Master of the Scrolls

by Benjamin Ford

  Sensing movement behind her, Gloria whirled around, but whoever had been standing behind her was gone. She fearfully returned her attention to the mirror.

  Her reflection was gone.

  Two people stood there facing her: a short woman with dark hair, dressed in Tudor clothing, and a hooded figure in black. The woman turned to face Gloria.

  ‘Please, help me!’

  Gloria clamped a hand over her mouth, for those words issued forth from her own lips!

  The image of the woman shifted focus, altering before Gloria’s eyes to become her own reflection once more. The man was still there in the mirror, but Gloria was still alone in the room.

  The man lunged, reaching for her.

  Gloria screamed as she felt hands grip her shoulders.

  In the mirror, the man tried to strangle her. She could feel his powerful hands crushing her neck!

  ‘No!’ she cried. She stumbled towards the door, struggling to open it, not even registering that she had not shut it. It was jammed. She glanced behind her, fearing for her life, but she was still alone.

  In the mirror, the image of the hooded man moved, and he stepped effortlessly into the room, laughing, mocking her desperate helplessness.

  ‘There is no escape, Isabella!’

  Tears rolled down Gloria’s face as she struggled with the door. ‘I’m not Isabella!’ she cried through her terror. ‘Can’t you see that? Why won’t you leave me alone?’

  The man did not respond. He stalked her like a predator in pursuit of its prey, outstretched hands reaching for her.

  ‘Let me out of here!’ Gloria called out loudly as she hammered on the obstinately shut door. ‘Please,’ she sobbed, hysteria rising in her voice, ‘somebody open this door!’ She cast a desperate glance over her shoulder. The sinister man was almost upon her.

  Her palpable fear almost paralysed Gloria as she screamed, hammering with all her might on the door, tugging on it with whatever strength she could muster.

  She felt an icy cold finger the moment before it touched her neck, and then the door finally opened.

  Sobbing in absolute terror, Gloria threw herself from the room, down into the gloom of the spiral staircase.

  She did not look back to see if the man was following.

  Several times, she slipped on the stone steps, tripping over her own feet as she fought to recover her balance. At the bottom of the stairs, she went sprawling. She scrambled to her feet, crying hysterically, her feet barely making contact with the floor as she practically flew around the corner – straight into the arms of a waiting man.

  Gloria screamed again, her frantically flailing arms striking blow upon blow against the man’s torso.

  ‘Gloria!’ Phil cried. ‘Gloria, what are you doing?’

  As she realised it was Phil she was hitting, Gloria stopped and collapsed into his arms, her body wracked with sobs as she struggled to control her hysteria. ‘Phil, it was him up there, in the turret room: Isabella’s killer!’

  In spite of the fact that he could see how distressed she was, Phil could not help but chuckle. ‘Come on, Gloria, don’t be daft!’

  Gloria sniffed, wiping her eyes and nose as sanity returned to her fevered mind. ‘But it was so real!’

  ‘It was just your imagination!’ whispered Phil, pulling Gloria into a comforting embrace.

  They both heard the soft footfall from around the corner in the stairwell.

  ‘Was that your imagination as well as mine?’ whispered Gloria as she felt him tense at the same time.

  They both backed away down the passage, keeping their eyes fixed on the intersection. Gloria screamed, and Phil choked back a cry of his own as the hooded figure garbed in black turned the corner towards them.

  ‘Jesus, it is him!’ whispered Phil.

  Gloria turned as she heard movement from behind, and saw Mary standing transfixed at the far end of the passage. ‘Do you see him too, Nana Turner?’ Mary nodded. Clearly the man was not imaginary, and probably not a ghost either. Gloria turned back to the figure, whispering to Phil, ‘That’s not Samuel Wylams!’

  Phil stared hard at the figure, having already decided for himself that this figure was walking with the poise and elegant grace of a woman. ‘Who are you?’

  Familiar feminine laughter came from the figure, and a thin arm reached up to throw back the hood.

  ‘Wilma!’ gasped Phil and Gloria in unison.

  ‘Wilma,’ Phil continued, his fists clenched in fury, ‘what the hell do you think you’re playing at?’

