I blink rapidly, my eyes struggling to adjust to the blinding light of the chandeliers overhead.
For several moments, all I can see is white—an unbearable brilliance that burns through my vision. Slowly, shapes begin to emerge from the glare.
I know this place.
My home.
Or, more accurately, my family's home.
I haven't set foot inside these halls in six years.
As my vision clears, I take in my surroundings.
The hall is enormous, its vastness made even more apparent by the unsettling emptiness that fills it. A domed ceiling stretches high above me, disappearing into the harsh glow of countless chandeliers. Their light spills across polished stone floors, illuminating a room that should have been filled with people, servants, and the quiet murmur of conversation.
But there is nothing.
No people.
No furniture.
Not even the faintest sound of life.
Only silence.
Tall support pillars stand at regular intervals throughout the hall, their pale surfaces disappearing into the shadows beneath the dome. Directly ahead of me, two grand staircases rise side by side, curving gently as they ascend toward the upper floors.
And between them, at the base of the stairs, stands a portrait.
I know the man in it.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
The first patriarch of the Spinoza family.
My family.
The portrait is enormous, nearly reaching the height of the staircase itself. Its frame is silver, intricately carved with designs I can't quite make out beneath the chandelier's glare.
The man within it looks to be middle aged.
Dark black hair falls neatly around a sharp, severe face, and sapphire-blue eyes stare outward from the canvas.
Straight at me.
There is something unsettling about those eyes.
They don't merely look at me.
They seem to see me.
As though the man in the portrait can somehow look beyond the canvas and into the deepest parts of my mind.
I stare back.
Then—
The smell of smoke reaches me.
I frown.
A thin gray tendril curls lazily through the air beside me.
Another follows.
Then another.
My eyes widen.
Smoke.
When did the hall begin filling with smoke?
I take a step back, coughing as the acrid scent fills my lungs. The smoke thickens rapidly, spreading across the floor and coiling around the pillars like living serpents.
And then the flames come.
They appear wherever the smoke passes.
One moment, the pillar is untouched.
The next, fire blooms across its surface.
Another pillar catches on fire.
Then the walls.
Then the ceiling.
Flames spread through the hall with unnatural speed, crawling across every surface as though the building itself has become fuel.
Heat crashes over me.
I stumble backward, coughing violently as smoke claws at my throat. My eyes sting, tears spilling down my cheeks as I turn toward the entrance.
I need to leave.
I force my legs to move.
Nothing happens.
I look down.
My feet are rooted to the floor.
Not metaphorically.
My shoes have somehow fused with the stone beneath them.
Panic begins to rise in my chest.
I pull harder.
Nothing.
The flames draw closer.
They roar around me, devouring everything in their path. The pillars crack and collapse. The walls disappear behind curtains of fire. The chandeliers above me groan as their metal frames begin to warp beneath the unbearable heat.
The hall is burning.
And I am trapped inside it.
Yet somehow, amidst the inferno, one thing remains untouched.
The portrait.
The flames crawl around its silver frame, licking at its edges, but they refuse to consume it.
The first patriarch still stands there.
Still watching.
Those sapphire eyes remain fixed upon mine.
Piercing.
Judging.
Waiting.
Then I hear a scream.
I freeze.
It takes me a moment to realize the scream is coming from me.
Pain explodes through my legs.
The flames have reached me.
They wrap around my body, scorching through flesh and bone with a heat unlike anything I've ever known. I scream harder, desperately trying to tear myself free, but my voice seems to vanish beneath the deafening roar of the fire.
I can't hear myself anymore.
I can't hear anything.
Only the roar of the flames and the pounding of my heart.
Those cold sapphire eyes staring at me from across the burning hall.
My vision begins to fade.
The world darkens around the edges.
The last thing I see is the inscription carved beneath the portrait.
Three words.
Three words that seem to burn brighter than the flames themselves.
Cineres et Sulphur.
Then everything goes black.