"Scared is what you're feeling. Brave is what you're doing," – Emma Donoghue, Room.

I woke feeling refreshed and awake. I was warm where I lay and realised there were extra blankets laid upon me. I felt a dip in the bed close to my left hand, I extended my hand, hoping to feel what it was. Unsatisfied, I opened my eyes and looked down.

To my surprise, there was Raff, sitting in a chair close to my bed. His head was laid on my bed near my left hand. His eyes were closed, and he appeared to be snoring. He looked so peaceful as he slept but I still couldn't work out why he was here. I distinctly remembered dancing with Raff and then overhearing a conversation between Maggie and Cora, but the rest of the evening was a blur. Not wanting to disturb Raff, I sat quietly and tried to figure out why Raff was keeping virgule by my bed. As if to stop me from thinking on things further, the door to my room opened and in came Ben carrying a tray that was laden down with food. He seemed relieved to see me awake and I noticed the concern on his face and the tiredness in his eyes.

"You're awake. Everyone will be so pleased."

"What do you mean?"

I was once again being filled with confusion. I hoped that Ben would have given me instant clarification of what had happened to me, but it seemed I would have to find out myself.

"What happened?" I asked.

"You don't remember?"

I shook my head as Ben handed me a plate filled with food. One look at Ben's face told me that I had better eat every scrap on my plate or face the consequences.

"You collapsed at the ball last night."

I spluttered, having just taken a big gulp of water as Ben spoke which had gone down the wrong way.

"Gave us all quite a fright I must say. Valera did you have another vision? You weren't trying to force one, were you?"

I shook my head, "no Ben, I wasn't. It wasn't a blackout, or anything I've experienced before. I was dancing with Raff and thought I saw something. It chilled me to the bones. I remember feeling full of fear and dizziness but not much else."

"Who were you looking at when this feeling started?"

"That woman from before, I can't remember her name...Raff's friend."

"Harriet?"

"Yes, Harriet...that's right."

I continued to eat as Ben looked on with a frown upon his face. In the end I couldn't eat everything, but Ben didn't seems as angry about it as I thought he'd be.

"Valera, this stuff that's happening. I don't think you should keep it to yourself anymore."

"What does it matter Ben? I'm taking care of things. Besides, half the people here think I'm a gold digger or a whore. I don't want to add crazy and unhinged to the list."

"I have no idea what you're feeling or what you're going through but there are others involved now and you need to let them in."

"Whose involved? No one! You all walk around like riddles from hell, nothing is ever given straight. My troubles are my own, I appreciated all you've done to help me but I'm fine."

"Everyone who cares about you is involved, me, the Marquis, Cora, the twins...the list goes on. You need to let us in, you need to let the Marquis in."

"Why? Why must I tell Raff anything."

"Tell me what?"

I gulped at turned pale. Turning in my bed to see Raff was starring up at me, very much awake.

"Nothing."

"Valera, tell him."

"No."

"Yes."

I shook my head, I didn't like this one bit.

"If you don't tell him then I will."

"Please don't make me."

"Will someone please tell me what's going on?"

I was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

"I suffer from blackouts. I've been having them for a long time now, but they intensified once I arrived at the Castle. Ben knows obviously, and my friend Maya is aware. The blackouts are often accompanied by visions, but I can also have visions when I sleep and when I have what I call the 'bleeding affect' where the past and present converge together. I thought for a while that I was going insane or that I was dying from something horrible. I feel a connection to this Castle and a sense of belonging. I keep getting deja-vu of feel that my surroundings are familiar. Recently I've been seeing people in the visions that I know. People who really should be dead by now but...surprisingly aren't."

My gaze never wavered from Raff's. I knew that we were standing at a crossroads with only two options. I waited with bated breath for Raff to decide on what would happen next.

"I suppose since you have been so truthful with me that I must do the same. I do not wish to alarm you in what I sat, and should you so wish it I will terminate your contract immediately if you find a desire to return home."

I continued to hold eye contact with Raff as he paused, and I nodded in consent for him to continue.

"I come from a long line of Marquis's, from a family whose name is prestigious and whose money, miraculously never ran out. I have been raised by a loving family, though both my parents died before my twenty-first birthday. I suddenly became the Marquis and though I felt unprepared, I managed with the help of those around me."

"Please don't stop now," I urged.

"Life was passing by in a pleasant way and the only worry I had was my lack of married status. It was a big deal to have a title and a fortune but to have no wife or heir to accompany it. I was young and assumed I'd have plenty of time to find a wife. It was the beginning of spring when she arrived, apparently out of nowhere. I was angry that she had just appeared in my home. A mutual friend had invited her without a thought to me or the current social conventions. However, when I first saw her, I was mesmerised, and I just had to know her."

"Was she really that pretty?"

"Times were different. Marriages were different. People weren't looking for someone they had things in common with, they were looking for someone of good beauty who would bare them lots of children. She fit every box set before her. People adored her and flocked around her. She was a great friend to my Great Aunt Carlotta, the Dowager and often took time to meet Cora in the village."

"She sounds wonderful," I said, taking note of the familiar names I was hearing.

"She was. I felt madly in love with her. I thought that she felt the same way but even now I cannot be sure. She rejected my marriage proposal and could not bear to be tied to me. I watched her spiral out of control, I tried to help her, but she just pushed me away. When I think of it now, I see her fear and feel her pain and I wish I'd tried harder to help her."

"What was her name?"

"Valarie."

I tried not to let my shock show, realistically I'd been expecting his answer. "I have felt her fear. Something or someone was following her, and she was terrified."

