Chapter 3: A Fairy Tale

'WARNING' (Some imagery may be disturbing to some readers. Readers discretion is advised)

"What is wrong with me?" Carol silently asked herself. She clenched her hands into a fist to stop them from shaking.

Julie had already gone down the hallway and disappeared into one of the rooms.

Carol tried to force herself to step into the house, wrestling with a strange foreboding that had overcome her.

She managed to lift her foot up and step over the small step that led into the entrance of the house. As her foot touched the wooden floor the feeling vanished, leaving her even more confused.

"Carol? Are you coming?" Julie called.

"I'm coming," Carol told her as she walked down the small hallway and into a medium sized room.

It was the family room or the parlor. She was not sure of the differences.

"Nice furniture," Julie said running a hand over the top of one of the armchairs.

Carol had agreed. There were several cushion chairs that were placed in an almost circle patterns around a small coffee table. A piano stood in the corner, collecting dust that was coming in through the window behind it.

Julie had a small notebook in her hands and was taking careful notes as she examined the room. She took out her cell phone and snapped a quick picture of one of the chairs.

"Ugh, the memory is full," she groaned.

Her fingers once more were dancing as she ran through her gallery trying to find pictures to delete.

"Why are there so many blurry ones?" she pondered out loud.

Carol sat down in one of the armchairs waiting for her to finish. The chair was uncomfortable overstuffed causing her to get up back up. As she stood up her foot knocked into a small, weaved basket with several balls of yarn.

Three of the balls of yarn fell out of the basket as she jolted it with her foot and rolled under the coffee table.

With a sigh, she went down on to her knees to reach under the table for one of the balls.

"Why are you interested in this house?" she asked Julie, putting the yarn ball back in the basket but Julie had already left the room and entered the kitchen.

Carol pushed herself up and once again followed Julie.

The counter stretched outwards across the room, cutting off even more space of the already tiny kitchen.

"Why are you taking notes and pictures?" she asked as Julie snapped more pictures with her cell phone.

"I'm trying to make sure my hotel is authentic as possible. I figured I could get some ideas from looking at these older homes" Julie said as she scribbled another note down. "Plus, this is the house of one of the people in my aunt's book."

She started pulling each of the drawers open, but they were all empty.

"Which one?" Carol asked bored.

She did not share Julie's interest in going through someone else house even if they did live a long time ago. But seeing the wood burner stove made her glad to be living in the 21st century.

"Caroline," Julie said now heading for the dining room.

"You mentioned her before. What is it about her story that you like so much?"

Julie was fiddling with the candle sticks set in the center of the freshly polished table.

"You think this are from Jerry's or Bennjins?" she asked.

"What?" Carol said completely lost.

"The candle sticks, what brand do you think they are?"

"I don't know," Carol admitted without caring.

"Hmm," Julie muttered then smiled at Carol. "It's one of the darker stories. With romance, tragedy, and betrayal."

"Does sound like one of your type of books," Carol said.

Julie held out her aunt's book to Carol. "Page 78," she told her before going to the cabinet to look over the teacups on its shelves.

"The thing about this story is that my aunt doesn't know if it is completely fiction," Julie told her. "The only thing she could confirm was that there was a person name Caroline. And she was slowly dying from an unknown aliment."

Carol pulled out one of the wooden chairs and sat down as she listen. This chair was a lot more comfortable to sit on then the ones in the family room. She flipped through the book to the page Julie had told her. There were numerous pictures dotted throughout the chapters as she flipped through. Carol recognized many of them done by her friend Lizzy's. She had a nice way of painting with dull colors that she would expertly mix in with enough bright ones to make the drawing look alive.

The first watercolor painting was of a woman and a man kissing. A horse and buggy stood behind them and in the distance was a ship with sails bulging with the wind.

"There was a fiancé that left her to go fight in the war with promises to return and marry her. Some say they were madly in love. Childhood sweethearts," Julie continued while attempting to open the cabinet doors, but they were locked.

"I don't think those doors will open," Carol told her as Julie tugged on the door's brass handle.

Julie nodded, giving up. Sighing disappointed, she left the room heading for the stairs.

Carol got up quickly and pushed the chair back in before going after her.

