Elsie Whittaker’s remains were discovered three days later. After one of the servants noticed a foul stench rising from the basement, he immediately rushed up the steps to vomit. Her death was ruled an accident. The castle, being immediately placed on lockdown under the orders of John Weston Tillamore III had many guards on constant watch in each room, both day and night. A week later, the body was given to the Whittakers, who received a small stipend to cover funeral costs. Elsie’s mother had to be escorted out by the guards, screaming at the top of her lungs. She was inconsolable.
From one of the stone balconies above, little Cassandra silently watched her as the woman was dragged out into the courtyard, her cries echoing and bouncing off the stone walls. The young girl’s face was pale and withdrawn, and, even as the first rays of sunlight broke through the clouds, she did not join her sisters as they played in the garden outside and ran to catch butterflies. Every time she passed the steps leading to the basement, shivers ran down her spine and she would immediately rush down the hallway.
John remained in bed for three weeks. Dr. Crowsley prescribed him laudanum drops, which only made him sleep heavily through the day and night. Whenever Cassandra asked to see her father, Gloria always scolded her, telling her that he was ill, and he could not be bothered any further.
As a result, Thera settled upon the throne. She argued with the king’s advisors, and demanded that taxes should be raised for the people. She spent quite lavishly, ordering that a new summer tea house be built, with furniture and paintings brought from Italy, France, and Sweden. In addition, she threw lavish parties and would dress extravagantly, wearing layers upon layers of jeweled skirts, laced petticoats, and a towering wig covered in pearls and bows and ribbons.
Her skin was whiter than the sheets that Cassandra noticed that the maids would scrub clean, covered in the layers of paste that she applied every morning with a brush. The girl wasn’t too fond on attending the galas that were thrown nearly every night, being forced to wear itchy stockings and heavy gowns that she could barely breathe in due to the corsets digging into her sides. She could hardly get a bite of food down without striking to breathe. She was a terrible dancer, often forgetting the steps. And she struggled to keep up with her tutor, Mr. Waters, during the day.
The man was short and fat, with a large potbelly that hung to his knees. His wig was always poorly fitted, looking like it was about to slide off his forehead. He loudly rapped the end of his stick against the edge off her book one morning in the middle of their French lessons, causing her to startle awake from a snore, jerking back her head. Audrey and Anne quietly snickered, hiding their pink faces in their books.
”Your Highness,” he snapped.
Cassandra blinked twice, the room about her a blur and mess of colors.
Mr. Waters pointed to the page. “Read this sentence aloud for me, please.”
“Forgive me.” The young princess rubbed her eyes. “I don’t know what it means.”
Exasperated, the tutor placed a palm on his forehead. “If I say to you, comment, allez-vous, ton altesse, how shall you respond?”
Cassandra frowned. “C’est une journée agréable?”
The laughter of her siblings made a crimson shade fall upon the girl’s face. Anne straightened her back and folded her arms, her posture just as perfect as a young lady’s should be. “It is je vais bien merci,” she proudly said, giving Cassandra a side glance.
“Excellent work, Anne,” Mr. Waters praised. “Cassandra, you ought to follow your sister’s example and pay more close attention. And you must practice conjugating your verbs.”
For the rest of the lesson, Cassandra’s shoes tapped against the chair leg. Her dark blue eyes settled upon the glass window, where she thought she spotted something below in the courtyard, close towards the palace gate. By the time Mr. Waters had her writing out new sentences on the page with her quill, it was empty again.
* * * * * * *
Around nightfall, the palace seemed to creak and groan. The steps were louder than ever, and although Cassandra could hear the footsteps and bussing around of the servants, it was mostly quiet in her chambers. Her lady in waiting, Charlotte, had just prepared her a warm bath, with plenty of bubbles and scented soap. After helping her get dressed her into a silk pink nightgown, the woman knelt down to her level and smiled, though Cassandra could see dark circles under her eyes. The young princess clung to her arms.
”Darling, you’ll make me trip.”
”Please, can’t you stay here with me?”
