The archive room

The moors rolled by in slow motion, a smear of gray and green under a sky the color of bruised porcelain. My reflection hovered in the train window - pale, thin-lipped, eyes a little too wide, like I was already bracing for something. The wind outside howled faintly, muffled by the thick glass, and every few seconds the train wheels shuddered as we passed over another unseen crossing in the vast nothingness. I’d never seen land so empty. And I’d never felt so full of nerves. The voice over the intercom was distorted by age and static. “Next stop, Blackmoor Station. Blackmoor University. Final stop.” I exhaled, finally, and gripped the letter again. My acceptance letter. The same one I’d read so many times it had creases in the corners and a faint stain where a teardrop had landed weeks ago. Full scholarship. Literature track. One of the top-ranked humanities programs in Europe, and possibly the most isolated. My parents hadn’t understood why I chose Blackmoor. They wanted me somewhere warmer, louder, easier. Somewhere with cafes and beaches and neon signs. Not here, in this place where the fog kissed the ground and the sky barely looked like it remembered the color blue. But when I read about the program, about the faculty, the legacy, the archives older than some countries, I knew I had to come. Maybe I wanted to get lost. Maybe I wanted to start over. Maybe I just wanted to disappear into something ancient and beautiful and a little bit cruel. The train slowed. A low hiss of brakes. The moor outside thickened into mist and silhouettes - iron fencing, leafless trees, a clock tower in the distance with no visible hands. Then I saw it. Blackmoor. Even from the train, the university looked like a relic of another century. Stone turrets rose from the fog like spears. Windows were narrow and pointed, glass stained and streaked. Ivy crawled up every wall like it was trying to swallow the buildings whole. There was only one platform. No station building, just a black car and a man standing beside it holding a sign with the Blackmoor seal - no names, just a gothic letter B etched in silver. The wind tugged at his coat. He did not smile. I stepped off the train with my suitcase in one hand and my letter clutched in the other. The man nodded once and opened the car door. “Miss... Emilia?” “Yes.” “You’ll be in Bellmere House. Welcome to Blackmoor.” ⸻ The ride to campus was silent. The road curled like a ribbon through trees stripped bare for the winter. Fog clung to everything - stone walls, the tops of hedges, the windshield itself. When we turned a corner and passed through two wrought-iron gates, I felt it. A shift. Like the land itself was exhaling beneath us. The college unfolded slowly: a chapel with a broken bell; a courtyard littered with dry leaves; a library tower so tall it vanished into cloud. Gargoyles jutted from corners like they’d been watching students for centuries. No people. Just the buildings. Watching. Waiting. Bellmere House sat at the far end of the west quad, three stories high, its windows narrow and glowing faintly gold through the haze. My room was on the third floor. The hallway was dim and smelled of candlewax and cold stone. My key was brass, and the door groaned like it had a memory. The girl already inside glanced up as I entered. She was unpacking a box of books with perfectly painted nails. “You must be Emilia,” she said. Her voice was smooth, low. She didn’t offer a handshake. “They told me you’d be the last one in.” I nodded, setting my suitcase down by the bed nearest the window. “I guess that’s me.” “Ava,” she said, turning back to her books. “Scholarship too?” “Yes.” She smiled thinly. “That makes two of us. But don’t worry. Everyone here pretends not to care how you got in, as long as you act like you belong.” I wasn’t sure what to say to that, so I said nothing. Outside, the sun, or what passed for it, was already disappearing behind the fog. In its place, the faint outline of the old clock tower glowed white. No numbers. No ticking. Just light behind glass. By the time we made our way down to the Great Hall for the orientation dinner, the sun had vanished completely. What little warmth the afternoon offered had been replaced by a chill that crawled up through the flagstone floors and into my bones. Even the candlelight flickering from the high chandeliers seemed muted, like it was struggling to keep the dark out. The room was massive. Vaulted ceilings. Carved rafters. Stained-glass windows so tall they touched heaven. And silence. Not total, but polite, measured laughter, hushed conversation. Even the silverware clinked delicately, as though afraid to offend the wood-paneled walls. Ava and I sat near the center, flanked by students who didn’t say much beyond their own names. There were maybe sixty of us in the hall, new students, mostly. I watched them carefully. All of them looked clever. Or clever enough to pretend. At the far end of the room, a long table was raised slightly above the others. Faculty. Nine of them, all in black robes. Most looked older, graying, spectacled, one with a hearing aid and another with gloves he never took off, even to sip his water. But I only saw him. Second from the left. Dark suit. Crisp white collar. No robe. His posture was perfect, his expression unreadable. He wasn’t smiling, but he wasn’t scowling either. He was... watching. And then he turned his head. He looked directly at me. Not past me. Not at Ava. At me. And I felt it, not a stare, not a glance. A connection. Like he had recognized something in me I hadn’t known was visible. I looked down too quickly, my fork trembling slightly in my hand. “That’s him,” Ava murmured beside me, voice barely above a breath. “Who?” “Professor Vale. Caspian Vale. Teaches English Literature.” The name landed like a bell inside my chest. “You know him?” “No one knows him.” She smirked. “That’s sort of the point.” I turned back to look at him again, but he wasn’t looking at me anymore. He was folding a piece of paper, slowly, precisely. Something about the motion was hypnotic. Like a ritual. “He’s brilliant,” Ava continued. “Graduated from Cambridge when he was twenty, turned down a dozen fellowships. Came here instead. Rumor is the Dean recruited him personally.” “Why?” She shrugged. “You don’t ask why people end up at Blackmoor. You just hope they leave you alone.” ⸻ After the meal, we were dismissed without ceremony. No welcome speech. No handshake. No community-building activities. Just a vague announcement about orientation schedules posted in the main foyer and an invitation to “rest before instruction begins.” I was halfway up the stairs when I heard someone call my name. “Emilia?” I turned. A girl I didn’t know handed me a folded note. “It’s for you. Someone left it on your table.” I opened it. You have a gift. Don’t let them dull it. – C There was no other signature. I stared at the letter for a long time. And then I pressed it flat and tucked it between the pages of my journal. ⸻ That night, I couldn’t sleep. Bellmere House creaked like a ship at sea. The radiator in the corner of the room hissed, but never quite got warm. Wind pushed against the windows like it wanted in. Ava was already fast asleep in her bed across the room, her breathing slow and even. I sat up against the headboard, staring at the ceiling, the faint scent of wood polish and old paper rising from the floorboards. Who was Caspian Vale? And why did it feel like he already knew me?