The Manor's Library chapter 13

Morning came quietly to Breedlove Manor.

Too quietly.

Beatrice noticed it before she opened her eyes.

There was no rain against the windows. No wind moving through the trees outside. No distant call of a bird from the gardens.

Only silence.

She opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling.

For a moment, she could not remember where she was.

Then the stone above her reminded her.

Breedlove Manor.

The events of the previous evening returned all at once.

The hidden room.

The portraits.

The family records.

Eight generations.

And their names.

Beatrice sat up.

She could still see the page in her mind.

Three names written beneath the Breedlove crest.

Hers.

Nathaniel's.

Elias's.

She dressed quickly.

When she entered the corridor, she found Nathaniel already waiting.

"You saw it too," she said.

He nodded.

"I haven't stopped thinking about it."

"Neither have I."

A door opened behind them.

Elias stepped into the corridor.

"You're both going back."

It wasn't a question.

Beatrice looked at him.

"Wouldn't you?"

Elias considered that.

"No."

She raised an eyebrow.

"I'd go with you."

Despite everything, Beatrice smiled.

"Thought so."

They walked together toward the eastern corridor.

The door to the Library was exactly where they had left it.

Closed.

Nathaniel stopped before it.

"Yesterday, we didn't know this room existed."

"And today?" Elias asked.

"Today we know better."

He opened the door.

The Library waited.

Morning light slipped between the heavy curtains, turning the dust in the air into tiny floating sparks. The room smelled of cedar, old paper, and something faintly floral.

Beatrice stepped inside.

She had noticed the portraits the night before.

In daylight, they seemed different.

Not changed.

Just clearer.

There were more of them than she had first realized.

Portraits filled the walls from floor to ceiling.

Some were formal family paintings.

Others showed people standing in gardens, on staircases, beside horses, or near the great windows of the Manor.

Children stood beside parents.

Brothers beside sisters.

Husbands beside wives.

Generations stared down at them.

Beatrice moved closer to one painting.

A young girl stood beneath an archway covered in ivy. Her dress was pale blue. Her hair was dark. Her expression was serious.

There was no name beneath the painting.

Only a date.

1794.

"Who is she?" Beatrice asked.

Nathaniel approached.

"I don't know."

Elias looked at the portrait.

"Maybe the Archives do."

That was enough.

They began searching.

The Library was organized in a way that made sense only to someone who had spent years learning it.

Family records occupied one section.

History filled another.

Maps were kept near the far wall.

Personal journals and correspondence had their own shelves.

There were books on architecture, botany, medicine, philosophy, poetry, religion, astronomy, geography, and subjects Beatrice could not immediately identify.

Some books were bound in leather.

Others in cloth.

Several had metal clasps.

One was so old that its cover had cracked completely down the middle.

Nathaniel ran his fingers along a shelf.

"Look at the dates."

Beatrice leaned closer.

The books had been arranged chronologically.

But not completely.

Some older books appeared among newer ones.

Some volumes had no dates at all.

Elias pulled one from the shelf.

A cloud of dust rose.

He coughed.

Beatrice laughed.

"You're enjoying yourself."

"Immensely."

He opened the book.

A pressed flower fell onto the floor.

All three stared at it.

It was almost perfectly preserved.

Purple petals.

A thin green stem.

Elias picked it up carefully.

"There isn't a flower like this in the gardens."

"How do you know?"

"I've seen the gardens."

Nathaniel looked at the flower.

"Keep it."

Elias frowned.

"Why?"

"I don't know."

That answer seemed to become increasingly common in Breedlove Manor.

Beatrice turned toward the map section.

Several large cases stood against the wall.

She opened the first.

Inside were rolled maps.

Some were modern enough to recognize.

Others were hand-drawn.

She carefully lifted one.

The paper crackled.

"Come here."

Nathaniel and Elias joined her.

Beatrice unrolled it across the table.

Nevermore Valley appeared beneath their hands.

But not the Nevermore Valley they knew.

The mountains were larger.

The forests extended farther.

Several roads were drawn where no roads existed now.

The map showed Breedlove Manor at the center.

To the north were the Blackwood Mountains.

To the east, Thornwood Forest.

To the west, Silvermist Lake.

But beyond those familiar names were others.

Places they had never heard of.

Villages.

Streams.

Old roads.

Ruins.

A small symbol appeared beyond the mountains.

Nathaniel bent closer.

"What is that?"

Beatrice shook her head.

Elias traced the edge of the map without touching the ink.

"There's more."

He pointed toward the bottom.

The map continued beyond the borders of Nevermore Valley.

