The Secrets of Darkling Manor

Fifteen: Aleksander Morozova

Fifteen 

He told Alina that he was going to be working. Instead, he went out and walked to the back half of the property. When he had been a child, his family had kept a groundskeeper. There was a house on the back part where the groundskeeper and his wife had stayed. His wife had served as the housekeeper back then. They had also had a daughter. Luda Voronin. She was a beautiful girl, with dark hair, and dark eyes. Aleksander had grown up with her. There was not a moment of his childhood that hadn't been spent with her.

He'd also been two years older. Luda had been his companion mostly out of necessity. Darkling Manor was in the middle of nowhere, and Keramzin Village wasn't exactly filled with a lot of opportunities to meet new people. Up until he was ten, he was educated at home. When his family decided that he was going to Eaton to be educated as all rich, young men were. He wasn't a lord but they were a family of means and Eaton was where all young men from wealthy families went. He spent most of the year there, with the exception for breaks when he came home.

Meaning Luda was left all alone on the property by herself and nothing but the forest to keep her company. The first summer that he had come home, he had been so eager to see her he ran out to her home. She ran to him.

"Aleks!" she said. "Aleks, you're home."

He smiled. "Of course, I am."

"Did you miss me?"

"Of course I did," he said, hugging her. "You got tall."

She smiled. "I'm eight now."

"Yes," he said, "I can see that. What did you do while I was gone?"

She smiled. "I saw the witch."

He frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"The witch, from the legends about Darkling Manor. You know. She was shunned from the village for her power because she murdered that ancestor of yours. The General?"

"Oh yes!" he said. "The one they drowned in the pond. What do you mean you saw her?"

"I mean," she said, "I was walking through the woods one day in the snow. It was cold and I heard someone call my name. Ludaaaaaa, Ludaaaaaaaaa....then there was this beautiful woman with stark white hair wearing a white, torn dress in front of me. She touched me."

"I thought she was a Saint," said Aleksander, "a saint that they drowned because she failed to win the war."

"It depends on who you ask," said Luda, "the Christians say that she was a witch. The Catholics say that she was a Saint."

"Wouldn't a Saint make her good? Why would you drown a saint?"

Luda shrugged. "Who knows. But I still saw her. Do you want to see her too? They say that if you call her name three times, she'll grant you a wish."

"What's her name again?"

"Saint Alina."

"Alright," he said, "I want to see her too. I could use a wish. Maybe I can ask her not to send me back to school."

Luda smiled. "Was it awful?"

He shrugged. "They're all rich prats."

Luda laughed. "Aleks, you're a rich prat."

He smirked. "But they're richer than me, and I don't like it. It's alright. I'm going to grow up and make more money than them."

Luda smiled. "You could always ask the witch to make you rich."

"You think?"

"I think," she said, "come on, let's go."

She grabbed his hand and they raced to the pond.

"Did you chant her name to see her?" Aleksander asked.

Luda shook her head. "I didn't. She just appeared."

He frowned. "She just appeared?"

Luda nodded.

"Don't you think that's weird? If the legend says that you're supposed to chant her name three times."

"Maybe the legend is wrong," said Luda, "maybe she just has to like you for her to appear."

"Well, she liked you. Hopefully she'll like me too."

"I bet she will," said Luda, "you're wonderful."

Aleksander smiled. "You're wonderful too, Luda." He paused. "Did you wish for anything?"

Luda shook her head. "I can't tell you. If I tell you, it won't come true."

"Alright. Don't tell me. I won't tell you either. But what do we do now?"

"Now, we wait."

They waited all day. They had the luxury of summer about them. No one cared where they were, or what they did. As long as they didn't interfere with anything that the grownups were doing. The witch did not show. They told stories back and forth as they lay on the ground, watching the pond for her to appear. And still she never came forward. As the sunset, they were about to go home for dinner.

In fact, they had just gotten up and brushed themselves off before grabbing each other's hands to make the long walk home when they heard splashing coming from the water.

They watched as the white-haired woman rose from the watery depths. She seemed to float towards them. "Aleksanderrrrrr," she rasped his name, and he realized he was trembling. "Tell me what you want, Aleksanderrrrrrr."

"Money," he said, "more money than god."

The witch jerked her head back as if it had been yanked, and a horrible wheezing sound that he thought might have been laughter came from her. "I don't believe in god. But I can make you rich. But you have to give me something in return. There is nothing that is free, Aleksanderrr."

"Name your price."

"Your love," she said, "you be able to love your family, and your friends. But you will never be able to love a paramour. That is the price you pay."

"I don't need a paramour," said Aleksander, "I have my family and my friends."

"Then, money you shall have. Remember, if you go back on your word, the witch of Keramzin will claim you. And you'll rot here with me."

The witch reached out, and placed a chilly, wet hand on his young head. Then, in a blink of an eye, she vanished.

What a fool he had been. Of course, he had been a child. He had not known what it was to love someone intimately, versus familial love or the love of a friend. That night, he and Luda returned home, and they never talked of the incident with the witch again.

As Aleksander got older, it was easier to write it off as a childish game. Something he and Luda had made up to keep themselves entertained during a long, hot boring summer. He had not thought of the witch until the accident....and then again when Alina had showed up. It seemed to him a message, that she had shared a name with the witch that had been drowned in the pond.

Now, he went to the old groundskeeper cottage that Luda and her family had once lived in. Everything was still there, still exactly the same. After the accident, her parents had moved away, and they hadn't been able to stomach taking anything with them. He kept it all there in case they ever wanted to come back to get it.

He went to Luda's room, untouched by time except for dust, and pulled out an old book. Old English Saints. And then he sat on Luda's old, twin bed and began to read frantically. Looking for anything that would get him out of the mess he had gotten himself into.