Jack marched strait to Bodie, and wandered the streets again. Black never seemed to leave any foot prints, so tracking her to a certain building was difficult. He eventually came to a building with its door swung violently open, skid marks of snow were scratched beneath it, and the dust around it had been disturbed. He stopped for a moment, absorbed in an anger he wasnt sure where to place. He knew he was angry at Pitch, and blamed Blacks plight entierly on him, but he couldnt do anything about it, yet carried it with him. He sighed, calming himself down a bit. He didnt want to barge in on Black and displace his anger on her when she already didnt want him there. After a few more deep breaths, he quietly approched the door, still wide open as it had been thrown open in a haste.
The house was tro stories, dotted with many holes, some as wide as golf balls, a sickening green and brown mixture and a soft moldy texture. Jack swore he could hear the very structure crak and groan in the wind, wondering if it was even safe to enter at all, but the door had been opened recently, and that had to mean Black was inside somewhere. The closer he got the more uneasy his stomach felt. He got that same feeling many eyes were watching him, almost daring him to enter, but he pressed on. Though it looked half dead, Jack couldnt help but feel as if it were alive, just as he or Black was.
He lightly touched the wooden frame, peeking into the building carefully. A thin wooden pole lashed out at his face, forcing his to step backward in order to avoid it. " I told you to leave." Black stood, both hands clutching her staff in a fighting stance, glaring at Jack with cold, crimson eyes, hidden behind sooty black bangs. " And I told you, its o.k., Im fi-" But she slammed the door in his face with a sad shake of her head. He could hear her through the rotten wood full of holes and riddled with termites as the walls around it. " That doesent make you safe, now go away! " Her voice was shaky, as if she had been crying. He stood still, unsure of what to say to make her listen. After a while, he heard the thudding of her staff on the ground, stalking away slowly further into the house. He heard it rise and slowly drown out as Black retired upstairs. Jack touched the door carefully, finding it creak at the slightest touch, but silently. The door handle had long been gone, and dissintegrated, so getting in was no problem.
The inside was suprisingly homely compared to the outside. The furnitue had minimum dust, and the couches and chairs were free of holes and tears, much unlike the shabby remains hed seen through holes in the walls elsewhere in Bodie. Unlit candles in elegant silver holders dotted the shelves alongside many odd trinkets, purple crystals, strange metal devices and artworks, odd straw dolls and philes of multicolored liquids. Clean tea cups and a white tea pot sat on a small round table alongside several old books boundin leather like the one he had seen Black read. The book! He thought, and dashed off in the direction of the pond hidden by the trees. She must have dropped it when we started throwing snowballs, he thought. He reached the edge of the pond and sure enough, a thick, wor, book bound in dark cracked leather sat neglected and forgotten in the snow. Picking it up and examining it for damage, he noticed it didnt have nay kind of title on either side of the cover.
Finding it almost unharmed, with the exeption of a little water stain from the snow, he dashed back into Bodie, and found the half decaying household once more. The door was still open as he left it, and he quietly made his way inside. He found the interior strangly warm, not enough for nay mortal to survive in, mind you, but slightly different from the outside. He tried going up the stairs as quietly as possible, but every step was old, and creake under his weight. He stepped softly enough for the creaks to barely be heard, he didnt want Black to know he was coming and attack him again. When he finnay stepped over the last step, he was suprsed to find the upstairs was only a halway with a single room. He stuck his head inside carefully, and his mouth dropped open. The room was as big as the entire downstairs, and filled compleatly with books. The walls were covered from floor to celling with shelves, and stacks of books cluttered the floor. Candles sat on top of these piles, unlit exept for a single candle. Black sat in the middle of the room, cross legged, head in her hands and staff resting across her lap. The flame of the candle danced in front of her almost in slow motion, casting flickering shadows on the walls.
