M. Kate Allen - Crystal Winters and the Haunted Mansion

For Anastasia

Chapter 1

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Crystal who didn't like to wait around. She arrived an hour and forty-seven minutes after her mother's water broke. The nurses and doctors gaped as she made her way into the world with a shock of dark-blue hair and light blue eyes. She was reading full-length novels at the age of three. She read every note her Kindergarten teachers wrote before her parents came to pick her up from school, and there were a few. Crystal was a current of energy, fast as lightning and loud as thunder.

Crystal was a girl unlike any who had ever lived in her town. This left her feeling very much alone.

On her tenth birthday, her parents gave her permission to begin riding her bike around the neighborhood on her own. She didn't waste a moment. As soon as they returned from her birthday party, she put on her favorite dark blue jeans and black leather boots and tied her waist-length dark-blue hair in her favorite sparkling black hair tie. She packed a pouch of cashews, threw a metal water bottle in a sling over her shoulder, and pedaled away into the evening light, hair and handlebar streamers flowing in a tumbling breeze of her own making.

At the edge of her town lay a wide, deep forest. She parked her bike along the outer ring of trees. Her birthday landed in the month of the Leaf-Turningleaves in hues of red, orange, and yellow whispered amongst themselves before they danced through the air to the forest floor. She looked left and right to see if anyone was watching.

She was the only creature of her kind there.

For the first time in her life, she slowed down.

She stepped carefully into the trees, rubbing their bark and catching leaves. Deeper and deeper into the forest she walked.

She stepped into a clearing. The light in the sky was vivid and colorful; it would be dark soon. She saw the beginning of a stone path at the far end of the clearing and excitement overcame her caution. She trotted toward the end of the clearing like a horse and stepped onto the path. Fireflies began to light the way as the darkness swelled around her.

All of a sudden there was a grand house before her, pale stone with roof tiles the color of blood. Two pil ars rising into the sky on either side of the house with hats like upside down sugar cones. Candles stood unlit in the windows. No light shone within. She shivered, wondering who or what she might find inside. She ascended the stairs to the porch and knocked three times.

Knock.

Knock.

Knock.

Chapter 2

Crystal placed her left ear against the door.

The wind blew hard at her back. Her ponytail whipped against the doorframe. She pulled it over her right shoulder and plaited it quickly, securing it with a black hair elastic from her pocket. She pressed her ear against the wooden doorframe again. Were those footsteps she heard?

Holding her breath, she clasped the door handle. She heard a click, and then the door swung inward into shadow and dust.

She glanced behind her, wishing for the warmth and familiarity of home. Then she turned back, straightened up, and took a breath. She crossed the threshold.

Cool, musty air greeted her. She stood in a large entryway. Two curving staircases ascended on either side, meeting in a united

staircase that continued up to the second floor. A fine filigree pattern covered the maroon wallpaper. Cobwebs hung from the crown molding. Dust lay thick on an iron coat rack near the front door. Crystal shivered and pulled her jacket tighter around her waist.

Next to each staircase was a doorway to a first-floor room. She peeked inside the room to her left. A row of tall, narrow windows lined the wall that bordered the porch. Two more windows flanked a fireplace. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases stood along the remaining two walls. Crystal drew in a breath and held it as she gazed around the room. She approached a green leather armchair that sat on a darkened rug next to a side-table. A pair of wire-rimmed glasses lay on top of an old book. The book was covered with a fine layer of dust, but the glasses looked clean. She reached forward to pick them up, but a creak startled her. She whipped around.

Nobody was there.

"Hello," Nobody said.

Crystal's jaw hung like a sloth on a tree branch.

"Aren't you going to answer me?"

Nobody asked.

Nobodys voice was as clear as a ringing bell. Crystal decided she'd better say something.

"Hello," she said. She licked her lips. A shiver crawled across her body.

"Want to see the rest of the house?"

Nobody asked.

All of a sudden, the smell of bread tickled her nose. Her stomach growled.

"Hungry?" Nobody asked.

"Kind of," Crystal admitted, her mouth watering. She exited the library and followed her noseand, it seemed, Nobody. Nobody and the delicious smell led her to the rear of the house to a large kitchen. There was no dust herethe whole room gleamed in warm candlelight. On the counter next to the oven, a wooden slab bore a loaf of nearly cooled, just-baked bread.

"Help yourself," Nobody said. "You know your way around."

Crystal thought that was an odd thing to say since she'd never been here before, but she was also talking to Nobody, so perhaps she was the odd one. She opened a drawer under the counter and found a sturdy bread knife. She cut a thick slice of the still warm loaf. She noticed a slab of butter on a crystal dish next to the bread. It hadnt been there a moment ago. Odd, she thought. She cut a sliver of it. It gave way easily. She buttered the bread and took a bite. Her mouth filled with warm, soft, melting deliciousness, and she forgot for a moment that she was in the company of Nobody.

Nobody cleared their no-throat.

Crystal looked up, bread half hanging out of her mouth. She had bitten off more than she could chew. Was that shimmer Nobody's outline? And was Nobody gesturing for her to join them in the hallway? She continued to chew the bread as she walked across the checkerboard floor tiles.

"Are you scared?" Nobody asked.

Crystal thought this, too, was strange.

"No, not really."

"I didn't think so. The only ones who ever make it in here are those with True Sight, and they never stay scared for long. They're too busy being curious."

"There are others?" Crystal murmured.

"Of course," Nobody said. And then Nobody was moving up the left stair of the main entryway. Crystal was not sure how she knew this, since she could not see Nobody, but she followed anyway, picking up a lit candle from the kitchen table to light her way.

She paused at the window that stood above the stairwell where the staircases met. It started as a rectangle at the bottom and curved to a point at the top. Miniature panes of glass cut in diamonds hardly bigger than Crystal's hand formed a pattern that reflected the light like jewels. She set her hand against the window and then withdrew it, realizing Nobody might yell at her for touching what was not hers to touch.