by K.N. Lee
Arcadia.
P.S. Lulu left this for you.
Anais burst into tears again. She knew it wasn’t their fault this was all happening. She was being angry at the wrong people. She wiped her eyes and tore the paper from the parcel.
Inside was the portrait Aethelu had painted of her the night they shared their first kiss. It was beautiful. Aethelu had captured her likeness so perfectly, but at the same time given her an ethereal quality. Anais could now see why she’d been painted in a hot tub filled with gold water. It looked like she was floating in a bath of golden light.
She wished Aethelu were here right now. She really wanted to tell her how much she loved the painting. The tears fell again, but she smiled as she recalled the one night she spent with Aethelu.
She fell back to sleep holding on to the painting, not waking until early the next day.
Chapter 13
Anais stayed in her room for three days, only leaving to use the bathroom and kitchen and then coming straight back. She timed her visits to the kitchen when she thought it might be empty, taking only what she could eat in her room. Rolls of bread and cuts of meat became her staple meal. She had managed to not see a single member of the household for the entire time, although she did narrowly miss Rafe heading up the main stairs at just past midnight on the third day. She wondered what he was up to. She managed to hide in a dark recess as he walked past. He looked like a man on a mission.
She felt like her heart had been ripped out right where she was standing. Aethelu’s absence was palpable. She could barely take the pain of it.
How would Aethelu ever forgive her? Not only was she going to have to have a baby, she had to do it with Aethelu’s own brother.
She prayed for Aethelu’s safe return, but she didn’t know where she was or how long it would be until she got home. Aldrich seemed to think it could be weeks. She didn’t even know if Aethelu was safe, and that was the hardest part.
She spent the days in bed alternating between crying and sleeping.
The irony didn’t escape her that she had now imposed a kind of self-exile on herself in the very same room from which, only a few short weeks ago, she had been desperate to escape.
Thoughts of Jago finding Aethelu and hurting her plagued her dreams and made her feel sick, and the lack of proper meals did nothing to help.
She ignored everyone knocking at her door, preferring her own company, although the reality was that she didn’t trust herself not to scream at any of the family should she see them.
Eventually there was a knock at the door that wouldn’t stop. She dragged herself out of bed to answer it. It was Alex with a tray of food.
“Mama asked me to bring this to you. I hope you don’t mind.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I told Mama you’d say that, and she instructed me not to come down until you’d eaten it all.”
Despite the misery she was feeling, she gave a small smile. She could well imagine Winnie saying something like that.
She left the door open and retreated back to her bed, which Alex took as an invitation to enter the room. He laid the silver tray with the cooked breakfast on the bed next to her.
Anais took a bite of bacon that stuck in her throat. She took a big gulp of coffee to wash it down.
“I’m sorry I haven’t come to check on you before. I knew you were upset, but I’m kinda embarrassed.” Alex held a sheepish look on his face, as he sat on the bed at the other side of the breakfast tray.
Anais realised that poor Alex was in this just as much as her, and she began to feel bad for being so angry with him.
“It’s ok. I just wanted to be left alone. How about you?”
“Put it this way, I went for a very long run in the grounds yesterday and almost thought about not coming back.”
“You did come back though.”
“Yes. I realised I was being selfish. I know it’s harder for you. I don’t have a girlfriend to answer to for a start. Plus I’m not the one who’ll get stretch marks”
Anais made a face at him.
“Or bloated ankles, or a giant fat belly.”
Anais laughed. He was teasing her. She hit him with a pillow.
“Not to mention morning sickness.” his voice was muffled under the pillow.
“And then a baby.” She stopped laughing
“And then a baby.” He was momentarily as sombre as her, but then he smiled.
“It won’t be so bad.” He was trying to console her “Everyone is on your side. I’ll do everything I can to help, and if you’re worried about Aethelu, she’ll come around. She’ll know it’s not your fault.”
“Thank you.” Anais didn’t know how he could be so calm about the situation, but she was grateful for his warmth and understanding. Feeling slightly better, she hugged him tightly, thankful that she had at least one person who understood what she was going through.
Finally they broke apart. Anais ate the food from the tray, ravenous, after all. Once the first bite had gone down, she realised how hungry she really was. It was Winnie’s cooked breakfast, guaranteed to make her feel better.
Alex waited patiently until she ate the last bite.
Then he spoke.
“We should really get to know each other if we are really going to do this,” he said. “Would you like to spend the day with me?” He suddenly seemed very shy, but brightened up considerably when she accepted his invitation.
Sitting in her room was a pointless waste of time, and she felt better after eating. It would be nice to be out for a change.
“Ok, I need a shower. I’ll meet you in the entrance hall in half an hour, ok?”
He smiled a huge smile and almost skipped to the door taking the now empty tray with him.
She had been wearing the blue striped pyjamas for three solid days and she felt disgusting. The shower refreshed her and just the act of getting dressed made her feel more human. She wore jeans and purposely picked out a red sweater, which made her feel closer to Aethelu.
