I promised you all a murder mystery, and I always deliver what I promise. The only reason it's taken so long is because I was writing it out at school, but now that school's over, I can type it up and post it! So here you go, and you'd better only read this if you've read my Continuation trilogy, otherwise, you won't know who 6 of the characters are. Oh, and this takes place as if the last chapter of The Continuation never happened.

The Mystery

Isabel

I look up at the giant mansion. "How in the world did we all manage to get this place as a Christmas vacation spot?" I ask nobody in particular.

Ethan answers me from behind Rochelle. "It's not real," he says, "It's just an illusion. An extremely powerful illusion, if I do say so myself." He looks up at the house with pride on his face. "Remember how I used to have to work to keep my illusions up?"

I nod. "Well not anymore! Now I can keep this up while enjoying a nice vacation with my family and friends."

We walk inside, all 13 of us, and I instantly have a bad feeling. "Whoa," I whisper. "Where did that come from?"

"Don't worry about it," Arkarian says. "It's probably just because you know this house is an illusion."

I nod my head. "Probably…"

We go find rooms to sleep in. Arkarian, Kyle, Kevin, Ophelia and I get a room downstairs, and Matt, Neriah, and Ambrosine get the other downstairs room. Ethan, Rochelle, and Blaze get an upstairs room, while Dillon and Crystal get the last bedroom.

Since it's 9:00 pm, and we're all tired from the long walk up here (it took about two hours), we decide to go to sleep.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

I wake up an hour later, and it takes me a moment to figure out why. I look around the room. Everyone's asleep. Arkarian is still beside me, Ophelia is in her bed, and Kyle and Kevin are in their cribs. So then what's…

I hear a high-pitched scream from upstairs, and immediately know that it's either Rochelle or Crystal. I bolt out of the room, closely followed by Arkarian. Ophelia stays behind with her brothers.

At the stairs, we meet up with Matt, Neriah, and Ambrosine. The five of us run up wordlessly. When we get to the top, Arkarian and I check Rochelle's room while the other three check Crystal's room.

I get in the room first, and scream. Rochelle lies on the floor, a dagger sticking out of her chest. Ethan and Blaze are kneeling beside her, and as Arkarian comes up behind me, he urges me towards the center of the room. Even as I make my way forwards, I know it's hopeless; I can already sense the poison inside of my friend. But still I move, not stopping until I reach the space that Ethan and Blaze have made for me beside Rochelle. Matt, Neriah, Ambrosine, Dillon, and Crystal come in the room, looking shocked. Just for Ethan and Blaze, I make it look like I'm trying to heal her, when I really can't.

I feel the tears slide down my cheeks, and it's obvious that the others can see them. Blaze stares off into space and lets himself fall onto the floor, hugging his knees to his chest. Ambrosine walks over to him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, although she's crying too. Crystal buries her head into Dillon's chest, and Neriah buries hers into Matt's. I stand up to embrace Ethan, because I know he needs it.

"It's okay to cry, you know," I whisper to him. "Rochelle would want you to release your emotions like she never could."

Ethan nods, and big thick tears fall onto my shoulder. But I don't mind. I'm just glad I can be there for my friend.

I would offer for Ethan and Blaze to sleep in our room, but we've already got five people, and it's sort of crowded. So Crystal offers for them to stay with her and Dillon. Blaze seems scared at the thought for some reason, but Ethan agrees. I can't help but think that by saying what he did, he's just sealed the fate of both himself and his son.

XXXXXXXXXXX

Ethan

As Blaze and I walk to Dillon and Crystal's room, the other five go downstairs back to their rooms. Dillon and Crystal sleep on one bed, allowing Blaze to sleep next to me on the other one. And so we all sleep until about 4:30 in the morning, when I wake up to see someone standing over me with a knife. I look beside me to see that Blaze is already dead.

The figure's face is burned slightly, and I feel a sense of pride at the fact that my son tried to burn his attacker before he got killed.

The figure speaks. "Ethan," it says, "your time has come."

Wait a minute…I know that voice! Using my skill of animation, I force the knife out of the figure's hand, flinging it across the room. I jump up and run to the door, but the killer grabs the knife again and stabs me before I can leave. Some vacation, huh?

