The Abandoned Greenhouse

Chapter 7 (Edited)

After lunch, Ginny offered to help her aunt Ellie. She took the plates to the kitchen, lingering around the sink until her aunt came. Soon enough, Ellie appeared, carrying the last couple of glasses. She set them on the counter and turned to Ginny.

"Thanks for helping me. I'm usually the one to set and take off the table."

"Don't worry, Auntie."

Silence fell into the room. The only sound that could be heard was the plates being washed. Ginny fidgeted in her place. She didn't know how to ask her about the greenhouse. She had never been confrontational. She inhaled deeply and shot the question.

"What were you doing in the greenhouse?"

Ellie dropped the fork she was cleaning.

"What did you see?"

"You going into the greenhouse with a bowl of something. What were you doing?"

"Listen to me." Ellie's face seemed like it was made of stone. "Forget about the greenhouse."

"But why were you going inside? Isn't it dangerous?"

"Ginny, what you saw wasn't me. Don't go into the greenhouse and don't interact with anyone who does"

"But why?"

"You have to promise me." Ellie's ice-cold stare was difficult to hold. Ginny felt herself falter.

"Okay, Auntie."

Ellie turned away and continued washing the dishes while Ginny left the room defeated. She walked towards the yard and sat on a bench. It was damp, like everything in that house, and she feared she would break the rotten wood. It was just outside the back door, just in the right place to see the greenhouse and the kitchen at the same time. Something moved in the greenhouse, and she saw something get out. It was quite short and had red hair, or was it feathers? Ginny stayed really still and saw the thing change. The reddish hair turned blonde, and it became long. The figure grew in size, and the face morphed into her aunt's, except it was a little different. Ginny looked at the creature and then at the kitchen window where her aunt was still washing the dishes.

Ginny's heart skipped a beat as thr being set eyes on her. She ran inside the house and went to her room. She approached the window and looked at the backyard, searching for that thing. What was that? Was it a Wernel? It had red hair, but the book didn't say anything about shape-shifting.

Her heart was racing. She grabbed the book and flipped through the pages. There was only one dedicated to Wernels, and there was nothing on how to get rid of them. In fact, there was a place where it told her how to attract one.

She sighed, almost ready to give up, but thought a little more. If there was a book written, more people had to know about the Wernels, and if more people knew, there had to be information about them on the Internet.

She opened the search engine on her phone. The search for Wernel was unfruitful. There wasn't any mention of it on any website, or she didn't find it. She grabbed the book again and turned it around. Opening the first page, she looked for any mention of an author but didn't find any. What she did find was a dedication to someone named Angela Byers. She was addressed as the love of the author's life. Ginny wondered how her life could have been. This person had spent all their life studying a world which people couldn't dream of. Could it be possible to track the author from this woman? Maybe or maybe not, but she had to try.

She went on Facebook and searched for the name. There were lots of profiles, but most of them weren't in Ireland. The title specified Irish Faeries, so the author had to be from Ireland, right? She narrowed the search. There wasn't an Angela Byers in Dublin or Limerick, and there wasn't an Angela Byers in Waterford. In reality, there weren't any Angela Byers, except for one. Angela Byers-Doyle in Galway City. Her relationship status said she was married to Conor Doyle. Ginny looked at the title of the book. 'Doyle's Guide to the Unexplained World of Irish Faeries.' An Angela Byers married to a man named Doyle. She was the woman she had been looking for and her husband, the author of the book. The last post on the page was posted two years ago, and before that, she published every week. Conor didn't have a Facebook page or any other social media, and he wasn't in any of Angela's photos. There was an address. 68 Ros Geal, Rahoon, Galway, Ireland