“Dude, did you hear they’re dragging the lake?” Jade sat down with her tray at lunch, her green eyes wide.
Erica nodded from her side. “I know. I saw a team of people drive up during my free period.”
Corvina took a bite of her salad, chewing slowly as she listened to the conversation, hoping for some update.
“Why do you think they’re doing it now?” Ethan wondered, munching on a carrot stick. “Something must have happened to make them. I don’t think anyone’s even gone to that lake before.”
Jax turned to her suddenly. “Hey, didn’t you find the lake in the woods at the beginning of the semester?”
Corvina nodded with her mouth full of food. “Yeah, but I never went there again.”
“Weird,” Jade muttered. “You think it’s because of the Black Ball?”
“What do you mean?” Erica asked. “The Ball is next month.”
Jade looked out the window at the surprisingly clear day. “I mean maybe they don’t want anyone disappearing this year and that triggered something? Who knows?”
“You guys want to go see what’s happening there?” Ethan suggested. “I heard a bunch of guys from my tower had gone already.”
“Yeah, let’s go,” Jax nodded enthusiastically.
As they mulled over different theories, Corvina ate her lunch, wanting to go to the lake herself, just to see what was going on. Once they were done, Corvina grabbed a banana and they all filed out and towards the woods, her heart aching at the gaping hole in their group that was Troy, remembering the last time they’d gone into the woods with him.
“I miss Troy, man,” Ethan echoed her thoughts, gripping the back of his neck. “Asshole would’ve loved this.”
“Yeah,” Jade agreed, moving ahead of the group towards the woods.
“Did you know he went into the woods alone one time?” Ethan huffed a laugh. “Got a few paces in and ran back out, then pretended it was because he was late for class.”
Corvina smiled, surprisingly able to visualize that with the boy.
“Where is this lake?” Erica asked Corvina directly as they went down the incline. The sunlight played hide and seek with the dark clouds, still making it a brighter day than it had been in weeks.
“Just a little up ahead if I remember correctly,” Corvina replied, knowing the exact location but pretending not to. They got closer to the opening in the area, the more she could hear the sounds from people echoing in the forest. Emerging a few minutes later into the clearing, Corvina stood still, taking the scene in.
The water of the lake reflected the light, its dark depths still unknown. Two boats stood in the middle with two divers each. A few people stood on the bank and the bridge in the distance, overseeing or watching the activity, she couldn’t tell.
Corvina headed to her rock and left the banana there for the birds, turning to see her group edging towards the bridge. The bridge itself, now that she could see it in the daylight, was beautiful. It was small, made of grey stone and covered in green moss, tunneling over a narrow part of the lake that connected this part of the mountain to the other side.
She joined them as they went there, stumbling over the first step up. Jax caught her, steadied her, and Corvina thanked him, looking up to see silver eyes flash for a moment before he clenched his jaw, looking at the rest of their group.
“What are you all doing here?” Vad asked the group at large, deliberately keeping his eyes off Corvina as she went by the railing to look down, spotting a familiar face.
“We just wanted to see what’s happening, Mr. Deverell,” Erica said in an overly sweet tone that made her teeth gnash. Corvina ignored them, coming to stand beside Ajax.
“Good to see you, Mr. Hunter,” she greeted him as he turned to look, his face creasing in a genuine smile.
“Ah, the purple-eyed girl. Please call me Ajax, Corvina,” he looked forward again. Corvina watched the divers in the lake put on their goggles, giving Ajax a thumbs up, and jumped down.
“You got them here?” she asked him, looking around at all the strange, serious people in the area.
He nodded. “Your boyfriend gave me a call this morning. Thankfully, I was still in town. I was able to get the team in time.”
Her heart fluttered at the ‘boyfriend’ but she tamped it down. “Please don’t say that out loud.”
He gave her a look. “Of course. I take it he told you the truth?”
“Some of it, yes,” Corvina admitted quietly. “Troy?” she asked, her stomach knotting.
Ajax sobered. “Resting in peace.”
They stood silent afterward, just watching the lake as the divers did their work. She felt other people join them at the railing, Vad on the other side of Ajax, her friends on hers.
“They found anything yet?” Vad asked, taking a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, silently offering one to Ajax who took it.
“Nope.”
They lit up, smoking.
“How long will you search the lake?” Jade asked from her side, peeking in. “I’ve never seen water this dark before.”
“There’s an old legend behind the color,” Vad informed her, his knowledge of these mountains so much more vast than she’d imagined.
