Young Writers Society

Ok here's the first chapter of The Prophecy of Indigo Rayne, although I think I might change the title to The Riders of Indigo Rayne. (Please tell me which one you like better!) Umm.. anyway's could you pick out any typo's or misspellings you see (I'm not the best speller in the world plus WordPerfect thinks any word that has ('ve), ('s) ect. is spelled wrong.) And yeah just tear it apart! And BE harsh! I can take it! Thanks and enjoy -- Stevie

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Chapter One; Welcome to Beowulf Manor

Erin sat watching the trees pass by her car window. The weather outside the car was grey, and it looked like it would start raining before the day was done.

“Remind me again, why we're going to our grandfather's?” Erin said bored, looking at Mrs. Coleman who was sitting in the front seat. Erin watched as Mrs. Coleman adjusted her rear-view mirror.

“Erin. For the thousandth time your grandfather has decided that until your brother is found you two may stay at his house. Since he can’t stand the thought of you two living somewhere without a male relative.”

Mrs. Coleman was a social worker and her job was to find homes for people like Erin and her little sister, Kara Lynn. Her hair was turning grey, but she was still beautiful. Even though her age was starting to show.

“Whatever, being ignored for twelve years doesn’t help his popularity.” Erin stated. In her mind her Grandfather wasn’t the most caring person. If he cared at all, he would have let them live in his house six years ago when their father disappeared, not now when their brother did.

“You can complain all you want, but it’s not going to change the fact that your going to live with your grandfather,” Mrs. Coleman said. “We're almost there.” She said changing the subject, as the car started to curve with the mountains beyond the forest road they were traveling on. An old manor house, surrounded by a tall iron gate, came into view. It had an old tower with one closed window coming up from the third floor. Its peeling paint and foggy yard made it look haunted – all it needed was boarded up windows. Erin stared at the tower window, a figure was standing at the window. That must be grandpa, Erin thought as the car got closer to the old manor.

“Here we are,” Mrs. Coleman said, parking in front of the manor.

“You've got to be kidding ” Kara Lynn said. Erin looked at Kara Lynn; her little sister was ten and

“Kara, why do you always say that?” Erin said in a quite voice so Mrs. Coleman couldn’t hear.

“Nope, this is where you’re going to be living,” Mrs. Coleman said plainly, opening her door and going around to the trunk.

“Come on Kara. Maybe it won't be as bad as it looks.” Erin said, trying to stay positive for her little sister. Even thought she didn’t like the look of the house any more than Kara did.

Erin could see how much Kara didn’t want to be there, Kara had an overly active imagination–like her older sister–Erin could only imagine that some ghost were starting to brew scary thoughts into her little sister’s head. Erin got out of the car and went to the trunk of the car, Mrs. Coleman had Erin and Kara’s backpack’s in her hands. Erin took her backpack, it was covered in pin’s and badges that you could hardly see the black fabric that it was made of. She flung it over her shoulder then handed Kara her’s. Kara’s backpack looked totally different it was clean and looked a few months old even though in reality it was several years old.

That was the difference in between the two sister’s – Kara liked keeping everything nice and neat. While Erin didn’t care, nice and neat was . . . nice but Erin didn’t want to make in effort in keeping stuff clean and new. Erin followed Mrs. Coleman to the door, keeping Kara’s annoying neatness habits out of her head. Mrs. Coleman rang the doorbell.

“Erin why don’t you put your hair up, so your Grandfather can see your pretty eyes,” Mrs. Coleman said, Erin rolled her eyes before taking a rubber band from around her wrist and putting her hair up in a messy ponytail.

“Is that better?” Erin asked as the door opened.

“Hello,” said a man in a tuxedo. He had grey hair that was brushed back, and pale skin. He was very old, Erin could only guess how old, he looked mean. Erin wouldn’t have wanted to run into him at night.

“Hello. I’m Mrs. Coleman –” Mrs. Coleman said.

“Yes we’ve been expecting you; come in.” The butler said moving out of the doorway so they could come in. Erin and Kara Lynn went inside, Erin didn’t like the feeling of the house. The foyer was huge and had a ceiling as high as the manor. The room was in the shape of a circle, Erin thought the tower was right above the foyer. The room was grim even though the paint was new. The floor was white marble with a giant rain drop in the middle in blue marble. The ceiling was painted with murals. Stairs spiraled up the walls.

