Liam made it to the ledge. Caleb was right behind him. Finn jumped, his foot missing the solid ground and landing in the thick, rising slime.

A terrible, sucking sound filled the air. Finn screamed, feeling the slime begin to pull him under.

Caleb reacted instantly. He dropped the book (which Liam quickly snatched up) and grabbed both of Finn’s wrists, his feet braced against the doorframe.

"Hold on!" Caleb grunted, pulling with all his might.

The suction was fierce, threatening to drag both of them down. Liam, seeing his brother slipping, grabbed Caleb around the waist, pulling both boys back with a desperate surge of strength. With a final, sickening POP, Finn was yanked free of the goo, landing in a wet, stinking heap on the ledge.

They scrambled back through the bronze door. As they slammed the small wooden plank back into the attic wall, they were all shaking. Finn was covered in sticky, purple goo, breathing heavily.

Caleb immediately turned to Finn, ignoring Liam's frantic checks. He gently wiped a smear of slime from Finn's cheek, his eyes wide with concern and a deep, fierce relief. "That was too close," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion.

Finn could only nod, suddenly unable to speak, utterly overwhelmed by the fact that Caleb had risked his own life without a second thought.

Liam, meanwhile, was focused on the third book, which Finn had miraculously saved from the slime. He flipped it open. The handwriting was meticulous, technical, and full of strange diagrams.

“The Foundation is the Anchor, a mechanism that does not exist in three dimensions but spans many. It requires a specific energy signature to locate its dimensional center. The energy must be balanced: two souls bound by blood, one light (the Watcher) and one fire (the Protector). Once the Anchor is located, a third soul, one of pure intent (the Key), can activate the final treasure.”

They all stared at the page, the purple goo drying and flaking around them.

"Two souls bound by blood... one light, one fire," Finn whispered, looking at his blonde hair and Liam's red hair. "Me and Liam."

"The Watcher and the Protector," Liam breathed, realization hitting him like a physical blow.

"And a third soul, one of pure intent... the Key," Caleb finished, looking from Finn to Liam and then back down at his own hands, his face troubled.

The books were not just warnings; they were an instruction manual. They revealed why Finn and Liam had been brought here. They were the components needed to unlock the final treasure.

"We are bait," Liam stated, the awful truth finally settling in. "Eda isn't our aunt. She brought us here because we match the Foundation's requirements."

"The books were trying to warn us who the Trapper is," Finn concluded, his voice cold. "We have the motive (Greed), the method (Trapping), and now the necessary components (Foundation). We need to find the final two books. They have to tell us where the treasure is and how to stop her."

The realization that they were the bait left a bitter taste in their mouths. Finn and Liam, the Watcher and the Protector, were pieces in Eda's game. Caleb, the Key, was the only one who seemed to act without a vested interest—or so they hoped.

They needed the next book to confirm Eda’s identity. The sooner they got it, the sooner they could stop her.

The next afternoon, they approached the attic with a shared, tense silence. Liam, his protectiveness amplified by the knowledge of the "Foundation," was twitchy. Caleb was quiet, his eyes darting between Liam and Finn, as if measuring the distance between them.

The small door opened. The dimensional door behind the crawl space was now a dull, cold iron-gray, engraved with what looked like swirling, ancient Nordic runes.

When they pushed it open, a rush of cold, damp air and the smell of woodsmoke and old leather hit them.

They stepped out onto a muddy, packed earth ground. Before them lay a world bathed in perpetual twilight. Massive, snow-capped mountains loomed in the distance, and the immediate landscape was a desolate, mist-shrouded valley dotted with crumbling stone ramparts and thick, dark forests. They were in a medieval world.

The air was heavy, and the silence was broken only by the sound of rushing water from a hidden stream.

"No aliens, no slime," Liam muttered, gripping a rusted piece of pipe he’d found in the attic. "Just cold."

"This feels like a dungeon," Finn whispered, shivering. The lime-green book of Foundation was clutched in his hand.

"There's the book," Caleb pointed. It rested on a small, crumbling stone altar about fifty yards away, glowing with a fierce orange-red light.

Just as they started forward, a noise stopped them. A rhythmic clang of metal on stone.

From behind a moss-covered ruin stepped a figure. He was tall, dressed in thick leather armor, and carried a menacing, double-bladed axe. But it wasn't the axe that made them freeze.

It was his face.

He had the exact face of Caleb. The same intense eyes, the same strong jaw, the same dark, intent gaze.

