Post by Kosovo on Sept 17, 2014 3:06:05 GMT -6
No matter how long he wandered around the Manor, Astrit never seemed to get used to it.
It wasn't just that the hallways all resembled each other, though it was true that they did. And it wasn't like he hadn't spent long enough (it should have been long enough!) acquainting himself with halls and doors and passages. It was the way that they periodically seemed to reroute themselves, for one thing. And it was the way that all the little markers of the passage of time shifted in ways he didn't understand...
Astrit was fairly certain that he was back on the second floor. He even thought he recognized the door he was standing in front of right now, though it could be just his imagination getting desperate to make this strangely dreamlike place more solid. Not that it mattered. Pushing all philosophizing sideways out of his mind, he opened the door to see for himself what was behind it.
The door had looked familiar for a reason. He had seen it only once before, but how important that one time had been! What he saw now before him was the Manor's library, looking exactly as it had before with its rows of book-laden shelves, and yet so very different now that he was aware of what could be behind any of them. Such a breathtaking difference it made, to know the character of this place.
The last time Astrit had been here, he had been newly arrived at the Manor. Compared to what he now understood, he had been so naïve then. It was as if the ghost of his past self pushed past the place he now stood in the doorway, innocently eager to see what there was to read, secure in his tragically mistaken certainty that nothing was going on except for a party game. Astrit raised a hand in a brief salute to that boy who had so little suspected what was to come.
This was the last place that he had been while believing that all was well. This was where he had seen his first monster, his first clue that something was truly wrong with the Manor. This was the last place he remembered being before he was forced into the death match, and the last place where he had seen Serbia, either alive or dead. He had seen so much since then, of what the Manor was and what it could do, but he scarcely understood any more now than he had all that time ago, when he had been here for the first time.
Standing in the doorway like this was beginning to make Astrit feel uncomfortably exposed, though he knew that he wasn't taking any risks that were any different from anywhere else. Comfort and instinct were still high on his priority list, and he wanted to get something solid at his back so that he could see any threat that approached. So, keeping an eye out in hopes of avoiding the strange snake man he indistinctly remembered from last time he was here, Astrit went to hide himself between shelves. He thought he might even be able to find again the book he had been reading last time, but the idea of it was unexpectedly painful. He could continue the book, but not the conversation that had interrupted his reading it, because the person he had spoken with was gone entirely. So many he had seen, so few he was ever likely to see again...
With his back pressed up against a shelf, the boy sank to the ground, folding his knees in front of him. The loneliness was getting so overwhelming. Under his breath, lest he be heard by a monster, he whispered to himself the beginning of a story.
“Once upon a time, a long time ago, I had a family...”
It wasn't just that the hallways all resembled each other, though it was true that they did. And it wasn't like he hadn't spent long enough (it should have been long enough!) acquainting himself with halls and doors and passages. It was the way that they periodically seemed to reroute themselves, for one thing. And it was the way that all the little markers of the passage of time shifted in ways he didn't understand...
Astrit was fairly certain that he was back on the second floor. He even thought he recognized the door he was standing in front of right now, though it could be just his imagination getting desperate to make this strangely dreamlike place more solid. Not that it mattered. Pushing all philosophizing sideways out of his mind, he opened the door to see for himself what was behind it.
The door had looked familiar for a reason. He had seen it only once before, but how important that one time had been! What he saw now before him was the Manor's library, looking exactly as it had before with its rows of book-laden shelves, and yet so very different now that he was aware of what could be behind any of them. Such a breathtaking difference it made, to know the character of this place.
The last time Astrit had been here, he had been newly arrived at the Manor. Compared to what he now understood, he had been so naïve then. It was as if the ghost of his past self pushed past the place he now stood in the doorway, innocently eager to see what there was to read, secure in his tragically mistaken certainty that nothing was going on except for a party game. Astrit raised a hand in a brief salute to that boy who had so little suspected what was to come.
This was the last place that he had been while believing that all was well. This was where he had seen his first monster, his first clue that something was truly wrong with the Manor. This was the last place he remembered being before he was forced into the death match, and the last place where he had seen Serbia, either alive or dead. He had seen so much since then, of what the Manor was and what it could do, but he scarcely understood any more now than he had all that time ago, when he had been here for the first time.
Standing in the doorway like this was beginning to make Astrit feel uncomfortably exposed, though he knew that he wasn't taking any risks that were any different from anywhere else. Comfort and instinct were still high on his priority list, and he wanted to get something solid at his back so that he could see any threat that approached. So, keeping an eye out in hopes of avoiding the strange snake man he indistinctly remembered from last time he was here, Astrit went to hide himself between shelves. He thought he might even be able to find again the book he had been reading last time, but the idea of it was unexpectedly painful. He could continue the book, but not the conversation that had interrupted his reading it, because the person he had spoken with was gone entirely. So many he had seen, so few he was ever likely to see again...
With his back pressed up against a shelf, the boy sank to the ground, folding his knees in front of him. The loneliness was getting so overwhelming. Under his breath, lest he be heard by a monster, he whispered to himself the beginning of a story.
“Once upon a time, a long time ago, I had a family...”