As The Raven Dreams Podcast - "Winter Kingdom Pt. 4 - Stan" by Aakash Sharma

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Starting point is 00:00:44 By Akash Sharma. She looked into my eyes. That gentle curve of her face radiated a feeling I hadn't felt in years. I felt the shell I had built around myself crumble with each moment her eyes were locked onto mine. The warmth of her palm on my face, it was soothing. The feeling so divine. I had to close my eyes to live only in that sweet warmth. And then, slowly as I opened my eyes, her skin was gone.

Starting point is 00:01:20 Their bones clung to me, lifeless and cold. I blinked into the waking world. My forehead was pressed against the driving wheel, and my mouth was crusted with drool. I dreamed that same dream again. My wife had been coming to me in my dreams as of late. I didn't give it much thought until it began to recur. That is when I knew it had to mean something. I leaned back, stretching on the driver's seat,

Starting point is 00:01:51 and looked at the lightly illuminated digits of time on the digital clock, stuck to the dashboard. 2.12 a.m. I stepped out of the car and sighed, setting free a pocket of mist into the cold winter air. I buried my hands into the pockets of my pants and began to walk. He's been singing and dancing to the songs of the Skin Witch. How long had it been?

Starting point is 00:02:20 A year? A month? It all felt like yesterday to me. That night, all those years ago, the reason my fate nudged me down this path tonight, it all started from the night that brought the death of Sharon Vale, my wife, and the mother of my two. children. But that, that was too distant now, almost as if in another life. I haven't cried

Starting point is 00:02:47 in years, and even now, I felt numb to everything that wasn't hate or anger or sorrow. Out there somewhere, there was a puppeteer looking down on us, twisting the strings around and thriving on the chaos of it all. My wife had played her role. Her string had been cut. loose, and she had passed away. My sister had played her role. She had disappeared the night my son was taken into custody

Starting point is 00:03:18 and for all I knew she might have passed away as well. Now my son, my son, he... I didn't know what happened to him. He's been singing and dancing to the song of the Skin Witch. After that night in the hospital, the incident they now call the invader

Starting point is 00:03:36 killings. After One of the two shooters had claimed that the town was infested with invaders, and the two of them had been tasked with ridding this town of these malicious entities. After that night, my son was gone. Gone as if he never even existed, or rather just blinked out of existence. Singing and dancing to the songs of the Skin Witch. I cannot say with absolute certainty, not after the things, I had witnessed on the old job, but I had a feeling that he was innocent of all he was accused.

Starting point is 00:04:14 I had no proof. Call it father's intuition, if there is such a thing. But Dan never seemed like the sort of person who would do something like this. Stan, I heard a voice behind me. Billy, I replied, turning to find my old colleague, the man I had partnered with for the first time when I made detective. Where is she? Billy twisted his head, scanning the background so as to be certain that I wasn't followed or watched. Come, he said, walking ahead and down into an alley.

Starting point is 00:04:49 I followed closely behind. Billy's caution was reasonable. If someone did want to follow, our tracks on the fresh snow wouldn't exactly make it any harder for them. And if it was one of those news folks, God knows what kind of story they could come up with. Everyone needs a bloody story in this world to stir up some anger in them. Everyone wanted to be a part of one. We reached the back door to what looked like a diner, and Billy gave three distinct knocks while I waited.

Starting point is 00:05:22 The door was answered rather eagerly by a short, anxious-looking woman. She parted her lips, presumably to complain about something, but Billy handed her a bill, and she kept it to herself. The diner was closed. The lights were dimmed, and the seats were stacked. She went behind another door and called out to someone. I waited, and my teeth gritted in anticipation. A skinny, weak-looking woman, with dirty brown hair and tired blue eyes, stumbled into the room, barely putting any effort into her stance.

Starting point is 00:06:00 Her features were sunken. The white of her eyes were invaded by branches of her. red and dark bags of sleeplessness were in her eyes. She barely even looked awake. Make it quick, man. We got to leave soon, Billy urged. I squinted my eyes, examining her face. A minor scar lay under her ear.

