Creak!
The door creaked when it shut.
The sound was quickly swallowed by gusts of wind.
WOOOOOH!
A familiar sensation, one that struck them almost immediately.
Crunch.
For a moment, neither spoke.
Crunch.
Slow steps ran along the snow, as the voice of the diary pressed against their bones; each line seemed to echo louder than the wind itself.
With their backs turned....they could still feel the pull of the house.
"Haa...."
Riven looked to his right, coming to a short stop.
The mounds of before?
They looked different now.
No longer just humps of snow; each shape seemed heavier.
His eyes lingered, tracing it's ridges and folds.
His lips parted as his fingers twitched...
Was it the cold?
A hollow void was slowly forming.
One that dimmed those grey eyes further.
...Something's are best left unanswered.
WOOOOOH!
Saphira pulled her cloak tighter, the wind pushing against her frame as they stood there momentarily.
Her eyes flicked back and forth.
Tracing the view of the humps of snow, and then to her own feet; the words of the diary seemed to twist around those still mounds.
Forever still.
"Hkk--"
Her chest felt heavy as a chill seeped around her neck.
A chill that lasted.
Eternal.
'...Mother....'
WOOOOOOH!
A brief pause.
One that was needed, as they stood rooted.
The wind was their only pull back to reality; for they were lost in endless thought.
The silence stretched until it almost consumed them.
"Haa..."
Riven exhaled slowly, the cloud of breath vanishing into the storm of frost.
His hand moved from the hilt of his blade, to his face; before it slid down his cheek to his chin.
Cough!
The sound scraped against the gushing air.
Behind him.
Riven turned towards Saphira, his gaze; grey, strained, unreadable.
"Hkkk---"
Her breath trembled, eyes falling unfocused....
Her mother's face flickered in the frost, lips mouthing words she could no longer hear.
crackle!
The faint memory of firelight; warmth, laughter.
That shallow peace, she'd been so used to her whole life.
It all stabbed sharper than the cold.
Felt heavier as the eternal memory of that diary pressed deeper....
It rang across her mind like a bell; waking new thoughts.
'...Will I be forgotten along with countless others?'
'...Will my name be buried here....along with them?'
The silence pressed heavy.
WOOOOOOH!
But then her boots shifted:
Crunch! Crunch!
Crunching into the snow.
Step by step, she moved forward, thoughts clouding her mind dark.
Crunch! Crunch!
Not looking at the houses to her left or right....
Crunch!
She clutched her layers tighter, as she paced mindlessly.
Crunch! Crunch!
They didn't need to exchange words...
Riven followed in silence, his shadow stretching beside hers.
He didn't look back.
Crunch! Crunch!
Although carried without focus, Saphira's steps softly carried towards the gathering hall.
Its tall silhouette, with its dark, hollow windows, unmistakable even in the slight haze falling.
WOOOOOH!
The wind howled behind them, clawing at their backs, as if pushing them closer to its looming structure.
Crunch!
The closer they approached, the more Riven's shadow stretched beside Saphira's; long and thin against the pale white.
Present.
Resolute?
Crunch! Crunch!
The steps they took weren't primarily from choice, but from a lack of another.
The derelict houses all around?
'...No more....'
Was it fear of discovery?
Fear of another eternal memory? One that would live inside them forever?
Crunch!
'...It didn't matter'
That's what Riven told himself.
Liar.
WOOOOH!
Grrrr!!
A reminder spelled, reaching both of their ears even amongst the pull of wind.
The weight of hunger hadn't disappeared.
It was evident.
Real.
Crunch.
It gnawed at their stomachs, dull and constant, making every step heavier.
It took a back seat....but the endless thoughts reignited its fuel.
WOOOOOH!
Don't be mistaken.
Crunch.
After everything---
the hunger wasn't new.
Crunch!
Neither was the cold.
Neither was:
'Blood.'
'...Dread'
Those ideas stained his and her memories in fragments.
Constant, just like the need for nutrition.
Crunch! Crunch!
The words clawed at Riven, forcing his mind to replay the scenes:
Rile's gurgled end.
The scavenger's whimper.
The stalker's claws.
...That, voice.
The diary's story.
WOOOOOOOH!
All of it one.
All of it circling.
Crunch!
It was said, since the beginning of time:
"Numbness was a curse."
That, "Silence, was the price of survival."
So why?
'....Why is it so loud?'
This wasn't silence....
Crunch.
Silence was mercy.
Silence was the grave.
Silence was empty.
Crunch.
But this?
This pressed closer.
It was the scratching, the diary had noted.
The tapping, under the floorboards.
It breathed against his ear.
Pressed into his chest.
Ran atop his mind.
'The trees'
He almost heard it....
Crunch!
Inside his mind, it was a storm circling without shape.
He didn't know what to call it.
...He didn't want to name it.
Grrr!
His eyes shifted. To her.
The girl beside him.
Still breathing. Still here.
That was enough.
WOOOOOOOH!
One step. Then another.
Keep moving. Stay alive.
'Should I even keep going?
A thought.
Dangerous in deposition.
It flickered, disappearing like ash.
Buried.
Hopefully forever....
For that box, was something best left unopened.
For its unboxing, was a delivery to descent.
Crunch! Cru-
Their steps came to a halt.
They had reached it.
The gathering hall was right in-front of them.
WOOOOOOH!
Those thoughts that plagued?
They had made the journey seem longer than what it was.
"Haa...." "Hkk--"
The stop in motion, signalled the two to look up, snapping out of their delirium.
A door stood before them.
Wood swollen with frost, its grain etched by time and something harsher. Shadows gathered in its cracks, as though a home.
It was a large building.
Much larger than those wooden houses.
WOOOOOH!
The wind called.
Saphira's eyes shifted from the swollen wood to him.
Not a word; just a look.
A question, a plea and a warning all at once.
Riven's breath fogged the air, as he met her gaze; grey colliding with red.
The hall loomed.
The door waited.
Still.