Freiyon Fables: The Rochester Runes

October 5th, 2007, 2:32 pm. Rochester, England.

The sound of clashing practice swords filled the room as a group of teenagers of various ages practiced fencing together. The seven teachers took great care to make sure their students were taught the best moves of defense and attack, and would call out to another teen to replace a previous one that didn’t quite get it right.

Among the students were six teens that were watching and eagerly awaiting their turn at fencing. Three of these teens were siblings; Charles, Sarah and Robert Rochester. The three of them were having their last fencing class with their friends before the day they had to move. Next to them were their friends; Christina Rivers, Jasper Hardy and Joe Kilroy. Mostly, these three were friends with Charles, the youngest teen in the Rochester family. However, they didn’t mind hanging around Sarah and Robert and, quite often, would create puzzles and solve fake mysteries together to pass the long boring school classes. For Christina, Jasper and Joe, this was a good chance to be with their friends one last time before the Rochester kids moved to a new home. The Rochester family had lived for the past thirteen years in a small house located in Rochester, England, [no relation to their family name, honest] but today they were moving to their Grandparents’ old manor five suburbs away to the east. Charles was looking forward to it, while Robert and Sarah were completely opposed to the idea, especially since they were going to be home-schooled once they arrived. The two of them were feeling pretty down about the whole thing.

“Moving houses as a teenager is going to suck! I can just tell!” Robert groaned as they stared intently at the fencing classes going on in front of them. Joe looked at the three blonde siblings and felt a bit sad that they were moving. “And you definitely can’t stay behind or convince your mum to stay here?” Joe asked his dear friends. “’fraid not, guys. Mum couldn’t afford our place. Especially after what happened with our… err… you know.” Robert looked down at Charles, but was relieved to see Charles had more attention towards the fencing battle going on. The truth of the matter was that Charles had never met his father, since his father had vanished from the family a long time ago and was suspected of murder, although there was no proof of him being the murderer. Mary, The children’s mother, had divorced from the father three years after Charles had been born, which meant that Robert and Sarah could remember their father but Charles probably wouldn’t even recognize his father’s face. It was a bad situation, but the police kept Mary up to date on the father’s movements in case he screwed up again and it was made clear he was indeed a murderer.

The fencing teacher called upon Charles next, who jumped forward ready to show everyone how good he had gotten with the practice. “Does Charles not know at all about is father?” Jasper whispered to Robert.

“Sadly not, and mum has been trying to keep it that way in case it turns out he was actually a murderer. But the thing is… no-one knows for sure! And we try not to talk about it. Much like Sarah is trying to avoid talking about moving, ’cause I can sense she doesn’t want to move away from our other friends. You know how vain she can be.”

Charles started his fencing training against the teacher as his siblings and his friends all watched carefully.

Charles was very good at fencing, and Jasper remarked a fact to Robert.

“You know, if he were to be cast in a movie, Charles would be good as the swashbuckler pirate with the way he does certain moves.”

Robert nodded. “Yeah. He’s quite good! I mean so are we but I think Charles likes doing this more than we do.”

Christina turned to Sarah. “I hope you guys will still be able to contact us! We’ll be praying for your safety and for a good new home of course.” She said kindly.

As Charles and the fencing teacher continued to fight together, Sarah nodded to Christina. “Thanks, we appreciate that. But I really would prefer not to move. Have you seen the manor? It’s quite large. Mind you… could be interesting to have a horse if they allow us to own one there.” Sarah told Christina.

Suddenly there was a loud clash and everyone looked surprised to see that young Charles Rochester had managed to actually knock the fencing teacher to the floor and had pushed the fencing sword to one side. Everyone applauded Charles and the teacher got up and patted him on the back. “Well done Charles! The youngest to beat me in a fencing battle! 11 year old fencing winner how about that? Well done! Three cheers for Charles Rochester.”

The whole class erupted in congratulations as Jasper and Robert chuckled to each other. “You know he is going to be the only one that will like this move, right? He’ll probably not stop being excited about it.”

Robert nodded. “I can guarantee he’ll probably end up exploring everything in the mansion until the day we die.” Robert replied with a smirk.

The next morning, Charles’ early alarm clock woke him with a song he enjoyed immensely, and as he prepared himself for a new day he thought on the music and how it was always a good way to start the day. Charles turned and poked Sarah and Robert awake gently before running down-stairs to have breakfast. Mary was already awake and serving bacon and eggs. Charles chewed them down eagerly, feeling quite eager to see what moving to a new place was like, and once he was finished breakfast he then went to pack his stuff. His brother and sister had only just finished getting dressed in new clothes when Charles came back into the bedroom and started collecting his belongings.

Not wanting to listen to the music anymore, Robert and Sarah walked down to breakfast, leaving Charles alone to do his thing. Today, Charles decided, he was going to enjoy himself.

