To Ashley's grim misfortune, she grew up as an orphan in a town that hated orphans. For sixteen years, she lived under the hatred of the people around her without ever finding willing parents to love and care for her--and she is not surprised. Now casted away from the orphanage with nary a coin to spend, she walks the icy streets like the lost child she is, struggling to survive from one hungry day to the next. For her, the savory smell of food are no less the wildest fantasies, and the stars that hang above her head every night seem nothing more but twinkling audience to her miserable life. Now that Winter's Eve has arrived--the pinnacle of the year, where people dine and drink and give gifts--Ashley expects nothing but the frost. But when the watching heavens begin to decide, and a golden, shimmering ladder drops from the darkest clouds, she can only do so much as wonder: where in the world does it lead up to?

On a lonely icy cliff, an old manor sits like a long forgotten statue, run by an elusive master and his team of faithful servants. One in particular--a young man at the peak of his curiosity--has had too much of his isolated life and not enough of the massive world beyond the comforts of the bastion. However, to reach the rest of the world, one must cross a deep, dark forest--a gloomy labyrinth that is said to be the home of an even greater terror that leaves not even the corpses of those who wander too far...

At the edge of the town, the crumbling shell of a once-splendid manor sits like a tombstone, untouched and unloved. The townsfolk dare not touch it, and those who come too close are said to disappear... At a very young age, Mary Nightingale busies herself with something the religious and superstitious Bridgelyn Town frowns upon: studies about the unknown--studies about specters, daemons, and other abstracts which exist far beyond humans. Her refusal to adhere to local beliefs has been a gamble for her identity and safety. Some may call her journey to the ruins fate; some may call it a most terrifying misfortune. After all, the dirty secret hiding in the ruins--they who have been lurking under everyone's noses... ... may very well want to remain a secret! (Highest Rank: #73 in Paranormal)