Emilia's reaction served its purpose. Mischief twisted Meri's expression, abandoning her previously apathetic one as her lips curls into a smirk. "A child?" Meri chortled, mirth lightening her tone. "How funny! You really have made this dreary morning so much more fun for me -". Meri would honestly laugh louder, truly enjoying her ire, if it was not for the bone chilling freeze that currently threatened her. "Coming from the one who is whining about the chill as if she has a choice".
Meri seemed poised to spew more venomous words to serve her own goals, yet she fell silent when Venetia and Sullivan spoke, an exasperated look on her face. Out of the other heirs, she had a preference for them and so like the petulant child she called Emilia only minutes ago, she sulked. Her posture dropped visibly, head lulling uncomfortably back as she found herself watching the grey skies apathetically - once again rather bored with the wait they were enduring.
The Crowthorne heir did not pay much attention after that. Her focus had turned to the forest and the depths it promised and as usual, her mind drifted far from her environment. Raging towers of fiery flames that ravaged and and devoured everything it touches, a searing heats that would lash at your skin even without the closest touch and the smoke that would cloud the skies threateningly - it was beautiful and dangerous. Meri, of course, was still curious to whether the forest itself would be able to escape the devastation of flames. Her imagination always entertaining her with images of outcomes if such would work.
Only to the end of Emilia's speech did she find herself listening, a dulled gaze finding the other Heir as a rather deep huff left her. "Well that works fine does it not? I did not and continue to not care - Amelia is gone and you are here." Meri states, apathetic in her reply, "In my opinion, this is more beneficial outcome. You are far more entertaining after all."
"Osti de calisse de tabernak." Corin kicked the wall in time with her words. But even though it had just sprung up behind her, it seemed as solid as any other wall, and the only things she damaged were her foot and her pride. She huffed, kicking the wall once more before spinning around and storming down the hall.
She'd thought, at the beginning, that she was hallucinating everything. She still wasn't entirely sure she wasn't. That wall sure felt real, though, and was a real bitch at that–she'd just wanted to go back to the room to grab her walkman, and the castle decided to build a whole wall just to block her off?
Screw this freaky funhouse castle. Screw the mirror that brought her here. If she saw the weirdo who gave her the mirror again, she was going to sock him in the face, freaky magic be damned. Did she deserve it, for being stupid enough to take random stuff from creeps who lurk around lakes at the dead of night? Maybe. Did he deserve a black eye? Definitely.
It was clear that the castle was leading her somewhere, though. Corin thought about stubbornly sitting down in the middle of the hall, but she really didn't have the patience to wait around like that. Besides, if the castle so wanted her to be somewhere, it might just open up a trapdoor beneath her and drop her down to her destination. So she went along with it, making her displeasure known by stomping down the hall and muttering curses under her breath.
Eventually, she was spat out into a depressing room with a ragtag group that looked more like actor hopefuls for a Breakfast Club sequel than residents of a creepy magic castle. Still, there was always a possibility that they were demons wearing human skin or something. Who knew what this place was capable of.
Taylor's mind was breaking. The past twenty-four hours had put her sanity through the wringer. It felt like a dream, if dreams could last forever or feel hauntingly real.
She walked along a dim hallway now, arms scraping the walls, feet throbbing, hands trembling. Briefly, she considered giving up. What was the point? But then she turned a corner, and something there broke her out of her stupor. A figure in the distance.
"Oh, god!" She stumbled back. It took her a few seconds to realize that the figure was human-shaped. Relief surged within her, until memories of that mirrored place and its horrors floated back to the surface and swiftly crushed her hope.
"Oh… um… hi," she said, adjusting her headband and trying not to look as crazy as she felt. "Do you live here?"
A pair of eyes stared from the shadows. The figure shifted minutely; the lights from the candelabras danced then over the body, and a small girl shrouded in a hood was made evident at last. Her eyes continued to peer, bug-like.
She creeped forward, drawing closer to Taylor. A hand snaked out from the draping sleeves, pinching Taylor sharply.
Taylor let out a long, glass-shattering scream.
