Chapter 3: An Odder Feeling

The ride back was easy and uneventful. Johnathan let Ginny stray at the stream for a few moments in the darkness, cooling her hooves and taking a drink. He wanted to get home, but was in no rush.

Seeing the lights of the manor house raise out of the darkness before him, Johnathan let out a breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

Manson had been right, there was little of value to be had with that Victor Robenson. Best to leave him to his own devices.

Leading Ginny back to her stable, Johnathan only now realized just how tired he was. Dinner had been held late, it had to be close to eleven by now. Not that Johnathan was a stranger to the wee hours of the morning, but he was out of practice at being up at this time.

A few moments spared to make sure Ginny was well taken care of and Johnathan was only too happy to begin the short walk back to the manor.

Stepping up to the back kitchen door, it opened for him before he could even lay a finger upon the handle.

"It's good to have you back, young master." Manson's voice was smooth and dignified, but there was a definite edge to it that betrayed his concern. "I trust everything went well?"

Manson ushered him into the kitchen where Johnathan took a grateful seat at the table and warmed his hands over the dieing embers of the range. The summer night was warm, but not that warm.

"I'm afraid to report that I shan't be funding good Doctor Robenson's research." Johnathan had to fight to keep the smile from his face as Manson let out an audible sigh of relief. "You were right," Johnathan said, shaking his head. "What was it that told you so?"

Manson walked slowly around the table, pulling out a rag to buff the already clean surface. "It would be inappropriate for me to say, sir."

Johnathan rolled his eyes. "Come on now, spit it out. No one likes a smug winner. You had it right. How did you ever know?"

Manson paused for a long moment before turning from him.

"It's all in the way they treat the staff, sir." Did Johnathan hear just the slightest of a chuckle from the man? "It's a rule as old as time itself. Your parents knew it well. It was often your father would have dealings with a man that was proper and polite to his face and in all his apparent dealings, but mark my words, if they were unrefined to any of the staff your father would hear about it. He never once dealt with a man who treated the staff badly and didn't at some point betray him as well."

Johnathan sat for a moment, staring bleary at the red coals.

"He never told me that."

Manson shrugged. "He would have had no reason to. It was not a tactic he advertised. It would have lost it effectiveness once it became well known. We were servants, sir. To those above us we simply don't exist. Your father never went out of his way to ask us our opinions of a prospective business partner, but he was always sure to get it one way or another."

"And in any event, sir," Manson continued, "you have little reason to be concerned with such a test yourself. I've never known you to treat the staff poorly, your learned as much from your parents. They were once no more than mere staff themselves."

Johnathan let out a long sigh. "I'm starting to think the plan of investing my parent's money is going to be more challenging than I'd at first thought. How did they do it so well?"

Manson chuckled slightly. "You only saw your parents later in life, after they'd already had decades to become experienced. And even then you only tended to notice their successes. Dare I say that your parents were undoubtedly successful, they were not without fault. The," He paused for a moment and coughed, "Doctor may simply be one of those poor choices."

Johnathan smiled. "We can agree on that now. I just wish I knew how they did it. They hadn't any of the advantages in life, but yet they managed to work for what they knew was right. Father never did tell me how he battled his way up from the deepest depths of the Scottish coal mines to go toe to toe with the pit bosses and demand a better living."

Manson took a moment to chuckle softly. "Neither did he I, sir. That was shortly before I met him. Your esteemed father had already made a name for himself by the time he began to seek out a valet. I only became acquainted with him when he encountered my previous master. A Sir Chomwell. While I will never speak discouragingly of any man who has employed my services, I and Sir Chomwell and his family... were not in full agreement in all things. It was then that I handed in my notice to them and took pains to follow your father to his next port of call. As I remember it," Manson raised a finger to his lips, "Your father was not even convinced that he was in need of a man in his service."

Johnathan laughed. "And how did he survive without you? The stories I've heard suggest he would have been lost in high society without your skills."

Manson glanced away, just the slightest shade of red touching his cheeks. "You grant me too much favour. Your father was a capable man, more than able to look after himself. He would have been able to adapt to the upper echelons of society given time, I simply guided him, helped him avoid the most common - yet invisible - pitfalls, nothing he couldn't have done himself."