Starting point is 00:06:23 I would examine her hands as well, but I knew I would be greeted only by possible infected needle marks. You saw him? I asked her. My eyes still on her scar. Yes. Yeah. She stammered. I looked into her eyes, staring coldly until she finally went on.

Starting point is 00:06:43 I already told this guy and the others what I knew at the station, she said. I don't want trouble. Just ask me what you want, but the story won't change. No, it won't, I replied. But you see, I have a special talent. I know how to make people tell the truth and what to do with them when they don't. She gulped, stepped back, and raised her hands. hands ever so slightly as she did.

Starting point is 00:07:08 No, no, no, no, I swear. I saw him do it. He killed Jack, Lem, and Dina. I saw it. And he saw me see him do it. I don't know why he didn't kill me too. Maybe he wanted me to watch. Maybe he was one of those psychos with a fetish thing. I don't know, man. What did he look like? I asked. He knows. He would have told you what I told him. I want to hear it from you, I said. Tell me. He was... He wore a coat. There was something...

Starting point is 00:07:39 I don't know. Something familiar about him. He was about this tall. Almost your height, or maybe a little more or less. And half his face was... Half his face was burnt? She finished speaking. That was the part of the story that bothered me.

Starting point is 00:07:57 Did you know him before? She shook her head. No. And his face was burnt. Are you sure? Sure, I asked. The man's description was so uncanny. It would be near impossible for someone like him to go unnoticed,

Starting point is 00:08:14 and yet this man had been so sneaky in his ways that even with everything going on, the police still had no clue as to his identity. The missing children, now almost six of them, had caused a lot of panic and fear amongst the people. And ever since, that skull had been found at the house, house my wife had died in, hell broke loose. That skull had belonged to Marcus Piper, the first kid to go missing.

Starting point is 00:08:45 He didn't have the best reputation and was known to be trouble yet. It caused great panic amongst the people. The town's school had to cut the school buses out. Most kids were being dropped off by parents, and a curfew had been ordered as well. With my son missing, there were certain rumors surrounding. surrounding our family. One of the reasons I had quit. The police had been at it for a while now,

Starting point is 00:09:11 and yet so far, they had been following empty trails. Not a single one told about the person who was behind all of this, or if it even was just one person behind the abductions. That was, until this woman had flagged down a police car, which found three corpses, all junkies with different bits of their skin torn. off, and now they had a start, and so did I. It was. It's got to be, she replied. I think I saw some bone, too. Look, I'm really

Starting point is 00:09:47 fucking scared, please, just let me go now. I need to get home. I gotta feed my cat. I'd heard enough, and I walked out the door, followed by Billy. I owe you for this, I told him. Nah, you got everything. The truth was, I didn't really know what it meant. I didn't really know what meant. I was going down a road that branched into many other paths, leading to other branches, leading to other branches. I didn't know where this went, but it was all part of something much bigger and I put it down on a page of a tiny journal. As I sat in my car alone, I contemplated all the pieces of this cursed puzzle, trying to fit pieces together randomly to see if anything fit. My son had gone missing. But before that, my sister, And he was found covered in blood. The blood was surely his aunt. That much I knew for a fact after the DNA was done. The thumb?

Starting point is 00:10:43 It had no prints. Yet DNA couldn't tell whom it belonged to. Whoever's it was, they were not in our database. He's singing and dancing to the song of the skin witch. Shut up, I mumbled out slowly in the car. Those words had haunted me like a vengeful ghost. I put my hand into my pocket and pulled out my phone and then looked at the screen. Those words still surfaced from the stream of my thoughts threatening to drown my sanity.

Starting point is 00:11:16 I hadn't spoken with her in a while, and I pulled up her number, Ellen, my daughter, the last living family I had. The phone rang once, and then twice, and then thrice, and it went on unanswered. I saw a ghost in my daughter's eyes now. Somewhere she blamed me for the disappearance of her brother, and slowly that had been what took her away from me. She had left the house that night after the hospital shootout. We'd had a huge argument. If you weren't so hard on him, maybe he would still be here.

Starting point is 00:11:54 Maybe if you believed in him, given him a chance, he wouldn't have to run away, not from his own fucking father. Her words would have torn. right through me. Hadn't there already been a gaping void there already? And like that, she was gone. I wondered every time

Starting point is 00:12:13 she didn't answer my phone if she had changed her number. She probably had. And then last week, I got a letter in the mail. It was signed Ellen V. Kemper, and with her new address on the bottom. She was married now.

Starting point is 00:12:31 I drunk myself numb that night, I felt like the only reason I had even gotten that letter was just to spite me, as if she wanted to let me know that she didn't consider me important enough to be part of her life anymore. I began to drive, not knowing where to go next, but all the clues I had so far were so far apart, seemingly unrelated, that my intuition was the only thing holding them together. His face, as the girl said, was half burnt. He relieved two bodies. Jake Weschler and Dina Amber,

Starting point is 00:13:11 of the flesh on their thighs and the other identified as Maurice Lemmon lost his lips and nose. A bunch of nobodies. At first glance, neither of their names seemed of any significance to me, but eventually I made up my mind to inquire after these names the next day. Maybe I would have to trouble Billy once again. He's singing and dancing to the songs of the Skin Witch. Two armed boys,

Starting point is 00:13:43 Byrne Simmons, 19, and Terrence Greggs, 21. Arrived to shoot up the town hospital at around midnight. Byrne was shot dead by an armed officer and Greggs was taken in after he took two bullets. One in the kneecap, and the other on his left shoulder. A very disturbing journal was found at Burns' residence, which chronicled his attempts at trying to dabble into the occult,

Starting point is 00:14:10 with loads of research online, amongst various forums, as well as paying visits to places that had some sort of grimness to them. The cemetery, the morgue, and possibly even my old house. A recurring mention of something known as the skin woman or the scintembourg, or the skin witch, as Greg had later said, was concerning, especially to me. Some of the things written in the journal were eerily similar to the kind of stories my late wife had told my son, the skeletons of winter land or winter kingdom, or something like that, as well as detailed paragraphs about flaying a person and other horrific things had been written in there.

Starting point is 00:14:55 I had watched the entire interrogation behind the glass. Terence had claimed that the two boys had heard some entity whisper to them, which eventually led them to find each other. And when they did, they would often be asked by this entity to make tiny sacrifices for the power of the invaders of this town to weaken. The boys started with tiny insects, and then moved on to small animals, and then there were links to certain missing pets as well.

Starting point is 00:15:27 Eventually, to appease this entity, and in hopes of gaining fuck-nose-what, they decided to make a bigger sacrifice and to hunt down the so-called invaders by shooting up a hospital. My son was the only one missing from the hospital in the aftermath. The only trace of him that was found were some bits of ear and a little blood from when he had apparently been shot at by one of the two boys. I was allowed to put one question to him off the record. I asked him if he knew where my son had disappeared or if he had seen him. He gave me a wicked, twisted grin and then looked right behind me, as if there was something materializing in the dark corner of the room. He's singing and dancing to the songs of the skin witch, he said.

Starting point is 00:16:23 It took a moment before I could let me. the words sink in. They sounded like the ramblings of a very mad man, and I can make nothing of it. He then opened his jaws wide with slow and careful movements. His hesitation was apparent on his face, and the moment it hit me, it had been too late. He thrust his tongue forward, and he slammed his jaw against the table and severing his tongue, spraying blood all over the place. He then proceeded to grind his teeth through the dangling.

Starting point is 00:16:55 bits left of his tongue, which he then spat out on the table. Several men rushed in as he screamed a bloody scream and began to convulse and choke on his own blood. It was because of that entire ordeal with the diary that I knew my wife's story had something to do with it. For the rest of the night, I just drove around, wandering aimlessly like I was in purgatory. As the night went on, I began to do with it. I began to forget myself and felt like I was fading from existence.

