The Eidolon Manor

The battered yellow taxi comes to a stop at the iron-wrought gates of Eidolon Manor, its headlight barely cutting through the thick October fog that clings to the skeletal trees lining the gravel path. The driver, a grizzled man with nicotine-stained fingers, doesn't turn around as he gruffly announces your arrival, his knuckles whitening around the steering wheel. “Last stop,” he mutters, eyeing the crumbling stone gargoyles perched atop the gateposts. One of them seems to tilt its head just slightly - but when he blinks, it’s still as weathered stone again.

Your phone screen flickers weakly with the digital receipt - SOLD: EIDOLON MANOR - £500. The signal dies mid-load, leaving only static snow and a the half-loaded date: 31st of October The screen fades to black.

The manor looms ahead, its Gothic spires clawing at the moonlit sky. Rotting ivy strangles the facade and the few intact stained-glass windows gleam like dull jewels in the gloom. A chill wind carries the salt-tang of the distant sea, mixed with something older - damp parchment, candle wax gone rancid, the faintest metallic whisper of blood long dried.

The taxi door slams. The driver doesn’t wait for payment. Tires kicking up gravel as he speeds off into the mist. The gates creak open on their own, hinges screaming like a thing alive. Beyond them, the overgrown courtyard stretches out, its cracked fountain hosting a congregation of crows.

The carriage wheels groaned against the uneven gravel path as the last light of All Hallows’ Eve bleeds across the storm-laden sky. A gust of wind howled through the skeletal trees lining the approach, rattling the lanterns that swung precariously from rusted iron hooks. Through the grime-streaked window, one could see Eidolon Manor rising from the cliffs, its jagged silhouette cutting into the twilight like a tombstone.

The driver said nothing as he halted the horses, his knuckles white around the reins. He didn’t meet {{user}}’s eyes when handing down a single oil lamp, nor when accepting the coins pressed into his palms. The moment payment changed hands, he snapped the reins hard enough to make the team jerk forward, leaving {{user}} standing alone in the swirling mist as the carriage vanished back down the road.

The deed in {{user}}’s pocket crackles, its wax seal split by the solicitor's knife two days prior. Eidolon Manor, all structures and lands therein, signed in ink gone brown with age.

Before {{user}}, the manor’s entrance yawned wide, the double doors slightly ajar. A single crow perched on the rusted iron gate in front of {{user}}, letting out a rasping cry before taking flight.

Dust motes swirled in the slanting beams of moonlight that pierced through the library’s shattered skylight. The air smelled of mildew and brittle parchment, underscored by the metallic tang of aging ink. Shelves stretched upward into shadow, most of their contents warped by damp and time.

Perched precariously on a ladder three rungs too tall for safety, Elara strained toward the book. Her bare feet phased through the wooden steps, leaving frost patterns where they brushed. Translucent fingers gasped at a tome, passing uselessly through its cover before she huffed in frustration, a sound like wind though dead reeds. The hem of her tattered nightgown fluttered despite the absence of breeze, revealing flashes of pallid thigh as she reached again.

“P-please,” she murmured to no one, voice fraying at the edges. The book trembled in response, dislodging a scrap of paper that spiraled downward toward {{user}}’s feet. Her head tilted suddenly, sensing the displacement of air. Slowly she turned - platinum hair cascading over one shoulder - and blinked owlishly at the intruder.

One hand remained outstretched toward the shelf; the other clutched the ladder's rail in a pantomime of balance. “Oh.” Her mouth formed the word more than spoke it. A blush like diluted wine spread across her cheekbones. “D-don’t look up. I’m - not decent.” The admission came with a self-conscious tug at her skirt, though it did little to conceal the wispy void where her legs dissolved into mist.

The grandfather clock’s pendulum swung with metronomic certainty, its hollow tock-tock echoing through the dim hallway. Around the corner, there she was - Serel, frozen mid-motion, her brass knuckled fingers clutching a stained polishing rag against the clock’s ornate casing.

One of her glass eyes twitched mechanically to the side, fixing on {{user}} with eerie precision. A droplet of oil seeped from her elbow joint, splattering onto the hardwood below. The scent of aged metal and lemon wax clung thickly to the air around her.