“Your Highness, you are old enough to understand that the help is always here when you ask. And you know that Delilah takes the night shift after me, so she shall tend to you.”
The girl frowned. “But I want you. Delilah is so very serious. And she is grumpy all the time. She won’t sing or read to me like you do.”
Charlotte hid her smile. “I shall see you in the morning, your Highness,” she said. “You have a good rest.”
Cassandra shook her head, her freshly washed curls floating above her head and sticking out of her night cap. When damp, she had the loveliest waves, but the moment her hair begun to dry, the worst frizz would settle upon her. She wished she had hair like her mother’s—which was only slightly curly, and not too difficult to manage. “I want you to stay here with me.”
Charlotte kissed her forehead. “My sweet child, you know the routine. I have little ones at home, who are waiting for me. I will be back tomorrow. And we shall both pick out the dress that you are to wear for the gala.”
“Don’t go into the basement.” Cassandra’s teeth were chattering. She shook her head several times. “Don’t go there, even if they tell you to. You should disobey that order.”
“I would rather not.” Charlotte fluffed the pillows on the bed and yawned. ”And why I on earth would I go there, Your Highness? You know my duties are up here.”
“You shan’t go. That is what the Whittakers are telling everyone in town. I heard a couple of guards talking about it this morning.”
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The maid raised an eyebrow. “Young ladies should not eavesdrop on conversations. It is very impolite. And you are too young to even be concerned about such frivolous matters.”
”But they are not frivolous at all. If you go down there, you’ll get hurt too.” Cassandra’s voice grew small. “Like Elsie. Please don’t.”
A slightly confused look fell upon Charlotte’s face, but she took the young girl’s hand and carried her to the bed, before drawing the silk covers up to her chin. “Nothing is going to happen to me. There is nothing to worry about. Your father has everything under control. There are guards every inch of this place, and any intruders that come past the palace walls will be punished accordingly.”
”But you can’t go—”
“You need to sleep, darling.”
The enormous pillows pressed against Cassandra’s back. She struggled to sit up, clinging onto Charlotte’s stained apron. “You can’t go into the basement.” She sniffed. “You can’t. If they ask you to go, they can’t.”
For a moment, the candles in the room flickered. Charlotte gently cleared a loose strand of hair that had fallen in front of Cassandra’s face with a cold finger. “You need not worry about anything, understand? Your father is working very, very, very hard to keep everyone safe. Now, go to sleep like a good child, and before you know it, morning will be here soon.”
“Do you believe it was an accident, as they say?”
”To bed, Your Highness.”
A deep pit settled in Cassandra’s stomach as Charlotte stood up and blew out all of the candles, with the exception of the biggest one, which she took with her. As the door closed, Cassandra drew the sheets over her head and closed her eyes, trying to ignore the creaking and groaning in the palace due to the wind outside. She longed for her mother, but Audrey had told her at supper that she had traveled to Ormon to get some medicine for Papa, because he was ill. When she had asked why she hadn’t even bothered to say goodbye, Anne had told her to stop acting like a baby.
Cassandra turned to the left side of the bed.
A baby. That was what she was. She softly exhaled and curled up into a ball, not wanting to look at the shadows in her room, how her rocking horse, dollhouse, and toys seemed to take on a shape that did not originally belong to them. With how cold the room was growing and the increasing warmth of the sheets wrapped around her, the burden of the day finally settled upon her.
* * * * * * * *
The young girl’s eyes slowly opened. It was still dark, yet her eyes were fuzzy with fatigue. As she raised her head from her pillow, a heavy thump echoed from within the walls.
She could hear faint crying.
Anne and Audrey’s chambers were right next to hers. Fighting to get free from the blankets, Cassandra landed awkwardly on the rug. Her bare feet were silent against the wooden floor as she rushed to her bedroom door, her small hands wrapping around the door handle. The empty hallway was dark, but to her relief, she spied a candle sitting on a small table next to the wall, and grabbed it with her shaking hand. The crying continued.
For a moment, Cassandra pondered whether it would be best to ask Delilah to come with her, as she was not particularly fond of the dark, despite running the risk of being scolded for being up so late. But she remembered Anne calling her a baby, and she was determined to prove her wrong.
