The Puppet's Strings

Chapter 6: Plagued

Aria woke up with a start, she took a quick glance at the clock. Not a good idea. She flinched in pain from even the slightest movement. She saw it was 7:30am and relaxed.

She then noticed a strange pressure on top of her stomach, she looked down to find (guess what) a slumbering brown tabby kitten curled up in a cute tiny ball. She lifted her arm to scratch Hodge between the ears, he chirped and turned to look at Aria. He chirped again in excitement and hopped up, causing Aria to flinch again. Hodge crawled over so he could lay on Aria's neck, "Bleck! Are you trying to suffocate me with your fur?! Get off!" Cried a muffled Aria. Once the stubborn young cat got off, Aria spat out a wad of brown and black fur. "Yuck! I love you Hodge but jeez! You got a whole lot of fuzz! Please try to get a handle over it!" Of course the tiny feline just mewled in response. Aria then rejoiced at the smell of bacon and eggs cooking downstairs. She followed the smell dreamily from her fluffy bed upstairs to the simple kitchen below.

Her father greeted her with a hug then shoved a thermometer in her mouth. "Ah, a high of 101.3 degrees Fahrenheit, which would be...." he awaited Aria's response, "38.5 degrees Celsius?" "Very good! Anyways no school for you. Your fever might be low but it's still a fever." In response Aria was left in a coughing fit, "See what I mean." muttered her father as he searched for the cough syrup.

Aria downed a spoonful of the disgusting, sticky, messy syrup. "I guess you could say it tastes like cherries, just mouldy, rotten, sour, already digested and regurgitated monstrous imitations of cherries." laughed a hapless Aria. "Ew, you're gonna make me sick!" "Daaad!"

It was now 8:45, Aria's stomach let out a hungry groan. Aria laughed which caused her insides to ache, "Dad? Food? Please?" Aria's dad laughed too, "Okay, I made something light, feel like scrambled eggs?" "Only if I can have bacon." "Fine. But I get some too. In the meantime rest, maybe read a little, the radio's on so change it to any channel you want."

Aria just plugged her phone into the weird iPod/iPhone music player slot thingy and put her playlist on shuffle. Her phone then lit up again with a text from Xianna,

Xia 👾 : Hey! What's up?

🌟Ari🌟: The sky

Xia 👾 : You don't say...Anyways how's it going?

🌟Ari🌟 : Sick :(

Xia 👾 : Really? Aw

🌟Ari🌟 : Aw? Why "aw"?

Xia 👾 : I was looking forward to seeing you this weekend :(

🌟Ari🌟 : Too bad, gotta go okay, maybe if I feel better later I can come over. Dad says I need to rest right now, and you know how stubborn he is

Xia 👾 : Okay, bye

Aria sighed, shut off her phone, relaxed and grabbed her book.

About an hour later...

The light orange walls of the living room faded to black as the words on Aria's book swirled and swirled until finally Aria's gave in to the tiredness and fell deeply asleep...

Aria woke up all of a sudden, well at least she thought she did.

She found herself surrounded by tall stone brick walls. Small clumps of long tendrils of ivy hung from various spot on the walls. A thick fog hung everywhere and the air was very humid, making it a little hard to breath. A strong stench wrapped itself around the area, the reek of blood.

When Aria looked down she saw she was no longer wearing her light blue kitty pyjama pants, she wore a dark grey dress that ended at her knee, she also had light grey leggings with black boots that reached mid-calf. Her hair wasn't in a messy bun anymore either, it was in a neat braid trailing over her shoulder. While she was admiring her new attire she noticed that dead leaves littered the floor. The sky was grey and dark clouds swirled above. . Aria's body started to shake slightly with fear, she could have sworn she just heard whispering, "H-h-hello?" Although she said it quietly, the sound of her voice rattled around in the air. The only response was an echo, repeating the question over and over again. Hello? Hello? Hhello? Hhhello? Hhhheelloo....

Aria slowly started walking forward, leaving behind her a dead end. Her light footsteps echoed in the gloom.

