“What a guy.” I said sarcastically. “So now we have a whole bunch of vague information. Why did he even write the riddle if he was giving us this in the first place?” Duncan shrugged.

“The last bit of information I have at the moment is that he keeps on stressing over and over that we need to use our willpower to our advantage. Sulphur is going to try to corrupt us and we need to stay strong, Lacey’s got that covered I think.” Duncan finished, Lacey rolled her eyes.

“Where are the rooms then?”

“Dunno, but Stanley said we can find a map to the property somewhere. If we find it we can probably use it to find them.” Duncan flipped through a few pages of text. Stopping on a page with several black lines and a few sharp corners and other such scribbles. “I think we will find the map wherever this is.” I looked at what he was referring to, in some of the rectangles there were small labels stating whatever was in the shape, and there was also a mess of scribbles with a straight pathway going through it, the scribble was clearly labeled ‘garden’.

“Duncan. Is it a map to help us find a map? Or is this a piece of the map in general?” I asked him for clarification.

“It’s… wait, hold on.” He held the book up to his face briefly. “I think, uh, I don’t know. I actually can’t read the page but the second option makes more sense now that I think about it.” He scratches his head as he turned it back towards me. I reached out and glanced at the page one more time, and confirmed that what I was reading made sense. I tore out the page after checking that there was nothing on the other side, I held it out to everyone else.

“I can read this, anyone else?” A few concentrated looks later and we easily deduced that I was the one to have the map piece. “It’s a map of part of the kitchen, backdoor, and most of the page is the yard.” I began pointing at the labels on the page as I spoke.

“Over here is the fountain, the stone paths, and the ‘flat spot’.” Mentioning the stone ground had me pause. There were no words to label it, but there was a small circular symbol at the edge of it towards the hill that leads to the forest, a bit in the direction of the narcissus flowers that led us toward Sophie. The symbol had a small scribble that vaguely resembled a blooming rose.

“Sophie-Rose, can you show me your key?” I knelt beside her while she retrieved it from her dress. She held it up to my face, the silver key looked brand new after it joined with the eye. Sure enough, the bow of the key matched the rose drawn into the map.

“I think we may have already found one of the rooms.” I stood back up, and explained the rose symbol I had found. It wasn’t long before we all grabbed some flashlights and umbrellas and made our way back upstairs. The walk to the flat spot was short, and we all looked around the area to see if there was anything of note on it. At some point, Alice went on high alert. She let out a low growl, and walked toward the edge of the flat spot where it drops off onto the hill. She sniffed a bit, then hopped about four feet to the ground. Lacey quickly rushed over and dropped down with her, while we all stayed and watched from the top. Alice was looking around confused, like when we pretend to throw a ball and watch her look around for it before she realizes we still have it. Lacey stopped paying attention to Alice, and was closely observing the stone wall.

“I think I found a button?” She reached up and poked at the wall a bit, after nothing happened, we all climbed down to get a better look. There was a small circular indent in the wall with an engraving on it like the key, it was about the size of a quarter and a good two feet below the top of the flat spot. There was also a crack around the indent, as if it was a button as Lacey said. We spent a good few minutes poking at it and trying to use Sophie’s key to unlock it somehow. Eventually Liam had the idea to turn the key around and use it as leverage to push while some others looked around for a different option. He pressed his thumb against the bow of the key and had his hand around the stem while he pushed, and everyone stopped moving when we heard a low scrape. After the initial shock of success, he began to press harder, and another scrape sounded. He removed his hand for a moment to to give it some rest, then tried again. This time the button jerked forward, and so did one of the stone bricks. We could hear the brick clatter to the ground within behind the wall. In the hole that the brick used to be was a thick rope hanging down from the darkness inside. Liam jerked his hand back and rubbed at his palm where the key dug into it, he also gave the key back to Sophie.

“I wanna pull the rope!” She shouted out as she reached for it, Paisley quickly grabbed her hand.

“I don’t know Sophie, we don’t know what’s in there or how strong it even is.”

“We don’t have any other leads though.” Lacey commented.

“I’ve seen movies, pulling random ropes never seem to work out very well.” Liam said, I nodded along. I wasn’t going to say anything, but as soon as the stone fell through I couldn’t help but feel uneasy. Like when you think someone is watching, or maybe when you are standing on something super high in the air looking over the edge.

“Oh for crying out loud.” Duncan apparently did not feel the same, as he ducked past everyone to reach for the rope and give it a tug. Nothing happened. He pulled harder, and more grinding sounded out. He braced his feet against the wall as everyone took a few steps backward and he pulled the rope with both hands. He was slowly able to pull the rope hard enough for part of the stone wall to the left to shift open slightly. He kept trying, and eventually Liam and Lacey stepped in as well. The uneasiness I felt grew and grew with every inch the door opened, until eventually it was wide enough for someone to step through. Duncan did, but rather than walk all the way in he propped himself up against the wall and used his legs to push it open further. This seemed to be much easier than pulling the rope because it unstuck itself and jerked open similar to the button we had to press. We all stood before the now open doorway, flashlights pointed toward the stairs leading into it.

