The Majors, Rebuild and Reunite (Book 3)

Chapter 15: A Crimson Companion

~Scott~

A muffling hand clamped itself around my ears, the world falling silent. My footsteps left no sign of falling, other than the sudden spurs rocketing up through my ankles, my chest aching from the strain of my heart trying to escape from between my ribs.

And then all at once I was falling again. A scream tore through the quiet, destroying it at the seams. My scream. Head over heels, lungs stifled, feathers to the face. Something was wrong, in the mess of panic throwing my thoughts in a whirlwind flashing behind my eyes.

I hit the ground, knees buckling beneath me. I hadn't realized my eyes were closed until I saw pulses of blue through my eyelids, the soles of my shoes and hands suddenly and startlingly cold.

A glittering sheet of frost spread from the impact point, an eerie glow coming from beneath my fingertips. There was no light for the ice to reflect off of, yet it gave its own sheen and light to the surrounding hall. I was back in the twisting lanes of the library, the bookshelves feeling suffocatingly close on either side.

I craned my neck upward, trying to see where I had fallen from. But it was just arched beams and paneled wood above my head.

A deep pit of unease was steadily growing in my chest, tightening just behind my sternum. My head felt heavy, my feet and legs throbbing mildly from landing. I forced myself up from my knees, standing. Like daggers on my back I could feel pins and needles prodding between my shoulder blades. Someone was watching me still.

With hands raised I began to walk slowly down one end of the hall, hoping it was the right direction and I wasn't heading deeper into the labyrinth of knowledge.

The darkness within the crevices of the stone skirted away from my feet, like water droplets racing across a stretched tarp.

You can run, but the shadows won't hide you, Scott.

The cold's icy fingers were wrapping around my throat, choking my breath in anxiety. Shadows swarmed just out of arm's reach, gathering in long jagged coils that seemed desperate to latch onto me and pull me in. I tried to divert my attention away, away from the dark, from the numbing cold gnawing on my fingertips and ears, from the goosebumps plaguing the back of my arms. From the sear in my chest, to the deep breaths I was taking, my heartbeat in my throat. And yet, like my heartbeat, the surrounding area seemed to pulse in tune, in and out of focus, both my vision and my sense of sound.

I was on edge, just waiting for one of their hands to grab me from behind, dig its nails into the skin of my wrist. I ran a thumb over my knuckles, vague white splotches spreading out beneath my fingertips just barely noticeable over my paling skin and the light layer of crumbling frost.

"Aeor, please," I whispered into the nothing, glancing over my shoulder into the darkness that laid just feet away outside of the icy glow's reach. My hand found the pendant beneath my collar, antlers carved from gold frigid at the touch. "Help me."

I knew at once that I had made a mistake.

"Your god is not here, little hero..." Exor's voice was far too close, their breath just as before along the edge of my ear. Light, nimble, yet lethal fingers grazed the underside of my chin, those same cold, dead hands. The darkness was closing in around my blindspots, overtaking the ice spreading from my footsteps.

Fear worked its evil magic for only a moment, keeping me as still as the statues of memory under the Demon God's gaze. But then my mind found its footing, taking control of my body.

I ran, the fleeting grapple of Exor's fingers trying to latch onto my neck futile.

The ice raced after me, spreading like torchlight along the walls, books, shelves and ceiling. A crackle of cold latching onto metal chains holding dead lanterns, ice expanding in the crevices of wood where water once was, splintering the beams dividing sections of particular subjects.