"Halt!" the figure commanded, his voice deeper and colder than Caleb's, tinged with a thick, unfamiliar accent. "You trespass on the King's Barrier. Why do you seek the Scroll?"

Caleb stumbled backward, a look of pure confusion and shock on his face. "What—who are you?"

The guard ignored Caleb, his eyes sweeping over Liam, dismissing him entirely, and then settling with unnerving familiarity on Finn.

"Ah," the guard said, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his Caleb-face. "It is the Light-Soul. The Watcher. I was told you would eventually come. You have the curiosity of a captured star."

Finn felt a horrible twist in his gut. This felt intensely personal.

Liam immediately stepped in front of Finn. "We're leaving. We don't want your 'Scroll.'"

The guard laughed—a chilling, hollow sound. "You cannot leave without the Scroll. It is the price of passage. And you, Light-Soul," he said, taking a slow, deliberate step toward Finn, "are worth a far higher price."

The real Caleb bristled, his face contorted in a mixture of fear and growing possessiveness. "Stay away from him! Who are you?"

"I am the Keeper of the Anchor’s Secrets," the guard replied, never taking his eyes off Finn. "And you," he spat, finally sparing a look for the real Caleb, "are a cheap imitation. A poor echo of the Key."

The guard began to advance, axe raised.

"He's trying to mess with us, Finn! Don't listen to him!" Liam yelled, shoving Finn backward.

But the guard was fast. He moved past Liam and suddenly lunged, grabbing Finn's shoulder. Finn gasped, paralyzed by the sight of Caleb's face twisting into a cold, lustful mask of possession.

"Come with me, little star," the guard hissed. "The house wants to show you things it can't show your companions."

A white-hot surge of adrenaline hit the real Caleb. His face flushed with pure, fierce jealousy. He didn't have a weapon, but he didn't care. With a roar of genuine rage, Caleb hurled himself at the guard, slamming into him with the force of a battering ram.

The guard was knocked momentarily off-balance. "Foolish echo!" he roared.

Liam seized the opportunity. He swung the rusted pipe with desperate force, connecting with the guard’s arm. The guard cried out, dropping his axe.

"Now! The book!" Liam shouted.

Finn, heart hammering, sprinted to the stone altar, snatching the orange-red book. The second he touched it, the air in the medieval world seemed to crackle and die. The guard, clutching his injured arm, began to shimmer and fade.

"You'll be back!" the fading guard shrieked, his eyes on Finn until the last second. "The Light-Soul always returns to the Keeper!"

The three boys scrambled back through the dimensional door, slamming the small wooden plank shut.

They were panting, covered in mud, and emotionally raw. Liam immediately started checking Finn for injuries, his hands protective and firm.

"Did he touch you? Are you okay? Don't ever run off like that again!" Liam demanded, his voice thick with fear and anger.

But Finn's eyes were on Caleb. Caleb stood a few feet away, his chest heaving, his jaw clenched tight. He looked hurt, furious, and strangely triumphant.

"Don't worry," Caleb said, his voice husky, looking Finn up and down with intense relief. "He didn't hurt you. He won't."

The shared intimacy of their danger, and Caleb's jealous fury, made Finn's heart race in a way no shadow monster ever could.

Finn turned to the new book. He needed answers more than reassurance. The handwriting was neat, meticulous, and filled with bitterness.

“The fool keeper believed in the kindness of strangers. She called herself Eda, claiming to be an estate seller, but she was a wolf in silk. She seduced the Anchor to steal its power. She laid the Trapping and knew the Greed of her own heart. This is the first warning to any future soul who holds the Key: Flee Eda, or she will use you to unlock the ultimate prize.”

The book was the final confirmation. Eda was the Trapper.

"We were right," Finn said, the words heavy. "It's her. She's the greedy wolf."

Liam's face went white. "She's not our aunt. She's a monster. We need to leave. Now."

"We can't," Caleb stated, pointing to the final space in the attic wall. "The house has one more book for us. It has to tell us where the Amulet is, and how to stop her. And I think," he added, looking fiercely at Finn, "that the house is ready to give up its last secret."

The sun was high when the three boys made their final trip to the attic. They had only the four books and a terrifying certainty: their "Aunt Eda" was the Trapper, a thief driven by Greed, and they were the Bait needed to satisfy the Foundation’s ancient protocol.

Liam was visibly shaking, but his hand never left the rusted pipe. Caleb was silent, his gaze moving between Finn and the small, wooden attic door, a primal readiness in his posture.

"This is it," Finn whispered, holding the four books tightly. "The last one has to tell us where the Amulet is, and how to shut the whole thing down."

