"Dreams in the Witch House" Trivia Quiz

Answer: Her bed

As a child, Walter Gilman found his sister, Epperley, crying in bed in fear that the ghosts were coming to find her. He promised that he would always protect her, but she died moments later while he held her hand. As the wind picked up outside and lightning and thunder rolled through, Walter saw his sister's ghostly spirit appear at the foot of her bed. He would be powerless to help as she was dragged out of the bedroom, through the front door, and into an opening in the trees, not to be seen again.

What this event in Walter's life would do was fuel an interest in other dimensions. Many years later, he attends a private exhibition of the powers of Madame Levine, a sensational psychic whose seances leave the audience in awe. Walter is sure of it, after a demonstration at least, that she is the bridge who can take him to his sister.

Answer: a psychic society

Walter forces his way backstage at Madame Levine's and rushes to her dressing area to ask for her aid but he arrives just in time to hear the alleged psychic complaining about her act, specifically the fact that some of her actions were faked. The discovery is disheartening for Walter; he knows the other side is real. His friend, who's been helping him prop up the Psychic Society, says that he can no longer help him find new resources to find the other side-- he needs a real job-- and with that Walter is alone in hunting for the truth.

Walter returns home, reminisces about his sister, and crawls into bed. The next morning, he sets out for the Massachusetts Spiritualist Society, arriving just in time to see a woman departing, muttering of a house that's believed to have special powers. It just so happens that the house belonged to Keziah Mason, a local witch.

Answer: Bartender

Walter explains to Mr. Labuschagne, the head of the Spiritualist Society, that he's located two credible out-of-state mediums he wishes to meet with but, unfortunately, funding for the society's research seems to be drying up. He's confident they're close to finding a real medium, but they may have to close the office in the near future. In the meantime they need to put a hold on all failed fieldwork. It means that Walter will need to resume his day job, working behind a bar in town.

Walter is dismayed by the turn of fate, and when he's approached by his friend, who offers him a job travelling the world as a journalist, he turns it down with the intent to continue searching for a path tot he other side. His friend claims that he's a lost man, more concerned with his dead sister than the living.

Answer: Liquid Gold

While cleaning up at the bar, Walter comes across two men speaking of alternate dimensions and he joins their conversation, explaining he knows about the path in the woods. One of the men leaves without further discussion while the other tells him to chat outside, where no one will overhear them. Walter explains his sister being taken to the woods and it's enough for the man to understand and inform him that his people call it the Forest of Lost Souls, a limbo for those not yet ready to move on. The man and his people have been there before and they can take Walter, but he needs to pay up.

Walter is brought to the basement room of a local establishment and handed a small vial made by a Navajo man. The contents, which they refer to as 'Liquid Gold', are what he needs to visit the other side. Their only recommendation is that he not cause any ripples in the forest.

He takes a seat, downs the vial, and passes out, opening his eyes to find a portal into the woods has appeared before him.

Answer: A piece of her dress

Walter rises from his seat and steps through the threshold in the wall, passing through a tunnel of thick branches before a vine wraps itself around his arm and pulls him deeper into the woods. What he finds on the other side is a terrifying, foggy forest where a small handful of people wander around almost without aim. Walter races around searching for Epperley and, to his amazement, he finds her alone there, unchanged since the day she was taken. She recognizes him as he approaches, but Walter is pulled back into his waking life almost immediately after, opening his eyes in the basement where his physical body was left behind.

With his newfound intelligence in hand, Walter races to his friend's apartment to tell him the news but it's reasoned that he took an unknown drug from an unknown man. It reeks of desperation, and his friend worries that he might go to extremes just to prove his sister can come back.

Walter returns to the basement nonetheless, paying for the Liquid Gold and searching for his sister. One person he does find on these trips, to his surprise, is the woman from the Spiritualist Society, there amongst the trees, painting the witch house. He finds his sister, speaks to her about his life for a short time, and tries to bring her back with him, but he only succeeds in bringing back a shred of her dress. It is, nonetheless, a hopeful result.

Answer: Rat

With further motivation to explore the Forest of Lost Souls, Walter researches the local witch, Keziah Mason, who claimed the ability to travel different dimensions using an ancient ritual dagger as a key. She was, however, tried for witchcraft and hanged on her property. Three days later, her body vanished, believed to be retrieved by unknown persons. With that he packs his things and heads to the witch house to investigate.