Johnathan smiled, but a moment later his face was split by a yawn.

"In any event, it looks this might be a good time to turn in."

Manson nodded. "Understood, sir. I'll just prepare the house for night."

Johnathan waved him off. "Never mind that. You've been awake at least as long as I have. I'll handle turning out the lights, you can head off."

"But, sir..."

Johnathan shooed him away, almost pushing him through the door.

"Go on, get. I'm the master of the house now and I might as well act like one for a change."

It was a few moments before Johnathan could get Manson to move on, and only then after a long and drawn out goodnight. To be honest, Johnathan was more than happy to see him gone. He'd never wish the man away, but it was nice to have the house to himself for at least a little while.

The long, wood panelled hallways of the manor looked almost alien in the night. Johnathan had spent more than enough years growing up here, but they seemingly been so long ago. Now the shadows and creaking joints of the building seemed to be something far more than simply another man made construction.

Stepping up to the first gas light, one in the kitchen, he reached up to twist the small knob on the side to kill the flow.

The flame burnt out a moment later, changing from a bright yellow glow to a dull and flickering burnt rose as the last of the heat was wicked off into the night.

The sudden darkness was near breathtaking.

Suddenly blind, Johnathan lifted his hands before him and felt his way out into the hallway. Light again, there was another gas lamp here. He killed it too in time.

Working his way up one hallway and down the next, a circuit of the house was finished in short order. The manor was a large building, but not so great in size when one had a destination. It was possible to go round and round in circles, but there were only so many corridors.

The lights in most of the rooms were already extinguished, but the exception was the library to the west of the house.

A large, two story room, the library was ringed in bookshelves, all of them full to bursting.

Unfortunately, Johnathan knew for a fact that many of the books had been inherited from the previous owners of the home. While that might not necessarily be a bad thing in the best of circumstances, it was unfortunate here.

The previous owners had been forced to sell the manor as their fortunes had declined, one of those reasons had perhaps been their choice of reading.

While there were hundreds of books held in this room, only a small fraction of them were worthy of the name. The vast majority of the volumes here were empty.

Bound in the finest leather and fabrics, the stately books sat upon the shelves, doing little more than collecting dust. Nothing sat between their covers but spotless vellum.

It was one of the many mysteries of the house when Johnathan had been growing up. He'd once, long ago when he believed in such things, imagined that the books were in fact collections of magic spells. Great gremorums, Johnathan had once dreamed that they were written in an invisible hand, only waiting for the right incantation to once again share their secrets.

With a laugh Johnathan pulled down one of his favourite volumes from a high shelf. The spine read Unknown Mysteries of the World. It, like all the others, was blank from cover to cover. Despite the books unusual size and heft it was absolutely empty.

Johnathan could remember one sorry day when he, no more than ten at the time, had dragged the book to his father who sat reading in front of a warm fire.

He'd asked if the book was literal. If science had answered all the questions in the world, if there were no more mysteries left, if that was why the great book was empty. Then, after enduring his father's soft laughter, Johnathan had tried again to work his young mind. His next question had been if it was that a book could not be of the unknown, if writing them in such a book would in fact make them known.

His father had simply reached down and lifted the book easily from Johnathan's grasp with his huge miner's arms.

Johnathan had not received an answer that day. It was not until far later that he realized just why the book with such an intriguing title had been empty.

But those books were of no interest to Johnathan tonight. Pushing onward to the far corner of the room, there was a single bookcase that was far less crowed than the rest. This was the corner that the Pennyfare's had made their own.

Johnathan's father had carried few books, being of poor birth and travelling most of his life it had been intractable to carry such things on the road. His mother on the other hand had brought most of them with here.

The modest collection numbered no more than a hundred volumes but covered such things as the sciences, history, and economic theories.

The last of those had been, by far, his parents most read.

Reaching out to run his hands over the dogeared book, Johnathan couldn't bring himself to pull it down. The library was exactly as his parents had left it. No servants had come in here to clean, nothing had been straightened away.

Letting out a long sigh, Johnathan took the three strides to stand before the small reading table that sat between the windows and fireplace, directly under the still bright gas light. It was strategically placed to collect the light from all three so as to be able to be used at any time of the day or night.

