The Prisoner of Silverwood Castle

by Marie Treanor

  “When did he die?”

  Angelika shrugged. “Hmm, must have been around 1842.”

  “What happened to him?”

  Angelika frowned, strolling forward, presumably to keep her place in the unofficial line. “Typhus, I think…or was it tuberculosis? Something he caught when he wandered off by himself in the city.”

  “Why did he wander off?”

  “Curiosity? Nobody really knew why he did anything.”

  “Then he really was insane?”

  “Apparently. He was living privately by then. Between you and me, I suspect that was a euphemism for a private asylum. He was certainly a bit strange and very erratic. He used to talk about dead people a lot, hold conversations with invisible companions. No one thought it funny beyond the age of about eight.” Her gaze flickered to the space around us before she added, “I believe it was generally considered a blessing when he died. He couldn’t have succeeded to the dukedom. Why the interest in Kasimir?”

  I shrugged. “Someone mentioned him, that’s all, made me curious. I’ll leave you now to face your moment of glory alone.”

  As I walked across the lawn, the echo of that bloodcurdling cry reverberated in my mind. Surely it belonged to a very unquiet spirit? Or to some other Kasimir entirely. I wished I liked my bother-in-law the duke better, or at least that he was a little more approachable so that I felt I could ask him about keeping prisoners in the castle. As it was, I had the feeling that he would consider anything to do with the running of the castle as none of my business—or even of Augusta’s beyond decoration and the ordering of meals. Maybe I could ask him about the history of the castle instead.

  * * * * *

  Augusta made me take my spectacles off for the formal dinner. I confess I gave in only from spite because I was more likely to embarrass her by not being able to see who addressed me, let alone recognize them. But since they were for my comfort, not hers, I hid them in the pocket of my gown, where they clanked occasionally with my jar of ointment that I seemed to be carrying around as a talisman of my own sanity.

  In any case, I forgave her when she realized I was not seated beside her but much farther down the table—rather lower, in fact, than was strictly acceptable for the daughter of an earl, let alone the sister of the duchess. Since my precedence didn’t concern her, I was surprised by the sudden glance of vulnerability, almost panic that she cast at me. As if she’d been deprived of her security.

  But then the duke took her hand, and her chin lifted again. I was forgotten, but that look, however brief and passing, stayed with me. I resolved to be more understanding of her caprices. On the other hand, when someone handed me to my own lowly chair and I sat down between an elderly gentleman with a fabulous beard and a military man with a splendid red uniform, I felt in my pocket for my spectacles and put them back on my nose.

  Relief made me smile at the military gentleman, who, now that I could see, was a familiar face.

  “I know you!” I exclaimed with a triumph that must have seemed inexplicable to the officer. “You were escorting the duke and duchess this morning!”

  The officer inclined his head. “I had that honour.”

  “Is it?” I asked, watching with rumbling stomach as the first course began to be served from the duke and duchess downward. The servants were excellent, though, and fast, so I hoped we wouldn’t be kept waiting too long.

  “Is it what?” the officer enquired. No wonder he sounded puzzled; I’d almost forgotten my own question.

  “An honour to escort the duke and duchess on their expeditions of pleasure.” Realizing belatedly that there was only one gracious—or indeed safe!—answer he could give to that, I added hastily, “I mean, as a soldier, would you rather be fighting battles?”

  “That would rather depend on the battle,” he said. When I glanced at him in surprise, he added, “I suppose war and battle are what I signed up for, but to be frank, my lady, if it’s a choice between these duties and the last fighting I was called to do, I choose my current post any day of the week.”

  “Really?” I said intrigued. “What was your last fight?”

  He glanced around him with a hint of desperation, as if searching for a change of subject. Unexpectedly, someone spoke mockingly from across the table.

  “Against the rabble, of course, in the late revolution,” Bernhard von Gerritzen pronounced.

  “Ah,” I said, shifting in my chair with discomfort. I thought I understood. “You were obliged to fire upon the mob.”

