Chapter 6 of my story is here!
Okay. So, here's chapter six. ^_^ I hope you enjoy it.
They were falling, falling so quickly into the dark abyss. Rose let out a bit of a scream as she started grabbing at the air, trying to find anything that would help slow her descent into the unknown. Cieus had tried this for a few moments, but he quickly realized that there was nothing to grab hold of. So, he reached for Rose and wrapped his arms around her firmly. After he had a good grip on her, he shifted his body so that he would take the brunt of the blow when their bodies met the ground below. It wasn’t even a second later when their fall ended abruptly. The wind was knocked out of both Cieus and Rose, and his arms fell away from her so she could roll off of him, giving them both some space as they tried to catch their respective breaths. The ground was soft and grainy against their bodies, as though it was made of sand. It was because of that soft, yielding surface that they weren’t seriously hurt.
Rose sat up after a few minutes, her hand going to her neck to rub it, the muscle sore where her head jerked from their hard landing. “Are you okay,” she asked, staring straight ahead since she couldn’t see anything in the pitch blackness. She paused for a moment, waiting for a response from Cieus, wherever he might be. “Cieus, are you okay,” she asked again when the only thing that responded to her was silence for what she thought was much too long.
Cieus let out a bit of a wheeze as he opened his eyes, sitting up slowly. He winced as his back popped, and he rotated his shoulders. He grunted in pain when he rotated his right shoulder, the one that had taken the majority of the landing. “I’m fine,” he said, gritting his teeth a bit as he stood, his legs a bit shaky at first. “Are you okay, Rose? Are you all in one piece?”
“I think so,” she said as she stood after him, her own legs feeling like wet noodles at first. She imagined it was from the shock of being thrown into a place like this, not that she could actually see what this place was like. The darkness was oppressive, seeming to cut off her air as she stood in it. She raised her hand, so that her palm was extended to the air, and after a few moments of concentration, a flame burst forth, shedding some light on their surrounding area. “That’s a bit better,” she said, moving her head as she looked for Cieus. He was standing next to her, trying to look past the light that was cast by her flame, but all that surrounded them was the darkness of the chamber that they were in. “Let’s try to find a way out of here,” she suggested.
Cieus nodded a bit at that suggestion, and moved closer to her as they began to walk. He still had the pack with him that he’d picked up just before Rose had fallen, since he had slung it over his shoulder. That was good, because if they were going to be down here for awhile, they’d need some sort of sustenance while they were looking for an escape route. Rose frowned a bit as she looked down at the flame, which was beginning to flicker slightly, as though it were dying. Cieus noticed the flickering flame, as well, and he began to worry. He imagined that she wouldn’t be able to hold the magic that was causing the flame to float a few inches above her opened palm forever and there was nothing that they could burn. What would they do when they were cast back into darkness, once her mana source had been tapped, and needed recharging? It could take quite awhile for them to get out of here, if they had to stop every few minutes for her to charge the source of her powers back up. The fretting ceased with both Rose and Cieus, though, once they came to one of the walls of the chamber. There was a row of wooden torches that looked as though they’d never been lit, so their worries over the problem of light seemed to be over. A few of the iron mountings were empty, signifying that other people have been in here before, in the same situation, most likely. The torches were too high for either of them to reach on their own, but if Cieus gave Rose a leg-up, then they’d be able to get a couple of them down.
It was almost as though Cieus had read her mind, because he dropped down onto one knee and linked his fingers together, lowering his hands for Rose to step up onto his palms. “Here, get us a couple of those,” he said. Rose nodded a bit and stepped up onto his linked hands with one foot, her other one acting as a balancing beam for her. She put one hand against the wall as he began to raise her up, and when she could reach the first torch she’d set her sights upon, she reached up with the hand that didn’t have the flame hovering over it. After a few moments of stretching and trying to keep her balance, she wrapped her hand around the smooth wood. “Got it,” she said with a bit of a grunt as she pulled it out of the iron holding, and tossed it to the floor. She looked towards the other one, which was a few feet away. She figured she could grab that one real quick, if he hoisted her up a bit more. “Just go a little higher,” she said, looking down at him. With a nod, he did as she asked him to do, raising her up a few inches more. She stretched out again, leaning towards the right as she reached for the other torch. She was so concentrating on getting the torch that her mind drifted away from keeping the fire above her palm going out, so it did just that. They were cast into darkness for a few moments, but Rose kept stretching, until she felt her fingers brush against the torch. She grabbed it and straightened out before igniting the fire in her palm once more. “Sorry about that,” she said as she hopped down from Cieus’ hand.
