Along the road out of Istanbul, the last stop of note was a reasonably large hostel, solitary for miles. I was relieved to see it. It had gotten dark, and I had yet to find a suitable spot to plant my tent for the night. Besides, I had done well to avoid any unnecessary expenditure thus far. An actual bed, and perhaps breakfast in the morning, sounded perfect.

The parting doors ushered me into the warmth and light inside. A face my own age greeted me with a smile. I said hi, asked if they had any space.

“Ah, English!” said the girl with an accent I couldn’t place, and looked down at the computer at the desk. “I put you in 7B, with other English.”

“How much will it cost?”

“No money,” she laughed. “You tell story for everyone later, at dinner.”

Dinner as well? I was in heaven. She renewed her smile and asked me my name.

The Americans in Room 7B also seemed excited at the prospect of a fresh arrival. They turned as I entered, eager to ask me about myself. As I let the weight of my rucksack fall to my bunk, and felt the peculiar sensation of the embedded skin formerly bound by straps begin to breathe, they were already asking about my love life. I told them about my last boyfriend.

“How was the sex?” one asked. My surprise was lessened when I saw that there was no television.

I admit, I was curious about the concept of the place. I had known of many hostels that were to a degree self-sustaining, with a staff made up of traveling students with depleted funds. But stories couldn’t help with the expenses of the place. I asked the group whether they had done it, what sort of story was expected.

“Just tell them about yourself,” the American on the bunk above me said.

For some people, this would come easily, though I couldn’t think of anything to say. All I’d learned from my gap year so far was that trying to make my way with extremely limited funds had only made me more self-conscious about money. (So much for finding myself.) Perhaps I could fashion some wisdom or some joke, that only the wealthy can afford to be unconcerned about money.

No, clichéd.

Before I knew it, the Americans were leading me down to a cafeteria of some size where there was already an intimidating number of people. For those with a fear of public speaking, this is the equivalent of that dream where you have no clothes on. I was led to the front, in full view of everyone as the last seats were filled. I could smell dinner being heated behind me, and my brain froze on that.

A middle-aged woman in the middle of the audience gently prodded me: “Start from the beginning”. She must’ve been the owner-operator.

The beginning, then. My name, where and when I was born. My family. What they were like. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary or interesting. My earliest memories and secrets, the loneliness of childhood and secret horrors, my schools, my first kiss. Which classes I liked, which I didn’t. Who I liked and who I didn’t.

I felt narrative threads string together, storylines in miniature and connections that only occurred to me now as I recounted my life as a piece. I thought of the people I’d forgotten, how I’d like to see them again, and didn’t hold back from saying so.

Finally, I spoke about finishing school, and my hesitation about what to do next. What I wanted out of life, and what I feared. Not the strongest conclusion, yet a conclusion to the formation of my character maybe. And the assembled guests seemed appreciative, locked as they were in memories, dreams and reflections.

They were openly curious, asking for further details about where I grew up. Some seemed to have been there before, and inquired what it was like now. There was an inescapable feeling of stasis in the atmosphere, as if this were the city of sleep awoken at last. What was the outside world like? Or, at least, what was the world as I saw it? Something creeped at the edge of my consciousness like a word on the tip of your tongue, before a sense of religious dread sealed it away. They were asking now about the technological advancements in my time, and the developments in world politics.

I knew this place. Somehow, I knew this place.

Beyond the workings of the living world. Eventless. Where time and space merge into one. Where, when your time comes, all there is left to do is to wait to learn about the other side.

This was the end. I excused myself and, making no attempt to reclaim my things, headed straight to the entrance. Inevitably, the doors didn’t open.

Some time later, Cinderella spotted a pair of local boys spying on her as she worked. It made her smile, remembering that she was still a princess despite her ragged clothing. Even on the harshest sunny days, covered in dirt and sweat, her blonde hair glowed. It reminded her of Perrault House, where everything sparkled. It reminded her of her mother.

In her quarters, a small fire smouldered feebly as the young woman lay on her cramped bed, staring with scrutiny at her single possession: a photograph (worn at the edges) of her dearly missed mother, who Cinderella thought must have been the most beautiful woman in the country. In the frozen sepia snapshot, she looked every bit its queen. Cinderella, in her adolescence, resembled her more every day.

As winter gave way to spring, news travelled that the current queen, Cinderella’s stepmother and tormentor, had herself passed away.

It was finally safe to go home.

Bidding farewell to her patrons (without revealing her true reasons), the long-suffering youth set off for Perrault House, to be reunited at last with her father, and the dreamlike palace that bore this modest title. In her yearning, she imagined she could smell the hyacinths that would be blooming outside the proud walls of her childhood. The silver! The gold! The rubies and pearls the queen wore until those wilting weeks when her palace had shrunk to her bed, her bed which was itself doomed to be appended to the word “death”. On that night, just a small girl, Cinderella couldn’t bear to look at the colourless shell that so disturbingly resembled her mother, yet it killed her when her dying parent asked to speak to the king alone. It was a painfully vivid memory, waiting in the hallway, knowing that behind the oak door she was saying her final words before slipping into the darkness. It was summer. Cinderella could smell lavender.

