The shadow continued to move and Penny stood there, her feet refusing to move forward. Things like these were not meant to be followed but right now she didn’t know if she had to follow it.
Having come here twice and walked through the corridors alone as well as with Mrs. Artemis, she decided to not hover below here but instead decided to walk up the stairs to the first floor, just when she was about to do it, she saw something move from the corner of her eyes and she was sure this time it wasn’t a shadow but a person.
Penny had no lantern and the only source she could depend on was her ears. Walking up the stairs, Penny stepped on to the first floor of the house which was much darker than the floor she had walked by now. With a soft gulp down her throat, she took a step ahead.
She had already learned some of the spells where she didn’t need an actual lantern. As they were in the house of witches, Penny didn’t find any reason to hide what she knew and she raised her hand slightly up and said,
“Light!”
And as if an invisible candle in front of her, the place she stood, in front of her lit up with an orangish-yellow glow enough for her to see where she was going. All thanks to Lady Isabelle. There was no need for her to have an elemental ability when there were secret codes that could be cracked and learned.
She stepped further into the lonely corridor which felt strangely colder now as if winter had appeared again. The house wasn’t too big which was why now she wondered where the others were. The servants of the house, Alexander and Damien, Caitlin and the Artemis couple, there was no one she could spot or hear from right now.
Her eyebrows furrowed when she caught sight of finally seeing someone standing in the corridor with their back against the wall. It was a young girl who stood there with her eyes open. The girls appeared to be in a similar state as the people she had met in the two villages. By her attire, she noted that it was a maid. In the dark corridor, she looked like a phantom.
Taking another step moved the light further and she caught sight of many more servants who stood in this fashion. It looked like the Artemis had put everyone under their control, be it in the morning or in the night, the people here didn’t have a will of their own.
While Penny was trying her way towards the others, Alexander and Caitlin were in the lower ground to make sure they hadn’t left anything unturned. They walked through the bas.e.m.e.nt which was old and dusty to catch sight of skeletons that were dumped in the corner. There were at least more than twenty of them which were thrown on top of each other, creating a tower.
“Whose dead bodies do you think these are?” Alexander asked Caitlin who shook her head.
“I haven’t been living here for years now. I don’t think my brother and I even came here when we were young and we grew up,” how strange thought Caitlin to herself.
Walking forward, she looked at the bare skeletons. She wouldn’t be able to tell who these belonged to. Except for the sizes and then she saw two smaller skeletons that were placed on the chairs one after another. The strange thing was that the clothes still existed on the two little skeletons.
“I think those belong to their children. The two boys,” Caitlin said, walking closer to it while looking at the bones. She raised her hand, touching the dull white surface to feel nothing, “Did you see the two boys grow?” she asked Alexander.
“Damien and I once saw them, but it was just at that time.”
“I don’t think those two were their children. They were probably a replacement of their real children.”
“What do you mean?” Alexander frowned out of question.
Caitlin stood up straight from her bending position where she had been observing the clothes skeletons. Turning around the woman said, “When my brother and I arrived here, the reason they had given to take us in was that they couldn’t conceive a child. They had all the time if they wanted a child or two. I am older than you, milord.”
“That much I guessed,” he responded back. White witches’ age was irregular and haphazard compared to the vampires or pureblooded vampires with only humans having a uniform timeline of their lives.
“My uncle and aunt had enough time before and after us, I think they did try and they had their babies but they died right after it. I don’t remember that well,” Caitlin’s memory had dulled down as she had tried to forget the family during her time in the slave’s establishment. After all, who wanted to remember people like that.
Alexander stared at the two skeletons. He doubted any sane parent would ever dress up their dead children like that because no matter how he saw it, it looked like they were mocking the dead. If what Caitlin told was true, then the boys who fell in the well were not their children and it was no accident but the Artemis was responsible for the death of the two boys.
“Then it is possible that everything until now has been nothing but an elaborate plan which has been scheming for years,” said Alexander, his gaze shifting to look around the room for anything more. His eyes fell on a bunch of papers that looked like the daily news which was often circulated throughout the town and villages so that it could be bought.
The Artemis couple had killed the two boys in the name of calling them their own and then raising children like sheep that were given to the other black witches in the name of adoption and a new home for the children when in truth it was for the easy ritual.
He walked towards the papers and picked the top papers to read which was of no importance. Suddenly his ears picked up a click sound at the door where both he and Caitlin turned around to see the door was now shut close.
They quickly made towards the door, pulling the iron door that didn’t open.
“Someone locked it,” Alexander said with a deep frown.
