The Foyer was…impressive. Even with the lights turned off and the elusive stench of decay that permeated every room, it was absolutely incredible.

Her boot heels made only the softest of clicks on the gray-tiled floor, and the only other sounds besides the breathing of the girl and the cat were those of a clock, somewhere in the room.

"You know…" Leota mused aloud, briefly startling the girl, "the energy of souls long passed still lingers in the Mansion. Sometimes, I can use it communicate with spirits in the afterlife. Maybe I could try using it to gain information on how to maneuver the rooms in the Mansion. I'm sure we'll need any help we can get to solve the puzzles Thorne has devised."

"It would have been nice to know this earlier," Salem mumbled under his breath, not caring if the women heard or not. I'm the one who comes with Sabrina on any of our adventures! Stop trying to steal my spot!

"That's nice," Sabrina mumbled, not paying strict attention. We've got to get this figured out…ah, there's the set of stairs! This should be fairly straightforward, then.

As she began to climb the staircase, the second floor, swathed in shadows, began to slowly come into view. Is the light switch up there? Suddenly, the floor gave way under Sabrina's feet, and she was falling.

The world was covered in black, her companions were groaning in either pain or shock, and it felt like the wind had been knocked out of her lungs. Sabrina opened her eyes with a groan, and the world came sharply back into focus. "Everyone all right?" she asked, reaching up to rub her head. Salem wriggled against her back.

"I would say that all my body parts seem to be in working order, but I'll get back to you when the pain starts fading," he drawled sarcastically.

"You okay, Leota? Not cracked or anything?"

"Thankfully, no, child. Our finicky feline friend here broke my fall."

"And no small matter, that. You're heavy!" He paused as her words sunk in. "Who're you calling finicky?"

"Guuuys…." Sabrina gritted. She stood up, rubbing her rear, and took a few test steps. Everything seemed to be in working order. The teenage witch sighed again, and made her way to the other staircase, on the opposite side of the room.

Wait a minute…

Sabrina's eyes flitted over the furnishings of the room. Her eyes landed on a wooden mantel clock, placed on a table near the passageway to a door. Picking it up, she stealthily made her way towards the staircase.

She heaved, and then tossed the clock at the middle of the staircase. With a groan, and a woosh, the lower half of the staircase collapsed to the ground, revealing a recess in the wall.

"I knew the staircases were unstable!" she smirked.

"Talk about your fixer-upper," Salem deadpanned.

"What's in the niche, there?" Leota questioned.

Squinting, Sabrina was able to make out a faint flash of something. She bent to get a closer look. Spiders. Green, large, and much like the fanged one she'd discovered outside. There were three of them, too, crawling onto the floor.

Sabrina immediately began jumping up and down on them—presumably, to flatten the little buggers. "Die, die, DIE!"

"Does she have these spasms often?" murmured Leota.

"More so than you'd think," Salem rolled his eyes.

Once she was done squishing the spiders into goo, Sabrina began to explore the rest of the Foyer. One thing was obvious—there was no light switch on the ground. "Which means it must be on the second floor," Salem sighed.

"Just great." Sabrina felt like bashing her head on the nearest object. She closed her eyes and began to count to ten. Must not lose temper…is that a clock?

The slow, steady, even ticking was coming from her right. Upon turning, Sabrina was faced with an antique grandfather clock. As she came nearer, she could obviously tell something was very wrong with it. The clock's face glowed an unearthly shade of green, and both hands pointed to—surprise, surprise—thirteen o'clock.

"Cute," Sabrina grumbled. Peering closely, she realized what really made her worried. The clock was a demon.

Or carved like one, anyway. The top head of the cabinet was carved in such a way that there appeared to be a crest in the middle of the head, with two eyes on either side. The clock face was nestled securely in the gaping, sharp-teethed jaw of the beast, and the crooked, jagged pendulum swinging lazily back and forth was its tongue.

Sabrina shuddered. How awful… "It's horrible," she said out loud and shuddered again. Why would someone even think of making such an evil-looking clock?

Leota chuckled. "You'd better get used to things like these, honey, because they're scattered all over the Mansion."

Sabrina looked at the clock in distaste. And to think I thought this place was impressive…

"What's in that door?" Salem wondered. "Maybe we can get out of this trap and into another room."

