Chapter 7: The Ritual of Binding

Chapter 7: The Ritual of Binding

The landlord’s confession hung in the office air, a poison gas that choked out all reason. Swap places. The two words pulsed in Leo’s mind, a death knell. It wasn't just about dying; it was about being erased, his body hijacked by an ancient, evil thing while his consciousness was left to rot in the walls, becoming the next spectral listener for some future, unsuspecting tenant. The fury that had driven him downstairs evaporated, replaced by the stark, crystalline terror of a man facing not just an end, but an eternity of damnation.

“No,” Leo whispered, the word barely audible. “No, he can’t do that.”

“He can,” Abernathy said, his voice hollow. He finally looked away from the photograph of Julian, his gaze meeting Leo’s with a shared, desperate dread. For the first time, Leo didn’t see a cowardly landlord. He saw a fellow prisoner. “He’s done it before. Not a full swap. Not successfully. But he’s tried. My grandfather wrote about it.”

This admission broke the paralysis. A sliver of hope, however thin and sharp, pierced the dread. “Your grandfather? He fought him?”

“He tried to,” Abernathy said, a flicker of something—pride? shame?—in his eyes. He got up, his movements stiff, and walked to a grimy filing cabinet in the corner. He fumbled with a key from his own ring, unlocked the top drawer, and reached deep into the back, pushing aside dusty folders. His fingers found a false panel. Behind it, he retrieved a small, steel lockbox. With another key, he opened it.

Inside lay a single object: a small, leather-bound journal, its cover warped and stained, the leather cracked like old skin. He placed it on the desk with a reverence that felt ancient.

“The Warden’s Log,” Abernathy said. “My grandfather started it. My father added to it. I… I was too afraid to even read it most of the time.”

He opened the book. The pages were brittle, yellowed, and filled with a frantic, spidery cursive. There were sketches of strange symbols, frantic warnings, and accounts of sleepless nights filled with phantom noises that chillingly mirrored Leo’s own experiences.

“He tried everything,” Abernathy murmured, flipping through the pages. “Iron, salt, prayer. Julian was weak then. My grandfather managed to reinforce the ‘walls’ of his prison, keep him contained to the third floor. But he knew Julian would grow stronger. He found a text, an old tome Julian himself had owned, and copied down the only passage that offered a solution. Not to destroy him—he’s part of the building now, destroying him would bring the whole place down—but to bind him. To weaken him. To force him into a deep slumber for decades, maybe even a century.”

Leo leaned over the desk, his eyes scanning the frantic script. “A ritual?”

“A Ritual of Binding,” Abernathy confirmed, his finger tracing a diagram of a circle surrounded by archaic symbols. “It has to be performed in the heart of his power—the room on the third floor. And it has to be done tonight.”

“Why tonight?” Leo asked, a fresh wave of cold dread washing over him.

“Because he’s making his move now. This… this is the apex of his power. All the phenomena, the whispers, giving you the key, appearing to you… he’s close to being able to cross over. The journal says the binding is only possible when the veil between his state and ours is at its thinnest. We either use that to bind him, or he uses it to take you.”

The stakes were clear. A frantic energy seized them. They were no longer landlord and tenant, victim and accomplice. They were unwilling allies in a war for Leo’s soul.

“What do we need?” Leo asked, his voice firm.

Abernathy read from the page. “Four anchors are needed to create the binding circle. Something of his former life.” He pointed to the photograph. “That. It’s a direct link to his physical memory.”

“Something of his prison.” Abernathy continued. “Iron, scraped from the building’s original pipes—the bones of his cage. And dust from the threshold of his chamber, where his influence is strongest.”

“Something to purify the space. A circle of salt is required, but it must be consecrated with water from an untainted source, somewhere his influence hasn't touched.”

“And finally,” Abernathy’s voice faltered. “Something of a life he has touched. A memory of a sorrow he caused. A powerful, personal totem of loss to act as the final lock in the binding.” He looked up, his face ashen. “We have no such thing.”

As if summoned by the dilemma, a soft, hesitant knock came from the office door.

Both men froze, their eyes wide with fear. The knock came again, gentle but firm. It was the knock of a person, not a phantom. Abernathy, moving as if through water, walked to the door and opened it a crack.

Standing in the hallway was an elderly woman, her back stooped with age, her white hair pulled into a neat bun. She wore a simple housecoat and slippers. It was Mrs. Gable, from 2A, the quiet woman Leo had only ever seen checking her mail. Her face, usually a placid mask of wrinkles, was etched with a deep, ancient sadness and a surprising, steely resolve.

“I heard you,” she said, her voice thin but clear as a bell. “I’ve been hearing him my whole life. He’s louder tonight than he’s been since I was a little girl.” Her eyes, pale blue and watery, bypassed Abernathy and settled on Leo. “He’s chosen you.”

She stepped into the office, her gaze falling on the photograph of Julian on the desk. A tremor went through her frail body.

“I have what you need,” she said, her voice now trembling with a grief that was seventy years old. “The final anchor.”

She reached up to her neck and unclasped a delicate silver chain. From it dangled a small, heart-shaped locket, tarnished with age. She held it out in her palm.

“I was eight years old when Julian performed his ritual,” she said, her voice distant, lost in memory. “My older brother, Thomas, was ten. He delivered newspapers. That morning, he went up to the penthouse to deliver Mr. Julian’s paper… and he never came back down. They said he ran away. But I knew. We all knew. The building… it felt wrong after that. It felt hungry.”

She opened the locket. Inside, on one side, was a tiny, faded photograph of a smiling boy with a gap-toothed grin. On the other, a pressed and faded four-leaf clover.

“Julian took him,” she whispered, the words heavy with a lifetime of unspoken sorrow. “Thomas was the first soul he tasted after he lost his own. This locket was my last birthday gift to him. He never took it off. They found it a week later, dropped in the stairwell. This building has held my brother’s last memory for seventy years. Use it. Use it to lock that monster in the dark where he belongs.”

A heavy silence filled the room, charged with the weight of her sacrifice. Leo, Abernathy, and Mrs. Gable. A trio bound by desperation and loss.

There was no more time for talk. The building itself seemed to be groaning, a low thrum of power emanating from the walls. A cancerous cold, deeper than before, seeped out of the vents. From the hallway, and from the pipes, and from the ceiling, the whispers started again. Not just Leo’s name this time. A chorus of sibilant whispers, formless and hungry.

Hungry… so hungry…

“We have to go now,” Leo said, his voice grim. He took the locket from Mrs. Gable’s hand. It was cold to the touch.

Abernathy grabbed an empty jar and a metal file from a toolbox. Together, the three of them—the Target, the Warden, and the Witness—ascended the stairs. Abernathy scraped rust-colored iron filings from a basement pipe into the jar. Leo scooped water from the main intake valve, a place hopefully too industrial and remote for Julian’s touch.

As they reached the second-floor landing, the whispers grew louder, clearer. Julian knew what they were doing. The air thickened, and the single lightbulb flickered violently before going out, plunging them into darkness.

“He’s fighting back,” Abernathy gasped.

Leo clicked on his flashlight, the beam cutting a solitary path through the oppressive gloom. He pointed it toward the stairs leading up to the third floor.

“Good,” Leo said, the silver locket clutched tight in his fist, the photograph in his pocket. “Let him fight. Let’s finish this.”