Eris peeled her forehead from the door with a sigh that fogged the cool air of her sanctuary. Outside her window, Sarah Torbit's ghostly face was a pale smear against the twilight, her expression a masterpiece of manufactured desperation. The joyful chaos of Luffy's grin from the poster behind her seemed to mock the situation.
So much for a normal holiday.
With the reluctance of someone walking a plank, she yanked her winter jacket from the hook behind her door—a practical, fleece-lined thing that felt absurdly mundane—and slipped out of her room. The wooden stairs creaked their familiar complaints under her weight. She was halfway down when her mother's voice, threaded with the focused energy of a pastry-general mid-campaign, floated from the kitchen.
"Eris? Where are you going? I need a taste-tester for the pecan pie filling!"
"Back in a sec!" Eris called, her voice a notch too bright. She didn't wait for a reply. She shoved her feet into a pair of worn boots by the back door, turned the handle, and slipped out into the biting Asheville evening, pulling the door shut with a firm thud that cut off her mother's inevitable, "But the filling is hot now!"
The cold was a slap, clean and sharp, scented with pine and woodsmoke from a neighbor's chimney. The backyard was a tableau of winter neglect: the skeleton of Cecilia's forgotten fairy garden, a lonely soccer ball half-submerged in a frosty patch, and the dark, silent shape of the family grill under its vinyl shroud. And there, hovering a foot above the frozen grass, was Sarah Torbit.
The ghost looked more substantial here, away from the house's lively energy. She shimmered like a memory, her dress from another decade, her expression now a blend of excitement and apologetic anxiety. "Oh, you came! I knew you would, you're such a good soul, really, the best I've ever—"
"What is it, Sarah?" Eris interrupted, crossing her arms against the cold. Her breath plumed between them. "I'm with my family. I'm on break. Whatever it is, it's going to have to wait."
Sarah's ectoplasmic form rippled, a visual wince. "Oh, honey, see, that's just it. It can't wait. It absolutely has to be tonight. She's calling it in." The ghost's voice dropped to a whisper, though no one living could hear her. "The favor. Camilla is calling in the favor."
A knot of cold that had nothing to do with the evening air tightened in Eris's stomach. The contract. The open-ended promise made in the surreal, suburban prison of Camilla's traveling house. A favor for a favor.
"I can't do anything for her tonight," Eris stated, her voice flat. "I'm not in Aldis. I don't have my… my stuff." She almost said 'my Huntsman,' but choked it back.
Sarah shook her head with frantic energy. "The location isn't a problem. She moves the house, remember? Like flicking a chess piece." The ghost extended a translucent hand. In it, a slip of paper materialized from mist and memory, becoming solid enough to fall to the grass. Eris bent and picked it up. The paper was thick, creamy parchment, and the address written upon it was in an elegant, looping script: 7 Hinds Road, 11:47 PM. The numbers pulsed faintly, a subtle enchantment ensuring they wouldn't be forgotten.
"And what if I don't show up?" Eris asked, the paper feeling dangerously heavy between her fingers.
Sarah's face dissolved into genuine horror. "Oh, sweetie, don't even think that! Please, don't! If you break a contract with one of them…" Her wide, pleading eyes shifted unmistakably toward the warm, glowing windows of the MacDuffie house. The sounds of a cabinet closing, of Peter's muffled laughter from upstairs, of Catherine's distant hum as she baked, all floated into the yard. Sarah's voice became a terrified whisper. "The forfeit wouldn't just be yours. Contracts have a way of… spreading. Snapping onto the ones you're anchored to. It would be awful. Just truly, spiritually awful."
Eris's blood went still. "What would she do? Be specific."
Sarah wrapped her arms around herself, a ghostly self-soothe. "I can't! It's not one thing, it's everything! Bad luck that isn't luck, whispers in the walls, lost things that never come back, smiles that don't reach the eyes… a slow unraveling. But!" she brightened, forcing a tremulous smile. "If you just come, it will all be fine! You fulfill the favor, the debt is cleared, and the lovely Camilla will be out of your life for good! You can go back to your… your track meets, and your chemistry, and your nice, normal boy. It's simple!"
Simple. The word hung in the cold air, a bitter joke. Nothing about Camilla Luana Hildur was simple. Eris thought of the traveling house, of the predatory charm in her eyes, of the chillingly casual way she wielded power with a simple flick of the wrist. She looked down at the address. 11:47 PM. Not midnight, but creepily specific. She thought of her dad balancing the checkbook, her mom rolling pie crust, Cecilia bandaging a stuffed frog, Peter trash-talking online. Her fortress of normalcy.
