I have roamed the halls of this house for years. Too many to 
remember. Too terrible to forget. These walls that once I loved, and 
now held me prisoner. Always in opposition of the Dark One, was I.  
Always doing all that I could to look after the inhabitants of my 
home. Some were afraid. Some despised me and wished me gone, though 
no exorcism or priestly words of any kind could release me from my 
curse.  The children were always my favorite. So simple in their 
belief, in their trust.  Their laughter would ring through the halls 
and chase away the shadows, bringing a memory of joy back into my 
existence.  If I had tears, I would cry.  If I had a heart, it would 
break. So many of them had been taught to fear me, though I would 
never harm a hair on their precious heads.  Always the Dark One would 
use their fear, and alway I would be the one who took the blame for 
his actions.  I...the Lady of the House.

Thus it went until one day the house stood barren and empty. I was 
both glad and lonely. It was an aching lonliness that permeated my 
being. Replaced by a stone chill that is the kiss of the grave. Yet 
still I wandered the halls hour after hour, day after day, year after 
year. Then the new inhabitants came and it began again.  Only the new 
family did not believe.  They did not recognize my voice.  They did 
not sense my presence.  In old days, I had only to breathe on the 
back of their neck to warn them of impending doom, but these new ones 
brushed me away and I could do nothing.  Still the Dark One returned 
and the house groaned with his malevolence.  And theirs.

The new family tore down the ancient walls of the once elegent 
ballroom and erected a new room filled with strange entities.  A 
glass box with stangely shaped drums mounted inside the box.  There 
were panels along the walls that deadened the natural energy of the 
room, making it very difficult to slip through, to hear, to breathe.  
There were strange cut wood ornaments that were strung with metal 
cords along their face, very similiar to lutes and simitars of old, 
but with no echo box.  There was a stand that mounted a keyboard 
like that of a harpsichord, but no strings or resonation chamber 
attached.  There were other huge black boxes with smaller boxes piled 
on top of them scattered about the room. There was one glass box that 
held nothing but a spindle with a silver ball on the top.  And 
everywhere along the floor was miles of lifeless snakes.  Everywhere. 
Leading into a seperate room that had black boxes with many knobs, 
levers, and buttons.  This family was very strange.

One night not long after they'd finished construction of their 
strange menagerie, the house pulsated with the most alarming metallic 
screeching. This was accompanied by crazed pounding of the drums and 
rough, throaty voices whailing as if in pure misery in the deepest, 
darkest dungeon imaginable being tortured into insanity.  My essence 
ached in repulsion. What was this evil magic? Then the house 
shuddered and I knew.  My enemy of old was awake.   I tried 
desperately to alert them. I breathed on their necks.  Caressed their 
bodies with my chill touch.  But their sweat-drenched ritual only 
made my breath a lustful welcome, and not the warning it was meant to 
be. The blood tingling noise invading my presence was intolerable. 
Finally the earth trembled and I had to withdrawal in defeat.  They 
were his and he had come to claim them. I faded away into my place of 
seclusion and wept.  It was an outpouring of emotion that cleansed 
the sacrifice clean before slaughter.

For weeks, I roamed the halls thereafter, unseen, unheard, an 
unwilling witness to the horrors that overtook the family rising in 
intensity with each mindbending, spine-tingling event. And then, as 
if in answer to prayer, one came to stand in opposition to the Dark 
One.  A child of light, one of the beautiful ones.  His presence 
inhabited flesh, yet he was an ancient.  His hair was flowing white.  
His face was mangled, no doubt from previous battles from which he 
had emerged victorious.  His one clear, blue eye like cornflower, was 
clear and steady. His jaw strong and true. His hands were gentle and 
firm. At last, he had come.  The one who would defeat the Dark One.  
The one who could free me from my indentured solitude.  

I could not help myself.  I moved down to where he stood talking 
quietly with the family about the Dark Ones deeds.  There was one of 
the family members who seemed quite enthralled with some private 
joke.  He seemed to find the fact that this champion was a faerie 
very amusing.  The humor was lost on me, but his spirit emitted 
malice, lechery, and crass sensations like oozing slime. I decided I 
did not wish to know the secret of his amusement.  I wanted so much 
to touch this warrior, to speak to him and tell him what has occured 
here, but I had no words.  

So I allowed my breath to trickle along the back of his neck, 
ruffling his locks.  Without warning, he turned and looked straight 
at me as if he could see me.  As if he knew me intimately.  I could 
only gaze into the deep, cool, blue of his one eye until I desired to 
fall into that ecstacy and drown. He COULD see me.  He knew I was 
there.  I was enraptured and reached unconsciously to caress his 
cheek.  He put his hand to his face as if to hold what was once a 
hand of flesh there. I could feel the whole of me fill with precious 
hope.  Dare I believe in a miracle? Gradually he lowered an armorment 
of his metaphysical self and reached out to me, caressing me in turn. 
I could do no other but smile in pleasure and long-suffered gratitude.

At that moment, the house shook violently, sending the family to the 
floor, but my warrior stood his ground.  It was a warning.  The Dark 
One would never let me be free.  My hero's fate would be the same as 
all the others before him.  I shared with him my overwhelming pain 
and sorrow.  I could see in his eye, he understood my defeat.  And 
then I faded. I could not bear this tragedy again.