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What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 5:59 PM

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The house was supposed to be one of the gems of the city for this season. Haunted, newspapers had boasted, was a stark understatement. It was beyond spine tingling, beyond bone chilling, it might outright send you to your grave over how accurate it's rooms were to the fears of those who entered.

Supernatural only had a few days left by the time the newspaper raves had gotten around. The lines were long and those coming out from the other side looked white-faced and completely breathless as if they had witnessed the nether realms and returned all in the span of the twenty minutes they were inside. One group had to completely exit before the next could enter for there was only one host that night.

He was charming enough--nothing overtly gory or gruesome about his costume. A simple black suit with bones that gleamed green under the blacklights outside. He wore a mask much like something out of Phantom of the Opera with a half-skull design of the same coloration on it and the other half of his face painted black with a few green cracks through it.

He had been gone for some time, but with the exit of the previous group his reappearance was assured. One might wonder how he made it back to the start of the house so quickly... and if that meant he never really followed and guided you through the house at all.

When he came through the door next in a flurry of tattered curtains and fog he smiled a stark white smile to the next lucky lady in line.

"A single party? Well, then we shall make your party of one a party of two. Come, come my dear. Welcome to the mansion Supernatural!" He held his hand out, meaning for her to take it so she could be properly whisked away into the depths of the house.

((This is a redo/continuation of a failed breeding room, so if it looks familiar at first that's why.))
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:03 PM

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Hie


Despite the festivities happening around her, the look on the young woman's face was vexed at best. The delighted screams of the people surrounding her, yet to face the horrors of this supposedly haunted house, did nothing to lift her mood. The stark, empty fear on the faces of those that had already been through the house seemed to actively darken it.

"Whether you like it or not, Hie, you're a part of the family business."

A quick tug on one braided pigtail and a scoff born of pure teenage pique declared what Hie thought of that! Family business, her tailfeathers! Dad was lucky she didn't drag him off to Medicai, talking the way he had been all month. 'You're of age now,' this and 'It's time you know about...' that. Here she was thinking that he was going to tell her about some awesome family secret or something. Instead...he just kept jabbering on and on about - ugh - monsters.

"There's another world out there. You can't ignore it, hell, you're already a part of it. Been since you were born."

Monsters! As if she were still a baby or something. As if monsters were real. The scary thing was, Andon talked like he really believed it. Come on! Like he really fought monsters instead of going to work. Like the real reason they moved around so much was because he needed to stay moving, to stay on their trail, to keep hunting them. Like she was actually supposed to do the same thing, and be completely okay with it because it was their sworn family duty or whatever.

"I know it's a lot to take in right now... But you need to be aware. Because, sweetie, they already know you."

Hie loved her dad. But she absolutely did not believe in monsters. She liked to think she was a mature - but fun! - level-headed girl, and such girls didn't believe in bloodthirsty things they couldn't see, or shadows that dropped and moved from the corners of their eyes. They probably didn't tense and say a prayer before they walked through dark doorways. And they definitely didn't check under their beds and in their closets every night with the same ritual seriousness that their fathers had established when they were barely able to fly. She bit her lip, tugging again on her pigtail. Nope. Did not believe in monsters.

"They are going to be looking for you."

Even her outfit for the night had been chosen with fatherly defiance in mind. While Hie was surrounded with distinctly Halloween-y getups, ranging from skeletons to demons to bunnies to everything-in-between, she had chosen something distinctly more conservative. A gray satin vest over a long-sleeved white blouse kept her blessedly warm while she was out, and long black slacks hid appropriately orange-and-black striped stockings. Those were covered by low-heeled black boots, with tiger-striped horn-rimmed glasses and a black clipboard to complete the look. When asked, Dad had dryly admitted that her decision to go as a lawyer was the scariest thing he'd ever heard of.  