As is well known, the mourning child’s pain was only just begun, since the King took as his new wife the proudest and most haughty woman that was ever seen, so it was said. Her brutish daughters, forced upon Cinderella as stepsisters, could scarcely conceal their hatred and jealousy of the sweet little girl. Kept out of view of her father, she was subjected by the malevolent trio to cruel tasks, and dressed in ugly rags – even the skin of a donkey. Among her daily chores, she would have to clean the beautiful chambers of her stepmother and stepsisters, while she herself slept on a wretched straw bed. But she could not be prevented from dreaming.

Eventually, the girl’s beauty growing, the princess was by way of deceit banished by the wicked stepmother. The king was told that she had run away. Had Cinderella not grown in resolve, she would have surely cried now at the sight of Perrault House. Were this the end of the story, the moral would be one of patience, that those of good deeds receive their just rewards eventually.

Her father recognised her at once, and ran to wrap her in his arms. Now, she cried. He thanked the Lord for returning his child to him. His beautiful child. His perfect child.

The joy of her homecoming was made an occasion, spread across weeks of celebration. Even Cinderella’s stepsisters were happy to see her, or at least too cautious of their position to revel in meanness. For her own part, Cinderella could not resist a note of triumph by asking them to scour the dishes and tables, to clean her exquisite new room. They humbly obliged.

Over days, Cinderella took great pleasure in re-tracing the palace rooms and corridors, compared against those in her mind’s eye. Apart from the obvious shift in perspective since her early youth, it was delightfully exactly as she remembered it. Curiously, off in the east wing there was a room that hummed, that must have been new. The door, cold to the touch, had a symbol embedded in its face: two squares joined side by side. It was locked. Taking it for a walk-in freezer, Cinderella curiously asked her father about the renovation, with the hope that she might be able to complete her tour of the palace.

“It is full of dead animals”, said the king, “and unfit for a lady to see, especially one so blossoming and fair. But take this consolation, that in celebration of your return here we shall host a most splendid ball.”

The idea filled her with delight, thinking of her old friends and family with whom she could become reacquainted. But most of all it was the prospect of seeing Perrault House once more in all its shining magnificence that made her feel as if she was living in a dream. During the day, the maidservants would help to dress her in resplendent gowns, which she would model to the pleasure and approval of her father. There was a dress the colour of the sky, a silk dress the colour of the moon, and more, all from the very best tailors as summoned by the king.

At night, her mind would wander to the curious room, the walk-in freezer that was, on reflection, some distance from the kitchen and the servants’ quarters. Just then she heard strange footsteps in the corridor. When she went to investigate and found a deer, she decided that she must have fallen asleep.

“My poor Cinderella,” it said. “You must be careful.”

“Mother?”

The deer suddenly appeared melancholy.

“Though I saw you as a daughter, no, you would not know me as your mother.”

“You?” Cinderella was taken aback, recognising the voice of her stepmother. “Keep away from me…”

As she hastily retreated into the bedroom and shut the heavy door, the voice seemed to phase through and came down from the corners of the ceiling.

“You are in danger, child.”

At this, Cinderella was all at once terrified that her jealous stepsisters might be plotting against her. But instead, the phantom voice of the stepmother told her a story, at once deeply familiar and a shocking revelation of fundamental secrets.

The account began with her marriage to the king, and her fears for her two daughters. Being without blood relation to the throne, their position was tenuous. But she quickly came to love Cinderella as well, and would be fiercely protective of her. One day, she learnt that the former queen, on her deathbed, had made an agreement with the king, that he should remarry only if he found a bride as beautiful as herself. As it was, the new queen was only a consolation in the king’s eye. To her horror, he had realised that only his daughter might have the charm and beauty of his former wife.

And so she had kept Cinderella away from him. She had dressed her in unappealing rags, and prepared her for a life outside the royal household. Finally, the day came when her blossoming beauty put her in grave peril in the vicinity of her lustful father. There was only one recourse. By banishing the king’s daughter in secret, she had aimed to save her.

Cinderella’s whirling mind could only think of one thing. On her bedside table, a key materialised to meet this thought. She opened her door to the deer, and wandered toward the east wing. There was the door with the symbol squares, moonlit. She slid the key in place, and forced open the heavy latch. She knew what was coming, but had to see. There, on a meat hook, was the violated corpse of her murdered stepmother.

Our protagonist’s immediate emotion, though it may be puzzling to you, dear reader, was guilt. A deep, painful guilt that she had betrayed her father’s trust and entered the forbidden room. She may have blamed herself for some time, given her curiosity and what she now knew. It is hard to comprehend the repugnance and terror of the scenario. Were this the end of the story, the moral would be one of existential despair and man-made atrocity. But Cinderella is our hero. It could not end here. Her actions live on today as a lesson to us all.

