About

You're standing at the end of a quiet, country lane. In front of you is a crumbling stone wall. Stones litter the ground around you, little tufts of grass springing up from beneath them. There is a gap, big enough to squeeze through just in front of you. You manage to slip through.

You find yourself now in a small wood, with short trees which twist and knot together above your head and almost blot out the sun. They seem to be thinning out as you walk forward.

The ground begins to grow steeper, and before long you emerge into the sunlight on a little hill, swathed in long grass which rustles in the wind. At the top of the hill is a strange little house, grand and ornate, a stately home in miniature. You head towards it, and then you hear the sound of singing drifting towards you on the wind. The words are unclear, reduced to nondescript sounds by the distance, like an impressionist painting in sounds. It's pleasing to the ear, and though you don't know the song, you find yourself humming along. You're hurrying along through the tall grass, the sound is enticing.

You can see a small shape at one of the top windows. It seems to be beckoning, welcoming you in. The door is open. You go towards it and push it aside.

You're in a hallway. The light is dim, and it takes your eyes a few moments to adjust from the glare of the sun outside. All appears grey under a thick layer of dust, except for one thing. Wrapped around the banisters, coiled around the clock which does not tick, twisted around doorknobs are endless lengths of brown string. It crisscrosses across the hallway, and you frequently must duck and hop to avoid becoming equally entangled like the objects in the house. That sweet voice from before is singing again, and you instinctively turn towards the stairs. You must be careful to avoid the threads which gather around your ankles.

You reach the landing. Somewhere a clock is chiming. It sounds as if it is coming from behind you, but the clock in the hallway was still. You count the chimes, knowing they will claim midnight though outside the sun if surely still shining. After the twelfth chime is struck, it falls silent.

There are doors on all sides of you, and the corridor is narrow. It stretches away from you on either side, into the gloom. The threads are curiously absent here. On your left, about three doors down, a curtain billows forth, bathed in silvery light that cannot possibly be moonlight. You hurry forward, your foot almost catching on the carpet. You reach the window and find neither the hill or the wood staring back at you, but a courtyard. High above the roof is the moon, fully glutted when just last night it was hardly there. In your distress you hardly notice the figure in the window opposite. When you finally catch sight of shadowy individual you recoil in alarm. They do the same. Hesitantly you raise your right hand, only to see this gesture repeated, in mirror form.

Somewhere a door opens. It is hard to tell where. The sound echoes, bouncing off walls, real or imagined. You turn away from the window, which cannot truly be what it pretends to be, and are faced with a ghastly apparition. A man in beetle black, with a wan, pale face, drooping eyelids and thick, fleshy lips. These last he draws back, revealing yellowing teeth and grinning like a clown. "The mistress will see you now." He calls, in a voice which warbles and booms so terribly you put your hands to your ears to try and block it out. All at once he propels himself towards you, seeming to glide rather than walk and that grinning face is almost pressed against your own. He grabs your wrist, holding it with cold fingers like spiders legs, and when you open your mouth to cry out the air is sucked forth as the walls seem to melt and shake and pulse.

In hardly an instant you are before a tall, dark wooden door, and the ghoulish butler is nowhere to be seen. You can still feel his hand upon your wrist though, threatening to snap the bones like dry twigs if you do not go on. The doorknob is fashioned most horribly, with a little gnomish, malevolent face peering out at you. Shuddering, you grip it and twist and in your terror you fancy you hear a little muffled squeal of pain from behind your palm. The door swings open slowly, revealing a small, damp-smelling chamber. Here again, those strands of string appear. These are pure and white as lamb's wool, stretched taut across the room until they reach the bed. The bed is a large four-poster, draped with fabrics so that the occupant is quite well hidden. The song is louder here, and is coming from the bed you realise. As you draw closer you see the carvings on the bed posts in more details. Witches and goblins cavorting with goats, hares, weasels and beetles, under a sympathetic moon. The song abruptly stops, and the thing -for it cannot be human- begins to stir. You seem to have no control over your movements, for your hand is already drawing aside the curtains. Layer after layer fall, a veritable nest of fabrics is now at your feet. Finally you pull aside enough to be able to peer in.

The bed is empty, the bedspread undisturbed. All is crisp and clean and untouched. With a chill that spreads like fire through dry woods you realise there is something behind you, breathing on your back. The witch is here.

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