So she'd decided to go to this haunted house. She'd heard all the reports - it was supposed to be a terrifying show. But no matter how scary it was, it was still just that: a show. For show. All made of smoke and mirrors and really convincing props. Nothing real, and surely no monsters. Hie figured that something that could successfully spook so many people using completely normal methods would be proof that monsters were not behind the world's scares. She could go back home with a racing heart, a little bit of a laugh, and the unfortunate knowledge that her dad was a little bonkers. It would be okay, though. Even if he was crazy, Andon was still pretty cool.

"I want you to be prepared, Hie. They will find you."

A chill ran down Hie's spine that had nothing do with the haunted house. But there she was anyway, next in line for Supernatural. The event guide's smile had her creeped out already... Something like warning bells were clanging in the back of her brain, making the hair on the back of her neck stand bolt upright. Was it her turn already? "Yep...just me." Her answering smile was broad, but so nervous. Still, she lifted the hand that wasn't clutching her clipboard to rest in the stranger's own. There were no such things as monsters. Everything was going to be fine.
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:07 PM

Wraith, for the moment, played the perfect gentleman as he lead the lady into the house. The doors creaked closed with an eerie squeal in their wake before clicking shut in the deadly quiet foyer. There were no overhead lights--in fact there wasn't much of anything.

It was old fashioned--a sitting chair with an umbrella tin off to one side, a hat rack on the other with an old coat that smelled of mothballs. Authentic cobwebs clung, heavy with dust, in every corner and barely fluttered from some undetectable breeze. The chair looked as if it had been recently sat in--the impression of a person still in the cushion.The painted half of Wraith's face seemed to glow where the skull was painted though there was no black light. Only candles at the edge of the room, illuminating just enough so that one would not run into anything, where five dripping white candles held snug in their wrought iron holder.

Wraith reached out and took it--the hot wax dripping onto his hands without him even flinching. One might suppose he had simply built up a tolerance

"Now then, M'Lady, we pride ourselves on the most freeing experience you will find at a Haunted House. I will be your guide to whichever of the following you wish to go--we can venture upstairs to the sleeping quarters and the nursery, downstairs to the cellar and shelter, or out into the gardens." He tilted his head towards the candlelit, watching a bit of wax dribble down his skin without leaving so much as a scald mark.

Each held its own horrors, each it's own self-discovery to an extent. But more importantly each held an element of fear that was so precious to the skeletal-clad man who stood waiting before her. She could give him no wrong answer--he already had chosen the area in each where he would lead her to. The areas he could bring out those fears best and bath in the energy she would give off. The areas where he would feast.

"Where you say, I shall lead."
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:17 PM

The warning bells were still clanging away - and now they had been joined by tingles up and down Hie's spine strong enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck. This place was terrifying...but so far, it was a very mundane kind of terror. The ancient decor, the candlelight. It was all the 'ha-ha' kind of fear, not the blood-curdling kind Dad wanted her to believe in.

All the same, Hie ran a few fingers self-consciously down a braid or two at the sight of cobwebs. Their gentle billowing gave her creeps. They had to be some of the most convincing fake webs she'd ever seen: she could feel the barely-there threads tangled in her hair already. And she tried not to think of the way her guide's makeup was glowing, even though there were only candles to light the way. It was just...how neon his paint was. That was all. The girl sucked her lip between her teeth. She was only seeing the brightness of the paint, and not an actual glow.

"Oh!" Good job. She'd been so busy staring at his face that his voice had hardly registered. Her slight jump, realizing she'd been caught off-guard, didn't help matters. Of course there were different rooms. That only made sense, house as large as this one. Although as big as it had seemed in line, it seemed somehow larger - darker, a little more infinite - inside. Definitely surreal.

Hie's eyes, widened, followed the tilt of his head despite herself. Her eyes seemed just as drawn to that bead of wax - dimly, she seemed to think that should be hurting him.

