The Secrets of Dragonsmoore: The Takers.

Chapter Four: Continued

                                                               Chapter Four

                                                                 Continued

Saturday 22nd July 6.29 p.m. The Blue Room (Ettie's bedroom)

After tea and cake and a visit to the stables to see the puppies, Ettie returned to her bedroom to unpack her cases and put away her clothes. A large four-poster bed with long blue drapes patterned with swirls of gold, made a grand impression when Ettie first entered the bedroom through a thick carved oak door. Two pretty bedside tables stood either side of the four-poster. On top of one was a brass cherub lamp and on the other, an old fashioned black telephone with a number of off white intercom buttons. Pushed into the far corner to the right, was a mirrored dressing table and from the high ceiling hung a chandelier dripping with tiny pear-drop crystals.  

The wall, to the left of the bed and facing her as she entered, was covered with a pale blue fitted wardrobe. Each of the five doors had tiny handles in the shape of elves or pixies. The middle door was fitted with a gold-framed full-length mirror and behind this, was another room. It had once been a secret hiding place but was now a bathroom. Although, there was a sliding pannel that lead to the unused bedroom next door.

Dominating the left side of the room, where the sun shone in, sending streams of dust filled light across the floor was a large stone mullion window. This was also dressed in the same long blue and gold drapes. From here Ettie could stand on the window seat and look out over the garden and glimpse the sea from over the Castle walls. There was a much wider view from Aunt Beth's bedroom on the floor above. From her balcony you could see more of the garden and the surrounding bay and on a good day the distance lighthouse.  

On second glances the room may have appeared shabby. The curtains frayed, wallpaper faded, carpets threadbare, floorboards that creaked and yawned and many years of unrestrained cobwebs, which stretched lazily across the tired beams of the high ceilings but to Ettie it had always been a room fit for a princess.  

Ettie changed into a little white top and jeans and stood on the window seat gazing out across the garden and the bay. The sea was calm and she began thinking about taking a boat out. Maybe she'd bump into Charlie, but with her uncle missing, she felt she should look for him, but where to start? Monty took rooms in the west side of the Castle and Aunt Beth the east. They had lived separate lives for as long as she could remember, but always coming together whenever Ettie visited.  

Before Ettie was born there had been some kind family feud between her mother and Aunt Beth about inheritance she believed, but had never been told and the way her mother's nostrils flared and lips tightened whenever Beth's name was mentioned, she'd learnt it was better not to ask.  

Although her aunt and uncle were honoured with a title, Ettie knew they weren't rich. Most of their income came from the sales of uncle's storybooks. Monty wrote children's fantasy stories, about the weird and wonderful, magic and mystery. Sometimes he included Ettie and her younger brother, Daniel in his stories. The Castle always featured somewhere too. Its secret passageways and dungeons became labyrinths and time portals, which could whisk you away to other worlds. Nearly always the heroine had a brave hero to save her from certain death.  

Monty was also very interested in the history of the Castle so some of his stories were based on truth, all be it a little stretched. Allegedly the Dragoon Monks had built a monastery to hide their treasure, on the moors just north of the Castle's boundaries, using stones from all over the world. Stories told of how the Cornish king of that time had destroyed the monastery when no treasure was found, believing it evil and bewitched. He had the monks tortured and put to death, then built his Castle from the ruins. Whether this was true or not, ancient maps proved there was a castle on 'Dragoon's Moor' long before the monastery was ever thought of. This only added to the Castles mystery and helped fuel the tales about ghosts of hooded monks who haunted its many rooms searching for the murderous king and the lost treasure. But the only ghosts Ettie was familiar with were in the stories her uncle told, and they were all friendly and as for the treasure, that had long since been thought of as a myth.