Heart stuck in her throat; Arabella trailed behind Silas through the hallways of the manor. The vampire spared not a glance nor a word her way thus for comfort, she clutched at the locket around her neck.
Eyes strictly on his feet, Arabella only stopped when they did before a far less decorated wooden door.
A cool and hasty breeze escaped the instant he pushed it open, its creaking echoing all around them.
Utter darkness greeted the two, but one step inside was all it took for the first torch hanging on the wall to ignite of its own accord which made Arabella shudder.
And yet, she dared not utter a word of complaint, freezing montarily before practically leaping out of her place to follow him down those spiraling stone stairs.
Despite the light from the fire, the young woman still struggled to descend and was thankful for the narrow walls from each side where her hands would go to find support and guidance.
Cold and rough to the touch, Arabella couldn't help but notice, along the way, that the decoration around them was limited to gray stone blocks, from the floor to the high ceiling.
It was a place where daylight did not reach and therefore forced its explorers to rely solely on the torches posted at regular intervals from each other.
The longer and the further they strayed down those dungeon-like hallways, the harder it beca for Arabella to breath or to even think.
Loud and obnoxious, the voices in her head were screaming at her to run for it, to pray for her own life, wondering if she'd ever walk out of that place on her own two feet or in pieces.
Silas finally stopped at the very end of a corridor, before the sad painting of a small and lonely house perched upon an island. A painting so large that it had almost covered the entirety of the wall. From his sleeve he pulled a silver-colored dagger. The sa one he'd always used to break his own skin in order to draw blood, but Arabella had been completely unaware of that.
Seeing it only rattled her further as the more ti she spent in the vampire's company, the easier it beca to believe her last monts among the living had co.
The young woman took two steps back, away from him when he had unsheathed the dagger. Silas however, ignored it and with the blankest of expressions, proceeded to drag the knife along his palm, leaving a straight-lined gash in its wake. He then placed his bleeding hand flat upon the painting and remained in that position for a few seconds.
Arabella's eyes widened the instant Silas had pulled his hand away from the painting, watching intently as the blood staining it gradually seeped into the canvas only to vanish all together in under a minute.
The second that happened, the fra of the art piece detached from the wall on one side, mimicking a door, giving way to yet another passage that had been hidden behind it.
Without any hesitation, Silas went through it and Arabella found no other recourse but to follow.
The secret door led to a special sort of room, or so Arabella had thought.
Unsettlingly, in the eyes of the young woman as on the many wooden shelves and pedestals furnishing the place, lay weapons... Used weapons, boxed in clear and spotless glass cases.
More upsettingly, the room slled of nothing. The air was very much breathable but not a single distinguishable odor flowed with it.
A shattered silver armor plate in one case, and a breached helt in the other or a small, red covered notebook run ragged by the passing of ti in the next.
Blood-stained swords and spears, silver daggers much like the one in Silas' possession, silver ornate pistols and muskets laying right next to boxes of silver laced bullets.
But what had truly whisked Arabella's senses, had been the sword that stood as tall as her in its case.
"That sword belonged to Garreth Goldberck," Silas' voice blared, wrenching Arabella's attention from the weapon, "He was dubbed Garreth the great by the humans during the great war. One of, if not the biggest human I've ever seen to this day," he stared the sword from its point up to the poml as he spoke.
Mouth agape, Arabella brought her eyes back on the dull edges of the blade, tracing so of the cracks left on it up to the hilt.
"All you see in this room once belonged to a human warrior during the great war. Warriors that were sent to their afterlife by an Eleazar,"
Dry and cold, his tone did not help Arabella fight the shivers crawling all over and under her skin.
"This is our trophy room. It was made for the sole purpose of holding these pieces,"
Arabella's hands flew to clutch her arms, rubbing them up and down from ti to ti for so warmth.
"This one is a very special piece,"
Silas moved over, behind the giant sword. When she followed him, her gemstones fell on an even larger glass case, sheltering a complete silver armor.
"Read the na on the plaque," he ordered.
"Abe...," with a shaky voice, Arabella began, but the realization of who it was, stomped her, rendering her voiceless for a good mont.
"Go on," he urged her calmly.
"Abel, Chester... Sterling," she murmured.
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