The bus shuddered to a stop, its brakes screaming into the empty air. Shafik peered out the window, uncertain if this was even the right village. The air was heavy with mist, rolling in thick sheets through the dense trees. The driver’s voice, rough and low, cut through the silence.
“End of the line.”
Shafik stepped off, his feet crunching against gravel. The bus roared away, leaving him alone on the empty road. A warped sign creaked overhead — Noyashal Village. His stomach twisted, unease bubbling beneath his skin. His uncle, who had invited him here for a brief stay, had been oddly vague about the village’s reputation. Just a quiet place, he said, perfect for some rest.
But something about this place made the hairs on Shafik’s neck stand up.
The village sprawled ahead — wooden houses with roofs sagging under years of neglect. There were no people out. Just silence, except for the occasional groan of wood or rustle of leaves. Shafik’s uncle lived at the edge of the village, in an old house surrounded by ancient trees.
As he walked down the dirt path, the silence felt heavy. Too heavy.
He finally found his uncle’s house — a squat, two-story building that looked stitched together from different eras. The windows were shuttered tight, and the front door stood slightly ajar. Shafik knocked, the sound loud against the stillness.
No answer.
“Uncle?”
The door swung open with a soft creak. The inside smelled of damp wood and something metallic, like rust… or blood.
“Uncle? It’s me, Shafik.”
Silence.
He stepped inside, closing the door behind him. The house was dim, the only light filtering through a cracked window. The floorboards creaked under his weight, and the air grew colder the deeper he walked into the house.
In the living room, a note lay on the floor, smeared with dirt and something darker.
"Stay out of the wailing room."
Shafik’s skin prickled. The handwriting was his uncle’s, hurried and uneven.
What the hell was the wailing room?
He found the kitchen next — dishes in the sink crusted with dried food. There were no signs of his uncle, though. Upstairs, perhaps. The old wooden staircase groaned under his feet, each step protesting. The second floor hallway stretched ahead, dim and narrow.
On the left side were two bedrooms — empty and stale with dust. On the right side was a door, older than the rest of the house. Its wood was darker, almost black, and carved into its surface were dozens of marks — tally-like scratches.
The wailing room.
The handle was cold under his touch, and before he knew it, he turned it.
The door creaked open.
The room was empty — or so it seemed at first. Pale moonlight poured in through the single window, illuminating the room in shades of silver and blue. The walls were bare, except for more of those scratches, like someone had dragged a blade across the wood over and over again.
A faint sound drifted through the air — a distant, trembling wail, as if carried from far away. Shafik stepped back, heart hammering, but the sound grew louder.
It was coming from the walls.
Suddenly, the door slammed shut behind him. The scratches on the walls shifted, rearranging themselves into strange symbols — twisting, writhing shapes that seemed to pulse with faint light.
The air grew dense, heavy with the stench of rot and something foul — like burnt hair and bile. Shafik pounded on the door, but it wouldn’t budge. The wailing intensified, shrill and desperate, as if dozens of mouths were crying out at once.
He spun, searching the room for any escape — but there was nothing. Just those shifting walls and that awful, unrelenting wail.
The window.
He ran to it, prying it open with trembling hands. It was nailed shut. Splinters tore into his fingers as he yanked, the wood refusing to give. Behind him, the walls shivered — something crawling beneath the surface, pressing outward, like hands pushing through wet fabric.
The scratches split open.
A hand — gray, skeletal, its nails blackened and cracked — slid out from the wall, fingers twitching in the air. Another hand followed, then a face — skin stretched tight over a hollow skull, its mouth hanging open in a soundless scream.
The wailing wasn’t from the walls — it was from inside them.
Shafik staggered back, slamming into the opposite wall. Cold fingers brushed his ankle, and he screamed, kicking wildly. The floor beneath him rippled, and another face pressed up from the wood, eyes wide and empty, mouth frozen in terror.
They were trapped here — in the walls, in the floors — crying for help that never came.
Shafik threw himself at the door, pounding until his fists bled. The wood softened under his hands, turning to something like flesh — damp and pulsating, cold to the touch. His fingers sank in, and from deep within the door, something grabbed him back.
He ripped his hands away, skin torn, blood slicking the door’s surface. The wailing rose to a deafening pitch, the air vibrating with it, pressing into his skull, into his bones.
The door finally gave way, flinging open into the hallway.
Shafik stumbled out, slamming the door shut behind him. The wailing cut off instantly, leaving behind a silence so complete it rang in his ears.
His breath came in ragged gasps. His hands trembled, blood dripping onto the floor.
The scratches had spread outside the room now, creeping along the hallway walls, carving their way through the house. From somewhere below, a door creaked open.
“Uncle?” His voice shook.
No answer.
He crept down the stairs, each step loud in the silence. The living room was dark — darker than before. The front door was open now, swinging gently in the night breeze.
He stepped outside, the cool air burning his lungs. The village was still empty, but not silent. From every house, faint cries drifted through the air — distant and weak, like echoes from underground.
The villagers were gone — swallowed by their own homes.
He ran.
The mist closed in around him, blurring the trees and path until he couldn’t tell where the village ended and the forest began. The wailing followed him, threading through the mist, whispering into his ears, pulling at the edges of his mind.
He didn’t stop until he reached the bus stop — empty, rusted, overgrown.
There was no bus.
There was no road.
Just the mist — and the wailing, calling him back.
Three Weeks Later
The bus driver frowned at the empty stop. Noyashal Village was never a popular destination — most people avoided it altogether. But there was always someone who didn’t know better, someone who came, stayed a night, and never left.
He glanced at the scratches on the bus stop sign — deep, uneven gouges carved into the metal.
The wind carried a faint wail through the trees.
The driver shook his head and drove on.
Some places don't let you leave.
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