by J Armitage
He opened his door fully and beckoned her into his room. Despite having the room next door, she had never seen the inside of Andrew’s room before. She had expected it to be filled with gadgets and gizmos, with wires leading everywhere so she was surprised to find that it looked like a normal room. Spotlessly tidy and rather drab compared to the rest of The Manor. It looked a little like a room a student might live in in halls of residence. Unlike the rest of The Manor which had expensive patterned wallpaper and a chandelier in every room, this one was painted cream and had a very boring lampshade, also in cream. The bed was nothing like her four poster. It was not an antique at all, just a normal divan single bed with a duvet in blue checks and a pillow to match. There was one computer (Anais didn’t know why but she had expected many of them) now, currently turned off. There was little to show any personality in the room. A couple of framed pictured of Chess pieces adorned the walls in cheap frames. The type of picture that was mass produced and was trying and failing to be arty. The shelves held books, mostly on computer languages, some on electrical circuits, no novels. A row of DVDs stood next to the books, all adventure films: Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, Goonies. She now understood where Andrew got his ideas for secret passageways from. It certainly explained why the house had secret rooms and passages. Apart from his obvious love of adventure films, there was little else to show his personality. He had hand carved a beautiful chess set depicting all the family in intricate detail so she knew he had a creative mind. The only thing he had in his room to show this was a small wooden statue. She recognised the woman straight away. It was Judith. The only other personal item in the room was a single photograph of them both taken in front of the house, knee deep in snow. Both were wrapped up warm against the weather, arms around each other and smiles on their faces. They made a strange pair. Andrew, so white, he almost blended into the snow and Judith, ebony skin but still somehow managing a healthy glow of pink on her cheeks from the cold weather. Both looked radiantly happy in the photo which Anais knew could not be more than a couple of months old.
Looking at Andrew now, he looked nothing like the man in the photo. He was still ever so pale but he had black rings under his eyes. Instead of looking a picture of health, he looked tired, thin, frail even. He was not crying at the moment but his red eyes showed that he had been recently. He sat on the bed and was silent.
Anais walked over to the statue of Judith. It wasn’t really a statue as such. A bust really as it just showed her head and shoulders. It was amazingly lifelike and accurate. She picked it up and ran her fingers over its smooth polished surface.
“Why don’t you fly out to her?”
“I can’t.” Even his voice sounded empty, Devoid of any emotion.
“Why not?” She sat next to him on the bed, careful not to touch him as he had not had any human contact for a while and would no doubt give her the electric shocks of The Light.
“I can’t,” he repeated. His eyes downcast as if he was looking at his knees.
“Just book a flight and go. What is stopping you?” She couldn’t understand it. He had the money for the ticket. Thanks to generations of life and some canny business decisions of Arcadia’s, they were all very well off. A flight to Kenya would be a drop in the ocean for them.
“I can’t fly. I’m scared of flying.”
Anais was not expecting that answer at all.
“Well that doesn’t sound like too much of a problem. I mean, there are ways around it. Hypnotherapy? Deep breathing exercises? As a last resort you could take some heavy duty sleeping tablets just before you set off and sleep the entire journey. It will barely feel like you’ve flown at all.”
“I don’t think you understand. I feel physically sick just thinking about flying. I think I would pass out just going to an airport. I can’t do it.”
“I will help you. You can overcome this. When I’m better we will drive to the airport, just sit in the car park if needs be. We can go every day until you feel you are able to go in. I don’t even mind catching a flight to Kenya with you if that’s what it takes.”
“It won’t work, I really can’t do it.”
Anais had a few fears in her life. She wouldn’t be too happy if a snake slithered into her room, for example, but she’d never had such a phobia that prevented her from doing anything. She sympathised with Andrew. For a short period, she and Aethelu had been separated and it had been unimaginable torment. Not knowing if she was safe. Thankfully, Aethelu had come home safe and sound. Anais could still remember the pain she felt in her absence.
She placed her hand on Andrew’s arm.
“Why don’t you just invite her back here then? She loved the place and the danger is over now. Jago is caught. There is nothing stopping her.”
“I’ve asked her and she said no. She said that there were too many secrets in the house.” Anais remembered back to when Judith was living in the house before. It was before Jago was caught and she had to admit there was a lot kept from her. She didn’t know that the family were virtually immortal for a start. It must have all seemed very strange to her. Anais had a pang of guilt. She’d not taken the time to get to know Judith, mainly because she had been going through so much herself. Still, it would have been nice to.
“I’m sure she will change her mind. I’m sure you can change her mind.”
“Perhaps.” He didn’t seem too sure. Anais moved as if to put her arms around him but he shied away from her.
Anais really didn’t know what to say to make things better.
“I felt the same when Aethelu left to go to France. It really was the most awful feeling and the worst part is, people keep telling you to get over it, as if you are suffering no more than a common cold.”
