She tried to forget the feeling as she walked downstairs. Now that the feeling was gone, she wasn’t sure how to describe it and only a vague memory of it had left. When she reached the first floor a sudden movement outside the window caught her eye. “Dammit, it’s snowing again”. She groaned. The orphanage was located somewhere in the middle of the woods and connected to the main street via a narrow winding road. She had to take a bus to come here, and the stop was about forty minutes walk, on the main road. She enjoyed her walks in nature with nothing but the sound of the birds, little woodland creatures, and whistling wind to keep her company but, in the snow it simply became torture. She shook her head and entered the living room where she was greeted by a warm fire in the fireplace and kind Maryam who was knitting a scarf on a rocking chair next to it. She was a women in her late fifties with strands of the gray mixed in her auburn hair. The life has not been kind to her. Being widowed at a young age and losing her son so early had affected her, making her look much older than she actually was. But the years were not able to touch one thing and that was her eyes. Her kind brown eyes that always watched the children under her roof as if they were her own. Even after the children went to bed, Maryam was busy doing something for them like mending their clothes, planning their next day or in this instance knitting them winter clothes.

* How did it go, love? Was he… um… upset?

She asked nervously as she poured coffee into a cup and passed it to Nyla. She sat on the couch and gladly accepted the cup. The smell of the freshly brewed coffee washed away any remnants of the indescribable fears that she was feeling earlier and pushed them to the distant corner of her mind. Maryam did not approve of her drinking coffee this late in the evening but she gave up that fight a long time ago.

* He is completely fine, Maryam. You worry too much.

Nyla said with a smile while sipping the delicious dark liquid.

* I can’t help it. Nutrients are very important for growing boys and god knows that they already don’t get much of it. I shouldn’t have sent him to bed without supper, but I lost my temper…

Maryam said while pulling on the yarn she was holding. The orphanage was dependent on Church and a few external donors for operation funds but every year they received less funding than the previous year. Especially in election years such as this one.

* He’ll be fine

She assured Maryam and tried to hide her smile. Earlier when she entered Billy’s room, she had caught a glimpse of snack cakes hiding on his nightstand. He probably had persuaded Emma to give him some in secret. He could be very charming when it suited him and Emma was a simple girl who managed the kitchen. She continued sipping her coffee as Maryam continued to tell tales of the children and activities of the house, especially the winter charity event. Everyone was excited about it. Her main concern was that Father Francis was returning as an inspector to make sure that the orphanage’s operation was going smoothly.

She glanced at Nyla with worry. She admitted that she was glad he left shortly after the whole basement incident and was not happy about his return at all. His visit probably would affect the kids quite a lot since she hadn’t put much emphasis on their religious education. But she was more worried about the impact that it might have on Nyla. She tried to hide it but Maryam knew that she always tried to stay away from basements in general. So she was glad to see her not showing any specific reaction to the news and instead looking at her phone like any other young person of her generation.

* “Is it time for you to leave, Nayla, darling?”

She asked while glancing at the clock behind her.

* Unfortunately, yes.

Nyla replied as she carefully placed her cup on the table. The return of the father Francis was unfortunate but she didn't see any need to worry Maryam.

* That’s disappointing, I was hoping you would stay the night since it’s been a while. Do you have to go in this weather?

Maryam went to the window to see if it was still snowing or not.

* I have an early shift tomorrow so…

* Wait! I know what to do! I just remembered Brian was saying he is going to be around here tonight. How about we ask him to give you a ride?

Nyla froze up upon hearing Brian’s name. He was one of Matt’s friends who worked in the same field. They met in the academy and joined the same division of ADA afterwards. And he was the one who brought them the news of Matthew’s death three years ago. She knew Brian was not at fault for his death-in fact, he was one of the few that insisted on looking for him till the very end - and death was part of the job description for the hunters, but one part of her heart blamed him and the other hunters. He still visited the orphanage and helped as much as he could out of his obligation to his fallen comrade- which wasn’t easy given the town's position toward ADA- but she couldn’t help being reminded of that awful day whenever she saw him. as the matter of fact, she tried to arrange her visit so she wouldn’t see him as much as possible. Unlike her, Maryam seemed to enjoy his visits and hearing endless stories about Matt’s academy years. Nyla opened her mouth to say no but was interrupted by the doorbell,

* Great! It must be him.