Julie continued her story as they went up the stairs, "but there was another person who wanted Caroline. A demon who wore the suit of a man."

"Ominous," Carol commented turning the pages in the book until she found another one of Lizzy's paintings.

This one was a dark figure watching the same woman from the shadows of the forest. The woman was walking past the forest, keeping to the path that led to her destination, unaware she was being watched.

"They called him Hunter, but no one knows if that was his real name. They knew he came the day Caroline's fiancé left. That the two of them met, only briefly. Just a passing glance. It is said that when Hunter saw Caroline, he fell in love with her. That his desire for her consumed him."

Carol was starting to see why Julie liked the story. "Is that why it is consider fiction?"

"It's not all fiction," Julie corrected. "I told you, my aunt was able to confirm Caroline was real and there is a title deed that shows Hunter was one of the owners of the Burgen's house."

"Okay, sorry. Go on with the story," Carol urged.

Julie cleared her throat before continuing, "but Caroline was faithful. She kept her wedding ring around her neck to keep her from ever forgetting about her lover. And when she shunned Hunter's love he became-violent."

Carol found the drawing of the ring dangling from Caroline's necklace. It was a golden band with tiny diamonds circling the ring.

Julie opened one of the bedroom doors but only glanced in before moving on. She stopped outside the door of the next room, deciding to finish the story before going in.

"Weak from her sickness, Caroline was not able to fight off the demon as he kidnapped her in the middle of the night and took her to his home. A place called the Burgen's house."

Julie smiled mysteriously, "That's the name of my aunt's home."

"Why is it called that?"

"The person who built it, his last names were Burgen and people been calling it after him," Julie explained.

The next picture was of a house near the edge of a cliff that Carol recognized as the house from the picture Julie had shown her.

"Anyway, Hunter kept Caroline locked away until she would willingly become his. But day-by-day, Caroline refused him. And day-by-day the demon became more enraged. As the days turned into months and those months became years the demon started to get desperate."

There were several pictures dictating that very scene. Caroline locked away in a room with only the visits from the demon to keep her company. But when he came, she refused his offer for her freedom. The price was too steep.

Julie had to cough to clear her throat again. "Then one day, the ferry docked at the port and two people disembarked. They took a carriage and rode all night and day, never stopped until they reached Evergreen. Those two people were a powerful witch known as Margret and Caroline's own fiancé, Danial. He had come to save her, and the witch had come to kill the demon."

"This story is really starting to sound like a fairy tale," Carol joked.

"Trust me, it's not," Julie warned.

Carol had a feeling that Julie had memorized every word of Caroline's story, but was enjoy hearing it and remained quiet as Julie finished. Her storyteller drew a breath before she started again, "the demon had lost his patience as Caroline remained as faithful as ever. And on the day that Margret and Danial took their horses and rode to the Burgen's house, the demon asked Caroline one last time if she would be his. And one last time, Caroline refused him. Unable to stand being spurned again the demon reached for her and, in a madness of passion, he pushed her away from him. Caroline lost her balance and fell out the window of her room. Unfortunately, her room overlooked the ocean that now became her unmarked tomb."

Carol liked how Lizzy depicted Caroline's death with a simple painting of the ocean, allowing the reader to imagine what it would be like to fall in it.

"At that moment Danial arrived in time to see his love fall. Unable to save her, he turned his rage and pain on the demon. Danial was wielding a mighty blade that the saints had given to him so he could slay the demon. But the sword was too weak against Hunter, and so the witch stepped forth. With her magic she managed to bind the demon within his wooden coffin. Sealing it with many powerful spells to make sure that the demon would never rise again. But to be sure of it, she spent the remainder of her life guarding his coffin. Danial, his heart crushed with the loss of his love, wandered the lands. He slayed villains and monsters with his sword, trying to ease the pain within his heart but never could."

Julie started to cough again. "That's the end," she said sounding a bit hoarse.

"That is a dark story." Carol commented and then asked, "why do you like it?"

Julie shrugged, "I don't know. I always like those sad romantic stories. It just seems more real to me. I guess you would understand that huh? With David and all that-heartache."

Carol felt her cheeks burn and she reached to tug on her pointer finger. She wished Julie were more sensitive about bring up awkward subjects so casually. Or at least leave her relationship with David in the past.

