In the Shadow of the Lilac: IV: Shatter
In the Shadow of the Lilac: IV: Shatter
History, Ghosts, and Haunted Balls, oh my!
Welcome to In the Shadow of the Lilac! This is projected to be a five or six-part wholesome spooky serial. Previously intended to conclude with Part V today on Halloween, due to having been under the weather, I’ll be posting the finale (whether that is Part V or Part VI) sometime in November. If you’d like to receive it in your inboxes, please be sure to subscribe to the section “It was a Dark and Stormy Night.”
Synopsis: When Melody and Zion Holcomb move to Lavender Vale ahead of their parents, they expect the peaceful Gilded Age town to be a breath of fresh air. They can’t begin to guess that a century-old mystery has been lying in wait for them to solve. . . and the answers lie buried in the halls of the Hotel Lilac.
Last seen: A break-in at the Emporium - a family history which Grant was reluctant to share - and a spectre that returns even in the secret hallways of the Hotel Lilac.
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“Melody?”
Melody jumped at the sound of Grant’s voice next to her and the garland of berries flipped out of her fingers, sending painted pearls tumbling.
Grant poked his head out from an open in the wall, with a puzzled frown for her as the beads rolled to a stop at his feet.
“Why didn’t you follow me?”
“Why didn’t you know the lights went out and he showed up?” Melody demanded, still shaking a bit and frustrated with herself for it as she struggled to catch up the beads. He stopped to gather them and tucked them in his pockets. His brow creased as he knelt beside her.
“He?”
“The spectre!”
“To the first question, I’m afraid that sliding door jams easily, and the library was pitch-black with all the windows shuttered. Are you okay?”
“Yeah I just don’t like his face coming at me in the dark,” she mumbled. “How was he here anyway? I thought you told me to stay away from the trees. And Grant, you never manage to be around when it is!”
“Curious. I wonder if it could be one of the other employees. It would fit, perhaps.”
“Except it started before I began working here,” Melody pointed out. “Unless you told somebody about Zion and I when we first came. I like mysteries, but this one is creepy when it’s just me.”
“Yeah and usually he’s seen in the woods, or near them,” Grant hesitated. “Listen, Melody, I have an alibi this time, at least. But the lock on the door we took is faulty, and he could have followed us in. I don’t know why he’s picking on you, Melody. Not yet, but I’m going to scour this village until I know exactly who has a costume like mine.”
He pressed her fingers.
“Come on, let’s get these into the library.”
He held the door open for her, locking it securely behind them.
“No spectres will come through that,” he declared. Melody was already distracted.
“Oooh,” she breathed, realizing that they were in a building completely separated from the main hotel, on the opposite end of the gardens to balance out the placement of the Emporium. The passageway must have taken them underneath the northern edge of the garden.
“This,” Grant told her, “is the one and only library in Lavender Vale. Mostly comprised of donations from the wealthy in decades past, so you won’t find much that isn’t. . . you know. Stuffy. Formal. All that jazz.”
“Since when do you. . . slang?” Melody giggled at him, admiring the gilt bindings of the books on shelf after shelf in the round towered room.
“Eh,” Grant grinned. “Might’ve picked it up from Zion. Now, Melody-”
Across the room, between the two largest windows facing the sea, hung a large oil painting, a portrait, to be precise. A young maiden, clad in ruffles and lace of lilac purple, reclined on a seaside boulder, the autumn woods at her back; her dark curls tumbled carelessly over her shoulders, her eyes turned thoughtfully towards the frame as her fingers spun a sprig of lilacs.
“Oh, she’s beautiful,” Melody exclaimed. She bounced to stand underneath the portrait and inspected the golden nameplate.
“This is Delilah?”
Grant cleared his throat.
“Mel-”
Melody spun around to see Grant and noticed, for the first time, that the manager Marcus Lyle was standing there too, arms folded with an eyebrow cocked at the girl.
My alibi, Grant mouthed silently. “Melody, you haven’t met Marcus Lyle, the Lilac’s manager. I’ve asked Miss Holcomb to spruce up the library some before we reopen it to guests,” Grant explained, turning to Lyle.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t see you when I came in,” Melody apologized.
“The library is enchanting, isn’t it. Please be careful with decorating, and it appears it’s been some time since it’s been dusted. I don’t recommend touching the statuary or other artworks in the room,” Lyle said to Melody. “In fact, if you could put up signs stating such to the guests, that would be great. It’s all original, and we’d like to keep it that way.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s all. I’ll leave you to it.”
Lyle turned back at the doorway.
“Before I forget – you don’t have a penchant for shattering things, do you, Miss Holcomb?”
“No?” Melody answered, startled as she instinctively turned to Grant. He appeared equally perturbed.
“Good. Now, Grant. I have six complaints that seem best left on your plate; the downstairs and upstairs staff need assistance with not bumping heads every time someone needs a new duster; and I believe I’ve received a notification that you’re needed in the stock rooms today. A charity group for saving the penguins – who knows why they need saving, my budget does – is now organizing a Halloween ball to be held in our ballroom next week, and by the way, ghosts areexpected. Just don’t scare off any of the staff. I can’t handle the rising paychecks just to keep this place running.”
