~Chapter 6~
Dawn was breaking on the following day, the sun-kissed my cheek as my eyes slowly opened to see the robins singing their happy melodies on the window sill not too far from the bed. I sat up and swung my legs off the bed, almost leaping across the room as if I were a grown man chasing fool's gold. With legs that felt like thin strips of lead, I ran across the room towards the door and made my way into the hallway, stumbling and using the walls and tables to keep myself from falling. Like a bloodhound, I followed the scent of bacon that was lingering in the air, making my stomach rumble so loud as to make the entire mansion shake. As I passed the many paintings in the hallway, still cautious in my exploring of this strange place, a painting stood out from the others and captured my eye. Despite being surrounded by walls made of glistening obsidian with pure silver as mortar; the several golden chandeliers hanging along the corridor ceiling, holding black candles which were burning in blue flames and illuminating what seemed to be elegant oil paintings depicting battles being fought amongst the clouds; nor the scarlet carpet with golden lining which covered an arm's length of the smooth black marble floors could distract me from the painting I now stood in front of.
Mesmerized by the subject of the painting, I slowly walked towards it like a sailor lost in a Siren's song. I ventured off the red carpet which I was walking on and took a step onto the black marble towards the painting.
"Whoa," I whispered to myself with visible confusion on my face as I noticed how warm the marble was, like walking on the beach during a Sunday afternoon, instead of ice-cold as one would expect from such an old manor. My gaze shortly snapped from my feet and back to the painting as my jaw dropped and opened wide with my chin almost brushing the marble floor and my eyes not blinking once. I stared at her standing as still as a statue. A great beauty I would only hope to see in my dreams laid forth on the canvas in front of me, like an angel surrounded by a frame of glimmering gold. Although my eyes were captivated by this majestic creature, my stomach was not.
The smell of bacon kept my legs moving towards the door at the end of the hall. A slightly opened door with rays of sunlight beaming through the small gap. Sounds from within the room got louder as I got closer to the door and the variety of aromas got stronger with every step I took, teasing my senses.
Rays of light from the blinding sunrise hugged my arm as I stretched it in front of me, reaching for the doorknob while the voice of an angel found its way to my ears. Slowly, pushed the door open to find a girl in the mansion's kitchen, singing a melody with the morning robins seeming to sing along to her angelic voice as she cooked a breakfast that had filled the air throughout the entire manor with mouthwatering aromas.
"Oh bloody hell yes," I whispered to myself as I peeked into the kitchen, and rubbed my eyes in disbelief to what I was witnessing.
I watched as a young girl sat in the middle of the room on one of the kitchen stools with an old cookbook on her lap. She sang a song whilst reading the cookbook and turning pages on the breakfast section, with her legs lightly kicking as they hung over the floor which was being cleaned by a mop without a user. The mop swayed back and forth on its own, levitating and cleaning spilled orange juice from the ivory kitchen floor. As she sang and hummed away, the Juice continued to drip from the kitchen counter where a basket of sun ripe oranges was being cut by floating knives and then juicing themselves into a large glass jug, as if it were phantoms making fruit juice.
I then looked over to the stone ovens to see lumps of pastry kneading and powdering themselves into bread or perhaps even into some nice rolls. The bacon sizzling in the pan was being flipped by a levitating spatula whilst some pancakes were stacking themselves onto several plates on the kitchen counter as an actual honeycomb flew over them, glazing them with pure golden honey.
This mysterious girl casually sat in the middle of all this madness, all the while reading the cookbook as if she were the one controlling the kitchen appliances which were preparing this large breakfast.
"That's impossible," I said out loud before hastily covering my mouth with my hand as to not be heard and spotted.
I continued to watch through the tiny gap at the kitchen door as several cups of tea landed onto tiny saucers before being filled by a floating teapot which neatly poured steaming tea into each cup; steam that carried in the soft breeze coming from an opened kitchen window and drifted directly into my nostrils, filling them with a soothing black-current aroma as silver teaspoons, each having a lump of sugar on them, gently plopped themselves into each cup before they all in perfect synchronicity, slowly started stirring said steaming tea.
"By the gods. It's haunted tea." I said to myself ignorantly, unable to blink at the sight in front of me.
My gob-smacked gaze snapped back to the girl, who had ocean blue eyes as deep as chasms you could lose yourself in; her hair was the color of a crimson fire in the rays of the sunlight, with highlights of gold as it captured the suns' beams. Her skin was pale like pearls and as white as the snow that fell in the coldest winters of the land.
"Born of fire and ice."
She said out loud with me peeking through the opening of the door.
"That's what they call us. Come on in."
She says to me sweetly and cheerfully, wearing the most amazing smile on her face, like a perfect picture that stares back at you. Through the trance her voice had me caught in and the hypnosis her eyes had me lost in, I almost didn't recognize her; a face I thought I had recognized only from my dreams, my great beauty. The painting that hung on the hallway did not do her beauty justice, with her lips of crimson that shamed the red rose to wither. My eyes struggled to keep themselves off her as to not make her uncomfortable, and with a soft chuckle and a deeply dimpled smile, she says to me…
"You can call me Mirella. Mirella Kolte." She said with a dazed expression on my face, still not trusting where I was and not believing the beauty of what stood in front of me, I foolishly yelled with a stammer in my voice…
"I, I'm Beuren, but you can call me B. You know if you want, no big deal!" I replied as I cleared my throat afterward and looked to my feet with a blushing smile on my face while pinching myself on the forearm with my arms crossed behind my back, to see if I would wake up from this dream I had become lost in.
She let out the most harmonious laugh I had ever heard.
"You must be very hungry, after all that happened. You know dying and coming back to life and all." Mirella says to me with a blank expression on her face as sunny side up eggs and thick slices of greasy bacon, float and dish themselves onto a ceramic plate now levitating in front of me, along with golden hash browns and a tall glass of freshly squeezed orange juice which fly towards me from across the room and land next to a cup of milked tea placed next to the giant breakfast.
She watched it all happen with a light hum in her silence as if it was all normal to her. Judging from the mansion and what I had seen in my vision, there was probably more I did not know about this new mysterious world.
"Wha, what is this place?" I calmly asked her.
"How'd I get here?"
Mirella placed her finger on my lips.
"Shush now. Eat. All will be explained soon enough," she said.
We sat down on the kitchen counter and talked over breakfast, as if we had known each other our whole lives, two young misfits who saw the true beauty in each other's souls.