Addie wasn’t sure if she wanted to get closer to the house. For one thing, the house certainly wanted her to get closer, with the way it tugged on her ethereal form. But just because the house wanted to suck her in, didn’t mean that Addie herself thought that to be a good idea. In her experience, when magic stuff wanted to do things to your soul, it was better to avoid it at all costs.

And yet, she didn’t know anything better to do in this situation. They needed to clear the ruin site, and Addie certainly wasn’t going to let Nettal go investigate by herself. Nettal had no way to protect herself— that was Addie’s job. Always protect the healer— that was Addie’s new motto.

Just for good measure, she asked Ember to go check out the house again before they got closer. Like last time, Ember easily swooped around the house and didn’t find the eyes. But this time, Addie instructed her birdie to touch the house— nothing crazy, just the first step on the porch.

When Ember flew close enough to land, she fell right through the porch until she hit the grass below. Addie began to question if they even could touch the house at all after that. But staring at it from far away wouldn’t help them.

With trepidation in her heart, Addie grabbed Nettal’s hand, made sure Squishy was ready, and finally began floating closer to the haunted house. Just like before, as Addie got closer to the house, the soul-sucking feeling grew stronger. She had to stop halfway there, the feeling so strong she needed to ground herself and reinforce her transcendent loop.

Her current strength was enough, the transcendent loop holding around her soul and stabilizing it. Squishy was also able to help reinforce Addie’s soul, since he himself did not feel the house trying to draw him in. Together, they were able to weave three whole layers of protective magic around Addie’s soul, and the soul-sucking force coming from the house suddenly didn’t feel quite so bad.

That didn’t mean the force stopped existing altogether, though. Addie worried that as they got closer, soon, her protections wouldn’t be enough. And yet, she resisted with all of her effort, will, and focus.

Just as Addie readied herself to start moving forward again, Nettal turned to Addie with a worried expression. They couldn’t talk, so Nettal pointed backward toward their physical bodies. Addie shook her head no; she didn’t want to go back. They could do this.

Still with concern reflecting in her eyes, Nettal gave Addie a nod, and together they started floating closer to the house again.

“Do not worry, my lady. If the haunted house, as you call it, does something dastardly, you must simply exit your ethereal form— retreat back to your body. And, do not forget, even like this, should you be in danger, I shall always be there to protect you.”

Squishy’s words set Addie more at ease, especially with how they continued to work together to form powerful barrier loops around her soul. Christena had trained them just for a situation like this, Addie reminded herself.

Once they reached the front porch, the tugging on Addie’s soul stopped growing any stronger. Sure, this close to the undulating house, the pull felt to be at its strongest, but when she took one step forward, and then another, the pulling did not get stronger. The current strength must have been the most the house could do.

Or the most the eyes could do.

Addie shook the thoughts away. With one last glance at Nettal, receiving a confirming nod from her cousin in return, Addie started up the stairs of the porch. Unlike Ember, Addie easily made contact with the stairs, climbing up as if she were climbing up any old physical stairs. After a moment, she realized that she was being a bit silly, since she could just float around instead of manually climbing up the stairs. She’d just been so curious if she could touch them after Ember hadn’t been able to.

Now floating properly, Addie approached the front door. This close, she could more easily make out the door knocker, which she hadn’t been able to see very well from afar. To her surprise, the knocker looked an awful lot like Ember— not exactly the same, but a metal-looking casting of the same species, for sure.

She grabbed the knocker and then gave it three hard whacks against the front door. She couldn’t hear anything, which made the whole thing just feel weird to Addie. Her hand knew she was banging on something as hard as wood, and yet her ears told her she was basically punching air. The whole thing disturbed her.

Tense, everyone waited for a few moments, but nothing happened. So, Addie decided to try opening the door. She grabbed the door handle and tried to slowly push down on it, but the handle came to an immediate hard stop. The door was locked. She raised an eyebrow at it— of all things, she didn’t expect to get stopped by a locked door.

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“What if we try going to Realmspace?” Squishy’s mental words jolted Addie out of her surprise.

She thought about Squishy’s idea for a moment, normally they could always get around locked doors just by using their magic, but she’d never tried going to Realmspace while in ethereal form before. It should work just fine, she supposed, since she could still feel Squishy’s magic thrumming within their soul bond.

Shrugging, Addie decided to give it a try. She was still holding Nettal’s hand, so it was a simple thing to extend her magic out to her cousin and Lotty who was on Nettal’s other side. Addie built up the magic, and in the next moment, the entire world around them went pitch-black. She couldn’t see anything, but she quickly realized that her spatial sense still worked just fine.

