The air around them bent, as if reality itself was being pulled apart. The shadows coming from Elora weren't just dark they were alive, pulsing, whispering.
Clara dragged Emmanuel toward the hallway, but the house stretched, warped. The hallway seemed endless now.
"Elora!" Emmanuel shouted, even as they ran. "If there's any part of you still in there, fight it!"
Behind them, her laughter echoed Elora's laugh, then something else. Something ancient and hungry.
Clara pulled a small vial from her pocket a gift from Reverend Graves, just in case. Holy water, etched with a sigil. "This was never meant to be used," she muttered, "but screw it."
She turned and flung it at Elora.
The vial exploded mid-air.
Screaming raw, inhuman filled the house as Elora dropped to her knees, clawing at her face. Smoke curled from her skin. "Why would you do this to me, Emmanuel?!" she cried, and for one second… it was her voice. Just her.
He froze.
Clara didn't.
She ran toward the old mirror at the end of the hallway the one they'd always avoided, the one Graves said was the real door.
"Elora didn't bring it," Clara realized. "The house did. And it used her to get out."
Emmanuel finally moved, helping Clara drag the heavy mirror from the wall. Behind it, they found what they'd feared: a perfect circle carved into the wall, runes scorched into the wood. A portal.
The source.
The door.
"Elora," Emmanuel called. She was crawling toward them, sobbing, black ooze spilling from her mouth.
"You can save her," Clara said, handing him the lighter. "But the door has to close. Someone has to be in there when it shuts."
The room went silent.
Elora raised her head. Her eyes—her real eyes—looked at him. "Let me go," she whispered. "I opened it. I'll close it."
Clara grabbed his hand tight, tears falling. "Let her go, Emmanuel."
Elora smiled one last time, then threw herself into the circle.
Emmanuel lit the edges.
The fire roared. The shadows shrieked. The mirror shattered, and the runes flared white.
Then… silence.
Nothing but ashes and the sound of Clara crying softly beside him.
Elora was gone.
The door was closed.
But Emmanuel knew some doors leave scars, even after they're shut.