The Uninvited Guest Of The Haunted Mansion (16)

Serenity’s fingertips went cold. She forgot to breathe as she stared up at the towering bookshelf blocking her path.

Just one step. If she had taken only one more step forward, she would have been crushed beneath its weight.

At the same time, there was a soft snap. The thread she’d relied on, already stretched to its limit, snapped uselessly. The corridor twisted, the path behind sealed off, and her only guide unraveled into nothing.

Serenity’s eyes locked on the massive wall in front of her. The way she had come was gone. Every route had closed.

Except one.

The corridor ahead, leading straight into the deepest part of the library.

Darkness stretched there without end, waiting for her like the maw of some great beast.

‘Are they really expecting me to walk straight into the grave?’

A dry laugh slipped out.

“Miss, miss, what happened?”

The apprentice maid’s voice stammered from within the bundle of cloth. Serenity, pulled from her daze, gave a flat answer.

“Other than the exit being sealed, nothing special.”

Though they both knew something worse was coming.

Gathering the scraps of cloth into her arms again, she froze at a realization.

‘Why hasn’t the librarian appeared?’

According to the rules, the instant a book was dropped, the librarian should have come, tearing intruders apart, skinning them alive, turning them into bindings. Yet the end of the corridor was empty. No shadow, no approach.

This was different. The story wasn’t following the rules.

But rules or no rules, it didn’t matter. The exits were sealed, and the corridor into death lay wide open.

Serenity’s thoughts drifted unbidden to Blake. Where was he now? Was he wandering the shifting maze, startled by the sudden changes? Somehow, she doubted it. He had looked as though he understood this manor better than she did.

‘Maybe I should have stayed with him after all.’

It was pointless to dwell on now.

She steadied her breathing and looked once more into the abyss ahead.

There was nothing to do but walk. Nothing to hope for but a miracle, stumbling on an unclosed gap in the maze, running into Blake, or, failing that, a prayer to a god she didn’t believe in.

Mouth dry, Serenity stepped forward.

“Miss, miss, we’re going deeper, aren’t we? It smells worse, mustier!”

Even smothered among the rags, the maid sniffed like a bloodhound.

“I told you, the exit is blocked.”

Her voice was low, flat, the tone she always took when tension pressed too hard. She no longer bothered to whisper.

“We’re going to meet the librarian.”

“The librarian?”

The bundle twitched. Serenity glanced down.

“Have you seen the librarian?”

She expected a no. The girl was only ever attached to the laundry maid. The librarian never left the library.

But the answer stunned her.

“I have! Long, long ago!”

“…What?“

“I used to see them often, before they became the librarian! It was more than two hundred years ago!”

Serenity blinked. Had she misheard? The words were clear, but her mind lagged.

“Two… hundred years?”

“Yes, about that long!”

The scraps of cloth trembled as if it were the most natural thing to say.

Serenity felt her head swim. An apprentice maid, supposedly a child of thirteen or fourteen, claiming memories from centuries ago.

She tried to piece it together, then gave up. Trying to impose reason on a twisted legend was meaningless.

“The librarian was scary, but kind before they changed! Back then, before becoming the librarian, they were just a scholar!”

The scraps trembled excitedly, voice brightening as if happy to chatter. Serenity’s every step felt like a march to the gallows, but the maid sounded like she was reminiscing over tea.

“They wrote all day, and every night at three, they would go to the graveyard for tea time! They loved tea brewed from lily of the valley. Said it soothed the mind!”

Serenity almost scoffed. Lily of the valley was poison, deadly even in small doses. But then again, Anomalous beings chewed glass as if it were sugar.

“Then one day, fire swept the manor! The elder’s books all burned! After that, they became the librarian and never left again.”

The maid’s scraps shivered pitifully. The scholar had turned monstrous.

Serenity, despite her tension, found herself unsettled. Hearing the personal history of an Anomalous being was… strange. Even stranger was realizing they had such histories at all.

‘So their obsession with books comes from that fire?’

She seized the chance. “Do you know what the librarian likes? Something they might show mercy for?”

“Yes! Tea! They loved tea. I could even smell it from here, twenty years ago. If you offered them tea, maybe they’d calm down!”

“And their favorite was lily of the valley?”

“Yes, that’s right!”

The maid’s voice brightened, then faltered in pity. Of course, there was no way Serenity could find tea leaves here.

‘Even if I’d known earlier, what could I have done?’

No flowers grew in the Primdellrose gardens anymore except blood-red roses.

Still, Serenity caught on a detail.

“Why specifically twenty years ago?”

The maid didn’t answer.

Serenity’s thoughts churned. Twenty years ago was the year she had been born.

She tried to fit the pieces together, but before she could, the corridor ended.

At some point, a red glow had spread beneath her feet, thick and wet like pooled blood. It cast long shadows behind her.

Her heart thudded. Her steps slowed.

“Miss, miss? It’s strange. Beyond this corridor, right now—”

Serenity clapped a hand over the maid’s mouth. A chill lanced through her fingers and toes.

‘Stay calm. If the librarian hasn’t appeared yet, that means something changed. If I stay sharp, there must still be a way…’

Her thoughts cut off.

The corridor opened. Hundreds of red lights hung like clustered eyes, watching. The vast chamber ahead dwarfed even the library itself. At its center sat a solitary wooden desk.

And crouched before the desk was a vast silhouette, draped in a black shroud. The air stank of mold and age.

The librarian.

But it didn’t move. No sudden leap, no flash of speed, no tearing claws. It only hunched motionless before the desk.

‘What is this…?’

Then, from behind its enormous shadow, someone stepped out.

“You’re late, young lady.”

Serenity’s breath caught. Whether that face was salvation or a curse, she couldn’t yet tell.