Chapter 2 The Blank Pages
After a refreshing bath, I decided to finally do the last thing I needed to do before I could relax and enjoy the meal Honey was preparing.
I took a deep breath, grabbed my phone, scrolled through my contacts, and tapped the name Eleanor (Agent).
She answered before the first ring had even finished.
“Maisie! Tell me you’re on chapter twenty,” Eleanor said in a sharp tone. I could hear her keyboard clatter aggressively in the background. “The marketing team wants a teaser excerpt by Friday, and the publishing house is already drafting the pre-order campaign.”
“Eleanor, breathe,” I said. “I’m not on chapter twenty.”
The typing stopped instantly.
The silence on the line was lethal.
“What chapter are you on, Maisie?”
“Chapter three. Technically, page twelve.”
“Page twelve?!” Eleanor screamed, her voice cracking slightly on the second syllable. “The final manuscript is due in eight weeks! You can’t be on page twelve! What have you been doing for the last two months?”
“Dying inside,” I said candidly. “Which is why I’m taking a hiatus from the city. I’m currently in the countryside.”
“You’re on vacation? Now?!” I could practically hear Eleanor tearing her hair out through the phone. “Maisie, no. You need to come back, sit your butt in the chair, order a takeaway, and type until your fingers bleed. You can’t just run off to the middle of nowhere!”
“It’s not a vacation, Eleanor. It’s a rescue mission for my career,” I said, keeping my tone steady. “The city is suffocating me. I’m here in the countryside because I need a new environment.”
“Is there Wi-Fi out there?” Eleanor demanded, her tone shifting into pure panic. “What if the cell service is spotty? What if I need to reach you about line edits? What if the publisher wants to jump on an emergency Zoom call?!”
“Then you’ll have to send a carrier pigeon,” I replied dryly. “Or wait until I drive into the local town to check my email.”
“Maisie, I swear to God—”
“I promise I’ll check in once a week. I promise I’ll bring back a finished draft, but only if you let me relax without calling me every hour.”
Eleanor let out a long, ragged exhale that sounded like a deflating tire.
“If you miss this deadline, the publisher is going to push your release back a whole year. Do you understand what that means for your royalties?”
“I do. Which is why I’m hanging up now so I can start writing.”
“Maisie—”
“Bye, Eleanor.”
I sighed in relief after hanging up.
-
After dinner, I went back to my room to continue writing.
For the first time in four months, my fingers didn’t hover helplessly over the keys.
Inspired by the lush, picturesque gardens, the crescent-moon bridge, and the vibrant, delightfully eccentric people who lived here, the words simply poured out of me.
I didn’t overthink it.
By 11:30 p.m., I hadn’t just broken my writer’s block—I had blown right past it. I finished three full chapters, totaling over eight thousand words.
I immediately opened my email, attached the fresh chapters along with a dozen photos I’d taken of the picturesque garden, the stone bridge, and the grand dining hall, and sent them off to Eleanor.
Not even ten minutes later, my phone vibrated furiously on the desk.
“Maisie!” Eleanor practically shrieked into my ear the moment I picked up. Her usual sharp, high-strung panic was gone, replaced by pure, unadulterated ecstasy. “I just read the first ten pages. This is incredible! The imagery! The setting! It’s warm, it’s vibrant, it’s alive!”
“You like it?” I asked, leaning back against my pillows with a satisfied smirk.
“Like it? I’m obsessed!” Eleanor gushed. “Whatever they are putting in the water at that inn, I want you to drink a gallon of it every day. Forget what I said about coming back to the city! Stay at Fable House forever! Live there! Write five more books there!”
“I thought you were worried about cell service and carrier pigeons?” I teased.
“I was a fool, Maisie! A blind, stressed-out fool!” she declared without missing a beat. “Keep writing at this pace, and we’ll have the full manuscript to the publisher three weeks ahead of schedule. Send me chapter seven as soon as it’s done!”
I chuckled, hanging up the phone and feeling an immense weight lift off my shoulders.
Validation felt good, but the pure high of actually creating again felt even better.
I spent the rest of the evening writing. By the time I finally closed my laptop, my eyes were burning, and my neck was stiff, but I felt immensely accomplished.
I stretched, checked the digital clock on my nightstand, and blinked.
11:59 p.m.
I stood up to change into my pajamas when a sound suddenly echoed through the walls.
Gong… Gong… Gong…
It was a low, heavy, reverberating chime, sounding like an ancient bronze cathedral bell ringing from somewhere deep inside the house.
I looked down at the nightstand clock to check the time.
The digital red numbers read 12:00 a.m., but the tiny colon between the numbers wasn’t blinking. The digital seconds display had completely frozen.
The clock had stopped dead at midnight, yet the deep, melodic chimes kept rolling through the mansion—one, two, three, four…
Is the wiring short-circuiting? I thought, taking a cautious step toward the bedroom door. Will that loud noise wake up the vacationers in the west wing? Blossom’s going to be furious if some broken clock ruins their sleep.
Then a strange sensation washed over the room.
It wasn’t scary, but it was undeniably bizarre. It felt like a gentle, cool gust of wind passing straight through solid stone walls, sweeping from the far-left corner of my room all the way to the right.
A strange, momentary shimmer—like a subtle wave of heat rising off asphalt in the summer—scanned across the bedroom.
I held my breath, standing rooted to the rug.
Gong…
The moment the chime died away, the digital clock on my nightstand gave a tiny beep, and the colon resumed blinking.
12:01 a.m.
I exhaled a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.
I was about to brush it off and head toward the bed when a new set of sounds drifted up from downstairs.
Footsteps.
Loud, confident footsteps accompanied by the heavy thud of hard-soled boots.
Then came voices.
A low, muffled rumble of conversation, accompanied by bright, ringing laughter and the distinct, unmistakable clatter of ceramic dishes and heavy metal cutlery against wooden tables.
I blinked, thoroughly bewildered.
The downstairs area sounded like a bustling, lively tavern at peak dinner hour.
Did a busload of late-check-in tourists just crash the inn at midnight? I wondered, grabbing a thick velvet robe from the closet and tying it tightly around my waist.
Curiosity completely overriding my common sense, I unlocked my bedroom door and stepped out into the quiet hallway of the left wing.
Then I headed straight toward the stairs to see what on earth was going on.