XXXXXXXXXXX

Isabel

Morning comes, but I don't want to wake up. Cold as it is outside and around the house (Ethan forgot to put a heating system in), I'm nice and warm in bed beside Arkarian. I groan as the light comes through the window. I definitely have no chance of going back to sleep now. Stupid gift of sight. Although it did come in handy when we saved Arkarian from the Underworld…

Crystal screams from upstairs. "Not again," I groan. This is getting really repetitive.

"Ophelia!" I command. "Stay here with your brothers!"

"Why can't I see all the blood and guts?" she whines.

"Because I need someone to stay with Kyle and Kevin," I reply, grabbing Arkarian's hand and running out the door. We meet up with Matt, Ambrosine, and Neriah again, and the five of us run upstairs into the room that houses Dillon, Crystal, Ethan, and Blaze.

When we get there, we see Dillon standing over someone in the doorway, and Crystal crying over someone on the bed.

"Oh no," I whisper, dread filling my heart. Dillon looks up, and I'm startled to see tears falling from his green eyes. Of course; he and Ethan were best friends.

"How did…" Matt starts, but trails off. Dillon seems to get the message.

"I don't know. It looks like he was stabbed."

Ambrosine pushes past all of us to run to the bed where Blaze lies. "Blaze?" she whispers softly, nudging him. "Blaze, come on! Get up!"

Crystal puts a comforting hand on her shoulder. "He's not coming back," she says.

Ambrosine looks up at her with tears in her eyes. "Yes he is," she says fiercely. "He has to, because I love him."

Neriah opens her arms, and her daughter runs into them. Ambrosine's body is shaking with the force of her sobs, and there are silent tears flowing from Neriah's face. Matt puts his arms around her from behind, and Arkarian embraces me. Somehow, Ethan's death hurts more than those of his wife and son. Even Arkarian has tears down his cheeks. I mean, he was Ethan's Trainer since the boy was four!

Crystal is wrapped in Dillon's arms, crying hard. "I feel responsible," she says through her tears.

This startles me. "Why?" I ask. "It's not like you killed either of them."

She shakes her head. "No, but I feel like I should have stopped whoever did."

"It's not your fault," Dillon assures her. "At least, no more than it is mine. Either one of us could have stopped the killer."

"There's just one thing I'd like to know," I say, and everyone turns to me. "If Ethan's dead, then how is this house sill standing?"

Matt shrugs. "I guess he finally perfected his skill, so this house is as real as the people inside it."

Ophelia comes up with Kyle and Kevin in her arms. "Mom," she says, "the twins are hungry."

I nod, unable to speak, and take the twins out of her arms. "What about you?" I ask her.

She just shrugs. "I should be, but I'm not right now." I nod again.

After I feed Kyle and Kevin, I look in the kitchen to see if Ethan put any food in there. He did.

So I pull out a few boxes of Macaroni and Cheese from the cupboard as well as a pot, and start cooking. Once it's done, I call everybody over. In light of recent events, I decide to count everyone. "Neriah…Matt…Ambrosine…Dillon…Arkarian…me…Kyle…Kevin...hang on. Where are Ophelia and Crystal?"

At that moment, the toilet flushes in the bathroom and Crystal comes out. She sees us all sitting here, staring at her in disbelief. "What?" she asks. Ophelia screams from downstairs.

"SHIT!" I exclaim, running down. I'm vaguely aware of everyone else following me, but nothing matters anymore except getting to my daughter. I finally get to the room where she is, just in time to see her being cornered by a shadowy…thing. She screams again, and the shadow advances.

"NO!" I scream. The shadow turns to look at me. Its face looks familiar, somehow, but I can't place exactly where I know it from…while the shadow's attention is on me, Ophelia tries to escape. Key word: tries. The shadow turns at the last second and kills her before dissolving into nothing.

I run to my daughter, crying as I do. Arkarian comes up slowly behind me. I hold Ophelia's lifeless body in my arms, hardly daring to believe it. I feel Arkarian's hand on my shoulder, trying to comfort me, but it's not working. My life will never be the same again. I mean, sure, I still have Kyle and Kevin, but Ophelia's gone forever, and she was my first child.

