Level 1 – The Velvet Fears

I inherited a painting from my great-aunt after she passed.

We weren’t close. I remembered her only vaguely—an elderly woman in a dark dress who smelled of lavender and spoke too little. She’d lived alone in a crumbling estate on the edge of a forest, far from everything and everyone. Her name was rarely mentioned, and when it was, it came with uncertain glances and whispered stories.

When she died, a solicitor delivered a large box to my home. No letter. No explanation. Just an item she had chosen to leave me.

A painting.

It was heavy and strange—framed in gold leaf so intricately carved it almost looked like it had grown that way, like a living vine had hardened into metal. The image showed the exterior of a medieval castle: tall, foreboding, half-swallowed by fog. Its towers reached into a red-and-gray sky, almost bruised in color. Forests curled around its edges like they were trying to hide it—or protect others from it.

I hung it in my library.

The room was one I had built slowly over the years, filled with bargain-hunted books and secondhand shelves. There was no theme. No system. I just liked the feeling of being surrounded by stories, even if I hadn’t read most of them. The painting seemed to match the room’s mood: quiet, faded, and perhaps a little haunted.

At first, I thought nothing of it.

It began with a light.

A flicker in one of the castle’s highest towers—just barely visible. I didn’t remember it being there when I first hung the painting, but I told myself I must have missed it.

The next time I looked, the light was brighter.

And in the window, I saw a figure.

A silhouette—small at first. A shadow.

Still and silent.

Days passed.

The figure moved lower, from the highest tower to a window below. Then again, to a balcony. Always descending. Always still.

It didn’t seem to move while I watched, but it was never in the same place twice.

I told myself it was just a trick of the light—or my imagination.

One afternoon, while dusting the library, I noticed a book I hadn’t seen before.

It was on one of the lower shelves, tucked beside two thick volumes I was sure I hadn’t touched in months. Its spine and cover matched the painting’s frame exactly—dark leather trimmed in curling gold filigree.

It was sealed with a clasp.

I tried to open it, but it wouldn’t budge. The metal catch held firm.

I left it there, unsettled but unsure what to make of it.

That night, I woke with a start.

There was a sound. Faint. Drawn out. Like someone walking slowly across wooden floorboards—too slow, too steady.

I sat up, breath shallow.

It came again. Step. Pause. Step.

I got up, hesitant, heart beating harder than I wanted to admit.

The hallway was cold. The air felt wrong—stale, pressed flat against the walls.

I reached the door to the library.

It was closed.

I opened it.

The painting was glowing. Just enough to cast a soft light on the opposite wall. A low, silvery sheen—like it was catching moonlight.

Except the curtains were drawn.

The shutters were locked.

There was no moonlight.

I stood in the doorway, unable to move. My mouth had gone dry.

The figure in the painting had moved again.

It now stood on the lower terraces of the castle—closer to the main entrance. Closer to me.

It hadn’t been that far down before. I was sure of it.

I closed the door with shaking hands.

Locked it.

Leant against it for a moment, listening. Waiting.

But nothing followed.

I returned to bed because I didn’t know what else to do.

But I didn’t sleep.

Not really.

The next morning, I found a key lying on the floor, just beneath the painting.

Small. Ornate. Brass.

As if it had fallen. As if it had been waiting.

I didn’t touch it at first.

But eventually, I picked it up, my hand trembling. It fit the clasp on the strange book perfectly. The metal gave a soft click, and the cover loosened under my fingers.

The pages were blank.

I turned a few, half-expecting something to appear—but there was nothing.

Some days passed.

The unease lingered, but nothing else happened. No new lights in the painting. No movement. The figure remained frozen, as if stalled mid-step. I started to think maybe it had stopped. Maybe it was done.

One evening, restless and trying to distract myself, I opened the book again.

I thought I’d write in it. Or draw. Anything to reclaim some sense of control over it. But as I turned the pages...

They weren’t blank anymore.

There were sketches. Rough, grainy, drawn in a soft charcoal hand that wasn’t mine—but felt familiar.

My library. The shelves. The reading chair.

The painting on the wall.

And then… the figure.

Still in the painting, but facing out now. Not just watching—but looking.

Straight at me.

My stomach twisted.

Something inside me recoiled. Every hair on my body lifted. The fear wasn’t loud—it was cold. Slow. Settling like dust on my skin.

I needed it gone.

Not just the painting—the book too.

I packed them both, wrapped in blankets, and left them at a secondhand shop across town.

I barely slept that night.

The next morning, the painting was back.

Hanging on the wall.

Perfectly centered. Unmarked. As if it had never left.

Only the painting. The book was still gone.

I called my brother and told him everything.

He laughed. Thought I was joking. Told me I was reading too much horror lately.

I didn’t try to convince him.

I just tried again.

A landfill this time.

Then a collector.

Then a fire.

Once, I watched the painting burn—saw the frame blacken and curl, the canvas blister.

I thought it was done.

But the next morning, there it was.

On the wall.

Untouched.

The figure had moved again.

Now it stood at the base of the castle steps.

Just beyond the doors.

It had nearly arrived.

