Chapter 28: Beneath the Trapdoor

Evelyn's breath hitched as the trapdoor creaked open on its own, the air from below flooding the basement with the scent of rot and something older—something ancient. It wasn't just decay; it was the smell of forgotten things, sealed away for a reason.

> "Help me… please…"

The voice again. So close now, as if it was just beneath the surface, clawing at the wood between them.

She stepped back. Her rational mind screamed to flee, to reseal the door and burn the house down if she had to. But her heart—her grief—kept her rooted.

What if it really was Lillian?

What if Evelyn had left her behind?

She picked up her flashlight, the beam sputtering like a dying flame. Slowly, cautiously, she knelt and peered down.

A narrow staircase descended into pitch black. Stone walls, slick with moisture and etched in the same pulsating glyphs. The light caught something moving—not slithering or crawling, but undulating, like it had no bones, no form.

And in the middle of the darkness...

Eyes opened.

Too many eyes.

All of them staring at her.

And then—Lillian's voice, perfectly clear:

> "It took my face, Evelyn. Don't let it take yours too."

Evelyn stumbled back, slamming the trapdoor shut with a scream.

The house reacted immediately.

The walls shivered, the lights upstairs burst, and the air filled with a low, guttural chanting. Not in English. Not in any language Evelyn knew.

The entire house was alive now. And angry.

She ran upstairs, nearly tripping on the last step, only to find her front door gone. Not locked. Not blocked.

Gone.

Where it had once been, there was only a wall of eyes, blinking slowly in unison.

In the kitchen, her phone buzzed again.

> "You opened it."

"It's awake."

"Run."

But where could she run?

Every window showed a different place—not her street, not her town. One showed the forest where Lillian had vanished. Another, the circle carved into stone. A third showed Evelyn herself, looking back from inside the screen.

Her reflection was moving—but she wasn't.

She turned around sharply.

Nothing.

But when she looked again, her reflection smiled.

A cruel, unnatural grin.

And then it whispered:

> "I'm ready to wear you now."

The Thing in Her Skin

The lights in the house were dead, yet Evelyn could still see. Not with her eyes, but with something else—as though a second sight had opened, one that peeled back the veil between worlds. Every surface shimmered with an oily haze, revealing shadows that didn't belong and cracks in reality too narrow to crawl through… yet wide enough for things to watch from.

Her reflection on the phone continued smiling, the eyes wrong—pupils like slits, mouth twitching as if resisting a laugh.

> "You should never have come back," it whispered.

"Now it remembers you."

She dropped the phone. It didn't shatter. Instead, it melted into the floor, swallowed by the boards that now looked like trembling flesh.

Evelyn backed into the hallway. The pictures on the walls had changed. Where once were family portraits, there were now blurry images of people screaming, faces stretched into expressions of eternal silence.

Then came the humming.

Soft. Gentle. A lullaby.

She knew it.

Lillian's song.

She had sung it that summer night by the lake, just before vanishing.

Evelyn turned the corner toward the source. The living room, bathed in flickering candlelight. Symbols scrawled across the floor.

And in the center—

A girl.

Back to Evelyn. Kneeling. Hair matted and dark. Pale skin.

Wearing Lillian's favorite yellow dress.

> "Lillian?" Evelyn whispered.

The girl stilled.

Slowly, mechanically, she turned her head—but only halfway. Like her neck resisted, like her body wasn't used to movement anymore.

Her face…

Was a mask of skin. Not hers. Stitched. Borrowed. Worn.

Evelyn choked on a scream.

The girl smiled.

> "You brought my face back."

Suddenly, the air went cold. Every candle snuffed out. Evelyn was plunged into blackness.

Hands gripped her from behind.

Cold. Bony. Too many fingers.

> "One by one," a voice breathed against her ear. "You'll all wear her."

Evelyn thrashed, breaking free, running blindly toward the kitchen. The hallway stretched unnaturally, bending into a spiral as she ran. The walls bled words in charcoal ink. Names. Dates.

Hers was among them.

Evelyn Carter – Claimed.

She crashed through an unseen barrier and landed in the kitchen, gasping. It was… normal.

Bright. Morning light streaming through the window. The kettle whistling.

Had she imagined it? A dream? A hallucination?

The front door stood open. Birds chirped outside.

She took a step forward—

And froze.

Her reflection in the window was still smiling.

Still watching.

Still waiting.

And then it blinked.

> "Almost ready," it mouthed.

The Reflection Room

Evelyn stood frozen in the kitchen, heart thundering like a war drum. The peaceful morning light felt wrong, like a stage set—too perfect, too still. Even the birdsong outside looped unnaturally, a glitch in reality.

Her reflection in the window didn't mimic her movements. Instead, it tilted its head slowly, skin rippling as though something underneath was trying to get out.

And then it whispered through the glass:

> "You're already inside. You just haven't noticed yet."

The world shattered around her—literally.

Glass exploded inward, but not from the window. It came from inside the walls. Every surface in the kitchen fractured outward, revealing mirror-like layers beneath the drywall and paint. The entire house had been built atop a skin of reflections, a labyrinth of twisted versions of herself watching from beneath the surface.

One mirror—directly across the room—flickered violently. In it, Evelyn saw herself, bound to a chair, mouth sewn shut, eyes wide with terror as the thing wearing her skin stood behind her, smiling with too many teeth.

> "You see it now," a voice whispered from the shards. "This house is not a place. It's a memory. And you're the one who buried it."

Evelyn stumbled back, knocking over a chair. The moment she hit the floor—

The kitchen disappeared.

She was no longer in her house.

She was in the Reflection Room.

A circular space with no doors, no ceiling, no floor—only mirrors, stretching in all directions. And every one held a different version of her.

Some screaming.

Some laughing.

Some hollow-eyed, their mouths filled with worms.

And one—one stood still, arms open, waiting.

It looked exactly like her, except its shadow stretched in the opposite direction. Not away from the light—toward it.

> "Let me in," the reflection said. "I'll carry the pain. I'll find the truth. I'll make it all stop."

Evelyn shook her head. "You're not me."

> "But I'm stronger than you. And I remember what you don't."

The mirrors pulsed. One by one, they shattered inward, and the versions of Evelyn began to climb through the broken frames. Dozens of her, all limping, crawling, dragging themselves forward.

> "We're all that's left," they chanted.

"We're all that you buried."

"We are what remains."

She screamed, clutching her ears as the voices became deafening. The air thickened into a cold mist, swallowing her whole. Her lungs burned, her skin prickled, and her mind fractured under the weight of too many selves screaming to be heard.

And then—

Silence.

She opened her eyes.

She was standing in her childhood bedroom.

The summer of Lillian's disappearance.

Her mother called from downstairs.

> "Evelyn, honey? Don't forget your flashlight. You girls are going to the lake, right?"

Evelyn looked down at her hands.

She was twelve again.

But in the mirror by her bed—she was still thirty. And the older version was crying.

Silently.

Desperately.

And behind her reflection, a shadow moved.

The Faceless Queen.

Still watching.

Still waiting.

End of Chapter 28.