Maryam walked to the entry to open the door and Nyla could hear her greeting someone. She returned to the room followed by a young blond man with a dashing figure wearing the army green uniform with the panther of ADA embroidered on his chest. Nyla tried to smile.

* Come in, come in. Sit next to the fire to warm yourself, Brian. Would you like some coffee?

Maryam asked while guiding him toward Nyla.

* Thank you, Mrs. Gordon. Don’t mind if I do.

He cautiously looked at Nyla and was glad to see a little smile instead of her usual frown. He happily went to sit next to her. His hair was slightly wet, and the tip of his nose was turned red because of the snow. He seemed to have been outside for a while.

* Hello, Nyla. How are you doing this evening?

He asked with a wide smile while carefully sitting on the couch next to her.

* Hi Brian, I’m fine, thanks, how are you?

She responded awkwardly as Maryam left the room to make more coffee. She was never good at making small talk. Thankfully, unlike her, Brian was quite good at it and continued talking about different topics until Maryam returned, occasionally taking glances at Nyla to see her reaction.

As she entered, Maryam looked at the two on the couch. There was a time that she hoped to see her son where Brian was sitting now. But the past was past and life was for the living. Now she wanted to see Nyla to start her own family and Brian was a very suitable suitor. His job was a little bit concerning but he worked for the ADA branch in Pendle now and everyone knew that Pendle was the safest place when it came to demon activities. Maryam was about ninety percent sure that he transferred to Pendle to be close to Nyla. She could see how his eyes sparkled whenever he looked at her. He was already head over hills for her. But Nyla needed a little bit of push. A sort of push that only Maryam could give her.

* You came right on time, Brian.

She said while placing the freshly brewed pot of coffee with extra cups, milk and sugar on top of the table in front of the couple. Nyla liked her coffee black like Mathew did but Brian liked his with milk and sugar. She started pouring coffee for Brian.

* Really? How come?

He asked while accepting the cup of coffee from Maryam.

* Nyla was about to leave by herself in this weather, can you imagine it? I told her to wait for you since you wouldn’t mind giving her a ride, would you?

She said while winking at Brian without Nyla seeing.

* Maryam!

Nyla cried her name in disbelief. She was practically forcing the poor guy to give her a ride. She turned to Brian to apologize but before she could say anything he responded with another smile,

* It would be my pleasure, Nyla.

“God bless you Maryam” Brian thought to himself as he picked up his cup. If he had offered Nyla she would have definitely refused as she always did. He had a crush on her ever since Mathew introduced them when he tagged along on a summer break from the academy. But she never showed any interest in him making it difficult for him to ask her out or even get closer to her.

* I don’t want to bother you, Brian. I’m sure you have better things to do…

Nyla said apologetically as she racked her brains to find an excuse.

* Please, It is a gentlemen’s duty to make sure beautiful ladies such as yourself get home safely. We can leave as soon as I finish my coffee.

He said with another dazzling smile making her blush and feel guilty for mixing his presence with the memory of Mathew’s death. She gave up, thanked him and got up to gather her stuff as he finished his conversation with Maryam. As she picked up her coat in the entry hall, she suddenly heard a squeak from the stairs as if someone was walking downstairs. She quickly turned around to find that no one was there. She suspiciously inspected the stairs feeling as if someone was standing on the stairs and gazing at her.

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* Are you ready to go?

As she was contemplating going upstairs to check on her suspicions, Brian followed by Maryam asked her. Brian grabbed her coat from her and held it for her to wear.

* Ah, yes. Thank you.

She replied as he helped her to put on her coat. This had been a weird day for her. It had been a while since the last time she had a break day and she was working full-time in both the orphanage and the supercenter. That was it. She was probably overworked and was hearing things. As she made a mental note to ask Oliver for fewer shifts, she hugged Maryam goodbye and joined Brian who was holding the car door open for her.