  “Apparently not,” Herr von Gerritzen answered for him again. “Certainly, he didn’t, for which promotion and this prestigious appointment is his reward. Beats court martial, eh, Colonel Friedrich?”

  The two men stared across the table at each other until the lady on Gerritzen’s left claimed his attention.

  “What did he mean by that?” I asked the colonel, insatiably curious.

  “That my appointment here is by no merit or even by birthright,” Friedrich said in a voice carefully devoid of bitterness, and yet I was sure he felt that commodity keenly. “But the result of political necessity, appeasing the duke’s enemies with a bodyguard commanded by a supposed friend of the defeated opposition.”

  “Maybe the duke admired your courage in sticking to your principles,” I suggested, since I rather did. I was thinking of my sister, chosen as a bride for much the same reasons. As my prisoner had remarked last night, British parliamentary democracy had been much admired by European liberals in the late revolutions.

  A smile flitted across the soldier’s rather harsh face. “That is a novel interpretation I shall cherish. Why are you sitting so far down the table?”

  “Oh dear, am I in the wrong place? I wasn’t wearing my spectacles, and I just went where they put me!”

  All the same, an unworthy suspicion crossed my mind. If it hadn’t been for my sister’s moment of panic, I would have suspected Augusta of maliciously lowering my consequence by placing me here. Now, I wondered if it was the duke himself who was to blame…or the baroness, whose gaze slid across me as I glanced at her. I thought of my room, which I loved but which, to be honest, was small, bare, slightly grubby, and thoroughly disapproved of by Button. For the first time, I wondered if I was not wanted here any more than I had wanted to come—before I saw the castle, of course.

  My comment seemed to amuse my military companion, and I was glad at least to be in pleasant company. What was more, I realized as I began my somewhat heavy but deliciously smelling main course, he was the perfect man to answer several of my questions.

  “Do you keep prisoners here?” I asked him bluntly.

  He lowered his wineglass, eyebrows raised. “Prisoners? Good grief, no. Why should you think that?”

  “Well,” I said evasively, “I know the castle is a fortress as well as the duke’s home. I just wondered.”

  “As far as I know, no prisoners have been kept here since the last century.”

  I frowned at my fork without seeing its contents as I remembered the strange young man in chains—a ghost indeed? The ghost of the unhappy Prince Kasimir? The horrible cry from the direction of his cell was still very much at the forefront of my mind.

  “What about beasts?” I asked.

  “Beasts? Like lions and bears?” He sounded amused. “I don’t think the duke would care for a menagerie.”

  In any case, who would keep caged beasts at the top of a tower? “It might be fun, though,” I said. “It would certainly make the courtiers behave. Although perhaps it would give too much power to a mere animal keeper?”

  Colonel Friedrich laughed. “What a wonderful idea!”

  “I think it is,” I agreed. “I believe I shall use it in my novel.”

  * * * * *

  The banqueting hall opened onto a large terrace and the formal garden, from where we could watch the celebratory fireworks wit
h safety. Colonel Friedrich escorted me and must have seen my hands grasped tightly together around the ends of my shawl.

  “Don’t you like fireworks?” he asked gently.

  “Oh, I love to look at them,” I assured him. “It’s just the noise makes me jump! I’m sure there should be a market for silent fireworks…”

  When von Gerritzen appeared on my other side, Friedrich bowed out gracefully, murmuring something about his duties.

  “You don’t like the colonel,” I observed.

  Gerritzen shrugged. “I barely know the fellow. I mistrust radicals and soldiers who don’t obey orders.”

  “I think radical is an exaggeration. Besides, you know, if the liberal principles of the late revolution had been implemented, you would be given a position according to your abilities and you wouldn’t be forced to cultivate me in the hope of my bringing you to my brother-in-law’s attention.”

  His slightly smug expression fell apart into one of blatant startlement that made me want to laugh. However, after the stunned moment, it was he who laughed. “Lady Guin, you are wonderful. If I ever approached you for such a reason, it got lost long ago in the pleasure of your company.”

