Reflected sorrows

Chapter 23

Her footsteps were engulfed by tendrils of gloom that choked the echoes of truth and silenced them, watching as they perished. They watched as she took steps further and further into the chamber, full of the echoes of the tormented souls' wails as they were silenced. Those ripples were echoes of silence that seeked something; they consumed their victims with a cruel bite, watching as the world gazed on, oblivious to the screams that rang out through the pools of reflected woe. Echoes of a past once remembered. Echoes of silence oblivious to the ghosts that walked among the fog. Those that tried to make the vile blanket lift and the screams deafen all who entered. She heard their constant struggle, their web of control writhing like a child stuck in a nightmare they couldn't escape – they contorted the mists of malady to try and see anything that could for a moment lift the veil and clear the sight of those who entered. Souls lay tormented and unheard, and they fought to escape the cruel lashes of silence that left only echoes in the mirrors, trembling in the pools of malice that reflected her. Her. Her. Her. They reflected her eyes, her dull, sickly gaze. Her skin so pale it almost looked yellow and ill. Those mirrors contorted in the endless, unrelenting battle of silence and the tortured souls who wailed, trying to spread over the room light. Trying to get out. Trying to let footsteps flow in rivers over the walls. They sought her smile. The smile that wasn't there. They wanted to leave their eternal imprisonment, and yet all they did was unleash trembling fevers over the pools of stolen light; it was as if the veil of reflected woe never lifted for a moment, only writhed as if a child suffered oppressive nightmares, unable to pull their hands away from the chains that held them. The silence deafened her, almost crawling out in tendrils as she gazed upon the mirrors, watching them quiver and tremble; watching their slim shapes turn to silhouettes in the distance, then vanishing as soon as she leapt back, sending cautious glance behind her in terror. Then it was her. Just her.

With cries of desperation, the apparitions called out her name in hoarse, benevolent tones – Celeste, Celeste... Celeste. That voice knew her, and that voice would never respond to her. That voice held a stench of death, one that the necklace cried out at every moment. That voice clattered like the ancient bones buried beneath the ground of those memories; those memories of joy. All erased like withering sails buried beneath the many miles of ocean that consumed them. She gazed at the reflections, then turned to that single painting among the ocean of trembling frames. She could've sworn that a breeze swept through the air, gathering around her hands in a sense of cold, thrumming dread. Those eyes. They blinked in a pattern of grinning teeth, jaws of a monster parting to roar, but letting out only a rasping breath into the cavern – teeth glinted within – they were black and coated in a layer of daggers, tormenting the pale skin of the figure who lay caught in a painting. They flashed whenever for a moment the character leapt out and glared at her, before turning back to simply a figure draped in a black cloak, wandering the night and glancing behind, painted then in a moment of clear beauty and grace. There was something woeful and forlorn within those eyes – it gleamed when Celeste shifted to the side, unnerved by the veil of silence drawn over the room. It smiled while sadness etched at the sides of the lady's mouth. It was formed into a friendly smile, but nothing dwelled within that smile. Nothing but perhaps the ghosts of happiness. The hollow ghosts that dwelled still within the eyes. The hollow cruelty that flashed as she blinked, daggers painted black with pitch glinting before her. Something writhing uttered a sense within her that this room lived; that its soul fought endlessly, unceasing against an insatiable enemy. It blinked. She felt its breaths against her skin, and something in her stirred at the thought of that voice once again, echoing in her mind, contorted every time she heard its hoarse tones. The painting breathed. Just as she did.

Those sails sprung to mind, smiling upon her as she wandered through those muted caverns. They stretched out before her in a wide expanse of sea. They were once again together, once again writhing in the wind, wavering and torn by age; it was as if the same beast within those eyes, with claws sharpened by the rain that poured relentlessly, had insatiably stretched out ravines in the sails, damning the boat that wavered on a contorted ocean to fall. As if they saw it play out in her mind, the mirrors began to shudder with an intensity that pulled her toward them. It was only when she looked up that she saw mirrors above her. Those ceiling had reflections of her gaze cast back at her. She saw the twisted sheets writhe with intense shudders, and she thought that now she must be dreaming. Perhaps she had hit her head – she must be hysterical – she must be seeing contortions of the devil. But no. Just like the sinking ship with torn sails, the mirrors fled from the fog of silence, swishing with wind howling suddenly through the room, the sea beneath her scattered now with mirrors, and the reflections held a smile that glinted with malice. Unperceived before by her weary eyes. There lay someone she knew. She leapt back but there lay still, contorted by the writhing sheet – the child wracked with nightmares kicking it away as it was placed back. She stepped one foot, and she tried to jump. The... The hands of the figure seethed in the sea of woe, but despite this the figure, gaunt and thin, continued. Before she knew it the hands were at her throat, pulling her down into the ocean of tears. The fog of silence returned. The ship sank. And its sails fell over the room, now once again empty of sound.