"Victorian Upir" Chapter 5: The Secrets of Castle Black
Thursday, June 23, 2011
by: Jeel Christine de Egurrola
Chapter 5: The Secrets of Castle Black
Young lad Jack now with the young princess, his eyes no longer white but beautiful sapphire-blue looks at her green eyes, filled with desire and longing—to kiss her red lips.
She, stares and sees for the first time not an errand boy but a boyish face—a young handsome face with a cocky grin.
He moves to her, closing the distance. Her lips touch his. A jolt of electricity flows through her and she jerks back. Without hesitation, she flees like a confused innocent teen and not the hag that she once was few days ago.
She finds herself outside the manor house, confused about the new feeling she has for the slave boy. In a few days, she will be reunited with her Xander, and she couldn’t afford any distraction. Not now, not ever. There is work to be done and be done with it fast!
She follows the path toward one of the seven gates of Silent Hill, The Gate of Phad. For a moment, one might think that the Gate of Phad is a replica of the Gate of Merak that leads to the Chapel or Peter the Rock. In an illusion, they are twins, but in truth one slight difference is at all obvious. Why didn’t she notice it before? She asks herself.
A dweller she is of the manor for seventeen years. It is a shame for a princess to miss such vague detail of her own home—the very land where she played hide and seek alongside her cousins. The very land where she scoots around as a child...
Perhaps, because she wasn’t allowed near this particular gate...
The Gate of Phad, like Merak, is made from wrought iron, horizontal posts attached to piers are painted white. Same sized imposts sit below both voussoir, which are connected to a keystone on the center of the slightly pointed arch. While Merak’s arch is Roman, Phad’s is of Gothic architectural pattern.
A huge lock seems to shimmer even under the dark and in the dimness of the night. Even so, with her advanced senses, she doesn’t need any lighting device for her to be able to see in the darkest of the darkness.
As if in servitude to her, the blockage seems to unbolt on its self.
She opens the gate not so wide, but enough for her body to slip through. She slides inside to a white painted, ten yard long Gothic vaulted walkway intersecting two separate open hallway on each side, opposite each other where a rib connects on the vault. A stink fills up the abandoned path.
After about what seems like five feet walk from the initial rib on the vault, another set of rib extends another two hallways opposite each other, same goes about the next five feet walk and so goes for the next six more ribbed vaults.
She admits that she hadn’t been in this part of the manor because the area had been restricted then on. None even the royalties and commoners enter this gate. Once it had been locked, but her blood—Aides very own—has magical properties that unlocks what is locked.
Where all twelve walkways lead, she has no knowledge of. Perhaps in her new life, she may explore each one of them, and be known of what lies there, and what dangers were her family is keeping her and the manor house from.
She continues to where the hallway leads her and she skids to a halt.
A movement... There is as swift movement of an orb of sort crosses from her vision just few inches from the hallway where she stands. Whatever that is, it is freakish, but she isn’t afraid. She has crossed the underworld for like centuries—had met hideous creatures in the dark realm. She isn’t afraid. She gives her cold damp hands reassuring squeezes. She moves from the stink of abandonment to a vast abandoned courtyard, with few gazebos on the sides lining near the plant bosomed walls.
In the night she could see Grape Ivy on the walls, Honeysuckle vines and Butterfly Bushes surrounding each gazebo, some oversized flowering plants she isn’t familiar of fill almost half of the courtyard. In the centre of the courtyard poses a large irregularly textured circular pillar stone monument with carvings of what look like pagans symbols surrounded by several shrubs and bushes. Large trunks of climbing plants coil around it. Butterflies of various colors and other insects are busy flying around and extracting the sweet juices from the flowers that extend throughout the area.
It is amazing. What danger could this place bring? She wonders.
The place is beautiful. More beautiful than the Silent Hill forest...
But what of the orb she saw about earlier she has no explanation.
She hurries back to the manor house to the library in the hopes of finding history books of the manor. Perhaps some of literature may answer the many questions she has in mind—questions no person can possibly answer her as of the moment. Maybe she could ask Thomas or the errand boy or those she is yet to summon from the dead.
