#hold up...

Something felt off.

It was something strange... Something watching. Waiting.

Patiently.

Pomni shook off the mild tremor crawling down her spine and merely rolled her shoulders once – twice – to ease the chilling pull of goosebumps that rose the hair on the back of her neck.

Someone was watching her – she should be used to this by now.

Slowly, Pomni turned to the entrance of the great hall, eyes trailing the expanse of the red carpet leading up to the main room. There was no one. Fine.

Was it always this quiet?

Pomni looked the other way, down the hall, towards Zooble’s room, only to meet the empty space that didn’t spare her as much as a nod. No one was there. No one was with her. She was definitely the only one there.

Unless...

Pomni’s shoulders sagged heavily, letting out a long sigh, before looking up and aimlessly dragging her eyes along the rafters, so high above, that she could not see what lurked among them, but fairly certain that their was someone there.

She had been very quiet lately.

The jester, looked down, to the side as she got lost in thought, as she tried to ease herself into calmness. She tried... Hopelessly haunted by that sinking pull of the gravity in the dread that just didn’t seem to quite leave her, despite knowing who was watching.

Her eyes caught onto something odd. Something unusual when compared to the norm. The wall paper just didn’t seem right. There was something off.

Oh!

A small tear in the paper – just barely noticeable – just off to the side from where Pomni was standing. A line... Carving a subtle trail running down the side of the hall’s wall. It beckoned her eyes to travel along the etched path, slowly entrancing her follow. It felt so long. It felt so intriguing.

Helpless to the beckon of this odd little etched trail that slowly seduced her down the hall. Hyper fixated, obediently following... as if to answer a soft, yearning call.

The trail was abruptly swallowed into an inky, black void, and the immersion was ripped from Pomni’s mind. She blinked as she found herself standing in front of a door, merely opened by a crack.

Ice burnt it’s sharp crystals into the jesters veins at the sight of Jax’s toothy grin sported onto the label adorning the door’s large flat surface, nailing it’s menace and perversion into Pomni’s peripheries.

She couldn’t tear her gaze from the black from what she saw inside the crack in the doorway, unable to see what is inside and overwhelmed by what she knew, lurked inside. The door didn’t feel like a door anymore... It felt like the open maw of a beast, waiting for her to step closer to swallow her whole.

Pomni knew that it had to be a play on her mind, but the room was breathing, creaking open it’s jaw oh so slowly just to beckon her inside.

She didn’t understand how it could be so...