Cieus had panicked for an instant when they had been cast into darkness once more, for something that he secretly feared was the dark. He knew it was a silly fear, that nothing would jump out and chase after him in the blackness, but it was a fear he’d never been able to shake, not since early childhood. “It’s fine,” he said as he straightened himself up, wiping his palms on his pants. He watched as Rose lit the torch that she had in her hand, and took it when she held it out to him. She let the fire in her palm die after she had one torch lit, and then bent down to pick up the torch she’d tossed to the ground. After lighting that torch with the torch that had been lit by Rose’s magical flame, Rose looked around a bit more. “You ready to try to find a way out of here,” he asked her.
Rose looked over at him and nodded. “Yeah, I’m ready,” she said to him. “I think we should just follow the wall, and enter the first door we come to.” She really hoped there was a door, because if the only thing to this underground place was this room, then they were doomed. There was no way that they’d be able to get out the same way that they got in. They began to walk around the perimeter of the chamber, remaining silent. The only sounds that could be heard was the steady crunching of their feet against the sandy surface of the floor.
After what seemed like forever, they came to a doorway. It was a wide doorway that looked like it had simply been carved from the stone wall. “Well, I guess this is our exit,” she said to Cieus, hoping that was the truth. She didn’t know too much about ruins, but she knew that many of them had traps that could potentially be lethal, or that it could be much bigger than they had imagined, leaving them trapped down here until they died from dehydration. These worries bombarded her mind as they stepped across the threshold, into a long hallway. The walls were smooth and a grayish-white stone color. As they walked, she trailed her fingers against the wall, finding them cold to the touch, the walls as smooth as glass. Their steps echoed as they walked along the ground, now that their steps were landing on a surface that was made of something more substantial than the grainy dirt of the chamber they’d just left behind. Rose glanced behind her to see if she could see the doorway that led to the cavernous chamber, but it had already been swallowed up by the darkness. With a bit of a shudder, she faced forward again. “I wonder how long this hallway is,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
“I don’t know,” Cieus said with a bit of a shrug. He was sticking close to Rose, not just because of how narrow the hall was, but because even though he wasn’t showing it, he was quite nearly terrified. The torches cast enough light so that they could see a little ways in front of them, but there was still so much that was unseen. His heart lurched a bit when he heard a rumbling sound, and he paused for a moment, his hand gripping on the torch’s handle until his knuckles were white.
Rose saw his reaction from the rumbling, which she assumed was just a bit of a groan from an old place. She remained still with him for a few moments, before taking his hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. “Come on. It was nothing,” she assured him, concerned from his white pallor.
Cieus stared ahead for a bit longer before looking down at Rose and letting out the breath he didn’t know that he’d been holding. “You’re right,” he said before he began to move again. They walked for awhile without saying a word. Rose and Cieus were still holding hands as they walked along, their fingers entwined so that their palms would be in close contact with one another. It was a comfort to them both, this reminder that neither one of them were alone in this unexpected, unwanted adventure.
They continued walking in silence, their hands clasped together, for an eternity. With each step that they took, Rose’s heart dropped a little more. There had been no changes to the hallway that they were in, despite the fact that they’d walked for at least a quarter of a mile. There had been no doorways, no statues, not even a mark against the wall. It was almost as if they were moving in one place, not really going anywhere. The only thing that let Rose know that they were actually moving was the steady, quiet echoing of their footfalls. Rose was about to say something, when the scenery changed. Instead of blackness being in front of them, they were faced with a wall. Rose paused along with Cieus, and then looked to the left, and then to her right. The hall seemed to switch directions on them. She tried to peer down as far as she could in either direction, but she couldn’t make anything out with the scant amount of light that they had. After puzzling over this sudden change for a moment, their situation truly donned on her.
“We’re in a maze,” Rose said to Cieus. This was the only possibility, in her mind. They had fallen right into a labyrinth. When she saw Cieus’ nod of agreement, she sighed deeply and closed her eyes. She thought they were in trouble before. Now she knew that they were in trouble, much more trouble than either of them had bargained for.
