Chapter Six

*A FEW DAYS LATER*

I haven’t left my room for a few days, in fear that my Aunt. I know she saw me, but why didn’t she just say anything to me then. All she did was look at me and smirk. I’m still very confused about who this ‘she,’ she is referring to when she was mumbling. I’m hoping to go down and peer at that book again, but I need to find the right time to do it all, but she never truly leaves the house, unless its to the village and that only happens a few times a week and before anyone wakes. I’m mostly a late sleeper, which got me into trouble most days, but it seems I have awoken quite early this morning. I look towards the window and guess it to be about six or a little later. The boys will be asleep. I lied in bed, waiting for the boys to awaken, but while I waited, looking up at the ceiling, I heard horse trotting and wheels on the gravel, just outside. My room is located at the front of the house, so I can see who comes and goes.

I get up out of bed to see who has arrived, but no one has, instead its Aunt leaving the house, she’s dressed in travelling clothes and has a small traveller’s bag with her, the sun hasn’t even had a chance to rise. She gets into the carriage, but before she closes the door, she looks straight up towards me. In a panic I drop to the floor, I waited until the moving carriage was completely left before, I picked myself up off the floor to look back out the window. In the distance, I could see the carriage slowly disappearing. I wonder where she was travelling to, she has never left the house before, only to the village and back. I then thought this a great time to have a proper look at the book, with her gone, I won’t be disturbed. I rush over to my closet and grab out the nearest dress and shoes. I happened to get a sky-blue dress and black flats, I put them on and head downstairs. Just as I hit the bottom, I hear someone close by clearing their throat, I look around and stand next to the stairs behind me was our head maid, Dorothy Leach, I jump a little not know she was that close to me. “Oh, I’m sorry miss, but Lady Greensteele has informed me to notify you all that she has gone away for a few days” She said apologetically, then turned away to continue her duties.

With Aunt gone, who was going to wake the boys up as they won’t get up until late, if not awoken, but I took the opportunity to go into the library to find that book. The only things that I couldn’t locate it, I looked all over the wooden table, but nothing. Maybe, she put it onto the shelves to hide it. So, I searched, pulled at the books, and that’s when something bizarre happened, when I grabbed hold of a red leather book and secret door opened from the walls next to the shelves. I had a feeling that I shouldn’t go down there but I’m too much of a curious one that I did anyways. I looked around for a candle to light my way as it seemed to be very dark inside, with a dim light at the end, but I couldn’t locate one close by, so I went inside, almost tripping down the stairs. Once my foot found the second step the door behind me closed. I tried pushing it to see if it will open back up, but it didn’t budge. All I could do was go down the stairs towards the only light, at the end of the darkness. I put both hands on either side of the walls and would use each foot to find where the edge of the steps where. After what seemed like years, due to me being very cautious, as I descended the dim light seemed to get brighter and brighter the closer, I got to the destination. Fear would start to creep more and more at me the closer I got, not know what I would find. Once I did get to the destination, what I saw was that there were herbs in jars, hung on walls, books piled on shelves and a cauldron in the centre of the room, sitting on top of a small fire place. There was a small wooden table close by the cauldron with a book left open, I head towards it to see what it was written inside. There were position recipes, some spells, and other things I didn’t understand. Aunt Ce had some pages marked, for unknown reasons. When I looked at some of the ingredients that were listed, I knew where to find, some I haven’t heard of or can’t even pronounce. When I finished looking at the book, I continued to look around at what was on the shelves. There were jars of ingredients, some had labels and others didn’t. There were dried cows’ tongue, horse hair, pigs’ feet and many other weird gross things just sitting in jars. She hung up herbs and other things on the wall. It seems to me that my Aunt Ce practices witchcraft, which is VERY illegal. If anyone found out she would be hung for dealing with the devil. I assume that’s why she hides this room, a little too well if you ask me. I decided to head back upstairs, as I couldn’t tell what time it could be, there were no windows or anything down here. I find my way back up the stairs in complete darkness, surprising myself. When I find the door, I realised I didn’t know how to get out of here. I touch the bricked walls to feel something, but there was nothing around, I touch the door and it just opened. I didn’t need to find a button or lever, just had to touch a door, strange, but I quickly got out of there before the door magically closed or something. That’s when I noticed that no bright sunlight hit my eyes, just slight darkness. Which meant it was close to dinner time or it already was, I do a quick step towards the side of the door frame to see if anyone was around. I couldn’t see anyone, I hurried upstairs into my room to clean myself up, there must’ve been cobwebs down there as I had them sticking to the bottom of my dress. I don’t want anyone to suspect anything in the slightest. After I cleaned myself up, I could hear one of the boys calling for me downstairs. So, I rush down to find it was Grey calling me, “I don’t know where you have been all day, but dinner is ready. So, hurry up” He said casually, which wasn’t normally like him, he must be taking the roll of the man in the house since Aunt Ce was away. I just nodded my head and rolled my head. I headed into the dining room and saw dinner was already served. I waled over to my spot and the boys sat in theirs. Aunt Ce’s sat lonely, just waiting for her to return. I looked down at the plate and saw we were having, Meat stew and cider for a drink. After we all ate dinner, the maid, which I think her name is Anna, but we aren’t allowed to talk to them, I’ve just heard Dorothy or Aunt Ce mention her name once or twice while talking to her. Anna took our plates and came back with our deserts, which was a fruit pie, I asked if I could have a black tea with it. Anna left and came back with my tea. When everything was finished, I decided to head up to my room and get some sleep. When I arrived in my room, I didn’t know how tired I really was, I got changed, climbed into bed, blew out the candle and went to sleep. A very deep sleep.

I closed the book and placed it onto the couch and walked towards the dining area. When I walked through the doors, my aunt did not take her eyes off me. Even when I grabbed some fruit and scrambled eggs. We all sat there in silence; the boys had no idea what to do. They did not even compete. They just sat there in silence eyeballing me and their mother.