* Thank you.

she blushed again. Brian was used to this kind of behaviour since he dated many girls, but she was not.

* You are very welcome.

He said politely as he carefully closed the door and walked around the car to sit in the driver’s seat trying his best to act nonchalant and hide his giddiness. As he drove toward the main street, Nyla turned to wave at Maryam for the last time as she became smaller and smaller and finally went out of her view.

**********************************

To her disappointment, Nyla couldn’t go back to the orphanage for the next two weeks. She had been working at the supercenter since she left the house at eighteen. She wasn’t good enough at her studies to get a scholarship, so attending college as she had dreamed of was out of the question. But she managed to get a job at the only supercenter in the town. She probably could have found a better job in a bigger city, but she didn’t want to be too far from the orphanage. After what happened to Matt, leaving Maryam had become too difficult for her. She wanted to stay and work at the orphanage full-time, but the orphanage was poor and had no means of employing her. The job at the supercenter wasn’t bad. There were some hard parts, but it was mostly manageable until recently. Kyle one of their best employees left for a better job somewhere east. They hired a new employee to replace him, but it was obvious that the new guy had never worked in any field remotely related to this one. He was the clumsiest person who ever worked in a store. Nyla wasn’t sure how he got hired in the first place. Tania, the other floor manager thought that some sort of nepotism was probably going on behind the scenes. Because of him, Oliver, the store manager, couldn’t afford to let her take her well-deserved break. He put her in charge of his training in exchange for a three-day off for the winter charity event which was happening today afternoon. She checked the time to see how long was left until the end of her shift when she heard a loud shattering sound from the next aisle.

* Dang, it!

A surprised voice yelled from three aisle over. She ran to the aisle to see a sea of champagne and glass surrounding the new employee, Gale.

* Oh my god… how… why…

Oliver the store manager was speechless standing at the end of the aisle. She saw the customers gathering and whispering to each other, so she ran to Oliver quickly,

* Oliver, don’t worry about this. I’ll take care of it.

She tried to calm him down before the situation got out of hand. He looked into her eyes for a few seconds before finally shaking his head and walking towards his office. He had a bad case of OCD and was prone to lose his temper when seeing a mess in the store and was one strike away from unemployment due to losing his temper one too many times and he really couldn’t afford to lose his job. Nyla carefully walked to where Gale was standing in a state of shock.

* Hey Gale… are you all right?

She gently asked him while checking for injuries. Health and safety came first. She could always scold him later. As if her voice triggered something, Gale’s face started to turn into a very bright shade of red.

* I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to… the boxes…

He started to mumble. The poor man. He was definitely not used to this sort of job and probably would get fired if continued this way.

* It’s all right, these things happen. But more importantly, are you okay? Did you hurt yourself in any way?

She asked gently. He looked at her confused. Then checked his hands and shook his head no.

* I’m glad to hear that. Maggie will help you to clean your uniform.

To her words, Maggie came to them and guided him towards the storage and employee lounge while comforting him. She was the eldest among them and always acted as a mother figure when needed. Nyla waved to Steven who was already carrying mops and cleaning supplies and they started cleaning up the aisle as quickly as possible. The customers soon dispersed as the conflict they were hoping for didn’t happen. Thanks to the incident Nyla had to stay longer than expected to review the safety rules again with the employees –except for Gale, who was sent home early due to shock-- as the floor manager and fill out paper works to report the incident to Oliver. By the time she was finished, it was already 3 pm. She was going to miss the snowman-making context but would make it to the ruling if she rushed. She stretched her arms as she looked at the clock, thinking about the warm fire, food, and the company that was awaiting her. She couldn’t wait for her break to start.