The book that still sat open was an accounting of the British Empire and her colonies.

Much of the book was of little interest to Johnathan, but the thought that either his mother or father had been reading it not hours before they'd been so quickly taken from his was enough to bid him to sit down before it.

The paper was dry and rough, but a bookmark held the place.

Forcing a tear back, it was all Johnathan could do to scan down the passages, lists of number of how much had been brought back to Mother England from the Colonies.

That had been his parents next goal. They'd fought for years to improve the lives of their fellow Englishmen that they'd recently expanded their horizons to wonder for the lives of those who resided outside their boarders. The efforts had not always gained them friends, but it had also gained them few enemies. His parent's actions were not to fight off those on top, but rather show them that they could emulate the great work of men such as Hershey.

Forcing his eyes to focus, Johnathan flipped the page, then again. This was what his parents had been doing when they had been taking away, and it was what he would continue.

When Johnathan next awoke he found himself sprawled forward over the book, his head cradled in his arms.

With a start he pulled back, but the damage was already done. The brittle pages of the book had been folded and torn. The damage was hardly insurmountable, but merely looking down at it was enough to make his heart break.

Lurching unsteadily to his feet, Johnathan staggered to a small nearby garden door.

Pressing his way out into the night, he could hear the pell of far away thunder as it echoed through the trees.

There were dark clouds crawling through the sky above him, but no rain fell.

Cocking his head, Johnathan could make out something that he'd never once been able to hear from his childhood.

The sounds of the village Hammerwood.

They were faint, but he could hear them. The town was bigger than it had been when he was a child, and more active, but not by that much. Yet he could just make out the faint sound of people and horses on the light night breeze.

Shaking his head, he composed himself and walked forward a few feet on the grass, the dew staining the hems of his trousers.

Try as he might he simply could not feel truly at home here anymore. This wasn't his. This was the home of his parents, not his own. There was little he could do to overshadow their presence upon the estate. He knew well enough that many of the things he saw, the manor, the garden, even the very shape of the grounds was less his parent's than it was those who came before them, but all he knew right now was that they were not his.

"Damn it all," he whispered under his breath. "I won't let them die. Not like this."

Spinning on toe, he turned back towards the house.

"This isn't what was supposed to happen. They did more in a year than I'm likely to do in my life."

Stepping back into the empty library, it was all Johnathan could do not to slam the door behind him, mindful of those who slept nearby.

With a savage twist he turned out the gas light. Its flame didn't even have a chance to sputter as he cut of its supply of fuel in an instant.

The rest of the lights on the way back to Johnathan's bedchamber fared little better. It was all Johnathan could do not to twist the fixtures from the very wall.

Stepping into his chambers, Johnathan's coat, waistcoat, trousers, shoes and all other clothing were quickly reduced to little more than a pile on the floor. He normally took pains to hang them neatly on a chair to be picked up for washing the next morning, but his heart simply wasn't in it.

The night was warm enough to sleep without bed clothes, no matter how indecent such a thought might be.

Staring out at the window next to his bed, Johnathan's last thoughts before slipping to sleep were of the waxing moon so very far away.

Johnathan's dreams were troubled that night. Not an odd occurrence for him since the death of his parents, but instead of the of the reoccurring images of his parents being trod under hoof of a run away carriage horse, the images were of a new nature.

Seeing the globe from far above, like a man in a balloon would if they could soar up beyond the sky, Johnathan could see all of land spread out beneath him as a great map.

Forests and rivers merged together as the edged upon deserts and mountains, all of them hedged in by the sea.

The sea itself was alive with ships rushing back and forth on the unending currents. They sprang forth from the ports of England, clogging Dover and Plymouth, pressing out in all directions.

On path, however, was far busier than the others. It dove south from England, pressing past the horn of Africa to loop back up on a long and perilous journey to find itself finally safe in distant India.

Johnathan had never been to the exotic land, but he could see it clear as day, smell the spice of the jungle and hear that alien calls of those who lived there.

He had just begun to focus on the land when his view was ripped away, forced back to the world as a whole. But now there was someone with him.

To his side, floating in the ether but yet still grounded as solid as stone was the majestic English lion.