With a sigh that felt ripped from her core, she shoved the parchment into her jacket pocket. The pearl necklace from Rhiannon lay against her skin, a second cold weight, a silent judge. "Fine."
Sarah's relief was a visible wave, making her form blur. "Oh, wonderful! I knew you were smart! We'll see you tonight, then! Don't be late!" And with a pop of displaced air that smelled faintly of old roses and damp earth, the ghost vanished.
The backyard was suddenly just a backyard again, silent and cold. But the pressure in the air remained.
The back door swung open, framing Cathrine MacDuffie, a streak of flour on her cheek and a wooden spoon in her hand like a scepter. "Eris Sylvie, what on earth are you doing out here without a hat? You'll catch your death! Get in here this instant and tell me if this filling has enough bourbon or if your father will complain."
Eris forced her frozen face into a smile. "Coming, Mom." She trudged back toward the light and the warmth, the enchanted address in her pocket burning a hole through the fleece, a countdown to an unseen throne room now ticking away in the Blue Ridge night.
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The digital clock on Eris's nightstand glowed a guilty red: 11:03 PM. The house had settled into the deep, creaking quiet of a sleeping family. Down the hall, Peter's gaming headset leaked a tinny, intermittent burst of gunfire. From her parents' room, the familiar, soft rumble of her dad's snore vibrated through the floorboards. Her phone buzzed on the comforter, a jarring little earthquake in the dark.
A text from Jessie lit up the screen. So my mom's calendar is a nightmare. How about Biltmore in 3 days? We can make a whole day of it. Hit the gardens, the winery, maybe that burger place you liked.
A phantom of a normal life, texting in the dark. Eris's thumbs moved quickly. That sounds great. Can't wait. She meant it, with a desperation that surprised her.
Cool. I'll text you a time tomorrow. Gotta run—my little bro is having a crisis about his free-kick form. Says my tutorial sucks. A second later, a follow-up: He's not wrong.
Eris's mouth quirked. ttyl, she sent back. The smile faded as she looked at the time. 11:07. The parchment in her jacket pocket, hanging on the back of her desk chair, felt less like paper and more like a lodestone, pulling her toward the door.
She moved with the quiet grace of her track training, slipping into the hallway. She grabbed her jacket and, on a impulse she couldn't explain, snatched Buster's leash from its hook by the back door. The dog, who had been snoring on his back in a patch of moonlight, cracked one eye open, then the other.
"Walk?" Eris whispered.
Buster rolled onto his feet with a grunt that shook his whole body. Walk was a magic word, even at this hour.
She didn't announce her departure. She simply opened the back door, the click of the latch sounding like a gunshot in the silence, and stepped into the swallowing cold of the night, Buster waddling eagerly at her heels.
Outside, the world had changed. A thick quilt of clouds smothered the stars and the moon, leaving the night ink-deep and starved of light. The cold was no longer brisk; it was predatory, seeping through her jacket and nipping at her ears. The only illumination was the jaundiced glow of sporadic streetlights, which cast hard, isolated pools on the empty asphalt, and the bluish glare of her phone screen as she pulled up the GPS. 7 Hinds Road. It was on the older, more wooded side of the neighborhood, where the lots were bigger and the shadows longer.
She walked, Buster's nails tick-tick-ticking a steady rhythm beside her. Her breath plumed ahead, a ghost leading the way. About halfway, under a streetlight that flickered with a dying buzz, the air in front of her gathered and thickened. Sarah Torbit coalesced like condensation on a cold glass, her form glowing with a faint, internal light that made the surrounding dark feel heavier.
"Right on time!" Sarah chirped, her voice a cheerful whisper that echoed oddly in the empty street. "It's just up here, around the bend. Not far at all! You're doing so wonderfully."
"Just lead the way, Sarah," Eris muttered, her eyes scanning the oppressive dark between the pools of light. The normal sounds of night—the rustle of leaves, the distant sigh of the wind—felt like they were holding their breath.
Sarah floated ahead, a will-o'-the-wisp in a vintage cardigan. "She's ever so pleased you agreed. Really, this is for the best. Clean slate!"
The houses grew sparser, the trees crowding closer to the road. Then, they rounded a curve, and there it was. 7 Hinds Road.