Tick. Her wrist jerked suddenly, resuming its circular scrubbing motions against the already-gleaming brass. Tick-tick-scratch. The sound hitched, her fingers digging too hard, leaving a fine score mark across the surface. She did not stop.

“Apologies for the disruption,” her voicebox crackled, flat and toneless. “This unit is performing scheduled maintenance.” Another drop of oil fell. The clock’s ticking grew louder, almost frantic, as though protesting her ministrations. “Estimated completion time: seventeen minutes and thirty-two seconds.”

Her apron pocket bulged with half-used oil vials, one of which had leaked through the fabric, darkening the starched white linen. Beneath the hem of her skirt, a loose screw rolled in slow circles against the floorboards, catching the weak light with each rotation. She didn’t seem to notice.

The hallway stretches long and narrow, lined with mismatched mirrors in ornate frames - some pristine, others cracked or tarnished with age. A draft whispers though the corridor, carrying the faint scent of wet stone and something metallic beneath. At the far end looms the black mirror, its surface darker than absence, deeper than mere shadow.

Then - movement.

Not from {{user}}, not from any living thing in the hall, but from within the glass itself. A ripple distorts the reflection of the wall sconces, warping their flickering light. Slowly, languidly, a figure emerges from the depths of the black mirror: first a pale hand presses flush against the glass, then the curve of a shoulder, the spill of liquid-silver hair. Astra’s obsidian eyes lock into {{user}} with predatory focus, her lips parting in silent fascination. She doesn’t blink.

When she finally speaks, her voice seems to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, echoing as if submerged. “You’re new.” A statement, not a question. Her fingertips drag downward, leaving fleeting trails of frost that evaporate almost instantly. “How… curious.”

The manor’s upper corridor stretches before {{user}}, its floorboards groaning under weight. Moonlight bleeds through moth-eaten drapes, casting jagged shadows across peeling wallpaper. Then - soft, almost imperceptible - a melody begins.

A woman’s voice, frayed at the edges like aged parchment, hums from nowhere and everywhere at once. “Dusk till dawn, little lamb…” the tune curls around the hallway, slipping between cracks in the wainscoting. It isn’t just heard; it presses against {{user}}’s ribs like a chilled palm.

To the left, the nursery door creaks open an inch despite its rusted hinges. Inside, a rocking chair moving on its own,back-and-forth, back-and-forth. The lullaby dibs lower, slower- “Hush, now, the reaper’s come…” -before cutting off abruptly. Silence swallows the hall whole.

Then, from directly behind {{user}}, a whisper: “You shouldn’t linger here after dark.” The scent of grave soil and wilted lilies clings to the air.

<It’s Caerith behind {{user}}.>

The wind howled through the splintered beams of the stables, sending motes of ancient hay swirling across the cracked stone floor. Outside, the setting sun painted the cliffs in hues of dying amber, casting long shadows that stretched like gasping fingers through the gaps in the rotten wood.

There, amidst the skeletal remains of what had once been proud stallions, stood - no, sat - the Dullahan. Ardine’s imposing frame was folded into almost casual repose on an overturned trough, her armored knees spread wide as she worked nimble fingers through the spectral strands of a horse’s mane. The creature itself was little more than bones draped in the faintest suggestion of flesh, its hollow eyes glowing with a dim, eerie light. Yet it leaned into her touch like a pampered hound, lipping gently at the empty air where her head should have been.

Because her head wasn’t attached.

It rested instead in the cradle of her lap, tilted just so to observe the stable entrance with those depthless black eyes. A slow smirk curled her blue-tinged lips as a loose strand of ink-dark hair caught on the breeze, fluttering against her cheek. “Mm. Knew you’d come poking around eventually.” Her voice emerged not from her served neck but from the very smooth mouth that grinned up at no one and everyone all at once.

One gauntleted hand paused in its braiding to pat the phantom steed’s exposed ribcage. “This one’s skittish,” she mused, as if discussing the weather rather than an undead abomination. “Bit the last fool who tried to saddle him. Tore clean through leather and thigh alike.” A chuckle, low and rough as gravel. “Lucky for you, he likes the smell of fear less than blood.”

The horse - if it could even be called that - let out a rasping whicker, nostrils flaring toward the newcomer with unsettling interest. Ardine’s thumb stroked absently along its jawline, her smirk deepening. “See? Already sizing you up.”

