Novels

When Edmund awoke, he knew exactly where he was. This was in direct contradiction to expected behavior of any child thrown into a new world over the course of a single night, but he didn’t have the time for such formalities.

Instead he engaged in his usual morning routine: first, he looked at his notebook.

Sure enough, during the night his sleeping brain had tried to wake him with any number of sudden thoughts, concerns, ideas, and the like; but his hand had caught them all, trapping them in ink before his rest was disturbed.

For six hours the train traveled through the countryside, stopping at various towns to pick up and drop off passengers.

Edmund left Moulde Hall on the thirty-first of August. In proper British fashion, it was raining.

Edmund was an orphan from birth, as was fashionable at the time…

Opening each Edmund book with an excerpt or quote from a fabricated biography of Edmund Moulde was the plan for a long time…but when I first decided to post the book on a (now defunct) blog, I needed something to separate each chapter. So, I decided to write more of Edmund’s Poems.

What resulted was a mix of parodies and absurdities. At first, I attributed each quote to a different scholar and book, but soon the rivalry between Sirs Kohlm and Krink took shape, and eventually they became the only scholars I cited.

A pin falling on a carpet from the height of an ant’s back could have broken the silence. The air itself froze, not daring to cross the room for fear of disrupting the stunned tableau.

Tricknee had no such restraint.

“WHAT?!”

His lanky body unfolded in a flurry of black limbs, rushing towards Edmund like a wrinkled thresher machine.

“Please forgive me, Mister Tricknee,” words tumbled from his mouth in an avalanche, desperate to slow his meteoric advance, “I know we agreed to reveal this later, but I simply cannot in good conscience keep such important news from our honored guests. After all,” inspiration struck, “they have clearly expressed how much they hate surprises.”

Edmund stood in front of Moulde Hall, dressed in the finest fitting suit he had been able to purchase in town, watching the carriage driver drive up the hill.

Ung had been waiting in his room to help him dress. Edmund was no expert, but Ung had assured him that the suit was well made and a perfect fit. The collar was broad and tall, and the vest was a thin leathery gray with Plinkerton’s watch tucked neatly into the pocket. His pants were well fitted, resting lightly on his shiny black shoes, while faint beige ruffles slipped out from around his sleeves like flowers.

Edmund cast the lantern around the tomb, casting shadows over the rough stone. Plinkerton didn’t create this room; it was far too old. The long steps and secret door weren’t likely the original entrance either; people would notice if the crypt of the first Moulde was suddenly covered by a clock statue. There had to be another way out…the original way out.

Edmund was beginning to realize the problem with trying to be three things at once; a person, a Moulde, and an Edmund. It required him to translate the confusing thoughts and actions of others three times before he could understand the situation with precision.

The Mansion struck ten in the evening, the deep boom rolling over Haggard Hill. The storm clouds continued their bubbling creep over the city, turning the warm velvety darkness of nighttime into the empty gray darkness of foreboding doom. Black rain fell fast and hard against the windows of Moulde Hall.

Edmund raised his crank lantern higher against the gloom. He had found it in a storage-room filled with gardening supplies; a clever tool that somehow turned the rotation of a crank on its side into a dim reddish light. Edmund had prevented himself from taking it apart then and there only by promising himself the opportunity later, when he had the time.

It is important to recognize — as Edmund did when he grew much older — that the discovery of Aoide changed everything for him, and not for the better.

Before Aoide, his days were a whirlwind of repetitive activity. In spite of Edmund’s enamouration with the library, he still had responsibilities, and as painful as it was for him there were times he needed to leave his beloved library to fulfill his obligations; namely, exploring the locked rooms of Moulde Hall, eating a lonely dinner at six of the clock precisely, spying on his family, taking Matron her tray of lunch, and his lessons.