Chapter 5 - The Architect's Will
The revelation hit me like a physical blow. The old man I had known as Thomas—the man who had pruned my roses, fixed my lawnmowers, and given Lily carved wooden animals for her birthday—was Julian Vance himself. He had never left. He had faked his disappearance, assumed the identity of his dead groundskeeper, and lived on the fringes of his own creation, watching us like specimens under glass.
Miller called for immediate tactical backup, his voice trembling with controlled fury into his radio. "I need all available units to Blackwood Manor! We have an armed, barricaded suspect utilizing concealed subterranean passages. The suspect is Julian Vance. Code 3, now!"
"Lily," I gasped, the cold realization freezing my lungs. "Miller, Mrs. Alvarez took Lily to the guest cottage at her sister's house, right? Tell me she's safe!"
Miller grabbed his cell phone, dialing rapidly. He put it on speaker.
It rang once. Twice. Three times.
Then it clicked.
"Mrs. Alvarez?" Miller demanded. "Are you with Lily? Is she safe?"
Silence answered. Then, a soft, trembling sob came through the speaker. But it wasn't Mrs. Alvarez.
"Daddy?" Lily's tiny voice whimpered through the phone. "Daddy, the lights went out. The man with the wooden horse is here. He says we have to go under the floor now."
"LILY!" I screamed, lunging forward, but Miller caught me by the jacket, wrestling me back.
"Where are you, Lily?!" I shouted at the screen. "Tell Daddy where you are!"
"We're in the big room, Daddy," she cried, her voice echoing with the distinct acoustic resonance of Blackwood Manor’s grand foyer. "He brought me back. He said you were waiting for us."
The call went dead.
"He never let them leave the property," Miller said, his face dead white. "He intercepted them before they hit the main gate."
I didn't wait for Miller. I didn't wait for the SWAT team or the sirens that were wailing miles away in the distance. I turned and sprinted out of the carriage house, tearing across the wet lawn toward the main house. Rain had begun to fall—sharp, freezing needles of water that blurred my vision as I ran.
The front doors of the mansion were shut.
I threw my entire body against the heavy oak portals, but they were locked from the inside. The massive iron deadbolts had been thrown. I smashed my fist against the beveled glass, but it was reinforced with wire mesh—another modification Vance had made to ensure his subjects couldn't escape.
"Daniel, back up!" Miller yelled, arriving behind me, chest heaving. He raised his service weapon, aiming at the brass lock cylinder, and fired two deafening rounds.
The lock shattered in a spray of sparks and brass fragments. Miller kicked the door inward.
The interior of the house was plunged into pitch darkness. The heavy velvet curtains had been drawn across every window. The only illumination came from the open square in the center of the foyer floor—the iron hatch, which was now bathed in an eerie, pulsing green light rising from the depths.
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And sitting at the edge of that open square, her small legs dangling over the precipice into the abyss, was Lily.
***
