THE THIRTEENTH GUEST - by Jhaymkay🖤

The invitations arrived without stamps. Thirteen black envelopes. Thirteen names. Every recipient had one thing in common: They had testified twenty years ago in the murder trial of Elias Vane. A child killer. A monster. A man hanged for his crimes. The invitation contained only one sentence: "The wrong man died. Dinner begins at midnight."<img alt="" src="/media/inline_insight_image/e48cb1b3b35ca7644a90c97da4f8ebe2.jpg"/>Curiosity became fear. Yet, one by one, they arrived at the abandoned Vane Manor. Twelve guests. One host. The storm outside erased every road. No signal. No escape. At exactly midnight, a voice echoed through hidden speakers. It was Elias Vane. The dead man. Some screamed. Some prayed. Others recognized the voice instantly. "I invited you here," it said, "because my murderer is among you." The lights went out. When they returned, Judge Miriam Holt was sitting upright at the table. Her eyes were open. Her throat had been sewn shut with black thread. On her forehead, written in blood: LIAR. Panic erupted. Everyone accused everyone. Old secrets surfaced. Bribed testimonies. Missing evidence. False memories. One by one, more guests died. Each murder mirrored a sin from the original trial. The doctor who fabricated evidence was found drowned in a bathtub that contained no water. The journalist who destroyed contradictory reports was discovered with pages stuffed down his throat. The detective who hid fingerprints vanished entirely. Only blood remained. Yet something impossible haunted them: No footprints. No fingerprints. No signs of anyone moving between rooms. It was as if the house itself committed murder. By dawn, only three survivors remained. Anna—the victim's younger sister. Father Gabriel—the priest who witnessed the confession. And Victor Reed—the prosecutor who secured Elias Vane's execution. They finally discovered a hidden chamber beneath the mansion. Inside: A preserved dining room. Thirteen chairs. Thirteen skeletons. Each seated perfectly. Each wearing the same clothes as the guests above. The skeleton at the head of the table belonged to Elias Vane. Except... Forensic notes on the wall proved something horrifying. Elias had died ten years BEFORE the murders for which he was executed. The man hanged in his place had been someone else. Someone made to look like him. Someone silenced. The entire town had condemned the wrong person. As terror consumed them, Anna revealed the final truth. There never had been twelve guests. There had always been thirteen. Victor Reed was not Victor Reed. He was Daniel Vane. The real Elias Vane's son. He had spent twenty years becoming the prosecutor's assistant, earning trust, changing his name, waiting. He had orchestrated everything. The invitations. The hidden passages. The recordings. The murders. Justice, he called it. But Father Gabriel laughed. A broken, terrified laugh. Because Daniel had made one mistake. He had murdered people in rooms where Father Gabriel had been watching continuously. Impossible rooms. Impossible deaths. Daniel couldn't have done them. The priest whispered: "Then who killed the others?" Silence. A child's voice answered from the darkness. "I did." The lights failed. A little girl stepped into the room. White dress. Bare feet. The same girl everyone believed Elias Vane murdered twenty years earlier. The girl whose death started everything. The girl whose body was never found. She had not aged. She smiled. "I waited for all of you." The final report stated that investigators discovered thirteen bodies in the mansion. All seated around a dinner table. All dead for several days. There was no sign of struggle. No murderer. No explanation. Only thirteen black plates. And a fourteenth chair. Still warm.<img alt="" src="/media/inline_insight_image/18217961a7a68cb823328933911e0a5d.jpg"/>

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