XXXXXXXXXXX

We bury Rochelle, Ethan, Blaze, and Ophelia all at the same time. Matt and Neriah conjure tombstones. "Well," Dillon says, "this is some vacation, isn't it?"

I look up at him. "Not funny, Dillon." Ambrosine is still extremely upset about Blaze's death; Arkarian, Matt, and Dillon are the ones most upset over Ethan; Neriah and I are upset over Rochelle; and Arkarian, Kyle, Kevin, Ambrosine and I are upset over Ophelia.

"It's not supposed to be," he says. "I'm just stating the truth! I mean, this is supposed to be a Christmas vacation, and now it's turned into a…a…murder mystery!"

"Not much of a mystery," Ambrosine says, speaking for the first time since Blaze's death. "We all saw the shadow kill Ophelia."

"Yes, but we still have to figure out who conjured it," Matt points out. "It can't have come out of nowhere."

"I saw its face," I say. Everyone turns to me. "The eyes were washed out, so I didn't see their colour, but I do know that it had a burn on its cheek."

"That would probably be from when it killed B…" Ambrosine can't even bring herself to say Blaze's name.

"Yeah," I agree.

I can see Dillon getting angry. "Why are you guys all so down?" he asks. "I mean, sure, we've had four deaths, but that shouldn't stop us from having a good vacation!"

We all glare at him. "So even though your best friend, his wife and son, and my daughter are dead, you still think that we can enjoy ourselves?" I demand.

"YES!" he yells. "That's why we came here in the first place, to enjoy ourselves! And I'm going to do just that, even if it's the last thing I do!"

"Don't say that," Ambrosine whispers. "Haven't you seen that whenever someone says that in a horror movie or book, they're the next to go?"

Neriah embraces her daughter. "But this isn't one of those, sweetie. It'll be fine."

"Oh yeah," Dillon says. "For the three of you it will be! You're all Immortal! I'll bet that you guys will be the only ones alive when we're all dead!"

"Not necessarily," Matt points out. "If it's somebody Immortal killing everyone, then the three of us are as much of a target as you guys!"

"Whatever," Dillon mutters, turning around and leaving.

"Crystal," I say, "think you could trail him to make sure he's okay? I have the feeling that he's going to die next."

Crystal nods and runs after Dillon, her blood red hair trailing after her. As soon as she leaves, I sigh.

"What's wrong?" Matt asks me.

"I'm not sure," I reply. "I just…" but I don't get to finish what I was going to say, because there's a sudden flash of pain which I know is the start of a vision. I'm vaguely aware of falling over as the vision takes hold of my mind.

The same shadow as before is back, and it's cornered Matt. Matt seems genuinely scared, and I see the dead bodies of Neriah and Ambrosine on either side of him. From where I'm standing, I can tell that they're actually dead. The creature turns and looks at me, but before I can get a good glimpse of it, the vision fades.

I sit up to find Arkarian and Matt both standing overtop me.

"What did you see?" Arkarian asks.

"The shadow was…" my voice trails off.

"Show us," Matt urges, and I oblige. My brother's eyes go wide as I replay the part with Neriah and Ambrosine.

I look around. "Where did everybody go?" I ask. "I know that Dillon went inside, and Crystal went after him, but what about the other four?"

As I finish showing them my vision, Matt runs inside. To my relief, he brings Neriah and Ambrosine back out with him.

I breathe a sigh of relief, then quickly draw my breath back in. "Where are the twins?"

Arkarian looks at me with fear in his eyes, and we both race inside. I can feel my heart pounding against my ribcage as I run. My sixth sense leads me straight to our bedroom, where I look in Kyle and Kevin's crib to see them both dead.

The shock of this, plus the fact that all three of my kids are dead now, makes me fall to the ground in a dead faint.

XXXXXXX

Arkarian

I catch Isabel before she hits the floor. Gently, I place her on the bed as I feel the tears fall down my cheeks. Matt, Neriah, Ambrosine, and Crystal come running in.

"Is she dead?" Matt asks nervously. I shake my head.

