Chapter 17: The Seventh Knocks

I didn't sleep.

I lay on the cold wooden floor in the center of the living room — the only place where the house didn't hum anymore.

The spiral had gone quiet.

But the silence wasn't peace.

It was waiting.

It was the kind of silence you feel before a scream.

The kind that knows something is standing just behind your breath.

And it was.

I felt it.

---

At 3:17 a.m., the knocking started again.

But this time, it wasn't on the walls.

It was on the door.

The real one.

The mouth-shaped one in the hallway.

The slit where a tongue belonged had widened.

Dripping slowly.

Rhythmic.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Then a pause.

Then again.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Not impatient.

Not demanding.

Summoning.

---

I rose slowly.

My legs felt like glass.

Each step toward the door pulled something from inside me—like the house was unraveling my nerves one thread at a time.

When I reached it, I paused.

Pressed my palm to the surface.

It was wet.

Warm.

And this time—it whimpered.

---

A voice came through, so faint I wasn't sure I heard it out loud:

> "You invited us.

We brought the seventh."

Then, a scratching.

Then a thump.

And then a voice.

Familiar.

Liam.

---

"Let me in," he said. "Please."

His tone was wrong.

Too flat.

Too calm.

Like he wasn't asking.

Like he wasn't Liam anymore.

---

I backed away from the door.

But it pulsed forward.

The wood stretched with each knock now, growing like a heartbeat pressed too close to skin.

Liam knocked again—this time faster.

Tap-tap-tap.

"Let me in," he whispered. "I found the seventh. He wants to see you."

Something about the way he said "wants" made my spine turn to ice.

---

I didn't speak.

But the house did.

It opened the book.

The pages turned on their own again.

Back to the center.

Then forward.

Then to the end.

A new phrase had appeared:

> "Speak the mouth. Open the echo. Welcome the listener."

Beneath it, a spiral drawing of the door.

Split wide open.

A figure crawling through it.

Its head was mine.

Its mouth was missing.

But its chest—where my heart should've been—was a black hole.

Endless.

Open.

And something was climbing out of it.

---

The knocking stopped.

I held my breath.

The silence was worse.

And then—

The door exhaled.

A hot breath.

Foul.

Earthy.

Alive.

And behind me, the mirror cracked.

Not shattered—cracked, as if something behind the glass had pressed its forehead to it too hard.

A spiderweb of splinters spread across the surface.

And through the cracks, I saw a man.

Staring at me.

Smiling.

He wore my skin, but his eyes were solid black.

And in his mouth—rows of small, chattering teeth.

Dozens of them.

Each one chewing.

Each one whispering.

And he mouthed one word:

"Knock."

---

I turned back to the door.

It was bleeding now.

Thick, black sap oozing from its frame like it was alive and suffering.

My hand rose on its own.

I touched the slit.

It pulsed once.

Twice.

And then a voice I hadn't heard in months whispered behind me:

"Dad?"

---

I froze.

Spun.

No one there.

But the voice came again—small, trembling, barely more than breath:

"Dad… it's cold here."

I hadn't told anyone about him.

Not since he drowned.

Not since I saw him in that coffin, waterlogged and smiling—like he knew what was coming.

---

I ran to the hallway mirror.

The crack was wider now.

And inside… I saw him.

My son.

Standing in the spiral hallway.

Holding a nail in one hand.

And in the other…

His tongue.

---

The house had taken him.

And now it was giving him back.

Not as he was.

As it needed him to be.

As the seventh.

---

The door behind me shook violently.

The floor split in thin fractures around it.

The spiral on my chest ignited—hot as fire, spinning so fast I could barely think.

The book's pages turned to ash.

One by one.

Until only the cover remained.

Black leather.

No title.

No author.

Just that final phrase burned into the spine:

"Let them in."

---

I approached the door one final time.

My voice cracked as I whispered, "What happens if I do?"

The door whispered back:

> "Then we speak.

Then we breathe.

Then the silence becomes a song."

I asked, "And if I don't?"

There was a long pause.

Then it answered:

> "Then you remain the echo.

And the mouths keep knocking.

Forever."

---

I closed my eyes.

Put my mouth to the slit.

And spoke.

Not a word.

A sound.

A low, guttural hum—like Walter's voice had always carried inside me.

The house shook.

The hallway went black.

And the door…

Opened.

---

Inside, there was no room.

Only sky.

Vast.

Empty.

Filled with spirals spinning in every direction.

Soundless screams twisting into music I couldn't understand.

And floating there—

The seventh.

Not my son.

Not really.

But wearing his shape.

Wearing my guilt.

He reached toward me.

And said:

"Now you're ready."