WARNING!! -- this is old, and while recently updated with minor edits and the last of the chapters i never put up back in the day, it shall never be updated...enjoy it anyways!
...since a lot of you seem to keep doing so o-o ...
- Created By itsumademo
Chapter Ten
The Catalyst
Chapter Ten
The Immortal’s voice was light but soft and after the disturbing shock I had, I found that I was stepping back into him for protection and comfort.
As I did, however, I was abruptly swept off the ground and into his arms, just as Caleb had done to me earlier.
“Why do people keep picking me up?” My voice was stronger this time, though the pain still hurt just as much. “Do I look like I need to be carried?”
“Yes.”
I stopped short, and then frowned.
“Well …I don’t. I’m fine.” I began to squirm a bit in his hold. “Put me down!”
“No.”
I thrashed slightly until the intense pain of my injuries caused me to discontinue my efforts towards freedom. Once I calmed down, he then relaxed some of his grip, which made it a bit more comfortable.
“Why did you come for me anyway? Did Caleb talk to you?”
He grimaced at the mention of Caleb, but nodded in reply.
“So you know what happened?”
He mutely nodded again.
“Would you stop being so monosyllabic and uncaring!” His pace stopped and he looked down at me with mild confusion as I hoarsely shouted. “I died! I was dead, gone, vanished completely from this and every world for nearly two hours!”
After I finished my outburst, I glanced up to find the Immortal angrily staring down at me, like a terrifying statue.
“What?” My reply was timid.
He suddenly looked out into the trees, “Orion!”
My head was getting fuzzy; everything was becoming more and more baffling as the day slipped into night.
Orion stubbornly pushed through the trees not long after being called, and seemed to roll his eyes when he saw me.
“Orion, take Jade back to camp.”
I attempted to protest this transfer, but as I opened my mouth to speak, the Immortal effortlessly lifted me onto Orion’s back. As I sat sluggishly, I idly scratched my wrist and laid half-way down.
Once he turned from me, I caught a quick moment of tension between him and Orion; the Immortal was placing a heavy glare on him. However when he left, Orion snorted towards his departure; neither seemed overly pleased right at the moment.
I ruffled his surprisingly soft mane to show my irritation at him and his gesture. He simply shifted a blue eye to me and snickered.
When we headed through the forest, back to camp, I found myself having to lie down along his back and neck since he clearly took no notice to avoid low hanging branches.
I released a sore and heavy sigh against him, blowing pieces of his shining hair.
“Orion, could you slow down a little more? My chest is throbbing from all the movement.”
To my surprise, he complied and lowered his pace. While peacefully riding my eyes began to droop, eventually I shut them completely. His stride became a gentle rhythm to me, so I started to pet along his neck and shoulder in reply to it.
He uttered a soft bluster at the contact, but I was tired and sore and didn’t care right now. Soon he stopped protesting altogether and let me continue stroking his white coat.
I hadn’t noticed until I slid from his high back to the ground, but a pretty humming voice had been coming from my body. Just before I laid onto several strewn blankets, Orion nudged my head with his nose. I looked at his large blue eyes and he then bumped at my forehead, leaving his exhaling nostrils pressed onto my skin.
My brow quirked wearily, “what?”
He lightly smacked against me again, beginning a bizarre attempt at humming. It was definitely the strangest sound I had ever heard, especially from a horse.
“You want me to keep humming?”
He snorted into my face and nodded.
I rubbed my hand against his long muzzle and I dropped down onto the warm bedding. I was just so exhausted all of the sudden. Furiously, I scratched my wrist again before starting to lightly hum the same tune I had been before. A simple lullaby my grandmother had sung to me years ago.
Whisper softly my angel’s lips
Take my hand and soar
Protect my dreams and watch over me
Be there when I slip too far
Guardian with me still
Night’s wings shelter here
And forever I’ll love you my darling
Till dawn’s break into day
I barely managed a second loop before I wholly succumbed to the comfort of sleep.