Seeing no other possible avenue for escape, she ran back the way she had come. To her dismay, the castle had changed again, and the corner from which she had emerged was now a dead end. With her back flat against the wall, Taylor faced the hooded girl with as much feigned courage as she could muster.
"Don't–don't you dare come close to me, demon! Or… ghost–whatever you are!"
Taylor wished she was more religious. Maybe then she could have borrowed a few phrases from the bible. Instead, she threw her hands up and, in lieu of a proper invocation, cried out the first words that came to her mind:
"Jesus! Bible! Holy water!"
"Mm, those things aren't here," croaked the hooded girl. She stood no more than two feet away now, having trailed after Taylor like a strange, feeble apparition. But ah–how her eyes had perked up at the mention of Jesus.
"Aliens don't know that stuff," She continued. "So I guess I can talk to you."
A pause.
"Do you have any food?"
Taylor blinked. Her fear quickly turned into confusion, and for a moment she didn't know what to say.
"Food?" She said, when she finally found her voice again. "I… don't have anything on me. Unless… do you want some gum?"
She received a flat stare in reply. There was a clicking of a tongue, and the beady eyes looked away.
"Gonna look for food."
The hooded girl began to shuffle away, muttering under her breath about chicken wings. Taylor had half a mind to let her go. The girl might not be a demon or a ghost but she was totally weird and would probably kill Taylor for food if it came down to it. But desperation won over fear, and Taylor found herself scrambling after the girl anyway. Literally anything else was better than being alone.
Probably.
"Wait, look! I'm Taylor Wendell, and I just want to go back home, so if you get me out of this place alive–in one piece that is," She clarified amidst that waterfall of words, just to be safe. "--my parents will literally give you anything you want. Money, food… your own private island, whatever. Say it and it's yours."
She placed a hand on the strange girl's shoulder and looked her in the eyes. "Do you understand? I'm Taylor Wendell. Wen-dell,"
"Jaime."
In a very awkward gesture, Jaime reached up and attempted to wrestle her fingers around Taylor's in an apparent handshake. When that went unsuccessfully, she frowned and looked away.
"Ok Wen-dell. I dunno how to get out of here but–"
She paused, squinting.
"You have a private island? For…what?"
Taylor shrugged. "Just because. Don't you ever just want to get away from everybody?"
"That's weird," said the weirdest girl Tayor had ever met. "But that's you. You're a human."
The uptick in her voice at the end conveyed some lingering doubt.
"Jeez, I wonder what gave that away." Taylor scoffed, but she had to admit that despite Janey's discomfiting presence (Did she say her name was Janey? Taylor was pretty sure it was Janey), she was a little amused. What in the Lord's name was up with this girl?
Before long, the hallway culminated at a door. There were voices beyond: familiar, human voices. But it could also be a trap. Taylor stopped in her tracks, hesitating. She turned towards her strange new companion.
"Well, Janey, what do you think? Do you want to go first? Because I really, really don't want to go first."
There was a pregnant pause.
The eyes of an alien peered back at Taylor from beneath her hood. After several beats of silence, the smaller girl turned and pushed through the door, bathing the young duo in a halo of light.
It emerged, shifting, from the door: a nameless figure that seemed to have escaped dreams or muddled memories. No word known to man could have described it, for simply seeing it shattered the mind. It elicited the familiar feeling of almosts: it was the word on the tip of one's tongue, the chase for the remnants of a fading dream, the sense of reaching, reaching but never grasping.
It did not stay this way for long. Soon, there was flesh, and a face to go with it, and finally it stood before them lucid and complete. Now it was a man, no more and no less: tall, fairheaded, and of a porcelain youthfulness. He wrought out calm and sent it rippling forth, invisible waves quenching fear and doubt.
"Please, sit," he said, as if his appearance were nothing at all out of the ordinary. The castle groaned, and from the ground several stools emerged, shaping themselves into existence.
