Chapter 1 - Moving Day

A pickup truck pulled into the driveway of the old house at 1113 Birch Street, pulling a rented U-Haul trailer behind it. The driver, 22-year-old Anna Penrose, parked it and hopped out, looking up at the building's exterior. It was a fairly old plantation-style house, apparently dating back to the late 1800s.

The building itself was fairly massive, one that many would think a celebrity or some other rich person would live in, but no one would dare live in this place. Until now, that is; Anna had just bought it and was moving in that very day.

She had been able to get the house for quite a bargain; rumour had it that it was haunted, and that stigma had dropped the price considerably. She'd paid half the cost and her family had paid the other half, and now here she was, fresh out of college with a bachelor's degree in history and ready to start a life of her own.

"Well, at least it looks how it did in the pictures," Anna remarked before taking out her phone, comparing an image she had saved from the website that was selling the house. It was no scam; Anna had bought a genuine 19th-century house.

Of course, it only looked old on the outside. There was apparently Wi-Fi and other modern appliances inside of the large building. Anna may have been a nerd about history, but even she wasn't comfortable with the thought of living like a peasant. Barely any hot water, diseases, bad food; things had certainly gotten better over the years.

Anna walked to the trailer hitched to the back of her truck, unlocking the door and lifting it up. As it opened, the sunlight poured into the trailer, illuminating the boxes and suitcases full of her various belongings. Some were from her family home back in her home state of Montana, but others were from her student apartment that she had shared with her best friend Kristina. She should have been helping her with this, with those big strong muscles of hers. It annoyed Anna slightly that Kristina had a hockey game today, meaning she couldn't come with her. What's worse, none of her other friends could help her out either. Her cousin Merida had archery practice, and her other friends Tiana and Lottie were working at Tiana's new restaurant.

Still, Anna would make the best of it. She herself was quite a buff gal-or at least, that's what her old college friend Korra used to say when they went to the gym together. Oh yeah, she couldn't help either. Likely, Korra was probably too busy with her new girlfriend Asami.

Anna frowned a bit at the thought. She was very happy for Korra, but also slightly envious of her; she herself didn't have a very good track record in terms of her relationships. She was a hopeless romantic, preferring women over men. But sadly, her studies kept her from getting into the social scene much, and when she did try dating someone, it would never work out. Either one of them was too busy, or neither of them could feel the spark from their first meeting.

But now that Anna had a house and a new life, perhaps some good luck would come her way. Now, though, she needed to unpack her belongings and move them into the house.

First on her agenda was getting the largest package into the house. She picked up a large cardboard box from the bed of her truck and carried it up to the old oak front door of her new estate. She then spied an old key on the doormat in front of her and knelt down, picking it up with one hand and using the door to keep the box in her hands from falling. The key was made of a slightly worn brass and looked like it hadn't been used in years. Hopefully, it wouldn't break anytime soon.

After using the key to unlock the door, Anna grunted as she tried to swing the door open with the heel of her foot. She somehow, somehow, managed to twist the handle open by some miracle she'd never understand, but it didn't make getting the overly large box through the entrance way. She twisted it, hoping changing the angle would help. Nothing. Then she dumped it to the ground and hoping to force it through would work. It was just clothes and… hopefully not anything else too valuable. It would be worse it got left out here and the weather spontaneously rained.

After a good few minutes of shoving, along with more than a few grunts along the lines of "Come on, you stupid bastard!", the box finally got inside the house, where it lay on the floor at the base of the staircase.

Anna smiled, brushing her hands together. "One down," she said. "God knows how many more to go."

She walked back out to the truck and started moving the rest of her packages inside. Thankfully, a lot of the bigger ones were suitcases, no more big hefty cardboard boxes, while others were small carrier bags, filled with Anna's various things like her CDs and her games console.

Finally, all of her packages were inside the house, and in good time as well; once Anna had brought the last of her packages inside of the house, she heard the distinct sound of thunder rumbling in the clouds above her head of strawberry hair.

Sighing, Anna wiped her brow. "Looks like I got my stuff in just in time." She then wondered if it would be alright leaving the truck outside as it was, but Anna probably had nothing to worry about. The city where she lived had a very low crime rate, so nothing was likely to get stolen, especially from a supposedly haunted house.

The young girl then eyed all of her belongings, all of them bundled in a large pile at the bottom of the staircase. If this really was supposed to be an old house, she would have probably expected a group of servants to take her belongings, but alas, she was forced to do it herself. Now what should I do?

Anna stared at the array of boxes thrown haphazardly around the living room. It was just after dinnertime, an awkward time of day. Not quite early enough to go out and do something to celebrate, but not quite late enough either. Besides, what fun was it to go out alone? She expected to be tired, but the thrill of finally moving into her first real home had Anna feeling giddy instead. Too much-excited energy made her still itch to do more. Decorating was so not getting done tonight, but perhaps she could get a start.