Focus! He was waiting for her response, to escort her to one of the rooms. The blink she gave her guide was owlish as she pretended to think it over. While the other areas might be interesting, she already knew were she was headed. There was only one place she would be able to prove that monsters were not at work here. "Let's go upstairs." Her voice was so much bolder than she felt! "Gotta make sure there are no monsters in the closets, right?" The smile was a little strained. He had probably heard that one far too often tonight.
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:19 PM

Her choice made, Wraith gave a grin that was only halfway seen--making it look even more uneasily lopsided than natural from under the mask. Many chose the gardens these days with all the buzz and fuss over zombies and the undead--thinking they might encounter something truly terrifying. How refreshing this one wished to see the upstairs chambers and their horrors. He knew he had chosen well in this maiden so haunted by her own upbringing that she harbored more fear than she wished to admit to.

"Ah, the sleeping chambers. Fine choice...but the closets I fear will be the least of our worries. Come now, my dear...let us see if we can wake the dead." Casually licking his fingertips he extinguished all but a single candle in the holder --leaving only his half-painted face and single burning flame to light the way.

The stairs creaked under the weight of each step as if even a feather more would cause them to collapse. Wraith conquered them easily, looking over his shoulder every now and again to see that his charge was still there.

"There are tales that those who once resided in these upper chambers were tormented by their own inner demons, you should know. Take caution, take care. Don't...lose your head or those same demons might just follow you home."

The next step would find an icy chill grasping at Hie's ankles like bloodthirsty rodents or cold, dead fingers. With each step the tendrils of ice crept higher and higher until, as they rounded the top of the staircase, it would feel as if those cold, ghostly hands were tightly woven around her throat.

"Now, Miss, there are three chambers and we shall visit each. This time I will leave a little more mystery--select left...or right." Oh but he hoped she saved the best for last so that he could fully savor her fear.
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:25 PM

In spite of herself, Hie was hanging on to her guide's every word. Her wide, colorless grey eyes followed his lips --twitched ever so as he grinned -- tracked his fingers as the candles burned low, and beat him upstairs as he moved.

Dead? Up there? She was momentarily paralyzed with dread: the kind that came before the worst horror movies, when raw meat and fruit juices dressed up as gore and paraded messily across the screen. She couldn't stand effects like that, not necessarily because they were scary, but because they so obviously weren't! The sudden, vivid impression that she would find poorly-made-up zombies leaping from the beds upstairs was overwhelmingly disappointing... On the one hand, of course, it would prove her point nicely and lay Andon's to rest, forever. On the other...that's what people were scared of nowadays? Prosthetic and paint? She would almost prefer it be real monsters.

Only as they ascended did Hie think better of his words, her mind racing mile-a-minute even as her skin crawled with every rickety squeak. They were going to the bedrooms. He'd said WAKE the dead. A joke. Right. So, probably no zombies then.

"I thought...demons were stationary," she mused aloud. "Die here, stay here. You know...bound to their resting place." His voice made the hackles at the back of her neck positively dance. How long had he had to practice to perfect such a creepy tone?

Her guide had absorbed her again, tangled the girl up so in spooky ambiance that she followed closer than she might have otherwise on the stair. It was getting harder and harder to ignore that the glowing half-skull of his face couldn't possibly gleam like that under the light of a single candle. And as he mentioned losing her head, Hie found herself short of breath. The stairway became nothing short of a mountain: the air somehow thinner the higher she went. Cold was needling at her, first her ankles, then thighs, then the hollows of her throat - biting, chilly bands that made it difficult to speak.

Hie brought a hand to her own neck, trying absent-mindedly to rub the chill away. It was so hard to focus, feeling like this! "Left," she rasped, after only a moment's hesitation. "Let's go left." It came out firmer the second time. She hadn't even seen anything frightening yet! How could she be so anxious?
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:27 PM

"Demons?" The guides voice echoed in barely a whisper as the single candle flickered and cast eerie shadows over his glowing, painted face. "I fear you are mistaken, miss. Ghosts die and stay--forever trapped within the walls that held them in life. This house holds many of those too, but I'm afraid we're on quite the wrong level to find mere ghosts."

