Part 11: An Unexpected Visitor Chapter 2

The man watched, in fear, at the shadow cast by a large man standing right behind him. His body frozen in fear. He stood there shivering, unable to move or speak.

Far on the horizon, he saw that the sun was about to rise. He knew what it was. He knew what got him.

“It has to be it!”, he thought to himself, “What else could it be? Alas!”

He felt his bag. It grew lighter.

He slowly pulled his bag in front and saw only three fishes.

“I have to do it. I have to or else it’s the end of me.”

He mustered all of his courage and walked ahead, towards his house.

He then started to walk briskly towards the door.

He stopped for a moment to check if the thing was still with him.

Yes! It was there right behind him, following him as if it were his own.

The man then took a right turn. He did not enter his home but went to his backyard.

When he reached the place where he prepares his fish to sell, he sat down and opened the bag.

The shadow disappeared.

The quickly closed the bag tight.

Chomp, chomp, chomp….

Came the sound from the bag.

The man ran inside the house and bought a garland made from tulsi leaves and sealed the bag with it.

As a child, he heard tales of these strange being from his grandparents but never came across one.

His fellow fishermen would talk about such incidences.

People going missing. And if they are lucky enough, these spirits would spare their lives but devour on all their catch for the day.

But he just caught the spirit, in his bag.

His grandmother would tell him stories about people who would catch these spirits and use them as slaves.

She even described him how to trap them and use them. And he had just managed to catch one.

“It must be my lucky day”.

The man took the bag inside.

Five years went by.

The man now owns a big house, a farm with workers and a happy and contented life.

It was a fine evening.

He sat down with his pipe in his garden and watched the setting sun on the horizon.

The evening reminded him of the day when he caught that spirit. It changed his life. It made him a wealthy man.

His son was now married to the only daughter of a rich landlord.

Contended with his life he began smoking his pipe recalling his past life as a poor fisherman.

No one in his family knew about what happened five years ago. The man kept the spirit trapped in the bag. He kept the bag in a locked room in a remote corner of his house. No one was permitted to get inside. He kept the key close to himself. He wore the key as a locket around his neck. Whenever he needs spirit, he would go in there alone and at midnight and performed the rituals to make the spirit do his bidding.

As the night fell on the sky, the man went inside.

Today, he was going to summon the spirit again.

He patiently waited for his family to sleep. At midnight, he silently crept out of his room towards the remote corner of his house.

He unlocked the large iron lock and went inside. As always he performed the rituals and when all was done he went back to sleep.

The night was just like every night for him. But alas! It was not the same night for his daughter-in-law.

His daughter in law happened to be quite a curious woman.

She always enquired about the locked room. Many a time, she had seen her father in law go inside the room exactly at midnight.

This time she was determined to find out what was it that her father in law was hiding.

When the man went to sleep, she crept into his room and stole the key from him.

She went inside to room.

There was nothing. Just some old furniture, a fishing rod, some hooks and an old bag sealed with a garland of tulsi leaves.

The curious woman grabbed the bag and opened it.

It was empty.

She looked around the room wondering what her father in law was hiding.

“The old man must have lost his mind”, she thought.

She then locked the room and placed the key back in the old man’s locket.

The next day the man woke up with a strange feeling. A feeling that said that something was wrong.

He first checked his locked. It was there but something was not right.

He hurried back to the locked room and went inside.

There he saw the bag on the floor. The seal was broken.

When he turned around to warn everyone, he saw a person standing right in front of him.

It was skinny and water was dripping from its body. It had long hair that fell below its shoulders. Its teeth were sharp and pointy. It was staring at the old man with a grin on its face.

The creature said in a shrill voice,”You had enslaved me for five years. Now you shall pay me back”.

Then the creature suddenly disappeared.

“Arghhhhhhh”

The man heard a voice from the kitchen.

The hurried towards the kitchen only to find the half-eaten bodies of his wife and his daughter in law.

Bamm!

Came a sound from his son’s room.

The man, now in grief ran to save his son.

Alas! On the floor, he saw the creature devouring on his son’s body.

In grief, the man shouted.”NOOOOO”

And fell on his knees.

The creature looked at the man.

The old man was in tears. He knew that his end was nigh.

With tears in his eyes, he watched the creature jump out of the window leaving the corpses of his family behind.

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