  “Oh, well said,” I approved, gazing at the colours shooting across the sky, cracking and spitting as they went. I began to walk forward, as if to get a better view of the fireworks, although in reality to let von Gerritzen efface himself without a fuss. Besides, I wanted to examine the castle at night. Perhaps I’d see a ghostly face by one of the old windows. Or traces of the tortured beast I’d heard that afternoon.

  Weren’t there folktales of men who turned into beasts—wolves—at full moon? The moon above me was a complete silver globe, patiently surveying the fleeting efforts of the fireworks to outshine her.

  As I wandered down the terrace steps to the formal gardens, I realized, to my surprise, that von Gerritzen was still with me, and had, besides, drawn several of his friends to join the group. I recognized some of them from this morning, before Augusta had crushed my pleasure in my unprecedented, if minor, social success, and interestingly, one of them, whose name I couldn’t remember, seemed to be part of the duke’s inner circle.

  Even more surprisingly, Angelika, hovering on the fringes of the throng around the duke and duchess, waved to me and detached herself to join me.

  “Enjoying the display?” she asked me.

  I couldn’t quite hide my jump as another set of fireworks exploded to appreciative applause.

  “Oh yes. So beautiful, and just look at the shadows and the colours they cast on the castle walls…”

  “I suppose you’re right.” Angelika sounded surprised as she followed my gaze, which strayed towards the old part of the castle, beyond the dividing wall.

  “Why is that part blocked off?” I wondered aloud.

  “It’s dangerous,” one of the gentlemen replied. “Someone was injured by falling masonry years ago, so the whole area was shut off.”

  I frowned. “Wouldn’t it be easier to repair the damage? Especially when the castle is crowded with the full court here.”

  “The duke considered it when he first came to power,” said the important aide. “But the damage is too great and would cost too much to justify…at this time.”

  When the duke’s court was under critical scrutiny by his defeated enemies. I nodded thoughtfully.

  “That was our grand finale,” Angelika said. “The duke and duchess appear to be retiring.”

  It wasn’t exactly the wildly dissolute Versailles-like court I had imagined. The duke’s revels all ended well before the witching hour, although apparently the masquerade ball would be an exception and would formally close as late as midnight.

  I didn’t mind. Something elusive was nagging at my mind, only I wasn’t quite sure what it was. I needed peace to think. First, though, I had my part to play as Augusta’s lady-in-waiting, so I dutifully trailed after her back into the castle and up to her private apartments.

  And I have to say Augusta’s new household operated like clockwork. A tea tray arrived almost as we did.

  “Tea at bedtime?” Augusta said doubtfully.

  “Well, your highness slept well last night,” the baroness pointed out with a comfortable smile.

  “I did, didn’t I?” Augusta agreed with a hint of surprise. “Then by all means, let us have tea!”

  It was almost pleasant after the evening’s chill, to relax with my warm tea. I wondered if Augusta would object to my taking it with me to my own, cosier—if slightly grubbier—room. But in the end, I couldn’t be bothered with the fuss.

  Abruptly, I sat up straight. Grubbier. That was it. The room below the prisoner’s had been swept and dusted. A recently touched book had sat on the table; it had been dust-free too. Why would someone be living there when that part of the castle was considered too dangerous, both outside and in?

  They wouldn’t, of course. I’d dreamed it last night…

  And this afternoon I’d been wide awake. I’d found the same places, looked into that same room before the scream, and it was clean. The book had been open on the table. Surely ghosts didn’t read… Someone had been there.

  My heart drumming, I set down my tea and wondered if I had the courage to go back tonight.

  * * * * *

  My eyelids were drooping by the time I returned to my own room and set down my candle. More bizarrely, the walls had begun to take on that odd, fuzzy, dreamlike distortion I remembered from my journey the night before.