  ‘I’m playing a game called nightmares,’ hissed the young woman spitefully. ‘I know all about your dreams, Phil. I was playing on your fears.’ She glowered with barely disguised malice in Gloria’s direction. ‘I guess she’s been sharing your dreams as well as your bed!’ Gloria and Phil both started to interject, but Wilma viciously interrupted, raising her voice. ‘Did you think you might be going insane? I think you’re both barking mad, so I figured, what the hell, I’ll give you a hand convincing yourselves that–’

  ‘How did you get back into the house?’ demanded Gloria harshly, interrupting her as she found her voice now that her nerves had recovered slightly.

  ‘I came through the secret passage that leads from the grounds to the mirror in the turret room.’ Noting Gloria’s perplexed look, Wilma grinned triumphantly. ‘All this time you had no idea about the secret passage.’

  ‘Wilma, why are you being so spiteful?’ snapped Phil. ‘None of us has done anything to warrant this behaviour.’

  ‘I’ve no real quarrel with that old cow,’ said Wilma, indicating Mary, who could not hear the exchange. ‘But you two… you are the enemy!’

  ‘But why?’ persisted Phil.

  ‘How can you not know why?’ whispered Wilma, a malicious gleam erupting in her eyes. ‘Have you still not yet worked out my involvement in all this?’

  ‘What’s she talking about?’ Gloria whispered to Phil.

  ‘She knows who I am!’ Wilma cried, pointing at Mary.

  Gloria turned to her grandmother. ‘Nana...?’ she whispered.

  Mary interrupted her. ‘Isn’t it obvious, child? You know your part, as well as Phil’s.’

  ‘Yes, my dear,’ Wilma mocked in a deep, masculine voice which was patently not her own, ‘be it still not clear to thee who art thy nemesis?’

  Gloria clamped a hand to her mouth, her eyes wide with terror. ‘Oh my God!’

  Wilma grinned wickedly. ‘Ah, I see thou doest know! I have tracked thee down at last, Isabella; Peter and James and thee, all in the same time. Vengeance shall at last be mine!’

  Wilma produced a frighteningly familiar looking dagger and lunged at Gloria. As she did so, Phil leapt into action. He grabbed Gloria’s hand and dragged her down the passage. They ran as fast as they could, Wilma in close pursuit.

  There was no sign of Mary, and since the door to her room was closed, Gloria guessed that her grandmother had locked herself within. She would be quite safe.

  Neither Gloria’s nor Phil’s feet touched the ground as they flew down the stairs as one person.

  ‘Thou cannot escape!’ screamed Wilma in the oddly familiar yet distorted masculine voice. ‘Meet thy destiny!’

  Gloria slowed as they reached the first floor landing. ‘I can’t go on… I’m so unfit.’

  ‘Come on Gloria, we can’t stop here.’

  ‘You go on, Phil.’

  Phil grabbed Gloria’s hand tighter. ‘Where I go, you go. Now come on.’ He dragged her onwards.

  Faster and fitter, Wilma caught them up and emitted a banshee wail of exultation. She lashed out with the knife, which tore into Gloria’s left arm.

  Gloria cried out in pain as blood started to seep from the laceration.

  A gleam of triumph glowed in Wilma’s eyes, but a well-placed kick from Phil sent the knife spinning from her hand. A double-edged cry of anger and dismay issued forth from Wilma’s lips in two distinct tones. She lunged at Phil, who neatly sidestepped her,
and with a guttural scream, she plunged down the staircase, hitting her head repeatedly. She lay at the foot of the stairs, inert in a pool of slowly collecting blood. From the awkward angle of her neck, Phil guessed her neck was broken.

  Phil bent to where Gloria crouched on the top step, clutching her arm. ‘Are you all right?’

  She nodded. ‘Yes, it’s just a scratch, nothing to worry about. Is she… dead?’

  ‘I think so.’

  Mary hobbled down the stairs from the second floor. ‘Are you two all right?’

  ‘Yes, Nana Turner, we are both fine.’

  Gloria helped her grandmother descend to the ground floor, where Phil bent over his sister’s inert body. ‘I’ll call the police,’ he mumbled, leaving the two women to stare at Wilma’s corpse.