He paused, watching the way she moved, the way her eyes darts. He could almost hear her pulse in the otherwise dead air, practically see each shaking breath escape her in light puffs of steam. His eyes sharpened as they fixed on her; already grim features seemed to loom much more darkly in front of her. "Demons, on the other hand, have no eternal home. They can be happy haunts to a place such as this, yes...but when they truly thrive is when a host presents itself. A host...of strong heart but weak mind. A host who cracks ever so slightly. But slightly is good enough, they only need a sliver of doubt to creep their way in. And once they're there..." he moved closer and seemed to tower over Hie in that moment, bathed in that pinpoint light. "They will slowly dismantle the mind to make your body their own. Feeding off every thought and emotion you have to offer until only a shell remains. So, dear girl, when I tell you not to lose your head...do take great care to heed my warning."

He leaned back to his original position--all doom and gloom seeming to disappear like ghosts into the morning light. "Left it is."

He turned grandly, rounding the top of the staircase and the railings to place his hand on the old brass doorknob just on the other side. The door shrieked when he applied pressure and gave in with a whoosh of pained bargaining. Wraith swept into the room, waiting only a second for Hie to follow.

"These chambers belonged to the head butler of the lord and lady of the house. He met his end the night his staff grew tired of his tyrannical hold on them...and they laced his toothbrush with poison each and every day, watching him shrink into less and less of a man until finally he failed to call them to order one morning. They found him lurched over his chamber tub, face down in a pool of his own fluids. They say the poison took so long to claim him that it still exists in this room to this day. Please, Miss, do take a look around. But be wary of demons of greed and power...touch no trinket here."

Before Hie was a small but quaint room. Straight ahead was a bed with a moth-eaten quilt barely hanging on to life resting on the deeply dented mattress. To the left was a dresser and the door to the bathing chamber, to the right a closet door that she so desperately sought. The closet was cracked open, the glimmer of something shiny inside. The dresser still had a few cuff links sitting on top, two appearing to be some strange sort of ivory or bone and crudely made. The silver chain to a pocket watch hung from one of the drawers and glittered in the candlelight.

Within the bathing chamber, should Hie chose to enter, was a simple bowl basin for washing and an ancient chamber pot. The basin was at one point in it's life a stark white porcelain though this night it looked nearly black from disuse and help a pungent smell to it. The toothbrush fabled to have been the butler's end, however, rested on the edge looking as fresh as morning dew despite the fact that it was made from wood and horse hair. Wraith remained by the door--ever watchful of his young charge with an eerie grin plastered on his face.
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:30 PM

Hie would come to regret the question. She felt quite headless at the moment, sapped all over with chills and light-headed with the effort of staving off the urge to shiver. It was definitely a combination of the two - mixed with what her guide was telling her - that was making her feel six inches tall right now. His every word seemed to crash in on her, smashing brutally against the shell of disbelief the girl had so carefully crafted. Hadn't her father said something similar about demons? If she was already questioning herself, could she be so sure that her mind was strong enough to resist?

"...we're on quite the wrong level to find mere ghosts."

"...Sweetie, they already know you."


And then he turned around, and color came back into the room. Hie's brain struggled to wrap around the way all light had centered on his glowing face even as another part of her strained to disprove it. In spite of herself, her arm shook around her clipboard as she hurried to enter the left room in his wake.

Inside was a horror, made more so by his story. The room seemed clean enough, she supposed, but she still found the entire matter distasteful - and hopefully, only made up for the sake of spectacle. Hie found herself frowning said displeasure at her guide. "What a horrible tale," she chastised, proud that her voice didn't quaver. Even as she spoke, though, she was already cutting across to the washroom. "Surely you can't really keep poison in..." But the words died at the door. Something awful had certainly happened here. At the corners of her vision, the shadows in the room seemed to flicker and shake, dropping too quickly to follow from the ceiling and pooling in the basin that was the focus of the awful scene. Hie stumbled back, wanting very insistently to have nothing to do with that toothbrush. She fancied that she could see the spite of a staff full of poisoners clinging to the grain.

