Marshfield - Closure -

- Quest -

"So since I personally want to find the spell more than you, I will have a higher chance of finding it because..."

Kate was still a bit dazed from the sleep, Christin had woken her up early to get ready. She was eating breakfast at the table in the room with the fireplace blazing right behind her. The warmth snuck up her back like an invisible wave of hot water. Yesterday, when she found her room on the second floor, she coincidentally went straight into Max's room. She was sleeping or actually she was trapped in the moment as she was unconscious, as Rick had told her. It hurt her every time she saw Max in that state. But at least she didn't suffer

But now Rick had also said that they would use a shortcut to find the Wish in order to find it quickly. She began to think his thing was shortcuts.But to return they had to rely on a group spell that revolved around a timer. It made it so that when the timer hit zero, they would all see a flash and then they would be teleported straight back into the house. And of course, Kate must have gotten her hands on it by then. What she didn't understand was how? How could anything of that actually work? She had seen some of the spells in work but magic. Really?

She could sense a fixed stare at the corner of her eye, so she raised her head to connect it. A friendly smile from Christin made Kate relax, that's the first time she had seen her smile genuinely.

"The reason why is because the quest the Wish most likely will send you on is tricky. If I'm not mistaken, you might be tempted to do something you will regret. And whatever is most important to you will hopefully shine through and lead you to the spell. Trust me, you'll not want to complete a quest if you have any other choice.  For example, If I were to go on the quest, even though I'm quite experienced, the Wish will use my desire to fight what I came to get because it knows the spell isn't what I truly desire. And If you get lost on the quest for too long, you will disconnect from your body and stay on the quest forever and that is a real pain to undo. But I will see to you while you're doing the quest with Rick so there shouldn't be any issues."

The tasty cereal suddenly had no flavour, she felt like someone had placed a huge stone in her stomach and was about to vomit. 

"It's alright, you just gotta get used to the food here. The place we're in is called Altas."  

Rick, who had been so serious the past day, was emitting an overly optimistic vibe. He gave her shoulder a light squeeze and stood up. Christin was already gone putting on a fairly small backpack, although it looked surprisingly heavy. As they were getting all the equipment needed, Christin told Kate to wear a ring she also handed out to Rick. When it was time the rings, infused with magic, would function as the catalyst to start the teleport magic. We couldn't take them off even if we wanted to until then. The rings would also indicate when the timer hit zero by blinking six times. Weird feature, because then it would be too late anyway to get anything done, Kate thought.

"Alright! Let's go" 

Rick walked out with Kate and behind her was Christin, locking the door to the house with an actual key. It seemed stunning to Kate, she wouldn't use some kind of weird magic. They crossed a little rocky track and was headed to the toward an even smaller path, leading in between trees that surrounded the house. They kept at it, walking and walking until Rick stopped at a tree, which had branches crooked like it wished to hug itself. Then Rick turned around, making sure everyone was following along and cleared his throat.

"Okay, we'll be using a shortcut, a portal if you wish, to arrive near the location of the Wishes, the House of Wishes as it's also called. When we are there make sure to stay tight. A lot of the tracks will cross each other, even change, and there might be other creatures there, they are not exactly dangerous but the might try to approach you and some creatures can use telepathy to distract you. But time is running and we'll have to find a Wish as fast as possible." 

Reaching his hand out, he went into the tree, the surface lighting up identical to when Christin touched Max's stomach. Occupied with the beauty of the nature around her, Kate gave her best effort to seem unaffected by all the strange events and new places unfolding before her very eyes. She went through the invisible gap in the tree and expected to see the same vigorous and buxom setting as when she first went through the other shortcut into Christin's house. But to her surprise, what she saw was a barren and empty area. Further in the horizon stretched a big mountain up to grasp the sky. To either side a fog prevented additional sight and behind them was a wall, wide as a door but competing in height with the mountain before them. Nothing made Kate feel safe beside the fact that Rick and Christin were tagging along, chills ran down her spine. 

"This is the gate"

Christin pointed toward the wall and added.

"We only need to get to the mountain and then we will just follow a path to a platform where the Wishes are."

When they reached the mountain, Kate could see an entrance with light in the end in the left corner. They were headed directly towards it and they walked through. On the other side, Rick stopped op looked at the ground then waved and continued walking. Multiple tracks crossed each other and formed a picture similar to a kid drawing random lines on a paper, some even ended abruptly. Now the scenery just looked like one of a book. They were on a higher altitude than the water below them. There was water to one side and forest to the other. The dawn was beautiful and the reflection on the surface of the water shone brightly. Tracks were visible on the ground and in the water. They went through the now grassy ground and stunningly, Kate felt like she could easily find her way around here. Christin took a deep breath.

"Great now it begins. Kate, you need to keep up now cuz we need to cross this part quickly."

Rick increased the pace, so much if fact, that they were almost running. He walked to the right into the forest. Kate whirled after and just a short moment into the forest, she heard them. At first as static in her ears. Then she began to pick up voices. Well more like thoughts that weren't hers. Kate felt Christin pat her back and heard her reminding her to keep looking forward and focus on her voice. The imposing thought kept throwing her off. She couldn't make out any words. But the stress on her head increased. The trees looked the same and for all Kate knew, they could be walking in circles. She focussed hard on not letting go of Rick's jacket with her eyes. 

For ages, they hasted through the jungle until the forest suddenly didn't engulf them anymore. They stepped out onto a plateau and stood in front of a house the size of a regular house. The light from inside it beamed out and revealed shadows hovering around the inside of the house.

"This is it. We're here."

Christin looked inside of one of the windows. She noticed the shadows too, but she kept looking for something else. Kate tried to understand what the shadows looked like and it frustrated her that even though there was a lot of light, she couldn't manage to clearly see what they were. They were tall and only the shade really stood out. No face, no visible clothes, no nothing really besides a human formed shadow. 

"These creatures are Wishes. We just talk to one of them, then Kate will propose that we get the Max Healing spell through the quest. We will then be taken to a room where the procedure will take place and we currently have around two hours left, so let's get going."

Christin turned the handle and walked in. Feeling a bit on the edge with the actual shadows floating around, Kate bit her lip hoping this would turn out good. 

I'm ending this chapter here. Vote and Comment xD if you like it.

- I hope you lovely readers' day just became ever so slightly better from reading it.

Love<3

- RS -