A sudden jerk pulled me awake and through watery, blurry eyes I saw the fire low and dancing and on the other side sat the Immortal; his eyes appeared closed. I quickly ran my nails along my wrist as I moved to a sitting position.
Orion was quietly standing and sleeping not too far from where I was; his blue eyes were shut and light exhales blew against his long deep auburn mane.
I was feeling so hot, but every breeze that passed across my skin caused me to shiver violently, disturbing my wounded chest and side. I gripped my torso then scratched my wrist again, though more forcefully this time.
Clumsily pulling to my legs, I nearly toppled over two or three times before I stood straight.
The world was spinning in my view. The trees seemed to be changing places over and over...dancing around me in strange patterns. I tripped and caught myself on a tree that abruptly stopped just to catch my fall.
“Nice tree…….thank you….”
I pushed off from the bark and it went back to its swirling, leaving slight dust clouds in front of me.
The back of my hand swept across my forehead and cold beads of sweat stung against my skin. To keep warm, despite the fire I felt in my stomach, I wrapped my arms around myself, my hands tucked deep into the long sleeves. Afterward, I quickly rubbed my forearm against the fabric of the coat, the skin was beginning to sting and felt raw with each itch that I tried to satisfy.
The area cleared itself of trees as they flew away together and beams of light splattered onto the ground. Young, excited giggling came from a female shadow that ran around me.
“Daela, Daela let’s play hide and seek!” My voice was child-like and as I spun around to chase her I saw my shorter locks of hair swish across my smiling face. Bare feet ran through growing green grasses that glistened in the brightening sun.
“Jade, I want to tell you something special.” She cuddled beside me while we hid up in our favorite tree.
I leaned closer to her quiet voice.
“I have a secret treasure. No one knows about it, so you can’t tell anyone! Especially grandmother!”
Nodding emphatically, my finger drew a cross over my heart.
She slipped a soft box from her pocket, a peculiar design decorating the cover. Before I really got a chance to study it closely she popped open the top and a shining straight diamond glowed from inside. I reached my hand out to touch the piece of jewelry but she immediately closed the lid.
“Hey—“
“Shhhhhh….” She held a finger to her mouth.
“Jade! Daela! Get inside, it’s time for dinner!”
“Come on Jade, we’ll play later.” She took my smaller hand and pulled me away.
Suddenly I lost her grip and she kept moving further and further from me. She turned and smiled happily at me before fading from view, her pretty curly black hair cradling her face.
“Daela….” I whispered.
The trees stopped moving and the ground changed back to dirt and grassy patches. I felt like I was lit on fire, melting inside my clothes.
In the dark blackness I slipped off a cliff that came up from nowhere and fell, fell, fell...stopping with a strange thud. While I lay there, the empty nothingness swallowed me whole.
When I awoke, black hair and eyes on pale, flawless skin hovered over me, the man’s hand on my forehead. I blinked away some of the haze that still plagued my vision, alerting the Immortal that I had woken up.
I lifted my arm to scratch at my wrist but the Immortal grabbed it and stopped me, revealing a bandage covering me from palm to elbow. The white, clean wrappings caught my attention because just at my wrist a brownish red stain was making a spreading pattern into the fibers.
I took a deep breath and my chest only ached a bit, though my side was somewhat stronger in intensity. I was surprised by the lack of writhing pain however and probed at my bruises. It was tender and in a few places sharp and more severe, but all in all I felt… better.
“I’m healed?”
The Immortal finally acknowledged that I had become conscious again and moved my hand away from the wound. “Mostly, though it was much harder with that poison spreading through your system.”
I furrowed my brow and then brought up my once irritated wrist, seeing the bloody bandages again. “What happened?”
He scoffed, his face marred with anger and cynicism. “I’m sure Caleb can elaborate far better than I could.”
I was a little surprised at his flare-up.
I lifted my torso towards him, ignoring the scream that my body gave, and placed my calm, bandaged hand on his fidgeting ones.
“Immortal…are you alright?”
He stopped making his agitated gestures and softened his face.
“Yes, I’m fine.”
