Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
As Alina lit the way at the front of the ship next to the General, the crowd became entranced with the sight. With everyone so distracted, the Crows found a trapdoor beneath some stairs and decended below deck to stay unnoticed.
As the door shut behind them, more darkness toiling before their eyes like a mist, Shan stopped stiffly at the bottom of the stairs.
She eyed the somewhat enclosed space warily, trying to control her fast heart beat.
As the others began talking she moved stiffly to sit on the bottom step sideways, her back to the wall so she could lean on the other stairs and tuck her legs up.
Without realising, all of their voices slowly decended into muffled waters.
The cries and screeches of Volcra shook her skull as she rigidly clutched her hands in her lap, fighting the urge to flinch. The batting of thick leathery wings and snapping jaws sent shivers down her spine.
One of her hands snapped up to her right cheek where she did flinch, feeling as though an actual shift of air had moved a strand of her hair against her skin.
Dread pooled in her gut, panic clawing at her throat like the claws of the creatures surrounding them. At a safe distance, for now, but not for long.
Shan rested her face in her hand, covering her closed eyes as white light blinded her.
A shimmering light against delicate snowfall, drifting down upon a giant white stag with towering, twisting antlers sharp as blades. A girl surrounded by glimmering light ran towards it almost protectively as a sudden darkness took over the image.
Shan shuddered as the animal was slaughtered in front of her, it's horrific pained howl making her grimace into her hand.
A blade of black, snow stained red, light fading around the girl who sobbed against the creatures neck.
Shan screwed her eyes tightly shut, wishing for the mornid imagery to end, the dying sounds of the animal echoing inside her skull. Her heart ached heavily, emotions twisting inside her as she internally begged for the vision to end.
It did after a minute but not in the way she had hoped.
Dread filled her entirely as darkness took over her sight once more.
In the centre stood Alina, the light around her dimming as she became overshadowed by the General. As she backed away from him, or tried to, chains clinked against the wood of the ship. Metal links appeared as her skirts slid over them.
Antlers brandished at her collarbones, jutting out like thorns against her skin.
"To give darkness the task of protecting the light," a shaky whispsr fell from her lips without Shan realising. "is to tell the wind to protect the candle..."
