"Who was that? The voice sounded like familiar, but I can't remember who it is. Why does it feel so familiar?"
As Lucian was wondering about the faint voice calling his name, he noticed that there was something written on the bottom of the handkerchief with sitches.It had become quite old and nearly worn away but he manage to make out the words"šššššš", his name was written on the bottom of the handkerchief.
"Hmmm I guess it really was meant for me" Lucian thought to himself and turn to Mary "Is there anything else you can tell me?". Mary sadly shook her head and said with a sad tone" I am afraid not,Young master. This is all I had heard about her from the previous maid".
Lucian offered an encouraging smile, telling Mary, "There's no need to be sad, Mary. You were very helpful." He didn't want to alarm her by mentioning the whisper just now. But as he looked down on the old cloth his finger tightened around the handkerchief - the single fragment of girl erased from his memories.
Lucian carefully folded the handkerchief, its rough, old texture a strange anchor to his unknown past. The faint, sweet scent of lavender still clung to the fabric like a ghost of a perfume from long ago.
"Thank you again, Mary," he said, his voice gentle but firm, a stark contrast to the different thoughts swirling inside him. He gave his farewell to the maid, then turned and went straight to the heavy oak desk in his study room, he cleared a space among the scattered papers, and carefully laid the handkerchief flat. The stitch-work, though faint, seemed to stand out now, demanding his attention.
The faint scent of lavender was stronger in the enclosed space. As his fingers traced the rough-spun fiber, he felt a strange, cold tingling sensation spread up his arm, and a fleeting, blurry image flashed behind his eyes: a dark, stone wall and the shadow of a girl's face, her eyes wide with fear or maybe a desperate, tearful hope.He shook his head, clearing the strange vision.
"What was that just now?" Lucian whispered, his voice was rough and uneven. His heart was breathing so fast against his ribs it felt like it will explode. He felt cold, despite the warmth of the afternoon sun coming through the window, a chill that had nothing to do with the temperature and everything to do with the image he saw in his mind.
He closed his eyes, as if that would erase the haunting vision, but it only made the details sharper. "Who was that girl? Why did she look so terrified, like someone had just seen her deepest, most shameful secrets, or caught her red-handed in an unforgivable act?"
The girl's face, pale and wide-eyed with pure dread, was now forcefully linked with the setting. And that wall... the rough-hewn, moss-stained stones of the old wall in the back courtyard. A shiver ran down his spine. He knew that wall. He knew its crumbling mortar and the way the shadows fell on it just after noon. He used to go there to play hide-and seek before he got sick, a secret, forgotten world of his childhood.
If the place was really a fragment of his own past then the girl had to be real too. The implications hit him with a dizzying force. "So does that mean I know her?" he muttered, running a shaky hand through his hair. "But she's a little old to have been my playmate. A servant, then? Does that mean she was a maid?"
The thought settled on him like a stone. He had only ever known one maid by name from those early, hazy years. "Don't tell me she was Maria," he pleaded with the empty air. A wave of confusion washed over him. "And if she was Maria, why was she so terrified? And if she is not Mary... then who the hell is she?"
A torrent of dizzying, desperate questions started swirling in Lucian's mind, each one a sharp spike of anxiety piercing his momentary calm. What was the secret she was hiding? Why was the memory resurfacing now, years later? Was it a clue, a warning, or just the torment of a half-forgotten past? He sat there, utterly lifeless in the grip of his confusion, trying desperately to find the answers to those questions and, more importantly, trying to reclaim the lost memories that seemed to be lurking just beyond his reach.
After what felt like an eternity, but was only a few minutes, Lucian took a deep breath. He forced his clenched fists to relax. He knew he wouldn't solve a decades-old mystery by panicking. He needed clarity, and he needed a plan.
First, he had to calm down.
Lucian pulls back the collar of his shirt, a sudden, cold sweat breaks out on his neck. His hand instinctively goes to the spot where he felt the phantom pressure.
"The back courtyard..." he mutters, the whisper tasting of dust and rain. "The old wall at the back of the north wing. The stones are exactly that colour and pattern."
He grabs a heavy paperweight and slams it down on the handkerchief, anchoring it to the desk, as if he is afraid it might float away and take the only fragment of truth with it. He stares at the stitched fabric, his mind now racing with purpose.
"The girl... she's connected to this. And I know that place.Something must have happened their."
His eyes snapped up to the clock on the mantlepiece. It was midnight. The house was silent, wrapped in the deep, heavy sleep of the old and the indifferent. He didn't bother with a coat or a lantern. The truth lay in the dark, and he knew it, with a chilling certainty that settled deep in his bones, that he needed no light to find a way to the wall he'd already forgotten once.
He turned from the desk, already halfway out the study door before the silence could reclaim him.