They were falling, falling so quickly into the dark abyss. Rose let out a bit of a scream as she started grabbing at the air, trying to find anything that would help slow her descent into the unknown. Cieus had tried this for a few moments, but he quickly realized that there was nothing to grab hold of. So, he reached for Rose and wrapped his arms around her firmly. After he had a good grip on her, he shifted his body so that he would take the brunt of the blow when their bodies met the ground below. It wasn’t even a second later when their fall ended abruptly. The wind was knocked out of both Cieus and Rose, and his arms fell away from her so she could roll off of him, giving them both some space as they tried to catch their respective breaths. The ground was soft and grainy against their bodies, as though it was made of sand. It was because of that soft, yielding surface that they weren’t seriously hurt.
Rose sat up after a few minutes, her hand going to her neck to rub it, the muscle sore where her head jerked from their hard landing. “Are you okay,” she asked, staring straight ahead since she couldn’t see anything in the pitch blackness. She paused for a moment, waiting for a response from Cieus, wherever he might be. “Cieus, are you okay,” she asked again when the only thing that responded to her was silence for what she thought was much too long.
Cieus let out a bit of a wheeze as he opened his eyes, sitting up slowly. He winced as his back popped, and he rotated his shoulders. He grunted in pain when he rotated his right shoulder, the one that had taken the majority of the landing. “I’m fine,” he said, gritting his teeth a bit as he stood, his legs a bit shaky at first. “Are you okay, Rose? Are you all in one piece?”
“I think so,” she said as she stood after him, her own legs feeling like wet noodles at first. She imagined it was from the shock of being thrown into a place like this, not that she could actually see what this place was like. The darkness was oppressive, seeming to cut off her air as she stood in it. She raised her hand, so that her palm was extended to the air, and after a few moments of concentration, a flame burst forth, shedding some light on their surrounding area. “That’s a bit better,” she said, moving her head as she looked for Cieus. He was standing next to her, trying to look past the light that was cast by her flame, but all that surrounded them was the darkness of the chamber that they were in. “Let’s try to find a way out of here,” she suggested.
Cieus nodded a bit at that suggestion, and moved closer to her as they began to walk. He still had the pack with him that he’d picked up just before Rose had fallen, since he had slung it over his shoulder. That was good, because if they were going to be down here for awhile, they’d need some sort of sustenance while they were looking for an escape route. Rose frowned a bit as she looked down at the flame, which was beginning to flicker slightly, as though it were dying. Cieus noticed the flickering flame, as well, and he began to worry. He imagined that she wouldn’t be able to hold the magic that was causing the flame to float a few inches above her opened palm forever and there was nothing that they could burn. What would they do when they were cast back into darkness, once her mana source had been tapped, and needed recharging? It could take quite awhile for them to get out of here, if they had to stop every few minutes for her to charge the source of her powers back up. The fretting ceased with both Rose and Cieus, though, once they came to one of the walls of the chamber. There was a row of wooden torches that looked as though they’d never been lit, so their worries over the problem of light seemed to be over. A few of the iron mountings were empty, signifying that other people have been in here before, in the same situation, most likely. The torches were too high for either of them to reach on their own, but if Cieus gave Rose a leg-up, then they’d be able to get a couple of them down.
It was almost as though Cieus had read her mind, because he dropped down onto one knee and linked his fingers together, lowering his hands for Rose to step up onto his palms. “Here, get us a couple of those,” he said. Rose nodded a bit and stepped up onto his linked hands with one foot, her other one acting as a balancing beam for her. She put one hand against the wall as he began to raise her up, and when she could reach the first torch she’d set her sights upon, she reached up with the hand that didn’t have the flame hovering over it. After a few moments of stretching and trying to keep her balance, she wrapped her hand around the smooth wood. “Got it,” she said with a bit of a grunt as she pulled it out of the iron holding, and tossed it to the floor. She looked towards the other one, which was a few feet away. She figured she could grab that one real quick, if he hoisted her up a bit more. “Just go a little higher,” she said, looking down at him. With a nod, he did as she asked him to do, raising her up a few inches more. She stretched out again, leaning towards the right as she reached for the other torch. She was so concentrating on getting the torch that her mind drifted away from keeping the fire above her palm going out, so it did just that. They were cast into darkness for a few moments, but Rose kept stretching, until she felt her fingers brush against the torch. She grabbed it and straightened out before igniting the fire in her palm once more. “Sorry about that,” she said as she hopped down from Cieus’ hand.