He then pushed me back onto what felt like the blankets I had been on before, only more comfortable. I was reluctant to lie back down now that I had gotten up, but I went. When I took a moment to look around I noticed the scenery had changed completely, the trees were a little thinner and much less green and the ground was nearly barren of any other plant except the few sparse roots from the trees.
“Immortal, where are we?”
I tried to sit back up, but he pushed me right down.
“Jade, you have been asleep for five days. Nearly the entire journey is over.”
“WHAT!?” I shot straight up and my dirty hair flung up with me.
“Well, yes. When I found you a few feet away from the campsite five days ago, you were almost completely gone. Your arm was throbbing and deeply bruised with bright colored veins protruding, except for an oozing, bloody slit at your wrist, which was surrounded by a patch of normal colored skin. I have been healing you as best as I could since, and Orion has been carrying you.”
I looked over to him and he snorted, turning his face away from me. He was just close enough that I barely managed to brush my fingers against his leg, my best attempt at a thank you.
“So… I was poisoned somehow and now the journey is almost over, yet you also healed up some of my ribs?” I was having a hard time following everything; perhaps my head was still cloudy from all that sleep.
“Not much, some of that was Caleb’s doing before I found you…it just had not yet taken hold. Though I took away some of the pain; you would sometimes scream in your sleep.”
“I did?”
“Yes, though actually you hum a lot.”
“I hum? How long has this been going on?”
“I hadn’t noticed you doing it before; perhaps you were dreaming something specific.”
I tried to think on what the dream may have been, but the only thing I could think of was the old, forgotten memory of Daela and I years ago, back when we still lived in Maine. “When was it that I remembered this?” I mouthed the words to myself. But, regardless, I didn’t recall any song from that? Out of some habit, I shook my head.
“No, I don’t think I dreamed.” I was looking sadly down at my hands, I couldn’t really describe the feeling but something just felt sad when I tried to remember anything.
“Don’t dwell on it too much.” He stood. “Come on, we need to be heading out. We should reach town by this evening.”
“What! So fast?”
“Yes, we need to get there before sundown.”
I crawled sluggishly from the bedding and used a tree to help me stand up. “Why sundown?” I mumbled half-heartedly as I brushed the dirt from my clothes and cloak.
“People rarely ever come from these woods. The only creatures known to live here are some of the remaining Immortals and several mystical forest dwellers that can’t always be trusted, and for good reason…” he began wrapping up all the blankets I had been spread out on. “Although I suppose there is the occasional traveler who unknowingly stumbles in from an area that is not blocked off.” He shrugged lightly with the bundles on his shoulders, “besides, if we just came out at night, it would cause a terrible panic. Our presence will already be unsettling.” He easily tied the packs onto Orion like an expert, which he most likely became in all the time I had been asleep.
I smacked my forehead for that.
Hands suddenly grasped my waist and then I was hoisted up and settled gently onto Orion’s back. I had blushed a little from the unexpected contact. I wasn’t even sure why, blushing was not something I did too often, although it seemed to be happening quite a bit as of late.
“Let’s go, tonight should be the War Memorial Festival, people are going to be everywhere, coming from all around, and we need to be there at a good time in order to slip in quietly.”
“War Memorial Festival...I never heard of that from grandmother...” I covered my mouth hastily, then sighed. I had been doing so well with not speaking out loud.
The Immortal and Orion chuckled softly at me. This was already turning out to be the beginning of a very long day.
Chapter One
The Catalyst
Chapter One
I casually repositioned myself on my bed when I realized that I had been staring at the small emerald lined box for over an hour.
Gradually, I opened the soft cover and exposed the perfectly clear gem, shaped similarly to a needle, nestled in a black onyx ring, which closed in around it in peculiar designs. I gently removed the piece of jewelry, and examined it closely beneath the lamp beside me. Every turn reflected the sudden rainbow of colors produced by the apparent prism within the onyx setting.
I slipped the smooth stones onto my ring finger and again observed its appearance in the light.
