So very cold.
Chilly breezes blow over and around her, making her shiver. She attempts to stand, but stumbles against the stiffness in her body. The long, flimsy silk dress she’s wearing, is doing nothing to aid her from the onslaught of cold. It bites into her skin and makes her teeth clatter.
The walls are still staring at her, as if expecting her to do something.
And so, she does. She gets to her feet.
Wobbling, grunting, yet successfully, she manages to stand, and feels the nebulous fingers of the still-flowing water brush her calves and ankles.
“Come closer…” The voice urges.
She takes a hesitant step forward, and the walls begin to shift. They hiss, as if upset, and start closing in on her.
She takes another step forward. One more. Then two.
Another.
And another.
She finally reaches the very edge of the path – where even the water seems to not flow – and glances below. At first, nothing but absolute darkness meets her gaze – bold and unrelenting – but as she peers deeper into the nameless abyss, a hand rises from within it.
An eerie, too-thick silence blankets the air around her, making her swallow.
A wave of icy wind brushes by her, rustling her long, rose-pink hair.
She shifts on her feet, which results in soft splashes of water to echo through the quiet.
The hand reaches out to her further, and curls its dainty fingers in a come-hither gesture. “Cignette…”
That voice…
She recognizes that voice.
It’s a thing of calculating menace; a tune she knows just as well as she does the rhythm of her heart.
The walls rumble restlessly around her, resulting in goosebumps to mar her skin.
“Cignette…” that voice calls again. “Come to me.”
She bends slowly and inspects the darkness, but can see nothing except for the eager hand calling out to her.
“You mustn’t keep me waiting this long, dear,” the voice says. “I yearn for you so…”
She blinks at the words; tries to understand the desperation they hold.
She knows that voice, but…but why can’t she put a name to it? Why can’t she remember who it belongs to?
“Cignette!” There’s an urgency in the voice now, one that makes her instinctively move forward and reach a hand out to the one that’s waiting for her in the darkness.
The walls shake, as if enraged by her move, but as she turns her head to look at them, they begin to scream. They bellow in pain, more like.
The sound causes ripples in the water. It vibrates against her very bones with its intensity.
She gasps and straightens, and watches, with fear gripping her by the throat, as the walls open their toothless mouths and continue to scream. And then, as if something inside of them has snapped, they shriek, and blood begins to pour out of their mouths, followed by gore and rotten fungi. It flows in streams of revolting disarray, making her take a few steps back – away from the darkened edge.
Their eyes, lifeless only a few moments ago, now flash with a single, evidently clear emotion: pure agony.
She places the back of her left hand over her nose as an intolerable, decaying smell fills the air. It’s unmistakably strong, so much so that it makes her eyes water.
