Story 1074: The Thing at the Threshold

The Threshold wasn’t a door, or a place—not really.

It was a moment. A breath between worlds. A boundary worn thin from too many curious hands scratching at the veil. A metaphysical wound in the air where thoughts leaked out and other things seeped in.

And tonight, something was standing on the other side.

Waiting.

Professor Ilya Marrin had chased whispers for decades. Doors that should not exist. Hallways that led nowhere. Angles that bled. His obsession culminated at Briarhelm House, a long-condemned estate built atop an intersection of leylines and ancient burial roots.

The locals wouldn’t step near it.

“Not since the scratching started,” they warned. “Not since the voice behind the keyhole.”

Marrin entered at dusk, his recorder humming and wards etched across his skin. Each room of Briarhelm warped as he passed—walls breathing, stairs creaking in patterns like Morse code. In the nursery, he found a child’s drawing etched into the wall with a nail: