Emily's hand slipped from the doorknob.
"Grandma…?"
The old woman's gaze pierced through her like glass. She didn't smile. Didn't soften. Only repeated, voice rasping like gravel dragged across stone:
"What have you done, child?"
For a moment they stood locked in silence, eye to eye. Emily's breath hitched. Finally, she stepped back, breaking the stare. "Come in," she whispered.
Grandma stepped inside. Her cane struck the floor with each step, sharp and deliberate. Her back was bent, her frame fragile, but her presence filled the house like a storm. She moved slowly, surveying every corner, every shadow, her gaze lingering on the photographs on the wall, the windows, the cracks of the ceiling — as if searching for something that wasn't supposed to be there.
Emily darted into the kitchen, palms damp. Her thoughts spun: Did Aunt Margaret tell her everything? Does she know? She filled a glass of water, the trickle of the bottle loud in the silence.
When she returned, her grandmother sat stiffly on the sofa, cane resting across her knees. Emily handed her the glass, their fingers brushing for a second — and in that second, Emily swore her grandmother's eyes burned hotter, searching deeper.
She drank slowly, then placed the glass on the table with a trembling hand. Her eyes never left Emily.
Finally, she spoke.
"How long have you been writing names?"
Emily's throat dried. She froze, then forced the words out, stammering. "I—I didn't at first. The diary wrote itself. It started with warnings. It said if I didn't feed it, it would start killing people close to me. I got scared. I… I only wrote the names of people who hurt me. Bullies. The bad ones."
When she dared to look up, she wished she hadn't.
Her grandmother's jaw hung slack, her face pale with horror. For a long moment she didn't speak at all. Then, faintly, she began to murmur prayers under her breath — words Emily didn't recognize, but their weight chilled her more than silence.
"Grandma…" Emily's voice shook. "Why are you praying? What's wrong?"
Her grandmother's voice trembled as she demanded, "Where did you find it? How did that book come to you?"
Emily clutched her hands together. "I… I found it between my notebooks. Inside my backpack. It just… appeared there. I swear, I don't know how."
Her grandmother listened carefully, lips pressed tight, then whispered as if to herself:
"It was never meant to be there. It should never have been touched."
Emily leaned forward, heart pounding. "You knew about it, didn't you? You knew this diary existed all along."
Her grandmother's sigh was heavy, centuries old. "Yes. I knew. Our family has always known. But it was sealed. Buried in iron. We prayed the seal would hold forever."
She looked at Emily harder now, voice brittle.
"Your parents knew only the surface — that the diary was dangerous, sealed away, never to be touched. They did not know the rules. Only I and Margaret kept those. They thought by silence they could protect you. But silence is never enough."
Her voice dropped lower, brittle with memory.
"Long before you were born, one of our ancestors — a woman whose name has nearly been erased from our records — wandered into an ancient, buried temple. At its center she found a statue, a grotesque thing carved with too many eyes and too many teeth. At its feet lay the book, chained in corroded iron. She should have left it. But she touched it.
"She began to write in it — travelers, merchants, people she barely knew. And then they began to die. At first she called it coincidence. But the pattern sharpened. She understood too late what she had unleashed.
"She tried to cast it away, again and again. Rivers, stones, fire. Each time, it came back. Always waiting.
"One night, the book wrote on its own. 'Lives taken. Debt unpaid.' The next morning, her younger brother was dead. His name was in the book."
Emily's nails dug into her palms. Her grandmother's voice grew weaker, yet heavier with dread.
"In her despair, she sought a priest. He tried to seal it. But the book resisted. Its chains rattled, the air filled with iron and ash, and the priest's scream was the last sound he ever made. The diary drank his life as if it were nothing.
"His final words to her: Never open it again. If you do, it will feed."
Her grandmother's eyes glistened as she leaned closer.
"She locked it in an iron chest. Passed down the warning. Do not touch it. Do not write. Do not bleed upon it. For generations, the family kept the secret. But with time, it became a myth. Just another story, told in whispers."
She exhaled shakily, her voice turning more fragile, yet edged with regret.
"Your parents knew, Emily. They kept the truth from you because they were afraid. Afraid this very thing might happen. They wanted to protect you — to keep you as far from the book as possible."
Her voice broke into a trembling whisper.
"The seal was never meant to be broken."
Emily's lips parted. "I didn't break it. I didn't even know it existed. I told you — it just appeared in my bag."
Her grandmother stared at her long and hard, as if measuring the truth in her bones. Slowly, her gaze shifted.
From Emily.
To the diary, resting on the table.
Her face drained pale.
And she whispered, almost to herself:
"God help us."
The diary trembled on the table. A faint glow leaked from its cracks, the glass rattling as if the house itself shivered. And beneath it all came a sound — low at first, then unmistakable.
Laughter.
The book was laughing.