A Soul Left Unsullied

Chapter 4: Uninvited Guests

That night, I didn't sleep at all, I locked my door and hid under my blanket. It was suffocating and scary, but I made it alive till the morning.

I was exhausted but I was too afraid to fall asleep, so I made myself a macchiato. I smiled and hummed to myself, pretending everything was okay.

I was always great at pretending everything was okay, when in fact my life was falling apart. This was the first time however, that the things I was ignoring weren't my own doing.

A small win in this horrible situation, but a win nonetheless.

I didn't dare aknowledge something was wrong, because if I aknowledged it, there would be no going back.

So I repeated what I did yesterday, I opened a new cabinet, also stock full of letters. I reached for the first letter absentmindedly, as I was too focused on watching if something was behind me.

I opened it not bothering to read what was written on the enveloppe. When the letter was in front of my eyes, my heart nearly stopped. The first line read "My love Jules".

Was Elaine or Sunshine cheating on their partner? I quickly scanned the letter, at the bottom it read "Yours forever, Anton".

Who the hell was Anton? I grabbed the enveloppe to check who sent it. It was neither Elaine nor Sunshine, it was some guy named Anton James. Weirdly, there was no actual adress, just his name and "Russia" were written.

I checked to see who the recipient was immediately, "Julian Levert, West Francia".

Who were these people? No one lived in this house besides the Barkers, Joshua Livingstone and my aunt. So who where these people? Why were they writing in Latin? Did my aunt collect old letters?

I picked up the next letter, this one was also in Latin, but from Julian to Anton.

Then I picked up the next two at once, these ones were written in German. From a woman named Lottie to one called Alberta, then from Alberta to Lottie.

I went through the entire pile in that cabinet, what I saw entirely confounded me. They were in groups of two, person A wrote to person B in the first letter, then person B wrote a letter to person A.

They were all different people, from different places. Some of them put down places that hadn't existed for a long time and wrote in languages that were forgotten or rarely used now. Who were these people ? Was this a joke?

From the letters I could understand, namely the German and the Latin one, I got some confusing info. This wasn't a normal correspondence, the second letter wasn't an answer to the first letter at all.

Despite most of the letters starting with the name of the recipient, it felt like the letters were never meant to be received.

The first German letter roughly translated, said something like this :

"My flower,

I won't bother saying hello as you are sitting next to me, smiling despite the trials that await us. I love you, Alberta and there is no one I would rather walk this forked road with than you.

When fear grips me, I remember your smile as sweet as honey and I am convinced that we will make it out of this.

There is something I must confess, something that I don't dare tell you, as I would hate for you to think I will easily give up.

Even if we were to fail, I cannot say that I would resent my fate. Making way for our predecessors and our descendants still is a noble cause. One I wish someone would have undertaken for us to be free.

One that I would gladly take on, were we to fail, as our souls would be fused together, eternally watching over those like us.

I love you forever,

Lottie".

The second letter of the set was not a response, like Alberta didn't receive the letter or didn't mind it. It was a love  confession and it contained encouraging words for the task they were about to undertake.

I couldn't make sense of any of this, if they were sitting next to one another, why not talk about? Why write letters that their significant other wouldn't read ? Were the letters like some primitive version of journalling?

What task were they talking about? What forked road ? What did they mean by souls fused together? Were they speaking in code?

Were they being spied on?

Some of what they said reminded me of Joshua's letter to his sister. I couldn't make sense of what they were saying and it was driving me up the wall.

I stood up to go fetch Joshua's letrer, maybe comparing it to the rest would help me have a clue of what they were talking about.

Just as I bent down to open the cabinet, someone or something whispered in my ear "It's time to get to work, guardian." This time the voice was gentler than yesterday, less guttural, it was almost feminine. I turned around, scared out of my mind and there was nothing behind me, but tacky furniture from the 60s.

My heart was beating so fast I could hear it ringing in my ears, I took a deep breath to steady myself and closed the cabinet.

Maybe this cabinet was cursed, I had only heard things when it was open. Perhaps if I just kept it closed and never came near it, the sounds would stop.

A small part of me knew that it wouldn't be possible for me, I would be too curious and this flaw would surely be the death of me. I ignored that voice and backed away from the cabinet slowly.

I must have looked ridiculous, a grown woman scared of a cabinet, bracking away from it like it was a grenade about to explode.

I headed to the kitchen to get something to eat, hoping it would settle my nerves. Hearing voices was a new one for me but perhaps I didn't have to be afraid of this house. Maybe there was nothing here and what I heard was actually a symptom from my alcohol abuse.

It was certainly plausible.

As I was ruminating on whether to run away from this house or not, I opened my fridge to get some cheese and mayo. I closed the fridge and turned towards the rest of the kitchen.

The mayo in my hands fell to the ground, shattering and my heart nearly stopped.

There, perched on my kitchen island were two women.

One was a beautiful naked brunette with golden eyes.

The other was my aunt Lisa.

My dead aunt Lisa.