“Hmm…” I tilted my head curiously. I had never really been too fond of jewelry other than the simple rosary-like necklace I wore to ward off my cousin’s curse; I shivered reflexively from the memory. However, there was something special about this ring.
I solemnly remembered my grandmother’s story, the true one at least. She said she had slit her wrist in an attempt to kill herself. When she fell, her injured limb landed onto the old wooden flooring of her kitchen and the longer she laid there the more her blood seeped through the cracks in the wood.
For some reason, the ring and its box were directly beneath the boards her blood was spilt on. Every time a drop slipped down to the hidden area containing the ring it seemed attracted to the gem. She remembered that just before her final breath the ring must have become full, turning a deep scarlet, causing it to emit a slow pulse. Her flat hand had begun glowing in reaction to the rhythm and just a second later she looked as if she simply flashed out of existence, not a single drop of blood was left where she once lay.
I stared blankly at the wall before me, and then took a quick look at the ring resting comfortably on my finger. Sighing, I mumbled quietly to myself. “I suppose I could try…it couldn’t hurt. Well, to try, not…not literally.”
I quietly pulled off my bed and walked over to my bookshelf; resting neatly on top was a medium sized chest carved from wood and intricately painted in various warm shades of green. The clasp slipped open easily and I carefully opened the top. Deep within the several objects filled with past memories was a small clean steal dagger my uncle had given me before he disappeared.
Once I had replaced the chest I moved to the center of my bedroom and kneeled to the floor. My natural inclination toward strange and possibly dangerous things caused my nerves to flutter anxiously as I steadied the dagger above my left palm. I tried to keep my breathing steady as I prepared to start and in my head counted: 1…2…3…cut!
The initial feeling was strange, but not bad. Nevertheless, almost immediately after that the pain hit me, the cries of millions of nerves struck my body and I instinctively clutched my hand tightly, making a strong fist in an attempt to dull the pain.
Biting my lip hard, I released my grasp. The cut was much deeper than I had intended, the wound reaching from the center of my hand to the top, thin skin of my wrist. The flow of blood was very strong, spilling onto the floor in small pools of red. My body began feeling a little heavy and I seemed to be slowly rocking my head in a gentle, rhythmic circle.
Slowly, I took a deep breath and balanced myself as best as I could. Despite my attempts to control my body, I continued to feel the same as I felt the blood dripping away from my existence, like an hourglass leaking it’s sand, and slowly my ripped hand began to throb angrily as though it were being refused oxygen.
“Damn.” I exhaled, “I think…I cut..the veins... but...but I wouldn’t have thought that…I would pass out so soon…I-I never would have pegged myself for…squeamish…” I took a few more deep breaths while weakly holding my wrist, trying in a near futile attempt to slow the blood. “I’m…going to pass..out…”
The strange feeling of constriction and pain continued to increase its overwhelming hold on me; in an effort to cease the confusion I quickly jabbed the odd ring deep into the flooded abrasion and then slapped my hand onto the floor. I nearly slipped in the blood covering the surface combined with the clotting layer on my hand, but I caught myself awkwardly just as the fabled red glow traced along each stained finger. I watched the light until suddenly the world turned black.
Large shadowy figures were everywhere; it was so very dark, my eyes ignored my hopes that they’d adjust. Being practically blind, I began running my hand in along the ground I sat on, soft dirt, small rocks, and little clumps of grass and moss rubbed against my fingers.
I quirked my brow slightly, “…Is this the place?” I thought out loud.
I leaned forward and used my hands to help push myself up. A sudden sharp pain swept through my calf, causing me to topple over and catch myself alongside a hard mass.
“OW!” My voice echoed eerily through the blackness before me.
With an unseen, but definitely annoyed, expression on my face I pulled away from the object and rubbed my hand along my now sore back. Using my other hand, I reached backward for the thing I had run into and found a rough, bumpy, moss covered tree. The tree wasn’t very big and upon further inspection I found that I had just nearly missed a broken, protruding branch, which was covered in sticky sap. I quickly pulled my hand away from the substance and wiped it against the trunk and a little on my most likely filthy dress.