It wasn't a mansion, nor a creepy Gothic pile. It was a cottage. A picture-perfect, storybook cottage plucked from a fairy tale and deposited behind a low, picket fence. It had cob walls that looked softly rounded, a thatched roof that appeared impeccably neat, and latticed windows where diamond-shaped panes gleamed with warm, inviting candlelight. Climbing roses, impossibly lush and deep crimson even in December, framed a bright blue door. It was the kind of house that begged for a gingerbread trim and a kind old woman offering apple tarts.
But everything was wrong.
The warmth from the windows didn't reach beyond the glass, casting no glow on the frost-whitened grass. The roses, when a stray breeze shifted, released a scent not of floral sweetness, but of something richer, darker—like overripe plums and damp, turned earth. And the silence around it was absolute. No crickets, no wind in the trees nearby, not even the distant hum of a car. It was a pocket of dead air.
Buster, for the first time, stopped. He didn't growl. He just sat down on the sidewalk, his head cocked, his velvety ears drooping as he stared at the little white gate. He let out a soft whuff, then looked up at Eris, panting with his tongue lolling, his expression one of pure, simple canine curiosity. Weird house. You seeing this?
Sarah was already halfway up the stone path, turning and waving a translucent hand. "Come on, silly! Don't dawdle!"
Eris looked down at Buster. His simple, confused loyalty was a tangible thing in the eerie quiet. "Okay, Buster," she whispered, her voice swallowed by the stillness. "You're my witness. Let's go."
As if on cue, the little white gate gave a long, mournful creak and swung inward on its own.
Buster barked once—a sharp, surprised sound—then gave a short, conversational howl, as if replying to the gate's greeting. He trotted through, his tail giving a tentative wag.
Eris followed, crossing the threshold. The moment she stepped off the public sidewalk and onto the property's path, the world outside the fence blurred, as if viewed through old, warped glass. The sound of her own footsteps changed from the crunch of frozen gravel to the hollow knock of her boots on ancient, polished oak.
She was no longer on a normal suburban lot.
The cottage now revealed its true scale. It wasn't larger, but it felt… deeper. The thatch of the roof was too perfect, each reed identical, whispering secrets of marshes in forgotten lands. The candlelight in the windows flickered with flames that burned a steady, unwavering gold, untouched by any draft. The rose vines, she now saw, had thorns that caught the light like tiny, hooked daggers.
The blue door opened before she could raise her hand to knock.
Camilla Luana Hildur stood in the doorway. She looked exactly as she had in Aldis: a girl of perhaps fourteen, drowning in the sophisticated elegance of a tailored ivory blouse and charcoal trousers that must have cost more than Eris's semester tuition. Her hair was a fall of pale gold, sleek and perfect. Her face was porcelain-doll beautiful, but her eyes were the weathered slate of a mountain cliff, holding centuries of sharp, impatient intelligence.
"Eris Sylvie," she said, her voice a cool, clear bell that held no warmth. "You are punctual. I appreciate that in an asset. And you've brought… a hound." Her gaze flicked to Buster, who sniffed at the doorframe, unimpressed. "How… economical. Enter."
The interior of the traveling house was a masterpiece of disorienting contradiction. It smelled of beeswax polish, aged parchment, and that same underlying scent of dark, fertile loam. The space defied logic—a cozy cottage parlor that stretched back into a grand, shadowy hall lined with shelves. Those shelves didn't hold books. They held cages. Small, ornate, beautifully crafted cages of silver, glass, and woven willow. Some were empty. In others, shapes moved: a flutter of iridescent wings no bigger than a thumb, a pair of glowing, sorrowful eyes, a tiny, furred creature that pressed itself against the bars.
This was Camilla's inventory. Her merchandise.
A grand fireplace crackled with a fire that gave off heat but no smoke. Above the mantle, not a painting, but a large, ornate frame containing a shifting, living map of what looked like constellations Eris didn't recognize, some of the stars pulsing with a slow, urgent rhythm.
"Sit," Camilla instructed, gesturing to a high-backed chair that looked more like a minor throne. She herself perched on the edge of a massive oak desk, her feet barely touching the floor. On the desk sat a ledger bound in what looked like pale leather, and a pen that gleamed with a cold, silver light.
Eris remained standing. Buster settled at her feet with a grunt, already looking bored. "You called in the favor. What is it?"