Chapter One
The shadow was coming. Fifteen-year-old Rasha Abadi lay slumped against her headboard, the hem of her duvet clamped in her fists. She dreaded the shadow’s return. For six nights it had come to poison her mind. Rasha squinted through the nickel moonlight and scoured her bedroom for a sign of its arrival. It was the smallest room in caravan forty-five, and half-mended Oxfam charity electronics littered every available surface. Her clothes dryer aired the previous day’s laundry beside her secondhand desk, which bowed under the weight of school textbooks she’d eagerly consumed. That was where the shadow would appear, just as it had every night the past week. Her digital alarm clock on her bedside table blinked: 2:03 a.m. It was time, again. In the corner, tendrils of viscous darkness coiled into a silhouette not quite animal, not entirely human: a malformed head, a barrel chest, misshapen limbs, and a pinched stomach. It was black – an unearthly deep void unlike anything Rasha had ever seen. The dark was hues of purple and brown in comparison. The impossible shadow. Rasha clamped her eyes shut, wishing it away – the shadow sometimes disappeared if she did. Only, with her eyes closed, she was plagued by memories of Syria. Her bedroom’s plasterboard walls crumbled, and in their place came rubble, fire, and ash: the remains of her family’s apartment. Explosions shook the ground, screams filled her ears, and guilt gouged at her intestines. She reminded herself that she was in Cornwall – three thousand miles from her home city of Homs – and that she’d fled Syria four years earlier, even though her stomach knotted and her heart pounded as if it were happening at that very moment. You’re fine, she thought to herself, opening her eyes to the shadow. It’s just PTSD, that’s what Dr Hewitt said. You’re with Mum in Gorenn Holiday Park. The shadow grew so tall its waxen head would soon scrape the ceiling. It couldn’t have been her PTSD; her mind only conjured Syria’s decimation and their haphazard journey to Britain. Until that week, she’d never come across anything like it before. It was a shadow and so didn’t have a body. If it only had a mind, then there was one thing it could be. A ghost. In their culture, they didn’t have ghosts, for spirits didn’t stay on Earth. The closest to that nature were demons called Shaytan, creatures with malicious intent. Could that be it? Rasha asked herself. Did she come back as a Shaytan to punish me? Rasha called her sister’s name. ‘Milana?’ The shadow stepped forward, and its chest heaved. Rasha collapsed onto her bed, too scared to cry. Sweat glued her untamable black hair to her face. The shadow didn’t move closer; it didn’t scream with agony or demand Rasha to atone. It did something impossibly worse: it stood rigidly and silently condemned her for what she had done. ‘I’m sorry,’ Rasha cried. ‘I’m so sorry.’ Rasha wept and apologised, slumped against her headboard, as her mind plunged into memories of scorching fires, singed flesh and bloodcurdling cries. Chapter Two A panicked shriek. Rasha sat upright in bed. The shadow was gone, and the room was awash with tepid morning light. Another cry. A flurry of white rushed past the window. Beating wings carried on the air. It was just a seagull telling the world to wake. She put her head between her knees so that her racing heart would still. Just a seagull . . . Just a seagull . . . Through the gap in her arms, her alarm clock read 6:20 a.m. Rasha wasn’t too sure if she’d slept or fainted. Her adrenaline had waned, and in the shadow’s presence she’d slipped into memories of Syria. Or were they nightmares? It was hard to distinguish the two. She dared not deliberate; it’d only induce another anxiety attack. Her alarm clock blared at 6:30 a.m. Time to wake Haya. Since their family had been reduced to two, Haya had suffered extreme bouts of physically debilitating depression. It took her a long time to get going in the morning and longer still without Rasha’s support. She raised herself from bed. Her arms were weak, her chest ached — the aftereffects of another panic attack. A nettlelike sting smothered her body, as it always did when she encountered the shadow. Rasha left her bedroom for the kitchen, her every other thought plagued by the shadow. She mulled between cupboard and sink to brew a green tea. Its warped, melted body. Own-brand bread sizzled beneath the grill. Singed flesh. The kettle whistled to a steady boil. Milana, crumpled beneath rubble. Stop it, she thought. Rasha grabbed a foil sertraline packet from the top shelf and poured a glass of water, assembled a bed tray, and moped to Haya’s room. Rasha’s mother was awake when she entered – it was unlikely