Continuing to feel around, which gleaned only more evidence of foliage, I mumbled to myself, “This must be the forest grandmother talked of.”
I stumbled briefly in the dark against a rock lying in my hidden path; thankfully another tree broke my fall. “If this is the woods, it’s not quite how grandmother described. She said it had been strangely bright with animals rustling all around her. I don’t hear anything.” I stopped my blind groping and looked about at the deaf air around me. “What was that thing about silence in a woods?” I tapped my lip as I thought. “If-if you don’t hear anything, that’s when you should worry…because…animals scatter when they sense danger...”
My heartbeat sped up and my eyes observed the black anxiously. I suddenly felt my hand grasping the metal cross of my necklace.
“Help me, Daela.” I heard my voice whisper.
The sound of my deceased cousin’s name seemed to echo back to me, spreading though the hidden trees like light reflected off metal. Beneath my hold the tree shook abruptly, knocking me backwards. Daela’s name still fluttered to my ears in the dark.
A warm wisp of air ran across my neck. “Guinevere?”
I jerked slightly at the sound of my grandmother’s name, even though the darkness prevented me from seeing anything.
“Who’s there?” My voice echoed once again. “How do you know my grandmother?” Once the words of my second question passed over my lips I noticed there was no chime of echoes but more of a dull, flat nothing, similar to talking at a wall.
“Grandmother?” The mysterious voice spoke clearly, as though it were right before my face.
Abruptly, bright light broke out around me, startling my eyes, and I reactively brought up my arms to shield my face. A small, soft hand lightly touched my arms, urging me to put them down. I blinked my eyes a few times before they adjusted and settled on an attractive child, no more than, perhaps, eight years old. I opened my mouth to speak but was interrupted by a delicate, albeit, demanding voice.
“Who are you?” bold, golden eyes were fixed on my own. Waving wildly in half curls were long thick locks of completely brown hair, nearly the exact same color as the dirt and trees I now saw clearly around me. Her golden glare narrowed at my silence. “Who are you!?” she demanded again.
“Oh, uh, sorry, I’m Jade.” I grinned politely, but continued sitting quietly beneath the young girl’s gaze.
“Jade?” She lowered her brow questioningly, “How do you know Guinevere?” Her tone suggested she was confused by my answer.
“Guinevere is my grandmother. I’m the only one of thirteen grandchildren who enjoys being with her.” I chuckled a little awkwardly.
“Grandmother? Grandchildren? Guinevere never had children.” The girl gracefully crossed her legs and sat down across from me like we were about to have some long conversation. Since she no longer protested so forcefully I assumed she wanted me to elaborate.
“She did eventually. Ten children, six boys and five girls, however her first two boys-twins actually- they were born at an entirely different time period then the other eight but they have been missing for a few centuries. And since obviously she never told anyone but me about her life here, none of her other children have any idea about their older brothers or their mother’s past.” I paused, realizing I had kind of babbled off, but she remained watching me, as though waiting still. So I continued, “Uhm, unfortunately most of her children dislike her, so they never come to visit.” I looked off, thinking, “there was one son who cared for her and one daughter who tolerates her, that would be my mother. I had also been rather close with my uncle, he was like another father to me…” my gaze lowered sadly, “but he went missing after my fourteenth birthday, three years ago.”
“Wait, wait, wait.” The girl shook her hands angrily, “I don’t understand. I thought Guinevere left because she never wanted a family or children?” The girl seemed to be unintentionally leaning toward me with intense curiosity in her eyes.
“Oh um, no…is that why you thought she left?”
The girl nodded anxiously.
“No, she told me that she was heading for this forest to tell someone something, I would imagine you. I think it was to mention that she may be pregnant.” The girl inclined forward a little more and opened her small mouth to speak but I held my index finger to her lips. “She said was running through the trees when suddenly the setting just changed and she was on a rain drenched cobblestone road in the late 1700’s,” I quirked my lips in thought, “I think around 1798 or ’99. Grandmother told me she researched for many years, but was never able to figure out why she went back or why she could never return.”