“I'm sorry but I don't have time to get Erin and Kara settled, I'm sure you can take it from here Mr. –”

“Henry, madam”

“Henry. I’m sure you can take it from here,” Mrs. Coleman said. “Good-bye Erin and Kara Lynn! I’ll be back in six months to see how your doing.”

“Goodbye madam,” said Henry, closing the door as Mrs. Coleman walked to her car. He turned to face Erin and Kara, “Shall we start with a tour of the house?”

“Sure,” Erin said speaking for both herself and Kara Lynn.

The Butler lead them up the stairs, “this manor had one-hundred rooms last time they were counted.” Erin and Kara listened as they followed him down the hall. The inside of the house looked nothing like the outside did. It was clean and the paint was new but still rather grim.

“Wouldn’t there still be one-hundred rooms now? It’s impossible for rooms to appear out of thin air,” said Erin.

“Is it now?” said the old butler, pausing. He looked at Erin with one white eye before continuing on. Erin and Kara exchanged looks. 'This is one creepy place,' Erin thought.

“Search for the tower and you’ll find out how creepy this place can be.” The butler said, “and if you do search, be warned for what you find beyond the door is not for the faint of heart Ms. Erin.”

“How did you know that I was thinking that this place is creepy?” Erin asked.

“Don’t be amazed, Ms. Erin by the unexplainable.” The butler replied. The butler continued up the marble stairs. When he reached the second floor he stopped.

“I doubt you where informed that your not only sharing this house with your Grandfather but also your with cousins as well?” Henry said turning around to face them.

“Mrs. Coleman didn’t tell us anything about cousins,” Erin answered, looking at Kara Lynn as if saying, ‘do you remember anything about any cousins?’.

“Their rooms are right across the hall from yours,” Henry said, then he continued down the hall. “This will be Kara’s room,” Henry said, opening a door, revealing a pink bedroom covered in paintings of flowers and a shelf covered with porcelain dolls surrounded the room.

Erin tried not to laugh. Not only was Kara not a “pink and dolls” type of girl, but the room was an ugly Victorian room. Kara was a bookworm, Erin guessed that by the next week the shelves would have no trace that the dolls were ever there. Leaving the door open Henry walked down the hall to the next door and opened it, revealing a room that was a sea foam green. It was plain, with only a desk, a bed and a door leading to a bathroom. Erin wouldn’t have picked that color for the walls, ‘I’ll repaint the walls when I get the chance’ she thought.

“This will be your room,” he said looking at Erin. “If you have any messages for your grandfather just write it down in a sealed envelope and give it to me, or Mrs. O’ Mally. Your cousins can answer any other questions you may have. Lunch is in five minutes, so you should be down there before eleven.”

“Sure thing,” Erin said.

“If you need anything call Mrs. O’ Mally,” Henry said, then he walked down the hall and disappeared. Erin and Kara exchanged glances before going into Erin’s new bedroom.

“Weird place, huh?” Erin said, putting her backpack on the bed.

“Beyond weird.” Kara replied following her sister into the room.

“I’m thinking a dark purple,” Erin said, after a few moments of silents.

“What?”

“I’m thinking about repainting the room a dark purple,” Erin said, looking at her sister. “What do you think?”

“I think I’d like this room better,” They both laughed, Kara loved the color green. “Do you think we have to get dressed up for lunch?”

“Probably,” Erin replied, standing up, “but I’m not going to. Jeans and a T-shirt; that’s all their getting from me today.” Kara laughed. “We better start down there. Unless we run into our cousins we’re probably going to get lost.”

“I’ll start making a map tomorrow,” said Kara, who loved making maps. Every time they moved somewhere Kara would make a map of the place so they wouldn’t get lost (or just for fun if the house was too small to get lost in). They started by going back to the main floor, (Henry said that the dining room was on the first floor so they’d start there).

The first floor contained three hallways, each with 10 doors. Erin opened seven doors before Kara found the dinning room.

“Erin I found it!” Kara Lynn shouted, after she had opened the eighth door. Erin rushed to Kara Lynn’s side.

