The estate agents had warned her the house was meant to be haunted, in that joking "we don't believe it and you don't believe it, but we've told you so you can't sue us" way they have. Good skeptical girl like Artemis didn't believe a word of it, of course- in a house this old, it's probably just the bubbles and air-locks in the antiquated plumbing.

It was strange how the electric lights never seemed to cast any light into the west wing corridor, admittedly. Bulbs blowing every time she put one in could be down to bad wiring. But there seemed to be a dense shadow which nothing really cut through, except for actual genuine candle-light. So of course, when she heard the crash in the west wing, she grabbed her candle, not her torch.

Down the corridor she crept, her lace night-dress doing little to dispel the sudden icy chill which had settled on the passage to the library. A distant chink- a sound of metal on ceramic. Or metal on bone....