Episode 1 to end
🏰 The Hunted Palace
A Historical Novel in Five Episodes
Setting: 15th-Century England — the first Tudor reign, when loyalty and survival were often the same thing.
---
Episode 1 — The Arrival at Greythorne Palace
The year was 1487.
Rain lashed against the carriage windows as Lady Eleanor Wrenford approached Greythorne Palace, her late husband's ancestral seat. Once a fortress of kings, it now loomed like a monument to despair — its towers dark, its gates groaning like the moans of the dead.
Eleanor, recently widowed, had been summoned by royal order. The new Tudor king, eager to consolidate power, demanded her loyalty — and her lands. Rumors claimed that Greythorne was cursed, haunted since the War of the Roses by the restless spirit of Lord Alaric Wrenford, slain under mysterious circumstances.
Inside, servants greeted her with hollow eyes. The great hall smelled of damp stone and old iron. At dinner, the steward whispered,
> "My lady, when the bells toll past midnight — do not wander the western wing."
That night, unable to sleep, Eleanor heard the bells.
And footsteps — slow, deliberate — pacing the corridors where no living soul should walk.
---
Episode 2 — Shadows Beneath the Throne
Days passed in uneasy stillness. Eleanor began restoring the estate, though whispers followed her — the servants spoke of the Hunted, a ghostly procession seen near the chapel ruins when fog rolled from the moors.
During a visit from Sir Thomas Langley, a royal envoy, tension thickened. He warned her,
> "The king suspects your husband's death was not of battle but treason. He seeks proof — or a confession."
That night, Eleanor discovered a blood-stained letter hidden behind a portrait. It bore the royal seal — and accused Alaric Wrenford of plotting against both York and Tudor alike.
In the candlelight, she saw a shadow move behind her — not her own. A low whisper brushed her ear:
> "Find the truth, Eleanor, before they find you."
The candles guttered out. The air grew cold. And when she turned, a figure in armor stood at the far end of the hall — helm shattered, eyes hollow — watching.
---
Episode 3 — The Betrayal Unveiled
Eleanor's investigation led her to Father Berwick, the confessor who'd served both the Lancastrians and the Tudors. Trembling, he admitted that Alaric's loyalty had been tested — and that he'd died protecting a royal secret.
> "Your husband knew," Berwick whispered. "He knew of the king's false claim… and he was silenced."
Sir Thomas soon returned, accusing Eleanor of conspiracy. Soldiers surrounded the palace, demanding entry. But before they could breach the doors, the bells began to ring again — though no one pulled the ropes.
Panic seized the men. A spectral army appeared upon the battlements, ghostly banners unfurling in a windless night. The spirits of Greythorne's dead had returned, led by Lord Alaric himself.
Eleanor fainted as cold hands brushed her shoulder — and a voice murmured,
> "You are hunted not by the dead… but by the living."
---
Episode 4 — The Haunting Revealed
When Eleanor awoke, she was in the crypt beneath the chapel. Alaric's tomb lay open. Inside, she found a hidden compartment — containing documents proving the Tudor crown's fabrication of its lineage.
Sir Thomas discovered her there and drew his sword.
> "The truth dies with you, my lady. England will not be undone by ghosts and widows."
Before his blade could strike, the ground trembled. The palace walls shook as if rejecting its intruder. Spectral fire swept the crypt; faces of the fallen flickered in the flames. Alaric's apparition rose, confronting Thomas — his once-betrayer.
> "You hunted me, traitor. Now the hunted becomes the hunter."
Sir Thomas's scream echoed as he vanished into the tomb's inferno. The fire ceased. Only silence remained.
Eleanor climbed from the crypt, clutching the truth — and the weight of her destiny.
---
Episode 5 — The Fall of the Hunted Palace
At dawn, royal soldiers arrived. They found Greythorne empty — its gates open, banners torn, and a cold mist rolling across the courtyard. Lady Eleanor was gone.
Weeks later, a rumor spread through court: the queen's secret lineage had been exposed. A sealed packet, bearing Eleanor's signet, had reached London — and the palace was now "hunted" not by ghosts, but by guilt.
Greythorne was abandoned. Ivy swallowed its stones, and travelers who passed by claimed to hear the tolling of its unseen bells — always five chimes, never six — echoing across the moors.
As for Eleanor Wrenford, no grave bears her name. But in the whispers of wind through ruined halls, her voice endures:
> "The hunted palace will always remember the truth."
---
The End