3.
Echoes of Joy Past
Silas paced his bedchamber for at least a quarter of an hour after the ghostly visit, trying to make sense of it. His father had been dead these past five years, and he hadn’t seen Grace since a frigid Christmas Eve ten years ago. The day before Elyse had died. He’d pushed thoughts of his lost love so far down, he was surprised his brain had managed to dredge them up.
He pressed the back of his hand to his forehead, wondering if he had a fever, but his skin was chilled to the touch.
Perhaps the blame lay with Benedict. If he hadn’t arrived this evening, with his smiles and invitations and reminders of the family Silas had once had...
With a groan, Silas threw himself back into bed, pulling the covers up to his chin in an attempt to warm himself. He couldn’t believe he’d given any credence at all to the possibility that his dead father had visited him from beyond the grave.
The wind howled through the cracks in the windowsills, carrying a chill that made even the roaring fire seem useless. He tossed restlessly in the tangled sheets, trying to find some peace, when he felt another shift in the air.
He lifted his head reluctantly, dread pooling within him, only to find yet another ghost hovering beside his bed. The specter materialized where the shadows had been deepest, its body shimmering with ethereal radiance. It was almost too bright tolook at, and Silas cowered back, realizing that perhaps none of this was a dream but something terrifyingly real.
“Silas Frostwick,” it called, each note of its clear, musical tone vibrating through Silas’s chest.
Silas pushed himself upright, and the very act of breathing seemed to dislodge time. The room dissolved around him, shimmering like a hazy portal. “Are you one of the spirits my father said would come to teach me?” he asked shakily.
“I am the Ghost of Christmas Past,” the spirit answered. “Will you come with me?”
Silas stared at it for a moment or at least tried to. The bright light emanating from the creature's heart made it almost impossible to distinguish any of its features. He wanted to refuse this invitation, just as he’d refused Benedict’s, but his father’s words came back to haunt him. Somehow, he knew that to refuse would be at the peril of his immortal soul.
He reluctantly slid out of bed and stepped forward, pulling on his dressing gown once more. The moment he belted it around his waist, the cold room fell away. Warmth suddenly enveloped his skin as the scents of roasting chestnuts and fresh pine filled the air.
He was no longer in his frigid bedchamber but in the great hall of his family’s country estate, Snowdon Grange, enveloped in a Christmas memory long forgotten. Candlelight flickered against richly adorned walls, casting intricate shadows that danced to the joyful rhythm of laughter. Silas blinked, feeling both the thrill of childhood and the heaviness of loss in a single breath.
He turned to the spirit, but before he could ask the question, the spirit answered. “They cannot see you. This is but a memory of things past.”
Silas stood near the towering Christmas tree, a spectator of this moment from long ago. He saw himself there—a boyno more than eight, eyes alight with an innocent wonder he could no longer claim. Young Silas moved through the crowd, laughing and talking to those he passed, obviously enjoying every moment in the way only a child can.
Family members surrounded the boy, each face familiar yet strange after all these years. An elderly aunt with laugh lines etched deep offered him a brightly wrapped gift, while his mother, vibrant and lovely, fussed over a table laden with seasonal delights. His father held court near the fireplace, and his older sister, Elyse, who had been in the midst of her debut Season, looked dazzlingly beautiful in her Christmas finery. The air was thick with the aroma of roast goose, spiced wine, and sugared sweets.
The elder version of Silas felt pulled into the scene, the spectral chill that had gripped him thawing in the presence of such overwhelming warmth. But the more he watched, the sharper his awareness became of the years that had passed. He saw the joy and connection he had once taken for granted, which now seemed distant and unreachable.
Amidst the chatter, young Silas’s voice rang out, bright and unburdened. “Come see what I got!” the boy exclaimed, holding up a wooden train with wheels that spun at a touch. The others gathered around him, their collective laughter echoing through the hall. There was such life, such light in this place, and Silas felt the ache of it deep in his bones.
A fleeting glance at the Ghost of Christmas Past revealed its form glowing softly at the periphery, a reminder of the journey’s purpose.
“Do you remember this?” the ghost inquired.
The words pierced the moment, and suddenly, he did remember everything—especially his mother’s laughter and the Christmas carols. The memory became a double-edged gift, each joyful detail laced with the painful knowledge of what wouldcome to pass. The lights burned brighter, the scents grew stronger, and the older Silas felt the crushing weight of the life he had turned away from.
“I do,” he said hollowly. “I was happy then.”
Everything suddenly shimmered, then disappeared, and now he was looking at a different Christmas Eve altogether. He saw himself again, older now, perched on the wide staircase that overlooked the hall, his chin propped on his hands as he watched the celebrations below.
He knew what year this was, and it filled him with a profound sense of loss. His mother had been very sick that year. She had remained in her bed, unable to join the festivities. Still, his father’s voice carried through the room, a deep and authoritative tone calling for a toast, as if nothing were the matter. Had he loved her at all? Over the years, Silas had begun to doubt it. Glasses clinked in reply, the music swelled, and Silas shrank even further into himself.
His mother had died the very next day. On Christmas morning. His whole world had changed.
“Christmas has taken so much from me,” he told the spirit, trying to make it understand. “That’s why I don’t celebrate it now. I lost my mother, Elyse, Grace...”
Time began to fold in upon itself, the room spinning like his toy train’s wooden wheels, and Silas clung to the fragments of the scene. He was losing it again, losing all of it, and the knowledge sliced through him like a blade.
“Christmas is not to blame,” the ghost said, its tone neither kind nor cruel. “For if you had not lost them at that time of year, you would have lost them at some other. Such is the nature of life.”
As those words echoed within him, he and the ghost were transported to the hidden world behind the manor. The frosted arches of the garden gazebo glistened beneath a waning moon.The air was sharp and expectant, and he shivered not from the cold but from the thrill of forbidden anticipation.