Andrew looked up at her and smiled sadly. “That’s exactly how I feel. Like I should be up and about and acting as if my heart doesn’t feel like it’s been ripped out of my rib cage but I can’t.”
“I don’t think anyone thinks that. These things take time. You take as much as you need. No one thinks any less of you. I’ll always be there if you want someone to talk to. You know where I am, just next door.” She felt useless, spitting out all these clichés, one after the other, but she was having trouble knowing what to say. It did seem pretty hopeless for the pair if Andrew couldn’t get on a plane and Judith was refusing to come back to Britain. She always suspected that Andrew loved Judith with more amplitude than she felt about him but it was not very well something she could verbalise to Andrew.
“Thank you,” he replied. Anais could see he was having trouble keeping back the tears. She decided it would be kinder just to leave him to cry. She didn’t want him feeling embarrassed on top of everything else. She felt sorry for him. Judith had been the love of his life. In six hundred years, she was the first girlfriend he’d ever had, largely due to the invention of the internet, she suspected, as Andrew never seemed to leave the house. Perhaps the beautiful Judith would change her mind. She did seem to enjoy being at The Manor for the short time she was there. Anais just didn’t know.
Leaving the room, she turned towards her own before stopping. It was still too early to sleep. Now would be the perfect opportunity to practice walking on her crutches without some worried family member fussing around her. She did a complete one eighty and hobbled down the corridor as fast as her crutches would take her. Walking on the flat was easy but this morning was the first time she’d tackled stairs with them and then she’d had Aethelu, Winnie and Alex helping her. She had been brought up to her room when her injury was fresh, the men of the house carrying her on a stretcher. For three weeks she had been confined to the third floor of The Manor and she was beginning to get thoroughly sick of it. She held one crutch in her hand, leaving the other one firmly in place under her arm. With her now free hand she held on to the bannister. The crutch went first, sinking into the deep pile of the carpet on the step. She gripped the bannister tightly as she hopped down to join it, being careful not to hurt her injured leg. A few d
eep breaths later and she repeated the procedure. It took her a full ten minutes to get to the bottom of the stairs but she made it. She felt elated and momentarily had the idea of going to Aethelu’s room to show off her accomplishment. She decided that if what Rafe told her was true then there was a good chance that Aethelu was asleep and she didn’t want to wake her. She instead headed for the grand staircase which led down to the entranceway and the big oak doors. Taking one step at a time, she slowly made her way down the stairs, looking at the Victorian portraits of the Guardians that lined the walls. She stopped for a moment as she always did when she got to her dads portrait. She gave it a smile and then stood, not knowing where to go next. The entrance hall was deserted although she could hear sounds coming from the dining room and parlour. She’d not actually put much thought into where she was headed when she started off down the stairs and now she didn’t know where to go. She could be sociable and join family members for the evening or go to the library and quietly read. Something Rafe said had stirred something in her though and before she knew it, she was making her way to the kitchen door to the left of the staircase. The kitchen door opened onto a spiral staircase which would be much more difficult to manoeuvre her crutches round. The only way she could think to do it was to throw one of her crutches over the balustrade whilst using the same method of crutch and bannister to hop down. She threw the crutch over which landed with a terrible clatter on the polished tile floor. She hadn’t expected it to be so loud but no one came to investigate the noise so she carried on slowly down the winding steps. It turned out to be much more difficult than the other stairs of the house. Narrower stairs impeded her ability to use the crutch effectively and the winding of the staircase did nothing to help either. At the bottom, she had to hop over to the fallen crutch and with much struggling, and balance a gymnast would be grateful for, she managed to pick it up. Once back with two crutches, it was relatively easy to hobble round the giant oak table, past the big range cooker to the pantry door.
She opened the door and made her way in. The pantry, as she had found out only a few months ago was not an ordinary pantry. It doubled up as a secret elevator down to the underbelly of the house. To the cellar where Jago was locked up. She pressed the switch and held on tight to her crutches, knowing that there was an abrupt halt at the bottom. Once down she arrived at two doors. One of them she had never been through but which she knew led to a passageway out into the grounds. The second door led to the cellar. It had a fingerprint reader which she place her thumb on and waited. One of the little red lights turned green. She just needed to input the code into the little keypad next to the fingerprint reader but she hesitated. Was she really ready to meet her parent’s murderer? She wasn’t so sure she would ever be really ready but something about the name Sabine intrigued her. Well, not the name as such, but the fact he was calling out any name in his sleep. He’d shown no mercy and threatened the lives of everyone on the planet. Surely that was the mind of a psychopath? Not someone who loved another. Curiosity got the better of her and she inputted the code 2103 into the keypad. The second red light turned green and the door opened.
