Chapter 11

That night, I went up again to the secret room to clean, but since I had finished sweeping, I decided to work on the desk. I had already made up my mind in the fact that I wouldn't open the chests until everything was clean, but that didn't stop me from thinking about what I would find. To my pleasure and surprise, dusting the desk and polishing it with pledge didn't take long at all, so I moved on to the chests, dusting and polishing. When I finished that, I went over to the cushion and dusted it as well.

Looking at my watch, I saw that it was only midnight, so I decided to start rummaging through the drawers to see what I would find. To my disgust, I found lots and lots of cobwebs, many containing spiders! "Gross! Why do theses thing have to exist?" I said to myself as I took the duster and whipped everything away so that I could get inside the drawers. All of the drawers on the left leg where empty, along with all of the ones on the right leg. "That's odd, I could have sworn that this was where the keys were." Tuning around, I sat on top of the desk, and then jumped off when I heard a crack. Turning back around to see what I had broken, I saw that there was another drawer that I had missed because it had been painted over with stain. In the middle under the top of the desk was a long but shallow drawer. Digging my nails in between the cracks, I was able to pry it open since there were no pull knobs. Just as I had seen in my premonition, there lay five keys. Glancing behind me, I counted and found only four chests. "What's this other one go to?" I wondered out loud. Figuring that I would find something else among the chests, I moved on to the shelves and the cupboards on the back of the desk. As I could already see, the shelves contained nothing, so I reached for the cupboard to open it, but it wouldn't budge!

"Oh, I get it." Picking up the five keys, I inserted each one into the lock that I had just noticed, trying to find the one that would open it. Neither the first, second, or third worked, but by the forth try, I found the right one. I couldn't tell by looking at it how to tell it apart from all of the others because they all looked exactly the same; long shaft with a clover shaped handle one end, and three prongs on the end that is inserted into the lock. "Well, if they fit different locks, they have to be different." So, looking harder, I saw that each key each had three prongs, but the widths and distances between each prong were all different. Opening the cupboard, I found a stack of papers, also covered in a thick layer of dust.

Carefully taking the stack out, I blew off the dust, then brushed the rest off with the duster. The first page was blank, so I put it down on the desk top. The next page contained a single word written in a neat cursive hand; journal.

Placing that page face down on top of the other, I looked at the third page, which was covered in the same neat hand as the previous page.

20 of May

I'm stuck in my room again with nothing to do. I accidentally knocked an elfish vase over and broke it earlier today; apparently elfish porcelain is very valuable because Father became infuriated with me and would have beaten me if Mother hadn't begged he send me to my room instead. Well, taking her advice, he ordered me to stay in my room and not make a sound until Nana and Pap come. Unfortunately for me, they won't arrive for another three days! Mother at least made sure that Lucy was sent up to my room, along with this which is my tenth birthday present.

23 of May

Nana and Pap just arrived, so I was able to leave my room, but I decided not too. Sometimes I'm glad that I'm…oops, I can't write what I was going to say; Mother forbade me to do so. Well, since I am ordered to my room so that I have to stay there for days on end, I have come to enjoy the solitude.

Since I never came out of my room to great his parents, Father thought that I was avoiding them, so he ordered me to come down and not leave there sides until they retire. Well, I did as I was told, and was then sent to my room because I wouldn't leave them alone! Sometimes I wish that Mother, Lucy and I weren't the only people who knew about my conditions, so that I wouldn't have to keep obeying everyone!

11 of September

I know I haven't written in many years, but father found out about my journal and forbade me to continue writing. I am now sixteen, and Mother, Lucy and I still have not found a way to fix my condition. Lucy says that Anita must fix me, but she thinks that she gave me a wonderful gift so that I will be a better daughter and wife! Lucy is infuriated because Anita refuses to see that if someone orders me to cut off my head, I will have to because I have the so called "gift of obedience." There, I said it! Over the years, I have found ways of twisting the commands.

Father is obsessed with finding a proper husband for me and I'm afraid it will be an old man who could care less about me.

30 of January

Mother is dead! She died three days ago; her funeral was today. Oh my, I never thought that I would see her die! Prince Charles was there, and he seemed very upset about her death; more so than father!

