Tenebrae Manor (2 page)

“So close to the house,” muttered Bordeaux.

He kicked at the corpse, dislodging the head from it and sending it hurtling down the hill.

“Ah, I do not need this!” he repeated to himself. Surely Crow would be of some help to keep the golems at bay but their increased frequency was troubling Bordeaux. Deadly though these creatures were, the golems were so slow that they were usually destroyed before they could wrap their claws about the throats of their victims. It was a favoured tactic of theirs, as some sick revenge for their own existence. They were essentially animated tree trunks, ripped from the ground by a noose and brought to life with the dark magic of a long gone baron of Tenebrae.

Bordeaux resumed his homeward stride, having formulated a plan of action in his mind. Yes, the golems could wait, if only for a moment. He had a celebration to plan and the mistress of the manor, the Lady Libra, was not wont to any form of patience or consideration.

Imposing, sinister and infernal, Tenebrae Manor stands perched upon its hill, a beacon of darkness quintessential to the surrounding lands. Monstrously enormous in its dimensions, it is the very spectre of antiquity, a ghastly abode, unsettling in all aspects.

             
It is within the mansion that a majority of strange beings take up their residence, some having lodged there for centuries on end. The history of its construction and the architects that designed it were long lost to the ages; even the eldest eldritch being of the house had no knowledge past a certain point backwards in time.

Bordeaux wove his way up the powdery path to the front steps of the castle. His physique remained crestfallen; his hand clasped his chin, his red eyes transfixed on his steps. The floor of the threshold groaned under his shoe and, without a hitch in his spidery stride, he continued through the massive archway as the heavy oak door swung inwards as if on its own.
              He stood in the doorway and sighed before looking towards the hulking being looming in the shadows over his left shoulder. “My thanks, Usher.”

“Master Bordeaux, welcome home.”

A mountain of a monster, the Usher had all the traits associated with an oafish and ugly man, though the scars upon his skin and the stitches at his joints betrayed his immortality. His gaze was permanently deadpan, as if his creator had neglected to teach him the thrills of joviality.

Bordeaux had to grin at the beast. “Always a steadfast servant, dear Usher.”

“Thank you sir.” Usher grunted in return, his hulking hand remained latched to the doorknob, as though he were awaiting another order.

“News?” asked Bordeaux.

“A message. The Lady Libra wishes to see you, sir.”

“The self-absorbed gourmand. Very well.”

He took a step further into the entry hall and Usher dutifully closed the door with a thud, resuming his erect stance as doorman of the manor. So lifeless was the Usher’s expression that he could easily be mistaken for mere decoration, not unlike the suits of armour that lined the wall against which he stood. Ever vigilant, the Usher had become just another part of the furniture in Tenebrae Manor. Not the most physically pleasant receptionist to newcomers to the manor but unmatched in quality of service. It was these traits that Bordeaux admired greatly and found himself thinking of as he began his ascent of Tenebrae’s main staircase.

No light shone down on the stairs at the present point and the house was as silent as it was dark. Flits of charcoal grey night sky illuminated the windows to some small extent, casting shadows that sculpted dimensions into bannister and step. The stairs slid down hypnotically beneath Bordeaux’s shoes, black then white, black then white, as his ascent to the higher floors of Tenebrae drawled on.

He came presently upon a junction in the staircase, a landing where a vast arch window looked out upon the southern forest. Bordeaux came to a stand still to absorb the adrenalin that came from such a dizzying height. Below the window, sheer wall dropped for the four storeys he had already climbed, before plummeting further down over the cliff face to jagged pines and boulders below. The edge of the world, with Tenebrae Manor teetering upon the precipice, a sea of black trees and mountains spreading further than vision permitted and threatening to obliterate any who may fall into the pitch.

Bordeaux pursed his lips and looked back the way he had come, the black and white steps trailing down until black conquered and light penetrated as far as it could. Forgotten candelabra stood soldier silent in the four corners of the landing, ancient tallow gripping their vine-like arms. One such candelabrum had become the inverted perch for a colony of bats that squalled affectionately to Bordeaux’s caressing claw.