That was when I sealed the library.

I nailed boards across the frame. Screwed the hinges shut. Dragged furniture in front of the door.

I didn’t care if it looked insane.

I just needed it out of sight.

I told myself it was over.

I told myself I was safe.

But I didn’t believe it.

Not really.

Weeks passed.

The house was quiet again.

Nothing creaked at night. The air no longer felt heavy.

And slowly, like fog fading with the morning light, the fear began to dissolve.

It lulled me into the illusion of safety.

Until the book came back.

I found it one evening, resting neatly in the hallway.

Right outside the library door.

I stopped walking the moment I saw it. My breath caught.

It hadn’t been there a moment earlier.

I stepped closer, heart racing. The air felt colder here. The temperature dropped in a way that made the hair on my arms rise.

I bent down slowly and picked it up.

The leather was warm, somehow. Almost pulsing under my touch.

A shiver ran down my spine.

I turned to look at the library door.

All the boards were gone.

No nails. No screws. No dragged furniture. Nothing.

No trace that it had ever been sealed at all.

The door stood slightly ajar.

A sliver of darkness bled through the gap, heavy and still.

I looked down at the book and opened it.

Inside was a new sketch.

The silhouette was no longer in the painting.

Now beside it.

Tall. Too tall. Its limbs too long, its body narrow and stretched like it had been pulled into shape instead of born.

Its face was wrong. Elongated. Unnatural.

Its lips curled back into a jagged, gleaming smile that reached beyond its cheekbones. Its eyes—round, gleaming, too wide—shone with something that didn’t belong in this world.

I looked up.

The library door was wide open.

And the painting was filled with nothing but the figure.

The castle was gone.

Only it remained.

Staring at me.

I screamed.

Tried to run.

Something caught my foot.

I fell.

Something cold—solid, slick, unyielding—wrapped around my ankles, pulling hard.

My skin scraped raw across the floor. I tried to grab the walls, the doorframe, anything—

But I was dragged back, into the dark.

Into the library.

Everything went black.

The library door creaked.

Then closed.

Softly.

With purpose.

One by one, the nails returned—driven by no hand, yet sinking into place with slow, deliberate force. The boards reappeared across the frame, sealing it shut as if they had never been removed.

Furniture scraped quietly across the floor, sliding back in front of the door until the entrance was once again buried beneath weight and wood and silence.

Inside, the library held its breath.

The painting on the wall—no longer pulsing, no longer watching—began to fade.

Its dark image receded into black, swallowed inch by inch like a flame going cold, until nothing remained but an empty canvas framed in gold.

And then, as softly as breath, another image bled into view.

A quiet lake at dawn. Pale mist rising off the water. Rolling hills in the distance, blushed with the first gold of morning. Light brushing the treetops. Birds scattered across the sky like ink spots on parchment. The water was still.

Serene.

Safe.

The painting that should have been there all along.

When the family arrived, the house was undisturbed.

No mess. No broken windows. No signs of struggle.

The bed was made. The windows were locked.

Every door was secured from the inside, and all the keys were accounted for within the house.

Nothing had been taken.

The phone still rested on the charger.

Identification documents, passport, and wallet sat where they should be.

The closet remained full. Shoes by the door.

The fridge held food that had gone soft, stale, or sour.

The library door had been sealed from the outside.

Thick boards. Screws. Heavy furniture.

It took effort to remove them.

Inside, investigators found only bookshelves, a pair of armchairs, and a single painting on the far wall.

No blood. No disturbed dust.

No signs of why the room had been shut away.

One of the last confirmed interactions with the missing person had occurred two months earlier, when a delivery driver dropped off a large package. It contained a painting.

No further visitors had been recorded.

The investigation determined that the disappearance had occurred roughly a month ago—quietly, without notice.

When asked when anyone had last spoken to the missing person, no one could give a recent date.

The parents had been traveling abroad for the past year, rarely checking in.

The brother had just returned from a three-month business trip. His phone had fallen into a lake early in the trip and had remained broken the entire time.

The missing person had attempted to call him—but no call had gone through.

Close friends had faded from contact.

One had relocated without forwarding information.

Another had entered a long-term silent retreat, entirely off-grid.

There were no messages, no visits, no answered calls in weeks.

The house stood untouched. Nothing appeared to have changed.

And yet, someone was gone.

The case was filed. Searched. Revisited.

But nothing led anywhere.

Eventually, it was closed.

The house was left as it was, quiet and still.

The sealed library remained just as it had been.

And over time, the absence began to settle.

Not like grief.

Like dust on a frame.

Elsewhere, far from the forgotten house and the silence it held, someone else received a package.

An inheritance.

A name they’d only seen in legal documents. A relative they barely remembered—or never knew at all.

There were no expectations.

Just a painting.

Something old. Maybe sentimental.

They opened the box in the evening, with the lights low and the air still.

Inside was a canvas.

A castle.

Tall.

Dark.

Wrapped in fog.

Its towers touched a gray sky.

And in one of the highest windows... a faint, flickering light.

If you ever receive a painting from a dead relative, just in case, have a specialist look at it.

And maybe have it exorcised.