3 of January

Father is even more determined to marry me off! He even tried to feed me love mushrooms! He also married a horrible old hag with two despicable daughters, Tabitha and Olivia. They hate me and keep demanding that I give them things that were my mothers, because they think that I am not worthy of having such beautiful things! But the worst thing is that Father is sending me to a boarding school with them! I'm never going to come home alive!

I told Charles and he was very sad to see me go, but said that he would talk to my father to see if I could visit him over breaks.

Reading through the first four entries, I felt so sorry for this girl! To have a father that beats her is bad enough, and the fact that she has to obey everyone for some reason is very odd, but to have her future decided upon whom her father chooses for her to marry? I would either run away from home or just kill him or any man he tries to choose! Well, not really kill him, but I'd want to.

Looking at my watch again, I saw that it was almost three, so I put all of the pages back in the cupboard, locked it, and put the keys back in the secret drawer.

I'm beginning to notice a pattern here. I thought to myself. Everything seems to be in secret places! First the secret stairs, then the secret room, the secret drawer, what next? Shrugging, I left the room, locked the door, walked down the stairs, peeked through the secret whole in the wall, entered my room, closed the secret door, put on my PJ's and hopped into bed.

At seven a.m., I got up and went running. Since I really had no idea where anything was, I decided to just run to and through the park that Michael had taken me to the day before. When I reached the park, I found a trail wandering off into a thicket of trees, so I followed it. I passed a few other joggers and some people walking, and even an occasional couple sitting on a blanket under a tree eating a picnic breakfast. Halfway back to the park, I heard someone run up behind me, but dismissed it for another runner, until I heard them run up right behind me, and felt their arms wrap around me, forcing me to a stop and off the path. Before I could scream, their hand was over my mouth, and I was not able to break free of their grasp. Remembering one of the hints I had gotten over the years from Giles, my old body-guard, I forced my body to go limp, so that my attacker would think that I had passed out, in hope that he would loosen his grip enough for me to break free.

To my relief, he did exactly that, and let me collapse onto the ground. As soon as I saw his shadow through my eyelids from his bending over me, I sprang into action. First, I grabbed his shoulders, driving my knee into his chest. I then leaped to my feet as he struggled for air; it was indeed a he; and began to punch him in the sides.

"Kit, cut it out!" I heard him gasp.

"Oh my gosh!" I exclaimed, ceasing the torrent of flying fists. "West! Why in the bloody hell did you pretend to kidnap me?"

"I told you I was going too yesterday!" West gasped, attempting to stand up, but clutched his ribs in pain.

"Here, let me help. I didn't think you meant a literal kidnapping! Why didn't you just run up beside me?"

"Because I didn't think that you would resist so much!" he said laughing, and then winced in pain. Walking out of the trees, I had to half support him. I was beginning to wonder if I had broken any ribs, when he suddenly tapped me on the shoulder, and took off running. Confused, I stood there for a few second, and then realized he was playing tag and took off after him.

To my surprise, he headed back into the tees, pausing ever once-in-a-while to make sure I could keep up, and had to take off very quickly when he noticed that I was faster than he had originally thought. Watching him turn into a clump of trees, I plowed in after him, but he had just vanished!

"West?" I called, wondering if he was just hiding, or was really that far ahead of me. "West, this place gives me the creeps! Where are you?"

Hearing a rustle from behind me, I spun around expecting it to be West trying to scare me again, but it was only a rabbit. Suddenly there was a hand on my shoulder, so spinning around again, I found West grinning like a fool. "A bit jumpy today are we?" he asked. Hitting him in the shoulder, he grimaced, but quickly returned his smile to his face. I couldn't help but smile at him as well.

Again, he headed into the thicket until we came upon a clearing. In the middle of the clearing was a blanket spread out on the ground with an assortment of food on top. "I thought you might be hungry after that run."

"Well that was very thoughtful after attempting to kidnap me." I told him indignantly.

"It was a joke! I honestly did not think that I would frighten you so much, especially since I told you!"

"Yes, but you made it seem like you had changed your mind! Okay, why don't we just start this over? We haven't exactly started out on the same foot this morning." I suggested. Agreeing West stuck out his hand and told me good morning. Shaking his hand, I burst out into laughter, because he had put the funniest expression on his face.