Touching the handle brought the familiar purple electricity back, snapping and crackling across the door. Sabrina sucked on injured fingers. "Guess we haven't solved Thorne's little puzzle yet." She looked around the Foyer, craning her neck to see the second floor. "But as far as I can tell, there's no way up. Even if I stood right in front of those broken stairs and jumped up, I'd never make it. Ditto with trying to climb onto the balcony from one of those end tables."

"How amusing," Salem noted dryly. "We've appeared to have stopped our quest before it really started."

All three members of the party were hushed. No way to continue. How horrible that sounded!

Salem paused, narrowing his eyes. "Hey Leota, is there any ectoplasmic juice in the room?"

Leota looked at him, startled and confused. "Plenty. Why?"

"Can't you do your psychic mumbo-jumbo shtick and talk to one of your ghost buddies or something? You said you can get hints that way, right?"

Sabrina straightened up. Leota grinned. "For a housecat, you can get some pretty good ideas every now and then." Salem puffed up, looking much like a black cotton ball, with pride.

Leota closed her eyes, her crystal ball glowing a strange sea-blue.

"When the easy way you cannot climb, a crooked path could save you time."

"What was that?" Salem demanded.

Opening her eyes slowly, Leota tipped her head in a way that must have been her equivalent of a shrug. "Sorry, sugar. You take what you get, and the spirits aren't always willing to elaborate."

"Don't call me sugar," Salem whimpered sulkily, as Sabrina began to ponder the cryptic couplet.

Okay, okay… 'The easy way' obviously means the stairs…so what's this about a 'crooked path'? 'A crooked path' sounds like going into another room and coming back later, or going up in some weird way…But we've already ruled out all these possibilities. What could it mean?

A wave of hopelessness washed over Sabrina as she turned in a circle, gazing at all angles of the Foyer. No enemies. No light switch. No way out.

She could always go back to the Great Hall or the Séance Room, and escape from there…but what kind of rescuer would she be?

The terrified man in the Great Hall...the ghosts who had lost their memories…would they be trapped in their worries and troubles forever if she left? What would happen to this place if Thorne took over? It was something that Sabrina didn't even want to think about.

So she would give it another try.

All right, what was there on the first floor? The door to her right that was sealed. The broken staircases dead center in the room, and the door they guarded that was, as yet, untried. The door in and out of the house was to her back, and the door to the Great Hall to her left. Plenty of paintings on the wall, as well as a grand chandelier above her.

Walking around, Sabrina began to examine everything. Even the smallest thing might hold a clue to getting them to the switch. The paintings were mostly of sea- and landscapes. As she neared the door to the Great Hall, the painting on her immediate left caught her eye. And the painting—hanging crookedly on the wall—was of a trail, leading into a desolate, sparsely wooded area, winding and turning at random.

"Guys?" Sabrina called as she stepped closer.

"Uh—yeah?"

"Hang on." Sabrina touched the frame of the large painting.

It seemed like the world was twisting in upon her, and then like a huge vacuum was pulling at her entire body. Sabrina screamed and took a step backwards, but she felt herself pulled, drawn like a metal tool to a magnet.

When the rushing sensation stopped, and Leota and Salem stopped screaming, Sabrina realized with fresh horror that she was inside the painting. The sky stretched over her, bleak and gray, while the path led into a very sparsely wooded area, beckoning her silently.

Sabrina shivered, trying to remind herself that this was just canvas and oil paint. But the slight wind whistling through the stunted trees and faded grass felt real enough… Biting her lip, Sabrina ran forward, following the dirt trail.

Sabrina's eyes widened as, in the distance, she could see what looked like a dark postage stamp. Maybe that's our way out! Running for it, the dark splotch grew larger and clearer. It was a view of the Foyer!

Sabrina added a second burst of speed, and made a jump as she reached the very threshold of the 'portal.' Reality seemed to flicker back into focus as Sabrina jumped out of a painting of a lonely dirt path leading away from some trees, onto the second floor.

She panted, leaning on the balustrade, trying to both calm herself and catch her breath. A squeaking to her right disclosed another of the poisonous-looking spiders. Sabrina growled and stomped it flat.

