Page 22 of Autumn Secrets

Lexi was standing in a corner across the room, by a small door that I hadn’t noticed earlier, waving for me to come over. Surprised, I smiled and waved back. I hadn’t recognised her voice. I had almost reached her, when she disappeared behind the door. What on earth was she doing in there?

As I reached the door, something felt off. I didn’t know why, but it made me hesitate. Were we even allowed to go through this door? Weren’t we trespassing? I thought of our conversation about how anonymous Julian was, and my curiosity took over my common sense. I wasn’t sure what I thought I would find in there, but I wanted to findsomethingthat could give me a glimpse into Julian’s life.I looked around one more time, but everyone was too busy dancing to pay any attention to me. I reached for the doorhandle and slid behind the door.

The first thing I noticed was the small, spiralling staircase in front of me, and the dim lights on the wall. There was no other way to go; I had to take the stairs.

“Lexi,” I called in a low voice. “Where are you?”

“I’m up here – hurry.”

I grabbed the railing and started to climb the stairs. I immediately felt guilty. This looked private to me, and we were definitely trespassing by now. What would we do if we got caught up here? I felt like we were disrespecting Julian’s hospitality.

When I reached the top of the stairs, I found myself standing in a long, dark hallway. Down one end was a balcony door that seemed to be wide open. What on earth was Lexi doing outside? It was freezing tonight. I slowly started to walk towards the open door. Even though it was quite dark, I could still make out some of the details of the hallway. The walls were covered with old portraits. I guessed they were Julian’s family members.

When I was halfway down the hallway, one of the portraits made me do a double take. There was something very familiar about the image hanging in front of me, but that didn’t make any sense. It was very old; you could tell by the clothes and the hair. Still, something about it was achingly familiar. I tilted my head and took a step forward to have a closer look.

Suddenly, a cool hand came down over my mouth. When I tried to wiggle myself away from it, another arm wrapped around my waist. Before I knew it, my arms were pinned to my sides, giving me no chance to fight. I couldn’t even scream. Seconds later I felt a sharp ache in the centre of my neck, and everything went black…

Chapter 8

“Aurora…Aurora, can you hear me?”

I knew that voice, and all I wanted was to come back to him, but it still took me a while to gain consciousness. When I finally did, I had to blink several times before I could properly open my eyes. The first thing that struck me was a pair of pale, turquoise-blue eyes staring down at me.

“Adrian? What are you doing here?”

“Well, the whole school year was invited. I would like to think that includes me too.” He smiled.

That’s when I noticed the loud music and the voices all around us. Where was I? I pulled myself up to a sitting position on the floor and realised that I was back down in the ballroom again.How the hell did that happen?

“How did I get here?” I asked, confused. I moved my hand over the back of my neck. I had a faint memory of something sharp piercing me, but my neck seemed fine.

“Well, from my understanding, you’ve been in here dancing pretty much since you arrived.”

“No, no.” I shook my head. “I went with Lexi upstairs… Wait, where’s Lexi?” I asked and tried to get on my feet.

“Take it easy, Aurora. You fainted. I don’t know if you hit your head…” Adrian gently grabbed my arm to help me stand, but I pulled away from him.

“I’m fine, I just need to find Lexi,” I said and brushed my jeans off, trying very hard to ignore his proximity. I didn’t need any distractions right now.

“I saw her in the kitchen not too long ago.”

I shook my head again. “No. That couldn’t have been her. We were upstairs—”

“Aurora,” Adrian interrupted me. “I talked to her. She was in the kitchen, trust me.”

“No, Adrian…you don’t understand. I was with Lexi upstairs. We went through the door over there.” I turned and pointed towards the door I’d snuck through only moments ago. My whole body went rigid; the door wasn’t there anymore.What the hell?I turned towards the other end of the room, even though somehow I knew that I wouldn’t find any doors on that side either.What was going on?

“Aurora?”

The music suddenly seemed way too loud and I felt like the room was spinning. I was really starting to panic now.

“I need to get out of here.” I pushed myself through crowd and was relieved when I finally reached the entrance. I threw a quick glance back and saw that Adrian was following me.

He wore a worried look. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I…uh…” I tore my eyes away from him and let them sweep across the ballroom one more time, before I briefly closed them, trying to focus on what had just happened. I know I went upstairs, I definitely saw Lexi, but something else had happened up there. I just couldn’t remember what. Frustrated I opened my eyes again.

“I need to find the door that leads upstairs.”