Page 40 of The Spiral

Chapter 14

Madeline

I crawl my way back up the wall and head for the closest door, hoping that by some miracle, the lock didn’t actually turn and it was just my imagination running wild. Ghosts. It’s insane.

A hissing noise erupts in the room the moment I go to touch the handle, making me swing round and back up to the wall again. White light explodes around the space, almost blinding me with its assault on my senses. I raise my arm, trying to protect my face as it gets brighter and then draws back to the mirror, giving me a chance to see again.

“What the hell is going on?” I shout out, shivering in fear.

Scrawled writing begins on the fogged surface of the mirror. Letters and numbers, dates, times, but it all disappears again so quickly I struggle to see its meaning.

I need you, Maddy.

More words appear, jumbled and messy, almost as if it’s another language until the surface clears and then I see one I recognise. There, bold as brass and dispersing by the second the name Lewis is scrawled. I gasp, my feet faltering backwards in disbelief. And then, as soon as it disappears, the beginnings of another word. I start forward again, still hugging my frame but intrigued by whatever is about to appear. Why would Lewis be written there?

Slowly more letters appear. First an S, then an E, then an L, until finally the name Selma hovers and then disappears, too. Selma. And then an H, O, M, and E. Home?

I stare, dumfounded by the last trace of an E as it all completely disperses, bringing with it a warmer feeling that washes around the room. I rub my shoulders, wondering what the hell I’ve just been a part of while desperately trying to dismiss it. There was writing there. Real writing. I didn’t imagine it. Storms don’t create writing. Wind and frost don’t make letters appear in the mirror. I just stand here, still staring at the mirror and trying to understand the meaning of any of this.

The door suddenly bursts open, the slam of it against the wall making me leap away from the noise.

“Why didn’t you answer?” a frantic looking Jack says as he storms in, axe in his hand and sweat marring his brow.

“I did, and then you stopped shouting.” I respond bluntly, frowning at his perplexed expression. He left me to deal with all of this—left me alone in the middle of this damned ballroom with nothing but the skin on my bones to protect me.

“I’ve been shouting through that door for twenty minutes,” he says, walking closer, which only causes me to back away from him and his offering of all too late help. “Fucking Scottish oak wouldn’t budge.”

Has he? I didn’t hear him. All I could hear was her voice, and then the wind.

I narrow my eyes at him, watching the way his hand grips the axe, and then swing them back up to his eyes for clarity in the middle of this strange drama. He appears to believe himself. He looks almost apologetic for not getting in quicker.

“Who’s Selma?”

His frame immediately tenses, his eyes looking anywhere but at me for a second or two before they’re replaced with his normal self-assurance, arrogance even.

“Why?”

“I didn’t ask you for a question. I asked who she is, which you clearly know.”

He takes two steps away from me, two long strides backwards, before turning on his heel and beginning to walk straight out of the room again. My feet are so quick to have me in front of him he hasn’t got a chance.

“No. Whatever just happened in here happened for a reason, I want to know what it is. Who’s Selma? You called me by her name. And I can hear her.”

“It’s not something I’m discussing with you, Madeline,” he says, sidestepping me and heading out of the room.

Fine. I’ll just go up to that third level of the stairs and find out then, shall I? Locked doors are absolutely not keeping me out, because that’s all I found when I got up there earlier. I go through that in a ballroom, something he most definitely has an idea about, and then he’s not prepared to discuss it with me?

I’ve turned, hurried past him, snatching the axe from his hand as I go, and picked up speed before he has a chance to even gauge what I’m up to.

“What’s the problem with the stairs, Jack?” I call, skidding around the corners to get to the long hallway. I hear his pounding feet behind me as he chases me down, but he’s not going to get to me in time. I want to know. Now. And if it takes a bit of taunting to get what I want then that’s what we’ll do. “What happened, huh?”

“Madeline, no,” his voice calls, a sense of desperation now coursing through that arrogant tone. Screw that. I’m going up those stairs and he can follow me or not. I’ll smash the doors in to find out what’s hiding in this house. Something’s not right here. It’s freaky, as is he now I think about it regardless of his clear beauty.

My knees propel me into the circular space then onto the bottom step, lurching me onto the next two before he’s even caught up. The vision of him sliding around the corner as I turn back to see how close he is, is one of utter rage. I half stop, twisting my body back towards him to ask the question again, my left leg still moving up the stairs.

“Who’s Selma? And why shouldn’t I go up these stairs?”

“Come down,” he snaps, his hands barely containing the need to grab out at me.

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