“My pretty little things,” he whispered, as one bat gave its leathery wings a good stretch before hugging itself back into slumber.

Bordeaux knew that the left junction of the landing would take him to the quarters of the awaiting Lady Libra. Yet, again he felt deterred from his duties. A fatigue had enveloped him, one quenchable only by a glass of red and a dusty old tome awaiting him in his own room.

But things had to be done, such was the responsibility of his position and, as such, he decided to inquire upon another of the preparations for Libra’s birthday, undertaken by another of the manor’s darkled characters. So it was the right hand stairs he took, stairs that ascended ever higher to the very zenith of the house, into the immense auditorium at its pinnacle.

At a glance, it seemed that the auditorium in question had been a poorly calculated add-on to Tenebrae Manor’s façade. So garish and out of place it did seem that it stood like a boil upon otherwise blemish free skin. A mighty, vacuous cavern, ghosts of an echoed past were all that occupied its dark red seats. Every sound was discernable from its outer circumference, proving it to be more than acoustically sound. But so unnecessary it was, a theatre of such size. Forgiving the fact that Tenebrae’s residents were small of count already and that visitors were indeed so rare as to render the auditorium redundant to all but one apparition.

As Bordeaux passed row upon row of empty seats, he found a soothing relief in the soft echoes of his footfalls accompanied by the muffled sound of gentle piano keys nearby.

“Such a capacity, this cave could certainly house my woes.”

His whispers surprised him; though low, they were still carried far in the ever-hearing eardrum of a hall. On the stage, a spotlight shone down onto nothing save for flakes of dust that captured its rays along a cyclical journey through the air. A loft in the high corner of stage left, hidden amongst rafters so that only a dull candlelight betrayed its existence, concealed the perpetrator of the aforementioned piano sounds.

Bordeaux stopped at the foot of the ladder up to the loft and cringed at observation of its rungs. He was not a man of physical exertion; even more so, he was not one for sullying his prim appearance. Nonetheless, he rose to the task and made his way to the loft as the sounds of music grew ever louder.

The simple and dusty loft greeted him, in such untidy state as to leave him hesitant to handle any objects with his bare hands. Across the floorboards, sheets of musical score lay everywhere as if thrown in a fit of rage. The piano, or rather, the immense pipe organ that stood with all its girth along an entire wall of the loft, had seated before it a passionate mantis-like man hurling his fingers along the keys with apt precision and speed. The tails of the man’s green cardigan shifted and swayed over the bench where he perched; waves of sickly brown hair sprouted and spread horizontally from a part where the roots of said hair bore deep into the magnificent mind of its owner, the composer.

Bordeaux stood silently for a moment, admiring the elegant tones floating forth from the instrument, before clearing his throat loudly.

The composer started. “Who is it? Who, I ask disturbs the melodic thought train of the irrepressible Arpage Espirando Notturno?”

He rose with emaciated hands aloft, convulsing, yearning for some lost and impossible dream. Green lights flew from betwixt the keys of the pipe organ, wisps of curled haze spewed from the pipes and a new sound, a ghastly wail exhumed from the composer’s cadaverous mouth. His mouth appeared to contort itself to inhumane dimensions, perhaps by a trick of the lights.

He now turned to face his intruder and, as if his jaw were merely elastic, the shriek increased in volume as his mouth stretched wider.

Unperturbed to this monstrous behaviour, Bordeaux clicked the thumb and forefinger upon his crimson hued hand and the lights, the flames, the wails from the composer and his instrument ceased.

“I…”

“Sit down, Arpage.”

“Sir.”

Arpage slouched back upon his stool and swung lazily around to face the keys.

“I am honoured by your visit, sir. Indeed, honoured! My apologies, Master B,” he mused, poking apathetically at a key on his piano, where a B note sounded over and over again.
Bernt, bernt, bernt
…

“It is just this blasted humidity,” he continued. “It places both my mind and instrument
positively
out of tune.”

“Arpage.”

