Chapter 115 – The Shrine of Nyx – Holly Hayfield

There was a new school rumor that a shrine somewhere on campus could grant wishes to the students of our school. Few people knew where this mysterious shrine was. The lucky few who knew about it made routine trips to it and weren't afraid to bring along an uninitiated friend or two.

The student council began keeping an eye on the comings and goings around the shrine. At first we thought it held some deeper meaning than a mere campus attraction. We were wrong. Apparently it was just the work of some anonymous hooligan wanting to celibrate the Killing Cat legend.

I didn't bother mentioning it to the vice principal since it felt insignificant. Instead, Alyssa promised to watch it for us whenever she could. She was so desperate to make herself useful that Val didn't have to work to convince her.

Part of me felt guilty for using her like this but it seemed to make her happy. It was looking more and more like she wanted to be part of our group, not just my stalker. She still used the information surrounding the shrine as an excuse to call me every day after school.

She told me a few stories about the girls visiting the shrine, but one in particular stood out from the rest. There was one girl that was visiting the shrine on a daily basis since we discovered it. She'd always toss a handful of coins at the shrine and then cry her eyes out.

Alyssa couldn't make heads or tails of that behavior and suggested I speak to her. Alyssa was grateful for my counseling in the past and believed I could help this crying stranger. So on that Friday afternoon I had Alyssa reach out to the girl while she was at the shrine.

Her name was Emma. She agreed to come to the student council room after school and talk to us about her problems. She arrived just after our student council meeting ended and so we were all in attendance, with the exception of Sam. Sam went to Naomi’s hideout in the Old Science Wing once the meeting was over.

Emma sat nervously at the end of the table near Lilith and Jay. Alyssa was sitting beside me in an extra chair, not content to simply use Sam’s chair. Her presence in the student council room had become common since Thanksgiving break ended.

"I don't know where I should start." Emma admitted.

"Try telling us about why you were crying in the simplest words possible." I suggested.

"Also, why were you praying to the Killing Cat shrine?" Lilith added.

"Forget that part," Val said. "Just tell us if someone is bullying you at school. The SCA will sort them out."

Emma shook her head profusely.

"It... It isn't like that..." She said. "I was crying over a mistake I made myself. No one else was involved... Well, no living person was involved, I mean..."

We all shared curious looks between each other.

“You’re going to have to explain further than that.” Val said.

“Well… This all started out with a group of friends… We were exploring the old Meredith elementary school and…”

“Stop right there!” Lilith said. “There isn’t a Meredith elementary school.”

“That’s what my friend called it.” Emma said. “It was never finished being constructed according to her.”

“What?” Lilith asked.

“I think I know what building she’s talking about.” Jay said. “It isn’t called Meredith elementary school but Judith Meredith was on the development committee.”

“That’s ludicrous, I never…” Lilith started to say.

“Look it up on your laptop.” Jay said. “I think it was called autumn something….”

“Autumn Eden Elementary school,” Emma said. “That’s a graphic we saw inside the building.”

“That’s the one!” Jay said.

“You’re serious…?” Lilith asked.

Lilith began typing furiously on her laptop’s keyboard. Alyssa and I leaned in towards Lilith so that we could see the search results. Lilith pulled up a page from the city’s website detailing plans for demolishing the uncompleted school building. The plans were from over ten years ago.

“Holy crap, it exists!” Lilith said in disbelief, “How is this the first time I’m hearing about this?”

“There was a scandal surrounding the initial development that had nothing to do with Judith Meredith.” Jay said. “This was in the years before she founded this school.”

“How do you know this?” I asked.

“I’m more surprised that none of you know it.” Jay said. “This isn’t secret information. It’s briefly mentioned in a book we have in the library.”

Lilith shook her head.

“I’ve read the Life and Death of Judith Meredith multiple times now. There’s no way I overlooked something like that.” Lilith said.

“It wasn’t that one.” Jay said. “It was a book about our school’s construction and early development. I didn’t even read this of my own free will. My history teacher showed it to us near the start of the school year. I assumed you girls learned about this also.”

“I wish!” Lilith said. “This is news to me!”

“Please continue with your story, Emma.” Val said.

“Well… My friends and I were exploring the school...” Emma said.

“It was never demolished?” I asked.

“No. It has construction vehicles still on the premise. I think the associated construction company went out of business a while back. You can tell that they stopped working partway through the job.” Emma said.

“Why were you and your friends exploring a place like this then?” I asked.

“It started out as a dare. We heard rumors that the place was haunted and that this was a hideout used by the Killing Cat. My best friend stubbornly doesn’t believe in spirits or the supernatural so we wanted to change her mind. My friends and I just wanted to scare her a little. We never actually expected to really find anyone there.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“You mean to say you that you actually found someone?”

“A ghost.” She said in full seriousness, “There was a ghost haunting the facility.”

Lilith cracked a half-smile.

