Once upon a time, in a land not too far away, Aria Switzer found a mislabeled box in her grandparents’ attic. It said on the side, in her father’s writing: ‘Behavior, Destiny.’ She had no idea what it was, or what it meant; because inside it, there was only an iron key, a tattered journal, and a feather pen.

          She sat back on her feet for a minute, examining the objects. The box was uncommonly large for such a small amount of items. Aria reached for the journal first and flicked it open. A cloud of dust motes floated up from the yellowed page; she sneezed and brushed off the first page.

          There was nothing written on it.

          Aria turned another page. Then another, then another. There was nothing written in any of the pages. The pages felt crinkled, as if ink had been on them once, but it clearly wasn’t there anymore. She wondered if her father had written in it in invisible ink. Maybe it was some kind of journal from childhood, Aria reasoned. She couldn’t picture her levelheaded father writing anything in invisible ink now.

          She set the journal down to her right, on a steadily growing and precariously stacked pile of books, and then reached for the feather pen. There was nothing interesting about it, only that it was lacking an inkwell, so Aria picked up the iron key as well.

          The end of the key seemed to be misshapen, much in the way the box was mislabeled. Aria couldn’t picture a door or cupboard in the universe that could be opened by such an odd key. She shrugged and dropped the key into her pocket just in case.

          Aria was stuck emptying old boxes in a creaky, creepy attic because she was bored. She was bored out of her mind – she had already begun imagining dark goblins dancing in the shadows, although that could have been attributed to her tired eyes as well. Instead of traveling with her friends to a beach house for the summer, she was stuck in an ancient house in the Kent countryside.

          She was American; rather, she had been raised to be so. Her mother was originally English, though, which meant when she wanted to go home, Aria went with her. Her father was German and currently on a business trip, and because Aria could not be trusted not to either go on the beach trip or throw at least one party while alone at home, Aria had to accompany her mother.

          Traveling to the countryside in Kent was a rather sad affair anyway. Her mother was there because her own mother had passed away – several very long years past – and some strange issues with the real estate had arisen in the meantime. Besides, Aria’s grandmother’s things needed to be sorted out or sold, and nobody had gotten around to it quite yet. Aria’s uncle had just kept paying for the house, though it was empty.

          That made the house even creepier: but here Aria was, sitting, quite uncomfortably, in the attic. Aria struggled to stand up and waved her arms in the air for a minute while regaining her balance. When she managed not to knock down the nearest stack of alternately wooden and cardboard boxes, she leaned down to pick up the journal, and then headed for the door.

          Aria was two feet away from the bottom of the rickety staircase when her mother appeared, carrying a box of her own. Aria could see papers spilling from the top. “Aria,” said her mother, raising one eyebrow, “are you already finished?”

          “Sure,” said Aria, already half turned on her heel.

          “Oh, come on! You said you’d help me!”

          “Before a dust bunny tried to make its living in my lungs,” Aria replied. “I’ll work on it some more tomorrow.”

          “What’s that?”

          Aria turned back, holding up the weird journal in her hand. Her mother nodded. “I have no idea,” said Aria. “I was actually hoping you might be able to tell me. I found it in a box up there that said something about behavior and destiny on it.”

          Her mother snorted. “What?” she asked. She took a couple of steps toward Aria, adjusting her grip on her box as she did so. A couple of papers escaped. “Is there anything written in it?”

          “Nope,” said Aria, popping the ‘p.’

          “That is weird,” said her mother, as if this ended the subject. She turned around to walk away; she hesitated to ask, “Oh, could you pick those up for me?”

          Aria complied, cramming the papers down into the box her mother was still holding, and then they went their separate ways. Aria wandered down the hallway of the second floor until she reached another rickety staircase and headed down to the first. Once there, she went to her favorite spot, the crusty window seat in the parlor.

