”Who goes there!” Tanya spun around, more than once. ”Hey!”

  Even the cracks in the walls were suspects.

  There should have been an echo, but the uncomfortable silence hugged her instead.

  ”Where in fuck’s shit is this. Just keeps going and winding.”

  Beneath the cellar door, where Mr. Smile — floating around, smiling away — allegedly kept his ”house”, there was a corridor. A prison maybe, with cell after cell as she walked and walked. Or was this Mr. Smile’s idea of accomodation?

  It seemed infinite.

  She walked on, eventually thinking that voice had come from her own head.

  ”Do you enjoy the asylum?”

  She didn’t remember its tone, dialect or even the feeling it gave her. All she knew was — it stuck with her.

  Hours probably passed already when the row of rooms ceased to renew additionals, giving way for the cracks to spiral out of control — one such stretching all around. She imagined a giant of cosmic proportions holding the corridor, ready to snap at any moment.

  The precise timing of her foot traversing the crevice underneath, and the question that came when it landed — Ice ran across her backside.

  ”Do you, girl Tanya? Is it amusing down here?”

  It must have stalked her, impossibly treading behind. She knew it as that same voice, instantly unrecognizable.

  She turned, though not prepared. Wanting to still see nothing, that is not what she got.

  A dreadful person met with her. Man or woman, she could not tell. Wearing grey robes, it contrasted against true pale white skin. There hardly was any hair, but some long strands past their expiration date, clinging on for dear life.

  Tanya almost fell, feeling the energy flying out of her, when she saw them.

  Gouged out eyes, prodded and propped, as the person held them by thick needles in each hand. Where they belonged was a slow but steady stream. Not red — Yellow. The puss dripped and spattered.

  The corridor swallowed the sound.

  The person took a step. Then another.

  Tanya did the same. Just not to shake hands. Didn’t want that piercing.

  Then, as the person let go of the needles, setting those skewered eyes up for a nasty fall, she saw the metals were rammed right through those hands. Fingers spread wide. Broken eyes still watching.

  ”Stay away. Back off!”

  ”I do. I like it here.” Ignoring Tanya’s plead, the person — or monster — shuffled closer. And closer. ”But it is time to leave.”

  Tanya did not turn to sprint, in fear of getting a needle in the back of her skull — or of getting the very essence of her soul operated on, in Hells knew what ways.

  She never noticed herself falling. Suddenly the sightless person loomed over her — like a fell mountain side.

  Freezing wind blew from its empty, pus-running sockets.

  ”It’s a dream within a dream! ”Dream within a-”

  She felt the snow. Powder at first. Then, heavy flakes.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  A dream had never felt like this.

  The eye sockets grew bigger — and bigger still, fusing into one. Mouth disappeared. Swallowed. Dragged into the eldritch hole.

  A blizzard raged in the narrow corridor. Cracks and mold alike were hidden in the brightest of colors.

  She scrambled. Twisted. Tried to crawl, to no avail.

  The harder the storm raged from that head — Tanya moved. Inching closer.

  ”Nonono! Wrong way! Stupid fucking- Nngh! Aah-!”

  All of her attemps to scream wete smothered by cold air.

  Tears tried to roll — but before hitting cheeks, they were already hard to the touch.

  The living thing she at first believed to be a person raised its hands. Palms turned, facing the remains of a skull.

  Tanya turned to look at anything else — but she knew. She heard.

  It wasn’t the zing of the needles. Not the crushed skull, or smashed eyeballs either.

  But all of it. All in a symphony of agony.

  When those hands met in the middle, that blizzard sang convulsively.

  Something inside forced her to look again.

  The needles pierced both hands, pressing — crushing the frail skull.

  The pop of the head thundered through the indoor chaos.

  The deafening sound. Eyes shut. Ears couldn’t be — as hands were being used to crawl. Already numb. Nose too. Hells, what part of her wasn’t?

  A nail cracked.

  Strands ripped from her hair — as the ends were frozen clumps, stuck to the floor.

  She tore off a scab formed by her own tears, leaving a flesh wound deep enough to make her sounds be heard — even there, in the unyielding condition — stinging with pain.

  Before she dared realize, the storm sucked her in — still closer to that headless body.

  It still stood — when its hands and wrists shattered. The needles clattered against the slippery floor — It still stood.

  Sucked in. Now levitating. She flew — faster. Faster. She saw the future. Glimpses. Yet things she knew to be true.

  Unstoppable fear. Opposing heroes. Realms drowning in ice — the demons of Zeal Aqia. The rise and fall of fallen kingdoms.

  Higher she flew, forgetting her name.

  Her dead brother, still there. A Red Harp in ruins, no longer a hamlet for the people — but the ruin of unspeakable things.

  She had opened the black book in the swamp.

  Was he her friend?

  What was her name?

  Questions lost in the void.

  The summoning of Nyarlathotep.

  No more hands.

  She saw none — but still all.

  She knew what she was — yet it was without name. The frowning eldritch man had her book. The safety of the lock was off.

  Out it billowed, covering kingdoms in lies and bloody murder. Then she saw. There. The author — had found a fresh vessel. It was looking for those forbidden pages. A reunion worthy of an infested world.

  She descended, no longer human — something frightened children of times long gone had named.

  Lady No-Face.

  Her wild winds lifted the needles, letting their speed increase about her.

  Sharp-iced stumps hooked the air. A crash there, and another one deeply burried in the forearm.

  She floated through the cracks with a flicker of light, blinking against those lightning rods, stealing the spot where hands ought to be.

  ***

  The walls were no longer white, and there was no corridor. The white lady ate the humid air, sending impossible crackles through her storming aura — bursting with negative degrees as she opened the door.

  She had been there before, not as a Godess.

  ”Ah, you brought some fresh air, to say the least,” said Mr. Frown — as his one complete arm disappeared in mid air, before returning again. ”We should celebrate! I forget, is it about a thousand years since last time?”

  The wine bottle froze solid in his hand — Mr. Frown was unaffected.

  ”Uh… Fine. Cheers!” he exclaimed, putting the bottle down his gullet. No strain, no muscles that helped a gulp down that hatch. ”I almost feel strong again, were it not for this flippety floppety arm here.”

  Mr. Frown raised the wobbly limb to wave. A limp attempt.

  Lady No-Face felt indifferent to the attempts at breaking the ice, or whatever her brother thought he did.

  Knock!

  ”That’s him! Who else performs the fun activity of door-knocking with a single bang?”

  The white lady did not respond.

  The knocker barged in, waiting for no one.

  ”So sorry brother, I just ate the wine,” ’Frown’ said happily. ”It went stale anyway. Come! Enjoy my saffron-”

  Mr. Smile hovered in, broke something in the ceiling as he straightened his back, torn robes barely swiping the floor.

  ”-bread.” ’Frown’ frowned harder.

  ”Same spacious interior as last time I see. And the one before and so on,” came unhappily from ’Smile’s grin.

  Mr. Frown was already busy, birdwatching from his one window.

  ”Who was I?” said Lady No-Face. ”Who am I?”

  ”What? You’re not supposed to ask that. You’re the major ingredient to our trojka.” Mr. Smile didn’t sound… smiling — even though he was, constantly.

  ”Who!?” The rumble of her voice knocked down the few things Mr. Frown had shelved. Namely his snail shell collection and… the book.

  ”It’s Tanya!” ’Smile’ and ’Frown’ surrendered the name in tandem, Mr. Frown falling from his chair by the window.

  She did not pay much heed, as the disturbed pages flipped themselves on the floor. Still, she repeated it, the name of the wind — the eye of the storm.

  ”Tanya.”

  How do you like that transformation?