"They call me Grimsworth, guardian of the woods, keeper of the castle, and when the occasion arises, I am also a teacher," he said, a fleeting smile on his lips. "Each of you had your own reasons for coming here. There is something you seek: a dream that, before now, you had believed to be impossible. Not here. This is the place where dreams and the corporeal converge like two rivers flowing to sea. This is the place where imagination takes root, flourishes, and grows wings. This is the place where the impossible is made possible, if one wills it so."
He did not stall nor stutter when he spoke; the words flowed effortlessly, but not in a manner that felt rehearsed. The man paced along the edge of the room, hands behind his back, eyes flitting from one fresh face to the next.
"It will take time. It will take practice. Where the mind rules, there will be as many nightmares as there are dreams. But do not fear; I will teach you everything you need to know. And when the time comes, when you have learnt enough, you shall manifest that which you seek and return to your old life renewed.
"Until then, as with any institution for learning, there are rules you must follow."
He raised three fingers, counting off each one with every rule imparted:
"The first: do not play with forces you do not understand. This castle is not only home to you, it is home to a civilization that does not take kindly to strangers. They may look like you, talk like you, but they do not think like you. There are things in their possession that could bring you ruin, as harmless as they may seem. Tread cautiously.
"The second: do not go into the woods. Not until you are ready. It is a place of beauty and light–for that is where our magic resides–but in it there is also evil. A parasite has taken hold of Grimwood, drawing power for itself. In its presence, dreams turn into nightmares and life crumbles into dust. Left alone it could spread and breathe its evil unto the world. It is a sickness, a darkness one cannot fight alone.
"And so we arrive at the last, which is less a rule than a request, and it's that at the end of your learning, you must venture into the wooded depths and uproot the evil that sullies it. This is all I will ever ask of you."
He paused, letting the words fall with their heavy weight. Then he raised his hands; and in the manner of the stools before, a table sprung next to him, burdened with a terrarium wrought in iron and glass. Within, mist ebbed and swelled around a sapling.
"Herein lies your first task: inside this terrarium is a budding tree, but it is not the kind you are accustomed to. Draw close enough and you will see your thoughts take shape in the mist. The sapling feeds on them: every thought, every desire, every subconscious fear. Too little of these, and it withers. Too much, and it will grow too large to be contained. When the glass breaks, when the mist escapes, the echoes of your mind will scatter along with it. It is therefore paramount that one learns to control their mind, to keep emotions small and restrained, to never let a single thought go astray.
"Your objective is twofold: keep this tree alive, and keep it contained. Every week, I will entrust three new individuals to this task. This is in part to foster a spirit of cooperation, and in another to avoid what terrible mishap could arise should so many tend to the tree all at once. You will find it here, on this same table, in this very room, which after today's lecture will take its permanent place at your residence hall."
The chairs sank slowly back into the ground, and as if on cue, the door behind Grimsworth creaked open at last. Past it was not the terrible, winding passage that had sent the outsiders here. Instead, it opened into the Dining Hall, from which coasted the crisp scent of bacon and freshly baked bread.
"And here your orientation concludes. If you have any questions, I will remain in this room for another half an hour. But if ever you require me after I am no longer here, know that you only need to call my name; for what the statues hear, so will I."
As the outsiders trickled out the room, Grimsworth uttered the names of the first three individuals tasked with tending the tree:
As tempers rose and the argument crescendoed, the vicious roots began to swell.
There was a scraping and a grating, and from that ghastly tangled growth a hand thrusted forth. It was bloody, grimy, pale. It scrambled for purchase, convulsing in its final death throes, and in this struggle screamed a stifled scream.
This was no illusion–no trick of the woods, no trick of the mind. Nothing would will the torment away, nothing would mould it anew. Was this the lost girl, now found? Or was it something other, some godless guileful creature now awoken?
Emilia's frustration only deepened as the exchange continued. Sylvia's rebuke stung, but she refused to show weakness. No one in this god-forsaken forest knows what her twin deserves! Meri's response only fueled Emilia's simmering anger. But despite the red-hot anger bubbling inside her, she held her tongue back. Instead, she shot back a glare that could rival the frosty air around them.