  “This isn’t right,” I mumbled aloud, sinking down on the bed, peering owlishly into the dark, misshapen corners.

  “You drank the tea,” my prisoner had said. “You shouldn’t drink the tea.”

  Stupid, stupid. Who would poison my tea? How could he possibly know I’d even drunk tea? Surely this was all coming from my wretched imagination? Perhaps I just needed to write this story and be done with it.

  In the meantime, I refused to go to sleep. I propped up my rather lumpy pillows and leaned against them, digging my fingernails into my palms and silently reciting Byron’s Childe Harold to focus my wandering mind. I’d have said the words aloud if I wasn’t afraid of being overheard. If someone had put some kind of potion in my tea, wouldn’t they check up on me?

  Augusta had slept well after drinking the tea… Oh God, were they poisoning her? Was it some kind of court intrigue where Augusta was the victim?

  Too far-fetched, too fanciful. We were both hale and hearty, just sleepy, and after travelling halfway across Europe and settling into a new life with new people and a new language, that wasn’t surprising. I was sure exhaustion could alter one’s perceptions, which would account for the odd looking walls. Even the odd-looking shadows that didn’t seem to relate to anything in the room…

  I peered at them, forgetting my poem as they resolved into two wispy, human figures. I couldn’t make out their features, but the sight of them chilled my blood while thrilling my insatiably curious mind.

  Ghosts. Surely I was actually seeing ghosts.

  My ragged breath caught. “Are you there?” I whispered. “Kasimir?”

  And another figure seemed to walk straight through the wall and through the wispy apparitions. Although he bore no more substance than the first two, he seemed to have a shock of blonde hair, torn clothes, and transparent chains dangling from his wrists. I knew with a surge of inexplicable excitement that it was him.

  Chapter Four

  “Ghosts,” I uttered in a half-strangled, barely audible voice.

  “Don’t worry about them,” soothed the equally ghostly prisoner. “They’ve been here forever. Can you see me too?”

  “Yes,” I whispered, staring as he glided towards me, lowering himself on to the edge of my bed. Part of me was fascinated that I could still see through him to the wardrobe and the wall, although his features seemed to be firming as
I remembered them. Another part of me was paralyzed with abject fear.

  “Impressive,” said the prisoner, looking around him. “Which is more than I can say for your quarters. Are you really the duchess’s sister?”

  “I like this room.”

  He nodded. “It will make a fine setting for your story.”

  “Am I dreaming you again?” I managed.

  He regarded me, leaning his head slightly to one side in the characteristic gesture I remembered. “Sort of. You drank the tea again, didn’t you?”

  “Is it really the tea?”

  “Making you so sleepy? Probably.”

  I tried to move, meaning to stand up. “I have to see Augusta, warn her—” I broke off, staring at the ghostly fingers wrapping around my wrist. I could even see the chains dangling off his, and yet I felt nothing.

  But no, that wasn’t true. Something stirred the skin of my wrist, soft, sensual, almost like a butterfly’s languid wing.

  I swallowed, desperately trying to keep the thread of my thoughts. “Is Augusta in danger?” How the devil would he know? He isn’t even real! Yet I was still relieved when he shook his transparent head.

  “I shouldn’t think so,” he said. “It’s you who has to sleep well.”

  “I don’t want to sleep!”

  He smiled, and surely he was just a shade more solid than before. “You’re a fighter, aren’t you? Don’t be anxious. The tea won’t actually harm you. Just sleep it off.”

  His ghostly fingers slid up my wrist to my shoulder, sending shivers all the way up my arm. As if he pressed me back into the pillows, I relaxed for a moment, and then jerked forward again.

  “I can’t sleep! I have things I need to find out!”

  “What things?” he asked, and once again, I relaxed under his wraith-like hand.

  “You. The clean room. The beast…”

  “There’s a beast?”

  “Maybe. I thought there was a beast…” My eyelids were fluttering, trying to close. I forced them open again. “Are you really Prince Kasimir?”

  “Do I look like him?”