The paper had been folded so many times that the creases were nearly white.

Beatrice unfolded it.

A larger region appeared.

For several moments, none of them spoke.

The world suddenly seemed much larger.

"We thought this was everything," Beatrice whispered.

Nathaniel looked toward the Manor windows.

"Maybe we only knew what we were supposed to know."

Elias looked at him.

"That's a disturbing thought."

"Yes."

Beatrice studied the map.

Near one of the distant mountain ranges was a handwritten note.

She couldn't read it.

Nathaniel took the magnifying glass from the desk.

He leaned over the page.

"It's a name."

"What name?"

He read it slowly.

"Valemere."

Beatrice repeated it.

"Valemere."

Something moved behind them.

They turned.

Nothing.

The room was empty.

Elias glanced toward the portraits.

"Did you hear that?"

"Hear what?" Beatrice asked.

"Someone walking."

Nathaniel listened.

There it was.

A faint sound.

Footsteps.

Above them.

Slow.

Measured.

One step.

Then another.

Then silence.

Beatrice looked toward the ceiling.

"There isn't another floor above this room."

Elias looked at Nathaniel.

Nathaniel's expression had become serious.

"No."

The footsteps came again.

This time from the corridor.

They waited.

Nothing.

Elias moved toward the door.

"Don't," Beatrice said.

He stopped.

"Why?"

"I don't know."

He looked at her.

Then smiled faintly.

"You're starting to sound like Nathaniel."

"Maybe I've been spending too much time with him."

Nathaniel gave them both a look.

"Can we concentrate?"

Beatrice laughed softly.

The sound disappeared quickly into the enormous room.

She returned to the table.

There was another book beside the map.

None of them had placed it there.

Its cover was deep green.

A silver line ran down its spine.

Beatrice picked it up.

There was no title.

She opened the first page.

A name had been written inside.

AUGUSTINE BREEDLOVE

Beneath it was a sentence.

What is remembered cannot always be buried.

Beatrice looked at Nathaniel.

"Another family book."

"Maybe."

Elias turned the page.

The next page contained handwriting.

Not a record.

A story.

A description of the Manor.

Someone had written about the sound of the western staircase at midnight.

Someone else had described seeing a light moving through the gardens.

Another entry spoke of a locked room.

Another mentioned hearing a woman's voice beneath the floor.

Beatrice slowly closed the book.

"How many people have experienced this?"

Nathaniel looked around the Library.

"Probably more than we know."

Elias looked toward the portraits.

"And probably fewer were willing to write it down."

The thought settled heavily between them.

Beatrice looked again at the map.

Then at the books.

Then at the portraits.

The Manor suddenly seemed impossibly large.

Not because its rooms had changed.

Because she was beginning to understand how much history they contained.

Eight generations.

Hundreds of stories.

Thousands of days.

Lives beginning and ending beneath the same roof.

And they had only just begun reading.

A soft sound came from the far end of the Library.

A page turning.

Beatrice looked up.

A book sat open on a distant table.

No one was near it.

The page moved.

Slowly.

Once.

Then again.

Nathaniel stood.

"Stay here."

Beatrice immediately followed.

"So are we."

Elias joined them.

They crossed the Library together.

The open book was enormous.

Its pages were filled with drawings.

Not writing.

Drawings of the Manor.

The front entrance.

The gardens.

The eastern corridor.

The Library.

The staircase.

And then—

a room none of them recognized.

Beatrice stared at the drawing.

"Where is that?"

Nathaniel studied it.

"I don't know."

Elias leaned closer.

"Look at the window."

There was a window in the drawing.

Beyond it was a view of the mountains.

But the mountains were wrong.

They were closer.

Different.

As though the artist had drawn the Manor from somewhere that no longer existed.

Beatrice touched the edge of the page.

A chill passed through her fingers.

She pulled her hand away.

The book closed.

By itself.

No one spoke.

Then, somewhere far below them, Breedlove Manor gave a long, low groan.

Not the sound of old wood settling.

Not the sound of wind.

Something deeper.

Something almost like a breath.

Beatrice looked at her brothers.

The three stood together in silence.

The Library had given them another piece of the puzzle.

But it had also given them something else.

A question.

If the Archives contained records of places that no longer appeared on their maps—

and books written by people who had lived within these walls—

then how much of their family history had never been told?

Beatrice looked toward the shelves.

There were thousands of books.

Perhaps more.

She suddenly understood why the Manor had never needed to speak all its secrets at once.

It had books.

It had records.

It had maps.

It had portraits.

It had memories.

And somewhere among them all was the truth.

Not waiting to be given to them.

Waiting to be discovered.