Chapter 2 – Shadows in the Chapel
907 Words
The night in Dune Ridge was darker than Leah remembered. The stars above were distant, veiled behind low-hanging clouds, and the air felt heavy with unsaid things. Crickets chirped from the bush, a lonely dog barked in the distance, and Lake Dune whispered secrets against its rocky shores.
Leah stood at the edge of the old chapel ruins, her phone flashlight flickering weakly as she stepped over broken stone and moss-covered slabs. The once-grand house of worship had collapsed years ago during a mysterious fire. Now, only the foundation, a few fractured pillars, and the shattered remains of stained glass windows remained.
She checked her watch. 12:02 a.m.
No sign of Mzee Baraka.
Suddenly, a voice, raspy and low, echoed from the shadows. “You came.”
Leah turned sharply, pointing her flashlight toward the sound. Mzee Baraka emerged from the darkness, walking with slow but purposeful steps, a walking stick in hand.
“You’re late,” she said, her voice low.
“And yet I’m here.”
He pointed to an old stone bench hidden beneath a collapsed beam. They sat. For a moment, there was only silence.
Then he began.
“Twenty years ago, the lake took a boy. Nobody talked about it because that boy belonged to the wrong people. They said he drowned while swimming. Just like they said Zuri did.”
Leah leaned in. “You think the same people are behind it?”
Baraka nodded slowly. “Power is a cage, Ms. Mwende. It protects its own and hides its shame well.”
Leah pulled out a folded photo from her coat—a copy of the one from her mother’s mantle. “What if I told you someone sent me this?” She handed it to him. “And that the same person warned me: ‘Not everything that sinks drowns.’”
Baraka’s expression shifted. He looked up sharply. “Then they’re still watching.”
“Who is?”
He hesitated. Then, “Have you heard of ‘Juma’?”
“No. Who’s that?”
“A shadow. A name whispered when people vanish.”
Leah frowned. “Zuri mentioned him once. We were 15. She said he knew things—could fix things. Then she stopped talking about him. Almost like she was scared.”
Baraka looked out toward the lake. “Juma isn’t one person. It’s a name people use when they don’t want to name the real devil.”
Before she could ask more, a rustle cut through the night.
Baraka stood swiftly. “We’re not alone.”
Leah turned, but the beam from her flashlight hit nothing but stone and weeds. Still, the hairs on her arms stood. Someone was watching.
“Go home,” he whispered urgently. “Don’t come here again. They’ll see you as a threat now.”
“Who are ‘they’?”
But the old man was already disappearing into the night, like smoke from a dying fire.
Back at the house, Leah locked the doors, drew the curtains, and placed a chair beneath the doorknob for extra measure. Her journalist instincts screamed at her to run, to report, to document—but her gut told her to stay quiet, to dig deeper, alone.
As she lay on the couch with only the ticking clock and her heartbeat for company, she thought of Zuri. Her laugh. Her eyes. The way she’d sometimes fall quiet for no reason, eyes darting to the lake.
Was she already being watched back then?
The next morning, Leah visited the town records office. She asked for incident reports from ten years ago, but the clerk—an aging man with trembling hands—refused.
“Files are sealed. Access denied,” he muttered, without looking up.
“Even for the press?”
He looked at her, eyes suddenly sharp. “Especially for the press.”
But as she turned to leave, a younger intern slipped a note into her hand.
“Check the church basement. The old pastor kept copies.”
At twilight, Leah returned to the chapel ruins. She found the crumbling staircase beneath a fallen pew, hidden under years of leaves and dirt. It led to a half-buried door. She forced it open.
Inside, the air was damp and thick with mold. Wooden cabinets lined the walls. Some were empty. Others had been eaten away by time. But one drawer—marked “YOUTH MINISTRY 2013”—still had folders inside.
She flipped through them.
And there it was.
A list of youth attendees. Weekly sessions. Zuri’s name—highlighted in red ink. Then, a torn paper stapled to the back.
A warning:
“Zuri asked questions again about the lake boy. Told her to stop. She’s making people nervous.”
Leah’s blood ran cold.
Who wrote this? Why keep it hidden? Why was Zuri silenced?
Suddenly, she heard it again.
Footsteps.
Someone was in the basement.
She turned off her light, crouched behind a cabinet. Her breath caught in her throat as a figure stepped into view—tall, dressed in black, face obscured by a cap.
They scanned the room silently, then walked toward the cabinet where Leah had just been.
She held her breath.
The figure stopped, then placed a folded note on the cabinet and left.
After a few minutes, Leah stood and read the note under the moonlight filtering in.
“Stop digging or you’ll drown too.”
- Writer