Starting point is 00:17:29 Before I knew it, I found myself parked right next to a house that seemed a stranger to me. Yet, holding the card in my hand, I knew that this was where my daughter lived now. How long had it been? A year? A month? Probably a year, but it still felt like she had left home just yesterday. I sat waiting near a streetlight. A horde of moths rolled under, taking solace and buzzing.

Starting point is 00:18:03 I considered going to the door for a moment, and as much as I did want to, I was hesitant. I don't know how she'll react or if she even would want me in there. I saw a window from the front of the house light up, and I started my car. I didn't want to cause any trouble tonight. The moment I turned my car out, I saw someone standing next to the window and stepped on the brakes. She stood motionless like a still shadow cast by the streetlight. We locked eyes onto each other, and for a moment, the world went dark. Even the moths had stopped their buzzing on the streetlights above.

Starting point is 00:18:47 I don't think they were even there anymore. And that, that was when I felt it. something about this was unnatural. She moved into the light, and I got to see her clearly. Her hair had grown irregularly on her head, leaving behind empty patches of almost rotted skin on her scalp. She was wrinkled and pruned, almost as if she was older than any living thing should have reason to be.

Starting point is 00:19:16 She was completely bare, naked. Her skin was corrupt with decay. Her limbs had gone thin. and I sped out of their horrified, trying not to turn back to look. I gave the rearview mirror a quick glance for some reason. Perhaps deep down somewhere I was worried about being followed or something like that. But nothing. There was no one behind me.

Starting point is 00:19:41 She wasn't there. Almost as if she had never been there. I would accept that I had imagined the entire thing. But even if I did, I was too creeped out to go back or even slid. sleep that night. Eventually, sleep did take me, and after a night of dreamless slumber, I found myself awake in the driver's seat, parked next to my house. It was almost midday, and my eyes felt heavy. My head throbbed, and I felt slight dizziness. He's singing and dancing to the songs of the skin witch. I turned the radio on. I didn't want to wake up to the silence.

Starting point is 00:20:22 And today, in a shocking turn of events, four of the missing children have been found. According to sources, they were all found in different places. I listened, feeling a mixture of relief and confusion. Why were all these things happening together? If the man with the burnt face was behind all of this and he had evaded police successfully so far, why had he allowed a living witness to his crimes? and now the children have returned back home. This did seem a bit unsettling, but then I must be reading too much into this,

Starting point is 00:21:01 and maybe there wasn't even a connection to begin with. Marianne Xavier, a 12-year-old girl who was amongst the missing children, will go back to living with her adoptive parents, who took her in after her mother was deemed to be an unfit guardian after several instances of drug abuse. The Levits will be taking her back home after I turned the radio down. My phone had been buzzing somewhere. I reached under my seat and patted around, feeling the cold frame of my Glock,

Starting point is 00:21:34 and then eventually my phone. The phone buzzed again, and I grabbed it, picking it up and pushing it to my ear. The number wasn't one I had in my contacts, but I was desperate to hear from my daughter again, so I took no chances. Um, Dad? It was her. I knew that voice. I wouldn't forget it.

Starting point is 00:21:56 For a moment, I thought that I had been dreaming, but I didn't really care. Ellen? Elle, how are you? I asked, rushing with my words. It's so good to... Were you at our house last night? She asked. Her voice was stern.

Starting point is 00:22:14 I... Were you? You were, weren't you? I sighed. She took it from my... answer. Dad, you... you should have... She was stumbling through words, searching for the right thing to say. I couldn't tell from her tone if she was about to lash out or if she felt bad. Either way, I felt horrible. Dad, you should come over, she said firmly, and then sighing as if to accept what she

Starting point is 00:22:43 had just said to herself. I told her I'd be there, and I went into my house to get myself ready. I sent Billy a text, asking him for some information about all the three dead addicts as well as about the girl who witnessed it all. I didn't wait for a text back. After a shower and a change of clothes, I arrived at her place. Her house seemed a bit more familiar now. The strange coldness I felt from it was gone in the daylight. When she answered the door, I was met with surprise. She looked a bit older.

