Due to a lot to do in my private life I somehow haven’t been really able to dive into my book here. But it’s Friday and I decided that I won#t do anything else today, and I have an hour spare, so I wanted to spend it with pleasure. ANd since the story hasn’t come to me yet, I decided just to deepen my last subject and to go look around those places I described.
And the one place I liked most so far was the Prudhomme house. Fabien Prudhomme, the leader of the pack, lives there alone with his 25 year old son, Emmanuel. So I’m talking a walk in that house, looking in the secret places and asking the owners for comments. I want to get to know the place.
So the house stands next to the smithy. It’s got the ground floor, the first floor and the attic. Also, there is a basement with a secret second level. So all this makes that house really HUGE. For only two people. It stands by a small river. There are tall bushes around the house on the river side, and the forest isn’t far away either. It’s towards the end of the village, rather far away from the centre. The house is made of wood, which is dark with age, and there is a lot of metal work, because the men are smiths. The front door and the kitchen door are two entries to the house. The kitchen door was actually built there for the nights when the werewolves are coming back from a hunt and don’t want the neighbours to notice them walk up to the fromt door. Now, the front door has got a beautifully crafted handle, which looks like a lion head. The corners of the door are also decorated with metal decorative work. The wood itself is solid and probably wouldn’t even crush right away if a werewolf attacked. Fron the inside you can barricade that door with a heavy piece of wood. The hinges make no sound. When you step in, you get straight into the “living room” with a stove in the middle. The fire side of the stove is in the kitchen, but the big warm side is in the living room. There is only a need for the living room because the members of the pack come often to visit and they need a room to gather. Now, the kitchen would be a more provate place. The Prudhommes eat there, spend evenings there, it is their private living room with some beer or wine and nuts. Fabien loves nuts, so children in the village always get him some from the forest and he pays them a few coins. Okay, so far so nice. By the way, they both have their favourite chair.
I walk upstairs now. There is Fabien’s room. A king sized bed which he uses all alone since his wife died. The room is simple, but there are a fewstrange objects. Of course there is his father’s and his grandfather’s favourite hammers on the walls. But there are also some books, a chest in the corner (I will yet have a look into that chest), writing utensils, an urn, a few tiny caskets with yet unknown contents. Interesting.
Now, Emmanuel’s room. I almost expect to find porn magazines under his bed, but remind myself it’s 1602. So I ask him: Manu, what about women? You’re 26 already, isn’t it time? He shrugs. I have to ask: Are you gay? Are you asexual? Impotent? Are you maybe transsexual? Now he gives me a look. Some of these words have no meaning to him, not in his century. And I get it. The answer is so simple it’s almost ridiculous. Manu is simply shy. There is nothing more behind it. Just shy with women. People like that do exist. In this room I find nothing of Fabien’s strangeness. Manu has a few books as well, but his room is simpler. On the bottom of his chest with clothes there is a dress his mother used to wear, he keeps it as a memory. However, this room is almost always dark, that’s the specialty of it. It’s always cold and dark, because it’s on the dark side of the house. Manu likes it this way. Wow, this is the first thing I notice about him that he relaly likes. However, now that I can speak to him, I find it more and more difficult to keep that secret crush he has on ANouk a real secret. He really is very much into her. So if I look under his bed, will I find a ribbon he stole from her? Or a piece of bread she gave him? Or a dried flower that he plucked for her but never gave to her? Yep. I find all of that, but not under the bed. It would be too obvious there. His father, being a werewolf, would have picked up a strange scent of Anouk’s things were under the bed. Manu keeps such tokens hidden under a lose board of the floor. Oh, and there is a mirror in his room, the only mirror in the house. Why he has a mirror? Used to belong to his mother. Oh, so we are a senrimental one! That’s sweet. There is another room on that floor but it’s empty and covered with cobwebs.
The attic is really nothing special at all. Only a chest with Manu’s old playthings there and a couple of wooden boards.
Now, the basement. The normal basement is filled with vegetables stored for the winter. Popatoes, everything is there, along with meat, flour, wine. Also there are weapons. Yeah, not only the Comte has weapons. The Prudhommes have a collection as well, just in case. Behind the shelf with jars and old tools there is a hidden door which leads to the second level of the basement. Now THAT one is an emergency room, where a werewolf can turn, can be locked in, can hide. The door is strong enough to hold even a beast like a werewolf. It is the only such room in all werewolf houses. Not everyone is rich enough to have a panic room in their houses in that century, but the pack knows the necessity of that room. This room also serves as a small private prison in case some werewolf was acting naughty.
Well, so far I like what I see. This house is very cold, they practically never really heat it, but they love it this way, and somehow so do I.