Before Walter leaves, he stops at the Spiritualist Society and begs for funds for this lead. Mr. Labuschagne reminds him that this can't be done, especially after Walter's recent drug use; it would tank their credibility. Walter's membership is terminated, but he may return when he proves himself to be an honourable man again.

Walter arrives at the home, rents one of its overgrown rooms, and is warned not to tend to the oddities of the building. The landlady leaves a key and departs while Walter takes stock, finding odd etchings on the walls, rats scurrying about inside (and chewing the wiring), and a damp spot on the ceiling. Little does he know, the rat is acting maliciously.

It isn't long before he senses the figure in the shadows, watching him reading over his books. Regardless, he eventually retires to bed.

Answer: Twins

Walter awakens in the night to find himself paralyzed, lying on his back in bed and staring up at the undulating wet patch in the ceiling. A decrepit figure with glowing eyes emerges from the stairwell across the room and lurks towards his bed, gazing at the books on the table, and is it nears him it finds the framed picture of Walter and Epperley on the nightstand. While the figure realizes Walter's significance, a rat crawls out from the wall and stares into Walter's eyes, revealing itself to have a human face and the capability of speech. It comments that he may be the one they've been waiting for, there to free them.

When Walter awakens to the sound of a banging window shutter the next morning he comes to understand that the real key to bringing something back from the other side is, in fact, twins. He purchases one more vial of Liquid Gold, brings it back to the witch house, and imbibes, finding a passage to the Forest of Lost Souls waiting for him. He doesn't see the witch watching as he passes through the portal.

Answer: Sunrise

When Walter reenters the Forest of Souls, Epperley is quick to find him and warn him of the mistake he made as something dangerous has stalked him through the door. As he's disturbing the forest, they're all in great peril. The twins run with the witch in close pursuit and, though they manage to hide, the rat with the human face gives their position away. Epperley nearly makes it through the door to the witch house but Walter, tripping and falling, is caught and embraced by Keziah. His sister manages, however, to drag him through.

Walter awakens back in the witch house with Epperley's spirit present with him but the two know something is horribly wrong. The two are pursued by the rat but they take shelter in another room belonging to the woman who dropped her painting off at the Spiritualist Society. She's quick to realize Walter is meddling in Keziah's work and offers to help, especially when she sees that Epperley has crossed to the real world. Walter has created a ripple and it must be remedied. Epperley is dead and should never have come back. For the dead to become flesh, the living must die. If her paintings are correct, and they always are, the witch will aim to have him dead by sunrise.

Answer: Ceremonial dagger

The painter brings Walter through the nearby cemetery in the middle of a snowy lightning storm in the hope to find sanctuary with the nun of a local church. The painter begs for this, though the nun aims to cast them out. Holy ground, the nun warns, may not keep them at bay since the demons want Walter bad enough. Walter calls upon his friend, Frank, who rushes to the church to discover the news.

What occurs next is nothing short of terrifying as Keziah attempts to enter the church and beckons Walter forth to claim his body. Though the nun holds the cross before her to cast the witch away, she's killed by shards of glass blasted our from a nearby window. Despite Walter's best efforts to hold himself back, Keziah's psychic powers manage to pull him through the door. Frank and the painter are helpless to save him but Epperley reappears before them.

Walter is teleported back to his room in the witch house and Keziah brandishes the ceremonial dagger before him. Before she can plunge the dagger into his eye (at the cheering of the human-faced rat), Epperley emerges from the ether and turns it back on the witch, destroying her physical form. Walter has no choice but to let Epperley go as her spirit finally crosses to the other side. She is finally free.

Walter, exhausted by the perils of the evening, falls unconscious on the floor.

Answer: In the attic of the witch house

Frank and the painter find Walter in his room and set him up in bed, tending to him while he sleeps off his fatigue. While they sit by his bedside, something drops from the leaky ceiling above and Frank decides to investigate, grabbing a lantern to see what's causing the issue from the attic. What he and the painter find there is a still-wet patch in the floor beneath a hidden panel, and inside that panel is a passage containing Keziah's long-rotted body. In a small box nearby is the skeleton of a rat with a small, human skull.

Down in the bedroom, Walter awakens from his sleep to an awful sound coming from within his own body. The others rush downstairs and tear open his shirt to hear the heartbeat from within. It's not Walter's heartbeat, however; it's the heartbeat of the rat with the human face, bursting forth from his chest and killing him moments before sunrise. The witch has succeeded.

As Frank and the painter leave the room, the rat returns to the bed and burrows itself back into Walter's body, taking control of the corpse and possessing it to live the rest of its life as a human being.