“I see,” Grant muttered, and dryly saluted the door as it shut.
“What-“
“Nothing. Melody, I have a busy day. Do you feel safe here on your own? I can send Lys in your direction, if it’s any help. He needs ghost training.”
At her expression, he added, “I’m part of what Lyle means by ghosts. So’s Lys. We’re occasionally considered backup. You know, for those ‘ghost tours’ that start turning out not-so ghostly. You’re not the only one who’s caught me pranking, you’re just the first one who was…Melody,” he smiled. “I’ll meet you for lunch, okay? Lys will show up in a few minutes, so just leave the library door open. But don’t tell Lyle!” he whispered. “He’ll be unhappy if Lys so much as gets a hair on the books.”
So Melody was left on her own. Her eyes wandered over the books. Thankfully, it was a cozy library - the best kind, with the kind of why-is-this-a-good-idea fireplace, deep velvety armchairs, tasseled pillows, and dark mahogany bookcases. The light dappled in through the mottled eastern windows, painted with rose trellises, matched by those outside in the garden.
On a cold, now wet morning, it was exactly where Melody wanted to be, albeit with a shudder and a constant hyper awareness of the secret panel behind her. She set about carefully dusting off each surface, pushing aside lace runners and the less-breakable knickknacks, as well as the stately candles she hoped no one ever lit, while she waited for Lys.
That was one of the two great artworks in the room; the other was a statue in the niche below it, coming about shoulder-height to Melody, who was fairly little. It was a classic image, a woman in finely pleated robes and shawl, gathering roses from the intriguing vines that spread up the wall, white petals glimmering. It didn’t seem like marble, Melody decided, but resisted the urge to inspect it more closely. She was still uneasy, particularly with the fact that even she was being suspected regarding the break-in, and it was better to avoid any delays on her work until that was cleared.
A soft scratching and a paw pushed the door open further as Lys squeezed in.
“Good boy!”
With a big yawn, “the very biggest,” Melody told him, Lys bounced up on the couch to survey the doings with interest, chomping thoughtfully on any stray end of vine that came near him as they were wound around shelves and bookcases. The scent of flowers, those of the ghostly ladies, seemed to cling to every corner.
Truth be told, Melody hadn’t stopped thinking about Jasmine, or what Grant had said earlier that morning. She imagined wandering the hotel halls, or even the pink house, for 116 years, waiting for one or two people who would think to pray for her. That, and the fact that no one knew who she was, or tried to remember.
That was one point in favor of modernity here. Those ladies and their names weren’t hidden by time, not if she could dig up newspaper articles from the time - surely the deaths had caused a stir in the newspapers!
“Only,” she told Lys as she rearranged the candles and lace she had moved, “I haven’t got a phone to research in, and the only computers here are for the staff’s jobs. Zion always wanted me to get a phone, but I always say no, and I haven’t needed one until now since I’ve never been far away from him or mother. Except!”
She nearly smacked Lys with the duster in her excitement as she came across exactly what she had been hoping to see – cases of old newspapers, carefully preserved between layers of plastic film within dark green binding. This might be the one place she could find out the names of the deceased. Funny, wasn’t it, that Grant – nor anyone else, for that matter – seemed to know.
“At least I’ll know, and that will help the ghosts,” she sighed to Lys. She looked again at Delilah’s portrait and the statue that stood underneath. The rose petals climbing up the wall were covered with dust – but she hesitated to touch them. Still, they were glimmering oddly in the light, too much compared to the marble of the statue they belonged too. Taking the corner of her apron, Melody gingerly rubbed away the dust from one of the roses.
The light flashed, and she blinked.
“Lys? Do you have any theories on who would use opal in a statue. . . in a library. . . at a hotel?”
It was impatiently that Melody waited through that day. As mystifying as the opal was, it was probably just a decorative choice, if an ostentatious one. As for the newspapers, she wouldn’t have an opening to research until Saturday afternoon, which was tomorrow. That was if Zion was willing to bring her along for his short afternoon shift. He had already informed her that he was driving thirty minutes to Barnstable for some errand that morning, he wouldn’t say what, and he didn’t want her to tag along.
The thickness of the ten volumes comprising 1908-1909 was daunting. There was no way she would get through them quickly! At least her workdays were shorter than Zion’s. She just wanted to be on her best behavior today, just in case.
A rap on the door made her jump.
“Hide!” she whispered to Lys, in case it was Lyle – that was such a bad idea, but anyway, she needn’t have worried, because it was Zion who poked his head in.
“Sis?” He eased the door shut behind him. “Nice place,” he admired. “Like the decorations you’re doing. Mel, I got a text from Grant. Honey, I’m afraid you’ll be stood up for lunch. He’s swamped, and he says he’s now got a five-day business trip to attend to, so he’ll have to barrel out of here as soon as he’s done. Why am I not surprised he disappears before I lecture him,” he grumbled, seeing the way Melody’s shoulders slumped. “I’m gonna give him double when he gets back.”
He hugged her.