He stood on four feet and ware no crown but his mane of gold.

Only once had Johnathan see a true lion in the flesh. The symbol was to be see all over the country, but the only living specimen to make Johnathan's acquaintance had been years ago.

The creature that stood beside him now bore little resemblance to the old and bone thin creature Johnathan had caught a fleeting glimpse of through thick iron bars.

Knowing the animal beside him to be a beast, some small part of Johnathan's mind screamed to pull back and run, but the unreality of the situation held him in check.

The two of them stood there, nearly as still as stone, nothing but their gentle breathing to betray the life in their bodies as they stood above the world, surrounded in stars.

"Why am I here?" Johnathan's voice was weak, seeming to be consumed by the ether the moment he spoke.

The lion slowly turned his head to him, blinking his eyes wearily as if to ask 'You don't know?'

A moment later the beast raised a forepaw. Thrusting it forward he set the now impossibly huge paw flatly over all of England and the the isles, covering them completely and perfectly.

A slight grunt escaped the lion's throat.

Lifting his other paw the lion set it far more carefully over India.

This time the sound that escaped the best was more raw. Not a grunt of exertion but a cry of pain.

One of the creature's rear paws lifted now to settle across Australia. The sound that escaped the lions lips was a howl.

His last paw came to settle across the sea, landing on the huge expanse of Canada.

To this the lion made no sound.

Stepping forward ever so carefully, Johnathan's knelt to see the lion's face. It was a twisted mask of agony as the creature struggled to maintain it stance, spreading itself to the four corners of the world.

There was a strength there, no doubt. The creature had a more than admirable soul to stretch so thinly, but it could not keep itself stable for long.

Reaching out a hand, Johnathan tried to stroke the creature's back, it provide some, if little comfort.

The creature's fur was soft and neat, the perfect image of what such a powerful best should be, yet Johnathan could feel the muscles trembling underneath.

"Why do you insist on doing this?" asked Johnathan.

The creature's only response was to bare its teeth and let loose of growl of indignation.

Pulling back, Johnathan could suddenly see other creatures hanging in the ether. A bull hovered over Spain, spreading its hovers where it could, and a black eagle over Germany was suspended motionless.

None of the creatures covered as much land as the English lion, yet they too seemed stretched to the breaking point, faces pulled in pain as the very earth beneath them tried to push them away.

"You can't hold this," Johnathan said, turning to the lion, "and what does it bring you? Glory? Gold? You stretch and push so hard to bring land under your shadow only to find yourself rushing to keep ahead of others doing the same."

With a sudden lunge the lion snapped forward, clamping its huge fangs around Johnathan's shoulder.

Screaming, it took a moment for Johnathan to realize that the teeth, plunged deep into his flesh as they were, caused no pain.

Lifting his free hand up to stroke the lion's head, he tried to pry apart the beast's jaws. It was to no avail.

Johnathan could still feel the creature's fangs within him, pushing deeper, and nothing he could do would change that.

"Why?" Was the only word that came to his lips.

He never got an answer. A moment later the beast tossed its massive head, with Johnathan still held fast, and thew him down towards the globe far below.

In the blink of an eye he was hurtling once again downward, back towards home. The lion had disappeared from above him.

Sitting up in bed, coated with a cold sweat, it took everything Johnathan had not to cry out.

Heart beating out a frantic rhythm, Johnathan gasped for breath as his hands tightened on the bedsheets.

That, he wasn't ashamed to admit, was something he'd never experienced before.

Johnathan had carried few dreams of note over his life, and the nightmares had only begun after his parent's death, but that had been most unlike anything he'd ever imagined.

Glancing out the nearby window, it was soothing to his eyes to focus on the distant horizon. It was a dark purple, only the faintest hint of the sun's quickly approaching rose.

Wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of a hand, Johnathan stopped dead.

Lowering his hands before his eyes, he was surprised to find their backs covered with a fine blond hair, most unlike the brown hair he was more accustomed to.

Odd... but not impossible. Johnathan's mother had possessed the most striking blond hair...

Putting the thought out of his mind, Johnathan got out of bed and stepped into the slippers that sat next to the bed.