  ‘Was she really Samuel, do you think?’ whispered Gloria. ‘Or was she mad?’

  Mary shrugged. ‘Are you really Isabella? Is Phil really Peter?’

  ‘If we are all reincarnations, then that means Samuel’s spirit is dead while I’m still alive. Does that mean the curse is broken?’

  ‘Destiny cannot be changed.’

  ‘That’s not much of an answer, Nana Turner!

  Mary sighed. ‘It’s the only one I can give, child. Only you can know the truth.’

  *

  The police arrived to investigate the tragedy. It was a short investigation, during which Mary spoke briefly to the two police officers within her room. When they returned to the ground floor, ashen faced and trembling slightly, they took the body away, having apparently concluded that the death was accidental.

  Mary’s physician, Doctor Garrett, had been called in from nearby Kingussie. He declared that Gloria was in no fit state to drive. Her wound needed no stitches and had been bandaged securely, but she was also suffering a degree of shock. It was therefore decided that Gloria and her grandmother would delay their departure until the following day.

  That night, unsurprisingly, Gloria could not sleep. She wanted to know what her grandmother had said to the police officers within her room. Whatever it was, it had clearly disturbed the two men, who seemed overtly eager to leave the house. She knew it would do no good pressing Mary for a reply – if her grandmother wanted her to know what she had said, she would venture the information herself.

  Gloria slipped on her robe and slippers, and padded down to the kitchen. She was not entirely surprised to find Phil already sitting there in the gloom. Switching on the kettle, she settled into the chair beside him.

  As the morning embers of sunrise crept cautiously through the window, Gloria could see that Phil had been crying. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked, touching his arm gently in concern.

  ‘No. I keep thinking about what happened. I can’t decide whether Wilma really was possessed by a spirit from the past like we were, or whether she was just using our dreams as an excuse to exact revenge on us for getting her fired! I can’t believe she’s dead… we were once so close.’

  ‘It’ll take time, Phil, but the pain will get easier. Tell me, did you have dreams as a child?’ questioned Gloria. ‘Dreams about Peter and Isabella, perhaps?’

  Phil nodded. ‘I thought I was going mad. I used to tell Wilma everything… she was the only one I felt I could confide in. It was only once I’d met you and found out about Isabella that I realised I might be Peter’s reincarnation, but now I wonder whether I might be possessed by his spirit!’ He sighed. ‘I don’t know what to think really, other than relief that I’m not mad!’

  ‘I guess that’s something we’ll never know with any certainty. Nevertheless, Wilma also said something about James being here in this life. If Wilma really was Samuel, then I wonder who James is.’

  Phil shrugged, wiping his eyes. ‘That’s probably something else we may never find out.’

  The kettle boiled and Gloria made two mugs of coffee, which the pair sat sipping in silence.

  ‘So, what were you doing in the turret room, anyway?’ asked Phil eventually. ‘You never said.’

  Gloria glanced up from her coffee and shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I was chasing a shadow, or a ghost. There was this figure, a woman. She certainly wasn’t Wilma or Isabella. In fact, she looked a lot like me, though obviously she wasn’t! I followed her up to the room, but the door was locked. Then it opened on its own, and when I went into the room I saw her reflection in the mirror. Only she wasn’t in the room. And then she disappeared, and Isabella appeared, along with Samuel… and I swear to you, he came out of the mirror… stepped right into the room and tried to strangle me. And I’m fairly certain that wasn’t Wilma!’

  Phil shivered. ‘Spooky!’

  ‘Yes, it was. It’s all connected with that room. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but I know one thing for sure – I didn’t imagine it!’ Gloria sighed, and smiled as Phil placed a reassuring hand over hers. She could tell from his demeanour that he believed her. ‘This other woman, the one who looks like me… I’ve seen her image twice now. It’s significant, don’t you think? I mean, she must have been someone who lived here years ago, but who was she? And what happened to her in that room?’

  ‘I get the impression she’s trying to tell you something!’

  ‘My feeling too, I’m just not sure what. It’s another mystery!’

  ‘This house if full of those!’ replied Phil solemnly.