          She had arranged all of her things around it – including an air mattress, because she refused to sleep in a springy old bed full of leggy spiders. Aria sat down on the window seat and dropped the journal onto the cushion beside her. She looked down at it for a minute, and then reached for her phone.

          After taking a picture of the journal and sending it to her dad, Aria put her phone back down and pulled out the iron key. She studied it for a long minute. This house was full of doors: there were no rooms without them. There were even rooms with too many doors. Aria’s mother had already pointed out two secret rooms she’d discovered as a kid, and Aria thought there were probably many more.

          The end of the key, though, was swirled off, looking more like a drill bit than something that might fit in a keyhole. Aria frowned at it. “You don’t make any sense,” she muttered, spinning the key in her fingers.

          She checked her phone; her father had yet to respond. Aria set down the key and picked up the journal. She flicked through the pages. What even are you? Aria wondered. The pages did feel as if there had been ink on them at least once: they were crinkly, not smooth like the journal had just been bought.

          Aria pushed it aside again and stared at it, wishing it had something in it.

          Her phone vibrated. Aria picked it up, hitting the green answer button, and pressed it to her ear. “Hello?”

          “Aria, it’s your father. Where did you find that?”

          “In a box,” Aria replied cautiously. He sounded oddly serious. “I was cleaning out the attic today because Mom asked me to. There’s nothing in it.”

          He let out a breath of relief. “Okay, it’s fine then,” he said. “I have to be at a meeting in five minutes. I’ll call you back later.”

          “Love you,” said Aria. Her father echoed this sentiment before hanging up. Aria looked down at her phone for a minute, curious and perturbed. She tossed her phone away and grabbed the journal.

          This time when she opened it, there was something inside. Instructions, written in a flowing black calligraphy on the second page. Walk down the second hall to the mirror. Turn. Wish for Lire.

          Unfortunately, that was it. Aria flipped through the pages multiple times and found no more. She rolled her eyes – but this did seem interesting. “Lire” was French for the verb “to read,” she knew that much. But facing a mirror and wishing to read didn’t make any sense.

          Aria glanced at her phone. Nobody was calling or texting her; all her friends were having fun together at the beach, probably having forgotten about her plight already. Her father was in a business meeting somewhere. Her few friends from outside school were either working summer jobs or traveling.

          Well, she had nothing to lose. Aria left her phone and journeyed back toward the staircase, which she ascended. She could hear her mother on the phone in the old study at the end of the hall; she walked halfway down the hall, turned, and faced the golden gilded mirror.

          Aria blinked at her reflection. “I wish for Lire,” she said. Unsurprisingly, nothing happened. She checked the journal, which she was still holding, to make sure she’d done the right thing. She had.

          “I wish for Lire,” she repeated, this time more adamantly. Her reflection looked slightly more frustrated. Aria folded her arms and glared at the mirror. “I said I wish for Lire, dammit.”

          She half expected the mirror to respond, well, that’s nice. Aria rolled her eyes and shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Her mother called from the end of the hall: “Aria, sweetie? Who are you talking to?”

          “I’m on the phone, sorry,” Aria called back.

          “Okay, well, so am I,” her mother said with warning in her tone.

          Aria snorted. She faced the mirror and thought, I wish for Lire. It was a little difficult to think, though, because she didn’t know what Lire was. I wish to read. Well, she could do that if she walked downstairs and wandered into the old library room. She stared at her reflection.

          That was when something clicked. Five minutes ago, she’d been staring at the journal, wishing something was inside it; and then something was. Aria swallowed and looked down at the journal. She slowly looked back up at the mirror and closed her eyes, concentrating. She didn’t know what Lire was, but she wanted it.

          After a minute, she opened her eyes. The mirror wasn’t showing her face anymore: it was showing a circular image of a forest, with brown crunchy leaves. Aria took a step back, alarmed. Before she could cry out in surprise, the mirror reached out, with some combination of light and melting glass – it took her by the shoulders – and yanked her right in, journal and all.