The Midnight Oath

Chapter 3: Secrets of the Blackwood Estate

Elara stood at the edge of her bed, the dim light from the oil lamp casting long, wavering

shadows across the room. The storm outside rattled the window panes, the distant sound of

the waves crashing against the cliffs below, the same rhythm that had haunted her since she

was a child. This house-her house, her prison-was all she had ever known, and yet it

seemed to be hiding something from her, something just beyond her reach.

She closed her eyes, but the memories came flooding back, as they always did.

Her father's study had been forbidden territory when she was young. Rows of ancient,

leather-bound books lined the walls, their titles in strange languages that no one in the

house could read except for him. There had always been something secretive about her

father-his late nights, the odd guests that would come and go, speaking in hushed voices

as if they were planning something that no one else could understand.

One night, when she was barely twelve, she had crept downstairs to find the door to his

study slightly ajar. She had hesitated for a moment before slipping inside, her small fingers

trailing over the cold, polished wood of his desk. There, on the desk, she had seen it-a

letter, written in her father's unmistakable, angular handwriting. The ink was fresh, and the

words were cryptic, but they spoke of something sinister. Something he was involved in,

something that terrified him.

Then, just days after she found the letter, her father vanished. No explanation, no trace. He

was simply gone, as if he had never existed at all.

Elara's mother, once so full of life, had crumbled under the weight of his disappearance. Her

grief spiraled into madness, and soon, the whispers of a curse began to circulate among the

staff. The curse of the Blackwoods, they said. A curse that had driven Elara's father away

and was now slowly consuming her mother's sanity.

It wasn't long before her mother's mind unraveled completely. The final months before her

death had been filled with wild, fevered rants about the sea, about drowning, about shadows

that moved in the night. She had locked herself away in the tower room, refusing to see

anyone, not even Elara. And then, one morning, Elara found her mother gone-taken by the

madness, or so everyone said.

The curse had claimed her, just as it had claimed Elara's father.

Now, years later, Elara was still trapped in that house, the weight of her family's secrets

pressing down on her shoulders. The nightmares that plagued her since her childhood had

returned, more vivid than ever. In the dreams, she was always standing on the edge of the

cliffs, staring down into the dark, roiling waters below. And then the sea would rise up, pulling

her under, dragging her down into the abyss where she couldn't breathe, couldn't scream.

And there, in the depths of the water, she would see a shadow-a figure watching her,

always just out of reach.Elara shivered and opened her eyes, her heart pounding in her chest. She couldn't shake

the feeling that something was coming for her, something inevitable.

And then there was Damien.

She had tried to resist the pull she felt toward him, tried to ignore the strange, electric

connection between them. But every time he stepped into her bookstore, she felt it

again-an inexplicable magnetism that drew her to him. He was a mystery, one she wasn't

sure she wanted to solve. But something inside her whispered that he was connected to her

past, to the secrets that had haunted her family for generations.

As the storm outside raged, Elara wrapped her arms around herself, trying to push the

memories away. But the truth was, the past was not so easily forgotten. And Damien... he

was dangerous. She could feel it in the way he looked at her, as if he knew something she

didn't, as if he was waiting for the right moment to unravel everything she had tried so hard

to bury.