The library in the second floor is two doors away to the right from where the staircase is located. Its French doors of fine grained, reddish brown colored Mahogany is patterned with similar Gargoyle-like designs embossed on almost all of the doors in the house.
Inside the library is a Walnut wall panelling instead of wallpapers. Attached to them are bookshelves that extend from the platforms up and to the ceiling with huge Lacquered wood mouldings touch the top of the uppermost compartments of the wooden shelves. A collection of almost of the same size hardbounds are placed on one side of the wall. On the other side are several volumes and collections of encyclopaedias and other reference books. On some shelves are paperbacks. To where the history section is located, she doesn’t know.
She reaches a cabinet of catalogued cards and starts looking for ‘Castle Black Manor’ in the titles section. Dust motes make her sneeze spasmodically the irritants in her nostrils.
She finds two cards with the titles “Castle Black Manor House: History and Construction” and “Castle Black Edifice.” She copies the each Dewey decimal classification numbers on an old paper parchment she finds on piles in one of the drawers of the library’s counter table.
She arrives at a collection of hardbounds, and finds the two books on the same shelf. She sits on one of the wooden bar chairs. She scans the first book—a not so thick book. Read through some parts. She does the same with the next book. For a while she learns some information about her family, their properties, the construction of the manor house, the woodworks and features of the house and so on... for what seems like two hours, she tires herself from the reading, half-satisfied for the knowledge she just received, half disappointed for not having find any information on that courtyard where the Gate of Phad and its hallways lead to. None of the two books take mention of what’s behind all the seven gates of the Silent Hill.
She takes off from the library to hunt. It is almost midnight and she is hungry. In the next day, she decides to rummage through the library ones again. She is not about to give up on finding what secrets lie behind the manor where she is born. She is positive that somewhere in the vast collection of books she will find her answers.
--to be continued---http://twitter.com/jeelchristine
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| gothic house matte painting |
Young lad Jack now with the young princess, his eyes no longer white but beautiful sapphire-blue looks at her green eyes, filled with desire and longing—to kiss her red lips.
She, stares and sees for the first time not an errand boy but a boyish face—a young handsome face with a cocky grin.
He moves to her, closing the distance. Her lips touch his. A jolt of electricity flows through her and she jerks back. Without hesitation, she flees like a confused innocent teen and not the hag that she once was few days ago.
She finds herself outside the manor house, confused about the new feeling she has for the slave boy. In a few days, she will be reunited with her Xander, and she couldn’t afford any distraction. Not now, not ever. There is work to be done and be done with it fast!
She follows the path toward one of the seven gates of Silent Hill, The Gate of Phad. For a moment, one might think that the Gate of Phad is a replica of the Gate of Merak that leads to the Chapel or Peter the Rock. In an illusion, they are twins, but in truth one slight difference is at all obvious. Why didn’t she notice it before? She asks herself.
A dweller she is of the manor for seventeen years. It is a shame for a princess to miss such vague detail of her own home—the very land where she played hide and seek alongside her cousins. The very land where she scoots around as a child...
Perhaps, because she wasn’t allowed near this particular gate...
The Gate of Phad, like Merak, is made from wrought iron, horizontal posts attached to piers are painted white. Same sized imposts sit below both voussoir, which are connected to a keystone on the center of the slightly pointed arch. While Merak’s arch is Roman, Phad’s is of Gothic architectural pattern.
A huge lock seems to shimmer even under the dark and in the dimness of the night. Even so, with her advanced senses, she doesn’t need any lighting device for her to be able to see in the darkest of the darkness.
As if in servitude to her, the blockage seems to unbolt on its self.
She opens the gate not so wide, but enough for her body to slip through. She slides inside to a white painted, ten yard long Gothic vaulted walkway intersecting two separate open hallway on each side, opposite each other where a rib connects on the vault. A stink fills up the abandoned path.
After about what seems like five feet walk from the initial rib on the vault, another set of rib extends another two hallways opposite each other, same goes about the next five feet walk and so goes for the next six more ribbed vaults.
