"This house is a real bargain," Nathan said. "Why is it going so cheap?"
"Oh, you know how it is," said the elderly real estate agent. "Nothing but superstition. The locals in Darkshire think that Manor Mistmantle is cursed, you see. Haunted, even. Would you believe such hogwash? I'm sure such an educated, upstanding gentleman of yourself puts no stock in their foolishness."
Nathan laughed aloud. "Cursed? Well, if it's a curse that'll let me get a lovely old house for my family at a quarter the price I'd expect, I'll happily take my chances. Consider it a deal."
They shook hands. "Pleasure doing business with you, sir. If you'll just come with me, I've got some paperwork for you to fill out..."
Lissa climbed out of the carriage and took a look at the big old house. It was a little run-down and sprawling, and much bigger than she thought it needed to be. The old fence circling the overgrown yard was falling apart. The house was three storeys high, and had neat windows bulging out of it on the upper floors. It looked like it would be fun to play in, so she was sure Mama would tell her not to play near the windows or stairs.
"Why do we need so much room?" Lissa wondered. "Are we all going to get our own floors?"
Mama chuckled at her and took her hand, and leaned down close conspiratorily. "Tell you a secret? You're going to have a little brother or sister soon."
"Really?" Lissa said. "Oh. How soon?"
"About seven months."
"That's a long time."
"But we've got to have the place fixed up and ready. Your Papa wants to have lots more sons and daughters, so we have to have room for them all."
"Oh," Lissa said, cocking her head. "Am I not good enough?"
Mama chuckled again and squeezed her hand. "Of course you are. But Papa's always wanted a big family. Come on, let's check out the inside of our new home." Mama led her off down the walkway up to the front door and stepped inside.
"Can I go look around by myself?" Lissa asked.
"Oh, alright, I suppose it's safe enough," Mama said. "Just be careful. Come back down to the kitchen if anything seems weird. Papa will be back with groceries soon and I'll be fixing us some dinner, so don't be late."
"Yes, Mama," Lissa said, running off to dart up the staircase.
The house was so big and quiet, Lissa thought she might have fun for hours on end just poking around and looking into every nook and cranny to see what treasures she might find. It would be great fun to play hide and seek with other kids here, if there were any others around. But she didn't know anyone in the town yet, so she was perfectly happy just to explore for the moment.
On the third floor, Lissa came across a big library full of old books. At least she thought they looked old, but there wasn't a speck of dust in the room, not a cobweb in sight. She started to think that maybe there was some mysterious old magic book hidden away here, which would let her cast amazing spells she couldn't even imagine. But as she looked carefully around the room, all of the books looked pretty ordinary at first glance, if quite fancy. She'd never actually gotten to touch books bound in real leather with gold or silver decorations on them before.
After exploring the house some more, Lissa went downstairs to the kitchen to eat some dinner, then was promptly sent off to bed. Mama had even let her pick out whichever room she wanted as her own room on the third floor to use as her bedroom, so she'd happily picked the room right next to the library. Maybe she would try to read some of the books tomorrow. Even if they weren't magic books, they still looked very interesting.
Lissa curled up in the big, comfortable bed, and quickly fell asleep. At least, she thought she was asleep. She heard sounds in the night, the creaking of floorboards which hadn't creaked during the day, the distant sounds of doors opening and closing. Then there were voices, loud enough that it sounded as though they were right in the room with her, and she sat up with a start.
"Who's there?" Lissa demanded.
She looked around the room, but it was empty but for herself. She must have just dreamed it. Shrugging uneasily, she tucked herself back in bed again and went back to sleep. Sure enough, she hadn't been out for long before she was again disturbed by voices, although she couldn't make out what they were saying. Lissa sat up again and peered intently about the room.
"I know somebody's there." She crawled out of bed and crossed the room, and carefully lit a lamp on a nearby table, picking it up to carry with her. Maybe there was somebody in the library, she thought.