Surprisingly, the girl had a large smile drawn across her face.
“What?” I tilted my head.
She ignored my question and leapt up happily, her long hair bouncing about her face and shoulders. “Hello Jade, granddaughter of Guinevere, I am Autumn, the druid of Talen Forest,” she spread her arms around smiling proudly.
The gesture leads me to notice she had a vine twisting around and going into parts of her left arm. I didn’t have much time to observe it though, since she continued her exaggerated introduction.
“It is a great pleasure to meet you.” She held out a small hand and, although I was wary, I took her invitation; the second our hands met she swiftly yanked me off the ground. I attempted to pull my hand away, but Autumn held fast. “The Catalyst suits you well.” I watched as the rainbow effect reflected onto Autumn’s young face.
In all the chaos I had almost completely forgotten about the ring on my finger and the cut on my hand. I pulled my arm away from her at last in order to see my once mortally wounded limb; a long, pale, somewhat silvery taut scar lay where the bloody slit once was.
“Don’t worry, the scar will go away a little more in an hour.”
“Only a little?”
“Yeah, the first wound you ever get when you come here stays with you as a scar forever, but all the others completely heal once you arrive in Talen.”
“Hmm.” I ran the tip of my finger along the smooth, slight protrusion on my skin.
“Well, now that we’ve been introduced, it’s time that you got going!”
“Wha—” she turned me around as I protested and pointed a finger directly ahead of me.
“Just go straight, heading for the shadows. That’s where it’ll be.” I felt her give me a gentle nudge forward.
“W-wait, that’s where what will be?”
“You’ll see.” Her voice whispered across my ear as she had done the first time we met.
“Autumn?” I swung around, but she was nowhere to be seen. Taking a deep breath, I returned to face the gradually darkening shadows. “Ok, I guess it’s off to… somewhere.”
Once I started walking I yet again felt the sharp pain in my calf, it had lessened now but still not good enough to walk well or quickly. I gasped through clenched teeth and continued, limping along with the help of sporadic trees. After about an hour, the sky had nearly fallen into the blackness I once sat in and the bright Talen Forest still shown faintly behind me. The further I went, the fewer the trees became, but then about fifteen feet away an odd, large tower stood on the ground, the area around the edifice was far spreading and barren of all nature. Once I finally managed to get out into the clearing, I was better able to view the structure hidden within Talen Forest.
“Wow, that’s a very tall building.” I craned my neck so that I would be able to view the peak of the tower.
Large rectangular bricks wrapped themselves around the cylinder with perhaps three large windows set into the stone, two of which had balconies with black iron railing warped into a strange mess of designs. As I limped in a daze around the side, I found vibrant green ivy growing from nowhere up the wall and slightly tangled with a railing. The leaves stemming from the vine were large and soft with small veins of blue emanating from beneath its thin skin. For some reason, I felt rather compelled to hold and take one of the hypnotic leaves. Gently, I slit through the stem of one leaf and carefully tucked it into the bosom of my dress, as I had no pockets. The plants appendage was warm against my chest, calming my racing mind, which eased some of my discomfort with my wounded calf.
While I continued my observation I came across a large door. “That looks relatively heavy and impregnable, maybe steel or some other form of iron. I wonder why? It’s not very probable that whoever lives here comes across many robbers.” I cocked my head and noticed the handle, it was vertical iron and just as warped as the railing along the balconies edges.
“AHHHHHH!” A muffled female shriek echoed in the clearing.
My heart skipped a beat as I gasped, “holy crap…w-where’d that come from?” I gazed up the tall structure, “the only possible place is this tower.”
Although the voice was obviously expressing pain from who knows what lurking inside, I reached for the large handle and pulled. Dust, dirt, and small rocks drifted from the top of the door molding, it had evidently not been opened in several decades or centuries even. Luckily, as I strained to open the door, not one rusted cry came from the hinges. I heaved a sigh of relief, just in case there was a murderer or psychotic torturing fiend waiting in the tower, and so I then carefully shut the heavy door behind me.