"No, she just fainted from shock."

"The shock of what?" Neriah asks.

"Well, all three of our kids are dead now," I reply.

"WHAT?!" All four of them exclaim at the same time, rushing over to the twins' crib. Isabel moves on the bed and I turn just in time to see her run out the door and upstairs. I run after her, and Matt, Neriah, and Ambrosine run with me. Crystal sort of walks slowly, her skin pale. I stop.

"Come on, Crystal!" I urge. My sister takes two steps forward before collapsing.

Neriah and Ambrosine come over to me. "What's wrong with her?" Ambrosine asks.

I pick Crystal up. "I think that she's just over-exerted herself."

"How can you tell?" Neriah inquires.

"Because 7 years ago – has it really been that long? – Ethan and Matt went on a mission together, and a bomb blew up, so Isabel had to do some major healing. Afterwards, she looked sort of like this."

"Hold on…what has Crystal been using her powers for?" Ambrosine wonders out loud.

Before we can talk about it any more, Isabel and Matt come down carrying Dillon's limp body between the two of them. Unfortunately, Crystal chooses this moment to wake up. The second she sees her boyfriend's dead body, she faints again.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Isabel

As we bury Dillon and the twins, I lean over to Arkarian. "There's only six of us now," I whisper, tears falling down my face.

"On the bright side," he says, "it'll be easier to figure out who's behind all this."

"The thing is, I'm not too sure I want to know."

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Late at night, I wake up to go to the bathroom. But instead of going into there, my feet carry me into my brother's room. There, I see the scene exactly like in my vision, except that it's not a shadow standing there…it's an actual person, and it looks like a female. She's wearing a cloak with a hood, hiding her hair and clothes, and she's facing away from me, so I can't see her face, although I'm pretty sure that I know who it is. I scream out in my thoughts for Arkarian to come, and right behind him is…Crystal? But I thought…never mind.

The female figure in front of us turns to see us, and I notice that she has blue eyes. She turns back to Matt. "I'd better do this quick," she mutters to herself before raising an arm and sending a streak of power towards Matt.

I watch in horror as my brother falls dead beside his wife and daughter. The figure turns to Arkarian, Crystal, and me but Crystal disappears and the figure sways a little before fainting.

I look at Arkarian, and he simply shrugs. Together, we pick up the figure and place her, sitting, on a chair. I grab a bunch of rope and tie her to it.

After about an hour, the girl wakes up and panics when she sees Arkarian and me. She closes her eyes before I see them, and when she opens them again, they're blue. I see that the hair beneath her hood has turned black, although I don't know what colour it was before.

"What's the big idea?" I demand. "Why have you been killing everybody?"

I expect her to say something along the lines of 'Because I hate you all', or reveal to us that she's in the Order, but never would I expect her to say what she actually does. "The house made me."

"What?!" I exclaim.

"How can a house make you kill everyone?" Arkarian asks, way more calmly than I ever could.

I send a thought to Arkarian. She's nuts!

"Hey!" the girl exclaims. "I heard that!"

Great. So whoever she is, she's a Truthseer. Making sure to shield my thoughts, I ask her the question that I think should have been asked at the very beginning. "Who are you?"

"You already know me," she says, then sighs. "I guess I should tell you who I am. Maybe then I might have a chance to live." She motions for me to slide her hood back, which I do, revealing dark black hair. But her face still shows that she's concentrating on something. I see her relax, and her black hair turns blood red, her eyes turning violet.

I already knew (somewhat) that it would turn out to be Crystal, so it's not much of a shock to me. Arkarian, however, draws a sharp breath in beside me.

"Crystal, how could you?" he asks. "We're your friends, and I'm your brother. Matt was your cousin."

Tears pour down her cheeks. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to!" she cries. "The spirit of this house possessed me!"

This has me confused. "And yet, you knew exactly what you were doing?"

She nods. "Yes. The spirit let me see what it was forcing my body to do. Blaze tried to fight his way our, and he burned my cheek. Ethan recognized me, and he almost got away. But the spirit knew that sooner or later, people would start realizing who was killing everyone, so it played off of one of my skills: that of making duplicates of myself. The spirit turned one of my duplicates into a shadow form when it killed Ophelia."

