Dinner had been a strained affair, a performance of polite conversation over expensive, mostly untouched food. Alistair's charm felt like a thin veneer, his grief like a costume he wore impeccably. Every time his gaze rested on her, Julia felt that same unsettling mixture of cool appraisal and something that felt alarmingly like interest. It was wrong. Utterly, completely wrong. Marian was gone. Yet his eyes held a possessive gleam that made Julia want to shrink away.
He said little more about Marian, only confirming that she had died quickly, unexpectedly, of a fever. His descriptions were clinical, detached. Nothing of the vibrant woman Julia remembered.
After dinner, Alistair bid her a formal goodnight, expressing hope that she would find the house less intimidating in the morning light. Finch appeared again, as silent and unnerving as ever, and escorted Julia through the labyrinthine corridors to the room prepared for her.
It was a large room, grand but touched by the same creeping decay that seemed to permeate the entire house. Heavy velvet curtains, faded and dusty, hung at the tall windows, muffling the sound of the still-falling rain. The bed was vast, draped in dark, heavy fabrics. A fire had been lit in a small hearth, casting a faint, struggling light that barely pushed back the shadows in the corners.
Finch placed her small traveling case on a stand near the bed. He lit a few more candles around the room, the light doing little to cheer the oppressive atmosphere.
"Your requirements, madam?" he asked, his voice as devoid of warmth as ever.
"No, thank you, Finch," Julia said quickly. "This will be fine."
He gave that single, curt nod and withdrew, his footsteps making no sound on the carpet runner in the hall outside. Julia waited until she heard the faint click of a distant door closing, then she turned back to the room.
It smelled of old potpourri and damp stone. The candlelight flickered restlessly, even though there was no discernible breeze in the room. Julia noticed it right away. The flames danced and wavered as if disturbed by an unseen presence.
She walked around the room slowly. The furniture was heavy, dark wood, polished but scratched. She ran a hand over the back of a velvet armchair; the fabric was surprisingly soft, yet somehow felt cold. There was a vanity table with a cracked mirror.
On a small table next to the bed lay a few books. Old, leather-bound volumes. Julia picked one up. The spine was cracked, the pages yellowed. She recognized the title immediately. It was a book of poetry Marian had loved, one she had often read aloud.
A small ache formed in Julia's chest. A tangible link to the cousin she had lost. She opened the book carefully, the brittle pages whispering under her touch. She turned a few pages, her eyes scanning the familiar lines.
Then she stopped. A page was missing. Torn cleanly from the binding. Not just one page, but several, ripped right out of the middle of the book. The ragged edges remained.
Why would someone tear pages from Marian's favorite book? What was on those pages? More mystery. More unease layering itself onto the night. Julia carefully closed the book, setting it back down as if it might bite her.
Her gaze fell to the floor near the windows. Dark stains marked the floorboards. Water stains, she realized, looking up at the ceiling. Had there been a leak? The stains looked old, dried, but extensive. They ran along the edge of the wall and pooled in irregular shapes. It looked less like a simple leak and more like… something had been spilled. A lot of something.
She moved to the vanity table. It had several small drawers. She opened the first few. Empty. The bottom drawer, however, wouldn't budge. She tried to pull it open, then harder. It was locked. Solidly.
What was in there? More secrets? More things hidden away?
The room, despite its size and grand furniture, began to feel less like a safe haven and more like a cage. The flickering candles, the torn book, the water stains, the locked drawer – they all added up to a feeling of neglect, decay, and hidden things. And the constant sense of being watched, of not being alone.
Julia tried to unpack a few things, just the essentials, but her hands felt clumsy, her mind restless. The memory of Alistair's touch, that cold, lingering brush against her skin, kept replaying in her mind. The way his eyes had seemed to devour her reaction. It made her skin crawl again. He was charming, yes, captivating even, but there was a predatory quality beneath the surface that chilled her. And his talk of Marian's 'stillness'… it didn't make sense. None of it made sense.
She couldn't stay in the room. The air felt too thick. The silence too loud. She needed to move, to walk, to push back against the creeping dread.
She took a candle from the vanity table, shielding the flame with her hand, and quietly opened her door.
The hallway was dark and cold, the gas lamps extinguished for the night. Only the faint, weak light from Julia's single candle pushed back the oppressive blackness. The house was silent. Utterly, profoundly silent. It felt like holding her breath.
She walked slowly down the corridor, her candle casting dancing shadows that distorted the walls, making familiar shapes seem alien, menacing. The floorboards creaked occasionally under her weight, the sounds echoing in the vast space.
