Chapter 14
Salem
The storm raged outside, wind howling like a wild animal, but after our heartfelt confessions, Heresy built another fire. It was the only thing keeping the eerie chill at bay. The farmhouse groaned with age, as though the walls themselves were alive and restless. I tried to keep my focus on the warmth, on the steady crackle of the fire, but something about this place was gnawing at me.
This house was wrong.
I got up and started pacing, the floorboards creaking under my boots, every step echoing like a warning. Heresy sat against the wall, his dark eyes tracking me as I moved, but he didn’t say a word. He had that way about him, quiet but always watching, like he was waiting for something to happen. It unsettled me more than I wanted to admit.
“I don’t know what’s worse,” I muttered, casting a glance at the cracked window where the rain lashed against the glass. “The storm or this place.”
Heresy smirked, his lips barely moving. “Could be both.”
I shot him a look, but before I could retort, something thudded upstairs. We both froze.
“The fuck was that?” I whispered, eyes narrowing on the ceiling.
Heresy stood up slowly, his broad frame silhouetted by the flickering firelight. “You tell me, witch.”
I swallowed, not willing to show how much that sound got to me. “Probably just the house settling.” But even I didn’t believe that.
Then it happened again—a dragging sound, like something heavy being pulled across the floor above us.
Heresy’s eyes met mine, and without a word, he grabbed the flashlight from my bag. “Stay behind me,” he muttered.
“Yeah, right,” I shot back, grabbing my flashlight from him and storming past. “I’m not some damsel, Heresy.”
The staircase creaked under our weight as we climbed, the old wood groaning like it wanted to give way beneath us. Every nerve in my body screamed that this was a bad idea, but I couldn’t back down. Not now. Not with him watching.
We reached the landing, the air up here colder, sharper, like the storm outside had somehow found its way into the bones of the house. My flashlight swept the hall, the pale beam cutting through the thick darkness, landing on old portraits hanging crooked on the walls. Faces long forgotten, eyes that seemed to follow us as we moved.
Then we heard it again—the dragging sound. It was coming from the far end of the hallway, from behind a door that looked like it hadn’t been opened in decades.
“That’s definitely not the house settling,” Heresy muttered, his voice low.
I pushed forward, ignoring the dread curling in my gut. I refused to let some old house get the better of me. But as I reached for the doorknob and the door swung open on its own, revealing a room bathed in shadows.
The air inside was frigid, like stepping into a freezer. The beam of my flashlight fell on an old, dust-covered mirror standing in the corner. And then I saw it—smeared across the glass in what looked like dirt or… something darker, were words.
Leave before it's too late.
I blinked, my heart hammering in my chest. I wasn’t scared of much, but this—this was different.
“What the hell?” Heresy’s voice was tight, tense. I glanced at him, saw the way his jaw clenched as he stared at the mirror.
“I didn’t write that,” I said, my voice sounding far weaker than I wanted it to.
“No shit,” he muttered, stepping into the room, his eyes scanning the walls.
As he moved, something shifted in the corner of the room—something that made my blood run cold. A shadow, darker than the others, moved. It wasn’t our reflection. It wasn’t the storm. It was something else, something wrong.
“Look!” I hissed, pointing, my flashlight beam trembling slightly.
The shadow twisted, curling around the base of the mirror, and for a split second, it seemed to take on a shape—a figure—before vanishing into the floor.
“Jesus,” Heresy breathed, his usual calm shaken.
“Okay, what the fuck is going on here?” I snapped, stepping back.
Heresy didn’t answer, but I saw the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands curled into fists. He was rattled, and that unsettled me more than anything else. Heresy didn’t rattle easily.
Suddenly, the door slammed shut behind us, the force of it shaking the floor. The sound reverberated through the house, like a warning bell.
We were trapped.
“Salem,” Heresy said, his voice tight with barely restrained fear. “We need to get out of here.”
I nodded, but before we could move, the mirror cracked—splintering from the center outward as if some invisible force had punched it. Another mirror broken? Did that mean something? A low, guttural sound echoed through the room, like a whisper turned into a growl.
I grabbed Heresy’s arm, my fingers digging into his skin. “I’m not sticking around to find out what that is.”
As I said it, the door opened. We backed out of the room, but the hallway wasn’t any better. The sounds—whispers, creaking floorboards, things moving in the shadows—it all seemed to follow us as we made our way downstairs.
By the time we reached the front door, the fire had almost gone out, leaving the room bathed in dim, flickering light. The storm outside was relentless, as if it was attempting to rip it apart.
“I’m starting to think this dare was a terrible idea,” I muttered, my voice shaking despite myself.
Heresy didn’t reply. His eyes were locked on the front door, he was trying to open. But it didn’t open. It didn’t budge.
Whatever was in this house didn’t want us to leave, even if that had been the message on the mirror.