“A ghost… Are you sure you didn’t just see a-…”

“It talked to us, shouted at us, even!” Emma said, suddenly raising her voice. “I’m not making this up! We all freaked out and made a run for it. I was the slowest one of the group and nearly got left behind. That’s when it happened…”

“When what happened…?” Lilith asked impatiently.

From her tone, it seemed like Lilith wasn’t fully convinced. She was already giving Emma a hard look like she was looking for a way to poke holes into her theory. Val looked completely immersed into the story. Jay and Alyssa both looked ambivalent. Alyssa wasn’t even watching Emma. She had her eyes on me for whatever reason. Maybe she wanted to know how I felt about this.

Emma put a hand on her own neck and rubbed it.

“The spirit reached out and ripped my mother’s necklace from my neck!” Emma cried, “That necklace was the last thing my mother ever gave me before she passed away and I lost it inside a haunted building… I never should’ve gone there in the first place!”

Emma sounded intensely emotional over this. She was wiping away tears from her eyes while talking. It didn’t sound like she was making that part up, but a lot of this story felt strange. Why would a spirit take her dead mother’s necklace? Maybe it got snagged on something while she was running away?

“That doesn’t explain why you were praying to the Shrine of Nyx.” Lilith said.

Emma finished wiping her eyes and looked over at Lilith.

“The Killing Cat is a spirit too. I was hoping maybe she could retrieve the necklace for me.” Emma said. “I’ve donated $20 in change by now, praying for the spirit to help me out.”

It did make a sort of twisted sense. If one spirit caused her problem, then maybe another could fix it.

“I’m surprised that money hasn’t been stolen.” Jay said flatly.

“Ever since I heard about the shrine I’ve had the SCA roam the neighboring areas.” Val said. “Maybe no one wants to risk stealing ‘wishing well’ money with the SCA so close by.”

"The money isn't important to me." Emma said. "I just want my necklace back. I haven't told my dad that I lost it yet. He's going to lose his mind once he knows it’s gone."

Lilith smiled and put a hand on Emma's hand. This was an unusually sympathetic gesture coming from Lilith. Judging by her vibrant smile, though, I had the feeling that she didn't have Emma in mind.

"Don't worry! We'll retrieve the necklace for you!" Lilith said excitedly.

"We will?" I asked.

"We have experience with this type of thing. We can get that necklace back easily." Lilith said confidently.

"We can?" I asked.

"You can?" Emma asked hopefully.

"Of course we can!" Lilith said and turned to Val, "Right, Val?"

Val folded her arms and leaned back in her seat with a crooked grin.

"I'll admit that i'm a little interested to meet this ghost that she mentioned."

"If Val's in then I'm in." Jay said.

Lilith looked at me excitedly.

"Holly...? What do you think?"

"I was thinking about looking for another babysitting job or tutoring gig this weekend." I said.

Alyssa tugged at the hem of my uniform. I turned to see that she had an excited look on her face, just like Lilith. It was no surprise that she would be interested in something like this given that she was in the Occult Club up until now.

"But I guess a weekend of mystery solving with my friends would be just as good."

Emma's eyes lit up. She stood up out of her seat.

"If you can get the necklace back I swear I'll do whatever I can to repay you for your time! I promise!"

Lilith stood up to shake Emma's hand.

"Don't worry! You've already helped us out by bringing this to our attention! Add me on ChatCat and give me whatever further details you can."

"Sure!" Emma said.

The two of them exchanged information gleefully as the rest of us prepared to leave. Val and Jay headed out first. My mom offered to give Lilith and Alyssa a ride home so they’d be coming with me.

When we got in the car it was Alyssa who took the front passenger seat. She got along surprisingly well with my mom. In fact she had a habit of being quite talkative in the car and less talkative anywhere else. I couldn’t say why she was that way, but I suspected she appreciated my mother’s maternal demeanor. It made me wonder what Alyssa’s home life was like.

It was raining as we were pulling off of school campus and onto the main road. Alyssa was talking to my mother about something that happened in class when the conversation began to shift.

“Is it okay if I come over for the night, Ms. Hayfield?” Alyssa asked in her most polite voice.

“Sure! We’d love to have you over.” My mother said.

Alyssa’s idea to ask my mother instead of me was incredibly sly. She probably knew I’d deliberate it more. My mother was much faster to accept a guest since we didn’t get many. Also, my mother wanted me to spend more time with my friends like a regular high school student. She didn’t know just how clingy Alyssa was though.

“If she’s coming over then can I come over too?” Lilith asked.

“The more the merrier!” My mother said. “How about I swing by your houses first so you girls can pick up some clothes?”

“Sure.” Alyssa said.

“Let’s skip my place.” Lilith said. “My aunt will try holding you in a conversation for an hour again, just like the last time you dropped me off…”

My mother didn’t respond verbally to Lilith’s request but we did swiftly change course at the next intersection. Mrs. Wilson had left an amusing impression on my mother.