Nnnnope! The girl spun around, catching her breath for a moment before frowning in her guide's direction. Glad his props were doing their work, was he? A defiant (because she certainly was not scared, thank you!) twitch of Hie's lips, and she was back to the main room. Her poking was somewhat half-hearted, and due his warning, not literal. The only thing Hie made to touch, with a quick glance back at his reaction, was the ajar closet door. "For not wanting anyone to handle anything, there certainly are a lot of trinkets here. I can understand greed," she said absently, trying to get a look inside the cracked door without actually touching it. Was something glimmering in there? "But what about any of these things are actually powerful?"
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:33 PM

Wraith watched her, only his eyes following her about the room like an eerie medieval painting. She was a determined one, but he was already getting such lovely samples of her fears. Oh, how she tried to squash them out of existence! That, however, only refined it and made it all the sweeter. This sweet child would be his just dessert before a long years hibernation. When she returned, pressing her fingers tentatively to the door of the closet, Wraith simply rolled a shoulder.

"Dead men may tell no tales, it's the living who must carry them," he answered. To the notion of the trinkets, he gave a short, curt laugh. "Oh, my desires do not rest on whether or not they are touched. I am but a humble guide...and it would be a shame if one of my charges were to become possessed whilst in my company. Touch them, if you feel compelled to, but be wary that a particular draw to one may prove your undoing."

Her second question intrigued him, and Wraith moved to where she stood at a slow and somewhat menacing pace. "Demons often find it easier to acquire new human hosts by bringing them to covet items. Consider it....something like an angler fish. I'm sure you're familiar--a flashy little light in the stark darkness. Closer and closer...only to find once it's far to late to escape that there's a monster who's drawn you in for dinner." At the last word he reached out to place his ice cold fingers over hers and pull the closet door open.

Inside flashed a mirror in a blaze of bright white--far too bright to be from the candle or the glow of Wraith--and then it was gone with a gust of vile scents. Wraith waved them away from under his nose nonchalantly, glancing to Hie. "It would seem our murdered friend had a demon of some vanity of his own. Do you...wish to take a look?"
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:35 PM

He was coming closer. Hie could tell more so by the tingles needling up and down her spine than by his voice. Not that she couldn't hear the latter, much to her chagrin. Did every word out of his mouth have to be so creepy? The girl refused to turn around - she'd be damned if he was going to see her bitten lip, screwed-shut eyes or the freaked-out expression she couldn't really help right now - and thus, had no real way of gauging just how close her guide had come until his hand closed over hers on the closet door.

Hie snapped her eyes open with a squeal, reflexively flinching back into the man; despite every impulse to get away from his touch, from the flash of light in the mirror...and from the unexpected pain that brief contact had brought her. Pins and needles of an entirely different sort raced across her skin, tracing the impact of his fingers on her own. She quickly drew the hand back and cradled it against her chest in effort, however subconscious, to comfort the hurt.

Just as she recognized that, Hie realized that she was shivering. But she wasn't really in a position to do anything about it. She felt very much like she was on autopilot, facing the open closet. Her heart was racing. Eyes stung from the flash-bang in the closet - that's what it had to be, after all, even though part of her brain yelled across a very far distance that that was impossible. She reached for the mirror despite that little voice's protests, despite the air around her smelling of decay and rot, sulfur, shame, and acrid fear. Helpless to prevent it, Hie watched her own polished fingernails graze the mirror. She tipped it's glassy surface closer, began to peer inside...

All trance-like. Or, that little voice reminded her peevishly, like being on the wrong end of that angler fish.
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:37 PM

Wraith waited  for her yelp and jump, furrowing a brow just a bit. So, she was awakening already? Well then he would have to find remedy to that before she was beyond his control. But her reactions told she was still quite pliable to his will, so for now all was well. He only gave a dark chuckle.

"Be wary, young miss, of the things you cannot see."

As her fingers graced the mirror the material beneath her fingertips would feel momentarily as silk rather than cold glass and it rippled as such. The flash had gone but something else was staring back at her in the darkness of the closet-kept mirror. Slowly appearing as if out of murky waters came two pupil-less eyes, white and blazing like wildfire. Some strange energy lapped at unseen eyelids, strengthening the effects of the flames they mimicked. As the eyes became brighter, closer, the body followed. Ink black scales cradled by bones and wicked horns slowly appeared, Hie fixed in it's gaze. It drifted closer and closer to the surface of the mirror, black tongue flickering out to try and taste it's prey until...