Everyone except Robert was crammed into Mary’s car, wincing in pain because of the furniture that was poking into shoulders or stomachs or other parts of their body. Sandra, the poor cat, was stuck in her cage yowling in discomfort, since cats hardly like car journeys. To drown out the noise of the cat, Mary Rochester was chatting continuously about how wonderful the manor was going to be. But when no-one said anything, she decided to drop the subject for a while. Sarah, though, started talking about herself.

“I like being a Rochester.” She brushed her hair back with her hand

“Why do you say that?” Mary asked, playing along.

“Not many kids have the same last name, makes me feel special.”

Charles rolled his eyes in annoyance, thinking to himself. ‘Just because you have a different last name, doesn’t make you less of an ugly sister.’

Truth be told, Sarah was actually rather pretty. With her blond, straight hair and her luscious green eyes, she could make boys her age (fifteen) fall head-over-feet for her. But, of course, being boys and brothers to her, it was sort of Charles’ job (and ALWAYS Robert’s job) to make Sarah feel worse. That’s just the way brothers and sisters work.

Twenty-minutes later, it had been Mary who started talking again.

“When we get there, I want you three to get everything out of the car as quickly as possible, because we still have things back at the house to get,”

After another twelve minutes, they finally arrived at the new place and Mary smiled as she pulled up the drive-way and stopped at the manor gates.

“Here we are at our new home. Huh, I just realized, this is only the second time you’ve been here, Charles. We really should have gone to see my parents more.” Mary stopped the car at the huge, manor gates, stepped out of the car and unlocked them, swinging them in and then hopping back into the car and driving through. A few seconds later, Robert appeared in his car and stopped to close the gates before following his mother’s car the rest of the way.

When Charles laid eyes on the manor he had only seen once before, his eyes lit up in fascination.

“Wow! I don’t remember it being this big before!”

Indeed it was big! The manor stood an astonishing 50 feet tall, 185 feet wide, and 40 feet in length, making the family feel as tiny as ants in comparison.

Robert stopped his car a few feet on the house side of the gates and turned the engine off. Mary did the same.

“Last time I was here, that same vine had only just started to grow!” Robert admired the manor as he popped out, immediately digging into his pocket for his mobile phone to take a picture.

“It sure looks creepy, I wonder how Grandma and Grandpa could stand living in this mess.” Sarah brushed a spider off her shirt before turning to Charles, who had also jumped out of their mother’s car.

“Then you two should get along just fine.”

“Nice one, Charlie! Come on, let’s find our bedrooms. If they have one with an awesome dragon picture of some kind, I am so moving into it!” Robert pumped his fists happily.

“Uh, you two are so DEAD!”

“Hey, you three! Destroy each other later; we’ve got unpacking to do. Oh, and Charles, after you’ve unpacked, could you start moving all those knights in shining armour out? I hate having the feeling they are watching us.” Mary unlocked the boot of her car and started pulling bags out, ignoring the kids’ foolishness.

“Hey mum, if I have my own room, does that mean I can have one of those horses too?” Sarah nodded towards the stables where some great stallions were munching happily on hay. Their mother shrugged and then burdened Charles and Robert with three bags per hand. As Charles, Robert and Sarah walked in with their bags, Charles murmured to Robert.

“Hey, how long do you reckon it will be before she starts screaming to move again?”

Robert sniggered. “For as long as her make-up stays untouched by spiders. Am I right, Charles? Hehehe!”

After some time, Charles had finished unpacking all of his stuff in his room and stood back to admire what was his new bedroom. “Surprising how little stuff I had that was actually MINE. Oh, sounds like mum has gone back to get more stuff. Well, better start getting rid of those soldier statues. I think I saw one in the living room next to the fire-place.”

Charles walked down to the living room, but bumped into Robert and Sarah along the way.

“You two found your perfect rooms yet?”

Sarah nodded, but Robert shook his head. “I’ve looked almost everywhere. This house is like a maze. I wanted to go to the third floor, and I somehow ended up in the garage. You can really lose yourself here,”

Charles nodded in agreement, and then turned around to continue downstairs.

“Just where do you think you’re going, Chump?” Robert grabbed Charles by the shoulders.

“I really wish you wouldn’t call me that, Robert. Look, mum asked me to do a job once I had finished with my stuff. So I have to go and do that.” Charles broke free of Robert’s grasp and ran off downstairs before Robert could think of any reasons to keep Charles there.

‘Huh! Lucky bugger! Why does he get an easier job?’ Robert turned to Sarah’s room and noticed Sarah looking at a picture in disgust.

“Hey, if you don’t want it, I’ll put it in my room. Waste not, want not Sarah.”

Meanwhile, down near the entrance to the manor, Charles was admiring the lounge-room where he had first seen one of the troublesome knight statues. His grandparents had tried hard to upgrade each part of the manor so that it blended in nicely with today’s lifestyle, but even so, the lounge-room still looked as creepy and as old as ever.

Charles loved the fact, straight away, that his grandparents had left a wide-screen T.V. behind. Charles looked at the silver knight statue and felt a shudder go through his body. Adventurous though he was, he didn’t like the idea of a knight that had no eyes but you had the feeling that it was still watching you.