She passed the door to the drawing room, the one with Marian's portrait. She didn't dare look inside. She kept walking, her heart beating a little faster.
As she moved deeper into the silent house, she heard it.
Faintly at first. So faint she almost dismissed it as the wind, or the house settling, or her own imagination. But it came again, a fragile, tinkling sound.
Music.
A music box.
The melody was simple, sweet, but played with a slow, hesitant rhythm. It was a tune Julia knew well. Marian's favorite music box. A silver one, shaped like a tiny carousel. Marian had kept it on her bedside table since they were girls. She used to wind it up when she couldn't sleep.
The sound seemed to be coming from behind a closed door further down the hall. A door Julia didn't recognize.
She stopped, holding her breath, listening. The music continued, faint but clear now. It was definitely the music box. But who would be playing it? Alistair? Finch? Agnes? None of them seemed the type. And at this hour?
A wave of cold washed over her. It wasn't just the unheated hallway. It was a cold that seemed to seep from the very stone of the house.
Slowly, drawn by a mix of fear and morbid curiosity, Julia approached the door. The music box melody grew slightly louder as she got closer. It sounded wistful, melancholic.
She reached the door. It looked like all the others in the hall – dark wood, an ornate handle. She reached out a trembling hand, ignoring every warning instinct screaming in her head.
She tried the handle.
It didn't turn. It didn't even rattle.
The door was locked.
And from behind the locked door, the music box played on.
Julia snatched her hand back as if the handle had burned her. Her breath hitched in her throat. The locked door. The familiar, yet out of place, melody. It felt like the house itself was showing her something, teasing her.
She backed away slowly, the candlelight trembling in her hand. The music box continued its lonely tune. It felt like Marian. A piece of Marian trapped behind a locked door.
Panic began to set in. She needed to get back to her room. To lock the door. To be behind something solid.
She turned and hurried back down the hall, her footsteps louder now in her haste. She didn't look back. She didn't want to see if the sound was following her.
She reached the door to her room, fumbling with the handle. She pushed it open and stepped inside, her heart hammering.
As she turned to close the door, she saw him.
Finch.
He was standing in the hallway, a few feet away from her door. Just standing there in the darkness. Silent. Watching her. His gaunt face was unreadable in the faint spill of candlelight from her room. He hadn't made a sound. He was simply *there*.
Julia froze, the door half-open in her hand.
Finch's deep-set eyes were fixed on her. He didn't move. Didn't speak for a long moment. The silence stretched, heavy with unspoken things.
Then he spoke. His voice was a low murmur in the quiet hall.
"The house is not used to guests," he said. His gaze flickered briefly towards the dark corridor where the music box played, though it was too far for her to hear it from here. "It forgets itself."
It forgets itself. What did that mean? Was he saying the house was… alive? That it was responsible for the strange occurrences?
He said nothing more. He simply stood there, watching her with those unnervingly still eyes.
Julia pulled the door shut quickly, her hands shaking. The heavy wood felt like a fragile shield. She fumbled with the lock, turning the cold metal until it clicked into place. The sound felt blessedly final.
She leaned against the door for a moment, catching her breath. The house. It forgets itself. Finch's words echoed in her mind, cryptic and chilling. And the music box. Behind a locked door.
She turned back into the room. The candles flickered, their light too weak, too uncertain. She took a deep, shuddering breath, trying to calm her racing heart.
Her eyes scanned the room. The torn book on the table. The water stains on the floor. The locked drawer.
And then she saw it.
On the surface of the vanity table, right next to the cracked mirror, sat a small, delicate object.
A necklace.
It was silver, intricate, with a small, polished stone pendant. It was Marian's. Her favorite necklace. The one she always wore.
Julia stared at it, her blood running cold.
It hadn't been there moments ago. When she had left the room to walk the hallway, the vanity had been empty except for the candles. She was certain of it.
But there it was now. Sitting on the dusty wood. Gleaming faintly in the candlelight.
Marian's necklace.
It wasn't just the house forgetting itself. It wasn't just drafts or old pipes or an overactive imagination.
Marian was here.
Her presence hadn't left. It was in the portrait, the whispers, the music box, the fear in Callum's eyes, the warnings from Agnes.
And now.
Now it was in the room with her.
Julia couldn't breathe. She backed away from the vanity, her gaze fixed on the silver chain, the silent, undeniable proof that she was not alone. The candles flickered wildly now, casting grotesque shadows that danced like mocking figures on the walls.