The Gluttony of Blackwood Manor

The Gluttony of Blackwood Manor

The fog that clung to the Blackwood estate was not weather; it was breath. It sat heavy on the lungs, tasting of copper and wet ash, wrapping the Victorian spires in a shroud that never lifted, even at noon.

I had purchased the property for a song, the kind of price that suggests a cracked foundation or a lien, not a history of disappearances. As a restoration architect, I saw only the bones—the hand-carved mahogany banisters, the stained glass bleeding crimson light onto the floorboards, the potential for a masterpiece. I ignored the silence. In the city, silence is a luxury. Here, it felt predatory.

The First Night

The renovation began on a Tuesday. By Thursday, the tools started moving.

It wasn’t dramatic at first. A hammer left on the kitchen island would appear on the second-floor landing. A box of nails, sealed tight, would be found spilled in a perfect circle in the center of the master bedroom. I blamed my own fatigue. I was working sixteen-hour days, stripping rot from the walls, trying to make the house livable before winter set in.

On the fourth night, the house spoke.

I was sleeping on a cot in the parlor, the only room where the draft didn't cut through my sleeping bag. The sound woke me—a wet, rhythmic thump from the floor above. It sounded like a heart beating under the floorboards, or heavy, wet footsteps dragging something dead across the wood.

I grabbed my flashlight and climbed the stairs. The beam cut through the dust motes, illuminating the long, dark hallway. At the end of the hall, the door to the nursery stood open. I had closed it. I had locked it.

I walked toward it, the floorboards groaning in protest. The air grew colder with every step, the copper taste intensifying until I gagged. I shone the light into the room.

Empty. Just the peeling wallpaper, patterned with yellowing rabbits that looked more like skeletal hares. But in the center of the room, the dust had been disturbed. Someone—or something—had been pacing. Back and forth. Back and forth.

"Hello?" I called out. The word died instantly, absorbed by the walls.

The door slammed shut behind me.

The Digestion

I spent the next hour clawing at the handle. The mechanism was rusted solid, fused as if it hadn't been turned in decades. Panic, cold and sharp, began to set in. I turned back to the room. The walls seemed to be breathing. The yellow wallpaper pulsed, expanding and contracting in time with that wet, thumping heartbeat I had heard earlier.

Then I saw the moisture.

It started at the cornices, a thick, dark slime oozing down the plaster. It smelled of bile. The house wasn't haunted; it was organic. The wood wasn't rotting; it was digesting.

I realized then why the price had been so low. I wasn't the owner. I was the meal.

I picked up a heavy iron fireplace poker I had brought up earlier—wait, I hadn't brought it up. It was just there, leaning against the wall, waiting for me. I swung it at the window. The glass didn't shatter; it bruised. It bowed outward like tough skin, rubbery and thick, before snapping back, throwing me onto the floor.

The slime reached the floorboards. Where it touched, the wood hissed and softened. The room was shrinking. No, the walls were closing in, the house contracting its stomach to crush what it had swallowed.

The Bargain

"I can fix you!" I screamed, the desperation tearing at my throat. "I'm an architect! I can heal the rot!"

The walls stopped moving. The thumping slowed. The room held its breath.

A voice didn't answer. Instead, the floorboards in front of me split open with a wet tear. From the darkness of the crawlspace, a shape emerged. It was vague, made of shadows and dust, but it wore the face of the previous owner—I had seen his photo in the deed paperwork. His eyes were gone, replaced by pools of the dark bile.

“We don’t want to be fixed,” the thing rasped, the voice sounding like dry leaves skittering on pavement. “We want to be filled.”

I understood. The renovations, the stripping of the old wood—I had been starving it. I had been removing the decay it fed on.

"I'll bring you more," I whispered, backing away until my spine hit the door. "I'll bring you fresh wood. Old wood. Rotting things."

The shape tilted its head. “Not wood.”

It lunged.

The Aftermath

I don’t remember how the door opened. I remember falling down the stairs, the sound of snapping bone—my own arm—and the feeling of hot breath on my neck as I scrambled out into the fog. I drove until the gas tank ran dry, leaving the keys in the ignition and the deed on the passenger seat.

I checked the listings today. Blackwood Manor is back on the market. The price has dropped again. The listing describes "original features" and "a unique atmosphere."

I’m writing this not to warn you. I know you won’t listen. People never listen when the deal is this good. I’m writing this because I need to sleep, and I can’t sleep while I can still hear the house’s heartbeat in my ears.

If you buy it, don't renovate. Don't strip the wallpaper. Don't clean the stains.

Just feed it. And pray it fills up before it gets to you.