Her glare faltered when she suddenly heard a familiar scraping sound. Emilia spun around and looked at the forest to find a clue that could dismiss the unsettling noise as a product of her imagination. I must have heard wrong. There's no way that-
Emilia's breath got caught in her throat, a stifled gasp escaping her as her eyes widened in horror. The color drained from her skin, leaving it pallid and ghostly like the hand that emerged from the twisted roots.
"Lia?" she uttered in a trembling whisper, her voice tainted with fear. Emilia's hand instinctively flew to her mouth not only to stop herself from speaking further but also to stop the rising panic that threatened to overwhelm her.
As if the hand had heard her, it moved grotesquely. The hand scrambled and convulsed before a stifled scream filled her ears.
"No. No. No!" Emilia repeated in frantic and hushed whispers, taking a step back back. "You're dead. You're supposed to be dead! How- I- "
Like a sudden bucket of icy water dumped into her, the red-hot anger, previously simmering within Emilia, surged through her veins. It was an abrupt and chilling awakening to the gravity of the situation, the unsettling noise from the forest now serving as an eerie backdrop to the confrontation.
Without a moment's hesitation, Emilia's fury found a target.
Her composure shattered, replaced by a torrent of accusatory words as she lashed out, her tone filled with a mix of disbelief and outrage, her eyes shedding angry tears. "Do you think this is funny?!" The words cut through the tension like a knife, demanding an answer and reflecting the fear and anger that had taken hold of Emilia. "Who in the right mind would think this is the time for an insensitive prank?!"
"This isn't a trick," Venetia said slowly, despite the fear racing up through her chest and threatening to claw its way out of her throat. For a moment all she saw were stars and the brilliant night sky as she rushed forward.
"Coille bheannaichte na tha a' tachairt ort?!"
Before she touched the rich dark soil of the forest Venetia took hold of her censer and grasped it tightly— a small waterfall of blood ran from the length of her palm down the dangling silver chain and into the heart of the castle. She blessed the earth she walked upon with her own blood, swinging the censer back and forth, its hypnotic lull slowing her heart's tempo.
What she did next surprised even her.
Wrapping the extra silver length around her knuckles, Venetia bled into the censer until her beloved castle was filled with blood. She then swung the censor over her arm and right into the pale, grimy hand. In their final moments or perhaps their first, a little blood sacrifice to the forest never hurt anyone.
"Arise or d—" Venetia trembled, incapable of bringing herself to say the word. Their taboo too difficult to break, even amidst the horror of this.
Something came through the door. Something,, because it most certainly wasn't human, despite the appearance it had settled on. Faolán was hardly one to talk, though—Grimsworth, at least, was rather forthcoming regarding his intentions. Charismatic, as well, with an oddly calming air. Faolán found himself hanging onto every word as the man explained their situation.
He'd started to follow the others out the room, but started at the sound of his name. Faolán debated briefly where to go, but eventually turned away from the door he'd been about to step through—he wasn't planning to eat, anyway, though the smell was quite appealing.
His gaze alighted upon Hunter for a moment, before flickering away. What were the chances they'd both be picked to care for the tree first? Faolán briefly wondered if Grimsworth might have suspicions about them, but he dismissed it quickly. Surely he would have a better plan than throwing them together if he thought they had anything to do with the Roots.
Faolán stepped closer to the terrarium, but he stayed a fair distance away as he bent down to peer through the glass. He wasn't much of a tree person, having not had particularly good experiences in recent memory, and even if he were, "I'm not too sure what constitutes too much or too little thoughts," he muttered, more to himself than anyone else, before turning away and trudging off in the direction of the dining area. The tree could be a problem for later, he decided.
They'd barely had a chance to get acquainted and make any sort of introductions to one another before, what could only be described by Yzra as a presence made itself known. Coming from the door, it sure was a... something. Yzra took a cautious step back and away to get some distance between them. He was edge enough already, not necessarily at the point of wanting to run off in terror, however, as he'd have no clear idea where the hell he could have even run. The castle directed him to this place in particular and he sincerely doubted that it would have left him go so soon and so easily.
