the dawn of darkness | t riddle [incomplete]

Chapter 6: The Seer

Chapter 6

She waited him for him in the entrance hall, wrapped up tightly in a travelling cloak of crimson to protect her from the harsh wind and rain that raged on outside the Manor. Footsteps sounded behind her and she turned to see Riddle descending the grand, curving staircase in a swish of his long black travelling cloak.

When he reached her he did nothing but observe her with eyes as cold as the weather outside - but Estela couldn't help but notice the scent of ink, soap and fire smoke he brought with him. He didn't speak a word to her as he approached, and didn't even properly meet her eyes as he held out his arm and silently willed her to take it. She did. And moments later they were swirling through a void of flashing lights, her body being pushed and pulled in all directions, before her feet finally met solid ground.

She took a deep breath as she steadied herself. Estela had never liked apparating, it messed with her mind and made her feel sick to her stomach. When she'd fully adjusted, and her brain had finally stopped spinning, she looked around at the strange place in which she was standing.

She made a mental note of Tom who was standing just to her left, his bright eyes scanning the area as though it were a battlefield. Wherever it was that Tom had brought her was a strange place indeed, and from the cautious way Tom was moving and the strange feeling swirling around in her gut, she thought that this was a place she should be very wary of.

The scene surrounding her was damp and gloomy, and the smell of leaves and mud was extremely potent. She looked up to find no sky, but rather a ceiling of trees that prohibited any sort of light from breaking through their branches. They created a shadowy bleakness that hung over the forest-like place, and there was an eeriness in the air that sent a shiver crawling down her spine like a spider.

Despite the lack of light, various plants and flowers seemed to be emitting a faint glow from the trees, grass and bushes that encompassed the clearing. It was strange. Everything seemed to glow. Bizarre-looking flowers of a glowing electric blue, radiant berries of neon red, even the dark trees seemed to be emitting some kind of green-ish/brown glow. She looked at Tom and only just noticed the way his skin was shining white like snow on a bright winter's morning. But his eyes, Merlin's beard his eyes. They looked otherworldly. Even in natural light they were striking, but now... Now they were like two utterly captivating portals to some distant land of pure ice and blizzards. She didn't know whether they were beautiful or terrifying. Probably a mixture of both.

A thick mist lay across the damp and mossy ground, making it hard for her to see her feet and where she was stepping, and glowing fireflies flickered around in the heavy air. She squinted around the darkness, and couldn't help but feel that nothing was quite as it seemed, and was strangely comforted to know that Tom was close by.

He inclined his head in an order to follow him, and they slowly and silently pushed their way through a barrier of thick leaves and bushes into a second clearing, where the dampness and murkiness of the forest suddenly mixed with the smell of incense and smoke.

It took her a while to notice the small, wooden house before her. It seemed to be clinging onto the trees that surrounded it. It was a sprawling wooden shack covered in brambles and vines that slithered their way down the rickety looking wood. A faint radiance cast its self onto the damp ground beneath their feet from the open windows of the shack and Estela swallowed hard as she looked at the way it seemed to blend into the trees. The sound of faint whispering and humming could be heard somewhere between the trees, as well as the sound of the strange little trinkets and doodahs hanging from the roof of the shack that were clinking softly in the oddly warm breeze.

Her stomach twisted as though it was warning her not to take a single step closer, but Tom had begun to move towards the shack and was already at the foot of the unstable looking wooden steps leading up to it. She hesitantly followed, quickening her pace to stay close to him, and when she reached the porch, she noticed that some of the small hanging items that had been making a sound were skulls - skulls hanging by a line of thin and tattered rope as they knocked together in the gentle breeze.