CURSE OF THE EVER REALMS

Chapter 4: In these Hollow Walls

"At one point i could have sworn i knew that old lady. It was as if a memory was triggered and time stood still. Silence all around and every voice was a mere whisper. Yet i couldn't quite grab the memory i was after."

Sam speaks with herself, wrapped up in her own distant world. Her brain races like a movie in fast forward as emotions climb to the top of a mountainous region in the very depths of her mind. A jolt brings her vision back to reality and Marc stares at her asking her if she's still with him.

"Oh, sorry, I must have gone somewhere else for a moment." Sam realises that Marc and her had walked a considerable amount of time, the market was nothing but a spot of colours in the distance behind them. Turning back around Sam gulps, where did she just go to?

"Sam, i found us a free ride with this gentleman. We best hurry though he's leaving in a few moments." Sam and Marc quicken their speed, with their feet kicking up the white dirt road, toward this towering house-like monument that stands tall and proud like a statuesque figure. Stopping just by it they stare up in awe and cannot quite believe their eyes.

"Wow....it's like a morselium...What on earth is this place?" Sam states in a low whispered tone. Whilst Marc takes the first step forward into the unknown and places his hand gently onto the marble door knob, it turns and twists under his grasp and as he steps away looking back at Sam with a hint of fear, Sam looks up, stood there frozen but shaking as if her body has just had a thousand vaults through it.

Marc turning slowly back to the now open door, eyes closed but barely so he can see what lay infront of him, through partially sighted eyes, is met by a pure terrorfying darkness. Unable to make any sense of it he closes the door again quickly.

"Nope! That is a load of nope! Na ah...Not even likely i will be going into there thanks."

Marc takes Sam by the hand and ventures off toward the setting sun through a myriad of shapes in the distance. Shifting their forms through the clear shimmering energy feild created by the heat coming off the white ribbon that loops the hills of the country side. Before they can get too far, a man's voice comes from behind them.

"Hey, where do you think you are going? I thought you needed a lift? Don't you know it is seen as rude to not take up an offer of a free ride here."

Turning on their heels to face a withered gentleman, standing proud just like the structure they'd found, all in green and brown, a rapier sheathed beneath a cloth through a leather belt.

"May i be of any assistance to you still? I am travelling to meet a good friend of mine in the neighbouring village. You might as well hop on in!"

Seeing his shoulder length brown hair flow effortlessly as he spins around to make his way back, there they see an emblem of a sun on his hand, covered in so much dirt you barely know what colour his skin is. Reluctantly Sam and Marc follow him back up the winding narrow path.

"So, may i ask, what is that thing?" Sam points up toward the white as snow marble structure and doesn't take her eyes off it.

"Ah, that is our ride." Marc and Sam look to him with disbelief and with sarcasm to his voice and a slightly higher tone Marc protests.

"I get it so, hm, so the house of impending doom is our way out of here? Great, cool, i am totally up for that."

"Did you expect a horse and cart? I do not know where you are from but here all the merchants use their homes as way of transportation." Marcs eyes bulge almost out his head as he indulges the new man's stories.

"Amazing, I actually didn't see that one coming. How is that even possible?" Marc questions him. Laughing aloud with a deep belly sound the dishevelled man chokes his laughter back after noticing they are asking a serious question. The man with tangerine coloured eyes, much like the vision of the setting sun they'd seen before, makes Sam seem a little startled as he looks up to her.