The floors in the manor could be cool first thing in the morning, despite the summer month. Everything here was wood, thank god, not stone like some of the even older houses and castles. He never could understand just how people managed to live in such things.

A quick shake to wake himself up and Johnathan was ready to prepare for the day. Manson's touch was obvious in the chamber.

While it would have been more reasonable for the chamber maids to clean and prepare the room, Manson's obsession to duty prevented any such thing from happening. The man made sure that it was he, and only he, that cleaned Johnathan's private chambers.

A wash basin had been brought in last night and set up against the wall on a table under the mirror.

Lifting the lid from the basin, Johnathan lowered himself to the water and splashed it on his face. It was cold, but that just did more to wake him.

Taking the provided razor and shaving power that sat next to the basin Johnathan began the long and tedious process of shaving.

He'd never been particularly good at this. It always seemed to take him forever, yet when he rushed the only result was yet another cut to mark his face for the remainder of the day.

Done up in an imposing mane of white soap suds Johnathan whetted the razor and began. The long, slow rustle-hiss of the razor trimming parts of him away seemed louder than usual.

At first the only other sound to come to his ears was the call of birds outside the nearby closed window, but that changed.

Having nothing better to do as he let his hands absently perform the daily ritual Johnathan was able to make out more and more in the household.

Manson must be awake. Johnathan could just make out his long, slow footsteps somewhere far below. So must be the lower house maid. She doubled as the cook, and Johnathan could make out the scents of breakfast plain as day. The upstairs maid was also already up, her soft footfalls rained down on the carpet outside on the landing.

Carving away the last of the soap suds, Johnathan bent down to once again rinse his face. For just a moment he caught his reflection in the water.

Startling back, he had to grab at the table to keep from overbalancing. The sound of the wood rattling felt deafening.

"What..."

Looking into the mirror again, Johnathan looked at his face. Something had been... wrong.

But yet the twenty-seven year old face that stared back at him from the mirror was his own, the one he'd seen every day of his life.

Steadying his heart for yet another time, Johnathan had to laugh.

"One bad dream and I'm starting at shadows." He flicked the towel he'd dried himself with at the mirror. "Let's not go down that path. I've enough troubles on my list without having to add paranoia to it."

Stepping from his chambers, it was still early in the morning, the sun barely having crested the horizon. Many of the gas lights had been relit to banish the gloom until the day had fully arrived.

Down the main stairway, Johnathan didn't see a soul.

That was odd. At least one of the staff was almost always waiting for him here once they heard him rise. If not Manson than one of the others.

It was of no consequence. Johnathan was awake far earlier than normal, they were all likely going about their duties. No reason for him to disturb them.

Stepping into the back parlour, Johnathan took a moment to pull the curtains back from the windows. There was little light to let in yet, but being able to see the open land made him feel better.

This was the room of the manor Johnathan held the fondest memories of, save perhaps the library.

A smallish room, it had originally been little more than yet another drawing room before the Pennyfare's had taken over the home. His mother had redecorated the entire space, nothing but the flooring was left from the previous owners.

As a result the parlour was an oddity in the otherwise prim and fashionable house. It looked like someone had imported an entire room, complete with wallpaper, from a northern mining town.

Which, as the facts go, was rather close to the truth.

Both Johnathan's parents had come from the north, and this space was a testament to that. Few people ever entered this crowded, rather plain room.

Dark blue wallpaper with silver stripes, an ageing overstuffed chesterfield, and a host of small family portraits resting on a table that Johnathan's father had made himself, this space was not for outsiders.

Whenever the Pennyfares needed to entertain there were more than enough proper rooms to do so in. There were far too many proper rooms in this home by Johnathan's measure. Rooms for meeting guests, throwing parties, even a gazebo out in the garden for reciting poetry. This was the only room in the whole house for truly living.

And, Johnathan was somewhat alarmed to discover after all this time, it still smelled of his parents.

He'd only just had a moment to find himself a comfortable seat when Manson bustled through the door.

The motions were so unlike the man that Johnathan was convinced that for a moment it must not be him.

Manson moved slowly and gracefully, the years weighing heavy on him until there was a near perfect economy of action. The man who burst into the room now with a duster and cloth moved twenty years younger.

It wasn't until he saw Johnathan that he stopped dead.

