A Long Journey

• Eliza Warren, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2015

I woke up in the dark with my head pounding. I slowly sat up and leaned against the wall behind me. I eventually stood up and grabbed my candle, proceeding up a stone staircase with no further thought. When I reached the top I came across a Baize Door. The painting above it was beautifully painted with an image of a princess picking flowers in the garden of her castle. I looked all over the door and was unable to locate a door handle. I looked back up at the painting and stumbled backwards in horror. The entire picture had changed. The princess was no longer picking flowers but brushing her air in her turret. Her long white, blonde hair flowing from her head, her jet black eyes staring at me as if I were drowning a baby. I regained my balance and stepped slowly towards her. The mysterious eyes followed me. I looked back square into her eyes and bowed, gently and cautiously as if she were the queen. Her eyes turned a cheerful blue and looked away as the door clicked open.

I walked along a dark cold corridor until I came to another door. This door was made of an old, rusty piece of iron. It was bent and dented in all sorts of ways. However the creepiest part was that there was a large red handprint smeared across the middle of the door. I don't think it was paint. I move towards the door to take a closer look and place my hand against the handprint. My hand fits exactly, its as if it was my hand that made this print.

I turned around as I felt something softly brush against my shoulder. My heart was racing. I turned back around to the door, the handprint has vanished. That's when it hit me, I was stuck in a time warp, and I could see the future, the past and the present. Nothing made sense anymore. The handprint, maybe it was mine. Those statues on the landing, they were people, trapped people. People who had been in the same situation as me. Is that what was going to happen to me? Am I going to end up as a hallucination, a memory? I turned back to the door and saw it, the child, a scared child. She looked around 6 years old, with long white blonde hair and jet black eyes. She opened her mouth as if she was about to speak; her teeth were sharp and pointed. She said one word “Murder”. Her white dress had a big bloodstain on the front. She grabbed my hand and I felt a searing pain, then all of a sudden she was gone but my hand was dripping with a crimson blood, I pressed my hand against the door and pushed, it opened easily. The pain subsided as I stepped in to the darkness of the room.