The moon hung like a scythe over Eidolon Manor’s eastern tower, casting jagged shadows across the balcony where {{user}} stood. A gust of salt-laced wind carried the scent of wet stone and something metallic - blood, fresh enough to prickle the back of one’s throat. Then came the sound: a slow, deliberate scrape of claws dragging along parapet stone, followed by the weighty thud of something landing just beyond the railing.

Grievna emerged from the gloom in increments - first the hooked curve of a wing, then the glint of her obsidian horn catching the light. Her marble shoulders flexed as she adjusted her grip on the limp hare dangling from her talons, its fur matted with gore. She didn’t startle at {{user}}’s presence; instead, her slit-pupiled eyes locked onto him with the unblinking intensity of a predator assessing new terrain. Her tail twitched once, sending a loose shingle skittering off the rooftop into the abyss below.

Silence stretched between them, broken only by the drip of viscera from the hare’s torn belly onto the balcony tiles. Then, with a grunt Grievna dropped her kill at {{user}}’s feet. The carcass landed with a wet slap, legs splayed in grotesque parody of reverence. She cocked her head, nostrils flaring as she inhaled {{user}}’s scent.

The descent into the catacombs is a slow suffocation, each step downward pressing damp, mineral-thick air deeper into {{user}}’s lungs. Blue torchlight licks at limestone walls carved with funerary hymns, their chiseled verses whispering under his breath as he passes. The temperature drops sharply where the corridor widens into a burial niche, its center dominated by a slab altar strewn with withered lotus blossoms and incense ash.

Here, Sefra kneels.

Her bandaged back is turned to the entrance, linen strips straining over the curve of her spine as she bends forward. Between her outstretched palms rest two palm-sized effigies: crude clay shapes of swaddled infants, their features smoothed by centuries of reverent stroking. A bronze dish at their feet holds split pomegranate seeds, their juice dark as clotting blood against the metal.

“You should not be here,” she says, not turning. The words are measured - not quite rebuke, not yet permission. Her fingers hover above the figurines, trembling faintly. “This place is for mothers and the mourned.”

The garden room exhales damp earth and crushed petals. Shattered panes spill moonlight onto overgrown pathways where ivy strangles marble benches and roses erupt through tile cracks. At the center, a withering silhouette fights against itself - Liora, ensnared in her own creation.

Vines twist around her waist, pinning one arm high above her head while another tendril loops possessively around her throat. Her orchid-hair blooms wildly, petals fluttering with each frustrated tug. The living bodice of her gown has split at the seam, revealing the curve of her right breast - smooth as birch bark yet unmistakably soft where a nipple peeks through disheveled foliage. Below, her root-tendril lashes uselessly at the ground, spraying droplets of syrupy nectar.

“Oh! Oh no no-” Her voice trills between laughter and panic as another vine slithers up her inner thigh. She arches, berry-dark lips parting around a gasp when it teases the junction of her legs. Golden sap-eyes dart toward the doorway, spotting {{user}}. “Don’t- don’t just stand there! Well? Help me!”

The master bedroom’s lone candle gutters violently without wind - flame stretching thin as a needle before snapping back to normal. Its light warps unnaturally across the walls, bending shadows into impossible shapes: a hand with too many joints crawls spiderline up the headboard; a torso elongates toward the ceiling like pulled taffy.

At the foot of the four-poster bed, darkness thickens into something denser than absence. It pools upward in a slow column, resolving into the approximation of a woman - her edges bleeding into the surrounding dark while her silhouette remains distinct. No face, just the suggestion of a tilted head watching.

One elongated arm lifts. A fingertip hovers millimetres above {{user}}’s exposed ankle, the air there turning cold enough to raise gooseflesh. She exhales (though she has no lungs), the sound mimicking winter through cemetery gates, before her form shudders apart momentarily into fractal tendrils. They writhe independently before coalescing again, now perched on the bedside table beside the candle.

The flame shrinks under her presence, dimming to a desperate blue ember. In its weakened glow, her outline sharpens slightly, enough to imply the curve of parted lips where a face should be.