"Come, Miss. There is more to see." Suddenly the vision was gone and in it's place in the mirror was the reflection of Wraith glimmering in dim candlelight. "I believe we have another room which you may find more of what you're looking for. That is, of course, if you still have courage left to spare."

He gave her a moment to think or perhaps speak, before turning his candle back out the door and returning to the hall. As soon as Hie took her leave of the room an icy blast willed the door to slam closed, though Wraith paid it no mind. He angled his head towards the right, casting a glance over his shoulder. "Come now, to the Nursery."
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:40 PM

Full-body shivers gripped Hie, who stared into the mirror as if paralyzed. Frozen with fear, if the quiet, whimpering sobs coming from somewhere at the base of her throat was any indication. The pale, bulbous eyes within the mirror's surface captivated her, yes, but couldn't steal away all of her attention: now that it had made itself heard once, whatever imperturbable corner of her mind that little voice belonged to was careful to keep a constant dialogue.

It forced the petrified girl to notice the way that her fingers, hovering on the glass surface, felt pliant - as if they touched some great silken void instead of the hardness that should be there.

It forced her to take note of the creature's scaled visage, to notice the anatomy forming in the bright, blazing light of those terrifying flames. The structures of blackened bone and chinks in forming scales would not escape comment.

As the shape came closer, horns curving forth, and the brightness of its eyes filling Hie's vision, the voice made sure to berate her soundly. Demon. Monster. It pressed home these terms of warning, punctuating their meaning with the memory of Andon doing the same.  

"They are going to be looking for you."

By the time Hie had broken the spell, jerking her head away from that curling, black tongue - almost able to feel the wretched touch of it on her cheek! - her guide was speaking again. Only his image joined hers in the mirror, his mouth moving with the suspicious absence of any gleaming eyes or dreadful black tongues. Her nails, as she let the mirror hang naturally once more, made decidedly solid tk-taks when she pulled her hand away from the glass.

But the wide-eyed girl still saw images of darkness. She still noted, perhaps through the wisdom of that shrewd little voice, that there was more to all of this than she had allowed herself to believe before. But what, she wasn't sure of just yet. For the moment, it was sufficient enough that the sweat beading on her brow was fear; less that of the horrors just beginning to shape themselves in her vision, and more of the possibilities those horrors brought on.

Maybe sometimes...there were monsters...?

"Lead on," Hie murmured to her guide, in the brief window she sensed allotted her. Her voice was smaller than it had been all evening, and she hadn't stopped trembling. But when the door slammed shut in a wind that froze the standing hair on her arms, the girl did not jump - only met her guide's glance with a stare that might hint at some burgeoning clarity, and fresh suspicions.
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:41 PM

He led her around the corner, passing by the stairs once more that suddenly seemed to simply trail off into an inky lagoon of black smoke. The floor they had started on was entirely obstructed from view...or had it even ever been there? With every glance away a few more stairs would be claimed until the blackness lapped at the floor they stood on.

Wraith swept open the door to reveal...a perfectly normal nursery. Old teddy bears and dolls sat in a wicker rocking chair made for a child. One bed rested against the wall nearest the door with a journal on the pillow, while the other end of the room held a crib with carefully knitted shawls and blankets. The smell of old baby powder filled the room in a familiar and pleasant way, though there was something else of note in the scent. Something Hie would find familiar and comforting.

"Childrens' rooms are often a haven...closets, under the beds...lesser demons love to hide around such open little minds. Perhaps the closet would be a wise place to start...just to make sure." Wraith suggested, giving her no cryptic message this time. She was growing aware, and her awareness was going to begin unraveling everything he had worked so hard to build. Pity, he had thought her more naive. Ah well, it would have happened eventually.

