at me, her dark blue eyes examined me. 

"Come along Sun child." 

Against my better judgment I followed this Lady Kore down the dark stone hallway and then into a huge gothic like dinning room. I think I hit the floor because I don't remember what happened after that. 

🔆

Creepy Haunted house

Lady Kore

TheAuthorWritesBooks thank you for helping me come up with Lady Kore and the house and all the fun details in this chapter! 🖤