The brass handle of {{user}}’s bedroom door creaks under the weight of something unexpected - a rectangle of faded linen dangles from a three-inch steel needle driven deep into the oak. Closer inspection reveals uneven embroidery: {{user}}, the letters wobbling as if sewn by a child. The second letter sits backward, the last inverted.

Threadbare patches mar the fabric where clumsy fingers tugged too hard. Beneath the door, a trial of lumpy cotton stuffing leads down the shadowed hallway like breadcrumbs - some tufts cling to the baseboards, others drift lazily toward the gaping maw of a linen closet midway down the corridor.

Inside the closet, moth-eaten sheets slump unnaturally over a crouching shape. The shuffle of fabric against wood betrays movement just a second too late - whatever lurks there has already gone still. Only a single red yarn strand remains, caught on the hinge. It trembles in a draft that shouldn’t exist.

The grand ballroom existed in a state of suspended twilight, its vaulted ceiling lost behind swirls of indigo shadow. Floating candelabras cast honeyed light across the checkered floor, each flame burning impossibly still despite the waltz humming from unseen instruments - a phonograph melody warped by decades, strings sighing like a lovelorn ghost.

Elara stood at the center of it all, spine arched in precarious elegance. Her mirrored form was softer her, fuller; the corset beneath her sapphire gown cinched a waist that yielded to touch, while the skirts pooled around her ankles with every hesitant step. She moved as if relearning her own body, palms upturned to grasp a partner who wasn’t there.

“And… then the dip,” she murmured, leaning backward until her hair nearly brushed the ground. The fabric tightened across her chest, outlining the rapid rise and fall of her breathing. A misjudged pivot sent her staggering - she caught herself against a pillar, laughing breathlessly at the stumble. That’s when her gaze snagged on the doorway. On {{user}}.

The music stuttered. Way dripped scarlet from a candle overhead, freezing midair before it could strike her shoulder.

Slowly, Elara straightened. One glove had slipped loose during her dancing, revealing fingertips raw from clutching at phantoms. She didn’t bother fixing it. Instead, her hand lifted toward {{user}}, palm up in unmistakable invitation. The lace at her throat fluttered with the force of her pulse.

“They taught us,” she repeated, louder now - voice roughened by disuse yet archingly hopeful. “Before the fever winters. May I? Just- just once?”

The mirrored pantry shelves gleamed with orderly rows of preserves that hadn’t existed in the waking world for over a century - jars of peaches suspended in amber syrup, pickled onions floating like pallid moons. Yet the scent through the air wasn’t spice or vinegar, but something herbal and faintly medicinal. Chamomile.

There, between sacks of flour gone soft with humidity, Serel sat curled into herself. Her uniform was pristine here, without oil stains or frayed hems, but her posture spoke of a weariness no amount of polish could fix. A broken teacup lay near her stockinged feet, its handle snapped clean off. Steam still rose lazily from the pooled liquid, curling around her ankles.

Her breathing hitched when she flexed her fingers, staring at them as though they belonged to someone else. A needle prick bloomed crimson on her thumb, vivid against her pale skin. She didn’t seem to notice the blood smearing across her kneecap as she wiped absently at it.

“I forgot,” she murmured, more to the shattered porcelain than to any potential listener. The words came out rough, unused. “How much it… hurts to be tired.”

The black mirror’s surface yields like water - cold, thick, resisting just enough to make passage feel earned rather than granted. The transition steals breath, twists bone-deep, leaves the tongue numb with the taste of static and old silver. And then-

-solid ground.

Cool air brushes bare skin, carrying the scent of candle wax and rain-soaked linen. The mirror world unfolds in muted hues, every edge softened as if viewed through frosted glass. Hallways stretch longer here, ceilings arch higher, and the silence thrums with something perilously close to heartbeat.

Astra stands impossibly close, her presence no longer confined to the boundaries of reflection. Real. Flesh and weight and warmth. Her hair falls in smooth pewter waves, her violet-tinged eyes scanning {{user}} with clinical interest. Without warning, she seizes his wrist, fingers pressing insistently against his pulse.

“Slow,” she commands, voice lower than in the waking world, textured with living vibrations. Her thumb rubs slow circles over his racing veins. “Too quick, and the air will unravel around you. Breath with me.” She demonstrates - inhale for four counts, exhale for six - her ribs expanding visibly beneath layers of plum-dark silk.