  ‘That’s very true, but something else puzzles me. Why is Peter Neville in your body? Whether we are suffering from reincarnated memories or possession, I know Isabella’s in my body because I live where her ancestral home used to be, but you live in Scotland!’

  ‘Gloria, that doesn’t necessarily follow. I mean, you may live on the site of Isabella’s ancestral home, but you weren’t born there. And didn’t these dreams start while you were up here at Ravenscreag?’

  ‘I guess so, but I have a connection to the place where Isabella lived, and you have no connection to that place, which is after all also the place where Peter lived!’

  Phil thought for a few moments. ‘If there’s actually some sort of connection, perhaps it’s more to do with where they died?’

  ‘Well, I guess it’s possible their spirits have been lingering around the vicinity of the place of their death, waiting for a suitable vessel through which they might communicate. Isabella was killed at Neville Manor, but Peter died at Solway Moss.’

  ‘Solway Moss is very close to Langtree, where our mother moved to after our father’s death. Perhaps Peter fell in battle at Solway Moss, but actually died at Langtree?’

  Gloria shrugged. ‘I guess that’s possible, but ignoring the fact that my dreams started before I moved to Neville Hill, what is Wilma’s connection to Samuel?’

  ‘None,’ replied Phil. ‘She was just being vindictive, playing games with our minds.’

  ‘Deadly games!’ corrected Gloria. ‘She tried to kill us.’

  ‘I find myself questioning the logic of it all though–’

  ‘There is no logic!’ Gloria interjected.

  ‘What about her voice? When it changed, I swear I recognised it! And besides that, how did she know of your dreams?’

  Gloria shivered. Wilma’s pain filled male voice, twisted as it was with unrepressed rage and hatred, had also sounded oddly familiar to her. She did not want to admit it though, because it would mean Wilma was Samuel, which would in turn mean Phil really was Peter… and she really was Isabella!

  If all that were true, what did that make of the prophecy?

  *

  Late that evening, having safely deposited Mary at Rachel’s London home, Gloria finally arrived back at her own home in Neville Hill, completely drained.

  She sighed as she turned the key in the lock of her front door, and stepped into the house. It’s true, she thought, not for the first time; there really is no place like home.

  The first thing she did – the first thing she always did, as a creature of habit – was play the messages on her answer phone.

  Isolde: asking he
r to call the instant she returned – that could wait for a more decent hour.

  Louise: informing her she was cutting short her tour of the world – she sounded upset, but went into no detail to explain her decision.

  Allan: telling her he would be home next Thursday, four days earlier than he had originally anticipated – which, Gloria thought, was excellent news indeed.

  Only the three messages during a whole week – far fewer than were usually left on her machine in one day whilst she was home. As she showered, she took stock of each: Isolde she would call in the morning; another week and Allan would finally be home – Gloria could hardly wait… she would feel safe once he returned; Louise’s message, however, troubled her. Something had clearly happened while she had been away, but until Louise returned there was no way of knowing what the problem was.

  It seemed likely, though, that Louise might have contacted her parents if there was something wrong. As she sat on her bed drying her hair, Gloria glanced at her clock. It was gone eleven: Susan and Daniel probably would not appreciate a phone call so late in the evening, so she decided to ring them first thing in the morning as well.

  With a yawn, Gloria bundled all her dirty laundry into the bathtub. It too could wait until morning. In spite of the warmth outside that day, now night had fallen the house was oddly cold, and after switching off the bathroom light, she made her way to the bed and snuggled under the welcoming comfort of the duvet. Taking a sip of her cooling cocoa, she glanced at the bedside table, staring thoughtfully at the hidebound copy of Isabella’s unpublished manuscript. She was beginning to wonder whether perhaps there was something in the handwritten passages she had not yet read, or maybe even some vital clue to unravelling the mysteries that she had missed.

  She yawned again, and realised she was too exhausted to seriously consider reading anything at that moment. Events of the past couple of days had prevented her from reading much and an extra day would not hurt – like everything else, it would have to wait until the morning.

  Still, she thought as she snapped off the light and snuggled further beneath the duvet, at least being this tired I’ll sleep well!

  No dream will wake me tonight!