❝"I want to save them."
"You're just saying things that I already know, Nellie."
"You're not going to try and stop me?"
"On the contrary, my little Witch. I'm going to try and help you."❞
***
Viatorem Atramento: Ink Travellers. That was what Noell...
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Despite the rushing cold of the water suspending her in its body, all she could feel was a fire so molten hot that she thought she was walking on the sun.
The second she felt a pair of hands pull her broken leg until it snapped into place, Noelle opened her mouth to scream. Then she realised she wasn't in the Black Lake anymore, and a boy -- no, a man -- had pressed a dark hand over her mouth, but that hadn't stopped the agonised yell tearing at her throat, though it was muffled by his hand.
She could barely see through the tears in her eyes, though noted the dark blur hovering over her against the stark overcast sky.
"I'm going to move my hand now," said the blur, "so don't scream." The voice was oddly soothing, and Noelle felt compelled to listen despite every nerve in her body screaming at her to -- well, scream.
The hand had stopped pressing against her skin and Noelle instantly took a deep breath, choked on the air, and rolled over on her side to regain her breath. She felt the grass, dry and stiff, tickling her nose. Her leg burned, she was freezing cold, and her eyes were somehow throbbing and pulsating with colour even though they were closed. When she caught herself, she opened them to see the man staring at her with an indecipherable expression on his face.
"That was very stupid of you," he remarked, sitting back on his haunches, close to the lake.
"Who the hell are you?" she slurred. Her vision was fuzzy around the edges, and several times the man kept wobbling about that Noelle wasn't sure if she was hallucinating or not.
She could faintly sense that she was about to faint soon.
Instead of answering, however, all the mysterious man did was tilt his head to the side, his eyes glazing over. Noelle could have sworn they turned black for the millisecond of clarity her vision allowed her.
"She's coming," he said suddenly, standing up. His eyes focused on Noelle. "You made a grave mistake, little Jumper. You should prepare for the consequences."
Before Noelle could wrap her head around what sounded like a threat, she heard an angry yell from behind her and whipped her head around so fast to see another blob running towards her at breakneck speed.
She vaguely realised it was Amira, back to the age she had remembered her to be before her life turned into a literal fanfiction, and as her leg flared up in pain once more her vision faded and Noelle had fallen to the grass, too consumed by the darkness to see that the man had disappeared, with nothing but a faint ripple in the Black Lake to denote that anything had been there at all.
***
When Noelle woke up, the first thing she registered was and adult human-Amira sitting by her bed with a worried scowl on her face (although Noelle had no idea how that was possible) and for a second, all she could think about was how she was meant to explain her presence if anyone saw her.
