The 13th Attempt

Chapter 3: Everyone Dies

Alice started chanting the trapper spell before the rest of us could react.

Lucky for us, the Beast moved slowly, clearly not too worried for its safety. Its attention turned towards Alice, who began choking on her words as she tried to finish the spell. A droplet of blood slid down her nose, but before it got any worse, the Beast's focus was shattered by Julia's shout.

"Hey!" She stood up, the fake button held in her open palm. "This is what you've been looking for, isn't it?"

I watched breathlessly as the Beast's hold on Alice seized entirely and she was left gasping for breath. Now the Beast moved towards Julia, who nervously stood her ground. "Come and get it," she taunted the Beast.

It moved in the blink of an eye. All I could do was scream as I saw Julia go down, blood soaking her shirt and quickly pooling around her on the floor.

Eliot acted quickly, reaching for the button that lay on the ground now. The Beast waved one arm almost lazily and Eliot was slammed against the wall, crumpling down lifelessly. Alice was still chanting in latin behind me, and I looked back just in time to see her utter the final words of the incantation.

The Beast grabbed the button, and nothing happened. I moved back to stand beside Alice, and we waited.

"Quentin, really," the Beast said, pacing towards us. "I expected you to be a bit more clever than this." Without warning, it closed its hand around the button and crushed it into a shower of dust.

Alice and I stepped back until we were pressed against the wall, and that's when our salvation finally showed up.

Charlotte and George, standing between us and the Beast. The ghost children looked at us with frightened eyes. "What have you done?" George looked at us accusingly, and Charlotte yelled, "Run!". The Beast laughed terribly, and the two ghosts exploded in a shower of blood as suddenly as they had appeared.

I felt Alice grab my hand; hers was shaking uncontrollably.

"Oh, there's one more of you I believe," said the Beast. Just then, the ghost of Prudence appeared. She held something in her hand.

Alice screamed as Penny's empty eyes stared back at us, his severed head held in Prudence's pale and wrinkled hand. His lips were crudely sewn shut.

"That's the one," the Beast laughed once more. "Now then, would you care to know why your plan has failed this time around?"

Alice and I said nothing, but the Beast went on.

"You attempted to curse the owner of this house to remain confined to its premises. But I never owned this house."

As we watched, the moths fluttered upwards, quickly moving away and revealing a face -a human face- beneath. It was not the face we had expected. "Quentin," the man -who was decidedly not Christopher Plover- said with an almost pleasant smile. "It's a shame you couldn't stick around a bit longer to hear a most interesting story."

Alice raised her hands, ready to try battle magic in a last desperate attempt, only to fall, heaving, blood pouring out of her nose and mouth. The Beast looked at me and sighed.

"See you next time, Quentin."