“We’re working on him. He’ll get better, princess. I don’t think he’s used to having friends. Maybe this will give him time to miss you. Come on, I’m happy to eat lunch with you and I’m starving, and if we don’t go now, Jeff from maintenance is gonna force me to eat freaking fried chicken dusted in rose petals and buttered eel stuffed with rose hip jelly again, and when I tell you I sneezed, it was for ten minutes straight, so please hurry and save me!”
He dragged her out of the library, ignoring the passageways, presumably in a bid to escape the incorrigible Jeff, or else realizing that Melody was laughing too hard for the walls to be have any point.
~
The grounds felt strangely empty the following Thursday, the day titled Halloween, despite several delivery trucks running in and out, several spook-tour buses parked prominently beside the Emporium, and a gaggle of high-school girls having an Edwardian reenactment, touched up by blood and spiderwebs, on the promenade.
Grant still wasn’t there, Melody sighed, standing on the tea room’s porch and surveying the carefully manicured landscape, which, unlike the ballroom, was thankfully clear of all giant spiders and chicken-wire ghosts.
It was strange how quiet it was, and chilly, too, she shivered, tugging her sweater sleeves down over her hands. There was no Lys snooping around the property. Even the ghosts had been fairly quiet, perhaps due to how much noise had been filling the hotel.
At least Grant was due back this afternoon.
Whether or not the spectre had made any appearance was unknown: Melody had made a careful point of never looking out the house windows at night, and never wandering around the passageways by herself.
Which left Zion on his own with his theories.
And, Zion had been leaving Melody alone with hers.
She’d been buried in research for the past five days, every free minute – she’d discovered that she was, in fact, allowed to check out the volumes of newspapers, because those were all meticulous reprints.
Every evening was spent with newspapers scattered across her room, skimming until the text blurred and her eyes nearly permanently crossed; all to the point which, Zion was sick of finding the wrong newspaper at his plate (imagine findingthe October 27th, 1908 edition instead of that of 2024 under your cereal bowl), little Angeline had taken to studying Edwardian journalism styles for her English class, and Melody couldn’t read one letter from the grocery list. She’d even neglected to bake a single gingerbread cake or pumpkin-apple-cider doughnut for a week, and that was concerning.
Her eyes were so strained that Zion took the initiative and canceled Melody’s work on Wednesday and Thursday, wrongly assuming that his sister would spend the day taking carriage rides and perhaps playing by the shore with Ellie and Angie.
Instead, Melody had promptly curled up at the library desk, carefully-lidded vanilla-pumpkin-pecan latte in hand, and her research laid out.
Five days, and so far what Melody had, spread out before her, were a handful of clippings. Of course, she had copied them and printed them out before cutting them – including some panic where she thought she cut the library copy and not her own, but thankfully it had turned out well.
Several of them she’d found accidentally. No, the tome had been knocked from its shelf, only for a single newspaper to slip from its binding. That had happened a couple of times.
Melody could feel the air in the room begin to prickle with energy and glanced up, eyes turning instinctively to the emerald-velvet settle across the room. She fancied she could see the fabric crease and pale beneath the weight of skirts, and see the carpet ripple beneath their trains.
“Good morning, ladies,” she saluted them sleepily. “I already prayed my rosary this morning. I’m off today, and Grant-”
She winced as the air fairly bristled like pins and needles before settling, as it often did.
“-Grant will be back today. I’m sorry about all the people visiting who don’t understand ghosts. Lyle forbids me to say anything to them, but I’m hoping if I can put together pictures of who you were, that is, are, it will help, and more people will pray for you.”
She imagined the ladies across the way nodding graciously; she felt that they did.
“At least I know your names now,” Melody told the ladies. “And I know which one is which of you.”
May 8th, 1908 - Genevieve Gelsomino, 17, was found dead at her vanity this afternoon in the bridal suite at Hotel Lilac, a vine of jasmine twined about her right arm. Daughter of bank owner Johann Gelsomino, Miss Gelsomino was awaiting her wedding in Lavender Vale, prior to her honeymoon at the resort. Medical examiners state that she died of natural causes. It is well known to her family and friends that Miss Gelsomino suffered weak lungs after a recent contraction of pneumonia, and it is the official opinion that combined with this state, the excitement took its toll on her.
May 9th, 1908 – Adding to the tragedy of Genevieve Gelsominio’s death at Hotel Lilac is the death of her uncle, Rorick Stefan, who had been serving as her guardian on her wedding day while father, Johann Gelsomino, oversaw wedding preparations. Rorick was found dead within two hours of Genevieve. The cause of death is hypothesized to be from strain, as he had a difficult year and Genevieve was his favorite niece, family say, and the doctor who examined the body agreed, though puzzled to note that the palm of one hand was stained by what appears to be a rash, likely an allergen which could have resulted in a severe reaction, and even death.
July 1st, 1908 – This morning, Miss Mary-Marguerite Baker of Manhattan, age 19, was found deceased, having drowned accidentally, family says. A debutante recently come out and presented to Her Majesty the Queen this past June, Miss Baker on holiday, visiting relatives in America. She was accustomed to early morning swims during her travels, and was discovered to have taken a rest, prior to 7 a.m. this morning, at the side of the otherwise empty swimming pool. Due to her asthma, it is supposed that Miss Baker wore herself out with swimming and rested too close to the pool, thereby drowning when she fell in. It is curious to note that daisies were found floating surrounding her; despite the imitation of Ophelia, parents Julia and Martin assert that it was not a suicide attempt: Miss Baker had high hopes of meeting a beau while traveling.
July 22nd, 1908 – A fourth death jinxes the Hotel Lilac, with the death of Mrs. Ione Allen of Boston, age 24. The widowed and deaf wife of Colonel James Allen of the U.S. Navy, Mrs. Allen had been spending the remainder of her mourning period in retreat at Lavender Vale, accompanied by a maid. Witnesses say that Mrs. Allen was in her suite, likely preparing for dinner, when she received her brother, Alfonse Jackson, also of Boston, who appears to have stopped by on his way to business on Long Island. The maid departed, dismissed to have her own dinner. After thirty minutes, Mr. Jackson took his leave, and Mrs. Allen went down to dinner; not long after returning to her room, when the maid was once again dismissed, a noise was heard, and Mrs. Allen was soon discovered, deceased, with violet flowers scattered around her where she fell. It appears that Mrs. Allen died of natural causes, perhaps a heart weakened by mourning.
July 24th, 1908 – Further deepening the recent death of Mrs. Ione Allen is the death of her brother, Alfonse Jackson, who died on his carriage ride to Long Island after visiting Mrs. Allen at the Hotel Lilac. Cause of death is unknown, but an allergy is suspected, due to a red irritation discovered on his cheek.
August 17th, 1908 – The Hotel Lilac is beginning to earn an eerie reputation, not least added to by a sixth death earlier today. Miss Rebecca Manolas, 15, was vacationing with her family during July and August. Her summer was tragically cut short when she suffocated in her sleep last night. Miss Manolas, who suffered from chronic headaches and fatigue, is reported to have left last evening’s ball at the Lilac early, saying that she felt ill. She was found this morning, holding the magnolia she had worn in her hair, her face stifled in the pillows.
October 23rd, 1908 – Seven deaths – will it be the last for the Lilac, one way or the other? This afternoon, Lady Evelyn Lewandowski, betrothed of one Count Ilinski from Krakow, passed this evening. Lady Lewandowski had spent the afternoon entertaining young ladies in the Lilac’s tea room, and enjoyed the seaside promenade. Feeling fatigued, for she suffered greatly ever since a childhood illness, Lady Lewandowski retired, and could not be roused for supper. Curiously, as with many of the other deaths, a flower was found resting on her heart – this time, sprigs of sea-lavender, which the Lady may have picked during her walks.
“It’s odd. . .” Melody’s voice trailed off. The ladies gave no hint, but the silence seemed to prick.
Melody shoved her chair back from the desk and tucking her soft rose-pink plaid shawl tighter around her, darted off to track down Zion.
“Zion?” Melody whispered as she poked her head into the computer room.
Zion swiveled around in his chair with raised eyebrows. The other personnel continued tapping away at their keyboards, some monitoring the Emporium, others keeping an eye on hotel files.
“Hm?
“I need your phone, please.” Melody tiptoed up to him as he reluctantly drew his phone out of his pocket and handed it to her.
“What for?”
“Research.”
“Mel…gah, you’re becoming obsessed. Only if it gives you more peace, okay?”
“It’ll bring me more than if I left those questions knocking at my brain cells.”
Melody hastened back to the library and took up her seat again, bringing up the good old internet.
“Ione…name…meaning.”
From the Ancient Greek Ion, Ione means “violet flower.”
Hands beginning to freeze, Melody hastily input every other first name. They all drew blanks.
Either it was a dead end…but she knew that Marguerite meant Daisy, and that was a middle name. On a whim, she searched on the last names of the remaining women.
Manolas – from Greek for “Magnolia.”
Gelsomino – from the Italian for “Jasmine.”
Lawandowski – from the Polish lawenda, “Lavender.”
It was not a coincidence. The deaths had to have been orchestrated. Each with an illness, each with a floral name, each single and waiting for a relationship, each found with the flower that was in their name.
Melody’s heart started to thump painfully, skipping beats and feeling like it was being sucked at by a vacuum. She slowly lowered the phone and looked at the empty library.
“If this were 1908,” Melody said to the empty air, “I might be dying, too.”
The breeze brushed her forehead.
What about the men? Why weren’t they haunting the Lilac, or was one of them the sixth ghost Grant didn’t know? Melody hastily tried another search. All she was trying to do was locate any ghost stories from the Lilac, but what she found made her blood chill.
In 1996, newlywed Erica Wilder was narrowly rescued from an attack when a black-robed figure had reached out from a panel in the closet of the bridal suite and attempted to choke her. Her husband, Lane, had just left to fish in the lake, only to turn back halfway down the corridor upon remembering he’d left his sunglasses in the bedroom.
The spectre wasn’t Grant, who had been born the following year – to Erica Wilder.
Nor had it been Avery, who couldn’t have been alive.
The phone buzzed in Melody’s hand and a notification popped up on her screen.
Zion Holcomb: Where
Zion Holcomb: R
Zion Holcomb: U?
Grant: ? Driving?
Zion Holcomb: Not you
Zion Holcomb: Melody, I need my phone
Grant: Earth to Zion
Grant: You’re texting Grant
Melody realized that Zion must be texting from his tablet, only Grant had ended up in the chat with both phone and tablet.Probably Zion’s sense of precaution, to make sure if Melody didn’t reply, Grant was equally worried. She tapped out,
Zion Holcomb II: I’m in the library with the ghosts
Zion Holcomb: YOU’RE WHAT
Grant: *confusion*
Grant: What do you mean, I’m what?
Grant: Which ghosts? What’s going on
Grant: Zion why are you texting yourself
Zion Holcomb II: (This is Melody) All of them, I think
Zion Holcomb II: Oh
Zion Holcomb II: Not the spectre
Zion Holcomb: Seriously? She borrowed my phone for research
Zion Holcomb: @Grant, texting myself and you from my tablet
Zion Holcomb II: Zion how come Grant is “Grant FBIL” in your contacts?
Zion Holcomb: @Melody, FBIL = Future Brother in Law
Grant: . . . Nice to know you wanted to see if I’m almost back
Zion Holcomb II: ARE YOU ALMOST BACK???????????
Grant: 🥹 lol Melody
Grant: Missed you too
Grant: I’m walking into work rn
Zion Holcomb II: Aww 💕
Zion Holcomb: 😏
Zion Holcomb II: YOU’RE EARLY Yayyyyyyyy
Grant: 😂 Quit texting me as Zion
Zion Holcomb: K, lovebirds, Melody bring me my phone please
Grant: Yes you need to get ready
Zion Holcomb: Ha, you didn’t argue
Zion Holcomb II: (M) For what?
Grant: The ball!
Zion Holcomb II: ???? I’m not going
Zion Holcomb: Neither of me are
Grant: We all are
Grant: You’re ghosts
Zion Holcomb: WHAT
Grant: Ha
Grant: Lyle’s request
Grant: Not enough ghosting lately
Zion Holcomb II: ??? But what am I wearing???
Grant: Black
Zion Holcomb II: Ew
Grant: 😂 Meet me in the studio, Ellie’s going too
Zion Holcomb: Oy vey, Grant 🙄
Melody slipped out of her seat, surprised to find her arms still covered in goosebumps. Grant’s return and the silliness of the conversation had changed the anxious palpitations into a happy kind of flutter instead. Still, she was going to have to tell both boys of her discoveries. At least the weight wouldn’t be all on her, and she certainly was relieved that it wasn’t 1908, or 1996, for that matter.
There was an abrupt thump from the other side of the room, the sound of someone knocking. Melody jumped and turned back - as she knew, there was no one else in the library, and the sound wasn’t coming from the secret door.
It was coming from Delilah’s portrait.
Missing the now insistent texts from both Zion and Grant, Melody crept uncertainly towards the wall, past the chaise and chairs in which the ladies had been seated, which now felt devoid of their presence. The smell of perfume grew suddenly strong as she reached the statuary’s niche, but the knocking stopped, leaving the air unsettlingly heavy, until Melody tilted her head back and realized.
It wasn’t just the flower petals on the wall that were sparkling.
The ring on Delilah’s hand, did, too.
It was identical to the ring from the bridal suite.
“Now I know why you should never have a phone,” Zion grumbled, as he met Melody halfway through the garden.
“Zion, I have to tell you,” Melody tugged on her brother’s sleeve as they jogged towards the stable.
“Tell me what? That you really don’t want to wear black?” he teased, but tensed at the look on her face, listening as she told him everything she had discovered.
“You can’t be a hundred percent sure of anything from that,” Zion reminded her, but he was clearly uneasy.
“How can you say that?” Melody demanded. “It can’t be so coincidental!”
“Flowers. . . relationships. . . health issues.” Zion muttered. “What on earth would that have to do with -”
He halted, looking from the hotel before them to Melody.
“Delilah. You’re thinking of Delilah. Her love of lilacs, her autism – how would Grant even know that if it wasn’t a diagnosis at the time?”
“He’s done his research into his family, too,” Melody replied. “There must have been enough information about who she really was for him to guess that. But she had cancer, too, which would also count as one of these conditions.”
“Mel, please tell me you haven’t got any leads on who it – you do have a lead.”
“I’m. . .thinking of Avery.”
“Grant’s doppelgänger. That would explain why Jasmine – I mean, Genevieve – showed his photo to you. Do you have any other reason to think so?”
Melody shrugged helplessly.
“Grant doesn’t want to talk about Avery,” she murmured. “If he does know, I can’t blame him for not mentioning it. If he doesn’t know anything, I might be able to find something online.”
“I wish you wouldn’t dig it up,” Zion sighed. “I’m not giving you my phone for that.”
Draping an arm half-consciously over her shoulders, Zion drew Melody up the stairs.
“Melody, there’s something I have to tell you, too. I’m afraid it’s little lighter than what you’ve found – remember my trip into Barnstable on Saturday? I picked up a handful of hidden security cameras, the kind that are disguised as other electronics or décor. I haven’t told anyone about it outside of security, even Lyle and Grant, just in case. I’m the only one who can get the footage, because it links to my tablet.”
“Melody, it’s picked up a handful of creepy situations both here and at home. There isn’t one spectre. There are two. At least one of them broke into the Emporium again last night, the main security cameras went out, and left the same situation with the perfume bottles – one rose-pink teetering on the edge of the cabinet, the others smashed.”
He bit his lip.
“Princess. Both times this happened, the five perfumes that were broken. . . matched the flowers of the ghosts. I’d still like to think it’s nothing particularly ominous, though. Anyway, I – almost think you shouldn’t mention any of this to Grant, Mel. It’s not going to do much good to solve a mystery this long after it happened, is it? If there was an attempt on Grant’s mother, it’s got to be disconnected from the original five, because Avery certainly couldn’t have been around. Anyway, Grant’s probably not going to appreciate hearing about Avery again.”
“Maybe,” Melody said reluctantly, “but I don’t think he’d appreciate me trying not to tell him.”
“If you insist. Ugh, Melody, I wish you hadn’t needed to dig this all up. That’s a weight for you to bear. Please, don’t try to dig up any more answers for a while?”
“But Zion, I still haven’t told you about the ring-”
Zion let the studio door swing shut behind them with a bang, interrupting Melody, and Grant and Ellie looked up from studying a pile of black fabrics.
“Graaaant!” Melody bounced up to him and laughing, Grant reached out to give her a hug before she asked for it.
Lys was also bouncing around happily, leaving Ellie to catch up all the ferns and the last of the potted marigolds which he knocked over in the process.
“What’s all this?” Zion surveyed the looming pile of satins, wool, gabardine, and lace.
“Costumes,” Grant replied. “This isn’t the first time the Lilac has needed to assist with Edwardian ghosts. The whole masquerade ball is going to be Edwardian and Victorian in theme, so we’ll be able to blend in part of the time. Since I don’t know what size you both wear, Ellie and I have dragged out everything we could find from the costume room. At this point, we could have just brought you there,” he sighed, ruffling his own hair.
“Huh,” said Zion, gingerly pulling out a suit coat. “Looks like prep for a funeral.”
“Don’t worry. There’s some…lilac and lavender mixed in with it,” Grant grinned. He helped Zion sort out a full-dress suit with shawl collar and deep lilac tie, but Zion balked at the top-hat, much to Melody’s amusement.
“This definitely, freaking looks like somebody’s funeral,” he complained, “and it’s probably mine! And it’s going to get knocked off by a flying bat, probably. Unless I can pull rabbits out of it, I don’t want it.”
“No rabbits, but possibly mothballs,” Grant examined it. “You’re in luck, this is the only one that fits and it’s got water stains, so I’m going to call that an excuse.”
In the meantime, Ellie and Melody had discovered two matching dresses, crafted in heavy black lace embroidered with roses, over a deep lavender satin. They were already playing with the sweeping trains and hunting for appropriate ribbons for their hair, which they found to be black and lilac silk.
“What was that you were saying about a ring?” Grant pressed Melody, coming to her aid when the ribbons turned out to be tangled up with a mess of gloves and lace shawls.
Melody turned to him in surprise. “Oh, yes, I wanted to tell you -” perhaps not everything? She thought. “I think the ring in Delilah’s portrait is identical to the one I found in the bridal suite, and it’s opal like the roses seem to be in the library.”
“What ring?” Grant paused. He seemed genuinely mystified.
“The ring I found before I saw Jasmine. Don’t you remember? You told me you ought to keep it, and you did.”
“I vaguely remember that now,” Grant nodded slowly. “What about it?”
“Delilah’s portrait?”
“Ah. Yes, I did think of that when you showed it to me. You see, in my research of my family’s history, particularly Avery - I was fascinated by him for a time due to the resemblance - I found that in most photos between Delilah’s death in 1885 up until 1908, Avery prominently wore her engagement ring, an Opal ring, on the chain of his pocket watch. You can see it fairly easily, especially in the rare portrait. I also came across letters from his mother and his sister’s diary, in which they noted that he seemed to have finally let Delilah go, for he no longer wore the ring after spring of 1908. But,” he shrugged, “that’s probably all it is. He stopped wearing it, maybe even gave it away.”
“You promised me before that you knew it wasn’t Jasmine’s ring,” Melody reminded him. “Aren’t you sure?”
“I thought I was. How likely do you think it is, though, that Delilah’s ring would have lain undiscovered for 116 years, in the bridal suite, of all places? No, it was probably a lost engagement ring from later on, if you want to be logical about it.”
“What’s the point of typical logic if you have seven people die mysteriously and there are ghosts everywhere?” Melody replied quietly, but Grant didn’t hear her.
Halloween evening was a funny thing. Even Lavender Vale found itself draped in tissue paper ghosts and silver spiderwebs, with happy-faced pumpkins on every doorstep. Even Angie had got her wish and three very little pumpkins sat smiling on the porch of the pink dollhouse when Zion and Melody headed back to work for the ball.
The rest of the family was away, and wouldn’t be back until Saturday evening - Angie had begged her way into Aunt Lily-Mae’s Halloween party and the following day’s All Saints’ party, so it would be a Boston weekend for both Angie and her parents.
