The moment the human’s hesitant nod confirms that yes, they can in fact see her shimmering form in all its unasked-for glory, something in Gretel shifts—not in any sudden or violent way, but in a slow, dawning awareness that spreads across her features like the glow of a candle gradually conquering the corners of a darkened parlour. Her spine straightens, her chin lifts, and her hands, which had been trembling against the front of her translucent gown, lower just enough to suggest she is trying desperately to reclaim whatever dignity she believes she once had before time, death, and crushing loneliness stripped it from her.

With the most careful, cautious glide—her feet never truly touching the warped floorboards—she drifts a little closer, as though pulled by a mixture of curiosity, yearning, and the kind of social instinct that never quite dies, even when the body does. Her gown swirls around her in slow, liquid arcs, catching every flicker of moonlight as though she were made entirely of restless silver.

“You must forgive my rather dramatic display a moment ago,” she says, voice warm with embarrassment and edged with centuries of cultivated refinement, “for I had steeled myself to spend the remainder of my afterlife in complete solitude, which is a far less romantic prospect than poets of my age would have you believe, and thus the sudden discovery of company—breathing, warm, vividly present company—has rather overwhelmed my sensibilities.”

She lifts one hand, fingers hovering near her cheek as if checking whether her composure has physically cracked under the strain of excitement.

“It has been so very long since I have encountered someone who casts a shadow, someone whose heartbeat I might almost imagine I can hear if I listen hard enough, someone who does not drift through the furniture in a fog of disembodied restlessness,” she continues, her tone growing softer and more intimate as she drifts nearer still, “and I must admit, the sheer novelty of your presence is… profoundly stirring.”

Her eyes—bright, luminous, impossibly expressive—roam the stranger’s face with a mixture of awe and disbelief, as though she is trying to etch every detail into memory before fate cruelly snatches it away again.

“I do hope I am not imposing upon your comfort,” she murmurs, her words weaving through the stale air of the mansion like silk threads carried by a phantom breeze, “but I find myself utterly uncertain of the proper etiquette for receiving a living guest when one has been long dead and cut off from society’s ever-changing conventions.”

A faint, self-conscious laugh escapes her—airy, melodic, and tinged with a desperation she probably doesn’t realise she’s revealing.

“If you intend to remain here for even a short while,” she adds, her voice dropping into something undeniably tender, “I would be most grateful for the opportunity to reacquaint myself with conversation, companionship, and… heaven help me… the simple thrill of another soul acknowledging that I exist at all.”

A long pause follows, filled only by the distant creak of settling beams and the soft hum of her spectral glow.

Then, with a vulnerability no ghost should be capable of showing:

“Tell me… What has brought you to this forgotten place, where the living seldom tread and where I feared none ever would again?”

A soft, shuddering sigh escaped Gretel, a sound like the wind stirring long-dead leaves. She drifted over the threshold, her form seeming to draw strength from the very atmosphere of ink, vellum, and memory.

"Behold," Gretel whispers, her voice thick with a love that death itself had been unable to quell. "My kingdom of stories. My kingdom of dust and dirt."

Her luminous gaze swept over the towering shelves, the mountains of slumped leather, and the cascades of parchment that had spilt from overburdened desks. Moonlight, fierce and silver, cut through the broken panes of the domed ceiling above, illuminating swirling motes of dust that danced like tiny, energetic spirits in the still air. It was a scene of majestic decay.

"Follow me," she says.