The Maze

Thapperton Manor had always had a huge maze in its courtyard. This would not be unusual for estates of its caliber.

My husband Viscount Thapperton always told great stories about it. Wondrous two-hundred-years-old hand me down tales during the gatherings he had always been keen to throw at the residence. At least in the first decade of our marriage when he was still strong. Fun stories of peers failing to find their way out of the maze after morning walks, screaming out of frustration when they kept finding themselves back at the same spot.

The Viscount seemed to relish in the frustration of others in their escapades in the maze.

My favorite story he told had always been that of the Duke of Dachar threatening to speak to his father the King and have the Thapperton titles stripped away if they didn’t get him out of the maze that very moment. Guests would usually roar in laughter when he told this particular one. They seemed to enjoy it best, at least in the way the posh could. Plus the Viscount was a great storyteller. It wasn’t much about the story but how he told it.

Before you judge me, wondering why a twenty-eight-year-old woman would get married to a man whose sunny days were long behind him, that’s how he pulled me in. With his stories. And yes, the old manor at the centre of a sprawling five-hundred-acre estate and my declining career as a model raising two little girls were just extra motivation.

I guess the Viscount told stories as an escape. To try and forget that he was on the verge of losing this heirloom that had been in his family since his great ancestor the First Viscount Thapperton had acquired it after his business dealings with The Trithskinders - a feat that earned him noteworthy recognition worthy of a peerage. A fact I did not know until the very end.

And even though the estate was in potential ruin, the Viscount never seemed to worry. It was as though to him, the issue was already taken care of.

“ Whoever takes the manor, will have to bear the burden,” the Viscount often told his sons in my presence.

It baffled me that his two sons had refused this great inheritance.

Yes, the dilapidated manor was a money pit, and our attempts to repair or upgrade it through the years were frustrating. It would have bankrupted even an aristocrat with a pot of gold, but the land itself still held immense value. Why didn’t they want it? Were the wounds sustained from a strained relationship with their father still that open? Did they still hurt that bad? Or were they too spoilt choosing inheritances that would be easier to manage?

When I took the Viscount on his evening walks inside the maze, I’ll admit I would smile on the inside knowing that one day all this was going to be mine. Me. The inner city girl who befriend the train conductors so that I could get to ride for free. That me, now the soon-to-be sole owner of an aristocratic estate.

Thapperton always made me carry seeds for the birds and squirrels in the maze he said. And he would drop them one by one the minute we entered the maze until we got out every day without fail. If I forgot the seeds, he would throw a fit and refuse to enter the maze until I had returned for them or asked them to be brought to us.

The seeds were also of a specific type. Special. Shipped in from another manor in a rural estate he said. The Viscount had his ways I had come to conclude.

“What are you?” I would ask him when I thought the habit of dropping these seeds had become too ritualistic, “Hansel and Gretel? Can’t find your way home?”

He would joke back, “ The journey to the deep forest is treacherous. You need to find your way back to escape the evil witch. Whoever takes the manor, will have to bear the burden remember?”

I never gave his answers much thought. I wish I had. I had even failed to ponder on the fact that every next day, all the seeds would have been eaten. Every single one of them! But it was a vast estate anyway. Who would know how many squirrels it housed?

I was ready to bear the burden.

I planned to sell the estate or rent out its vast lands. I was also constantly day dreaming about a much simpler life with no Viscount to take care of and the annoying daily walks into the maze.

“I’ll be gone soon darling,” he would often tell me as I walked beside him on his wheelchair. “ You did give me seventeen good years of your young life. When I’m gone you are free to take them back.”

What an understanding man, I’d think to myself.

“ Just remember, if you take the manor, you will have to bear the burden.”

I would nod.

The Viscount Thapperton went to rest two weeks ago.

This evening in reflection and as a celebration of our life together I took some of his special seeds and went on a walk in the maze. I knew the path well having walked in it daily for almost two decades. I dropped the seeds as usual.

On my way out of the maze, I noticed all the seeds had been eaten. Every single one of them even though I did not see any bird or squirrel in sight.

What was this? I panicked. It had never happened before. Or had I been keen enough to notice it this time around?

I quickly rushed out and back into the manor. I went into the Viscount’s room to look out at the maze like he usually did, this time out of intrigue.

I picked his binoculars from the window pane and looked out.

“ The seeds are all gone, aren't they? That’s why you are here,” came the familiar voice of Teddy the now Viscount Thapperton.

I was startled. Had he been waiting for me?

“ Look out and see your work now,” he continued.

I looked through the binoculars.

Two large overlapping triangles pointing in opposite directions surrounded by a circle burned in the maze.

My legs shook.

“ Only the person who drops the seeds can see it. That’s your burden now. Keep the fire alive and you will never lose your manor. That’s how the first Thapperton got it. And that’s how they have all kept it. That’s father’s last gift to you. Only darkness can drive out darkness.”

I held on to the Viscount’s chair for support, shaken to my core by these words. When I turned Teddy was gone.

It’s been three days now since I have been into the maze. The plaster crack in the manor's hallway has extended. And the gardener just told me that an unusual yellow patch of grass has appeared next to the northern stables. It's as though someone poured acid on it, he said.

I have been fighting this great compulsion to rush to the maze with the seeds. I now can clearly see what had always been hiding in plain sight, and I will not be a slave to it. I did not sign up for this. I am looking for a way to free myself from the shackles of the occult.

Only darkness can drive out darkness. Isn’t that what Teddy said?