She admits that she hadn’t been in this part of the manor because the area had been restricted then on. None even the royalties and commoners enter this gate. Once it had been locked, but her blood—Aides very own—has magical properties that unlocks what is locked.
Where all twelve walkways lead, she has no knowledge of. Perhaps in her new life, she may explore each one of them, and be known of what lies there, and what dangers were her family is keeping her and the manor house from.
She continues to where the hallway leads her and she skids to a halt.
A movement... There is as swift movement of an orb of sort crosses from her vision just few inches from the hallway where she stands. Whatever that is, it is freakish, but she isn’t afraid. She has crossed the underworld for like centuries—had met hideous creatures in the dark realm. She isn’t afraid. She gives her cold damp hands reassuring squeezes. She moves from the stink of abandonment to a vast abandoned courtyard, with few gazebos on the sides lining near the plant bosomed walls.
In the night she could see Grape Ivy on the walls, Honeysuckle vines and Butterfly Bushes surrounding each gazebo, some oversized flowering plants she isn’t familiar of fill almost half of the courtyard. In the centre of the courtyard poses a large irregularly textured circular pillar stone monument with carvings of what look like pagans symbols surrounded by several shrubs and bushes. Large trunks of climbing plants coil around it. Butterflies of various colors and other insects are busy flying around and extracting the sweet juices from the flowers that extend throughout the area.
It is amazing. What danger could this place bring? She wonders.
The place is beautiful. More beautiful than the Silent Hill forest...
But what of the orb she saw about earlier she has no explanation.
She hurries back to the manor house to the library in the hopes of finding history books of the manor. Perhaps some of literature may answer the many questions she has in mind—questions no person can possibly answer her as of the moment. Maybe she could ask Thomas or the errand boy or those she is yet to summon from the dead.
The library in the second floor is two doors away to the right from where the staircase is located. Its French doors of fine grained, reddish brown colored Mahogany is patterned with similar Gargoyle-like designs embossed on almost all of the doors in the house.
Inside the library is a Walnut wall panelling instead of wallpapers. Attached to them are bookshelves that extend from the platforms up and to the ceiling with huge Lacquered wood mouldings touch the top of the uppermost compartments of the wooden shelves. A collection of almost of the same size hardbounds are placed on one side of the wall. On the other side are several volumes and collections of encyclopaedias and other reference books. On some shelves are paperbacks. To where the history section is located, she doesn’t know.
She reaches a cabinet of catalogued cards and starts looking for ‘Castle Black Manor’ in the titles section. Dust motes make her sneeze spasmodically the irritants in her nostrils.
She finds two cards with the titles “Castle Black Manor House: History and Construction” and “Castle Black Edifice.” She copies the each Dewey decimal classification numbers on an old paper parchment she finds on piles in one of the drawers of the library’s counter table.
She arrives at a collection of hardbounds, and finds the two books on the same shelf. She sits on one of the wooden bar chairs. She scans the first book—a not so thick book. Read through some parts. She does the same with the next book. For a while she learns some information about her family, their properties, the construction of the manor house, the woodworks and features of the house and so on... for what seems like two hours, she tires herself from the reading, half-satisfied for the knowledge she just received, half disappointed for not having find any information on that courtyard where the Gate of Phad and its hallways lead to. None of the two books take mention of what’s behind all the seven gates of the Silent Hill.
She takes off from the library to hunt. It is almost midnight and she is hungry. In the next day, she decides to rummage through the library ones again. She is not about to give up on finding what secrets lie behind the manor where she is born. She is positive that somewhere in the vast collection of books she will find her answers.
--to be continued---http://twitter.com/jeelchristine
2 comments:
wala na pong next? i love the story miss Jeel Christine.. you have your own blog?
-ancel james sugano (facebook)
ancel, mukhang busy pa si Miss Jeel like me kasi dami activities ngayon sa school eh. kasama ko siya sa faculty room. Salamat sa pagbabasa Ancel at makakarating kay miss jeel ang comments mo
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