~~~
It all started with the visit.
Thinking there can be no harm in attending the home meeting with the brothers and sisters from the church, Iris accepted the invitation gladly. The host family was a business client to her father's patient, who happened to express a great deal of interest in converting to Christianity.
When her father bumped into the patient by chance while out shopping, the host family's matriarch, if there was still such a thing nowadays, was with the patient. Iris' father, naturally, had immediately made friends with the matriarch and showed her his family photo.
Upon seeing Iris in the photo, the matriarch volunteered to open her renovated villa for a home meeting for Iris' church, saying she too was seeking spiritual guidance but had never quite found the right church group.
That lazy afternoon on her way home from college, Iris picked up several saints and her younger brother and drove them to the newly furbished Tuscany villa on the hilltop.
She parked the car on the sloped drive way but did not go into the basement garage, since she would have to leave the meeting early.
The villa was painted white and yellow and they had to go up several flights of stairs to enter into the marble-columned, carpeted parlor. The hostess welcomed them warmly, her magenta lipsticked mouth wide enough to swallow all the visitors.
On the left hand side of the villa, a gated community of high-rise luxury apartments were just a few minutes' drive from this singular mansion on the hilltop. Iris wondered why there were no other luxury homes beside the mansion. But then again, who in their right mind would want to build their home into a sheer cliff-face. From a distance, one side of the villa appeared to be suspended in mid-air.
The atmosphere was gay and normal and as the number of guests started to increase, some moved into the hallways of the villa.
Iris wondered why the hostess did not simply put them all into the large chamber hall further back. The hall was inlaid with fantastically sculptured rose-colored sandstone in unidentified styles and striped alabaster marble columns, with the floor paved in gold-flecked basalt and indoor balconies and mezzanine balustrades inlaid with onyx motifs. According to one gossiping guest, the real entrance to the villa was on the other side of the large hilltop estate and the parlor they were in used to be the family den.
But of course, they weren't that important to start with.
In contrast to the somber, regal yet somewhat ancient reception hall leading to the deeper parts of the mansion, maybe it was not that bad to stayed in the contemporary, white-fur padded parlor, with the filtered afternoon sun keeping the room in light, while the shadows casted by the columns and the air-conditioning offered the guests respite.
Iris looked at her laughingly conversing parents eating refreshments with the seated saints and felt suddenly ill at ease. Her instinct was telling her that something was not quite right.
She pretended to follow different groups loitering in the hallways, but was actually peeking into the uniquely decorated rooms from all the widely opened doors. After all, she reasoned, it was a once in a lifetime opportunity to tour a wealthy family's home.
"That's odd, why leave all the doors ajar? Aren't the family afraid someone might steal something or intrude into their private quarters?" Taking a bite out of a quiche in the kitchen, Iris muttered under her breath, "the confidence they have in people is truly amazing."
When she discovered a side-door leading to the chamber hall, Iris quickly scanned for nearby people and assured, took a long look into the dimly illuminated arabesque hall. High ceiling hung with metal-wrought Arabian lanterns, the hall was covered in a dirty blood-red color, the effect accentuated ever more by the rose-colored walls. Upon closer scrutiny, the patterns on the arches and keystones were like silk-threads of blood vessels...
"Hello there!" Jetting her face quite literally in front of Iris' eyes, the hostess suddenly appeared in the kitchen, nearly causing Iris a heart attack.
Iris backed a bit unsteadily towards the guest restroom nearby and quickly excused herself.
"No worries, I will be outside waiting for you, dear, if you need anything! When you're done, I have something to discuss with you!" The hostess with her high-pitched voice lingered outside Iris' hastily closed door.
"Great, I won't be long." Iris replied half-hearted.
~~~
When she emerged and felt much more collected, the hostess took her aside from the chatting guests and said to her in a whisper: "I have a proposition for you. If you stay here and work for me, then I can guarantee you wealth beyond your wildest imagination and bestow upon you the secret to the elixir of life itself, or perpetual youth."
Here her lips smiled ever so widely, "as you've seen, the chamber hall is the atrium to this mansion, and I am pleased no one but you seemed to be aware of its existence. This just shows you're one of those selected daughters of Lilith constrained in the human shells. Why not default back to who you really are?"
Iris stared at the woman. Is she mad?! "What do you mean?" But she knew it to be real. Whatever has clouded her mind and perhaps kept all of the guests under guise and illusion was suddenly dispelled.
"Come now, you know it long ago. Why hide it and deny yourself? You're not one of them. You have always been able to sense the spirits." The matriarch left it at that.
This mansion should have never existed on the hilltop. This woman who looked to be in her 40s was a sorceress, a defector to the satanic ways. Why she picked a devout Christian's daughter to make a deal so readily and bluntly was unfathomable, but Iris knew she's in deep trouble.
The house had the guests and saints under spell and cage. No one seemed aware of the different time-flows outside the windows, held up by the optical illusions of the afternoon sun and trees, and her parents and little brother were blissful captives unbeknown to their wills.
The woman's hands held onto her arms ever more tightly, the polished nails digging into Iris' flesh. "I'll have to think about it." And with a yank, she dashed away from the woman straight into the now glowing chamber hall.
"Yes, you do that," chuckled the woman, "meanwhile, remember that the saints are all imprisoned here because of you. The longer it takes to make up your mind, " the matriarch paused for emphasis, "the quicker their unprotected, blessed souls will be sucked dry of life, dear, and join the throngs of woeful ghosts this house possesses!"
The beating of her heart grew louder by the minute and with a concentrated will power she's never allowed herself before, Iris broke through the maze of enchantments and made for the arched gate leading outside.
When she tumbled out into the open, she signed a relief so loud she surprised herself. She went around the externally normal, quiet villa and was shocked to see all the windows devoid of life. All the opulence was still in place, but no living creatures was seen and she did not catch a single human silhouette or hear a sound from the lavishly furnished rooms exposed through the clear windows.
"God, I need to get away from this place." Thinking out loud, Iris made for the drive way and fumbled for her car key.
"Wait for me, I will be back." With a vehement vow, she drove down the hill.
She knew the matriarch would be expecting her return. Time itself was frozen on the hilltop.
~~~
To be Continued...
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