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He nodded, his mouth twisted into a semblance of a smile. ‘It’s a good idea. Make a list of all the things you want and I’ll get my secretary to send them over.’
I smiled happily. I knew exactly what I wanted to get for everyone. ‘Can I choose my own wrapping paper?’
He looked at me, surprised. ‘You want to wrap your own presents?’
‘Of course.’
‘Why?’
‘Because it’ll be fun.’
‘I see. Do you like Christmas?’
‘Yes, I’m really looking forward to the whole thing. My family never really celebrated Christmas. We never had presents and we certainly never had a Christmas tree, even though we lived next door to a fir forest. Misty said that we’ll be having a small tree in the breakfast room. And we’re all going to put our presents underneath it. And we’re going to have a turkey dinner. Do you want to join us?’ I asked excitedly.
For a moment he said nothing, simply stared at me. Then: ‘It might not be such a good idea. But you go ahead and have fun.’
*****
So it was a great and wonderful surprise when two days later a twenty foot Christmas tree arrived on a bright red tractor that actually looked very much like Santa’s sleigh.
We all went out to watch the tree being unloaded by four men. Mrs. Littlebell thought it was madness, Misty and I were beside ourselves with excitement, and Ceba growled at the tree. Getting the tree into the middle hall was the easy part. Getting it up on the tree base made of strong, thick, angled struts took not only the four men, but Ren and Mr. Fellowes too. At last it was up.
After they had switched on the fairy lights to make sure everything was working properly, they left, and Misty and I giggled like two schoolgirls. It changed the atmosphere of the whole place and suddenly the castle was no longer gloomy and dark, but like a fairy tale palace. Coming down the stairs to dinner in my long white dress I felt like a fairy tale princess.
Chapter 23
It was a week before Christmas. Mrs. Littlebell had made mince pies and begun to prepare some of the delicacies that we would be having on Christmas day. The Christmas decorations that Misty had ordered had arrived and we were nearly done with the breakfast room when we ran out of greenery, just before we reached the limestone fireplace.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Misty said.
But I remembered that I had seen green lace in Isabella’s room. It would just fill that little space perfectly. So I ran up to her room and was pulling the lace out of the box by the fireplace, when I realized that the draft coming from the fireplace was not cold but warm. I then noticed something else strange. Unlike the other fireplaces in the castle there were no soot marks around the stone. I hunkered down low to the ground and looked up the chimney and was shocked to see an opening on the opposite wall. If I crawled into the chimney and half stood I would be able to see what was inside the dark entrance.
Filled with a sense of adventure and excitement that I might have found something that no one else knew about, I crawled into the small space and half stood. To my surprise it was a secret passageway. It was full of cobwebs and dark.
I went back to my room to find a torchlight then went back and levered myself into the darkness. I crawled along the small square tunnel for what must have been about five minutes until I came to another intersecting passageway. This one was bigger and you could stand in it. I dropped into it and followed it until I came upon what looked like a wooden door. I found the handle, opened it and realized that it was a door hidden behind a large tapestry.
I pushed the tapestry away from the entrance, walked out of the side of it and found myself in a part of the castle I had never been in. The room was not large and the floor was made of flagstones. There was church paraphernalia all around. I opened a wooden door and then I was standing in some sort of a chapel. I walked out of the chapel and came upon a circular staircase.
I climbed it until I reached the first floor. I put my hand on the handle of the door and suddenly I felt a cold hand on me. It shocked me and made all the hair on my hand rise. After that I would always wonder what would have happened if I had heeded that warning hand. If I had not insisted on opening that door. What would my life have been like if I had not peeked at the crane making silk?
I opened the door.
And the strangest sight met my eyes.
My mouth dropped open. This was far worse, much worse than a crane making silk out of its own feathers. The thick curtains were all drawn even though it was daylight outside and the room was dimly lit with restful bluish lights. There were all kinds of blinking machines and medical equipment, almost like a hospital room.
There were two metal beds with railing on the sides and two occupants on them. One was smaller and the other fully grown. Both were female, hairless and grotesquely disfigured beyond anything I had ever seen. Their eyelids seemed to have been sewn shut.
A scream tore through me.
I clapped my mouth. I did not mean to scream.
But the two figures on the bed were oblivious to me. My breath came in spurts. With my heart hammering in my chest I walked closer to the two monstrously scarred figures. Numerous tubes flowed out of them. The room was filled with the artificial sound of their machines breathing for them.
As I stared at them in shock, the door flung open and Guy stood there. The blood drained from my face. I knew then. I had wandered into the forbidden west tower. I had gone where I should not have.
My first reaction was that of a child caught doing something wrong. I began to babble my explanation. ‘I didn’t know this was the west tower. I followed a secret passageway. I’m sorry, I… I’ll just go back the way I came. I haven’t touched anything.’
He stared at me dully.
I stopped speaking.
‘Meet Meredith, my wife, and Tia, my daughter.’
I felt my eyes widen.
‘We were going to a Christmas party. We had taken two cars because I wasn’t staying long. It was one of Meredith’s friends so she led the way. It happened so fast—suddenly an oncoming vehicle plowed into their car. It was no ordinary accident. They hit a truck carrying oil tanks. There was an explosion. The fire spread quickly.’ He winced with the memory. ‘I could not get them out in time.’
His hands clenched into fists.
‘For more than twelve weeks doctors and nurses grafted the skin from dead people onto them, flushed gallons of medicated fluids and electrolytes through their bodies, vacuumed the soot from their lungs, stuck pins into their flesh to hold together their shattered bones, covered their bodies with maggots that ate away at the dead skin and tissue, ripped away sheets of their flesh over and over again, and fought to keep their organs from shutting down. But medicine can’t do any more for them. So I brought them here. Here they are safe from all harm and cared for by Misty.’
There was nothing I could do or say. My mind was a total blank.
‘Do you think they are ug
ly?’ His voice was soft and wheedling.
I shook my head, but it was a lie. Of course they were. Horribly ugly. It was almost impossible to look at such destruction and not recoil in horror. They were so scarred and twisted they were barely human.
‘Well, my darling, I am as much a beast as they are,’ he said, and took off his mask.
Beyond the deep, dark penetrating eyes, and the long curling eyelashes, his chiseled face was so earth-shatteringly handsome he hardly looked real. But that was only one side of his face. The other was a gnarled mess of gored, deformed flesh. Most of his cheek was white, red, uneven, and totally cooked through.
He touched his cheek with his good hand. ‘I had to press my face into red-hot burning metal and hold it there while it scorched through my skin, muscle, tendons, and smoldered down to my bone to get Tia out.’
My mouth dropped open. But not for the reason he thought. Not with horror. With wonder. I realized instantly that the scars didn’t matter. I didn’t care. I loved him with all my being. And he was not ugly. Not at all.
But in a flash I saw him become so desolate, so inconsolable that it shocked me to the marrow. Just as I froze when my father boiled my mother’s hand, I froze then. In those few seconds our lives changed.
Misty burst into the room. She was panting hard. She must have run up the stairs. She did not look at me. Her whole attention was on Guy. It was as if she was waiting for him to say something. He turned away from me and slammed his forearms on the wall, his shoulders, big and solid, heaving as he muttered, ‘Do it.’
Do what? I stared at him.
Refusing to look at me he opened the door and walked out.
I couldn’t understand what was happening. I couldn’t react. I was in a state of shock. Everything felt like it was happening too fast. Like being underwater. I opened my mouth and I felt Misty take hold of my upper arm. I turned around to look at her, and couldn’t believe my eyes.