Starting point is 00:23:20 Her hair had been tied back, and she looked a little puffy. But most of all, what really caught my eye was her swollen belly. She made us both a cup of coffee and sat down to talk. The conversation we had was slow and awkward. She had been married to an aspiring actor. She met him at work and things went super fast, and before she knew it, she found herself pregnant with his child. She had made her mind to keep it, and eventually they decided to get married in a small, private little ceremony.

Starting point is 00:23:55 Eventually, there was a long silence between us, and I felt like our time was nearly done with, but then, then she asked me something, and I knew that she was waiting for the right moments to put the question forward. Is there anything about Dan? She asked. No. Well, I don't know, I replied. I contemplated telling her about my own investigations into the matter. Well, there was something yesterday.

Starting point is 00:24:26 I think it has to do with the missing children. Probably that will stop the rumors about Dan's involvement. Other than that, oh, yeah, I saw about that in the news. Sad, what's happened to her, she said. I nodded. Our time went by quickly, and I went on my way home. I checked my phone for any updates from Billy and finding none. I set it aside and got into bed to catch up on some sleep.

Starting point is 00:24:55 Hopefully now that the children had been found, the police would get somewhere. But then, as I lay in the darkness, I remembered what I had seen in front of my daughter's house that last night. I had somehow forgotten all about it in the day. It was probably because of lack of sleep, if I didn't get any sleep now, chances are I would see something like that again. I thought about the conversation I had with my daughter. I was so glad to see her after all this time, and I was grateful for the time I spent with her today, and then, thinking about our little talk, I remembered what she had said.

Starting point is 00:25:34 I saw about that in the news, sad what has happened to her. What happened to her? What was she talking about? I immediately called her up, not caring about the time. It was almost 10 p.m., and I had no hopes of her actually picking up, but this time, this time she did. Hello? What happened to her? I asked.

Starting point is 00:25:57 I hadn't really been keeping up with the news, so I didn't know what story had been spun out of the three murders at this time. Dad, what are you, you said it. You said it was sad what happened to her. The girl on the news. What happened? You don't remember her? She asked. And it all started to slowly sink in.

Starting point is 00:26:20 I could vaguely picture a younger version of the girl I had spoken with last night. Ellen filled the gaps in my memory. Dad, that was Lori. Lori Reed? We walked home together after school. I hadn't seen her in ages, and last night I felt awful when I saw how she looked. Walking out of the house, I stopped right in my house. next to my car and began to dial Billy.

Starting point is 00:26:45 As the phone rang, I looked around, feeling a thousand eyes watching me in the night. I remembered that awful sight I had seen last night again, and this time it filled me with unease. Billy, the girl, where is she now? I asked him in a hurry. I parked outside her residence, pulling out my gun from under the seat just in case. I slowly walked up to the house. It seemed almost abandoned. If it wasn't for the fact that there was a patrol car around in the area, someone would be watching her place.

Starting point is 00:27:20 I didn't give it much thought. I walked up and knocked on the door. It was left unanswered for such a long time that I almost turned around to leave. Slowly, but eventually, the door creaked open. The house inside was dark, and I could only make out the shape of Tori standing in the doorway. Her eyes widened when she saw my face. It's okay, I just want to talk, I assured her, raising my hands to show her I wasn't armed. Of course, I had tucked the gun behind my back, concealed by my coat.

Starting point is 00:27:55 She ushered me in with a quick motion. The house had been darkened, not just by dimming the lights, but actually darkened, by blocking out any light from the windows with layers of newspaper. The rest of the house was a mess. Almost as if the owner had no care in the world about it. Well, she said, what do you want? Tori, your Tori read, aren't you? She rolled her eyes.

Starting point is 00:28:25 Look, man, I... You used to walk home with my daughter, Ellen Vale. You guys were together in middle school? She paused, thinking for a moment. Maybe I did. What of it? You told me last night. the guy, the attacker.

Starting point is 00:28:40 He looked familiar to you. Why did you say that? I asked. I don't... I can't tell you why. Maybe... His ear. His right ear.

