Library

Chapter 25

NEIL

Downstairs and in the warm light of the kitchen, Neil felt a strange sort of relief. She'd gone into the wing alone, reaching for that door like it held all the answers. Was she that desperate for the truth? Neil couldn't stop thinking of the woman in white, of the rotting stench that filled his nostrils and made everything in his mouth turn to ash.

They weren't safe here. None of them were safe.

Penelope grabbed the journal, flipping quickly through the pages.

"There has to be something here." Her eyes scanned rapidly over large, swooping handwriting. "This!"

She turned the journal to him, fingers pointing to a charcoal sketch. Neil frowned as he angled the journal closer, peering down at the sketch of a man.

Neil's hands tightened on the edges of the table until his knuckles were white and his joints ached. He wanted to rip the page out of the journal and tear it into shreds. It was the man they'd seen at Penelope's door, the man with the black jacket slung over his arm, seemingly out of place.

The drawing was delicate and yet somehow dark, the lines swift and sharp, shaded and smeared like Georgina had sketched it without looking down. It was beautifully done, Neil had to admit. Her fingers had left perfectly placed smudges, shadows in all the right places, slinking along the man's jaw and nose, the eyes sharp and distinct as they stared out at Neil from the page.

"But look," Penelope whispered, leaning closer.

Beneath the sketch was a single name in the same, swooping script of the journal and the letters.

"Archie," they said in unison.

So, this was Archie. The owner of the name he'd heard whispered in the study.

"Archibald Skinner," Neil said, tapping it. He shivered, imagining the name carved into stone on a grave, abandoned to the elements. They were probably being watched, even now. The thought sent another shiver down his spine, and he slapped the back of his neck like that would convince the ghosts to go away.

"You okay?" Penelope asked, touching his arm.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." He waved a hand in dismissal. "Sorry, what were you going to say?"

She watched him quietly before turning back to the table and running her fingers over the letters.

Neil wished he were those letters.

"Well, we're missing something." He was snapped back to reality by Penelope's voice. "Why is she haunting the castle? Why is this called Skinner Castle when it once belonged to Georgina's family? Archie is probably her lover, right? Maybe a soldier sent off to war?"

Neil frowned as he searched through the letters, eyes flicking over paragraphs and sentences. They were love letters, long, intricate entries to Archie from Georgina. Her words were desperate and aching, the sort of letters he'd seen in movies and read about in books. It sounded as if the world would end if these two were not together. He glanced sidelong at Penelope, and Neil thought, alarmingly, that he knew what that felt like.

"Wait! I read something yesterday…" She trailed off as she searched through them, stopping on a letter. "I do not know what to do without you. I feel it growing inside of me, and there is nothing I can do to stop it. Please, do not abandon me."

Neil sifted through the letters as she read. He carefully peeled back one of the pages to reveal the familiar cursive, scrunching up his nose in thought.

"What's the date on that letter?" he asked slowly.

"This one is marked May of 1815, why?"

He ran a hand down his face, trying to remember why the date sounded so familiar. "Waterloo…" Neil turned to Penelope, laughing. "I should have known. Laszlo fell into a bit of a Napoleon rabbit hole after the release of some big biopic, and I had to listen to him rant about all the ways the film let him down for hours. Anyways, when these letters were written, British forces were under the command of Wellington. This would have been right after he returned—rather, escaped—from exile on the island Elba, marking the beginning of the Hundred Days. Maybe Archie had to go to war and died there? Maybe the legends are true, and Georgina has spent the rest of her time trapped in this castle, seeking revenge for her fallen lover and Archie is the… I don't know, protector ghost?"

"But if he went away, how is he here now? And what does that have to do with…" Her eyes went to the first letter. Penelope ran her finger over it, her nail dragging along as she reread it to be certain. "She was… she was pregnant, wasn't she?" Penelope picked up the journal, reading aloud from it. "I feel it growing inside of me . " She folded the letter and set it aside, frowning.

Neil scratched his jaw, fingers raking over the beginnings of stubble as he thought. "Maybe… maybe she got pregnant, and her dad found out, and then he sent Archie away to Waterloo? Waterloo lasted, what, a day? That was in June of 1815, this passage where it sounds like he was sent away is marked May of 1815, and then the last letter to him is from November of 1815. Her journal entries go further, and the one about feeling abandoned is from…"

"December of 1815. That tracks," Penelope said. "Nine months. Maybe it took him longer to return home, perhaps he'd been injured and delayed."

"And he returned by winter after the baby was born."

"But why haunt the castle?" she asked. "Why is she still here, and why is he still here, and how the hell did the castle get passed down to Archie? If he was off at war, then he would have died somewhere else and should be haunting that place instead, right? Unless we have the physics of ghosts completely incorrect and we're going about this the wrong way."

He snapped his fingers. "Maybe it wasn't Archie, maybe it was their kid."

"Her kid is wandering around the castle as a young ghost? Unlikely."

"No, the gravestone. Maybe their kid inherited the castle."

Penelope frowned. "I don't know, we must be missing something else. It just doesn't feel right."

"Sorry, I'm not exactly a ghost investigator, now, am I?"

Penelope ran her fingers over the worn red leather of the journal. Her brows were pinched together, her gaze distant as she stared down at the blank cover.

"Where's the last letter?" Neil asked.