I fight to keep the tears away when my daughter's name is mentioned. "The spirit didn't bother with my skills when it killed the twins, so afterwards I ran as fast as I could away from there. I joined up with Matt, Neriah, and Ambrosine as they came in, and made it seem like I was looking for them. But after that, the spirit forced me to make at least 6 copies of myself, turning them all into shadows to look for Dillon. I begged and pleaded with it not to do this anymore, so it forced me to use my other skill instead; that of changing my appearance at will."

"Wait a minute," I say. "How did you kill Matt, Neriah, and Ambrosine?"

"I didn't," Crystal replies, "the spirit did. And I guess that it's immortal." She stops and shudders slightly, closing her eyes. When she opens them again, they're blood red to match her hair. She speaks, but her voice is not her own. "And now, there's only the two of you left."

It's a good thing we tied Crystal's body to the chair, because the spirit tries to come at us. "Are we talking to the spirit of this house?" Arkarian asks, although we both know the answer.

"Yes," it says, "and once I've killed you two, I'll kill this girl who has so graciously lent me her body."

XXXXXXXXXXX

Arkarian

"I have an idea," I whisper to Isabel. Turning to the spirit, I say, "And how do you plan on killing anyone if the body you're borrowing is tied to a chair? Crystal isn't strong enough to break the rope."

Isabel looks at me with a confused look on her face. What are you doing? she asks me. Not for the first time, I wish she were a Truthseer so I could answer her. The truth is, along with teaching me to deal with Immortals, my father taught me how to deal with spirits. I just have to banish it to Dartemis's realm, where it'll be away from us here. If only it'll come out of my sister's body!

XXXXXXXXXXX

Isabel

Arkarian gives me a look that clearly states, 'Just play along', so I decide to do just that.

"Yeah," I say, "how will you kill us?"

"Or maybe you can describe to us exactly how you'll do that," Arkarian suggests.

"Well," the spirit starts, "first I'll kill you," it looks at me, "so that you can't heal the others ones. Then, I'll kill him," it looks at Arkarian, "before getting out and killing this girl." It looks at Arkarian uneasily. "You're not Immortal, are you?" Arkarian shakes his head. "Or you?" it looks at me. I shake my head as well.

"Okay, then why don't I just come out now, so I can kill you all at the same time?" the two of us just shrug. It does so, leaving Crystal to slump forward in her chair.

XXXXXXXXXX

Arkarian

Now's my chance. Gathering as much power as I can without looking like it, I walk towards the spirit with my hands behind my back. I know that if I simply touch it with a finger, it'll go, but I have to make it seem like I'm not planning anything.

Isabel notices the blue energy gathering at the tips of my fingers and distracts the spirit for me. While it's attention is on her, I walk behind it. Before it has any idea what's happening, I touch it.

It screams and, depositing the energy back into my body, I grab Isabel and pull her back. Once the spirit disappears, so does the house. I guess that must have been what was keeping it standing. The chair that Crystal was sitting on disappears too. She wakes up when she falls on her butt.

XXXXXXXXXX

Isabel

So, the mystery is solved and the killer is gone. Crystal keeps on apologizing to Arkarian, and me no matter how many times we forgive her. But a month after everything ends, and our lives return to somewhat normal, everything falls.

Arkarian and I have invited Crystal to live with us, since she, like her brother, can't live in the normal world. I'm coming back from in the shower, when I see Crystal talking to Arkarian. For some reason, I have a bad feeling about this…

After I change, I walk to where they're sitting. The three of us talk for a bit before Crystal screams for no apparent reason. She bows her head, eyes closed. A few seconds later, she lifts her head and opens her eyes to reveal them to be blood red in colour.

"Oh no…" I whisper. Arkarian draws me closer.

Crystal speaks in a rough voice once more. "I'm back."

End

Well? What did you think? Good? Bad? In between? Please tell me! I need feedback! Just so you know, this is only a oneshot, and there is no chance of me making any more chapters in it, so please don't review saying "oh, please write more", because I'll just ignore it.