Darkness

• Bridget Carson, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2014

The walls of the manor were cold, hard. Uninviting.
In mouse-like silence, I made my way down the hallway, the cold floor biting at my feet. I shivered, my thin cotton nightgown betraying me, releasing any warmth my body had previously held.
The manor was silent. No calls of the servants as they bustled around, no quiet chatter between members of the lord’s family, my family.
There was one inconsistent scraping sound. It had always been there, worming its way into our minds. No one talked about it, and certainly no one ever tried to find the source. It was ignored, and it remained.
I was one of those inquisitive young people, who wouldn't stop until I had looked under every rock, not leaving one unturned. Ever since I was a small child, the youngest of four, I remember begging my siblings to help me too come and look for the sound. But tonight was my chance, and it would not slip away from me like water through my fingers.
But I wish I had been a normal child, doing as my parents told, growing up to become a proper lady, instead of being curious, having a thirst for adventure, and an intense dislike for the proper talk of women.
That’s what I had thought this all was. An adventure.
At the end of the hallway were the spiral stairs, which spiralled down through two levels and reached the cellar entrance. Moonlight filtered through the windows, bathing the house in a soft silver light. I glanced over my shoulder, hoping no one could see or hear me, then, deftly, I jumped onto the banister, sliding down the three flights of stairs, arms outstretched, a picture of childish glee.
Once I reached the bottom floor, I stopped in front of the cellar door, rubbing my hands together, excited at the prospect of finding out what was inside. I flicked the lock and pushed open the door, lighting a candle before the darkness swallowed me.
I smiled sadly. It felt strange watching myself as I had been many years ago. Now I was but a pale form in the night air, translucent, made of moonlight and shadows, always changing.
I followed my younger self down into the cellar, a sudden sadness overcoming me as I felt sympathy for the child who would be torn away from her world, who would become nothing but a memory in the eyes of her family.
The cellar stank of decay and something else that I couldn't name. Now I realised it was the smell of death. I stepped off the bottom stair, not realising it would be my last time really touching the dying wood beneath my toes.
Invisible hands seized my previous body, and I watched as it jerked this way and that, before suddenly crumpling into a heap on the floor.
I sighed, if only I had learned that being inquisitive in my time wasn't seen as a good quality in women.