In this ethereal, dream-like state, Addie found she often had a hard time remembering things or acting with thought-out ideas. She hadn’t even bothered using her spatial sense like this once, even though it had been there in the background all this time.

Realmspace seemed even more alien in this form. It reminded her of the time she first visited Sen when she thought she was just dreaming. The world almost seemed to want to push her around and puppet her body. She felt almost like she ought to just be an observer, like Realmspace would direct her where to go, and she could just watch it like a play.

Nettal was the first one to move, tugging on Addie’s arm and pulling her forward. Addie easily allowed it, in that way that dreams often led her around without trying.

Their magic cut out, and it took only a moment for Realmspace to recognize the intruders. Soon, Realmspace pushed against them, its membrane ejecting them out. With it, Addie felt a great tugging sensation, and when she reappeared in reality, she was surrounded by ghostly blue wooden walls.

Now, more in control of herself, Addie made a concentrated effort to figure out what had happened. Some of the dreaminess she’d felt while in Realmspace wore off, but she still had to use all of her focus and will to control herself while ethereal. Her connection with Squishy told her he was right next to her, and a quick sweep of her spatial sense confirmed that Nettal and Lotty were with her, too.

The inside of the house was strange. She could easily see the four walls, ceiling, and floor of the box-like room she was in, both with her eyes and with her spatial sense. They glowed ethereal blue, not quite the same brightness as Addie and Squishy, but the same color the house had been before. Even though the walls seemed to generate their own illumination, the light didn’t go any further than that. This meant that the room itself was pitch-black. Addie couldn’t see Nettal, Lotty, or Squishy with her eyes at all.

The strangeness was thoroughly distracting; Addie kept trying to make sense of how the walls were lit up even though the room itself was completely dark. Something about it just didn’t sit right with her, and she couldn’t make sense of it.

She almost wanted to touch the wall, drag her finger across it just to confirm it was real. But, with that thought, suddenly she was already there, doing exactly what she’d just imagined. The wood felt normal beneath her fingertips, grainy, and she had to be careful not to get a splinter.

“Woah,” Addie couldn’t help but say mentally. She felt dizzy from the sudden location change. It made her wonder if this is how other people felt when she dragged them with her into Realmspace.

She thought about sitting on the floor instead, Squishy in her lap. And, the next moment, suddenly she was back in the middle of the room, sitting cross-legged, with no memory of actually moving herself or sitting down. One moment she was touching the wall, and the next moment she was sitting down with Squishy in her lap.

This time, she imagined moving outside the room, but no matter how hard she thought about it, she didn’t move.

Something touched her shoulder, and with a start, Addie rapidly scanned behind her with her spatial sense to see what had touched her. She let out a sigh since it was just Nettal. Her cousin wanted her attention in some way, but it was hard to communicate without words.

Even though she hadn’t imagined it, the next thing she knew, Addie was standing in front of the room’s only door. Nettal stood next to her, both girls holding hands. Since she was pointing at the doorway, Addie assumed that the sudden location change must have been Nettal’s doing.

To confirm something, Addie asked Squishy, “Imagine that we are standing at the very back of the room real quick, all of us.”

At the same time Squishy said, ‘Done’, all four of them were now standing at the very back wall of the room, opposite from the main door.

Nettal shook her head in confusion for a moment, and then all four of them were suddenly back in front of the door, Nettal pointing at it again.

It must have been Nettal moving them to the door; Addie realized she must be trying to say that they should leave the room.

The moment Addie put her hand on the doorknob, their location changed again. At first, Addie thought they were back in the same room, standing right in the middle. But since her spatial sense could easily scan the entire room with a single sweep, she realized pretty fast that the door was on the left side of the room this time instead of the front. Even more interestingly, there was also a door on the wall behind them. The room was still a simple cube, though.

Nettal started patting Addie all over the place until she found her hand, since she couldn’t see well in the dark. Then, she pointed to the doorway behind them, since the walls still glowed in that impossible way, seen even without needing a spatial sense. Happy to follow Nettal’s lead, Addie imagined the four of them back at the back door. Once again she touched the doorknob, and suddenly they were in a new room.

No, not a new room, Addie quickly realized. This was the same room they had started in, the one with the door directly in front of them and no other doors but that one.

This time, Nettal moved everyone back to the doorway, and she didn’t hesitate to put her hand on the doorknob— Addie not having to do anything.

Then, they were back in the second room, with the door behind them and the door on the left wall.

Squishy’s mental voice perked up, “Fascinating. Is it a maze?”