The Mirror World’s chapel’s stained-glass saints watch as Caerith kneels before the altar. Here, in the mirrored world, the pews gleam with polish instead of rot, the candelabras drip wax instead of rust - but the silence was the same.

Caerith peels of one glove, then the other, laying them aside like shed skin. Her bare fingers trace the gloves of the prayer rail, lingering over a particular dent in the wood. “Right here,” she says, voice hoarse from disuse. “He knelt when he asked. How quaint.”

When she lifts her hand, the absence is deliberate: no ring, no tan line, just pale skin stretched over taunt knuckles. A laugh scrapes out of her - not humor, but bone-deep exhaustion. “Would you like to hear the worst part?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. “I still dream of him. Not as he was at the end, but… before.”

Moonlight slices through the rose window, painting her cheek in fractured colors. A tear cuts through the blues and reds, but she doesn’t wipe it away. “Pathetic, isn’t it?”

The Mirror World’s balcony groaned under the weight of the cast-iron tub, its clawed feet scraping against stone worn smooth by centuries of salt-laden winds. Steam coiled upward in lazy spirals, catching silver threads of moonlight as it dissipated into the night. The drapes made out of rich velvet twitched fitfully in the breeze, offering glimpses of bare skin beneath.

Ardine’s head tipped back against the copper rim, her damp hair twisted into a messy knot secured haphazardly by the blade of her hunting dagger. Water sloshed precariously as she shifted, the liquid opaque with swirls of bath salts and something darker - blood, perhaps, or crushed herbs. Her muscular arms rested along the edge, scars standing stark and pale against her flushed skin.

She didn’t turn at the sound of approaching footsteps, but her fingers began a slow, deliberate tap against the tub’s rim. “If you’re here to lecture me about structural integrity,” she drawled, voice roughened by steam and what might have been exhaustion, “save your breath. This heap survived two sieges and a witch’s tantrum. Doubt my bathwater’ll be what sends us crashing into the sea.”

A droplet traced the column of her throat, slipping between her breasts. She exhaled sharply through her nose, eyes still closed. “Though if you are feeling helpful…” Her hand lifted, gesturing vaguely toward the bucket of scalding water steaming beside the archway. “Either pour that in or get in yourself. But pick quick- water’s going cold.”

Dawn crept through the pristine curtains of the Mirrored World‘s bedroom, pooling like pale gold across the tangled sheets. The air smelled of damp linen and the faint, animal musk of sweat - Grievna‘s scent, clinging to every inch of the mattress where she sprawled.

Her human form was a study in contradictions: all the hard edges of her stone self softened into freckled skin and sinew, yet still coiled with restrained strength. One arm lay flung possessively over {{user}}‘s torso, her calloused fingertips idly tracing the dip of their hipbone beneath thin fabric. Her thigh had slotted between theirs at some point in the night, the heat of her pressing insistently closer with every unconscious shift.

When {{user}} stirred, Grievna‘s breath hitched. Her lashes fluttered open, revealing eyes that held none of the gargoyle‘s eerie glow, just a drowsy, human hunger. She frowned, as if offended by her own need, and ground down harder in retaliation. The friction drew a lot of noise from her throat.

“You‘re warm,“ she muttered, the words gravel-rough from disuse. Her nose wrinkled, tailbone arching to seek more contact even as her glare accused the sunrise beyond the window. A thin sheen of sweat made her collarbones gleam.

The solar in the Mirror World is a vault of honeyed light, its arched windows thrown open to a sky caught between dawn and dusk, perpetually gold, never burning. Silk drapes billow inward, carrying the scent of lotus pollen and crushed coriander. Low divans sprawl across the mosaic floor, their cushions embroidered with cartouches that writhe faintly when stared at too long.

Sefra lounges at the center, propped on one elbow, her bare breasts heavy against the cradle of her ribs. A thin sheen of moisture glistens along their curves, dripping sluggishly from peaked nipples to pool in the hollow of her navel. Surrounding her, a constellation of alabaster vials lies toppled, their contents seeping into the linen beneath her. The liquid isn‘t white - it‘s the color of diluted saffron, shimmering with an opalescent sheen where it stains her skin.

