Shadowfire

Prologue

Since the inception of the small quiet town of Shadows,Colorado there had been a reported two hundred and thirty-six deaths in the area. However, none of these departures had been quite as newsworthy as the three-month period of grisly murders that transpired in the winter of the year 1980.

It all began on the old Farrow property, a three-story farmhouse right in the middle of the woods. It was far off the main road, down a long, unlit, dirt driveway―it felt very secluded at night because it was the only residence in the immediate area.

The manor had two stories with a russet-colored wood roof that was reinforced with asbestos fibers. The side was lined with white aluminum that over the years had become somewhat beige, and the dead vines from a nearby trumpet plant climbed up the right side of the house on a large trellis that leaned up against the second-story balcony.

The house hadn't been inhabited for sixty years, and the fields nearby totaled around seven to ten acres depending on which plot map you looked at. The family that had constructed the house had abandoned it in the early 1950s after claiming it was haunted by various malevolent spirits.

This property and the land that surrounded it was a haven for drunken teenage tailgaters and over the decades this particular house had become a major topic in the game of truth or dare.

So it was inevitable that on one summer night in 2018 a group of adventurous high school students wandered into the foreboding mansion to test their courage. This group included fifteen-year-old Vanessa Ross, the spunky yet somewhat naive girlfriend of the group's leader. She was a popular girl at their high school and her beau Josh Harvey was a seventeen-year-old motorcycle mechanic.

The couple didn't always get along and their relationship was often looked down upon by the local townspeople but Vanessa didn't especially care about what they thought of her,anyway. She was going to get out of this town the moment she turned eighteen, and she would do whatever it took to get her there.

"Just chill a bit, Vanessa. It's fine. Nothing bad ever happens at these kinds of things," Josh calmly said as they climbed out of their car and began to walk towards the old Farrow home and into the outskirts of the dark and foreboding Pennington Woods.

Vanessa knew that this statement was far from the truth. She had been warned by another incoming freshman about this place and what events transpired there. It was full of sex, drugs, and alcohol; all things that Vanessa would rather not be associated with.

"Let's just get this over with," Vanessa grumbled as she shivered against the fabric of her long-sleeved sweater. It was almost fifty-four degrees outside, and due to her boyfriend's insistence on leaving the moment he arrived,she had forgotten to bring along an actual coat. They were only about four-hundred feet away from the rest of the group when Vanessa started to hear things.

At first, it only sounded like soft murmurs in the wind;they were quiet and somewhat peaceful. It wasn't until about a hundred feet away that she heard what sounded like a giggle of a child. A chill went up to her spine, and she stood there motionless.

"Are you honestly just gonna stand there all night?"Josh asked annoyed at the behavior of his girlfriend.Vanessa didn't respond to his words and instead headed in the opposite direction, back towards their vehicle. She hadn't just imagined that giggle, had she?

"I'm gonna go sit in the car, take your time," Vanessa waved behind her as she swiftly began her walk back to the road. Josh let out a sigh of dissatisfaction as Vanessa ignored his demands. Then with one final look towards her,he climbed the steps of the front deck and was greeted by all of his buddies.

The Pennington Woods was a thirty-two-acre labyrinth of aspen and pine trees, and if you spent too much time in there, it was easy to get yourself turned around in it. This was exactly the problem that occurred to Vanessa as she started to trace her way back to the main road.