Julie opened the last bedroom door and went into the room. Carol remained in the hallway looking at the last two drawings in the chapter. One was of a dark room that looked like it was underground. There was a coffin on a three-step platform with strange symbols drawn around the room. There was a great deal of detail and bold lines that Carol assumed Lizzy must have spent most of her time on it then any of the other drawings.

The last one was of a man with his head lowered as he walked away from the readers. Carol figured it was Danial embarking on his lonely journey of slaying monsters. She felt sorry for him. To have experiences the joy of sharing a future with someone you love only to have the dream shatter before you. She could almost relate. Though her lover did not die but instead they simple could not be together anymore.

Carol leaned against the wall, closing her eyes as she felt tears begin to form in them. She fought them back, remembering that she had promised herself she would not cry anymore. It was a waste of time, especially since it had been a mercy that they had separated before they had started building a life together.

Carol opened her eyes no longer feeling like crying. Instead, she was smiling. She remembered how in love she had been, how she been willing to give up so much. They had talked about having a family and raising their children in the country. She could almost laugh at herself. She never wanted a family. It was at ten years old when she had first decided to see the world before she even thought of settling down. It had been after her mother and her watched Around the World in 80 Days. She hated that movie with a passion that was only rivaled with how much she despised the guy who just rushed from place to place. He was given the opportunity to travel around the world and he was running across it just to win some bet. That was when she told her mom she was going to travel the world and she was going to take her damn time doing so. Later that night she had her mouth washed out with soap, but that desire had stayed with her even to this day.

Carol chuckled at her past foolishness, but she had at one time fooled herself into letting go of her desires to instead have children and live in the country. Now she realized once the passion had ended between Danial and her, she would have started to resent her choices. Luck had favored her and left its scar so she would not forget what she owed.

Carol stopped smiling and tugged the sleeve of her turtleneck down to her wrist.

Yeah, real lucky.

To break out of her dreary thoughts, Carol stared to look over the few pictures that decorated the wall. Across from her was a family painting that had been nailed to the wall to keep anyone from stealing it.

The painting was faded, and the paints were starting to smug together so you could only see the general outline of the picture. There was some water damage in the bottom right corner that had washed away the artist's name.

It was a painting of four people standing outside a house that looked like the one Carol was in right now. There was a plump woman with wispy brown hair, and she was leaning on the arm of an older man that was bald. Their daughters stood on either side of them. They seem to share many of the same features but there were considerable differences in their age.

Carol turned away from the painting and preceded down the hall into the bedroom. Julie was playing with a small rocking horse, pushing it back and forth with her finger. It creaked as it rocked on its rungs.

There was a small bed with an arrangement of handmade dolls on it. The faded lace curtain moved slightly by the breeze coming in through the forgotten open window.

Like at the front door, Carol stopped as an overwhelming sense of dread came over her.

The room obviously belonged to a child, but Carol felt like she had stepped into a morgue. She glanced over at the bed expecting to see a child sizes coffin on it. Maybe open so everyone could have one final look.

She felt a sudden sharp pain in her chest, making her double over. She clutched her chest with her arms, clinching her teeth against the pain.

Julie's back was turned to her, not noticing her friend hunched over in the doorway.

Carol pushed herself away from the door and stumbled down the stairs. She ran through the living room nearly tipping over the basket again. More balls of yarn scattered across the room, rolling under chairs and the coffee table. The basket skid into the hallway.

Carol went out the back door while fumbling to pull something out of her pocket. There was a sudden loud beeping sound and she glanced down at the heart monitor strapped to her wrist. The numbers were increasing rapidly, warning that her heart rate was getting too high.

Finally, managing to pull the small orange bottle from her pocket, she unscrewed the lid. She shook out two tiny white pills in her hand and swallowed both at once.

Leaning against the wall she took a deep breath trying to keep it steady, then released it. She did it two more times and kept repeating it until the beeping stopped.

"Back to normal," she sighed relived seeing the numbers begin to decrease on the monitor.

She lowered herself on to the porch swing.

"What was that?" she muttered shaking.

Unable to answer her own question, she just swung herself back and forth hoping the answer would come to her.