"Her behaviour had been erratic. The day she disappeared I saw a look pass between Carlotta and Cora that I still haven't worked out the meaning too. Even though she had rejected me, I still love her and vowed to find her."

"What do you think scared her into running?"

"That I know not but when we found her several days later, I prayed for her soul. I have never seen a sight as gruesome as that. Had it not have been confirmed by the attending police, I would have thought an animal attacked her. I knew then that it was not an accident. That someone had purposefully attacked her though I have no idea why."

"I cannot imagine how you felt."

"I cannot tell you how I felt because I cannot put it into words, but I locked myself away in my study and let my thoughts consume me. I was determined to get justice for her death, but I didn't know where to start. I received a letter one evening, the post mark said it came from the village, someone had news for me. Blindly I went to meet the informant, had I been in more control of my mind and my actions then I would have waited till the morning, but alas, I did not."

"What happened?"

Raff smirked in a wild predatory way that made me flinch.

"Would you believe me when I said I know not what happened? It was dark out when I left the Castle and knowing the land so well, I walked towards the village with no light to guide me. My attacker knew this and with one strong blow to the back of my head, I knew no more."

"That is an awful story and yet here you are."

"Indeed Valera. I died that night and yet I came back again. My funeral had been prepared and I had been lain in my coffin. All of importance – by societies standards had already seen me. My devoted staff had been given the chance to see me before I was buried when it happened. I admit I gave them quite a scare when I sat bolt upright and gasped for air. They thought witchcraft was at play. It seemed thought that I would not or could not die and as the years went on, we realised that none of us were aging. That all who had enjoyed that moment of happiness with Valarie was cursed. That's when the reality of the situation set it."

"It sounds so preposterous, things like that just don't happen. When did the events originally occur because I know now more than ever, that you were not born of this century?"

"1815."

Logically it was impossible but illogically it made perfect sense. I believed in reincarnation. I believed there was something suspicious about the Castle. I believed the staff were hiding something. I believed the village was stuck in the past. But a curse, and a large curse at that was difficult to understand. I could see the logic behind those within the Castle being trapped but why subject the villagers to the same fate? What were the parameters of the curse? Obviously, there was enough leeway to turn part of the garden over to the National Trust. Then there was the village that was partially stuck in the past and the present, where that they got their information from? Were they able to leave the Castle and Estates? Or were they trapped within? If so, how did they keep up with the changes to society. How did they update their plumbing and electricity? Most of all, how had they survived and kept the ruse of the family going when none of them aged?

"Are you teasing me?"

"No. Perhaps it would be easier if I was lying. It took us a while to realise what was happening. It wasn't as it would read in a book. Times were hard. Fate seemed to interfere and drop people on us, people who were supposed to break the curse. In the end, it got too painful, making new relationships were too hard when people were ripped away from us. I closed the Castle down and forbid any visitors from entering. The curse had trapped us in this bubble, where we were remembered and forgotten at the same time. It was the best thing for us all. We've had to move with the times. All this technology at our fingertips. We can leave the Castle and Estates but the longer we're away, the further we fade. When I leave the Estate on business, those I meet know exactly who I am but once I've returned to the Castle, if you asked them of the Marquis of Flyzroy Castle, they wouldn't know who you were referring to. We have tried to stay true to ourselves while evolving at the same time. It has been quite hard."

"Did you love her? Valarie, I mean."

"Very much so."

I felt very much like I'd overstepped my boundaries in terms of conversation and repositioned my gaze down to my hands as I covered up the shame I was feeling. I wondered if seeing her was a kick in the face when I looked so like Valarie. Raff rose from his seat next to my bed and I had to fight the disappointment that welled up inside me.

"I should go and inform the others that you're awake as many have been worried about you. I need to freshen up as well."

Raff looked at me and I could feel the heat of his gaze.

"Ben will look after you while I am gone. Don't go scaring us like that again. You mean a great deal to us and I do not say that lightly."

I bowed my head, blushing under his words and watched as he left the room. Turning to Ben, I asked, "is this all true Ben? Are you really frozen in time? There have been others before me that tried to solve the mystery? Did they all die? Am I going to die?"

I gulped in air like my life depended on it as I realised, I was having a panic attack.

"It is a bitter pill to swallow is it not? Knowing that we were all alive in 1815 and yet we are alive now. We are so tired Valera, so bored with our frozen existence. Yes, there have been others before you but not in the last fifty years or so. The Marquis, Raff, was right. It got too difficult. So, you aren't the first to try and break the curse upon us but not all your predecessors died, some merely disappeared. I wish I could offer you something more positive."

"Why did you never tell me before?"

"Life is different for us. Some things can be told while others cannot. It changes all the time. I believe and so do a fair few others, that you are different from the rest. The usual chain of events has been broken and we're walking down uncharted territory now. There is something about you Valera that makes your special. I truly believe that you have a shot at breaking this curse."

"It's a bit much is it not? I mean I have my own theories of things, but it sounds impossible when put it all together."

"What theories are you currently leaning towards?"

"I think that whatever scared Valarie killer her and then killed Raff. I think the murderer has a darker past than all imagined and that it's closely linked to her life. You say you're trapped in a curse, I say you'll be stuck in that curse till her life is unravelled and the killer unmasked."

Ben nodded, silently agreeing.

I felt relieved that everything had been spoken about so freely. I had a better understanding of what was happening as well as what had happened. I was now full of determination knowing that what visions I saw would become the answers everyone was craving. I knew without doubt that I would see this through to the end and I wouldn't, like Maggie suggested, kill everyone in the process.