Holding her hand to her heart (trying to stop the rushing sensation thrumming throughout her body), Sabrina began walking towards the back wall. A slight chill blew through the air, and she gripped the Beacon even tighter.

The same hideous ghosts from the Great Hall swarmed at her, clawed hands outstretched. Sabrina shook one shoulder upward, trying to dislodge the cat. "Salem! Jump loose and head for the switch!"

The cat leaped in one fluid motion to the floor, unnoticed by the specters. Okay, light switch, light switch…

The focal point of the back wall was a large painting—of what, he couldn't tell, because it was too dark to see—with a faintly glowing white switch next to it. Salem approached it, and then paused.

It doesn't feel right… Turning his head, Salem noticed a second faint glowing, this time on the platform the staircases led to.

"SALEM!" Sabrina yelped, trying to fight off three ghosts at once. She was ducking their swipes, trying to blast them at close range.

Leaping to the switch, Salem suddenly skidded. Another ghost was gliding up the staircase, towards him! Exit, stage left!

"SALEM! WHAT'S WITH THE HOLDUP?" Sabrina shrieked.

Gritting his teeth, Salem jumped forward again, seizing the switch in his jaws. Tugging, he activated it. With a flicker, the chandelier's lights blossomed, and the ghosts fizzled away. The staircases slowly arose from the ground, and with a ka-shunk, re-attached themselves to the landing.

Sabrina sighed with relief as she relaxed her arms, letting the Beacon dangle by her side. Grinning, she flipped a braid over one shoulder. "What took you so long, you fraidy-cat?"

Salem jutted his chin out. "Nothing."

Sabrina shook her head, smirking, as she walked nearer to him. The same light switch Salem had been eying caught Sabrina's attention. "Leota, what's this? It looks like a switch, but it didn't activate the lights…" She paused, eying the dusty picture of a sour-faced, white-haired man directly next to it.

Leota frowned as she examined it. "I…don't know. It looks like something Thorne and his henchmen—the Order of Shadows—would use, but I have no idea how to activate it. Maybe we can figure out a use for it later…"

Sabrina shrugged as she began prowling among the pieces of furniture to see if she could find anything useful. She turned around, from her position at the end of the balcony, to call out to Salem, who was searching the rest of the landing. "You guys find anything else?"

"This," Salem mumbled around a piece of parchment paper in his mouth. Gingerly, Sabrina took it, noting the familiar texture.

"This is another piece of that Death Certificate we found earlier," she realized. Sabrina shuddered. "Okay, maybe it's me, but it's still really creepy holding the memories of somebody's death."

"It's probably just you," Salem nodded. Sabrina's boot conveniently found itself on the very tip of his tail, just enough to smart. The cat yelped and Sabrina snickered as she headed off.

Descending the staircase on the right side, Sabrina walked over to examine the tables and chairs on either side of the doorway (apparently the door leading to the Downstairs Hallway, according to Leota).

"Whoa-ho-ho!" a voice boomed from overhead. Turning around and up, Sabrina realized there was a ghost—a rotund man in a morning coat and Dickens-era top hat—on the chandelier. "It's amazing! I'm so high up!" He chuckled again. "One slip and I'm a goner!"

Leota grinned. "Old Pickwick…what a character. He never did understand why the Master frowned on his climbing objects while intoxicated."

"Are they all going to ignore us?" Sabrina muttered.

"If we're lucky," Salem sighed.

As they headed to the door on the first floor marked 'Conservatory,' Sabrina remembered to touch the door handle. The barrier melted away and they stepped in.

Pickwick swung around on the chandelier, admiring the view. "It's like I've died and become a ghost!" he chortled.

Author's Note:

The chandelier ghost's name is actually Pickwick. Apparently, he is one of only two ghosts (he and Madame Leota) who have actual names that were decided on by Disney Imagineers. Apparently, he received his name because of his Dickens-era appearance.

Most of the chapter titles in the story are from the Nancy Drew mystery series. I usually like using titles of Nancy Drew books as titles, since I'm a huge Nancy Drew fan (and they were the first mysteries I started reading!)

Next chapter: The gang gets to rock out in the Conservatory, but the appearance of a disturbing book causes a sour note among the fun. Break out the cowbells, because things are about to get creepy.