"They say, the night catches the forest faster, so don't dwell for too long.
Isn't it rubbish, Rati ?
We've lived here so long, but we never feel it. They just some bunch of Idiots.
Since there's some time till bedtime..... Rati, let me tell you again, about my dreams again. Now Come closer to me.
In that dream,
I'm running.
And that thing... it's chasing me. I don't even know what it is. Feels like a void-empty, endless. Like it wants to swallow me whole. It doesn't stop. It doesn't get tired.
I know it's real. My heart believes it. Even if I keep telling myself it's just in my head.
And this one,
In this dream,
Everything gets small. Not just smaller-farther. Like the whole world is shrinking away from me. People, places... all slipping out of reach.
And then there's this feeling in my head-like something's pressing in, concentrating everything. But I can't tell if my head's getting bigger... or smaller
And the feeling that follows... It's not just fear. It's like... like I'm vanishing.
Like the whole world's forgetting I was ever here.
Ivan takes a long sigh.
Is running and fighting the same thing?
It feels like it... at least in the dream."
"Today is the 10th day since winter began right ? So tomorrow is my birthday. I'll be sixteen now," he said Looking at Rati. His eyes sparkling with joy.
Rati, the horse was eating grass and her eyes were sleepy.
"Ok, sleep well,
I'll see you tomorrow"
*******************
The Kingdom Of Aslesa, Somewhere in time
The Queen's quarter was in an isolated part of the palace, off-limits to everyone except those she personally approved. Ironically, it wasn't heavily guarded.
These days the queen used to sleep in the King's Chamber.
And the Queen's quarter had caught a lots of attention recently. The guards talks about a little shiloutte that laughs and runs with a page in its hands. This was seen by two guards over a week ago. This paranormal event was the reason why no one wants to go near that room. And guards too are stationed a little far from that room but the room still not locked yet.
(Yana is a young princess of Kingdom of Aslesa. She is currently a student of Ancient arts & Magic. She is a adventurous type of girl. )
This night, Yana, the young princess as usual was doing sketches of whatever comes to her mind. Today, she created a unusual character. In the sketch was a being, showing his hand, like calling her and words above says "Come to me."
The art was pretty...prety Horror. Yana loves this type of things; Horror and black. Yana gets impressed by this sketch. She thought of showing it to her mother. But today, she was flickering toward that character in the sketch, Specifically towards those word, "Come to me". The art was indeed a masterpiece of her that even she couldn't take her eyes off.
Yana gets up and goes toward her mother's room but strangely she forgot the sketch book.
Driven by the impulse to share her unsettling sketch, yana pushed open the heavy door to her mother's forbidden chamber. Not knowing her mother wasn't there.
Yana enters inside her mother's room . As she remembers, this was the only 2nd times she walked inside this room. Before, when she was a kid.
The room was strangely small and packed. Filled with empty vials, stacks of books. The bed was in a corner where there was little light. There was a Painting of number 2 in Eastern Wall, and there were 2 curtains, one black, one blue and near it was a wardrobe. A branch of tree had made its way inside the room through one of window.
"Is this really mother's bedroom ? It's so scary but captivating for some reasons."
The curtains weren't placed at the window but in a open space. And this caught her attention,
"Black and Blue?"
She goes near the curtain and tries to slide it. But fails. Every time she touches the curtain, She heard a strange sound, like someone's exhaling through mouth.
"Who's there?" her voice cracks. "Mother? ...Father?"
There was smoke hovering over the bed, she hadn't noticed it earlier. Yana got alerted , her heart starts to race.
She was a magic student, So, in the intense moment, she makes a bold move & looks at the Curtain, goosebumps all over her body and she chants, "Nothing here, O devil above light, a flinch of movement is black, a whisper is blue".
After she spoke those words, that branch moved, all flowers in it dropped down, and that branch made a face, a scary one whose laughing. The princess who was already shaky due to fear, dropped down. Her back touches the wardrobe and she heard that sound again, like someone's exhaling through mouth.
Because of fear, she couldn't utter a single cry. Her back relaxed at the wardrobe, she was facing directly at that face, her eyes got bigger, mouth wideopen.
Behind her, from the wardrobe a voice, low almost like a whisper, speaks to him," Here, divinity won't call Sacred, it calls------Devils."
The girl finally yells and cries. The room wasn't empty, it had Void in it.
Her body was numbed due to fear.
She tries to get up, her body more Shaky than before.
She gets up finally, sticking her back in the wardrobe, both her hands closing her ears.
But strange was it,
Yana, faces the wardrobe, anger develops in her eyes, she looks at the wardrobe and screams loudly, in the moment her body got full of goosebumps....Again . And She starts kicks the Wardrobe. Yana had an strange habit, when She gets scared, Sometimes She becames angry. Probably a defensive mechanism of her brain. Fear was fueling her anger.
She continued spamming Kicks, Not realizing the bleeding in her leg.
The wardrobe opens the next moment, And a slow wind blows in the room, that slided the BLACK CURTAIN.
She finally stops kicking, she was Clueless . Her eyes were still big and stretched. Inside the wardrobe She saw one rectangular thin wooden Box.
She opens it, just to find a single page.
"A page ? What's this mean? "
Suddenly that whispers returns again,
"Blood is Key,
Blood is fear,
Blood is the Lord."
The page was in her hand and she ran toward outside,
At first that was just a running, then while running her head started to shake....Slowly and .... A little faster.
She was screaming loud while running.
After she left the Queen's quarter, She was screaming, her vision was Black and she was insanely faster than the average kid of her age. Her screaming was heard.
But to guards........she wasnt the princess they know, she wasnt the Little girl they know, for them she was the same shiloutte that had returned...... again and the shiloutte was as usual laughing menacingly. The laughter echoed through the halls. The guards some brave, some scared tried to Chase the shiloutte but no one could catch the shadow. They lost sight of it.
For Yana, she was running straight,
With a black vision and a page in her hand.
She went inside her room and locked herself.
She sat down.....near that sketch of her.
And in no time she faints. After she got unconscious Something strange happens. That Page disappeared from her grip and the wound In her leg was healing.