Though it took the form of a human, Yzra doubted that's what it really was. He didn't know who or what he was staring at here, even after the introduction was given. Grimsworth, he called himself, keeper of the castle and guardian of the forest. Despite the fact that he didn't exactly want to Yzra had taken a seat as the man spoke to them, running them all through a list of instructions and speaking to them of their dreams. He had Yzra's attention in full force, but there was still a pang of panic and worry and concern in his gut. Being here was probably a bad idea, yet here he was. There was no going back to where he came from.
There were rules to their stay, because of course there were. That was to be expected, and Yzra did his best to commit them to memory where he would not easily forget them. To forget them and disobey would be bad... wouldn't it?
When the door opened, he stood ready to shuffle out with the with the others, his stomach rumbling against his will in reaction to the smell of food. Before he got too far, however, his name was uttered and a shiver ran down his spine in reaction. Swallowing hard, he gave his head a slow nod in reply. "Alright..." he said aloud under his beath. He could do this... right?
What was this? Davian's thoughts intertwined with what was being seen into what was being fed to him. Much like an over stimulated dog, celadon eyes shifted throughout the room in curious yet anxious waves as his mind tried to sample as much information from the mysterious man who called himself Grimsworth. Tall and astute Grimsworth spoke with such a cadence Davian found himself drawn to the male's face, watching how his lips formed the words. Grimsworth held an ethereal beauty, such beauty the thorn had only seen one other time throughout his life and one he would likely never find again, this man was not human.
Having given the option to sit down by the numerous chairs that weaved themselves between bodies, Davian pressed his back against the nearest wall, likely trying to avoid any attention on himself by their 'mentor' or the other assumed students and their wandering gaze. The less eye contact the better.
Upon the table rested a terrarium, one of the more recent additions to the room that caused the males eyes to light up in a childlike wonder. A tree? Davian's eyes caught on the little life that remained contained behind the fence that was the mist in the terrarium. He had never been good at keeping plants alive, if they did not move around in his presence like a dog, it was out of sight out of mind. He managed a fish for half a year and that was pure luck, he'd stare at it swimming for hours as his mind endlessly struggled against the influences of whatever he got ahold of that day. Even with the drugs or the alcohol, it was the memorizing movements of the fish that were a constant.
How odd... He thought. The description of the sapling was in relation to fire.
Davian was struck out of his thoughts upon hearing the names of those tasked with caring for the now famed sapling, a sigh of relief escaped his lips upon not hearing his name. The responsibility escaped him, how lucky. Eyes darted around the room, holding a steady beat in his chest that he may be spared from even Grimsworth's wandering eyes. Someone stopped him however briefly, a pale boy with silver strands peering upon the sapling, he must be one of the three tasked to watch over the thing.
Unfortunately, Davian had made a sad effort to introduce himself to the sapling let alone another being worth speaking with, his own anxiety understood it was easier to avoid making connections lest people decide to dislike you. He had questions of course, but the thought of asserting himself over a man who claims the statues can hear talking, wasn't a conquest the thorn was ready to make on such an empty stomach.
With a soft sigh, the decision to make small talk over the recent happenings had not been chosen, and the male turned slowly out of the room. On the hunt for some of that delicious bread and meat he could smell from the now open Dining Hall.
What's one more crazy experience to add to the growing list that was Grimsworth castle. Changing halls that decide where you end up? Great. Their new teacher appearing before them as if breathed to life by said castle? Makes perfect sense. Take care of a magic plant by feeding it your thoughts? Why the fuck not.
Robbie could honestly say that he had no idea how he wasn't crazy or why he wasn't shitting himself with every new experience this place threw at him. In fact, everything that should have sent him packing, didn't feel that concerning.
Thank god he didn't have to deal with the magic shrub first. Knowing his luck he'd fuck something up.
He lingered in the room for a moment eyeing the terrarium. 'Subconscious fear… Fucking psycho plant.'
With that last thought he let the scent of warm bread lead him away.
Two figures awaited the outsiders at the Dining Hall: a young man and woman, so similar in appearance they might have been twins, now fast approached them. The boy possessed an urgency in his stride, as though he were gearing himself up for a physical altercation; whereas the girl trailed behind him distraught, like one might hurry after a child running through a busy road.