She did her best to brush through the rat tails of hair and make herself presentable.
Alex was waiting for her when she descended the great stairs, and he smiled when he saw her.
“I have a surprise for you,” he said excitedly.
She’d had enough surprises to last a lifetime, but she followed him anyway. She was expecting to be leaving the house so was surprised when he led her back up the main stairs. He took her back up to the second floor and past her own room to a door she had not been through before. She vaguely remembered Aethelu telling her that it concealed a set of stairs which led to the attic, but she had never ventured up there. A bare light bulb lit the way up the uncarpeted stairs. At the top was a huge attic room, bigger than any she’d ever seen before, filled with either the junk or treasure of times past.
Furniture piled up at one end, haphazardly, chairs and sideboards all thrown together, like a huge antique bonfire. Next to them, stood a mannequin with a faded blonde wig atop its head. It was wearing the same dress that Arcadia had been wearing in her painting in the hallway. The dress was faded with age and had lost some of its buttons. Moths had attacked it at some point, and there were now holes here and there in its fabric, a sad reminder of times gone by. A pile of half-finished canvases lay next to frames filled with old maps, and books which were obviously not in good enough condition for the library downstairs. Further along still, were some old travelling chests, some of which had badges stuck to them, telling the world how well travelled their owners were. She opened one to find a Victorian doll made out of porcelain and a locked silver jewellery box, which had obviously seen better days as it had a few dents in its tarnished surface. A ballerina engraved on the top, had faded with age, and was now almost invisible in the dull light of the attic. Anais was fascinated by all the history in the room, even more so, as the owners of these antiquities were still very much alive. She had stopped at a box labelled ‘Music’ when from the far corner of the room Alex ca
lled her. She looked up just as he turned on the lights near his end of the attic. Beside him was a massive table with a model village on it. As she drew closer, she realised that it wasn’t a village at all, but a scaled down replica of the manor and its grounds. On the outer edges were a few neighbouring houses, which was why she had first thought it was a village. The model was set in the summer, as all the model trees were painted with tiny green leaves. The manor was right in the centre of the huge table with the driveway leading off the table away from her. She could see August’s cottage by the entrance to the grounds, with a tiny August standing in the garden and an even tinier puppy nipping his toes. The tiny figure that represented Alex stood by the garage next to a small replica Corvette, the same one she had gone to the city in. The amount of detail in the models was amazing. She could even read the license plate on the car.
She looked all over the model, but couldn’t see any of the other family members.
“Where is everyone else?”
“Ah ha,” Alex lifted the roof of the model house.
She was looking down into the attic in miniature. There was model furniture piled up against the side, just like it was in the real attic. She could even see a model of the model she was looking at which she was really impressed by.
Alex laid the roof on the floor and then lifted the next floor off.
Anais saw the whole of the second floor, including her room, which was decorated identically to the real one, although the furniture was slightly different. This is probably how it had been furnished before she was held there.
She found the Andrew figure in the room next door to hers. He was sitting at a tiny computer surrounded by all kinds of technical looking objects. She had never seen Andrew’s room in real life, but it was exactly how she imagined it, full of gizmos and gadgets. Alex flicked a switch, and the whole board lit up, including the tiny machines in Andrews’s room, which flickered with minute lights.
Another floor was pulled up and she found Arcadia and Aethelu in their respective rooms. Finally, they were down to the ground floor and the main entrance hall, which held what she assumed to be Rafe.
“Very impressive,” she said, “but you’ve missed your parents.”
“My father is in his surgery,” he said, as he pointed to the outhouses, “and Mama is here.” He lifted the ground floor up, and she was surprised to see that the kitchen was somehow built into the table and was lower than the rest. She looked under the side of the table and could see where the kitchen was lower. She was also surprised to see other underground structures.
“What are these?” Curiosity filled her.
“All part of Andrew’s defences. See, here from the kitchen, there is a passage that leads underground to the lodge where August lives. It splits halfway and the other passage leads to the edge of the grounds over here.”
She brought her head up to see where Alex was pointing. A tiny hatch was at the edge of the grounds, just before the boundary wall. It was surrounded by rocks. Now that she looked at Winnie in the kitchen, she could see that there were other rooms under the house next to the kitchen. They had nothing in them to show what they were. They were plain and undecorated, unlike the rest of the house, which had been painted with meticulous detail. They were right next to the kitchen, but Anais had never seen a door to get to them.
“What are these rooms?”
“This house holds many mysteries.” He grinned at her. “Come on I’ll show you”
She helped him put the model house back in one piece and followed him downstairs to the kitchen. He opened a door at the back of the kitchen, which she had always assumed was a larder. When she looked closer, she saw that she had been right, and it was, in fact, a larder. Tins of food filled shelves on all sides. It was a big larder, but it was nowhere near the size of the rooms she’d seen on the model, nor did she see the start of a passageway. She was expecting something great and was more than a little disappointed.
“It’s a larder!” she said rather pointlessly.
“Shut the door.”
