The unicorns would have to wait until the morning, everyone apart from Chloe and Hans were far too tired, and they couldn’t remember where they’d left the car keys anyway. No doubt they’d be somewhere really obvious, like when someone is looking for a hat and it turns out they’ve been wearing it all along.
They couldn’t be bothered to look however, and decided to go sit and watch the thunder storm outside from the top of the tallest tower. It wasn’t really the tallest tower, more that it was the only tower, but it sounded more impressive when people called it that. The castle was originally supposed to have two towers but before the second one had been built, the owners had changed their minds and decided to build a bridge across a bog just north-west of the castle. No-one knew why, not even Mervin (though it was equally likely that he’d forgotten, you could never tell).
They were sat across the window seat looking out across the fields surrounding the castle. Hans had his back against the wall, holding Chloe who was sat in front of him. She felt comfortable when he was around, she had no idea why, it made no sense, he was a bumbling oaf if true words were to be spoken, but he was so much more than that.
“So when did you become a half vampire?” asked Hans politely, they’d got onto the topic of this earlier and she explained that she could go outside during the day but only really well covered up, or else she’d get a kind of extreme sunburn. Most people in town thought she was a muslim, and once one guy who had completely lost the plot gave her a carved wooden Buddha, thinking it would be a nice gift.
The answer to the present question was something that Chloe thought a little embarrassing, she’d been attacked by a stranger when leaving the pub she’d worked in. She’d reported the attack to the police but they just thought she was a weirdo who’d self-inflicted the wounds and they’d referred her to a mental health institution, which she’d escaped from and fled here. The previous owners didn’t know about her, but she’d helped her father maintain the place at nights. The change had happened whilst she’d been on the run from the asylum, but she hadn’t noticed until she’d got here as she’d traveled during the nights anyway.
“Oh,” was all Hans could say, he felt it prudent not to say anything else to save himself sounding either condescending or uncaring. “Ask me something then.”
Chloe wondered why he’d decided to live in Avysmere castle rather than anywhere else. It wasn’t as if it was the most well known castle in country, in fact people were far more likely to tell you it didn’t exist, or that it wasn’t in Avysmere at all, it just happened to be rather near it. But instead of asking him, she just gazed out into the night sky.
