Ashes and Blood

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Vast nothingness. That’s how inside the chamber felt to her. If it even was a chamber. Thinking of it as such kept her sane. She saw no walls; neither could she make out a beginning or an end to the dark stretching in every direction. No sky. No horizon. The only breaks within the black monotony were from pools of torchlight so bleak they gave the impression they were dying. What she and the room’s numerous occupants stood upon made her think of a bottomless pit. She shivered with the thought of what would soon breach the endless night.

A hum like a blade slicing the air resonated from the platform near where she stood. Similar noises mirrored it. Her heart hammered in her chest. The murmurs from the other patrons immediately ceased, cut off as if those honed edges severed their throats.

She recalled a time when hearing a portal’s formation did not cause her to panic. A period when traversing from one point to another was as simple as a thought. Of late, even opening her own sent her insides crawling up her stomach. She clutched her gray robe for what would come next before slowly releasing its folds.

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