‘Just don’t think about it, Charles. Close the helmet if you have to and look away from the general eye area whilst you’re carrying it.’

Charles bent down and pulled one of the knight’s legs off the floor. As it lifted up, he noticed that it had triggered a strange, grinding noise. He looked up, startled, and jumped back in surprise when he saw that, where the fire-place had been, there was now an empty, spider-filled, old tunnel leading somewhere else in the manor. Charles was fascinated and pulled out his ever-handy torch, shining it down the tunnel. He looked back up at where he had entered the room. ‘Mum won’t mind me exploring for a bit. Let’s see where this goes.’

As he walked along, he took note of the fact this tunnel hadn’t been used for ages; the smell was rancid and the dust was a nightmare. Eventually, however, he wondered if the tunnel was ever going to end. He could barely see three inches in front of him, even with the torch on. He stopped to catch his breath and was surprised at how quickly the spiders decided to come onto him. “Hey, get off me, you pesky things! Leave me alone!”

He tried to brush them off, but more continued to fill the space. Charles dashed away, tripping on a root and almost falling face-first. He placed a hand on the wall that had saved him from falling, and steadied himself. He looked up and was surprised to find he was staring at himself. Somehow or other, he had bumped straight into what looked like a mirror. There was only one thing about this mirror, though. The exact middle of the mirror had a huge imprint carved into it. Like something had been meant to be placed there. “Whoa! Talk about weird! Why on earth would a mirror be placed at the end of a tunnel?”

Charles ran his hand down the mirror, shivering from the coldness, watching the years of dust fall off. If only his friends, Christina Rivers, Jasper Hardy and Joe Kilroy could see this, they’d be ecstatic. He shrugged and was about to head back when he heard an eerie, strange voice.

"Charles. Open the closed, Charles. Find the lost and release the trapped."

He looked around, surprised. “Who’s there? How do you know my name?” He felt a little afraid, but at the same time inquisitive.

"Find the lost ... Open the closed ... walk into our world ... Charles ... Charles ...”

“CHARLES!!”

Charles swerved around in fright. “That was Sarah! That can’t be good!”

He ran back along the tunnel, startling some resting spiders, and then made his way to his sister’s new room. He jumped up the steps two-by-two and skidded to a stop at the bedroom door.

“Sarah what’s happen ...? Oh my god! What happened, Robert?”

Charles tried to take the scene in quickly. There was Robert on the floor with a stab in his leg the size of a bullet hole, and a discarded arrowhead next to him, with blood on it.

Sarah looked at Charles with relief. “Charles, you’ve got to help me get him down-stairs. There’s an ambulance coming to help him out, but I think the arrow may have been poisonous. Look at his face, he’s gone blue!”

Charles knelt down next to Robert and supported Robert’s head.

“Charles ... Tell mum ... the house ... is boob ... booby ... Aaah! Watch the leg, Sarah!” Robert winced as his brother and sister carried him down to the drive-way, where there was an ambulance waiting for them. The two men that eventually came out and inspected Robert’s leg confirmed to Sarah that the arrow had not been poisonous.

“You will have to be careful while taking target practice from now on, but thankfully the wound isn’t fatal.” One of the drivers commented, after Sarah told them a deliberate lie of the event. They both told Charles and Sarah that Robert was going to be ok, as long as he didn’t use his left leg for a while. Robert was wheeled back inside, placed in the lounge-room, and then the ambulance drivers left. All that was shown for their arrival was the bandage around Robert’s leg, their tracks on the drive-way, and the bill Sarah knew she would have to show to their mother as soon as she got back. When Robert was comfortable and the other two got a chance to chat to each other quietly, Sarah explained what had happened. “Robert was taking some pictures that were hanging in my room to his own. I thought they were too creepy, so he recommended him having them. Anyway, he got to the fourth picture and was taking it off the wall when an arrow shot out of the wall to our left and got him straight in the leg. He dropped the picture and fell to the floor, and that’s when I saw it.”

“Saw what?” Charles asked.

Sarah took Charles’ hand and took him back to her bedroom. “There, where the hole in the wall is. Have a look.”

Charles walked over and glanced into the hole, spotting a small box with a key-lock.

He retrieved it and shrugged. “It’s just a small, locked chest. Why’s that so important that it would be booby-trapped?”

Sarah pulled out something from her pocket and placed it in the lock.

“You have the key?” Charles was slightly surprised.

“’Course not,” Sarah said, fiddling with the lock. “This is known as the hair-pin trick. It actually works.” Suddenly, the lock sprang open. “Ah, there we go. Let’s see what’s inside.”

Charles stopped Sarah from opening the box.

“Maybe we shouldn’t. After all, Robert was hurt because he tried to move the picture that hid this.”

Sarah shrugged. “You want an adventure, don’t you?”

“Well ...”

“Well, what’s the best way of having an adventure? Ignoring the chance, or taking it on no matter the consequences?”