Set in Stone: The Rose Secret

Chapter 10: The Darkness 🌌

I turned a turquoise flashlight on and then turned off the big light. It was time for me to get out of here. I faced the stairs. I climbed quickly but still cautiously by bracing myself against the hand rail. I turned the doorknob and waited for the door to open so I could have a sigh of relief to be out of this tormenting place.

The door stayed closed. I turned the knob again but it didn't open. I slammed myself against the door yelling "Help" over and over. I got no reply everyone was probably bickering in the kitchen and could not hear me. I yelled once more this time thrashing my fists on the door.

Suddenly the plank below me started to shriek and split right down the middle. I plunged falling faster as I fell. I writhed as my helpless body crashed through a plank and carried on farther until I hit a soft moss bed. I shrivelled up into a ball clenching my weak stomach. I waited for the dust to settle then glared up at the jagged outlined shape where my body crashed through. It was about seven metres above me and so was the stairs.

Momentarily, a wave of pain shot through my shoulder where a giant splinter broke the surface of my skin. I stood up, brushed the sawdust off my jeans and looked around. Pure blackness. I curled my hands around a flashlight flicking it on.

I was in a small room that had rounded corners. Moss and vines strung across the withered celling. This must've been the cellar! A tiny wooden table was standing on its last leg in one of the corners. On the table were a few scraps of paper, ink, feather, a tiny embroidered chest and an oil lamp. I rifled through the yellowed papers unraveling the closest one to me.

I read:
Dear E.D,
We have concerns on your school work. You have failed to demonstrate any form of learning and...

The paper was shredded after that. I felt a sudden strangeness about that letter, something in my brain was telling me there is something weird about it. It felt like someone was tugging on every memory in my brain, I tried to pull a memory out of my head. Why did E.D sound so familiar? There were so many people in Bluntwood with the last name starting with D. It was even a sport to name all the people whose last names started with D, and there were trophies to be won if you got all of them correct.

E.d? Ellie Deline? Elsa Dunan? Evelyn Drake? Emily Dumont? Although this paper seems to be old, so it could be someone who had died. I searched the next paper.

July 14th 1954

Hey Eddie, I hear you are having a birthday. I'm sorry I could not make it, I am at summer camp. I will give you your present when I get home.

From Allen Rose at Delmoore summer camp,

Allen Rose? That was my dad! Eddie? He was the boy who went missing! I stood in shock. This letter is from 1954 and this cellar has been closed since 1917. Eddie must've used this as a secret hideout!

I tucked the notes in my jean pocket and clamped open the embroidered chest. A few necklaces knotted together, crumpled monopoly twenty dollar bill, pocket watch and a rusty nail.

One rusty chain had an oval locket that was painted purple. The locket was double sided with frail pictures on each half. One of a young boy who I assume is Eddie and the other of a small girl. Eddie had long thin branches of black hair that was neatly swayed to the left. His freckled face was smirking and his eyes filled with curiosity. The girl had frizzled brown hair and rose cheeks. Her sky blue shirt was tucked into her long cream coloured skirt. Aside from her clothes, she seemed normal. I wonder who she is? Or was?