But then the boy stopped, keeping a respectful distance between him and the outsiders.
"Pardon me, pardon–I'm afraid I must speak my mind, for the families' sake and my own. You cannot stay here. Already your presence has caused us great consternation. We are unaccustomed to guests, you see, and…"
As the boy continued his speech, he fastened his pince-nez onto his nose. But whatever he saw with that sudden visual clarity had him stuttering into incoherence. At last, all he could manage was:
"Dear me! What in the good Grimwood's name is on your head?!"
It was clear he meant Robbie's mullet. So intently was the boy staring that it seemed as though he half-expected the mullet to spring to life and lunge at him. He retreated a few paces, tugging anxiously at his cravat, his gaze shifting towards the rest of the cohort. He turned to his companion, who by now had caught up to him: "Lizzie, it is worse than we thought."
There was an expectant pause, but the girl named Lizzie had not been paying attention. Blushing, she stole glances at Davian, straightening her dress. It was a moment too late when she jolted out of her reverie, hastily concurring: "Oh, yes, Felix, they look very terrible indeed."
"You poor things," Felix tutted, shaking his head. "The world Beyond must indeed be a cruel place, full of many horrors. How pitiful you all look. And oh, your hair! Why, it's green! And yours is purple! Pray, tell me, what could have poisoned your hair so?"
Corin did not punch Grimsworth, which was really a testament to her incredible restraint and sense of self-preservation. Because what the hell was that thing? Corin surprised even herself that she sat down on the stools that popped out of the ground, instead of running screaming out of the room. Look at her, being such a good student–of course, the fact that the castle could move on its own and might just toss her back in here might have had a bit to do with it.
Despite the freaky entrance, Grimsworth's speech was pretty standard–ignoring the whole there's an evil in the woods that you have to defeat thing, anyway. And she was going to ignore that, because what the hell.
Thank God she wasn't one of the first people to watch over that tree. Corin didn't have the best track record for keeping things alive–she'd never taken care of a plant that fed on thoughts, but she'd probably screw it up somehow. Nah, let other people worry about that for now. She had far more pressing issues at hand. Namely, her stomach, which was making its complaints about her lack of breakfast known now that she could smell food.
She'd booked it out of there with the rest of them to the dining hall, only to get stopped by two people telling them to get out, as if they weren't being led around wherever that Grimsworth guy wanted them to go. They looked like they'd stepped out of a period show. They acted like it, too–what was weird about a mullet? That dude had a totally bitchin' hairstyle, in her opinion.
And then they had to go and insult her hair, too. Being insulted by someone with good taste was one thing, but these two looked like they were kicked off the set of Dracula. "The fuck's wrong with our hair?" she demanded, stomping closer to level a critical stare at the man. "You have the same hairstyle as my grandmother when she gets out of bed in the mornings, but her hairline isn't running away from her face."
"You can't make this up, you really can't," Shane whispered, chuckling, as he sidled up next to Hunter. He tossed a quick smile Yzra's way, then turned his full attention to the other Hollow, giving him a hard slap on the shoulder. To onlookers, they might have seemed like friends, but Shane's tightening grip was anything but a friendly gesture. Not that anyone would have noticed, given all the commotion at the Dining Hall.
"You lucky bastards are gonna have it real easy," He said through a gritted, toothy smile, as he attempted to lead Hunter away from the room. "Only an idiot would screw this up. You're not an idiot though, are ya, buddy?"
The Roots squirmed and the hand spasmed, but it was not out of weakness. On the contrary, the blood sacrifice seemed to amplify their strength. The hand strained forwards, grasping at the roots. It dragged itself up, up, up, breaching the earth with the blonde crown of its bearer, until at last a familiar face could be discerned: Amelia Dreamford.
"Help," she rasped, her desperate gaze sweeping over the group before settling on her sister. "Help… me."
Robbie just wanted to eat some bacon and eggs. Not to get insulted for his locks, sick locks he took lots of pride in, especially not from a vintage wannabe and his shadow of a sister.