“How can one think in this
stifling
heat?” Arpage interrupted, hissing through his teeth at the abhorred adjective. The B note rang again and again.
Bernt, bernt, bernt
…

“Arpage,” drawled Bordeaux.

“… When this dank auditorium alters the very sounds of my vision! Sounds of my vision? How perfectly ridiculous!”

“Arpage!”

The composer leapt from his reverie with a start, the monotonous B note breaking into a disconcerted squeal. “Oh, sir! Sir! A thousand pardons!”

Bordeaux grinned. “How is the composition coming along?”

Arpage was nonplussed by the question, “T-t-the composition?”

“You are a composer, are you not?” Bordeaux mocked. “The irrepressible Arpage Espirando Notturno?”

Abashed, Arpage was struck with realisation. “Oh, the composition! Of course, of course!”

Here, Arpage stood and strode to the cobweb encrusted writing desk in the corner of his small abode. He scratched at his head and stroked his ruff before his hands set into actions more erratic than those of his delicate music making. Rummaging through papers and knocking over one unfortunate vile of ink, the jittery man turned about face and threw his chest out with pomp and circumstance. The tails of his bottle green cardigan swayed to a halt and he straightened out a sheet of paper in his hands.

Inhaling to speak, he hesitated on a sudden. “Ah sir, I must warn, it is rather… Erm how to say? Unfinished?”

“Just what you have so far will be fine, my friend.”

The composer grinned, cleared his throat and proceeded to fling his limbs about himself in some whimsical dance. His voice boomed in baritone:

‘tis blood I’m told

that perks the soul

with life entwined

upon the divine

As eternal epoch

Tick-tocks the clock

A jubilant lark

Springs forth from the dark!

Radiant lass

Of luminous class

Tonight we boast

To your beauty, a toast!

Arpage finished his recital by holding himself in position similar to that of a flamingo standing upon one foot and spreading its wings.

Bordeaux’s thin mouth curled at one corner before peeling open into a smirk of fangs, his hands clapping in slow applause.

“Very good sir,” he said. “The Lady will be most pleased.”

“Yes, Yes. Thank you, Master B. Yes,” stuttered Arpage. “But the length, sir. The length is not quite, hmm, long? As to its continuation, I find myself suffering from writer’s block! Oh woe! Oh the intolerable!”

“There there, my good friend. Patience, good citizen!” Bordeaux reassured, “You have plenty of time remaining until Libra’s birthday to complete your task! I merely arrived into your quarters to inquire on the progress!”

“You are kind, Bordeaux, sir.” Arpage rubbed his hands together. 

“There’s a good lad.”

The slit of Arpage’s mouth split open like a wound, his ghastly crooked teeth beamed in a sour and yellowed smile. A hesitant utterance escaped betwixt those two craggy rows before the corners of his mouth collapsed as if of exertion and his shoulders hunched ever further.

“Now now, Arpage, there’s no need to be uncivil. A few minutes of entertainment is all that is asked. Surely you can hide your tepid feelings towards this project behind tricky lyrics and giddy strains.”

Arpage was feebly indignant, throwing an arm into the air and turning his back to the demon visitor. “Sir, I am afraid that goes against all my musical instincts. I’m troubled, sir. Troubled, I say again! To conjure this, this,
piece
! This
piffle
! How can one summon passion to draw forth quality when one is so, so…”

“Indifferent?” offered Bordeaux.

“Indifferent! Marvellous, sir!”

The loquacious Arpage seemed set to roll off into another prattle, before Bordeaux silenced him with a finger to his lips and a hush. “My dear friend - confidentially, all of us are somewhat,
disinclined
, shall we say, towards the lofty importance Libra has placed upon her birthday. But need I remind you of her position in Tenebrae? It is she who keeps this night sky strong for us, only she knows the spell!”

“She could do something about this heat, surely.”

“Ha, my friend. Your churlishness amuses me. There are things we simply must withstand with Libra at our hierarchic zenith and her birthday is but once a year.”

“But Master B! Each year it is more! More and more she wants! I cannot keep up at this rate!”

Arpage was becoming flustered, stamping his feet like an unruly child.