she’d slept. Her face was gaunt, as to be expected for someone who had to be prompted to eat. Her thick black hair was neglected and speckled grey. Rasha lowered the tray onto her mother’s side table and climbed into the bed beside her. Haya raised two heavy arms and cradled Rasha, who traced purple scars on her mother’s arm with her hand. Haya had gained those marks by saving Rasha’s life. Only she and Haya had survived the explosion that fateful night in Homs. Haya had pulled her from the wreckage and burned her left forearm in a fire that shrouded the debris. Her father’s and sister’s bloodied remains eradicated all thought so Rasha remembered little of the following journey. They’d been crammed amongst crates in the back of a truck, hidden in a waterside town house in Calais, and sandwiched amongst other desperate asylum seekers in a shipping container. British border patrollers had cracked open the container and escorted them to a detention centre in Gatwick. Three months, two key workers, and an appeal later, they were granted ‘leave to remain’ and relocated to the village of Gorenn in South Cornwall. Since then, the duo had lived in a routine that Rasha tirelessly maintained to try to find some sort of normality. ‘It’s that time already?’ Haya asked in Levantine, their mother tongue. Their Syrian friends had often mused how Haya’s daughters were mirror images of her, so when she looked at Rasha’s plump face, warm beige skin, and wide green eyes with adoration and sadness, Rasha wondered whether she was a constant reminder of Milana. She deliberated telling her mother about the shadow, but Haya barely had enough capacity for what was real. ‘I don’t know if I can do it today,’ Haya uttered. ‘It’s a short day,’ Rasha assured. ‘Mr Keats said one deep clean, three stays. You’ll be done by eleven. Then you can go back to bed.’ ‘There’s laundry to do.’ ‘I’ve done it. Take your pill, drink your tea, and I’ll get the sink ready.’ Rasha planted a kiss on Haya’s forehead and left the bedroom. She arranged Haya’s work clothes on the bathroom flasket and filled the sink with hot water. Haya held on for as long as she could before she rose to wash; the water would be at the perfect temperature by the time she did. Rasha changed and avoided the corner where the shadow had been. Within twenty minutes she was in her patched school uniform, sat at the dining room table, munching on a pack of chocolate bourbon creams to suppress her appetite. Glucose, the perfect fuel for the sleep-deprived. For someone haunted by shadows. Haya stifled a yawn as she entered, acrylic tabard on, hair wound in a tight bun. With her was the cup of tea and plate of toast, which hadn’t been touched. Haya was a far cry from the woman Rasha remembered in pre-war Syria when she’d worked as paralegal’s secretary. Rasha supposed that Middle Eastern qualifications meant nothing when she wasn’t legally allowed to work under ‘leave to remain.’ It was why Rasha had begged the site owner, Mr Keats, to allow her mother to do cash-in-hand work – she craved a purpose as much as they needed the money. Haya tutted playfully and offered her hand. Rasha reluctantly gave her the packet of bourbons. ‘All this sugar,’ Haya moaned. ‘Your insides will rot, never mind your teeth.’ ‘Yes, Mama.’ ‘No sweets before lunch, you hear me?’ ‘No sweets before lunch.’ It was time for Rasha to leave, after all. She had four miles of country lanes to walk. She rose and hugged Haya. ‘If I have to eat savoury, you have to eat something.’ Haya nodded. ‘I promise,’ she whispered. ‘Unconditionally,’ Rasha said. ‘Unconditionally.’ Rasha squeezed her tightly, then donned her rucksack and stepped into the spearmint morning. She faltered on the bottom step and wrung the straps of her bag. She contemplated every lesson sat quietly, hoping to be left alone by teacher and student, every solitary break time spent in an empty classroom or toilet cubicle. Get through it, she told herself. Get through it and get back to the caravan. Not that solace was found during evenings spent in forty-five, the place she was meant to call home. She took a deep breath and trudged on. Gorenn Holiday Park was compiled of caravans each within their own fenced ten-by-twenty-metre paddock, all arranged alongside a clean gravel path. Mr Keats’s caravan was at the heart of the holiday rentals, adjacent to the maintenance shed and activities lodge. His family consisted of seven obese tabby cats that milled within their fenced enclosure. Rasha stopped a moment to itch one of their chins, taking in the sea as it frothed and rolled beyond the caravans, letting the cool salt air course through her nostrils and ease her lungs. ‘ ’ere, Rasha,’ came Mr Keats’s voice. ‘What do you know about cats?’ The site manager, a thin man with a whisker-clad face and beady eyes, looked like an inquisitive otter walking on its hind legs. The morning wind threatened to rush under his bathrobe and Monroe him. ‘They like fish, hate belly rubs,’ she replied. ‘They like fish.’ He laughed. ‘Well, ’parently mine dunt. They haven’t touched a thing since yesterday. Gonna ’ave to take ’em to the vets, ain’t I?’ ‘Best be on the safe side,’ Rasha said. She nuzzled the head of an obese tabby. ‘Speakin’ of which, keep an eye out on yer walk. There’s been some wrong un’s loitering around here at night.’ ‘People?’ Rasha returned. She always struggled with Mr Keats’s thick accent. ‘They ain’t guests, I know that much. Probably lookin’ to pinch gas bottles, so keep yer eyes peeled. Tell your mother, too.’ ‘Sure. See ya.’ School started in an hour, so Rasha continued on. Shadows at night, strange people who wandered the caravan site by day. Rasha’s anxious mind couldn’t help but put the two together. For a moment she deliberated taking the school bus but decided against it. She hadn’t taken the school bus in months – crammed into a metal box with no escape from bullies was far from appetising. Into the bending valley lanes Rasha went until the caravan park was a blip behind her. Despite the long walk in all varieties of Cornish weather, she enjoyed the momentary freedom from the concrete and plaster that caged her very existence, where benign livestock plodded along in the fields beside her. Escaping her thoughts was another matter. The shadow plagued her mind. She didn’t believe for a second that she’d imagined it. Its fathomless depths of black had absorbed all light in the room, whilst its silhouette could have been the decomposed carcass of an unearthly beast. Her imagination could not conjure such an image. Not that it mattered. Rasha thought too much, and her lungs welded themselves to her diaphragm in anxiety’s havoc. Her neck prickled, just as it had when the shadow appeared. Not here, not now. She circled, but the grassy verges either side of her were empty. Could it be the shadow? No, the shade around her belonged to trees and power lines. Nothing unordinary in the lane. But in the neighbouring field, there was. Over the hedge to her left, across the pasture by a dilapidated cow shed, Rasha spotted three figures. Hoods hid their faces. A woman and two men. The shortest man consulted a gadget in his hands. Mr Keats had spoken of strange people who skulked around the area. What’s more, they looked straight her way. What else was there to see in the valley but fields and cattle? They watched her. Rasha ran as fast as her legs would carry her and never looked back. COMPETITION
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The Frequency: A Mind-Bending Paranormal Thriller (The Imprint Quintet Book 1) by Terry Kitto
Death wasn’t an absolute end, but a further form of being.
Deep within the bowels of an abandoned Cornish mine a covert occult group, known as the Network, protects the living from the dead. Their mediums host a plethora of abilities — from telepathy to astral projection — because of their connection to an energy source called the frequency. Fifteen-year-old Rasha Abadi and her mother are Syrian refugees granted leave to remain in Gorenn Village. The seaside town sprawls with beaches and idyllic coves, but the last thing Rasha finds there is peace. An impossible shadow visits her nightly and infests her mind with memories of the chaos that she and her mother fled in Syria. When she becomes possessed by the shadow, the Network intervenes to save her. The shadow’s wrath knows no bounds and orchestrates a string of interconnected possessions across the south coast. Having survived the shadow, Rasha eagerly offers to aid the Network’s investigation. They must all act quickly to unearth its motive before it disrupts the balance between the living and the dead, and forges a new world from the embers of their own reality. No choice will be easy for Rasha when thwarting a monster means becoming one herself. The Frequency is a paranormal thriller exploring grief in a world where death is just the beginning and where reality can be rewritten. Fans of Stephen King and James Herbert will enjoy this mind-bending, paranormal thriller with LGBTQ+ and POC characters. This is book one in The Imprint Quintet series, a five-part saga following a rag-tag group of mediums as they attempt to thwart an otherworldly tyrant from unleashing paranormal terrorism. TODAY ON THE GINGER NUTS OF HORROR WEBSITE RICHARD MARTIN REVISITS THE MASTERS OF HORROR: RIGHT TO DIE, DIRECTED BY:ROB SCHMIDT
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