Greenie beside him was a bop though, girl was as badass as she looked.
"I have this cool time traveling device." He offered, in answer. "They only work on hair. Maybe it's time we catch you up with the current times. The gothic empire isn't really a look anymore. " he drawled.
He strode forward with total confidence, giving gaunty a rough pet on the shoulder. "Take a seat mate, we're here to stay."
"And eat all your food…" He said, catching sight of the delicious goods.
Sylvia's eyes briefly brushed over Sullivan, as if expecting him to be holding a set of puppet springs and pulling a nasty prank. For that was surely what this is, a nasty, cruel prank. Only it wasn't Sullivan nor any of the others.
Which left their beloved forest as the culprit, or somehow Amelia… Hadn't died…
"Emilia…" She started. Reaching for the girl, to interrogate her further on the events leading to her sister's demise or perhaps to pull her away from the awful sight, she wasn't sure.
"We should not engage," She warned, looking back at the others, her fingers wrapped tight around the pale girl's arm. "Even a blood sacrifice is proving to be unpredictable."
As Emery awkwardly picked himself off the ground, he quickly scurried away to stand in the corner. His little clumsy entrance had already drawn more than enough attention to himself, and he'd be perfectly content to fade into the background of the room.
While more people entered, it appeared that he was not alone in being led to this room. But by what, he wondered. Was it the same entity that brought him here? Did it bring them all here? What even was this place? All these questions swirled in his mind, his eyes peering intently at the ground.
It was as if by will that an apparition began to manifest, finally lifting his eyes from the floor. Emery watched in amazement, his breath hitching in his throat as the man went from an intangible essence to a fully formed person. He would have been terrible if the man had not brought a salacious fluttering to his chest.
Emery darted his eyes away, determined to listen to what Grimsworth had to say. While he listed the three rules they were meant to follow, Emery wrote them in his notebook. Although the rules didn't answer any questions, they were just as good if they kept him safe.
When Grimsworth revealed the terrarium, Emery was in awe of the little sapling. The mystifying magic that seemed to occupy this place continued to bewilder him. As Grimsworth explained their duty to care for the sapling, Emery took the opportunity to sketch it quickly in his notebook, too. It was crudely done but good enough to get the point across.
As Grimsworth dismissed the group and the room began to clear, Emery stepped closer to the terrarium. The mist whirled in his eyes, "What happens if we fail our objectives?" He asked softly, peeking up at Grimsworth with rose-colored cheeks.
This was not the kind of party Leo thought he was walking into. There wasn't even any music. But he really couldn't complain. At least he was finally around some people. Since he'd been here, he'd only seen a handful of people. He was starting to go crazy, though that's probably what this place wants.
Despite how strangely they all ended up in that room, it was Leo's first feeling of normalcy since he arrived. However, that feeling quickly faded. Before he could even start a conversation or introduce himself, a strange… thing entered the room. He couldn't describe it even if he knew the words. Leo tensed, unsure if this was dangerous or just another unexplainable experience.
The strange figure soon became an inhumanly beautiful man. Leo doubted he could pay attention if he were meant to be his teacher. While he listened to Grimsworth, he quickly found himself growing bored. Leo had never been one to follow the rules. If anything, he grew more curious about what might happen if they broke them.
When the terrarium was presented, Leo tilted his head in interest. It was something to look at, as if it had come straight out of a dream. But why should they care if it lived or died? Or about this parasite threatening this place? How was any of this connected? But more than anything, could they even trust this man?
As Grimsworth announced who would be taking care of the sapling, Leo breathed a sigh of relief that he wouldn't have to deal with that headache. At least not yet. When they were dismissed, he was more than happy to leave. All of this was making him crave a bump.
While he followed the others toward the cafeteria, a pair of Gene Simmons wannabes sprinted toward the group. They seemed unhappy about their arrival, not that Leo was thrilled. But they made the mistake of hurling disses at most of the group. Somehow, Leo missed getting hit.
The blond laughed. "Oh, you've done it now," he remarked, sitting across the table from Robbie.