He waited for her to move across the room. Should she take his advice, the closet would be found standing completely void of anything...including a back wall. An endless pit of black was all Hie would find. Should she dally, or go her own path and check under the bed, the same blackness would shoot out from underneath and swallow her whole.

When the blackness left her vision, no matter the means, Hie would find she no longer stood in the nursery. She stood in her own room--either halfway under the bed or in the door of her closet. The only thing different was Wraith.

Gone was his mask, gone was the candle he had held. And gone were his captivating eyes. Now, instead, they held within them the same white flames she had seen in the mirror and his skin shone like scales.

"Clever girl, Hie," he purred, seeming rather amused by this turn of events. "You have fought your way through the labyrinth...now what shall we do? Back in your boring old room instead of my house of horror?"
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Ander » 02/08/2016 10:44 PM

The trembling girl closed her eyes to the overwhelming presence of darkness around her, only opening them when she heard the catch of a door's lock being lifted. Everything about the nursery her guide revealed was unassuming - bearing an unabashed blandness as absolute as the eeriness that pervaded the rest of the house.

Hie exhaled hard through her nose, jaws clamped so hard she could feel a vein standing out. That little voice told her to be angry at him. It warned her that she should be furious at this man, coolly smug, that had shepherded her through darkness. After all that she'd seen, this...for some reason, the little voice seemed to indicate that this was a lack of effort. A thin veneer over a familiarity that should agitate her all the more. Nevertheless, she felt compelled to follow his directive: to move, numb and loathing, to the closet.

For a beat, Hie paused. She would give anything for that 'autopilot' feeling right about now. The door handles were clammy in her palms. Cold sweat beaded on her forehead. The little voice was not there to reassure her, but coldly warned her to keep her eyes open. It force-fed her rapid little inklings of things she needed to understand. And then she flung wide the doors.

If her eyes had been closed, she might have thought it all a dream. Hie figured she could even find a way to justify falling asleep in front of her closet; but those days of explaining everything away were done. She had kept her eyes open, and seen the void that the closet in the nursery really was. She had watched it surge forward and engulf her, formless and empty. Completely overwhelming. Just like him.

Even though she knew what she would find before she turned her head, Hie found that she needed to see her guide's true form. The sight of those same, smoking white eyes brought tears to her own. "Why?" Her voice rasped, cracking with the sound of tears not shed. She couldn't bring herself to be surprised. She wanted to, she really did...but all she could manage was horror. Hadn't she been warned about this?

"They will find you."

Oh, Dad. She'd been such a fool.
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Re: What Lies In Dreams (Ander and I) [L][G]

Postby Kallile » 02/08/2016 10:47 PM

Wraith stood before her, his illusion faded but not yet broken. He smiled and anything Hie might have once found charming was certainly gone. A mouth full of needle-point viper fangs rested in the otherwise human face, black serpentine tongue flickering out between them as his eyes narrowed into a more devastatingly demonic state. He took a few paced forward, chuckling softly as he regarded the trembling girl who was so bravely biting back tears before him.

"Oh child, why?" he asked almost mockingly as he dared to take another step. She would be near her bed now, as the room realigned to a more realistic state, and if Hie dared to look behind her she would find herself, sound asleep, within. "Come now, my clever girl, you truly wish me to think you don't have a single inkling about what is happening here?"

He frowned comically before flashing his sinister smile at her again. "You feel as though you have just awoke from a dream to see that you are, in fact, still in it. So tell me, clever little Hie...what do you think is happening?"

He paced around her, his motions seeming more and more serpentine though his form ceased to change. He seemed to glide across the floor as he walked not to, but past her and seated himself at the foot of her bed where her body rested, grinning at her like a Cheshire Cat. "Come now, I truly wish to hear. Amuse me."
"I have been hidden, scorned, adored, worshiped, forsaken, coveted and banished more times than I care to count. But the one thing all those experiences cannot steal from me is the gentle soul I was born with, the kind heart I have molded, and the bright ideals for the future that have lit my way through the darkness of the past."




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