CHAPTER 3 – The First Sign
580 Words
The moment Kezia stepped back inside the mansion, the air felt colder than she remembered. Not the natural chill of old places—but something heavier, like the house was inhaling slowly, waiting for her return.
She set her flashlight on the dusty table near the entrance and whispered to herself, “This is where they were last seen… Mom and Dad.” Saying it out loud made the silence thicken.
It was only her second night in the mansion, but it already felt like the walls were listening.
Her conversation with Elias replayed in her head:
“The families connected to that house never leave untouched,” he had said.
“Your parents weren’t the first.”
He didn’t explain what he meant. He looked frightened, pressured, like someone could overhear them even in public. But he promised to send her old documents once he found them.
With a deep breath, Kezia pushed open the door to the west wing—the part of the house investigators never reached because it collapsed shortly after her parents disappeared. The hall smelled of wet wood and earth, as though rain had fallen inside the house for years.
Her flashlight flickered.
“No… not now.” She tapped it, and the beam steadied enough to push back the shadows.
She walked further until she reached a narrow room. Inside, there was nothing except a table, a cracked mirror, and a small wooden drawer. But something about the mirror made her stop.
Her reflection looked normal—tired, pale, but normal.
It was what stood behind her reflection that made her heart slam against her ribs.
A shadow.
Tall.
Still.
Standing exactly where the hallway should have been empty.
She spun around.
No one.
The hallway was cold, silent, untouched.
Her breath trembled as she looked back at the mirror.
The shadow was gone.
“Kezia… calm down,” she whispered to herself, gripping the drawer to steady her hands. “You’re imagining things.”
But when she pulled the drawer open, her fear sharpened into something else.
Inside was a photograph.
Her mother.
Her father.
Standing in this exact mansion—years before they died.
They looked young, smiling, unaware of the danger around them.
But what froze Kezia wasn’t the photo itself.
It was the blurred silhouette behind her parents—
the same height, the same shape, the same shadow she just saw in the mirror.
Her heartbeat cracked through the quiet as she whispered, “Someone was here with them…”
A sudden knock echoed through the hallway.
Kezia jumped, gripping the photo to her chest. The knock came again—three slow, deliberate taps on the wall outside the room.
She forced herself to move, stepping back into the hallway.
“Hello…?” her voice wavered.
Silence.
Then the lights above her—those same century-old chandeliers that shouldn’t even be working—flickered to life in a trail, one by one, leading deeper into the mansion.
Like the house was inviting her.
Or warning her.
Kezia swallowed hard.
Something wanted her to follow.
And she didn’t know if it was connected to her parents…
or something far more dangerous.
She tightened her grip on the photo, took a step forward, and whispered into the empty hall:
“I'm not leaving until I know the truth.”
Then she followed the lights—
straight into the heart of the mansion that had swallowed her parents whole.
- Writer
