A New Estate - Crimson Peak

Chapter Ten

Relative silence fell over the manor once again, giving the house a strange air, as if the past few hours had been nothing but an illusion.

The workers had all settled into their chosen rooms, the loud and boisterous laughter giving way to a deafening quiet, so quiet that a pin drop would echo for hours uninterrupted.

I had retired to my room before any of the men for a moment of peace, but there was no denying that there was comfort in hearing their voices travel from the parlour up to the open balcony of my room.

That sense of comfort disappeared as soon as all noises of liveliness ceased.

I couldn't say for certain how long I had been lying in the blinding darkness, my senses alert to every creak and groan of the settling walls around me.

Memories of past night flashed through my mind, constant and on repeat.

The sound of porcelain cluttering.

The sound of footsteps moving gradually closer to my room.

The feeling of something compressing the other side of my bed.

It was all on a repeating loop, playing over and over unpleasantly.

My bones chilled and my throat tightened as my emotions build up, everything was hitting me all at once and was stopping me from sleeping.

A part of me was nagging to get up and light the nearest candelabra, to get some light streaming into the room so I could get started on that Brother's Grimm book I'd had set by for a while now.

Yet I couldn't gather up the courage to move out from underneath my covers.

The thought of rolling over and facing towards the bedroom door spiked my heart rate and caused my hands to shake.

So instead I lay there, perfectly still and freezing cold despite the large duvet covering me.

My eyes stared towards the wall opposite me, though I knew a cabinet would otherwise obstruct my view in the light it made no difference as all that's in front of me was a wall of black.

It takes me a short while to notice that I had stopped blinking for some time, it wasn't until my eyes began to ache and beg for me to moisten them that I took note and closed them tightly.

Time continued to tick by slowly and my ears remained tuned into every bump that sounded, no matter the distance in the house.

Somewhere down the corridor I could head loud snoring, a noise that would normally be grating if it wasn't such a needed distraction from my own over active imagination.

The snore of one of the work men in a room down the hall from my own room reminded me of home, my father wasn't the quietest of sleepers and there was a strange comfort to the sound as it filled the silent void of the chilled night.

Lying perfectly still, I listened to the snores and imagined myself lying in bed at my parent's house, gradually picking up on a rhythm to the breathing.

Inhale with a short snort.

Wait four seconds.

Exhale with a gargled growl.

And repeat.

I listened to the pattern continue a few more times before a scuffling caught my attention.

The clear scuffing of shoes was closer than any other noise I'd heard to date, seemingly coming from the doorway behind me.

I stiffen up instinctively, as if lying stock still would stop any predator from seeing my figure in the bed despite the distortion of the duvet cover.