"Young master!" His voice was cut short as he forced it down into the more familiar drawn out tones, "I, ahem, wasn't expecting to see you so early."

Cocking his head slightly, Johnathan noticed Manson holding his cleaning tools behind his back like they were a shame.

"I woke up before normal." Johnathan shrugged. "Nothing of note." He gestured towards the duster that Manson still tried in vain to hide. "Why are you doing the work of the maids? Shouldn't they be the ones cleaning? I thought you just supervised them."

There was just the slightest twitch to Manson's lips. "This, sir, is another of the few rooms that I do not permit them in. It was your parent's personal sanctum, and I hold it dear even after their passing."

Johnathan laughed. "You needn't be so overdrawn. The room is personal, yes, but that's no reason to make it a mysterious retreat that only us few can enter. If it comes to that I could just as well clean the place."

Manson pulled back with a look of near horror on his face. "That would never do! As long as I am in your service you shan't be forced into such base actions."

Johnathan broke out in laughter, tears nearly streaming from his eyes. "Base action? Truly, Manson? By god, now I know why I've never felt the equal to my parents, I'm not! They grew up mining coal and sewing dresses, living a salt of the earth life. What have I done? I can't even keep my own home in order! See here," with a quick pounce Johnathan leapt forward to nab the duster from Manson's hand, "you do enough work as it is. I can afford to spend some of my oh so precious time learning how to at least live for myself."

With that Johnathan began poking the feather duster about the furniture and knickknacks of the room.

Only to knock over a small china statuette a moment later.

The fall from the table wasn't far, but it was enough to shatter the small figure into a hundred pieces.

"Oh bother." Manson was down on one knee next to it a moment later. "That was your mother's keepsake from her visit to Essex two years ago."

Placing the duster back to Manson's waiting hand, Johnathan sat back, dejected.

"Well," his laugh now was not so bright, "it seem that someone like me can't even perform the most basic of tasks."

"Never you mind, sir." Manson stood back up, the shards of the figure in his hands, "I don't believe your mother cared for the statuette much anyway."

"It's not that..."

Manson smiled, "I understand, sir." He paused for a moment as he unceremoniously dumped the broken china in a bin. Placing a finger along his nose, he turned back towards Johnathan. "Your parents made a choice in your upbringing, sir. It's not that you can't, but only that you've lived a life different than us, been trained in different things."

Johnathan rolled his eyes. "Right. They work to make a difference in the world and I go off to learn how to become a barrister. Some difference I'll make. I've spent more time in pubs talking to the sons of rich barons that I have helping anyone."

Manson cocked an eyebrow. "And what were you talking to them about, sir? If I don't miss my guess there was no little conversation about your parent's work, their goals. And won't those sons some day grow up to become barons themselves? And," he paused for a moment, eyes flicking to the seats that Johnathan mother and father had most often used, "would a barrister not be a perfect position to help those who need it? And would a kind hearted and honest man not be a perfect candidate, in time, to become a judge? A man of common birth would have difficulty gaining access to the upper echelons of power in the country, someone born into wealthy surroundings would find less of an impediment."

Johnathan threw up his hands. "You make it sound like my birth was nothing more than a master plan, like my parents have manipulated me my entire life, even from beyond the grave!"

Manson shook his head. "Hardly, sir. Your parents were dedicated to helping those they could, but they would never have sacrificed you to those ends. They simply saw a larger picture of the world."

Johnathan rolled his eyes.

"But in any event, sir," Manson stepped closer, looking at Johnathan critically, "are you quite alright this morning? You look a bit overdrawn. Would you like me to call a doctor?"

"No, no," Johnathan waved him away, "I'm perfectly fine, just a rough evening last night with that odd fellow Victor. Nothing to be concerned about."

"Very well, sir," Manson took a step back and opened the nearby door, "If you like I can have an early breakfast prepared for you. The staff have already eaten and there is still enough food left if you don't mind a simpler fare than normal."

Johnathan smiled. "That would be quite alright, Manson. I've gotten used to the less extravagant fare over the last few years. The pubs in London don't serve that much first thing in the morning, and I'm quite frankly appalled just how much effort you go through every day simply to feed me."