Liam opened the plank. The space behind it was different again. The full-sized door wasn't wood or metal; it was made of thick, polished mahogany, with a heavy brass knob. It looked exactly like the door to Aunt Eda's study.

"She's waiting for us," Liam breathed.

"No," Finn corrected, pointing to the dust motes dancing in the crawl space light. "The house is waiting for us to find the last piece. It’s showing us her world."

They crawled through. The thrumming of the house was now a low, persistent hum, like a giant, caged insect. Finn, his heart a frantic drum, pushed the heavy mahogany door open.

They stepped out into a perfect, but eerie, duplicate of Aunt Eda's study.

It was cluttered with papers, stacks of old deeds, and ornate brass objects. The air was cold, silent, and smelled faintly of old parchment and the metallic scent they’d noticed on arrival.

There were no monsters, no slime, no shadows—just the room of their supposed captor. Everything was a little dusty, a little faded, and subtly off. A grandfather clock in the corner had stopped at a specific, odd time: 3:17.

In the center of Eda's massive, antique desk, resting on a pedestal carved with the same swirling runes as the medieval door, was the final, fifth book—a thick, black leather-bound journal. It radiated a powerful, steady golden light.

"The journal," Finn whispered, relief making his knees weak. He ran to the desk and snatched it up.

As soon as he touched the final book, the hum of the house stopped. Silence. Complete, absolute, and terrifying.

Finn flipped it open to the final, frantic entry, written in the frantic, slanting hand of the original keeper.

“The Amulet—the prize she seeks—is not in a vault. It is concealed in the very Anchor of the Foundation, hidden beneath the trapdoor that starts the journey. The small, round wooden door. This entire dimensional security was built around the fear of a thief, the Trapper who calls herself Eda. I am locking myself in the system to protect the Amulet, and to leave this final warning. The thief knows the requirements of the Foundation: two brothers and a Key. She will draw them to her. They must place the Amulet on the Anchor’s Seal—the brass knob on the clock—to freeze the house and escape. Flee Eda, and may the Light-Soul survive.”

"The Amulet is under the little door," Liam realized, his voice strained. "She was waiting for us to figure it out for her! She brought us here to solve her puzzle!"

"And the Seal," Caleb pointed to the brass knob on the motionless grandfather clock. "That's how we stop her."

CRACK.

The sound of the real study door downstairs slamming echoed through the silent, duplicate room. Footsteps—sharp, purposeful, and definitely not Eda's rushed, eccentric scamper—began to ascend the main staircase.

Aunt Eda was coming.

"She knew we had to find them all!" Liam hissed, frantically looking for a weapon.

"She felt the house stop humming," Finn whispered, clutching the golden journal. "She knows the Amulet is exposed."

The footsteps stopped directly outside the study door. The brass knob slowly began to turn.

"Now!" Finn shouted. "Back through the crawl space!"

Liam and Finn scrambled to the door, tearing into the crawl space. Caleb, however, hesitated. He saw Eda’s shadow under the door and turned, facing the entrance to the duplicate study. He wasn't running.

"Caleb, move!" Liam screamed from the crawl space.

"She won't get to him," Caleb muttered, his eyes narrowed, the earlier shame of being called a "cheap echo" replaced by a fierce resolve to protect the Light-Soul.

The door burst open. Eda stood there. Her brightly colored clothes seemed suddenly garish, and her eyes were not warm and busy, but cold, hard, and blazing with maniacal Greed.

"Stupid children! You gave me the whole map!" she shrieked, her voice low and furious. "The Amulet! Where is it?"

Caleb didn't answer. He lunged past her and slammed the heavy mahogany door of the duplicate study shut, buying Finn and Liam precious seconds.

They burst out of the crawl space and into the dusty, real attic.

"Under the plank, now!" Finn cried, tearing the first four books from his belt and tossing them aside. He pulled up the small wooden plank, revealing the dark, round opening. Inside, the original keeper's journal had said, was the Amulet.

As Liam began to pry the floorboards away from the small hole, the mahogany study door in the distance burst open, and Eda's furious, shrieking form filled the attic.

"YOU WILL NOT ESCAPE ME!" she roared, her steps thundering across the attic floor.

Caleb burst out of the crawl space, grabbing Finn and pulling him toward the wall, trying to create a diversion.

"Finn, hurry!" Liam yelled, his fingers digging frantically into the floorboards near the small door.

Eda lunged, her hand reaching for Finn.

"You are mine, Light-Soul!" she screamed.