The inside was even darker than the clearing until my eyes adjusted and I noticed a small amount of patchy, pure blue light drifting in from most likely one of, if not all of, the three windows.
“I didn’t see the moon while I was outside?” After a moment I shrugged my shoulders and began to look around.
I quickly found that the room was enormous and quite empty, with polished black marble floors and smooth ebony banisters lining the two elegant spiral staircases, one on each side of the room.
A sudden vibrating creak sounded from above me.
“Eheh…that’s right, I had almost forgotten about the scream I heard. Maybe I shouldn’t go on...” I had my head tilted slightly in thought and my upper lip pushed out over my lower one as I looked cautiously up into the ceiling’s abyss.
The excitement began increasing its force and fast paced adrenaline advanced its once steady flow through my veins. My thoughts raced quickly with all I could imagine, good and bad, and something clicked in my brain. “Urg…” I groaned, “It seems my curiosity has gotten the better of my fears.” I bit my lip lightly and then stepped toward the left staircase, but before my foot even touched the first step I felt the blue, clear light envelope me. It was strangely warm, like walking into the sun’s rays. I looked up to find the source of the light and discovered that the blue only seemed to continue toward that black nothingness above me. The light was similar to the source-less vines that grew on the outer walls of the evidently huge tower.
Turning my head away, I again focused on the dark stair that twined before me. Another shrill creak rattled the wood of the banisters and pulsed eerie vibrations through the tips of my fingers. I stepped onto the smooth step and began to lift myself up. The blue light dulled bit by bit and the further up I went, the deeper I headed into darkness and consequentially toward a possibly life threatening danger.
When I finally reached the continuation of a stair I assumed I had reached the top level, although I couldn’t actually see to be sure. As my eyes adjusted to the pure black around me, I noticed a ray of white light emanating from what was most likely a crack in the floor. I made my way over to the hole rather slowly, groping about with my hands straight ahead of me. I kept feeling the general paranoid thoughts of sudden blindness, like I were about to hit a wall or fall down a never-ending pit.
The hole in the wood flooring, or so it appeared to be, was not very large but did give me a view of two peoples in a brighter room, though it was dimmed in several areas. It appeared to be a man speaking to a woman tied to a wall coming up out of the floor. “A wall in the middle of the floor?” I whispered without thinking, but my hand quickly smacked over my mouth. Hopefully they hadn’t heard me.
For a brief moment I thought I saw the woman’s disturbingly bright pink eyes twinkle excitedly in my direction, but I must have only imagined it. Her eyes were very vivid.
She suddenly screamed violently toward the man who leapt back with anger on his face, at least that’s what it looked like. I didn’t really have the best view from where I was. She definitely glanced at me this time and her eyes seemed to glow before she winked briefly at me. I pulled back my curious eye in confusion and concern. However, an almost immediate cracking sound erupted from beneath my body. Before I knew it the floor had given way and I felt myself falling a good twenty feet down, however, before hitting the ground, I was caught lightly in the air and then set down on the broken rubble. There was a sudden flare of pain from my injured calf; no doubt falling through a ceiling didn’t help matters much.
Everything was blurry for a few seconds due to the abrupt change of light and startling fall, but once I could see clearly I saw untainted black eyes staring back at me. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what his expression was, but I assumed it wasn’t a good one. We continued to stare at one another, though I kept my gaze for mere uncertainty of what could happen if I turned away.
A few long black hairs draped down over his shoulder and caught my attention, making a good excuse to stop looking so intently at him. He seemed to begin the attempts of forming a word when the woman abruptly rammed into him, knocking a chunk out of an arch molding and breaking several small objects.
Many more loud bangs came from the room openly connected to the one I had landed in. A bit of the separating wall beside me began to crack and dribble pieces of what looked like dry wall but smelt completely different. I leaned forward to touch the strange substance when the wall unexpectedly ruptured and collided with my head. The peculiar scent hit me along with a painfully nauseous dizziness, I felt my eyes roll against my eyelids with small patches and blurs of moving light and then I drifted into unconsciousness.
End
