The Secrets We Keep
263 Words
Days passed, and Eldermere began to feel alive again. Damian and Elara spent their afternoons by the sea, talking, remembering, rebuilding what had been shattered.
But the closer they grew, the stranger things became. Doors creaked open on their own. Lights flickered. Whispers followed Elara in the dark.
One evening, she confessed: “Sometimes I hear her voice, Damian. My sister Clara. She calls from the cliffs. It started after your return.”
He took her hand. “Then we’ll face it together.”
They went to the cliffs that night, the sea roaring beneath them. The moon hung low, pale and watchful.
Elara closed her eyes. “Clara, if you’re here, please… let us go.”
A cold wind rushed past them, and for a heartbeat Damian thought he saw a woman standing at the edge — translucent, weeping — before vanishing into the mist.
Elara shuddered. “She’s not angry,” she whispered. “She’s warning us.”
“Of what?”
“Something buried,” she said. “Something your mother never wanted you to find.”
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When they returned to the manor, Damian found Lucien waiting in the study, holding an envelope sealed with the Voss crest.
“It arrived today,” he said. “No sender.”
Inside was a single note:
“The truth sleeps beneath the chapel. Wake it, and you’ll lose her again.”
Damian met Elara’s eyes. “Then that’s where we’ll go next.”
And outside, the bells of Eldermere tolled midnight — slow, haunting, like the heartbeat of something buried alive.
- Writer
