The Pain Inside

Chapter 2

It was with another jolt that Kat found herself standing on a cold stone floor in a dimly lit hallway. The only light seemed to be coming from torches arranged in rows along the walls, spaced several feet apart. The walls were made of the same dark stone as the floor, in fact the more Kat looked around the more it seemed like she was standing inside some ancient castle, the kind built during the middle ages. Was this another part of Matthew's mind, like the cave had been?

"Matthew?" she called out, hearing her voice echo down the hall. There were multiple doorways along the hallway, but she had no idea where any of them led, or where she would need to go to find him.

"Excuse me, Miss," a soft voice said right behind her, nearly causing Kaitlyn to jump a foot in the air in surprise and shock. The hallway had been completely empty just a second before, she was certain of it. Yet turning on her heels, she found herself face to face with the speaker. How they'd gotten there, she didn't know, but as her eyes scanned up and down along them, the more important question seemed to be... What were they? The face was androgynous in bone structure, the hair medium length and brushed straight, offering no hints of gender through it's styling. The person was slightly shorter than Kat's 5'5", yet the voice had been just a touch masculine. The skin was pale, too pale, the kind of stark white that made you think the flesh had never once been touched by sunlight. The teeth were just a touch too pointed, too sharp. Not like those of a shark, but just enough that looking at them made you instinctively think of predators. The fingernails were long, clawlike, and the eyes... The eyes were not only dark, but the pupils were too wide, like someone on drugs. Seeing that they had her attention, the speaker went on. "Are you here to see the prince?"

'It's not real,' Kat had to remind herself, rendered speechless for a moment. 'It's just part of Matt's mind, like a bad dream.'

"Miss?" the speaker prompted when she didn't reply for several seconds, moving a step closer.

"The prince?" Kat finally asked, getting a hold of herself. "Is the prince Matthew?"

"Prince Frost reigns here, Miss. I'm afraid I've never heard of a Matthew," the androgynous creature answered, tilting it's head slightly to the side as it studied her.

That was enough to give Kat another moment's hesitation. But if this really was like a dream, then names really didn't mean anything. Matt could be called anything, in this place. She didn't quite know what would happen if she went to meet this prince, but she did know that standing around in the hallway by herself wasn't going to get her anywhere. Either the prince would be Matt, or maybe he could tell her how to find him.

"Prince Frost, right. Yes, I'm here to see the prince," Kat replied. "Could you take me to him?"

"Of course Miss," the creature said, stepping past her and beginning to walk down the hall, obviously expecting her to follow. She did, although she allowed a few feet of space between them, just in case. "Is the prince expecting you?"

"I don't think so," Kat replied, trying to catch glimpses through the empty doorways into the rooms beyond, but finding most of them dark and unlit. "Does he get a lot of visitors?"

"Not really, Miss. They call me Sharp, by the way, Miss. I'm one of the caretakers of the prince's castle," the creature stated. She could hear its toenails clicking against the stone floor as they walked.

For a second Kat wondered at the strangeness of the creature and their surroundings. Had the tables been turned and Matt been inside her head, would he have been somewhere equally weird? She'd certainly had her share of strange dreams and ideas in the past. How did one know what the inner workings of one's own mind looked like? For all she knew, there were dozens of creatures just like Sharp running around inside her head. The thought gave her a little shiver.