Stuck in the Deepend | ONC 2024

Chapter 6

The Truscott family were a strange collection of people, Lucas decided as they all mulled around waiting to be let into the dining room.

Lady Truscott had five other children besides Mirra's mother. And not one of them had paid any attention to him as he kept to the shadows by the staircase. Mirra was still nowhere to be seen, but whilst the other family members were in his sights, he felt reassured that she was likely safe from them.

'Excuse me.' A woman snapped her fingers to gain his attention. 'How long is my mother going to make us wait?' she demanded.

Lucas raised his eyebrow, taking in her sparkly dress and jewel encrusted fingers. He'd been informed that this would be a low-key dinner, but was feeling underdressed in his jeans compared to the rest of the Truscott family.

'I don't know,' he said when it became clear the woman was waiting for his response.

'Can you at least make yourself useful and find out? I'm sure my mother is paying you well to do whatever it is you do,' she snapped.

'I don't work for your mother,' Lucas said, resisting the urge to grind his teeth.

'He is my guest, Abigail.' Madge explained as she entered the hall from the dining room. 'An old family friend whom I've recently been reacquainted with thanks to Mirra.'

Abigail's sneer dissolved into a polite smile in the face of her mother.

'A family friend?' she asked in a sugary voice that set Lucas on edge.

'Mr Ashfield will be joining us for the weekend,' Madge explained without elaborating further.

'Ashfield? As in Martha Ashfield?' A man who had been attempting to wrangle two children from causing chaos said, giving Lucas his full attention.

'She was my mother.'

'Then you must be Edward Jushua Ashfield's son?' Abigail giggled at him, her previous looks of contempt apparently stricken from history, now that she knew his identity.

'He's the actor?' the man said, now leaving his two children to run up and down the stairs.

'My father mostly directs.' Lucas's smile was tight-lipped. His father was not the topic of conversation that he would have preferred to be engaged with.

Alex gave him a brief respite by appearing from the kitchen and announcing that dinner would begin shortly, before seeing them seated at an impossibly long table.

Lucas sat on Madge's right, and he was once again grateful that his host detested late dinners. If he was lucky, he could enjoy his food, fulfil his task to his host, and also query Mirra on her current projects, all without having to make an excuse as the sun set.

The only downside to his plan seemed to be Abigail's renewed interest in him as she sat beside him. In truth, he could tell she wasn't the only one who watched him with calculating eyes. There were many around the table that seemed to question his inclusion.

'So Lucas, is it? How did you and my mother reconnect?'

'Don't badger our guest, Damian, until he at least has his glass filled,' Madge admonished her son, who looked anything but contrite.

Lucas watched the servers dance around the family, bringing requested drinks, colouring books for the children, and even a battery pack for an unamused teenager glued to her screen. In some ways he wished the servers would never leave, for as soon as they did, the questions would start, and it had been too long since he'd been the centre of attention anywhere but inside his own lab.

During this performance of efficiency, Mirra entered silently and took her seat across from him.

'Late again, Mirra.' Tsked a woman in her forties with jet black hair.