“Why do you need to know?” she asked suspiciously. “I live in the house next to the well. I hear strange sounds at night.” The woman crossed herself and looked around, as if afraid someone was listening. “Sounds…”
“Yes, everyone knows about the sounds. But no one talks. Because talking is dangerous.” “Why dangerous?” “Because she hears. Sarah Thompson. The drowned one. They say whoever mentions her, she comes to them.”
James felt a chill in his stomach. His suspicions were right. “Tell me about her. It’s important.” The woman sighed. “It was 15 years ago. Sarah was a beauty, smart. All the guys chased her, but she chose Michael Davis, a rich guy from Lincoln. Promised to marry, build a house. Sarah believed him, even… well, believed in everything.”
“And then?” “He ran off with another. A week before the wedding. Sarah found out by chance—saw them in Lincoln. Came home white as a sheet, said nothing. And at night, she left.”
“To the well?” “Yeah. They started searching in the morning, but it was too late. Found only a scarf on the well’s edge and a note. She wrote she couldn’t live with such shame.” The woman wiped her eyes with her apron. “They searched for her. Even called divers. But that well is strange. They say the bottom is rocky, with caves underneath. A strong underground current probably carried her away.”
“And when did the sounds start?” “Right away. That same night. At first, they thought it was the wind. Then realized it wasn’t. Sarah didn’t rest. She calls someone. Waits.”
James asked for Sarah’s parents’ address, but they had died long ago, unable to bear the grief. Their house was sold; new owners didn’t stay long. “Sarah scared them,” the saleswoman explained. “Came to them at night. Said she wanted home. They moved out in a month.”
Next, James visited the local paramedic, an elderly man who remembered those events. “Yeah, I remember Sarah,” he said, pouring tea. “Good girl. Such a pity. But strangely, the body was never found. Usually, water doesn’t hold the dead here. They float up in a couple of days.”
“What’s special about that well?” The paramedic’s face darkened. “The well is ancient. My grandfather said they didn’t dig it for water. They dug for something else. In hard times, people resorted to anything. Even what they shouldn’t.”
“Meaning?” “Sacrifices. To old gods. Thought it would bring rain, a good harvest. They say they threw young girls in there. Alive.”
James felt his hair stand on end. “Did it help?” “Only made it worse. The place became cursed. Death settled there. Not ordinary death, but hungry.”
The paramedic sipped his tea. “After the war, they tried to fill the well. But the earth caved in, stones sank, like a bottomless pit. They decided to forget it. But it didn’t forget itself. And after Sarah, anyone else?”
“No. Sarah was the last. But she turned out the strongest. Others left, but she stayed. Clung to our world. And now pulls others to her.”
By evening, James returned home heavy-hearted. The picture was grim. But the worst awaited at home. Emma met him at the door, looking strange—too pale, with an absent gaze. “Dad, where were you?” she asked, her voice lacking its usual liveliness.
“In town, sunshine. Handling business. How do you feel?” “Good. Just slept a lot. And had strange dreams.”
“What dreams?” Emma went to the window and looked toward the well. “Aunt Sarah came again. Said you met her. And now we’ll be friends.”
James’s heart skipped a beat. So, contact wasn’t only with him. “What else did she say?” “Told me about her place. Says it’s beautiful there. Underwater, there’s a little house, and fish swim. It’s not hard to breathe underwater if you get used to it.”
Emma turned to her father, and James saw her eyes were different. Not in color, but something foreign, hungry appeared in them. “Dad, can I go look at the well? Aunt Sarah said she’ll show me something interesting.”
“No!” James said sharply. “You can’t go to the well. It’s dangerous.” For the first time, his daughter looked at him with displeasure. “Why not? Aunt Sarah is kind. She doesn’t want to harm me.”
“Emma, listen carefully. Sarah—Aunt Sarah—isn’t who she claims. She might hurt you.” “Not true!” Emma flared. “You don’t know her. She’s lonely and sad and needs a friend.”
This was their first real quarrel. Emma ran to her room and locked herself in. James stood in the hallway, realizing the situation was spiraling out of control. That evening, he talked to Mrs. Clara, who had returned. The old woman listened and paled.
“The worst is she’s latched onto the girl,” said Mrs. Clara. “Sarah always loved children. Dreamed of her own. And now? She thinks she can take someone else’s child.”
“What do I do?” “Call a priest. But he won’t come soon. And time doesn’t wait. Sarah gets stronger every day. She feeds on the girl’s life force.”
“Then we must do something ourselves.” Mrs. Clara was silent, then took an old book in tattered binding from the cabinet. “There’s one way. But it’s dangerous. You need to descend to her again. Not just talk, but make her release the girl.”
“How?” “Give her what she wants. Not the child, but peace. You need to learn what holds her—what pain won’t let her go.”
James took the book—a collection of local legends and beliefs, handwritten, with yellowed pages. “Read,” said Mrs. Clara. “It’s written about ones like Sarah. Maybe you’ll understand how to handle her.”
But when James returned home, Emma wasn’t in her room. The bed was made, clothes in place, but the girl was gone. Then he heard her voice from the yard: “Dad! Dad, come here! Aunt Sarah wants to talk to you!”
Emma’s voice sounded strange—distant, echoing, as if shouted from underwater. James ran out and stopped dead. Emma stood by the well—not on the ground, but in the air, a few centimeters high, as if held by an invisible force. Her eyes glowed with the same bluish light coming from the well.
“Emma!” he shouted, rushing to her. But she raised her hand, and James hit an invisible wall. The air became dense, impenetrable. “Don’t come closer, Dad,” Emma said, with foreign intonations in her voice. “Aunt Sarah said to keep your distance for now.”
“Emma, this isn’t you talking! Where’s the real Emma?” “I’m here, Dad. Just… I understand better now. Aunt Sarah showed me the truth.”
Bluish mist rose from the well, swirling and thickening into a human shape. Before James stood Sarah, no longer the fragile girl from the well. She was majestic and terrifying. Her dress billowed though there was no wind. Her hair streamed around her head, as if underwater. Her eyes were like two wells, bottomless and cold.
“James,” she said, her voice echoing across the yard. “We meet again.” “Release my daughter,” he said, trying to speak firmly.
Sarah laughed, a sound like shattering glass. “Your daughter! Did you care for her when your wife left you? Didn’t you bring her here, to my place, knowing it’s dangerous?”
“I didn’t know.” “Didn’t know? Were the townsfolk silent? Or did they warn you, and you didn’t listen?”
James realized she was right. Mrs. Clara had said from the start the place was restless. But he hadn’t paid attention. “You brought her to me,” Sarah continued. “You gave her into my hands. So fate decided.”
“No. I’ll take her back. Try.” James tried to approach Emma, but the invisible wall was insurmountable. With each attempt, it grew denser, and the air thickened, making breathing hard.
“See?” Sarah said. “You’re powerless. And the girl? She’s already half mine. Look at her closer.”
James peered at Emma’s face and was horrified. She was becoming transparent. Bluish veins showed through her skin, and her eyes flickered with the same cold lights as Sarah’s. “What are you doing to her?”
“The same that was done to me. Turning her into what I became. She’ll live underwater in my house. She’ll like it there.”
“She’ll die!” “No. She’ll become like me. Not alive, but not dead… eternal. Isn’t that better than a short human life full of pain and disappointments?”