The Door Opens

November 19, 1871

Tonight, the house exhaled.

The walls groaned, long and low, as if drawing breath for the first time. The floor swelled beneath my feet, and the cellar door creaked open on its own. The hum that once lived under the boards now beats like a pulse — steady, human — rising through the wood, through my legs, into my chest until my heart answers in rhythm.

The mark on my arm burned first white, then gold, then black. Each color felt like a different kind of pain — heat, light, emptiness. The candles died all at once. Darkness flooded the room so completely it had weight. And in that weight, I heard him speak my name — not as a question, but as a claim.

I fell to my knees, the air thick as ash, and whispered the words I had written to seal the veil:

“Aven marth ul’thel, seal the mouth, spare the vessel.”

For a heartbeat, there was silence. Then the laughter came — quiet, intimate, threaded through my own breath.

“There is no vessel,” he whispered. “There is only us.”

And the door below kept breathing.