Amelie couldn't keep her thoughts straight. She should've stuck with one of the others - Oleg, Samson - not run off in a random direction instead, opening doors at random and pounding along old stone passages.
Jasmine... oh god, she'd stayed behind to give them time. At least, Amelie thought so. She dared not consider that she may have left Jasmine for dead.
But she had shouted 'run!', and so Amelie did. Now she didn't know where she was, pausing to rest against a stone column in the darkness of some rarely-used corridor.
Her chest hurt, she wasn't used to running
that
hard. They've had to make quick getaways in the past, but this... this was more terrifying than any experience she'd ever had.
Whatever was chasing them wasn't human. It couldn't be. She'd never dealt with something like that before, and now she was separated from her comrades, and she had no idea about their fates.
They could be dead, they could be alive, they could be as aimless as she was, or being dragged away to a far worse fate. She really didn't know.
Samson was right, coming here was a bad idea. Part of her hated that.
She pushed off the wall, and slowly crept along, feeling along the walls because the light within was almost negligible.
She'd gotten turned around at some point, her sense of direction completely lost in her blind panic. She hated herself for it, she was supposed to be calm and composed, dignified.
There was nothing about groping around in the dark so she didn't trip on anything or stumble into something unpleasant that was dignified. How'd she even get here in her blind panic?
"Breathe, Amelie," she told herself. "Just find your way along until you get to somewhere familiar, or somewhere you can work things out."
Those 'things' would be escape. Pure and simple. As much as some would've said it fit her character, she didn't like the idea of leaving her friends behind to die. But what could she do? Use harsh language against smoke?
Already the guilt was eating her, but she pushed that deep down, knowing there'd be time later to reconcile with herself.
Hopefully.
She yelped when her fingers touched something cold, that something shifting with a slight rattle, but calmed when she realised it was a suit of armour.
It was more than a little disconcerting, Amelie afraid it would spring to life on her. She'd only be
marginally
better off fighting a living suit of armour. At least she could hit it with something.
She moved around the armour... and let out a scream when it suddenly clattered to the ground with a deafening crash. She practically jumped out of her skin, on the verge of hyperventilating. Slowly, she calmed herself, hand on heaving chest, before annoyance took place of the fear.
It'd probably been standing untouched for decades, and her light touch was enough to make it unstable and fall over.
Certainly not a supernatural cause.
She kept moving, the adrenaline of that scare still not quite out of system... nor the adrenaline from being chased by cackling smoke for that matter. But she couldn't stop. If she didn't find a way out, she'd be in deep trouble.
She wasn't sure how much time passed, forced to make a few turns in the dark hallways due to corners and locked doors, until she came to one door that wasn't looked.
She opened it, and emerged into what looked like a small ballroom, the door she came from nestled on one of the long sides, the opposite side lined with windows that let filtered light through ornately framed glass, each flanked with large rouge satin curtains pulled open with golden ropes.
Outside raged a blizzard, and she could hear the wind howling, rattling the window panes, though the air inside was still, if a little chilly.
At least she could see a bit better.
Her advance across the floor was quiet, save for the occasional creak of the polished wooden boards. It seemed she'd come in from a side entrance, for a look to her left showed a set of large, ornate double doors situated in the middle of the wall that probably led into the more well-maintained parts of the castle.
It was eerie in the dull light, especially given how nice the place looked otherwise;
someone
kept this place tidy, like the main areas of the castle they'd explored before encountering the black smoke.
She started walking the length of the ballroom, going past the set of double doors, looking to her right at another set of double doors, these ones glass, that led out onto a balcony, overlooking the environment down below. Perhaps she could get out there, though if her only option was climbing down a cliff face, then she may need another plan, since that would be suicide in a blizzard.
But as she pondered her predicament, she saw something at the end of the hall; a bust on a plinth.
She narrowed her eyes at it, and curiosity got to her, walking past both sets of doors until she came up to the statue; it was of a deer's head, but something was off; its eyes were missing, empty sockets looking back at her uncomfortably. She also noticed the antlers seemed like they could move in some fashion though she wasn't sure what for. And further inspection revealed a small groove at the neck of the relief, just above where it met the plinth.
Did this thing open? Was there a secret compartment within the statue?
Amelie grasped the bust, and grunted as she tried to force it open, but the thing refused to give. After a few useless attempts, she changed approach, giving an unpleasant face as she tentatively stuck her fingers into the eye sockets, probing around inside. She felt a mechanism, of sorts, but she could only just slightly depress it, and not enough to do anything. There were slots inside, not unlike keyholes. Perhaps the eyes served as such.
She wished Samson were here, he probably could've unlocked it no issue.
Samson.
She again remembered his reluctance to be here. If they listened to him, then she wouldn't be having these thoughts.
She'd be away somewhere else, probably somewhere warmer, pulling a less juicy, but far safer, haul.
Had greed finally blinded them?
In a moment of frustration and contempt, she kicked at the plinth, though it did not budge.
Not a moment later, she heard a voice echo disapproval.
"
Tsk, tsk, tsk
, that's not polite as a guest to do~"
Amelie's blood instantly chilled, and her face went bone white; she couldn't find the source of the disembodied voice, it seemed to reverberate all around the hall.
