@zeldacroft, @freewritehouse, We-Write #10
“I can’t believe we’re here!” Clara gushed, gazing at the manor house. Its front steps were preceded by carefully-laid stone, centered around a magnificent fountain. Tourists bustled around eagerly with their cameras and visitor pamphlets as the two sisters joined them.
“It says here that tours start every hour in the Grand Gallery,” said Kelly, holding up the guidebook. Clara was too busy admiring the variety of flowers that adorned the area, from the climbing vines near the elegant windows to the lush bushes around the stone path. So Kelly went back to her reading, but with a smile. It was nice to see that the manor was already living up to Clara’s expectations.
After a brief distraction by a duck swimming in the fountain, the sisters quickly made their way inside. As they mounted the marble stairs, Clara’s excitement became tangible, an emanation of joy that merged with the curiosity of the other tourists.
My continuation starts here...
This was an ancient manor of English gentry with centuries of history. Once upon a time, there was everything here – love, intrigues and mysticism, the brilliant rise and gloomy demise.
Clara was always interested in the story of young Lady Charlotte, who lived in the manor four hundred years ago. The story of her tragic love was surrounded by gloomy details - in her day people said that the young lady was a witch and was connected to the devil. Today, she, still looking at tourists from old portraits, was presumed to have a mental disorder. Historiographers also entertained theories about her ability to communicate with spirits.
Clara didn't care about which version to believe. She just always seemed attracted to that image of the old aristocrat: to noble features of her face, hazy look - as if the girl indeed saw something beyond the edge of reality.
The tour was the long one. The guide showed tourists each room of the manor, different corners of the garden and extensional structures - gazebos, gardener house, additions to the large kitchen.
Many tourists photographed with intensity, some examined noble splendor with an envious look as if saying: "Wow! That’s how wealthy people lived!"
In the remote corner of the garden, Clara slightly lagged behind the tour. A stone arch, standing somehow aside from the middle of the trail, between flowering trees, attracted her attention.
It was a very simple and very old structure of the grey stone. It seemed as if it was here long before the manor, the house, and the garden. Long ago, a path had passed through this ark, but people abandoned and forgotten about it centuries ago. Today the arch stood away from where people walked. That's why Clara was so interested to take a closer look.
Clara made her way between the bushes, approached the antique structure and touched the gray stone carefully - it was cold despite the midday heat.
The girl's hand slipped on the stone surface, sensing its convexities and concavities, chipped pieces, and cracks. She had a strange feeling that the stone was alive, and it wanted to tell her something.
For a few minutes, Clara studied the olden structure. She wandered around, looking at the elegant simplicity of the heavy structure. There was no extraneous decorations, only the harsh functionality of the medieval times.
The gust of cold wind blew, and the girl instinctively turned away from it, hiding her face... and saw something incredible in the garden.
Actually, "saw" was the wrong word in this case. The words “felt and imagined”, would have been more appropriate. Still, undoubtedly, something was approaching her through the trees. It was a woman in a medieval gown, carrying a braided basket. Only a woman and a basket were... unreal. It felt as if Clara was pointing a smartphone at something and saw an augmented reality picture on its screen.
“Ah, that’s how ghosts look like,” she thought.
She was surprised that she didn’t feel any fear, curious at what will happen next. The ghost woman was approaching, and Clara first realized who she was, and only then drew the woman’s portrait in her imagination. It was Lady Charlotte, the ancient witch, the owner of the manor.
"Hello," Clara thought when the ghost was two steps away from her.
"Hello," the words appeared in her head “I have apples in my basket. Do you want any?”
“Mmmm...” - such manner of questioning was unexpected, and Clara was bemused, and most importantly – had no idea of how to accept this intangible gift.
"That’s right," the ghost smiled. "You can't... There's no one for me to offer apples. It's been years. Well. Then just come close.”
Clara made a step forward.
“I will offer you a different gift,” Charlotte smiled, “now you’ll be able to see.”
She raised her hand and touched Clara's forehead. There was a bright flash of light in front of Clara’s eyes - and the world around her has changed. Augmented reality became clearer - if this expression were appropriate, given that everything in this "different reality" was covered with a light veil of grey fog.
Only the stone arch shone. Sedately, from the depth of the tunnel that opened behind it, clouds of fog swam into the light, passed through the arch and dissolved. There was muted Cappella music as though many voices somewhere in the distance began the long sad story, similar to a blues or a wistful Russian romance.
"These are the souls of the departed," Lady Charlotte said. "See how they get drawn into the portal - they go from life to death. This arch is the boundary between the worlds. Now you can see those boundaries wherever they exist.”
Clara looked at the pale light coming from the mysterious remote and the lethargic flow of "moths" stretching to this light. The spectacle was terrifying, but at the same time, mesmerizing.
In minutes, Clara somehow understood how to adjust her vision to see both pictures simultaneously or one at a time - a stone arch on a sunny day and the portal, through which a cloud of fog gracefully flew into a different world.
"That's smart," Lady Charlotte said. "Now you're just like I was once. Seeing. You 're a conductor.”
"Thank you!" Clara lightly bowed.
"Well, all right, go now!" Lady Charlotte said. "Go back to your world. Whenever you want to call me, find the right place and think about me.”
“All right!” Clara smiled and focused on that picture of reality where there was only a sunny day.
Lady Charlotte and other ghosts from "augmented reality" gradually dissolved, as if someone had superimposed a cross-fade when mounting pictures in front of Clara's eyes.
Turning away from the arch, the girl forced her way through the bushes again... and when she returned to the path, she heard her sister’s call:
"Clara! There you are! I was looking for you! Is everything okay?”
“Yes!” Clara answered. “Everything is just marvelous!”
P.S. Thank you @mgaft1 for helping me translate from Russian to English!