“It’s a larder!” she repeated.
“Yes, I know it is. Now shut the door.”
She shut the door and the larder turned pitch black. She could clearly make out Alex in the dark, thanks to The Light although she couldn’t see anything else.
Suddenly the lights went on, and she could see again. Alex still had his hand on the light switch and the room looked exactly the same as it had seconds before. She wondered if she should be expecting something, or if he’d really just brought her here to show her a larder.
“Hold on.” Alex grinned and flicked another switch.
The whole floor began to vibrate beneath her, no, not vibrate, lower. The whole floor was going down. What was really disconcerting was the fact that the shelves of food were not moving, so it looked like they were rising, though, of course, they were not. They must have been fixed to the walls somehow.
The floor lowered until two big oak doors appeared, one at either side. Finally, the floor reached its destination and came to an abrupt halt. Anais, not expecting it to stop so suddenly, stumbled, and Alex reached to catch her.
“I told you to hold on.” He grinned once again. “The door behind you is the start of the passages to the lodge and to the boundary, and this door,” he opened it for her, “is our little haven of safety.”
He gestured for her to go first, and she found herself in what she assumed to be an antechamber of some sort. It had unfinished stone walls which were deep into the foundations of the house. It was well lit thanks to a series of lights built into the wall, and in front of her, was a metal door with a keypad.
Alex pressed his thumb on a fingerprint reader, which lit a small blue light. He then pressed a series of numbers into the keypad, which illuminated a second blue light, and opened the door, which slid to the side rather than opening inward or outwards.
Nothing could have prepared her for what she was about to see. The secret underground room had screens from floor to ceiling along one wall, each one showing a room of the house or part of the grounds. On one screen, she could see Winnie coming into the kitchen through the back door, Arcadia was with her. She sat at the big kitchen table after making a cup of tea for herself and Winnie. The image blinked and now showed the great entrance hall which was empty, except for Baker who was pulling baubles from the still erect tree and chasing them around the room.
“They cover every room in the house except the bathrooms, of course, and most of the grounds,” Alex explained.
Anais made a mental note to get changed either in the dark or in the bathroom from now on.
She caught sight of Aethelu’s painting studio and blushed scarlet. She almost didn’t hear Alex speaking, as she wondered if anyone had seen her in the gold bath
“These rooms have always been down here as part of the manor’s cellars. The passageway to the lodge is an original feature too. It was only when Alistair, sorry, your father was murdered that Andrew got to work installing all this technology. The rooms up the stairway there were originally laundry rooms and storage. Andrew blocked the entrance to them from the kitchen and turned them into bedrooms. The only way to get to them now is up this staircase.”
Anais looked at the stairs and the rest of the room. Apart from the screens, it had a couple of sofas, which looked like they’d seen better days and a control panel and computer, both of which looked way too complicated to understand.
door led off to the left and the stairs led up to the right. Alex opened the door to show her another room, this time a small kitchen and eating area with a small table and eight chairs. It was all very basic and not in keeping with the rest of the manor. She calculated that she was now two floors under the main manor doors. Above her, were the secret bedrooms that Alex had told her about. He finally took her upstairs and showed her the last three rooms. There were two dormitory rooms with bunk beds and a small bathroom with a toilet, shower and basin. She counted the beds. There were on
ly enough for the family members and Andrew. If anything happened, both she and Judith would have to go elsewhere. Either that or bunk in with Aethelu and Andrew, respectively. Actually, that might not be so bad after all. She wondered what, exactly, they were expecting to happen with all these precautions and then remembered they were facing the end of the world.
She followed Alex down to the screen room and sat on one of the sofas.
A thought occurred to her.
“How did Jago get in?” she wondered out loud
“Sorry?”
“Jago. He left a letter did he not? On Boxing Day morning. I think Aldrich said it was left on the kitchen table.”
“Yeah, Andrew came down here as soon as the letter was found, but there was nothing on the cameras. One second the table was empty, the next the letter was there.
There are times when parts of the house are blind, so to speak. The images flick between cameras in different rooms, as you can see, and only tape the images they see.”
She looked again at one of the screens. The parlour was empty, but as she watched, the imaged flicked to the library where Mrs Smithson was dusting the books. A while later, it flicked back to the Parlour.
“Each room has 30 seconds on and then 30 seconds off. It would be quite easy to break in through the kitchen door and leave a letter in 30 seconds.”
“Was the back door broken into?”
“No, that’s the worrying thing. The back door was locked, the windows closed. No sign of a forced entry anywhere in the house. He couldn’t have come in through the front door because of the timing of the cameras. One of them would have picked him up for sure.”
“Could he have found out about the passage and come through there?”
“Not possible. Just like this room, both the entrance at the lodge and the entrance to the grounds have a keypad and a fingerprint recognition pad, which only recognises family members. The outer boundary wall has an invisible electric fence reaching an extra six feet above the height of the wall. My Father and August checked the perimeter and there was no breach in the wall, no tunnels under it. It is completely safe and impossible to get through.”