**********************************

The bus dropped her at the road that led to the orphanage. The actual stop was further along but the driver was kind enough to drop her off right at the beginning of the road. The path and the trees surrounding it were covered with untouched snow. Before being used as an orphanage, the building and its surroundings were created to be a retreat by Sir Davis, an inspiring hotelier about fifty years ago. To get to the hidden building among the trees you had to take a winding path. The surrounding woods and its distance from the town made the retreat a perfect escape from the noise of the town and modern life or at least that was what sir Davis thought. The inn never become very popular due to the lack of tourism activity in the area and the heavy snows in the winter; it only increased the debt of the Davis family. Over the years the building had changed hands a few times and even was rumoured to be hunted by the ghost of Sir Davis who still was trying to make it into a hotel. All rumours of course. Over the years Nyla had never seen a trace of a ghost in the entire building.

Nyla always loved the walk from the main street to the building. It was about a thirty to forty minutes walk, and she was surrounded by beautiful scenery. She had lots of childhood memory of Matt and her walking the path after school and exploring the wood. The orphanage used to have a car to give rides to the children and guests, but they were forced to sell it a long time ago. Maryam tried her best to tend to the path to some extent during the warm seasons but that was not the case in the winter. The snow piled on and made the travel very difficult. The city cleaned the road but they were the last priority. The good thing was the snow season didn’t last that long.

Nyla started walking toward the building thinking how weird it was that the snow was so untouched. The path should be covered with children’s footsteps as they return home from school, but the snow was free of any marks. Maryam probably let the children stay home because of the event. But what about patrons’ car track attending the event? She looked at the sky wondering if it had snowed recently without her knowledge. Halfway through the path She suddenly felt a tremor in her legs as the ground started to shake followed by a loud noise. she fell on the snow losing her balance. It was unusual to have an earthquake in these areas. She got on her feet as soon as the earthquake stopped and started running towards the house. The noise she heard a few moments ago couldn’t be anything other than a building collapse. They had requested the church for maintenance of the unused part multiple times to no avail. An earthquake like this one could easily destroy parts of the old buildings. She dug out her cell phone from her pocket and dialled the emergency number. To her surprise, the call didn’t go through. She tried a few more times with no luck. She stopped and looked at the phone. This made no sense. Did the cell towers break or something? she continued calling as she picked up the pace again.

As she got closer to the end of the path, she noticed larger and larger pieces of debris and surprisingly less snow but there was no trace of people. She felt a shiver and anxiety start to rise in her belly and come up to her throat. How did the debris get all way here? She reached the final turn and unconsciously started to slow down and finally stopped. There was something in the air. Something ominous. Something in her was screaming to turn around and run away. Her legs started walking towards the end of the path of their own accords and finally stopped as she came to the open area in front of the building empty of any snow.

As a tradition Every year they gathered around and made a very large snowman for Christmas to decorate the entrance of the house. It had become a charity event where children competed to make the most beautiful snowman and patrons from all over the country supported the child of their choosing. The money gathered was then used to pay for the children's summer trip and the winner of the competition received a special prize from their patron. But now, instead of a giant snowman, something else was decorating the entrance.

Nyla got closer and finally could see what it was. As soon she realized what she was looking at, her knees lost all their strength and she fell on the snow. Instead of a beautiful snowman, there, right in front of her was a horrendous sculpture made of skin and bones. The sculpture had no head but a severed neck with multiple human arms sticking out in different directions. The severed neck and what was to be the torso were simply piling of innards accessorized with different organs. the whole structure was placed on top of the legs for support which was separated from the torso with some sort of belt.

As she kept looking at the abomination with her brain still not registering the information it was receiving, her eyes caught a glance of something else. She looked closer to see a face staring at her from the middle of the sculpture. A very familiar face. As she looked at it, she started to recognize more and more faces and as if she was suddenly aware of what she was seeing she started screaming. The middle part of the sculpture was made of faces and not just any face, they belonged to the residents of the house. Nyla forced herself to look away from the gruesome sight and ran to the side of the building with tears in her eyes and her mouth still screaming. She held on to the wall of the east wing to keep her balance and felt something coming up her throat and before she could take another step, she emptied her stomach on the bricks piled on the side of the building.