Here's another very long, standalone story—one with a dark, Gothic feel:---# **21. "The Keeper of the Tower of London"—A Story of Who Stood Too Close to the Shadows**

The Tower of London is one of the most iconic landmarks in England.

Its walls, towers, and moats remember centuries of kings, prisoners, and blood shed in the name of power.

But no one talks about what happens there at night, when tourists leave the courtyard and the darkness becomes thick as ink.

The people of London whisper about the **Keeper**, a figure who only appears when silence descends upon the walls.

### **I**

The story begins in 1784.

A young soldier, Thomas Redcliffe, was assigned to guard the Tower.

He was proud of his task—to guard the royal treasures and the castle's secrets. But on the very first night, he felt the walls were more than just stone and brick.

As night fell and the courtyard lanterns dimmed, Thomas heard something strange: whispers echoing off the walls, as if the walls remembered every step of the prisoners who had died in the castle.

Strangest of all, the whispers seemed to be calling his name.

“Thomas… Thomas…” they repeated.

He lifted the lantern, but he saw no one.

The air was cold, heavy, as if thick with ancient secrets.

### **II**

On subsequent nights, Thomas noticed a figure.

It wasn’t alive, yet it moved with a human rhythm.

The dark figure, helmeted and sword-wielding, standing by the Traitors’ Gate, never left the walls.

Thomas tried to approach, but each step seemed lost in the infinity of the courtyard. The figure disappeared and reappeared elsewhere, always observing, never responding to words.

“Who are you?” he asked one night.

There was no answer, only the echo of footsteps that repeated exactly like his own.

### **III**

Thomas soon realized the figure was the **Warden**, who belonged to no time.

It was said to be the ghost of a former warden who had lost his life in the line of duty, but whose duty did not end with his body.

Anyone who stayed too close to him felt their own shadow cease to belong to them.

He became part of the walls, a part of history that could not be abandoned.

One night, Thomas felt something holding him down.

It was nothing material, but a force pulling his consciousness into the very walls.

He saw hundreds of faces of prisoners screaming, dying, begging for freedom.

And the Warden stood there, motionless, waiting for Thomas to become one of them.

### **IV**

From that night on, Thomas never left the Tower.

His colleagues told of sometimes seeing him at midnight, standing in the shadow of the walls, staring out into the courtyard, though no one was allowed to speak to him.

Sometimes, when someone walked through the courtyard alone, they would hear whispers:

> "Don't go... stay... observe... learn..."

The Guardian sought no harm.

He forced nothing.

But anyone who looked in his direction for too long began to feel there was no way back.

That their own shadow no longer belonged to them.

### **V**

Today, tourists come to the Tower, strolling through the courtyard, taking photos.

They don't know that within the walls lives the Guardian, who remembers every step, every sigh, every moment.

And if someone lingers at night, they might see a helmeted silhouette standing still, staring directly into their soul.

He is not malevolent.

He does not kill.

But he watches.

And anyone who sees his eyes in the shadows becomes part of the Tower's history, which never ends in time.

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