Cieus had panicked for an instant when they had been cast into darkness once more, for something that he secretly feared was the dark. He knew it was a silly fear, that nothing would jump out and chase after him in the blackness, but it was a fear he’d never been able to shake, not since early childhood. “It’s fine,” he said as he straightened himself up, wiping his palms on his pants. He watched as Rose lit the torch that she had in her hand, and took it when she held it out to him. She let the fire in her palm die after she had one torch lit, and then bent down to pick up the torch she’d tossed to the ground. After lighting that torch with the torch that had been lit by Rose’s magical flame, Rose looked around a bit more. “You ready to try to find a way out of here,” he asked her.
Rose looked over at him and nodded. “Yeah, I’m ready,” she said to him. “I think we should just follow the wall, and enter the first door we come to.” She really hoped there was a door, because if the only thing to this underground place was this room, then they were doomed. There was no way that they’d be able to get out the same way that they got in. They began to walk around the perimeter of the chamber, remaining silent. The only sounds that could be heard was the steady crunching of their feet against the sandy surface of the floor.
After what seemed like forever, they came to a doorway. It was a wide doorway that looked like it had simply been carved from the stone wall. “Well, I guess this is our exit,” she said to Cieus, hoping that was the truth. She didn’t know too much about ruins, but she knew that many of them had traps that could potentially be lethal, or that it could be much bigger than they had imagined, leaving them trapped down here until they died from dehydration. These worries bombarded her mind as they stepped across the threshold, into a long hallway. The walls were smooth and a grayish-white stone color. As they walked, she trailed her fingers against the wall, finding them cold to the touch, the walls as smooth as glass. Their steps echoed as they walked along the ground, now that their steps were landing on a surface that was made of something more substantial than the grainy dirt of the chamber they’d just left behind. Rose glanced behind her to see if she could see the doorway that led to the cavernous chamber, but it had already been swallowed up by the darkness. With a bit of a shudder, she faced forward again. “I wonder how long this hallway is,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
“I don’t know,” Cieus said with a bit of a shrug. He was sticking close to Rose, not just because of how narrow the hall was, but because even though he wasn’t showing it, he was quite nearly terrified. The torches cast enough light so that they could see a little ways in front of them, but there was still so much that was unseen. His heart lurched a bit when he heard a rumbling sound, and he paused for a moment, his hand gripping on the torch’s handle until his knuckles were white.
Rose saw his reaction from the rumbling, which she assumed was just a bit of a groan from an old place. She remained still with him for a few moments, before taking his hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. “Come on. It was nothing,” she assured him, concerned from his white pallor.
Cieus stared ahead for a bit longer before looking down at Rose and letting out the breath he didn’t know that he’d been holding. “You’re right,” he said before he began to move again. They walked for awhile without saying a word. Rose and Cieus were still holding hands as they walked along, their fingers entwined so that their palms would be in close contact with one another. It was a comfort to them both, this reminder that neither one of them were alone in this unexpected, unwanted adventure.
They continued walking in silence, their hands clasped together, for an eternity. With each step that they took, Rose’s heart dropped a little more. There had been no changes to the hallway that they were in, despite the fact that they’d walked for at least a quarter of a mile. There had been no doorways, no statues, not even a mark against the wall. It was almost as if they were moving in one place, not really going anywhere. The only thing that let Rose know that they were actually moving was the steady, quiet echoing of their footfalls. Rose was about to say something, when the scenery changed. Instead of blackness being in front of them, they were faced with a wall. Rose paused along with Cieus, and then looked to the left, and then to her right. The hall seemed to switch directions on them. She tried to peer down as far as she could in either direction, but she couldn’t make anything out with the scant amount of light that they had. After puzzling over this sudden change for a moment, their situation truly donned on her.
“We’re in a maze,” Rose said to Cieus. This was the only possibility, in her mind. They had fallen right into a labyrinth. When she saw Cieus’ nod of agreement, she sighed deeply and closed her eyes. She thought they were in trouble before. Now she knew that they were in trouble, much more trouble than either of them had bargained for.