The room that once housed grand pianos was still. Furniture, desks, the glossy counter I used to lean against while Mom yakked with the instructor- nothing but memories now, ghosts in a dark place. The room had lost the cheer of its music, replaced by undertones of undisturbed dust and hissing air, where the cracks in unsealed windows let the night in.

Two doors I recognized. One, a storage room or back office where my instructor would disappear to every so often. The second, that one I knew only by recognition. You didn't go near that door. That door stayed locked. Even its access had been obstructed by a wide display. To keep the curious kids at bay, the instructor would lie and tell us that was where the Phantom of the Opera lived.

Tonight, this was the only handle not covered in dust. I rubbed my arms, suddenly chilled.

"Al!" Becky's voice was hushed, but seemed to echo through the dry air. She pointed at footsteps on the floor. Her own boot filled one- female heel, probably her mom's. "Looks like she's alone."

"Except for Emma," I agreed, peering at the tracks and then the surrounding area to see if others had come this way. "Go easy across the floor. The hall is below us. She might hear us coming."

"Is there another way out?"

I shook my head. "I really don't know. I just know we can access it through here."

"Why'd she bring her here?" Becky asked, a small shiver overtaking her body. We inched forward one small step at a time until the door loomed before us in all its dark-stained glory. "You don't think it's some sort of ritual, do you? Some nights she'd come home late and sober and refused to tell me where she'd been."

"No. Whatever this is ...I think she wanted a quiet place to hide."

"Like one of your old lab rats."

"Becky, she's your mother."

"My mom left me at a playground when I was two and never looked back." Her hand clenched the door handle. The confidence in her voice cracked and wavered and little stains dotted the floor. "What's down there is a heartless demon."

"We can wait for police," I reminded her. "Just because you have a chance to face a demon, doesn't always mean you should."

"She didn't hurt me. I think I can get Emma back."

"I know you can," I told her. She turned the handle slow enough to hear every mechanism in the door groan and creak. A faint yellow glow tempered the yawning darkness, though we had to navigate our way down through the pitch before it'd provide any help. Becky went first, hand out for balance, easing both feet onto a stair before moving to the next. Dark drapes and moth-eaten flags lay upon upturned pianos and sound equipment as we found our way to the balcony landing.

A gravelly voice whispered lullabies through tattered fabric thrown across the rusted rail.

The ceiling upon in a wide dome framed by ornate pillars, all chipped ivory that glowed rose gold. We crept nearer to the rail's edge in a half-crouched stance, peering over the destroyed remnants of an era long-past to view the cluttered stage. And there upon a thin bench, sat a camping lantern. It threw the light that highlighted the ceiling, drew strange shadows from the useless equipment stored where an audience would have sat.

And it highlighted a thin woman in an oversized grey peacoat, who sat atop a piano, singing to a baby in her arms. 

Becky gasped. As if desperate for sound after a century unused, the room gathered her sharp inhale and fired it like a bullet toward the stage. Her mother looked up immediately, pulling the bundle in her arms protectively to her chest. "Who's there?"

I ducked. Becky rose before I could grab her. "Me," she announced, brushing dust out of her hair.

A smile spread across Trisha's face as her daughter's face caught the light. She set Emma down on the piano and herself hopped off, arms spread wide. Her red locks, the once-gorgeous origin of Becky's fire-kissed hair, were contained in a loose, greasy bun. Emma gave a soft cry. The veins in her neck bulged as she twisted her head around to regard her granddaughter. When all was well, she spun back, a figure whose gaunt cheeks and sunken eyes made her seem twice her age of 42. "Oh, my Becca! Come to me, child!"

"I'll be right down," Becky promised, glancing down at me. "If I can't get Emma, you have to."

"Distract her and I'll-"

"No. I'm not going to trick her. Get up. Wave." She turned, leaning over the rail as I hauled myself upright. "Stay right there. Allie is here, too. You remember Allie, don't you?"

"Little bitch who abandoned you in your time of need?"

"If it weren't for her 'abandoning' me, you wouldn't have been able to move in," Becky pointed out in a voice calmer than her expression let on.

I stood. "'Evening, Ms. Awles."

The grin on Trisha's face unsettled me. "Get your asses- Oops!" She tickled Emma's feet with a screechy laugh. "Tushies, down here."