Quietly, Lissa crept out of her room, bare feet padding against the hardwood floors, and entered the library to look around. But while the lamp cast flickering, eerie shadows from the furniture, there was nobody inside. Lissa frowned. She didn't want to go tell Mama and Papa. She was sure they'd just assure her that it was only a bad dream, and tell her to go back to bed. But she knew she had heard something!
"Was somebody trying to talk to me?" she asked, looking about at nothing.
Then she noticed, in one corner of the room, there was a book she hadn't noticed before, left open on the table. Lissa could have sworn that it wasn't there this afternoon, and went over curiously to take a look. She couldn't say just what it was saying, but she found it so fascinating that she could not stop staring at it and trying to read it. Her skin was crawling, and she shivered in bone-deep cold, and as she realized something was wrong she tried to wrench herself away.
"What is this?" she said, almost knocking over the lamp as she pried herself away. "Magic?"
There was a chuckling sound from somewhere, a deep voice that seemed to come from all around her, and Lissa peered about in startlement.
"Who are you?" she demanded.
"My name is Stalvan Mistmantle," the voice rasped.
"Hello, Stalvan," she said hesitantly. "My name is Lissa. It's... nice to meet you. I think."
There came a soft chuckling sound from nowhere. "Read the book, Lissa," the voice rasped.
"I can't," Lissa lied. "The words are too big."
"Say them aloud."
Skeptically, Lissa frowned and sat down at the table again. Her stomach clenched and her heart raced as she hesitantly looked at the book again. The words swam before her eyes for a moment, then settled into something she could read. Letters she could understand. The letters were clear now, but some of the words didn't make sense. She tried to take Stalvan's advice by sounding them out to try to figure out what they might mean.
"Necromancy," she murmured slowly. "Demonology. Exorcism. Possession."
"You speak very well for your age," the voice of Stalvan said.
"Thank you," Lissa said. "What do the words mean? Possession, I think I know that word, it means owning something, doesn't it?"
"Very good," said the disembodied voice. "In this case, it means owning someone, not something."
"You mean like, slaves?"
"Something like that. Now, if you like, I could teach you how these things work. Yes, I could help you learn great feats of power. You want power, don't you? You were here earlier, hoping to find magic books. You could be the greatest mage that ever lived."
Lissa's heart skipped a beat. "You could?" she said. "You really, really could?" It sounded too good to be true. Was she still dreaming? Was this just some bizarre dream, and she would wake up tomorrow and forget all about it?
"Oh, I most certainly could," Stalvan's voice said. Lissa felt a tingling sensation on her arms and shoulders, and she trembled involuntarily.
"Papa always said you can't get something for nothing," Lissa said. "What's the price? How much money do you want?"
The voice chuckled in amusement. "Money? What use have I for money? Oh no, dear Lissa, all I want is you."
"Me? What do you mean? You want to... possess me?"
"You catch on quite quickly as well. So, do we have a deal?"
Lissa thought about it for a moment, shivering again at the chill. "I don't know that I'd want to be a slave. I can't cook and I don't like to clean."
There came another deep chuckling sound. "I would not ask anything so mundane of you. Believe me, I think we could have a lot of fun together. I'm certain you would enjoy the sorts of games I would play."
"Well... Alright. That sounds like it could be fun."
Lissa jumped a little as the pages in the book fluttered, turning on their own to another page. "Read the book. Read these words. Aloud."
Obediently, Lissa stared at the book intently and carefully pronounced each word on the page. Her skin started crawling again, and instead of feeling like she was freezing, it felt as though she were burning instead. Was this what it felt like to be gaining power? If this were a dream, it was a really neat one. With each further word, she seemed to gain some sort of ineffable, profound realization in her mind, as knowledge spontaneously rooted itself within her. She was grinning broadly and malevolently by the time she finished reading the page. The darkness didn't seem so deep any longer, and the feeble light from the lamp almost brought her pain, so she blew it out. An eerie blue glow lit her eyes for a moment, piercing the darkness as the child stood and crept out of the library.