As her father conducted the remaining clothing sessions in preparation for the ball, he paid particular attention to Cinderella’s feet. Whereas before he had watched from the far side of the room, he dismissed the maidservant and himself bound various shoes to her. Finally he came upon the idea of glass slippers, and commissioned their creation.

Meanwhile, the stepsisters were desperate to attend the ball, but no longer had any fine dresses of their own. The maidservant, sympathetic to their sorrow, smuggled to them those clothes which had been discarded. The shoes, they found, were too small. As a result of their station they longed for recognition and the approval of the king. It was the elder stepsister who boldly suggested that they might achieve this by reshaping their feet by way of a knife.

“Lie back and think of England”, she said.

Finally, there came the day of the ball. Cinderella received a message from her father requesting her presence in his room. He showed her the glass slippers. And they were beautiful. They were surely the most beautiful things she had ever seen. As she looked through the fragile crystal, and the mesmerising colours of the rainbow that shone through it, she forgot for a moment her overwhelming fear.

“I’ve told you a small fib”, he said, touching her hand, gesturing that she should put down the shoe. “Tonight’s ball is in fact more than a homecoming celebration. I have decided that it is time my daughter should marry. Tonight will be your wedding ceremony.”

She couldn’t react.

“You shall be very pleased with the groom,” he continued, “He is quite the gentleman and a man of considerable wealth and stock.”

At this, she politely thanked him, and excused herself to tell her stepsisters the good news.

When evening came and the guests began to arrive, Cinderella was nowhere to be seen. The king fumed about, instructing the servants to redouble their efforts in locating her. He came to the stepsisters’ room, demanding to know if the princess had come to see them.

“No, my king”, said the elder stepsister. “We have been busily preparing ourselves for the ball and have been left quite alone.”

“Do you like our dresses?” asked the younger.

“See how Cinderella’s shoes fit”, said the elder. “Let me try on her glass slippers, oh please, father.”

“I’m not your father”, he snarled, “and I will allow no such thing. See how you wear her clothes.”

He grabbed a dress.

“You are as repulsive as your mother was.”

Leaving no pause for response, he stormed out the room, past a busy maidservant. If he had thought to look at her, he might have noticed Cinderella in clever disguise. She entered the stepsisters’ room, interrupting the younger’s crying to tell them of the apparition of their mother, and her story. She implored them to flee the palace.

The elder sister would not listen, believing it to be a trick, but the younger hobbled up on her bloodied feet to her stepsister’s arms. Together, so they say, they were able to escape, and never to return. The smell of lavender prompted Cinderella to look back at Perrault House with sentimental regret, and then to the road ahead.

Were this the end of the story, one can only hope that they lived happily ever after.

She clicked the link and a new page appeared on-screen. How strange that this simple act would change her life forever.

It was the warning that captured her. Allegedly, the story of Lyemouth was a true one, and not only that – it was yet to occur. The author, listed as one Erich Gull, insisted that the would-be reader close the manuscript (from which the text was presumably transcribed) or else take responsibility, legal and otherwise, for any future consequences.

The history of Lyemouth (location unspecified) began with a study of its symbols, the ancient and foreign characters carved into the archaeological remnants of its earliest known inhabitants. The proto-language seemed entirely distinct from the written tongue of any known civilisation.

Following this, a brief description of the various foreign invaders of the territory. Their number was surprising, since Lyemouth offered little in terms of natural resources or strategic placement. The river running alongside it seemed to have been in some way poisoned, so no crops grew and the average life expectancy couldn’t have been more than 30. It was speculated by the author that rumours of hidden gold may have been cause for the regular arrival of foreign spear, or else the land itself was considered to have magical properties, perhaps accompanied by some sybil whose prophecies would compensate for the lack of earthly production. At any rate, there was no material evidence for either.

The more recent history of Lyemouth centres on an archaic sort of asylum, in which patients reportedly became more unstable than when they were first detained. Various accounts relate to inmates claiming the personae of historic inhabitants, some known, others surely invented. It is from here that the popular legends of Lyemouth are derived; the great knight Derheld and the dragon, his encounter with the genetically impure residents of neighbouring Innsmouth, and so on.

Curiously, some of these men and women, though assumed illiterate, were able to write great passages in unknown symbols that were found to bear more than a passing resemblance to those already mentioned. The means of this hoax remain unproven, though the nearby gambling house certainly had much to gain from the arrival of superstitious tourists and foreign coin.

The next page is reproduced as an image. We see that the account is handwritten by its author.

“And yet”

By this point the scrawl has become shaky, or perhaps it was always that way. At any rate, the remainder of the sheet is clearly composed with care.

Erica Gull scrolled through the pages of symbols that comprised the rest of the manuscript. Closing the window, she felt the call to sleep and now in her bed shut her eyes to the conscious world. And now she saw the blue, underlined text that signified a link to another page and she was back again, meeting this promise with the gesture of a click, summoned to the black background. Summoned to the account of Lyemouth.