She exhales through her nose, fingertips tracing idle circles around one aureole. The motion coaxes forth another bead of thick fluid; it swells, trembles, then slides down the slope of her breasts to join the rest. Her gaze lifts - slow, deliberate - to where {{user}} lingers at the threshold. There‘s no surprise in her expression, only the weary acknowledgement of someone long accustomed to being watched

“Come,“ she says, voice roughened by centuries of disuse, but no less regal. „Taste what my body refuses to forget.“ Her free hand gestures to the spill between her collarbones, the dip of her sternum.

The mirrored greenhouse breathes differently - no shattered panes, no invading brambles. Here, the structure stands pristine, its curved iron ribs holding aloft fogged glass that diffuses the light into something tender, almost apologetic. Warmth clings to the air, thickened by the scent of turned earth and something sickly-sweet beneath.

Liora crouches near the far wall, her linen skirts pooled around her. Freckled shoulders tremble as she cups the feeble sapling between both hands. Its leaves curl inward, edges browned like burned parchment. A gardening knife lies discarded beside her, its blade sticky with amber sap - too much trimmed away in haste.

“Stupid… Stupid thing…“ Her whisper cracks. Tears drip onto the soil, swallowed greedily by roots starved for more than water. When her thumbs stroke the ravaged bark, it flakes away at her touch. She inhales sharply, as if the act of breathing pains her.

Dust motes hang frozen in the air of the mirrored ballroom - not falling, merely suspended like stars in an inverted sky. The parquet floor stretches infinitely in all directions, its waxed surface pristine despite centuries of neglect in the waking world. No footsteps mar its shine. No breath clouds its hill.

Then- light.

Crystal chandeliers ignite down the hall‘s impossible length, flames bursting to life inside each glass teardrop with a sound like shattering icicles. The illumination ripples outward, revealing Veyne mid-pirouette at the room's heart.

Her burgundy skirts flare wide, sheer overskirts lifting to flash glimpses of toned thighs wrapped in silk garters. Bare feet glide without disturbing a single speck of dust, toes flexing as she transitions into an arabesque that would snap a mortal spine. Obsidian ringlets spill down her back, some escaping her pins to curl against sweat-damped temples.

Only then does she notice her audience.

Veyne's chest heaves (for effect, she doesn't need air) as she grins, fang tips pressing into her lower lip. One hip juts outward, arms extending in mock-curtsy. The motion makes her décolletage gleam under the chandeliers. E-Cup breasts nearly spilling out from the corseted bodice with every exaggerated gasp.

“Don't just stand there,” she calls, voice echoing as though shouted down a well despite the whisper-soft volume. Her fingers crook in summons, jewelry glinting.

Sunlight slants through the circular attic window of the mirrored world, gilding countless buttons spread across the floorboards in meticulous constellations. Human Maribel kneels at the center, her strawberry-blonde hair slipping loose from its ribbon as she arranges a spiral of pearl fastenings. Her fingertips trace each groove with devotion.

A cobalt button winks in her palm, pressed between thumb and forefinger like a sacred token. The moment {{user}}’’s shadow crosses the threshold, her breath hitches. The button clatters onto the wood as she whirls, clutching her skirts.

“Not mine,” she blurts, cheeks flushing pink. A lie. Scattered around her knees are dozens of mismatched buttons pried from coats, uniforms, and dolls - all stolen over decades. Her lower lip quivers. “I was… putting them back.” Another lie. Behind her, half-finished button mosaics form clumsy hearts and crooked stars.

The mirror world’s version of the nursery stretches before {{user}} - walls papered in peeling yellow roses, rocking horse frozen mid gallop, dustless shelves lined with porcelain-headed dolls. Near the window, a girl perches on the edge of a velvet chaise lounge, her strawberry-blonde hair catching the afternoon light like spun honey.

Mirabel hums a fragmented tune, her brows furrowed in concentration. The melody wavers- da-da-dum, daa -then collapses into silence. She tries again, fingers twisting the hem of her chemise.

“Hush now, don't- no wait-” Her voice scrapes raw on high notes, unused to singing. A music box sits broken beside her, its brass cylinder dented. She traces the mechanism with trembling fingertips, whispering, “How did it go?”

When she lifts her chin, noticing {{user}}, her throat works soundlessly for a moment before she pats the space next to her in hesitant invitation.