The room was empty. A thrill of fear shot through her. Where was Jago? Where was Rafe? The room looked the same as it had the last time she had seen it except the giant row of screens that filled the nearside wall were now blank, switched off. Every monitor was connected to a security camera in each room of the house and the last time she had been here they had been switched on, monitoring the house, searching for Jago should he ever try to get in. He did actually manage to get in on more than one occasion but somehow got past the detection of the cameras, a feat which was pretty much impossible according to Andrew who had set the system up to begin with.
She wondered if anyone had asked him how he had managed to get into the house without being detected but then remembered he’d not been speaking to anyone.
The ratty sofa was still in the same position and the computer which used to control all the security was evidently now being used for games judging by the solitaire that was currently showing on the screens. She made her way to the little cellar kitchen to see if they were there but as she pushed the door open, she could see that it was empty. The only place they could be was up the narrow staircase that led to two dormitories and a bathroom. She shouted up the stairs.
“Rafe.” She prayed she would hear his voice and was extremely relieved when she heard him call back down to her. Except it was not Rafe, it was Alex.
“Anais?” He sounded surprised. “What are you doing down here? How did you get down? Are you alone?”
So many questions. She ignored them all and asked one of her own. “What are you doing up there?”
“I’m just helping Jago use the bathroom. Hang on a tick, I’ll be right down.”
He appeared grinning at the top of the stairs and bounded down, two at a time.
“Here, let me help you to the sofa.” He put his arm on her back and guided her across the room. She had to hide her annoyance at him, If she could manage three flights of stairs herself, she could surely manage to get the five steps to the sofa. Still, that was Alex, always trying to help. She sat on the sofa and Alex joined her.
“Will he be ok up there on his own?” She knew there was no way out from there apart from the stairs but she needed the reassurance.
“Yeah. I have to help him on the stairs because his legs are chained together but once he’s up there he’s ok by himself. He’ll let me know when he wants to come down.”
Anais was appalled by the news of him being chained up so much but obviously Alex read her expression wrong.
“Don’t worry, there is no way out and nothing he can do to escape up there.”
“Are all those chains really necessary? It seems a bit excessive, after all he’s locked in a room with no way out except for a thick steel door.”
“Are you feeling sorry for him?” Alex gave her a strange look. “He nearly killed you, Anais. Why are you down here anyway? Have you come to see me?”
A glimmer of hope flickered in his beautiful eyes. It was no secret that he was in love with Anais which made her uncomfortable around him. It was true that if she had never met Aethelu, she could see herself falling for him. His white hair cut short, spiked up in a modern style, so unlike that of Rafe, his twin brother. He had dimples in his cheeks when he smiled giving him a look of impish mischievousness. The overall look was stunning but it was the eyes where he really had it. The exact shade of Jet with the diamond flecks, just like Aethelu. The effect was mesmerising. Still, she was in love with Aethelu and nothing was going to change that.
“I was intrigued. I wanted to meet him.”
“Jago?” Who else?
“Has he spoken to you yet? Rafe says he talks in his sleep?”
“I wouldn’t know. It’s Rafe who is down here with him mostly. I just take over at mealtimes.”
“I thought Rafe would be here. He said he was taking over your shift over an hour ago.”
“No, he’s due down here at 9pm. He probably told you that so he could go to his room. He’s been a bit of a moody sod lately.”
Anais always thought of Rafe as, as Alex put it, a moody sod, so she’d not actually noticed any difference. She thought of Andrew holed up in his room and wondered if it was catching.
“Why do you want to meet Jago? He’s dangerous.”
“I know but…” she was interrupted by banging coming from upstairs which made her jump.
“Ah, He’s finished. I’ll be right back.” Alex disappeared off up the stairs leaving Anais to her thoughts.
She heard the clinking of chains and slow heavy footsteps coming down the stairs, coming towards her. Fear crept through her, surprising her with its suddenness. She was about to come face to face with the man who had torn her life apart and hurt her in so many ways. At that point she realised she had made a mistake coming down here. It was too soon to meet him. What did she really care who Sabine was anyway? She made a move
to get off the sofa but it was so low that she struggled to get herself upright. She’d barely managed to stand when Alex and Jago appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
Jago’s arms and legs were chained and Alex held him roughly under his arm. He brought him over to the sofa, almost too quickly for the old man to walk in his chains and sat him down. He quickly fastened him down to some other chains on the sofa so he couldn’t escape. Out of instinct, Anais backed away and sat herself a safe distance away on the only other chair in the room, the computer chair.
“Right, does anyone want a drink?” Alex made it sound like he was hosting a party instead of holding a deadly killer, but Anais knew it was just his way of putting her at ease.
Jago nodded his head almost imperceptibly. Anais also nodded and took a quick glance at Jago.
Almost immediately she knew something wasn’t quite right. This wasn’t Jago. This wasn’t the man who had attacked her. They had the wrong man.
~
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT