The Lake

A Haunted Soul Episode 7

I am a ghost who has nobody to haunt. A lost soul. I was once the lord of the castle that lies in the near distance behind me. But that doesn't matter now because I have been dead for hundreds of years. I was here throughout the years as the castle slowly emptied, then filled again, then emptied once more. I have received very few real visitors over the years, and none of them could see or hear me. The only one I've had to talk to over these long and lonely centuries is myself.

I wish I could one day see the light of the day once again. My only existence is at night, and I fade away right before dawn every morning. It has been like this every night since my murder so very long ago. My many conversations over the years have sometimes been long and painful because the only one who answers is me. And, yes, I do answer myself! Sometimes I imagine that I am two halves of the same person.

"But why do you do that?"

"Because it is better this way! Don't you see? Now there is always a person for me to talk to, even if you do always float over my shoulder in that annoying fashion!"

"That is not my fault! There is nowhere else for me to go! And stop speaking French all the time! It bothers me when you do that!"

"You are speaking French too. Stop and listen to yourself. We both speak the same language. It's the only way we can communicate."

"Okay, I will just stop talking then!"

This is what I have to put up with. Not only can I not find my way out of the castle grounds, I think this long loneliness has driven me ever so slightly mad. My search for a way out of here began that first night when my expected gateway to Heaven never showed up. At the very least I was disappointed. Devastated would be more accurate though. But I've determined that if I can get off the castle grounds then I may somehow be able to get to the long awaited paradise of the afterlife.

If not for this bothersome barrier that surrounds this place! My home has become my prison! There is no way out through the trees that line the sides of the estate. The barrier is very solid there, I know very well. But the lake out at the front of the grounds is where it becomes interesting. There is a soft spot. It is in the swampy area just to the side of the little observation bridge. You actually have to go into the water to find it, but it is there.

I can't go in very far because the water is very deep in some places. And the barrier does eventually stop me right at the point where I would be under water. I can't exactly explain the soft spot very well. It just feels different to me. Soft. There is just something different about that place. I have the strangest feeling that the exit to my prison might be there. One of these nights I will solve the mystery of the soft spot in the lake.