A tiny blue light appeared up ahead. Aria felt only slightly relieved and ran towards it. When she was close enough she could make out the faint shape of a very tiny humanoid creature with wings and soft moaning. Aria could make out two fluttering dragonfly-like wings emerging from its back, the blue aura seemed to originate from them, the creature's clothes looked like they were fashioned from the very same ivy that adorned the walls around. Its ghostly white hair seemed to float, as if underwater, Aria's eyes then trailed down to the delicate looking creature's face. Very humanoid looking, all except the abnormally pale skin, long pointed ears, very large eyes, lack of nose and needle-like teeth which hid inside a very wide mouth, so wide that it literally went from ear to ear.

Aria stared, amazed by this creature. When she stepped closer, the noise of which alerted the tiny creature. It seemed to gasp as it quickly turned to Aria. It let out another ethereal moan, an awestruck Aria continued to stare. The creature then darted in the opposite direction abruptly, Aria woke from her daze, then ran after it, calling to it, "Wait!" The creature stopped abruptly, jeez this creature was fast, it turned to Aria again, a tiny but beautiful voice emerged from it's lips, "Who are you? Why are you here?" Aria hesitated, surprised by the fact this being could understand and speak English, "A-a-aria, my name's Aria. And you might be?" "Lena, now answer my first question." "I don't know why I'm here, or even where here is. Could you please tell me?" Lena sighed and shook her head, her wide mouth displayed a disappointed frown. "The Labyrinth of Dispair. No one has escaped other than through death. I myself found myself captured by it's walls. I see you must be the newest victim." "Victim? No escape? Ah crap. How long have you been here?" "My brother and I have been trapped here for what I calculated to be three weeks. Or two and a half...I became very flustered over the last few days because my brother disappeared, just wait..." Lena looked like she was thinking hard, she then pulled a thin strip of metal out of the satchel that hung over her shoulder. Aria watched as she counted the little scratches upon the metal, "Yep, two and a half, we've been here about seventeen days." Aria just nodded, staring absently. Lena then said matter of fact-ly, "By the way if you didn't notice already, I'm a Faerie. Or if you prefer the terms Pixie or Sprite. My brother's one too." "Okay...well if you didn't notice already, I'm a Human." Lena then burst out laughing, her laugh was high pitched and echoed throughout the area. She then stopped mid-laugh and covered her mouth, fear slipped into her eyes. She brought a tiny finger to her mouth, shushing Aria although she didn't speak. "Don't even breath." she whispered instructively. The two girls then pushed themselves against the wall, holding their breaths.

Another mysterious creature made itself present. It looked like Lena but much bigger and without wings. It's hair was thin and scraggly, what was left of it's clothing was shreds. It was extremely thin, you could see it's bones clearly. Same pointy ears, same wide sharp toothed mouth, but where the eyes should be was blank, it was blind. It was just it's forehead down to the mouth. And it's skin was stained and slightly grey rather than the elegant white skin Lena had. It's nails were long and sharp, Lena's were sharp too but hers were at least well taken care of, drool slipped out of the creature's gaping jaw. The happiness just seemed to be completely sucked out of the atmosphere. The blind beast clearly relied on hearing to determine where it was. It's head cocked in a serpentine pattern, listening for signs of life. It gave a low growl of disappointment and ran off in another direction, if you can call it running that is.

When the creature was far enough Lena and Aria unglued themselves from the wall. "What the hell was that?!" Exclaimed Aria, Lena let out a long breath, "A Necro-sprite, it's what becomes of a faerie once it's heart is removed unwillingly." "You can live without a heart?" Lena looked at Aria with one of those 'well duh' looks.

"Yes, let me just inform you a little. Faeries can either give their heart willingly to save another's life and become a Celestial, but if that life of which they saved becomes corrupt the former faerie fades. If a faerie's heart is taken unwillingly they become a Necro-sprite, and the thief obtains a somewhat loyal servant, a cure to any illness, even death, but they also obtain a curse, the Necromancer's Curse." "And what's that?" Lena just sighed again, obviously this isn't a human from Toraithe, her homeland. "A curse that corrupts your soul. It then breaks it, like a mirror, once your souls shatters completely you become half-dead. It's drives you insane and in the end, the inevitable happens. And it's not pretty." Aria shivered in disgust. And she thought Marrissa Daley was terrible.