The return of the Dark

18

"Leave me alone," I said annoyed and turned around to my ghost.

My ghost.

I wish he was. Invisible, luring in the shadows and trapped in this house, a mirror.

But Ian Fral was alive, young and determined to follow every step I made. It had been four days now. Anxiously I awaited Robin's letter. It could come any day now.

In the meantime I tried to figure out how to get rid of Ian. He was always there. When I went for a walk around the property, visited the horses, sat in the kitchen with Mr. Scarlet.

Even when I went to my room, he stood downstairs, waiting for me to come down.

I was so grateful for him being down there and not in my little corridor. God knows what would happen if he heard the fireplace enige from its place.

"It's my duty to..." Ian started, but I was already growling and snapped at him:

"Yes, yes I know! It's your duty to protect me. But can't you do that somewhere else? You're driving me nuts."

His blue eyes, bright and as cold as the winter sky, only blinked, didn't show any other emotion. "I can keep more distance, but I can't lose you from my sight."

I mumbled in myself, kept walking until I reached the piano room, found Loveday sitting behind it as she played a sad tune. I ordered Ian to stay by the door.

He didn't need to know what I was talking about with Loveday, what I had planned.

"Loveday," I said as I sat beside her, "how are you?"

She smiled at me, it didn't reach her sad eyes. I felt sorry for her. I knew she was just as unhappy with the situation as I was.

But there was one difference between us. She was caught, imprisoned, not able to leave Benjamin's side. And I knew she loved him very much, but not to be able to see or even speak to your family...

I didn't want to know what that was like.

"Maria," she said and smiled at me. "I can still remember the first day I saw you. Young, twelve year old girl rattling up the whole Valley."

I snorted. "I was some kind of little dragon, I guess." I shrugged and followed Loveday's tune. "I remember this piano playing on its own."

She smiled. "Oh, yes it certainly did. But nowadays I think it stopped." The sad face appeared again. "I don't know why."

I placed my hand on her back. "How are you?" I asked again, softer now. Ian was still standing by the door.

"Oh Maria," she whispered back and blinked away tears. "It's like we're falling back into time. Everything is like before, but worse. I miss my little brother, I hate it to write in him in secret. I want to hold him again."

I started playing on the piano for her, creating noise so she could speak freely. I had to know more.

"He wrote me, I got his letter this morning. Yours is underneath your pillow. Maria, I don't know what is going on. It seems like this old war has started all over again."

"But how?" I questioned. "When I left everything was fine, perfect even! Robin and the boys came over almost every weekend, or I was going to his place! We were all together."

Loveday shuddered, looked at Ian and then back at me. I didn't dare to look at him. I didn't know what he meant to my Uncle, where he came from. I didn't know anything about this young man. And I didn't trust him for a second.

I knew that everything that happened in this very room, he would tell Benjamin.

"I think everything started again when you left, Maria," Loveday admitted whispering and her face became pale, a tired look in her eyes.

My fingertips became cold, the hairs in the back of my neck stood up. A sickness filled my stomach and I couldn't speak.

"Something poisoned these lands when the Moon Princess left it unprotected. I can feel it in the air, the light, the ground." She started playing again, took over. "Something is absorbing our magic, our energy. Which means it's taking yours and making our families turn to one another."