Dusk was a hazy pink on the horizon, reflecting in the bay as Melody met with Ellie in the costume room to finish their historical toilettes. Each was already dressed, but Melody and Ellie had agreed to assist each other with their hair, and with attempting to look like a ghost.
“Very white foundation,” was Ellie’s opinion, “and tons of powder, because the Edwardians would only use powder. We just need to look extra…dead?”
That was quickly achieved, leaving both girls declaring they could be mistaken for vampires, if they weren’t careful. A knock on the door announcer the arrival of Grant and Zion, who were unfortunately about to suffer similar fates with makeup.
“Oh for goodness sakes,” Zion exclaimed, catching sight of both girls in the mirror they were facing.
Grant takes one look at Melody as she rose to greet them. “Alright, the specs said ghostly, not absolutely dead, you need some color in your face!”
“I didn’t bring any color with me,” Melody protested.
Grant waved his hand towards the vanity Melody had just been seated at.
“There’s costume makeups there,” he reminded her. “You’re free to use it, after all the Hotel voluntold you to work tonight.”
There were, indeed, a collection of decorative cosmetics and perfumes on the vanity, which Melody had assumed were decorative only. To Grant’s relief, however she found an old-fashioned tin of powder rouge, gently painted gold and rosy-red, with pink rose-vines scrawling all over it.
Rouge - Rose-in-Bloom
“Tout Naturel” since 1890
Created exclusively for our special guests at
~
The Hotel Lilac & Promenade
~
Lavender Vale, MA
“Oh! Is this the Lilac’s makeup? They started making it again! I’m so happy they did,” Melody exclaimed excitedly to Grant, who turned around, bemused.
“Don’t ask me, I didn’t have anything to do with the setup here.”
Melody tapped her fingers into the soft rosy powder within the tin, which smelled distinctly like the garden outside on a rainy day. It shimmered in a lovely way and quickly corrected the over-ghost lines of her skin. Ellie, on the other hand,mischievously insisted on being a vampire, to Zion’s mock annoyance. Both girls did a quick, loose coiffure and wound the black and lilac ribbons around their coiled tresses for a classical effect before joining the boys at the door.
“Your masks,” Zion offered with a flourish, handing each a mask of black and lilac lace to match. Grant was scowling again at Melody, to which she smiled and shook down the ends of her curls, but Grant remained strangely quiet and chose to take Ellie’s arm instead.
“This way,” he said, and guided them through the hidden corridors up to the second floor.
The plan for ghosting was for one couple to begin dancing with the guests, while the other remained in a hidden room. Their image would be projected onto the first pair as they danced, creating a brief ghostly effect, before the lights would shut off and an exit would be made. After that, they would be free to enjoy the ball.
Zion had zero desire to be ducking through a crowd in the dark, and neither did Ellie, leaving Grant to escort Melody out of hiding onto the crowded dance floor. Lyle and a few of the other staff members were present, suitably dressed in Edwardian style, but without the masks as they checked in on guests and kept watch over a table where prizes were to be raffled off, most of them Edwardian antiques – jewelry, clocks, and porcelain.
The ballroom was usually quite beautiful, but tonight, mingled with the sparkle of the chandeliers were hundreds of candles on the banquet tables, and black and silver spider webs were strung everywhere. Edwardian werewolves were dancing with Victorian vampires, and one enthusiastic ghost was waxing poetical on the virtues of saving penguins, using a small stuffed penguin as a prop.
There was an unfortunate smattering of blood along the tablecloths and even on the floor, which turned out to be red sequins, something the housekeepers were going to love cleaning up. Melody winced at some of the gory costumes which seemed so out of place, particularly the somehow-Edwardian pirate who was apparently barely in one piece.
Melody leaned her head closer to Grant’s shoulder instead as he waltzed with her, managing not to be run into by several tribes of ghosts, skeletons, and zombies.
“I thought you weren’t afraid,” he said gently.
“I’m more afraid today,” Melody admitted. “I wish- I wish you were always here. I - don’t like doing things on my own.”
He twirled her away from him and carefully drew her back, folding her right hand more securely in his left.
“What do you mean? Do you feel safe when I’m here?”
“Yes.” She studied his face, which even with the mask, was still very safe. “Except when you’re confusing.”
“Then I need to cease being confusing. Melody, angel. What’s on your mind, princess?”
She smiled at that, hardly noticing as the lights flickered and a blue cast from the projector overhead fell over them.
“It’s just - I researched the ghosts, Grant, and I think - they were all murdered.”
His grip tightened on her hand.
“And?”
“I- started to wonder if it was Avery.” Melody briefly bit her lip as Grant’s lips tightened, too. The history of the five ladies spilled out, everything that she knew. Grant was surprisingly quiet as Melody softly relayed her research to him, waiting for a sign that he had come across any of the same before; he didn’t seem to recognize any of the information.
“So I began to wonder if this is why Jasmine showed me Avery’s photo,” Melody finished, and whatever reply Grant meant to make as he began to nod was interrupted.
Some woman screamed, and a few other shrieked a little, and a table went over.
“What in the world-”
“Jasmine? I mean-”
It wasn’t just Jasmine who had moved among the dancers and taken her place between the banquet and the door. The Maiden, and the Debutante were there too, flitting their way through the tables, beckoning to Melody.
