THE BASEMENT
When Victoria took her last breath, for a moment Sophia saw and felt nothing. She seemed to just be suspended in darkness, but then as fast as it came, the sensation was gone, and she was left breathless and back in her room again.
Selene next to her seemed just as effected. The curse must have been broken then.
"Do you feel different?"
Sophia flexed her fingers, breathed in deep, then out, and frowned. "I feel exactly the same."
It was clear that they needed to get their hands on the journals Victoria had been talking about. It would probably have more information for them. For now, they had to figure out a good story for what happened here.
Fifteen minutes later, a loud screech came from Sophia's room. Everyone heard it and came running.
Lillian burst through the door to see a horrible scene. Her sister, Victoria, was lying dead in a pool of her own blood, a hole in her chest. Standing over her was the head butler, who was shaking terribly, with a bloody dagger in his hand. Sophia was sprawled out on the floor near the door, as if she had came in and then fell while trying to make hasty exit.
The head butler opened his mouth as if to say something, but no words came out. That was when Henry burst in, took in the scene, and immediately apprehended the head butler.
He immediately sent for one of the maids to get the knights, while he tied up the head butler's hands to make sure he couldn't escape or hurt anyone else.
Lillian felt tears welling in her eyes at the sight of her sister's dead body, but she pushed the despair away as she pulled Sophia into her chest, hugging her tightly and comforting her. Sophia was shaking in Lillian's embrace, terrified.
Not long after, when they were all recuperating in the sitting room, trying to make sense of the tragedy that just occurred, Selene came in. She was paler than usual, probably having heard what happened from one of the maids, and as she sat down beside Henry he made sure to take her hand in his, offering quiet words of comfort.
While their parents weren't looking, Selene and Sophia shared a wicked smile.
The knights arrived a few minutes later, dragging the silent head butler with them to the prison. The Ellsworths, meanwhile, were discussing what they should do. First it was the theft and the disappearance of two maids, now it was the head butler committing a gruesome murder on a family member. What next?
Lillian suggested that maybe they should all move to a different residence for a while, leave behind the bad memories in the Ellsworth manor while they recover and rest. Sophia then piped up and said that before Victoria died, she was telling her about one of the ancestral Boyd homes that she had been cleaning up, as she was hoping to live there one day. Lillian almost started crying, and agreed that it might be good to live in one of the Boyd manors for now, to honour the memory of Victoria.
So they all solemnly packed up their things as they waited for the carriage to come around. The staff were all going with them, as well as the knights, but Henry was beginning to think that perhaps they needed some more protection, and spoke to Lillian about hiring some personal guards or knights for each of them. He hadn't forgotten that if they hadn't gotten there in time, the head butler might have taken Sophia too.
Selene frowned at the thought of having a personal guard. Having someone watching over her all the time just felt like a burden. Sophia seemed to thinking the same thing too. While it would ease the minds of their parents, it would also make it a lot harder for Selene and Sophia to do what they needed to do, as they would be monitored 24/7.
They arrived at the Boyd manor before long, its dark and somewhat intimidating infrastructure standing out immediately.
The staff were sent to clean up and sort their things out while Lillian retired to one of the bedrooms, giving herself time to grieve. Henry looked around the manor for a second before stepping back on the carriage to leave again, probably to get the business of the personal knights sorted quickly.
Selene claimed another bedroom, after looking through all of them and finding the darkest, most scariest looking one. She immediately collapsed onto the bed and took a nap, not bothered to keep up the act of being sad and scared anymore.
Sophia took to exploring the manor more thoroughly, trying to find the journals that Victoria had been talking about. As she went around the manor, checking every corner of every room, she thought once more about how strange it was that something this important was hidden from the main plot in the book. Her running theory was that the author had come up with the magic plot line, but in the end scrapped it and never put it in the actual story. But perhaps because the author had unintentionally put the seeds of this sorcery plot line in the story, when Selene and Sophia entered this world, the universe automatically filled in the gaps that the author left to accomodate them and fully realised the sorcery plot.
She was just about to leave the library as she didn't find any of the journals amongst the books on the shelves, when she noticed a corner of the carpet was peeled back strangely.
She approached the corner slowly, gazing curiously at it before bending down to see if it would peel back further. It did, and as she peeled back almost half the carpet, a trapdoor was revealed. Secret entrance to a secret basement, then. This definitely felt like something that would happen in a cliche mystery plot.
Sophia pondered going down there on her own, but felt there might be unknown dangers down there, so she went and woke up Selene up. Selene grumbled about being woken from her nap, but trudged down to the library with her anyway.
The revealing of the trapdoor seemed to interest Selene enough to wake her up fully, and she was almost bouncing with excitement as she opened it and climbed inside. Sophia followed behind her, but at a more sedate pace.
It was pitch black, but luckily Sophia had the forethought to bring a lantern with her. As they walked down a dark tunnel, she could see fire lamps along the walls. All of them looked old, as if they hadn't been lit in years.
Sophia froze when there was a sudden piercing noise, Selene stumbling back a bit from the sharp knife that had jutted out from one of the walls.
"Booby traps." Selene said in awe.
Sophia rolled her eyes. Of course Selene would be excited at the prospect of traps.
At Selene's feet, there looked to be a slightly discoloured part of the floor.
"Don't step on the darker stone tiles." Sophia instructed.
Selene nodded, and they didn't encounter any more traps as they moved forward. At the end of the tunnel they were brought to a large circular room. There were shelves filled with books and a strange looking table as well as what looked like an iron chair made for torture.
Selene let out a low whistle of appreciation as she stepped forward to admire the chair.
Sophia went to scour the shelves instead, knowing that if Elena's secret journals were going to be anywhere, it would be here.
It didn't take her long to gather up all her journals. Elena was efficient with them, and labelled them chronologically. Sophia gave Selene half to carry, and then they both trudged back through the tunnel and up the steps.
The moment they were back in the library, Selene left to go back to sleep and Sophia cracked open the first journal.