Tale of the Living Doors
“The Portal”
Through countless years The Ota had tried to gain power over the Nether Realms. In the Time-Before-Times they discovered the secret of taking control of other souls and knew that if they could but open a doorway into the land beyond, they would be powerful above all that lived. Yet to do so required a place, one specially built to harness and draw the spectral energies. It took much planning to even begin the experiment.
How often they tried, and how close they came to fulfilling their dreams, none can say. Lady Tremaine in France almost achieved that goal. Two hundred years earlier a Queen and Ota named Grimhilde had many hundreds of demons under her sway. Her reign lasted only until her step-daughter and a foreign prince conspired to lay her low.
Far too often the Ota were destitute and survived only by acting the part of wandering gypsies or soothsayers. Whenever they had collected enough gold and influence they would again prepare the foundations of another portal house.
As has been told elsewhere, a fresh attempt was begun in 1669 by a Dutchman named Ub van der Iwerks. He acted on behalf of his mistress, a particularly wicked and powerful Ota, but treacherously turned upon her, claiming the house and lands for himself. He was punished severely.
In time the house fell into the hands of a pirate named Ambrose Gracey and the Ota found him. Deeply intertwined are the lives of the Ota and the Graceys. No fewer than three children were born as a result of their close relationships. Their descendants were tied body and soul to the Mansion. The greatest of these witches was Madam Leota D’Thave, daughter of Victoria and grand-daughter to Ambrose. She spun webs of deceit around the mansion and the poor souls who lived there for all her 35 years. But her greatest moment, the Test of the Ota, came on Halloween Night 1869.
Leota’s powers were stronger than ever and eventually the challenge of the Portal would have to be faced. But in the very darkest corners of her black soul there was doubt. For nearly 13 years she had fought with the restless, unconquerable spirit of a little girl. Every year on December 20th, the date upon which Leota had taken her soul, Marcella rose in righteous fury.
The witch earned a measure of time and rest by imprisoning the girl into a room of the Mansion where the burden was not always upon her. But the annual battle took every bit of her strength and knowledge. Leota began to fear that child.
Desperately, the Medium looked to the Portal for an answer. If she could open the gateway, summon the powers of Death and Hell itself, then Leota need no longer tremble as December ended. By doing so now, this Halloween, she would be strengthened and finally take Marcella for eternal servitude.
The Witch held a single guttering candle in her hand as she passed through a hall door and stepped quickly down into the lowest regions of the Mansion. Few had ever entered these chambers since the foundations were laid 200 years previous. Master Gracey himself, who took great pride in discovering most of the Mansion’s secrets, had not penetrated to this very hidden room.
The chamber was small and star-shaped with only a single door through which she glided silently and pulled it closed with a tiny click. The thick darkness which enveloped her was impenetrable. She raised her right hand and waved it in the air as if plucking fruit from a tree. Into her hand swirled a thousand sparks of light which coalesced into a ball of purple flame. She laid the brilliant orb onto the very center of the room and looked about expectantly.
Above her head in a golden bracket rested a long silver rod. She removed it and examined the very ancient symbols etched into the shaft. Low murmurs escaped Leota’s mouth and grew into a chant of unmistakable evil.
From within a pocket she took a large piece of chalk, roughly cut into the shape of a human skull. Holding the rod in her left hand, Leota pulled aside the top of her robe to expose the upper chest which covered where a normal person’s heart would rest.
Trembling slightly, the witch plunged the sharp end of the silver rod into her own heaving bosom and withdrew it to allow a small rivulet of blood to trickle between her breasts. Her incantation rang louder within the tiny room as she touched the chalk skull to the bloody wound. Leota spun the wand within her grasp and brought the large crested end into view. There was a small niche surrounded by more symbols at this end of the rod and her now blood-stained chalk skull fitted perfectly.
Louder still she sang and began to draw scarlet chalk lines from one point of the room to another, forming a five pointed star surrounded by a circle. Her dancing violet flame still flickered in the midst of this pentagram. Leota raised her hands to cover her mouth and exhaled sharply into them. Immediately she thrust her open palms out to face the floor and the purple flame blew out. But the room did not fall back into night for the drawn lines now gave forth a fierce sanguine glow.
Leota stepped into the center pentagon and spun slowly on one foot, dragging the chalk irregularly in a circle around her. She smiled at the twisted and misshapen lines for she knew that only the most twisted souls would be able to pass through. She had no need of the perfect and saintly…yet.
Quickly she added leering eyes and a gaping mouth to create a fearsome visage. Now was the moment! She lifted the silver spike, still dripping blood from her own heart, and stabbed viciously into the center of her creation. A rushing wind roared behind the portal and a putrid green glow flashed around the edges. It lit the room briefly and then faded into the dull luminescence of decay. Leota tossed the wand away and beckoned toward the shape.
The door creaked open and she peered through to see a dark and misshapen city. Nightmares of all types were walking the streets. There were tall skeletons; gimlet eyed beasts; witches; mummies; demons and everywhere the stench of death lingered like a noxious fog.
Kneeling at the edge of the portal, Leota leaned forward until her head passed through the floor and into the Land of the Dead. Instantly she knew that all things were not as she expected. Rather than feeling great power and strength, she felt as if her natural vitality were draining away from her. Far from being a sinister power which could overawe the shades of night, her face radiated a brilliance to rival the sun. First by ones and two the denizens of the underworld turned to gape at this intruder. Then great crowds seemed to appear out of nowhere and a mob possessed of insatiable hunger rushed toward her, scabbed fingers reaching to claim her still-mortal flesh.
In a panic she lunged backwards into her own existence. All pretense of dominion gone, she crawled over to the open door and lifted its suddenly leaden weight. It rose slowly, heavily and Leota screamed in terror as the first of dozens of shadows poured forth from the open portal. She struggled with all the strength left her and the door tipped over and began to fall back into place. Mere seconds and the danger would pass but then long and snakelike fingers slithered around the oval shape, keeping it open just a sliver.
Empty of all thought and plan, she leapt onto the door. A howl of pain and rage echoed on both sides of the Eternal Divide. Then her mind cleared and a spell of forcing banishment rose to her lips.
The room was thick with the intruders and her throat closed as if throttled by a mighty hand. The walls of the room began to grow softer, indistinct as if seen through a veil. Conversely the sprites and ghouls that had entered this realm were growing clearer by the second. She was dying just like her innumerable victims and Leota was not thrilled with the prospect.
Her pride and fury rose to new heights and she burst forth with renewed enmity to all forces but herself. Words of power dripped from her tongue, sweeping the dead and undead before it and back through the portal. It closed with a snap and sealed back into solid stone.
The room had returned to an empty nothingness. Leota retrieved the candle from just inside the doorway and lit it with a match. Nothing remained of the diabolical crowd so far as she could see. Carefully, almost sadly, she reached down a trembling hand to wipe a corner of the chalk. As the circle broke a wail could be heard through the black stone walls. She glanced around in bitterness and then, shivering slightly, she turned and left the room.
Unbeknownst to Leota however, a dark shape lingered in one corner. She neither heard the low cackle nor was she aware of the chalk line reforming on its own.
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