Another shriek as a burst of icy wind blew out every one of the hundred candles, leaving the ballroom suddenly dim. Chairs scraped and were cast from one side of the room to the other, as Melody abruptly realized Grant had been pulled into the crowd and no one was with her. Melody shuddered for a second as the chill brought goosebumps and she began to feel oddly faint. She forced her eyes back open.
“Girls, girls, what do you want? I can’t understand you-”
The lights snapped off at that moment, plunging the ballroom into darkness. This time there were gasps from every corner amid the distinct shattering of glass, and a low, low laugh that Melody recognized from her nightmares. Every scrap of light was gone, except for the glow-in-the dark of a few costumes, and the white face that laughed in the ballroom doorway.
“Jack, I want to go home!” One woman exclaimed, and her sentiments were hastily echoed by everyone else as the violet eyes snapped and the chandelier fell, plummeting with a crash that shook the floor underfoot. Guests shouted and split in all directions crashing into each other; the tables, and piling up at the inexplicably locked doors which were quickly broken open, sending men and women flooding out into the lit hallways and down into the garden. Melody found herself swept along in the tide, bruised first one one side and then on the other as she called for Zion and Grant, but presumably each had been shoved out in the opposite direction.
“Zion! Graaant! Ow!” Melody found herself thrust out onto the stairway that led outside of the memorabilia hall out to the garden from a balcony, and tumbled down the last seven steps onto the grass.
The garden was weirdly quiet, as the buzzing guests caught their wits and drifted quickly into the lobby to make inquires.
For a moment, Melody lay in the tangle of the long lace train of her gown, staring up at the dtars and counting the seconds until she felt like picking herself up.
A gloved hand grasped her own and lifted her to her feet before she counted to ten.
“Melody!”
The spectre looked at her for a moment with cocked head as with one hand he helped disentangle her, and kept her upright with the other.
“Grant?” Melody asked him breathlessly. The spectre inspected her hand, reddened, sprained perhaps by her fall.
“They must have been the other spectre, or one of them,” Melody recounted, remembering that Zion had said there were two. “Unless Lyle wanted them to scare the guests too, but you weren’t supposed to do that; were you?”
He shook his head and put an arm around her.
“Your eyes are violet, too,” Melody whispered uncertainly. “I thought you’d keep them white, like the first time.”
The fingers tightened on her wrist. The mouth split in a leer, a leer that wasn’t Grant.
Jasmine-White was killed that night
Daisy-red went without pain
Violet’s flight wasn’t right
Magnolia loved too light
Lavender fell hard like rain
. . . . Rose-in-Bloom you die to-night!
Horrified, Melody began to feel faint again, the violet eyes spinning in her vision.
Rose-In-Bloom
The red stain -
The eyes were pressing into her vision and she couldn’t breath, couldn’t free her shoulder from his grasp.
If this were 1908 I would be dead
The makeup went out with the Edwardian era -
In 1909
Melody thrust her hands desperately at the spectre’s throat, weakening his grip briefly
The poison
It had been the makeup all along
She stumbled towards the rose garden, where she could see a few stragglers still discussing the uproar at the ball -
“Ziooon! Graaaant!”
“Melody?!” Zion shoved open the back lobby door, stepping out onto the veranda as he watched his sister stagger through the rose garden, hugging her wrist and wobbling on her feet.
“Melody! Are you alright?”
“Zion?” she answered dizzily as she drew nearer into the porchlight and he caught her arm. “Don’t feel good. Poison-”
“What poison?” Grant asked at once, on alert.
“The – makeup – all along,” she breathed.
Her head snapped forward and she crumpled, Zion scrambling to reach his arms beneath her head before it splintered against the stone of the veranda.
“Melody!” Grant grabbed a wet cloth and placed it on the girl’s forehead as Zion alternately chafed the girls wrists. She didn’t wake up.
“What’s her pulse?” Grant snapped, and Zion paled as he counted.
“Fast,” he said, looking up. “Too fast! Why doesn’t she wake up?”
“He poisoned her!” Grant whipped out his phone and dialed a number. “Dr. Barnard! It’s poison, can you – no, if you’re not here in twenty minutes -” He listened and punched the red button.
“He did it on purpose,” he muttered. “Dr. Barnard is the only one close by who could safely treat this poison, but he’s out of town today!”
“Who is, what is?” Zion asked impatiently, cradling Melody’s head. “If he doesn’t get here, is she -”
“We’ll just have to scrape together what I know,” Grant answered grimly. “We need to get her home!”
The wind hissed through the edge of the forest behind the hotel, raking through the maples and pines, and a sound broke over it, chilling the boys to the bone as the sunset crept lower: a laugh, maniacal, the kind a skeletal ghost gives in any old cartoon - but worse because as they heard it, all the shadows in the trees grew menacing and seemed to bob, marching on their way towards the Lilac - but only the wind and the owls replied to the laugh as the crickets timidly returned.
“What was that?” Zion asked tersely, as the sound died away, ringing among the dark trees.
“The reason why I scare people,” Grant whispered grimly. “And the reason why I wish to Heaven that she’d been frightened! I’ll get him!”
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Oh, the makeup! *Clever!* But who??