A chill, colder than the late autumn air seeping through the manor’s ancient stones, seized Elara. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic bird trapped within a cage of bone and fear. A violent shudder convulsed her frame, threatening to betray the carefully constructed calm she wore like a second skin. All she craved was for the floorboards to cleave open, for the very foundations of Ashwood Manor to swallow her whole into its silent, secret depths. Yet, a flicker of Elara’s inherent practicality, a sliver of her ingrained survival instinct, pierced through the terror. Her gaze, though wide and unfocused moments ago, sharpened on the man before her. “Mr. Blackwood,” she managed, the name a whisper against the vast silence of the room. “Arthur Blackwood.” No movement. Only the rhythmic, unnervingly heavy breathing from the bed. A dry swallow constricted her throat. “You… you don’t seem to be entirely well, Mr. Blackwood.” Her hand, a pale, trembling thing, floated towards the velvet pull-cord beside the bed, meant to summon the night nurse. “I shall call for Dr. Finch.” When Elara or Mrs. Gable were otherwise occupied—tending to the manor’s crumbling needs, or away on urgent errands into the village—the medical staff hired by Arthur’s brother, Julian, were expected to be perpetually vigilant. Dr. Finch, an old man with perpetually worried eyes, and Nurse May, a woman whose efficiency bordered on the ruthless, were always on standby. They accessed this isolated wing of the manor through a back door, disguised within the recent, hastily constructed addition to the second floor. They had, so far, discharged their duties with silent diligence, overseeing Arthur’s physical care, maintaining the complex machinery that whirred softly in the corner of the room. Elara’s own responsibility was singular, and far more insidious. She was to keep Arthur Blackwood within these walls, under her watchful eye, until the true culprit of his condition was brought to justice. And by ‘justice,’ Julian meant something far more absolute than any court of law. A memory, sharp and cold as a shard of glass, pierced her carefully maintained composure. The day Julian had laid out his chilling demands. It had been a blur of desperation and coercion. She had known so little of Arthur Blackwood then, beyond his name and the hushed rumors of his family’s immense wealth and formidable influence. The swiftness with which this entire wing had been added, almost overnight, was testament enough to their power. “It would not be difficult for me to see you painted as a murderer, Miss Vance.” Julian’s words, spoken with the silkiness of a viper, resonated in her mind now, causing a shiver to trace a path down her spine. The chill wasn't from the room's temperature, but from the bone-deep dread those words still evoked. She had never felt such crushing helplessness. Not even when she stood before the local constabulary, trying to explain the unexplainable. Her report of finding a gravely injured man on the desolate moorland path bordering Ashwood, of witnessing a shadowy figure flee into the pre-dawn mist, had been met with cold skepticism. By the time the officers arrived, the moor was empty, save for the wind whistling its mournful tune. They had fined her for making a false report, dismissed her story as hysteria, as the overactive imagination of a young woman living too long in isolation. “Either you’ve lost your mind, Miss Vance,” one burly officer had sneered, “or Mr. Blackwood’s world is a far more dangerous place than you can possibly conceive.” The implication was clear: she was mad, or she was lying. Once, in a surge of defiant courage, she had considered attempting to visit Inspector Thorne at the county seat. But before she could even formulate a plan, Julian’s voice, smooth and deceptively cordial, had come through the telephone line. He had merely called to ‘check on her welfare,’ he’d claimed. An hour later, a message had arrived: a stark photograph of Julian Blackwood, arm draped casually over Inspector Thorne’s shoulder, both men smiling. The message was unspoken, yet utterly clear. She cursed the day her path had tragically intersected with theirs, with the sprawling, suffocating web of the Blackwood family. There was nothing she could do. Her mind, usually so keen and resourceful, felt like a stagnant pond, incapable of finding an escape. Worse, she had given up long ago, before the fight had truly begun. All she could do was pray, with every fiber of her being, that Arthur Blackwood would remain in his profound, death-like slumber. Alas. There he was. Awake. His eyes, dark and unfathomable, fixed upon her. That stare was not something she would ever, under any circumstance, classify as comfortable. At that moment, her mind screamed one solitary directive: never, ever bark at the wolf who holds your collar. And so, to avoid rotting in some grimy prison cell on a fabricated charge, she had to ensure the 'murderer' – the man who was in fact the victim, yet for whom she was being forced to serve as protector – was in ‘good hands.’ Her hands. A bitter irony that twisted her stomach. “Mr. Blackwood,” Elara began again, taking a deep, shuddering breath, fighting his unnerving gaze. Her voice was steady now, a testament to her years of practice at outward composure. “I understand you must be terribly confused, having just woken. But I will explain everything, slowly. Please, allow me to step back. And perhaps you might sit up fully.” Instead, Arthur Blackwood did the exact opposite of what she requested. As if drawn by an invisible thread, he lowered his upper body further, bringing his face closer to hers. His massive shadow fell across the bed, consuming the small pool of gaslight and plunging Elara into a sudden, disorienting gloom. An unfamiliar warmth, close and oppressive, pressed against Elara’s back where his arm now rested, pinning her. In that silent, suffocating moment, the tip of his nose brushed her nape. “What… what the—!” The scream tore from Elara’s throat, raw and involuntary, a desperate sound against the thick silence. Arthur Blackwood did not budge. His grip remained firm. He buried his face deeper, inhaling the scent of her, like a wild, lost animal discovering a familiar, if unsettling, trace. His hot breath tickled her skin, raising goosebumps along her arms. “Stop making such a racket,” his voice was rough, a low rasp that vibrated against her ear. “Answer my questions.” Elara swallowed a lump of pure terror that had formed in her throat. She nodded, a quick, jerky motion, desperate to appease whatever nascent impulse now gripped him. “Did you lock me up?” “What?” Elara looked at him, bewildered. The unexpected question, delivered in such a strange, almost polite tone, threw her completely off balance. *Arthur Blackwood, what kind of life did you live? And why is he speaking so… formally?* “Or,” he continued, his voice softer, yet no less menacing, “did *I* lock *you* up?” Her fear, for a fleeting moment, vanished, replaced by the sheer absurdity of his query. She shook her head, a flicker of genuine frustration breaking through her terror. “Absolutely not! What sort of woman do you take me for?” “It is I who is asking the questions here,” he stated, his dark eyes narrowing slightly. “Why am I here?” This time, his voice was strangely sweet, laced with an unnerving, almost childlike innocence that she found deeply unsettling. His polite question was no less than a threat to her, a veiled promise of pain if she failed to satisfy him. Was it because she already knew his true, cruel nature? His tone, though deceptively gentle, pressured her. It demanded an answer. “You are merely a patient, Mr. Blackwood,” she managed, her voice recovering its composure. “You have woken after a very long sleep.” A heavy silence descended, thick and suffocating. She felt the weight of his gaze, the unblinking intensity. Elara knew it fell upon her shoulders to convince him, to keep him calm, to navigate this treacherous new landscape. This was the bare minimum she had to do to save her life. “It is, absolutely, not a dangerous situation,” she insisted, her voice carefully modulated. “Please, calm yourself.” The man, who had been breathing heavily, his chest rising and falling with an almost primal rhythm, slowly regained a more normal pace. Perhaps her words had, indeed, reached him, found some purchase in his confused state. Since the day Julian Blackwood had thrust her into this gilded prison, Elara had prayed for Arthur to remain in his vegetative state. He should never have woken. Things would become impossibly complicated now, in countless unforeseen ways, as this murderer—this man of known cruel and selfish nature—began to stir and move at his own will. She was not ready. She could never be ready. “But why are you trembling so?” His hoarse voice, a low rasp, scraped against her ears, dragging her violently from her spiraling thoughts. Did she detect the merest tinge of a smirk playing on his lips? He leaned in even closer. “Did you do something wrong to me?” “N… no?” Her eyes widened, unable to believe the audacious innocence in his voice, the chilling implication. The strength pressing her body, the unseen wall that had held her pinned, vanished in an instant. Her body lurched, turning over roughly like a discarded doll as he grasped her by the shoulders. Her heart, already a frantic drum, began to pound with renewed, terrifying force. She could feel the vibrations of it in her very bones. He brought his face dangerously, intimately close to hers. So close she could feel the faint tremor of his breath, could see the dark depths of his eyes reflecting the dim gaslight, like twin abysses. The air crackled with unspoken menace.

The Waking Nightmare