All of a sudden, the candles in the room blew out. But there were no open windows or anything. It was pitch black.
"Someone get light in here!" Rick yelled. But his voice was drowned out by a sudden thundering from outside. It had started raining.
There was a flash of lightning, shining through the room, and Rick caught a glimpse of Maria.
Her eyes were white.
"GET ME SOME DAMN LIGHT!" Rick yelled.
Policemen hastily relit the candles, casting the normal light in the room.
Maria was on the floor, eyes white, mouth slightly agape.
Paranormal investigators quickly rushed to her side, checking for a pulse and examining her. The unexpected storm continued to rage on.
"What just happened!" Rick yelled, demanding an answer. No one responded.
"Hey! She's saying something!" An investigator who was looking at her eyes said. Everyone leaned around Maria, trying to hear what she was saying.
In a very soft and unnaturally deep voice, the psychic was repeating the words: "When hinges creak in doorless chambers…and strange and frightening sounds echo through the halls…whenever candle lights flicker where the air is deathly still…that is the time when ghosts are present…practicing their terror with ghoulish delight…"
Rick looked at the candles that had just been lit in the room.
They were flickering.
"We're going in," Rick said after Maria had been removed, "We have to. Who's with me?"
But the others were uneasy about entering after what had just taken place.
"Fine. I'll go by myself," Rick said, and started through the door.
"No! What if something happens-" A cop tried to argue.
"I've got my cell phone. And besides…if I run into any ghosts, you should be able to hear my screams," he said with a small grin, trying to lighten the mood.
Rick stepped through the opening onto a red carpet that seemed to line the hallway.
As soon as he was all the way through the door, the panel slid shut. He whirled around as it closed, and saw that the people on the other side looked just as shocked as he did.
"Hey!" He yelled, "Can you get it open?" Rick waited for an answer, but there was no noise. Rick tried in vain to open the wall. He pressed his ear against the panel. It was deathly quiet.
"Soundproof…" he muttered to himself. He turned to the hallway – his only way to go now.
As he walked down the hall, lighting candles along the way, he realized that there were paintings hung here. They were an Egyptian queen resting on a loveseat…A majestic ship, battling waves…and a Greek woman with red hair. But whenever lightning flashed, Rick's eyes would play tricks on him. In the lightning, the Egyptian queen looked like a panther creature, the ship suddenly turned into a ghost ship on black waters, and the Greek woman turned into a screeching medusa.
The hallway took a right after the portraits, and Rick passed two white marble busts at the end of it. Their eyes seemed to watch him, glaring as he intruded in their abode.
He came to a marble staircase, and slowly began to ascend it.
You are cordially invited to Gracey Manor
On the Twelfth of April, 1965
For a Celebration of the Engagement of
William G. Gracey
And
Meadow J. Ellsworth
"William," Leota said as he finished writing the invitations. He dabbed his quill in the forest green ink and put the final touches on the last one, writing in beautiful calligraphy.
"Are you sure this is a good idea? This marriage seems very quick…you only met the girl three days ago!"
"Yes, I'm sure. Meadow and I are in love, Leota. Can't you see that?" The man said, finishing, "Or maybe…you're just a bit jealous?"
"What!" Leota said, taken aback.
"I see the way you look at us together. You're full of envy," William said, giving the invitations to a servant to send out.
Leota sighed heavily. Ever since William had gotten news that the war was over this morning, he seemed very jumpy and rude. As soon as he had heard, he proposed to Meadow. Everyone in the mansion thought it was incredibly romantic.
Leota thought otherwise.
"All he cares about is money," Leota said grudgingly as she headed to her room.
Leota had designed her room like a séance area – a table with a crystal ball, and a large armchair for her to sit in. Since William had hired her as a fortune teller, she figured she might as well look the part.
The psychic was psychic all right; she just hated all of the stereotypes that went with it. But to please William, and to keep her job, she went along with her little ruse.
Leota placed a hand on her crystal ball as she walked by her room, and all of a sudden, a series of images flashed through her head.
Meadow, trapped somewhere, screaming to get out; the mansion surrounded by people, screaming and shouting while carrying torches; and William, hanging from a noose in the attic.
She pulled her hand back in shock. Leota was used to getting premonitions, visions of the future…but none as awful as that. Staring at the crystal ball, she silently hoped that the vision wouldn't come true. But the soothsayer knew that was wishful thinking – every single premonition she'd had to date eventually came to pass.
Rick found himself in a long hallway, covered in cobwebs and dust. Old pictures on the walls seemed to follow his every move, and ornate doorways with brass handles filled the hall.
At first, Rick thought he was just hallucinating. When he saw that one of the wooden doors seemed to be breathing, bending out and in, he thought it was a trick of the light. But when he saw blood leaking from every opening above and below another one, and heard ear-piercing screams coming from others.
Rick started to panic. Especially when he came to the boarded up rooms.
When Rick passed the first one, withered arms, claws, skeletal hands and all sorts of gory and bloody appendages shot out at him, grasping at him. One got his throat, and he gagged and desperately tried to get away. Finally he wrenched the hand off, and backed up against the wall as far as he could, sweat on his forehead and breathing heavily. The hands eventually gave up, and retread back into the darkness.
It was about this time that Rick realized that this was not an ordinary old house.
"What the hell is this kind of place?" He asked himself, trying to calm his nerves.
"You just answered your own question."
Rick whirled around. Nobody was behind him. And nobody was in front of him either.
"This IS hell. Trapped in this godforsaken house for over a hundred years. And I'm the only sane one here."
The voice belonged to a woman, Rick figured that out. But it seemed to be coming from all around him, from every door and from each end of the hallway he was at.
"Well, not anymore. But I soon will be. That poor boy…"
That sparked Rick's interest.
"Boy…you mean Tyler?"
"Ah yes. That's his name."
"What about him? Do you know what happened to him?"
"Of course, dear. I know everything."
"Wh-who are you!" Rick asked.
"Follow my voice. And I'll explain everything."
All of a sudden, the direction of the voice changed to further down the hall. Rick started after it, a feeling of dread in his stomach.