The fifteen minute novel writing experiment is a attempt to write a complete (and very rough) draft of a novel by writing for fifteen minutes each day. I have taken a timed writing from one of the daily prompts done in 2021, cleaned it up a little and used it as my jumping off point into a story. Each day I will take the last line of the story written the day before and use it as my sentence starter and write for fifteen minutes, growing the story as the year progresses.
Day 103: “I wonder if it is because so many rooms were walled off and hidden or if the place was built to be confusing.”
“I wonder if it is because so many rooms were walled off and hidden or if the place was built to be confusing.” Even if the place was built to be confusing Anya doubted walling off large parts of the rooms and passageways helped with the layout. “Especially as it was turned into a place to hide things and not built as such.”
Anya started to bend down to continue her reading when there was a soft tapping at her door. She put her book to the side and stood. Anya walked to the door and opened it. A young woman stood there looking a little uncertain. She held a bucker filled with what looked like soapy water, a broom and had dust rags of all sorts sticking out of pockets.
“The matron asked that I drop these off for you,” she said.
“Oh thank you,” Anya said. She stepped to the side and the girl entered. She placed the bucket on the floor, set the broom next to it and then pulled out her collection of rags. “The matron says you are to keep them in case you find them needful in your studies,” The girl repeated the comments as though she was repeating the words verbatim. She looked puzzled and Anya suspected that she was not expected to do her own cleaning.
“Thanky ou,” Anya said. “It will certainly help with my project.”
The girl’s confusion cleared. “Oh,” she said nodding. “For a project. Well if you need anything more, you can let me know. I’m Gerta,” she said. “And when you’ve done with this, you can just send them down to the Laundry with your other things and well send you more up.”
“Thank you Gerta.”
Anya wondered if she was expected to find and clean all of the hidden spaces in the House. Knowing how many she had seen, it was a daunting prospect. She walked Gerta back to the door and a thought occurred to her. “Are there many projects going on?”
“Oh someone is always looking into something,” she said. “Some are just gathering things for the next year’s season and others are trying to extend the season in some way. Someone is always trying something.”
“I see,” Anya said. She could imagine that if those living here only had magical skills for a small part of the year, they might want to have everything prepared so they could take full advantage of the skills while they had them. ‘And I’m sure many of them don’t want to let those skills go when the season is over.’ Gerta left and Anya closed the door behind her. Deciding not to waste the soapy water, Anya rolled up her sleeves, opened the hidden panel and entered the dusty study. While nothing she had ever cleaned at home had been quite this filthy, cleaning was a chore Anya was familiar with and she found herself settling into a rhythm with the familiar tasks. The cobwebs were chased down first, mostly because Anya didn’t want to think of big fat hair spiders lurking in the corners and watching her as she tidied their domain. To her relief most of the cobwebs were old as though after a while even the spiders forgot the hidden spaces existed.
Ten til Midnight 