The Shallots
This was the story that was passed down through generations of Le Chiens, all the way to Joaquin.
Featuring...
Newton Addington
A long, long time ago, Fredrick Le Chien, the heir of the Le Chien legacy, lived with his wife, Mabel Le Chien. Fredrick had recently inherited the legacy after his father, the founder, passed. His father’s passing was all that anyone could talk about. The news became so big that it reached the ears of the Shallot family in mainland Windenburg.
Lady Mimsy Alcon Shallot lived in a beautiful mansion with her husband, Lord Bernard Escargot Shallot IV. The two were said to have been descended from the royals of Windenburg past, potentially even descended from those who had built the castle that had long since fallen into ruins.
Despite what many believed and said, the Shallots did not lead a legacy family. Rumors had spread about there being more than just inheritance that kept the two living on the same land, and after a time, no one doubted that they ever hadn’t been a legacy family. This was what the Le Chiens believed.
Mimsy and Bernard had fallen on hard times, a recent economic crisis taking a huge toll on their lifestyle. Bernard, whose paintings had long been what payed the bills, found that what he created sold for less and less. This angered him greatly.
Bernard would rage at Mimsy, loud shouting matches scaring even the servants. Mimsy never knew what to tell him to reassure him that everything would work out fine. Theirs had been an arranged marriage, and Mimsy had never seen such anger until several years after their wedding.
Frequently, Mimsy would flee to their hedge maze and hide deep within, where Bernard would never find her. Only the gardener, Newton, knew just how bad things had gotten between Bernard and Mimsy. Newton was the one to bring the news of Fredrick inheriting his legacy to Mimsy, and she suggested a dinner party to celebrate.
Fredrick and Mabel were eager to accept the invitation, but stressed, as they were under the impression that the Shallots led a legacy family. Neither had heard any tales of two legacy families living in such close proximity, and both were terrified of conflict.
The dinner party was a lovely occurrence, but Mabel would later tell Fredrick that she felt tension in the air. Perhaps she’d detected the tension between Mimsy and Bernard, but that wasn’t the way Fredrick understood it. He began to believe that the Shallots were secretly plotting against him and Mabel.
The Le Chiens wormed their way into the Shallot’s life, gradually creating the illusion of their friendship. Through the Shallots, the two befriended their servants, including the gardener, Newton.
There were even times where Mimsy came very close to revealing to Mabel just how bad her relationship with Bernard was, taking her deep into her hedge maze. Fredrick helped Mimsy in her garden on occasion, then would drink with Bernard late into the night.
After a year had passed, the two persuaded Newton with cash to turn a blind eye as they worked to construct a tiny room underneath the hedge maze that characterized the estate. Newton wasn’t sure of why the two wanted to do such a thing, but he’d always been taught not to ask questions. So, that was exactly what he did.
Things started to go sour when Mabel walked in on Bernard shouting at Mimsy, and tried to defend her. Bernard asked her not to ever set foot on their estate again, and Mabel, who’d just started to doubt her original assumption of the Shallots intentions, ran to Fredrick and told him that Bernard definitely hated them.
As Fredrick and Mabel went searching for a witch to try to ruin the Shallots, Mimsy’s garden matured and she pulled the estate out of bankruptcy by selling what was grown. Bernard’s anger abated, at least for the time being.
Another year passed, and Fredrick and Mabel’s room was completed, as was their tutoring from the witch. Newton himself, the one who cut and tended to the maze, struggled to find where exactly the room has been built. And even once he discovered it, he couldn’t get inside and was left curious.
One evening, as Fredrick lounged in the Shallots living room while Bernard put the finishing touches on a painting of Mimsy, Bernard admitted that he’d come to fear how powerful the Le Chien family had grown.
That was all Fredrick needed to hear. He went to Mabel, and the two hurried to the room they’d built. Utilizing a series of potions, Fredrick and Mabel worked to enchant logs that would raze the house- and themselves- to the ground. The Shallots would never make it out alive.
As the two placed logs around the estate, Mabel argued that the two should try to save Mimsy, saying that she’d done nothing but suffer in her marriage to Bernard over the last few years. Fredrick eventually agreed that they should, but his decision came too little, too late.
Inside, after starting on a painting, Bernard found himself hating what he’d painted. Mimsy told him that it was a great painting, and this, somehow, angered him even more. Bernard hurled the painting into the fireplace, and the flames the canvas produced were enough to ignite the house, and, eventually, the logs outside.
Fredrick and Mabel watched in horror as the mansion erupted into flames, burning Mimsy and Bernard along with it.
When it came time to tell their children what had occurred, Fredrick and Mabel were too ashamed to admit that they'd burned who’d probably been an innocent woman and her servants. So, instead, they told that the Shallots had been angered that the Le Chiens started a legacy, and they’d had no other choice but to send their mansion up in flames. This was the story that was passed down through generations of Le Chiens, all the way to Joaquin.
Author's Note
Hey, Cade here. I was reading back through the early chapters involving the Le Chien family in Mai Legacy, and I realized that I was really intrigued by the conflict Rosaline and Bronson frequently refer to with the Shallots. The Shallots and the whole Von Haunt Estate in general have always been a very interesting piece of Windenburg to me to begin with. So, in addition to all that, I decided a piece set in the late 19th century would be fun to build, so here we are. Hope you all enjoyed this short little piece!
Hey, Cade here. I was reading back through the early chapters involving the Le Chien family in Mai Legacy, and I realized that I was really intrigued by the conflict Rosaline and Bronson frequently refer to with the Shallots. The Shallots and the whole Von Haunt Estate in general have always been a very interesting piece of Windenburg to me to begin with. So, in addition to all that, I decided a piece set in the late 19th century would be fun to build, so here we are. Hope you all enjoyed this short little piece!