Anna opened a random box and laughed out loud. An imitation Joan of Arc portrait sat at the top, wrapped in about twelve layers of bubble wrap. She peeled it off, smiling at the painting. Across the room, one of the walls seem to scream that it was perfect spot: there was even a nail already in the wall. Anna hurried over and hung the portrait on the wall, then stepped back to admire it. A couch right under her would look nice. Anna couldn't wait for the rest of her furniture to arrive sometime tomorrow.

Now that Joan had found a place in her new home, Anna's mind returned to the question: What now?

She could explore more of the house? Duh!

Anna nearly smacked her head at the thought. She was so concerned about getting everything, the idea hadn't even occurred to her. She saw some pictures online. That was cool. But nothing would compare to walking through the actual space, smelling wonderful...abandoned old air. Or actually, to be honest, it didn't smell as horrible and stale as Anna had expected. Instead, there was a light, pleasant aroma: possibly like flowers, but with the briskness of snow. The comparison between the two things was kind of a contradiction, but it still somehow worked. At least Anna didn't need to buy air fresheners.

She walked into the kitchen, admiring the decrepit flooring and walls. Anyone else would have sneered at it, but Anna's history nerd side kept getting more excited. Nothing was even in bad shape. If she put a few decorations here and there, this place would become really nice indeed. Some of the faucets were still antique. She'd need to check later if they were in proper working order. If anything crawled out of those fixtures…. Ugh, she thought, shuddering.

Then she headed down the hall. Not much to say there. It was dark. Wallpaper peeling in a few places. She'd need to fix that and get some lighting. The bathroom? Anna would worry about that trainwreck later. If there was one room she didn't want to see in an old house, it would be that.

Anna continued analyzing the spaces, working her way around the house. It was less scary than she'd expected. Probably her obsession with historical sites was overshadowing any need to have fear, which ended up being a mistake. It was probably why she completely missed seeing the odd light shining from under the door to the study room.

She stopped for a second right there on the upper floor, her mind finally registering both the door and the light coming from beneath it. The door itself was very unusual. While all the other furnishings in the house had been made of a brown oak wood, this door was much different. It was painted white with an unusual pattern along its frame, a gold handle, and what seemed to be a slight bit of red carpet underneath it.

"What the heck is this?" Anna muttered, going to the door and leaning her ear against it. As she moved closer, she found she could hear some sort of voice coming from the other side, a feminine tone, one that appeared to be humming.

She slowly opened the door and peeked around its edge, her eyes widening in surprise.

The study room was a large room, that looked like some sort of sitting room. The furnishings were old, seemingly older than anything that Anna had noticed in her house. There were more odd things about the room. While outside of her house, Anna knew there were dark storm clouds in the sky, but coming through the windows of this room was... sunshine?

But that wasn't the most peculiar thing about the room. Sitting beside a fireplace, reading a book, was a young woman. She was wearing a rather formal looking blue jacket and skirt, with white gloves on her hands, turning the pages. Her hair was a beautiful shade of platinum blonde and her eyes, blue like ice, were moving back and forth along the page. On her head seemed to be a golden tiara, one with a blue jewel inside of it.

Anna gasped, covering her mouth. She twirled around, pressing her back flat against the wall to get out of the person's line of sight. Who was this strange woman? What was this strange woman? She couldn't have been... no, she couldn't have been a ghost... could she?

Unfortunately, the woman seemed to hear a noise. Her soft voice silenced. Beads of sweat form on Anna's forehead and the fingers around her mouth trembled. She heard the floorboards in the room begin to creak and groan, the sound of someone's weight shifting as they hesitantly walked forward.

Anna squeezed her eyes shut. And then opened them, glancing at the entryway where the ethereal being/woman/phantom thing would appear. Then squeezed them shut again. The sound was getting closer. Oh, God. Did Anna want to see her killer, though? What was she doing? Who the fuck in their right mind buys old houses anyway?

No. She'd look death in the eye. She was tough. She'd…she'd fight back and win. Or maybe strike a deal and agree to sell her soul so that…thing would let her go. This wasn't the end. This could be fine. But then she'd have to deal with the consequences of that in her afterlife, which there obviously was since this woman existed, and oh hell Anna did not spend enough time praying in her life to -

Suddenly, Anna shrieked and jumped several feet back. She grabbed a dusty old lamp by her side to point at the woman, and landed painfully on her backside.

The woman looked down, staring at Anna with her blue eyes. She shot a glance down at Anna's clothing, visibly quivering in fear. This girl was the strangest sight she had ever seen, much like how she herself was the strangest woman Anna had ever seen.

Within a few seconds, Anna dropped the lantern and leapt back up to her feet. She screamed loudly, and pushed the other woman away, slamming the door.

Landing down on the floor of the house, Anna panted, taking in deep breaths. She sighed and relaxed. She hoped she had been making this all up somehow…but then she heard sobbing coming from the other side of the door.

xXx

Author's note: And so begins my latest big Elsanna fic! I hope you all enjoy the rather unique AU that will be brought to the table here. Rest assured that there will be lots of fluff and good times throughout the fic. I am still currently writing this story however, so please do send me feedback. It will mean a lot! I'll see you all next time when Anna deals with the consequences of her actions

Also special thanks to Halladelle and Matty for helping with some of the chapters

See ya!