'Don't look, Lillian. Never look into the eyes of a Sin-Eater, you will be as cursed as he is and will forever languish in darkness.'
Lillian Elmes remembers the warning her mother gave her about the town's Sin-Eater only too well.
How could she n...
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The oak spiral staircase is narrow and somewhat precarious, each step immaculately polished by the Wilderhope maid, however I notice the closer we get to the top, the care of each step becomes less meticulous. I cannot say I am wholly surprised by this, for if the second floor is where Edith now resides, I shan't imagine anyone would care to spend too much time close to where death surely walks.
The stairwell is starved of light, and on a bleak day such as this, what little light trickles through the small windows is just about sufficient to help guide our way upwards without losing our footing and tumbling down the many steps to the lobby. The dead silence here is a sharp contrast to the thunderous storm of the parlour room, and I can hear nothing but my shallow breaths and the sound of our footsteps. My skin prickles with the anticipation of what is to come, but I am strangely steadied by Daniel's presence and by the scent of him which fills my senses in the most welcoming way.
As we near the top, Daniel reaches for a paraffin lamp which stands on the ledge of the last window. Next to it, lies a single Lucifer box and Daniel extracts one of the matches and strikes it, lighting the wick of the lamp and replacing the chimney funnel intact. At first the illumination is dazzling, until Daniel adjusts the pin at the base of the lamp and the glow is muted just enough to stop from hurting my eyes.
Stepping out onto the second floor, we wait, with Daniel holding up the lamp to alight the long corridor. Dust particles hang in the air, undisturbed. No sound alerts us to any possible presence of Mrs. Smallman. In fact, it is so quiet that I cannot imagine anyone is here except for ourselves. Mr. Hawkstone made quite a monstrous cacophony of sound as he crashed through Rectory Wood and showed no mercy to any tree or bush that attempted to bar his way. Of course, in life, Edith was but a mouse of a woman, but in this stagnant silence, I would have thought to have heard something at least. A footstep perhaps. An agonised groan.
Instead, Wilderhope refuses to yield.
Daniel moves to the door of the first room and presses his ear to it. Shaking his head to confirm he hears nothing, he turns the knob and gently pushes the door, which opens, thankfully with no protest.
Craning my neck to look past him, I can see it was most likely a guest bedchamber once, slightly small and cramped and barely enough space to fit a bed, a nightstand, and a narrow glass-fronted armoire. Through the small window, I can see the gardens to the rear of Wilderhope, framed by the darkening clouds that look as if they threaten to lash the landscape with heavy rainfall at any moment.