Still frowning, she searched through the pile with him, lifting a slim one from the stack. It was marked November of 1815. Neil took it, carefully unfolding the parchment. Penelope leaned over the table as they read the letter.

Father has sent for you, but we have received no word of whether or not you even live. Though I continue to send letters in hopes of a response, I have heard nothing, Archie. There are rumors of others returning from war, broken, but still, no such sign of you. Where are you?

I fear you have left us here to rot.

"Us?" Penelope asked, eyes wide. "Her and the baby, right? He'd abandoned them ."

Neil frowned in thought. She was right, they were missing something, something integral to Georgina and Archie's romance. Maybe he'd been sent away, maybe he needed the money to marry her, to prove he was more than just the groundskeeper's son.

He sifted through the letters, scattering them over the wooden surface. Squinting, he began to unfold them, peering at the dates.

"Help me organize these chronologically?"

Penelope nodded. Bending over the table, they began to sort the letters, swapping the stationery back and forth, watching as the story began to take form. "Me" quickly turned to "you," and then "we," and finally "us." Georgina grew desperate and scared, her letters messier in the autumn months, ink splotching in the corners as if she'd written them in the dark when no one watched.

Georgina was clinging to a fairy tale, and her prince had been sent to his death.

"Neil," Penelope whispered. "Look at this one."

She held out a letter to him, this one marked October of 1815, and he took the delicate paper in his hand, squinting down at the words.

I promised myself to you in the dark of the crypt beneath the glow of a full moon. In turn, you promised to be mine. Pray, tell me, were you lying? Have you deceived me from the beginning, all to take something with which I can give only once? Do you not care about us? It is nearly time, and there is still no word from you.

Archie, do not leave me, do not leave us. Please.

"What are you doing?"

Neil and Penelope let out a loud screech.

"Would you two please stop screaming?" Laszlo hissed, crossing to them.

To Neil's left, Penelope pressed a hand to her chest, coughing. "You scared the living shit out of me."

Neil dropped the letter on the table and Penelope swiveled toward their tall friend, hiding the stack behind her as he stepped into the kitchen, frowning.

Laszlo shook his head. "God, between the loud sex, the throwing of the boot, and you two walking in on Daniela—"

"Now, that was a complete accident," Neil said, holding up a finger. "We thought it was…" He trailed off, meeting Penelope's pointed stare.

"As for… the other thing," Penelope went on, blushing, "I didn't realize we were being so loud."

Laszlo stared between them. "I'm unfortunately a light sleeper. I can't help but hear everything. Although I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you two finally got together. I figured it would happen eventually, just didn't think I'd be privy to the details ."

"Sorry," Neil gasped, pressing a fist to his mouth to keep from laughing.

"Did you bet against us?" Penelope asked.

"I bet for you. I always bet for you, Pen."

Silence fell between them, and Laszlo crossed his arms, watching them. Waiting. He knew something was up, Neil could tell, but what was the point when there was no way in hell Laszlo would believe them?

"Laszlo," Penelope ventured, "have you truly not seen anything ?"

"Like ghosts?" She nodded. "Can't say that I have." He looked between Penelope and Neil. "Why, have you?"

Neil shook his head. "No, no, we haven't."

"It is creepy, though, you know? I have this weird feeling, and it makes me want to run, as odd as that sounds. Not that I believe this castle is haunted, but every time I close my eyes, I think of those stories Fanny told us, of the woman in black and the protector in the cellar. But they're not real, right? I haven't seen or heard anything, neither have any of you. Besides, the van won't start, we're snowed in, and we have no signal. We're already here, and there's no harm in a creepy place, you know?"

"Totally," Penelope squeaked.

"Absolutely," Neil agreed.

"I'm gonna shower and change." Laszlo raised a brow and pointed between them. "See you down here in a bit for today's activities? We'll be reading some work and giving feedback."

"Yeah, for sure," Neil lied.

He tried not to think about how he'd written approximately one sentence since he'd come to the castle. The whole point of the retreat was to work on his book, and instead he'd stumbled into a ghost story with the most unlikely of companions.

Nodding, Laszlo disappeared down the hall, leaving Penelope and Neil alone.

"I haven't written anything," he admitted as soon as Laszlo was gone. "I came here to write my book, and instead we're chasing after ghosts and kissing—"

"Oh, I'm sorry, have I been distracting you?"

"I'm not saying I don't like the kisses and the other things, only…" He tugged on his hair, teeth grinding. He was fucking this up already. "This isn't what we should be doing."

"Yeah, well, I didn't come to this retreat to be haunted by murdery ghosts either. But writing a book is kind of the last of our worries. What if these ghosts can hurt us, Neil? What if this is just the beginning?"

Neil frowned, brushing off his pants as he straightened. "I don't know what we're supposed to do," he admitted.

The closer they got to the truth, to who the ghosts were, and why they were here, the more dangerous it became. He didn't want to put his friends in harm's way, put Penelope in harm's way. But the more they delved into the past, the closer the woman in white seemed to inch toward the east wing. Neil didn't mind the idea of ghosts, didn't mind the mystery they were unraveling, but put the two of them together?

No, thank you.

"We need to finish this," Penelope said quietly.

"How do you propose we do that?"

She didn't look at him as she muttered, "You're not going to like it."

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