We could see the pulley system above and around the door, it was rusted over and the rope was frayed. It was surprising that we were able to get it open all the way. No one really seemed to want to speak for a moment, but at the bottom of the stairs we could clearly see a wooden door. Duncan began to walk towards it, I could see in his shoulders that he was tense and likely didn’t want to. Not that anyone really wanted to. After a few deep breaths I followed, then Sophie and Liam. Paisley took a moment longer but she also followed. Lacey stayed at the top of the stairs, looking nervous, probably because the stairway was narrow and cold and dark, the ceiling hung low at first due to the size of the flat spot.

“Sophie, we need your key. It’s locked.” Duncan said from behind me, since I was facing the stairs still. Sophie moved past, and grabbed onto Duncan’s hand tightly with one of hers, and reached for the keyhole with the other. It was pitch dark in the room as the door slowly slid open with a high creek, and it seemed to absorb all the light from our flashlights. It sounded as if something shifted in the room. Sophie hid her face into Duncan’s shoulder when he picked her up. Liam followed, and I moved as well, but I was stopped before I entered the room.

“This place feels weird to you, right?” Paisley asked me after she grabbed my wrist. I turned to her fully.

“Yea, I think everyone feels that way.” I guessed.

“Do you think it’s because it’s corrupted?”

“I think so, yea. Why?” I asked her, and observed her concerned look turn to one of concentration. Until she looked up slightly. Concentration turned into a look of fear. I watched her open her mouth as no words would come. I slowly began to turn around. Directly above me in the doorway was this… thing. It was inky black, and had bits of white poking from the dark bubbly mass, like a bird’s skeleton only bigger, maybe a raven or something, it had some dim yellow shapes in its eyes and it was staring deeply behind me, towards Paisley. I turned back to her, I opened my mouth to tell her to run but she only managed to raise her hands in defense as the thing dashed above my head. She immediately fell backwards, struggling against this abomination. I could see now that it had wings like a bats, and legs like a cat, but feet like a large rats. It’s skin looked like it was bubbling and melting off of it before reforming over and over.

Paisley let out a shriek, and then I could see her pale fists punching out among the flurry of feathers and claws and whatever else this sick amalgamation was made of. Lacey began running down the stairs, Liam and Duncan also came up behind me, I was looking for a way to help, there was so much going on though. I could feel myself freezing up just as I took a step forward. Before anyone else could make any moves, however, Sophie came sprinting between us. She screamed an angry cry as she brought her tiny fists in the air and began pounding them against the creatures back, still grasping the key.

“Sophie no!” Someone shouted, it might’ve even been me. If she heard then she didn’t show it as she continued attempting to assault the beast. It turned its head toward her and lifted its wings as if to attack but Paisley surged forward and grabbed it by the throat. It did not like that. I finally moved forward enough to pull Sophie away, but changed my mind at the last second, and reached for the wings of the creature instead. It felt like I was holding something with the consistency of wet snow, but with the heat of a rock that had been sitting in the sun in the middle of a summer day. Crunchy and squishy and solid and hot, all together. It struggled against us, I could see it struggling to attack everyone at once, mindlessly. That’s when I noticed a faint blue streak in the corner of my eye. It got brighter and brighter in Sophie’s hand that was still wailing on the creature, fruitlessly. Lacey shouted amongst the chaos as she attempted to help Paisley in the narrow space.

“Sophie try hitting it with the key, it’s sharper!” She attempted to get out as she got bat at by a stray paw briefly. Sophie reeled her hand back, and brought it forward into the creature, focusing the force behind the key. She didn’t just hit the creature with it, she stabbed the glowing object into the grossly textured mass. The key got even brighter, just as the creature struggled free of our grasp. It flung itself to the ceiling, dragging the key with it. It latched onto the roof and crawled above our heads through the door, just barely avoiding Liam’s hand when he jumped to knock it down. It stopped just barely inside the room to a slow crawl, the key had only gotten brighter, eventually the thing dropped to the ground with a thud. It’s flesh dried out and flakes and collapsed as the blue light overwhelmed it and suddenly it exploded. The room flashing bright for a moment before the key dimmed. In the darkness towards the edge of the room we could all see more dark figures hunched over against the walls, each of them had just barely visible eyes reflecting the light from the key just before it went dark again. Duncan stepped the rest of the way in again and grabbed the key as quickly as possible, then passed it to Sophie. The key had dimmed some, but began to brighten again once it was back in her hand. She looked angry and scared all at once as she stepped into the doorway of the room filled with untold horrors that I never wanted to see again anytime soon.