We descended as fast as possible, until our feet touched the rotting floorboards and we creaked across the once-grand rows. Pianos, instruments and devices I didn't know the names of, all went here to die. This was a tomb, a musical tomb, and walking into the graveyard of classical melody had me as uncomfortable as I had been in the northern forests of Norway. The hair on the back of my neck rose as we approached the stage. 

"Hi, Mom," Becky said, arms outstretched in a hopeful, but rejected, attempt to hug her mother. She rubbed her own arms and glanced up at the crumbling ceiling, puffing out a small white cloud of breath. "It's  so cold here. Emma's gonna catch a chill."

"She's fine." Trisha's lips formed a pout. "Not concerned about your dear, old mother's health?"

"Not with that toasty coat! Wish I had one of those. Where'd you get it?"

"Woman's shelter." She shrugged the thing to the floor, revealing ragged grey jeggings and a wrinkled, semi-transparent blue tunic. There was a bulge in her front pocket. I tensed as her hands brushed over it. "You want this? Take it. I won't need this where I'm going."

"Somewhere warmer, I hope?" Becky's smile was a lot more non-threatening than whatever was on my face. Trisha nodded, but her eyes never left my body, as if she were looking for something. "Is Emma going, too?"

She threw back her head and laughed, a horrid sound that sprung up on all sides of us and made me step onto the stage alongside Becky. "You think I want to leave the country for the first time in my life and have to come home to an infant every night? She's yours, Becca."

Relief softened Becky's posture as she picked up the jacket. She folded it over her arm and walked towards Emma. "She looks a little untucked in the blanket. Do you mind?"

Her mother pushed past her, scooping the baby into her arms. From her pocket she pulled a tiny switchblade. "Yes!" A thousand hisses echoed Trisha's cry. Child gathered, she walked to the far side of the grand piano and held the tip of the blade an inch from Emma's throat. Behind her, a broken mirror reflected the scene from a dozen shattered angles.

Becky's eyebrows pinched together, pained. She started to ease around one side of the forgotten behemoth.

"No!"  Trisha shouted, and the knife touched Emma's cheek.

Becky didn't stop moving. The cold point made her daughter squirm. "Why, Mom?"

"Not until I'm paid. They told me to deliver the baby here, and someone would be along with the tickets and money."

"Okay." I raised one hand toward Trisha to stand still, the other at Becky. "Who's paying you?"

Trisha erupted into giggles. "Don't bullshit me." 

Becky's hands braced the piano. "Mom, we can help you. Allie can pay whatever you want."

"More," I agreed.

"Just tell us who."

A long, thin finger extended in the mirror's warped reflections. "Her. The queen of fucking Norway."

Becky's mouth dropped open. "Allie?"

I couldn't do anything but shake my head. "No! I swear I didn't-"

"Oh, you did!" Trisha spun with the baby high in her arms, taking a step nearer her daughter. "Becky, check my-"

A low, suppressed bang.

Blood sprayed my dress. The mirror exploded into tinier pieces.

Momentum carried Trisha's slackened expression a half-turn more, then she crumpled across the piano keys. Emma dropped like a stone, straight into her mother's stunned arms.

Thick liquid filled the gaps between keys and poured onto the ground. Trisha remained  there a moment, and then the keys played a somber note as she hit the floor. Becky collapsed on her knees, knees drenched in her mother's blood. "Wh-what?"

Making sure Emma was secure in her arms, I grabbed her by the shoulder and hauled her upright. The balcony was empty, untouched but for a banner fallen from place and onto the floor. "We're not safe here."

The door slammed in the still concert hall. By the time I could climb up there, the shooter would be long gone.

"My mom..." Becky's knees wobbled. I lifted her arm over my head and supported her sagging body. Dust muted the drips of blood from our clothes. "What just happened?"

"I don't know." As best I could, I started walking her across the stage. "But Emma's not safe yet. We've gotta get out of here. Can you do that for her?"

Becky turned wide eyes back onto the scene behind us. "Is she dead?"

I didn't realize how shaky I'd gotten until I lifted a lily-white hand to manually guide her chin away from the sight. "We can't help her."

"Oh God," she muttered, and her neck fluttered and pulsed. She shoved Emma into my arms. Cradling the baby, I leaned into Becky to ease her faint. She slumped against the wall as muffled sirens and red light stretched toward us. I looked at the top of the stairs, then at the baby in my arms, and sat and held Becky's hand.