“What’s the legend, Mr. Deverell?” Ethan asked, leaning on his elbows.
“I’m interested too,” Ajax piped in.
Vad took a smoke and blew it out. “It was called the Snake Lake a long time ago. According to legend, this hole in the mountain was a pit of monstrous snakes. They would eat anything they would find in the woods. One day, they bit a man in the forest, dragging him into the pit with them. His lover,” he took a drag, his voice hypnotic in his storytelling, “was a powerful sorceress. When she discovered him gone and brutally killed, her rage knew no bound.”
He paused to exhale and Corvina watched his profile, hooked both on him and the story.
“In her pain,” he continued in his deep, gravel voice, somehow making the story even more chilling, “she went into the pit and trapped all the snakes with her hair, embracing the decaying body of her lover, and filled the pit with water, forcefully drowning them all. They say the black in the water is her hair, keeping the venomous snakes trapped for eternity as she stays with her lover.”
Corvina shuddered.
“That’s macabre,” Ethan’s voice shook slightly.
“Fuck, I have goosebumps,” Erica rubbed her arms.
Vad chuckled, stubbing his cigarette on the stone railing. “It’s an ancient legend. You’ll find a bunch of them about these mountains in the library if you looked. Places like this tend to inspire imagination in the wickedest of ways.”
“Good thing the divers don’t know the story then,” Ajax quipped, breaking the gloom.
“You all should get back to the castle,” Vad told the group. “You have classes and this doesn’t concern you.”
Corvina could see the reluctance on everyone’s face but they all nodded, going back to the castle, life resuming as normal.
Three distracted classes and homework later, she returned some books to the library, meeting the group again during dusk, taking the little trip to the lake.
The scene they came to was slightly different.
There was a tarp on the bank with some stuff forensics people were working on, something Corvina couldn’t see. The tension in the air was high, the investigators all wearing severe faces. Vad and two other teachers, Dr. Brown and Dr. Pol, stood on one side with Ajax, arms folded.
“What’s going on?” Jade asked, wondering the same thing Corvina was when a shout went out.
Something else had been found.
Corvina gripped the strap of her bag with white knuckles, keeping her eyes on the lake as a team of people rushed to the diver in a boat, taking whatever he gave them, before going down again. The team hurried to the bank, carefully placing whatever was in their hand on the tarp they had laid out. Her friends hurried there to see what it was but Corvina stayed on the spot, suddenly feeling the warmth of his presence at her back as the chill invaded her bones.
“It seems like you were right, little crow,” he spoke quietly, his tone somber.
“They found the bodies?” she turned to look at him, her heart pounding.
“Bones.”
Corvina shivered, the urge to step closer to the warmth of his body severe.
“They’re still finding them,” he told her, his eyes on the lake. “The bodies were weighed down.”
Corvina remembered her dream, the hands gripping her ankles, dragging her down. “From the feet, weren’t they? Something tied to their feet?”
He slid a glance her way. “Yes.”
They stood in silence after that, witnessing the aftermath of the mayhem his grandfather had created. This couldn’t have been easy on Vad.
Corvina looked around to see no one was watching, then slowly ran a finger over his hand in solidarity. “Are you okay?”
He huffed a laugh. “I’m actually happy. Relieved.”
Corvina glanced up at him, her brows furrowing. “At the bodies being found?”
“Yes,” he ran a hand through his hair, over that white streak. “We’d probably never be able to identify all of them, but knowing they’re found, it’s a relief. Having so many deaths in one place,” his voice went quiet. “It might actually lift some of the curse off this castle.”
“You think it’ll finally stop the disappearances on the Black Ball?”
“We’ll know in a month, won’t we?”
Over the next few hours, as more and more students from the university came to the lake just to stand on the sidelines and watch the proceedings, Corvina stood with her friends in a daze and saw as the divers took equipment down and brought something out, over and over, until dusk began to fall and the diving had to be paused.
It took three days for the divers to bring everything they found on the lakebed upside. By the end of it, more investigators flooded the area, more students coming to see what was found, more forensic experts to neatly organize and record everything.
On the last evening, under a full moon, a neat row of the items collected lay on over four wide tarps. From personal belongings like shoes and hair clips and watches to skeletal remains.
Bones.
Fourteen skulls.
A total of eight hundred and sixty-eight fragmented bones, human and animal, rest of them probably buried under the lakebed.
The feminine voice didn’t come again.
And her one question remained unanswered.
How the hell had she known about them?
