There stood a cottage on a cliff above the sea. It was for all intents and purposes a perfectly ordinary house and yet there were whispers about the home in the village below. Very few had ventured into the little cottage or had even seen the owner of the home - there was some disagreement as to who owned the home, a man or woman all of varying descriptions, having been suggested - but those that had, described a sprawling interior that couldn't possibly fit within the humble structure. There were winding corridors and twisted carpeted staircases that went on forever and more rooms than feasible. Luxurious rooms that didn't fit with the dreary village setting that would have been more fitting of an art museum in Rome with windows that looked out at far-off places.

Anyone who had entered the home seemed to almost disappear for stretches of time and when they returned, they were eerie and otherworldly. Some speculated that the house belonged to the fair folk, for that was the only explanation for a home that didn't comply with worldly rules. Time was said to be suspended on that little cliff overlooking the crashing waves of the Atlantic. People aged there in ways that shouldn't have been possible. Some aged too quickly for their short stint while others remained untainted by the passage of time that they had been lost for.

It was said that the home retained memories of all those that had graced its corridors. Rooms were still made up as if waiting for the occupant to return, surfaces bare of all dust as if they'd only left moments ago for a cup of tea. There were photos lining the walls filled with unfamiliar faces. People who had long since passed from the village that only great grandparents may have the luxury of recalling them. Them and the little cottage and whomever lived there.

The owner of the home was even more elusive than the little home itself. All sorts of stories spread through the village about the quaint cottage, but details of its owner were harder to come by. As if the memories of the individual was the price to pay for walking the corridors of the home. It was said they would appear to crying children and those with wanderlust in their hearts, stifled by the confines of the village. Sometimes a haunting melody could be heard carried on the wind that seemed to call to those who were lost. Those without purpose and those who craved more would all find themselves striding across the cliff towards the cottage with no memory of having made the journey. As if something stronger than themself had brought them there.

It was said the labyrinthian home housed a creature that embodied the elements of nature itself rather than a minotaur. Fire and ice. The destructive rage of a storm and the patient calm of a lake. A force that was as neutral as the weather. Just as nature could not be characterised as evil; for the rains that bore fields of wildflowers also brought devastating floods, such could be said for the being that resided within the walls of the cottage. There was no malice in the destruction of a wildfire that allowed for new growth in a forest and there was no hatred in the violence the being wrought, only judgement.

Some left the home with gifts that would make the figures of mythos weep with jealousy while others left with scars that went beyond skin deep, the price for tangling with creatures beyond human understanding. The cottage sat with the cliff and the sea on one side and the forest and its brook on the other. The forests beyond the home were said to be filled with creatures guarding the little stone structure; wolves and centurions, ravens and stone statues of angels, supposedly all had previously been villagers who had entered the home. The cottage contained a whole other world within its walls, and some would rather become permanent fixtures of that world rather than leave.

There were warnings spoken in murmurs throughout the village to not step onto the property lest you wished to return home changed. The consequences were unknown and variable. There were faces between the lily pads and shadowy figures amongst the trees that looked as though too many people had been squeezed into one body. There were deers with human eyes and statues that watched with stone eyes at all those that passed by. Be careful what you wish for, they'd urge, because you don't know if they might be listening to your pleas.

On the property grew a variety of bizarre plants. Blossoms sweetened the air with foreign flowers. Fruits of alarming shades hung from the trees in a permanent stage of ripeness. While rot and mold lingered in the darker spots of the forest where the shadows congregated, and the fog crawled along the mossy carpet of the forest floor. It was a perfect dichotomy but bizarre in its execution like a stage crafted for a play and all those that stumbled upon it became actors in the story willingly or otherwise.

You couldn't summon the owner. No amount of knocking or shrieking would bring them to the door. Some argued that nobody lived there at all for no one was seen coming or going. No trips were made into town for the necessities or little luxuries in life. But an ethereal glow always permitted the curtained windows of the abode, though no shadows were ever cast.

Those who had been granted entry - lured, the elderly would correct - would vehemently defend the owner though their claims were easily dismissed as none could agree on the likeness of the owner. Their memories were as vague as they were changed. Gone mad, the old women would grumble, lost their minds while stumbling around in the forest for months. No one would listen to those that had visited the cottage, no matter how much they wanted answers. They weren't to be trusted; they were too peculiar. There was a fire in their eyes and steel in their spines that hadn't been there before they left. The uncanny ones, the villagers would mutter among themselves, they are agents of the cottage. Don't let them hear you either, for they are the eyes and ears of the owner, they will sequester you away to be changed too.

The discussions amongst the villagers were almost as contradictory as the cottage itself. The cottage was unoccupied, there was no owner. But don't say aloud that you wish to walk amongst the stars lest the owner hear you. And there was nothing eerie living in forests beyond the home. But those that had gone missing had most certainly been driven mad by what they found in the forest. The cottage was just a house. But don't trust those that had stepped inside.

What was true and what was fable was impossible to discern. The cottage predated the village and as such the stories were as much a staple for the people as the unease the place wrought. But they'd never known anything else. The cottage was there before them and would be there long after their bones had become dust, it was best to make their peace with it. Put warnings in place for the curious and the naive regardless of whether there was any danger or not, it was best to be safe. Do their best not to disturb the cottage with its forest atop the cliff that watched over their village in silent vigil. Ignore the haunting melodies and faces of lost souls in the dark, just in case you were next. It didn't matter what was true and what was fable as long as they didn't tempt the fates with their ignorance.

And it was best to not spare much energy for the Uncanny Ones. Don't look too closely at the way they'd become desensitised to blood and violence. Don't think about their vacant stares and shaken countenance like soldiers returned from war. Don't listen to their terrible screams that rang through the night as they spoke of horrors that they couldn't recall encountering. Lest they consider you hostile and make you the focus of that fire and steel.

It was very easy to get lost in the labyrinth interior of the cottage that seemed to have grown with every coming spring, stretching and twisting further beyond every human imagination. But it was even easier to lose your sense of self in there and become forever changed. In fact, the owner and the home even encouraged it.


A/N: Sometimes people will put pretty pictures on your dash that inspire you to write the tardis as a labyrinthian cottage, the doctor as some sort of eldritch being and the companions as feral changeling-esque figures. The moodboard for this story is made up of pictures that inspired it that were shared by englishbunnyrocks (who shared the original picture that inspired whatever this is), gingerteaonthetardis and thyaegis on tumblr