My Wonderful Second Life

Chapter 25- Blackouts

*Warning!! Heavy topics ahead! Discretion is advised!*

The initial days after the departure of the Duke were normal, nothing extraordinary happened. Nothing we, the ladies of the house, saw, though Fanny complained at us as she saw new people in the vicinities. And according to her, none seemed nice or had an air of belonging in there.

At that suspicious behaviour, I told her to watch over close by and find an exit only she knew about.

Fanny became concerned at the request and I thought Jenni too would be wary of it as well, but even she agreed to have it like that. And so in the few days that passed, we planned an emergency escape, hoping never to use it. As children, I was afraid we wouldn't go far... though I didn't say that to Jenni or Fanny.

But besides me and Jenni being required to go to those hellish classes separately because of our difference in knowledge (and interest, I may add), nothing was abnormal. The life inside the Mountenero house was calm and suspicious.

Until little by little, my head became heavier and heavier. Like rain drops dripping one by one, creating a ripple on my brain, making it freeze at times.

Soon Fanny reached us with a piece of alarming information. The Templar were now in charge of the security of the manor. Fanny, being an optimist, believed it to be Aunt Belladona's power and influence in place, however, both me and Jenni knew that to be impossible. If the Duke had agreed to have Templars keep guard, which he would never do as he didn't seem fond of his sister, he would have told the servants and at least Jenni. No, this was another thing...

As we, the ladies and Fanny, were conferring possibilities in my pink laced room, we got interrupted by a distraught head maid, who came to inform us that she found out that Lady Beatrice was reading our corresponce to the duke or anyone outside. Burning all the letters that she didn't like or carry any unsavoury opinion. This news, the head maid gave us, was acquired by a poor maid who ended up suffering corporal punishment for catching Lady Beatrice in the act.

This filled us all with horror, yet my mind again started to blackout. More each time, with a frequency that would have scared me if not for my total lack of energy. Life passed me through fast pictures, blurry and soundless. Yet a scene came to be sharp and with an alarming frequency.

In there Lady Beatrice paced in the study room, so frequently used by us children, in slow circling movements. She walked around the square white table. With small and calculated steps, she circled and circled it, repeating the mantra she loved, always with a sweet poison for a voice:

" A lady is only a great asset when she obeys. A useful lady does not talk back and does what other's in power say. The rest... is trash... And you, my lady, are not trash. Right?"

This last time her words appeared to be more vicious and icy than usual like my body felt more stiffed and sore. At a moment of clarity, I requested Fanny to help me undress so I could call the night after my bath time. We moved slowly to my marble and gold bathing place, where Fanny had started to prepare for my bathing, something I normally did, yet now it seemed impossible.

Not sure what happened, as all was fuzzy in my head, but I heard I gasp of horror coming from my personal maid, my confidant.

"My lady... your body... is covered in wounds..." there was a feeling of deep sorrow in the normally chirpy voice of Fanny.

It was only now that I got the energy to look at myself in the bathroom mirror that filled a whole wall. Even with the intense fog that covered it, I could see them... the black spots that covered my legs, my arms, my back. In complete disbelief, with a crying Fanny beside me, I decided to force my brain to work. It was all still a big blur, but something else did come up.