The dining room was pretty much empty. A long oak table stood in the middle. The walls were covered with paintings, of exotic places that Erin had never seen and several were of people. Only two other people were in the room. A boy Erin’s age was playing with a hamster, letting a girl about a year younger than Kara Lynn, pet it every once and a while.

“Hello,” Erin said entering the room. The boy looked familiar but she couldn’t remember where she had seen him. She scanned her memory. “You know they really need to label the doors.”

“Bonjor” said the little girl,

“Hello,” said the boy. “I’m Jason Trent, and you are?”

“Erin Skye Kingsley, and this is my little sister Kara Lynn,” She replied.

“This is Elsie, but we all call her Ellie,” Jason said. “She will only speak French.”

“Le français, Nice a choisi.” Erin said under breath subconsciously, and Ellie looked at her. French, nice choice. Erin had known French for as long as she could remember. Her parent’s had taught her French when she was little. The previous year she had learned some Spanish. She already knew enough French, Russian and German to hold a conversation with someone French, Russian or German. Only using a language dictionary for the more uncommon words. She wasn’t proud of being almost fluent in the three languages, but it helped when she met someone like Ellie. Who only knew one language. Also learning languages helped time pass when she was bored.

“Marci,” Ellie replied, in a perfect accent. Thanks.

“Do you like animals?” asked Kara Lynn, changing the subject.

“Yeah, I have hundreds in my room,” said Jason.

“What’s the hamster’s name?” Kara asked, pointing to the hamster.

“This little guy is Hammie,” He said holding up the hamster.

“Cool!” said Kara Lynn. She loved animals. Well, at least the ones that she could play with. “Can I go see them?”

“Sure, after lunch,” Jason replied. At that moment, Mrs. O’ Mally, a large woman in her fifties, entered the room with a plate of sandwiches and a pitcher of ice tea.

— — —

After lunch they all met in Jason’s room, Erin was going to go back to her own room. But she could have sworn that she had met Jason before. ‘Maybe I’ll find something out in his room. There has to be some reason why I think I knew him,’ she thought as she followed her sister into Jason’s room.

“Wow! You have lots of animals.” Kara said. The room was covered in animals. It had shelves similar to the ones in Kara’s room, only they were covered in tanks and cages instead of dolls. Erin looked in each cage and saw hamsters, gerbils, mice, rats, snakes, geckos, and about any other animal you could think of. The room had three overstuffed red velvet chairs. To Erin’s surprise, there was a giant iguana sleeping in one of them, cuddling a tiny Siberian husky puppy. Hanging from the ceiling were bird cages of all sizes and shapes. On the frame of Noah’s bed there was a blue-and-gold macaw, and on the bed an old orange cat slept in the middle of the bed. In a corner there was a large pen with a divider down the middle. One side had two female dogs, one a Siberian Husky and the other a Collie, and innumerable puppies of both breeds and mutts. The other side had a snow white cat, the white one with five colorful kittens. The noise in the room was obnoxious, the birds were chirping, the snakes were hissing, Puppies yapping, kittens meowing and the macaw trying to say hello to the visitors.

“Yeah,” Jason went over to the bed, and picked up the old cat. “Emma was my first cat.”

“She’s pretty,” Kara said. Massaging Emma’s head with her fingers.

She finally realized where she knew him. When she was little, her parents went out of the country a lot and they couldn’t take Erin with them. Company rules, no children allowed. Her parents left her with her Aunt and her son. A boy, Jason, who she had called Noah, because he loved animals. She had briefly met the boy’s sister. She was born just a week before Erin’s father disappeared.

“It’s like Noah’s Ark in here,” Erin said, looking into a cage that had a lizard in it, “but smaller.”

“Yeah,” Jason said laughing. “I spend all my money on these animals,”

“You must get lots of money, Noah.” Erin said. Jason looked at Erin, wondering for a moment who Noah was, then he remembered.

“Yeah plus I help out at the pet store in town,” Noah said. “I get payed in pets and pet food.” Erin laughed.

“Cool, can we go to the pet store with you some time?” asked Kara.

“Sure. I'm going down there next weekend,” Noah said.