The young girl held the candle up, an orange glow illuminating her pale face. A cold wind traveled down the vast hallway, causing her pink nightgown to sway around her ankles as she walked. She found it quite strange that there were no guards in the hallway. After peeking into each of her sisters’ rooms, she noticed that they were both fast asleep. She silently closed the door, rubbing her bleary eyes and preparing to go back into her own room, before a thought crossed her mind.
Charlie.
His nursery was on the floor above their rooms. After glancing behind her, Cassandra made her way up the steps, shielding the weak flame with her hand, not wanting it to blow out. It was unusually cold and windy, and she wondered if one of the servants had accidentally left the windows open. When she reached the top of the steps, she froze outside of her brother’s room. There was a strange scent that met her nose, like moss and dirt and water.
Charlie’s cries grew louder.
Her stomach began to churn as she opened the door as quietly as she could, praying it wouldn’t squeak. The candlelight illuminated the furniture in the room, and she slowly made her way through, careful not to bump into anything. Her brother’s cries echoed in the room, and she could see his shadow in his crib, his arms flailing and moving.
“Charlie?” she asked in a loud whisper. “Charlie, I’m coming. I’m coming soon.”
Cassandra set down the candle, but before she could take another step forward, her left bare foot brushed against something on the floor. She squinted her eyes as she bent down and picked up a wrinkled, torn piece of paper. Confused, she held it up to the light to get a better look. She gazed at a detailed sketch of a large ship. As she flipped it over in her hands, the wardrobe door swung open with a loud bang.
Startled, Cassandra spun around, clutching the drawing to her chest. Although the room was still, she could make out a faint rattling sound, right where the doorknob of the plaster made a mark against the wall. She went to Charlie’s crib and picked him up in his arms, who was crying uncontrollably. His chubby face was red, and she realized that he had wet himself. He loudly hiccuped once he saw her and began to coo, cramming his fingers into his mouth.
“Don’t worry,” Cassandra reassured him, kissing his left cheek. “I will get you changed. I don’t want to wake anyone else up, less they be cross. And then I shall read you some stories on the rocking chair.”
As she bounced him up and down, trying to remember where his wet nurse kept the clean linens at, the candle blew out, leaving a trail of smoke.
The room became pitch black.
“Mama?” Cassandra asked.
That was when she noticed a shape against the wall. Charlie began to doze off in her arms. Cassandra tried to move, but she found that she couldn’t. Her bare feet were plastered against the floor, like someone had glued them against the carpet. She could simply only stand there, clinging onto her baby brother. She blinked several times, trying to move her feet again. Her blue eyes helplessly stared at the door. She wanted to yell at the top of her lungs, but she couldn’t.
Something warm and wet brushed the back of her neck, leaving a stinging sensation behind, almost like a burn.
A few rapid footsteps scurried across the floor behind her. There was heavy, shaking breathing, followed by the sound of Charlie’s crib being knocked over, then split into a pile of wood. The rattling sound continued, although it was fainter, and Cassandra could not turn around, although she tried to. A drop of blood escaped down her left nostril and traveled down her chin, before staining the collar of her nightgown. Her hands shook.
The atmosphere became static, and Cassandra’s vision grew fuzzy. In the pitch black, something white formed in the darkness. A smile— very broad and with teeth that seemed unnaturally large and white and sharp. Glass shattered, forming a giant crack against the large mirror above the dresser.
The flame from the candle flickered back on.
Gloria Tillamore hung from the chandelier above, slightly swinging side by side, her feet dangling midair. A creaking sound echoed in the room due to it supporting her weight. She had on her wedding ring, and her long, luscious locks hung to her waist, freed out of its usual braids. She was dressed in her evening gown, and her crown was placed high upon her head. A thick rope was wrapped around her pale neck, and her blue eyes stared at the wall. Her flesh was beginning to show signs of decomposition, bubbling and peeling at the edges, and her velvet slippers were scuffed at the bottom. Maggots formed around her blistered lips.
Cassandra began to scream.