Prophecy of the Sisters Read Free

is still there. If it has changed.
    If it is deeper or darker. I slip into bed, sinking toward darkness without further thought.
    I am in the in-between place, the place we drift through before the world falls away into sleep, when I hear the whispering.
     At first, it is only the call of my name, beckoning from some far-off place. But the whisper builds, becoming many voices,
     all murmuring frantically, so quickly that I can only make out an occasional word. It grows and grows, demanding my attention
     until I cannot ignore it a second longer. Until I sit straight up in bed, the last whispered words echoing through the caverns
     of my mind.
    The Dark Room.
    It is not entirely surprising. The Dark Room has been at the forefront of my mind since Father’s death. He should not have
     been there. Not in the one room that would invoke the memory of my mother, his beloved dead wife, more than any other.
    And yet, in those last moments, as life slipped from his body like a wraith, he was.
    I slide my feet into slippers and make my way to the door, listening a moment before opening it and looking down the hall.
     The house is dark and silent. The footsteps of the servants cannot be heard in the rooms above our own or in the kitchen below.
     It must be quite late.
    All this registers in seconds, leaving only the faintest of impressions. The thing that gets my attention, the thing that
     makes the small hairs rise on my arms and the back of my neck, is the door, open just a crack, at the end of the hallway.
    The door to the Dark Room.
    It is strange enough that the door to this, of all rooms, should be open, but stranger still that there is a faint glow leaking
     from the small gap between the frame and the door.
    I look down at the mark. It shadows my wrist even in the darkness of the hallway.
It is this I’ve been wondering, is it not?
I think.
Whether or not the Dark Room holds the key to Father’s death or the reason for my mark?
Now it is as if I’ve been summoned to that very place, called to the answers I have sought all along.
    I creep down the hallway, careful to lift my feet so the bottoms of my slippers don’t scuff along the wood floor. When I reach
     the door of the Dark Room, I hesitate.
    Someone is inside.
    A voice, soft but urgent, comes from within the room. It is not the same frantic murmur that called me here. Not the disjointed
     voices of many. No. It is the voice of one. A solitary person whispering inside.
    I don’t dare push open the door for fear it will creak. Instead, I lean toward it, peering through the opening into the room
     beyond. It is difficult to get my bearings through such a small crack. At first everything is only shapes and shadows. But
     soon I make out the looming white sheets of the covered furniture, the dark mass I know is the wardrobe in the corner, and
     the figure sitting on the floor, surrounded by candles.
    Alice.
    My sister sits on the floor of the Dark Room, the glow of many candles casting her body in soft yellow light. She is muttering,
     whispering as if to someone very near, though from my vantage I see not a soul. She sits on folded knees, her eyes closed,
     arms at her sides.
    I scan the room, careful not to touch the door lest it should spring to life and glide open even farther. But there is no
     one else there. No one but Alice, murmuring to herself in a strange sort of ceremony. And even this, this dark rite that sends
     tendrils of fear racing through my body, is not the strangest thing of all.
    No, it is that my sister sits with the rug pulled back, a large well-worn rug that has been in the room as long as I can remember.
     She sits, as naturally as if she has done it countless times before, within a circle carved into the floor. The angles of
     her face are nearly unrecognizable, almost harsh, in the candlelight.
    The cold from the unheated hallway seeps through the thin fabric of my nightdress. I step back, my heart beating so loudly
     in my chest that I fear