EPISODE 3:THE HAND BENEATH THE DOOR
943 Words
Amara stumbled backward as the hand crept farther into the room.
It was unlike anything she had ever seen.
Its fingers were long and twisted, formed entirely from damp red earth. Tiny grains of soil crumbled from its skin as it moved, leaving a trail across the wooden floor. Yet it moved with purpose: slowly, deliberately as though it could smell her fear.
Her breathing became shallow.
She searched desperately for something to defend herself with and grabbed the heavy wooden chair beside the dining table.
With all her strength, she slammed it onto the hand.
The chair shattered.
The hand didn't.
Instead, it dissolved into loose earth, slipping through the cracks in the floorboards.
Silence.
Amara stood frozen.
Then...
Three knocks echoed once more.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
Only this time, they came from inside the house.
Every instinct told her to run, but the journalist in her refused.
Someone was playing a cruel trick.
There had to be an explanation.
She picked up the oil lamp, relit it with trembling hands, and followed the sound toward the back hallway.
The house, which had felt familiar only hours earlier, now seemed strangely different.
The corridor looked longer.
The walls appeared darker.
And the framed family photographs hanging along the wall...
...were crooked.
She stopped in front of one.
It was an old picture taken on her tenth birthday.
Her mother smiled brightly beside her father while young Amara held a cake almost too big for her tiny hands.
She frowned.
Something was wrong.
There had been one photograph.
Now there were two.
The second frame showed the same birthday.
The same cake.
The same decorations.
But one extra person stood behind the family.
A tall woman dressed in white.
Her face was hidden beneath a black veil.
Amara had never seen the photograph before.
She reached out to touch the frame.
The glass was warm.
Suddenly...
The woman in the photograph raised her head.
Amara gasped and stumbled backward.
The face beneath the veil wasn't human.
It was smooth.
Blank.
Without eyes.
Without a mouth.
The lamp slipped from her hands and crashed onto the floor.
When she looked again...
The photograph was normal.
Only her family remained.
"No..."
She whispered.
"I'm imagining things."
But deep inside, she knew she wasn't.
Before dawn, exhaustion finally overtook her.
She fell asleep on the sitting room couch with the journal clutched tightly against her chest.
She dreamed of her childhood.
She was seven years old again, running barefoot through the village while her father chased after her, laughing.
Then everything changed.
The sky turned crimson.
The laughter stopped.
The earth beneath her feet cracked open.
From the widening cracks, dozens of hands emerged, reaching for her ankles.
Children screamed.
Women cried.
Drums thundered from the Sacred Grove.
Across the field stood the veiled woman from the photograph.
This time, Amara could hear her voice.
"The debt must be paid."
"The first daughter must return what was stolen."
Amara tried to ask what had been stolen.
But no words came out.
The woman slowly pointed toward a massive iroko tree.
Something hung from one of its branches.
As the wind shifted, Amara realized it was a body.
Her father's body.
His eyes opened.
He looked directly at her.
"Wake up!"
Amara jerked awake.
Someone was pounding on the front door.
Not three slow knocks.
Frantic banging.
She rushed over cautiously.
"Who is it?"
"It's Obinna!"
Relieved, she opened the door.
Obinna looked terrified.
His shirt was soaked with sweat, and he struggled to catch his breath.
"They found another one."
"Another what?"
"Body."
A crowd had already gathered near the old village well.
No one spoke above a whisper.
The villagers parted as Amara and Obinna approached.
She stopped dead.
A young man lay on the ground.
His body was covered in red clay from head to toe.
His eyes were wide open.
His mouth was stretched into a horrifying smile.
But what truly unsettled her was the symbol carved into his chest.
A circle.
Inside it...
Seven small marks.
Exactly like the symbol she'd seen drawn faintly inside her father's journal.
The village chief knelt beside the body, his weathered face heavy with grief.
"It has started again," he murmured.
Amara knelt beside the corpse, ignoring the fearful stares around her.
There were no signs of a struggle.
No wounds except the carved symbol.
Then she noticed something clenched tightly in the dead man's left hand.
Carefully, she pried his stiff fingers apart.
Inside was a small brass pendant.
Her heart skipped.
She recognized it instantly.
It belonged to her father.
On the back was an inscription she had memorized as a child.
"For Chike. My beloved husband."
It had been her mother's gift to him on their anniversary.
How had it ended up in a dead man's hand?
As Amara stared at the pendant, a child in the crowd suddenly screamed and pointed toward the edge of the forest.
"There!"
Everyone turned.
Standing among the trees was a lone figure.
Tall.
Motionless.
Its white robe swayed gently in the morning breeze.
The veiled woman.
She slowly lifted one hand...
...and pointed directly at Amara.
Then, without taking a single step, she vanished.
The villagers fell to their knees in terror.
One by one, they began whispering the same words.
"The Earth Mother has chosen..."
"The Earth Mother has chosen..."
"The Earth Mother has chosen..."
Amara looked down at the pendant in her trembling hand.
For the first time, she wondered if her father's disappearance had never been the real mystery.
Maybe...
He had been trying to save her all along.
End of Episode 3
- Writer
