• The woman sat on the rug in the center of the Home for Lost Souls. Childs laughter washed over her. Spectral figures danced around the small room as the music box played. The woman cradled the frail white form of an infant. It cooed softly as she rocked it back and forth. A faint smile crossed her grey lips. Floorboards whined. The woman looked up.
    The lone traveler stood in the doorway, his shoulders and arms covered in bandages. The music box stopped.

    ♣♥♠♥♠♥♠♥♠♣

    He looked down at the woman sitting in the center of the empty orphanage, cradling the bones of a child. He could see her glowing eyes under her crimson hood. She gently put the skeleton down and stood. She clasped her hands at her breast. The strange song left her lips. She held a hand out to him, her pale palm facing the ceiling. He could see her chipped and broken nails. The room grew cold. A thick fog swirled around him.
    Something tugged at his pants leg. A translucent hand gripped his pants. A girl no more than five stared up at him. Other children stood in the fog around him. He looked up at the woman. She had vanished, a mirror standing in her place.
    “Don’t go,” the girl cried in a fading voice.
    He tried to push the child away but his hand passed through her. He moved closer to the mirror. The children moved closer to him. The room was lost in the fog.
    “You’ll be lost like us,” a boy called, his voice grew into a rasp with each word.
    The man touched the mirror’s face, his hand disappearing through it. He pushed through the mirror. Fresh grass crunched beneath him. A bright sun glowed overhead. He looked back at the freshly painted building. A bright sign hung over the buildings door. “Margret’s Home for Little Lost Souls” was written on it in blue. He turned back to the dirt path that led down a large hill. He followed the path absentmindedly as unseen birds chirped around him. At the base of the hill stood a massive farm. Cornfields flanked him as he walked up to the large red barn, where Horses stood. They watched him from their stalls.
    The woman’s hysterical laughter pierced the calmness of the farm. The sun vanished, plunging the land in momentary darkness. Fire sprang up around him. The horses lay dead and rotting on the barns straw covered floor. Screams erupted from the fields. The woman continued to laugh. The man looked up at the figure standing atop the barn. The woman in red took a step and fell from the burning roof. The rope around her neck grew taut, the laughter stopped. Her body burst into a flock of laughing crows that vanished into the sky. The noose swayed from the roof. The man backed away in horror, His heart pounded in his chest.
    “Don’t be afraid. Your soul is not among there’s, yet.” The woman rasped.
    The woman stood within the barn, a smile on her beautiful face. She held her arms out to him, as if waiting for an embrace. A horse jumped up from the ground. Its rotting form ran past him. The other horse’s follower suit, each little more than bone.
    “Come to me. I can make it all go away.”
    He took another step back, shaking his head. The man sprinted to the farmhouse. He burst through the front door. His eyes desperately searched for an exit. The world outside the farmhouse faded into darkness. Twisted bodies formed out of the ground. Distorted faces looked up at him as their arms reached out to him. A mirror lay on the ground a few feet away. The man hacked away at the bodies blocking his way. With each swing of his sword, he grew closer to the glowing mirror. The woman appeared behind the mirror, her head tilted to the side.
    “You can never escape. Your soul belongs to me now,” she said with a cynical smile.
    The man cried out in anger and ran at her. He grabbed her by the shoulder and plunged cold steel into her stomach. She began to laugh like a mad woman and shattered like glass. The house around him began to crumble. He hurriedly stepped into the mirror, his feet sinking into the moist earth.