Starting point is 00:28:51 What did his ear look like? I asked her, gritting my teeth and hoping she wouldn't give me the answer that I dreaded. Her eyes widened for a moment. What? Why do you ask? Just fucking tell me. I don't think he had one on the burnt side. She said.

Starting point is 00:29:09 It wasn't burnt. It was skinned, I declared. I sped in my car. I knew exactly where I was supposed to go. He's been singing and dancing to the songs of the Skin Witch. No, he was wrong. Gregs had claimed that my son was with something called the Skin Witch, along with many mentions of it in Burns Journal.

Starting point is 00:29:31 Except they had both been wrong. It was never the Skin Witch. It was the skin witch. It was the skinned. Which. I parked my car next to the Levitt's residence and went up the stairs. All of this. The missing children, the burnt man, my son, and the story about the skeletons. All of this are part of a puppet show. And it's something deeply malicious that is holding on to the strings. I went up to the door and knocked. The door was locked. I knew for a fact that the house was not empty. There was someone in there. The lights were on. And so was the television. I knocked again. Yet again, I was met with silence.

Starting point is 00:30:15 I walked away from the door and went to the side of the house, cupping my hands around my eyes and peering through the window. The front room seemed empty. And as I scanned through the heavily furnished room, something caught my eye. There was a huge splatter of red at the end of the wall, and some of it still seemed to drip down onto the crick. carpet below. I kicked at the door, which didn't help, and reluctantly shot at the lock of the

Starting point is 00:30:44 door and pushed it open. The metallic smell of blood assaulted my nose. The stillness of everything in the room with the television playing in the background had made it all the more unsettling. Following the blood, I went up the stairs, reaching a narrow hall in the middle of which a woman sat, clutching her feet to her chest. She still wore her white coat. coat. Dr. Anna's eyes were wide open and for a moment I thought she was dead. Hannah? I whispered to her. Hey, I put my hand on her shoulder in a bid to shake her awake. She was lost. I pulled my hand back to find it wet and sticky, coated with warm blood. A clean incision had been made into her neck. She was in shock. She was inconsolable. I heard movement in a room

Starting point is 00:31:38 at the end of the hall, behind a wooden door. It was shut almost all the way through, except for a tiny crack through which light escaped. I pushed the door open. My heart pounded louder with each moment the door creaked, and I was met with a hellish sight. A young girl, which I assumed was the Levitt's adopted daughter, sat in the middle of the room,

Starting point is 00:32:04 next to the body of her father, Zachary Levitt, who twitched as she peeled off bits of his scalp. For some reason he lay struggling to move, yet with vain results as his body did nothing but twitch. His face was red with raw muscles and blood. The rest of him still dressed seemed to be intact. But his eyes, his eyes were the worst thing. They were exposed, round and so red with dry,

Starting point is 00:32:37 brightness and bits of blood. And then I felt a ringing in my ear and a heaviness in my chest. Come with me, she said, in a voice so soft. I couldn't tell if she really said it at first. The king waits. She stepped closer to me and I stumbled back, falling on to the hardwood floor. She extended one hand towards me, the other clutching her. her prize that she had claimed from the skinned man.

Starting point is 00:33:10 I pulled out my gun. A loud bang followed. And my ears rang as I shot at her. So that my friends was. Winter Kingdom, part four, Stan. I buy Akash Sharma. A fantastic part to an absolutely amazing series so far. Super excited to see where this goes.

Starting point is 00:33:41 Super excited to see where he takes it because Akash, my man, is one hell of an author. So, all that said, if you want to see where this goes, please consider hitting that subscribe button the bell I got next to it. That way you get notified. You can also support the channel by following me on social media or, you know, Patreon coffee, all that stuff. Also, channel memberships do exist now, so consider signing out if you want to. If not, that is okay. All that said, my friends, I hope you have a beautiful day and I hope I'll see you on the next video.

Starting point is 00:34:09 But until then, sleep well.

As The Raven Dreams Podcast - "Winter Kingdom Pt. 4 - Stan" by Aakash Sharma

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