The Mansion: Up to Level One (The Landing)

There are only fourteen steps on the Staircase in The Mansion, and then a fifteenth one at the very top, which is actually the Landing floor. Some would say that actually counts as fifteen, but oh no. The steps on the stairs are different to the step to the top.

Coming the other way, yet again, there are fourteen stairs down, and then a fifteenth step to the floor in the Foyer. For years, the Foyer has had a marble floor, but now it is wooden, like the rest of the surroundings on this level… apart from the stairs.

There are a couple of sets of doors on either side of the Staircase, the ones on the right lead through to the Living Room and the wings beyond. The doors to the left lead to the Kitchen and the wings beyond that. Beside the doors to the Kitchen, there are another set of doors which appear and disappear at will. When they last appeared, they led to a 1970s space agency control room. Currently, there’s just a wall there, with a three-seater sofa in front of it.

On the opposite side, we have the Vestibule, which used to be in a room all of its own, but now it’s just a partitioned corner without a door. There’s a statue of an angel in there, and a bookcase with a single vase on a shelf. Inside this vase, there’s a key, which opens the doors behind the bookcase, which in turn lead down to the Catacombs below, and the lava streams below that. That place is always kept under lock and key these days.

Up on the Landing, after climbing the fourteen steps and then the fifteenth one, directly ahead is the Mysterious Shield. This shield comes and goes, just as the room downstairs does, but it always returns, although not necessarily in the same shape.

Turning left at the top of the stairs, leads to two further doors, as does turning right, but we’re looking left first! Directly ahead is the Bathroom, complete with Interdimensional Vortex behind a curtain, and stand alone shower with under-floor heating. The door just before it, on the right, leads to the Bedrooms and the corridors beyond.

Along the Landing the opposite way, right, the two doors here lead to the corridor along the South Wing (the left door) and the Spiral Staircase which leads up the Turret (the door ahead).

And that is it for this floor of the Mansion (well, this section of this floor… it goes further back, but there are parts of the Mansion that aren’t used very often). Opposite the Staircase is the Front Door, and beyond that the Courtyard which opens out onto the Grinds.

The Mansion itself shifts, although lately, it’s been resting, just doing a little redecorating when it feels the urge to. It never closed the Interdimensional Vortex in the Bathroom, I think it likes the challenges that come through it from time to time… but it never reopened those doors in the Vestibule. It was the Mansion that moved the bookcase across the doors too, as this used to be along the side, where the angel statue now stands.

The Mansion provides magic, mystery and imaginative ideas and situations… like the one it’s been doing a lot lately. I go to the Bathroom, and find myself in the Kitchen. I go to the Kitchen and find myself in the Bathroom. Which is fine… this happens to everyone from time to time – but it gets very confusing when they’re meant to be on two floors and somehow end up not being.

Just saying.