Dance Hall: Chapter 4, Vague Threats

Hello, Weirdos. It's been a while, but in honour of the first Saturday of Camp I have a new Chapter in the Dance Hall. Yeah, still need a better title. I don't even like as a working title. I will accept suggestions. I've worked on this chapter for a while, hopefully the next one will be wrote a lot quickly. This chapter does end with lots of direction for the next one. I'm still finding the characters. I don't know I've made the right direction for this story, my early starts might have been better. However, we here now so I'm just going to keep pushing myself to get through this. This story has been worth so far just with the different world building I've done and I do like ideas I've came up with. The Execution does need work. I'm going to stop review this chapter and just let you read.

Do tell me what you think and if you are also taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo this session as well.

Start & Last Chapter

Chapter 4, Vague Warnings

I’m woken by someone slamming on my door. I finally got to sleep last night at around 4am. I feel goggy. What the point of sleeping when you feel worse when you wake up? I answer the door to my mother.

“Good, you’re dress,” I hadn’t bothered to get changed before getting into bed. “You’ve missed breakfast and we have to get going. Get your stuff together.”

This is my mother typical morning greeting. She is morning person where I favour the night, sticking to the stereotype. I grab my phone and bag without saying anything. I didn’t even get my phone charger out last night, meaning my phone is likely dead and Necromancy doesn’t work on electronics, that was different type of magic. Though, I can do Frankenstein thing with corpses.

“Ready,” I tell the hallway. My hair is probably a mess but I’m spending the next three hours in the car anyway. She not there, I lock the door and make my way down the stairs. We’ll run into each other eventually.

No one was in the reception bit. Disappointingly, there’s not even a feeling of eeriness in the empty hallway. People are easy to find, when they are ghost to ask. I go outside to see if she at the car. I immediately spot that she not in the parking lot. The only one presence is a ghost. It’s standing at the gate looking out into the road. A girl in Victorian style white dress, how cliché.

The dress is a clue to her state of living but I can just tell with the dead. I couldn’t explain the difference between the living and the dead. There’s just a clear distinction.

I wander over to her. She must be one of the house’s actual sprits. They don’t tend to leave their objects. Though, maybe the gate was from another place originally. It wouldn’t surprise me if even the wall paper was haunted, stolen from a derelict mansion.

“Why are clinging to the gate?” Conventional conversation with ghosts usually go no way even with the most aware spirts, so it’s best to be direct with what you wanted.

“He’ll be back.”

“Who will…” I stop at a crunch in the gravel. It’s Mr Creepy. Camp NANo The ghost is faded away when I turn back. Our discussion was over with the intruder. I ignore him and walked to the car. I try the door for kicks, my mother often leaves the door open. Its locked.

“Hello, Nova,” Mr Creeps says rattling the gates. “How did you sleep? Have any disturbances?” I roll my eyes.

“Yeah, the mattress was so lumpy that my sleep was so light that woke from the sound of the pipes ratting. Maybe you should get those replace.” I fake smile as his disappears.

“I just came out to make sure the gates were unlocked,” he pauses. “They sometimes lock and unlock themselves.” He tells me this as though it’s a secret and not something he’s tells all his guests. If true, it sounded like too rivalling spirts.

“Maybe you should get a new a lock,” I reply to his disappointment. I know I’m being bitchy, but these places give me the creeps and I can’t believe my mum wants to run one. He goes on to opening the gate, pulling them wide and use a rope try them to the fence.

A minivan pulls in as if on que, it beat up Junker that’s all scraped up on the side of it. It’s also crammed with kids. Is a spook hotel, a family hotel?

The woman behind the wheel gets out the car, abandoning just at the gate. She is dressed in bright patterns long shirt and ankle length skirt that crash with each other and just the colours on them alone.

“Is Aytia ready to go?” are the words she says to Creep. My mother’s car is sadly lock. I can’t be bother to wait with Creeps’ family. My mother must be inside.

“You’re Tella Stern’s daughter aren’t you?”

The creeps all know us then. I awkwardly nod. I saved up from follow up questions with the appearance of Junior Creeps.

“Hello Aunt Mum,” the women turns disgruntled.  I didn’t know that witches doubled as Hill billies. I guess they must exist somewhere. It probably witches just have the habit calling the unofficial head of the family a version of mother and I haven’t met one who appreciates being the one with this honour.

Aytia stuffs her bag in a boot and then throws herself in with it. Witches are not safety or law abiding butch.  The woman gets back in the car and drives off with only a wave to Creeps.

“I’ll be seeing you all round Nova,” Aytia shouts waving as me as the van flees from her father.

My mother finally came out and meets me at our car. Its doors are finally opened. We dump our bags in the boot.

“Did you return your key?”

“The ghosts did it for me,” I say with smile.

“Go and do it so we can leave. Mav would probably demand we come back as the key itself is haunted.” I’m not sure she joking or not. I would rather never come back here. It’s a threat I’m not willing to risk.

Mr Creeps is back in the hotel, so I’m forced back into the building. The hall is strikingly colder than the spring weather outside now. Empty but for the ghost manning the desk, flicking through files.

I guess Aytia did keep the ghosts at bay. I slam the keys on the desk. He doesn’t look up at the noise. Well, he’s clearly not being paid enough to deal with guests. I probably should actually give Mr Creeps the keys, so they not carried off by the sprits, but if this is really the quiet season then he would have plenty of time to find the key again. Also he really should have spares in different places with the amount of ghosts this place has.

Eh, I need to get out this house before more show up. The room suddenly darkens and file ghost disappears. I sigh and turn to leave. The Victorian ghost stands before the door blocking the way. Well, she had her chance for conversation and I don’t time for her menacing act.

I walk towards her in game of chicken. Walking through ghost feels weird, but it just in your head. You see something that should stop you moving forward, except it just the same as a rainbow or light beam. Ghosts are just light, but not. Like I said they’ll been almost no research done by anyone with any real knowledge of the sprit world. The few non-cigma scientist are more interested in the biology of magic than anything else. How powers manifest is the only nut they are trying to crack.

She doesn’t move as I get to her. I brace myself to go past her, closing my eyes. I bang against something hard. I fall back on my arse. I open my eyes, to the girl still blocking my way. I scan to see what knocked me over. She can’t be solid. It takes a lot of energy for ghost to interact with the “physical” world and it more touching things long enough to hurt someone. Maybe she pushed me for ignoring her now.

“He will be back for you,” her voice echoes, through the hall. Irrational fear fills me. She talking about herself. Ghosts like to be dramatic and corner people who can see her. She starts to move but then fades away again.

“What are you doing on the floor?” I hear Mr Creeps behind me. Ghost must be repelled by the Creeps. I get up from the floor and go out the door.

“The keys are on the desk,” I shout back glad to be out of the company of the house.

Next Chapter: Temporary Homes