Finally, one of my favorite characters has arrived. Reading my boring story will be worth it when you finally get to him. Heheh, or at least I think so.
Elsa wasn’t sure what she had been expecting on the other side of the gate, but if anything, it wasn’t what she saw.
She had to say that she had been anticipating something at least in some degrees shocking or frightening, but as the gates closed behind them, she was looking around at a garden, but a garden unlike anything she had ever seen before. Four lampposts lined either side of the walkway up to the front door, but they weren’t the olive green stems that she was familiar with. Rather, they were made of black iron, like the kind she’d only ever seen before in movies. By the light that they cast, she could dimly see the outline of trees in the background, standing in line like an army of shrubbery lining the walkway. But there was something distinctly odd about the shine from the leaves, and even the dull glow that gleamed from the branches was different, unreal even …
Ignoring Rienzi’s whisper for her to hurry, Elsa veered off of the pathway, stepping onto the grass to take a better look at the trees. It was only then that she saw what was so strange about them. They weren’t real.
Each leaf was delicately carved from a sheet of metal, and the trees were made from solid iron that glinted in the lamplight in a manner that was both majestic and foreboding. Suddenly, a breeze swept across the garden, and Elsa’s ears were filled with a light tinkling. A sound startling alike to what she had always imagined fairy bells to sound like.
“Come on,” Rienzi’s voice hissed in her ear, and she felt his hand around her wrist, tugging her away from the tree with surprising earnestness, “You don’t want to keep Oblivion waiting.”
“But what are they?” Elsa asked, letting the twin pull her towards the house where Javier was waiting, only a silhouette against the rectangle of light the open door provided.
“Trees,” Rienzi replied, “We have them at home you know,”
“I know that.” Elsa answered with some annoyance, “But these ones aren’t real. They’re just …” although she wasn’t entirely sure as to how to describe them.
“Felix makes them,” Javier replied dryly, as they reached the bottom of the three wide marble steps that lead up to the elegant double doors where he was waiting. “He makes everything, can you please hurry?”
Elsa bit back a rude reply and followed him inside the grand house, only to have her breath taken away by the grandeur that greeted her.
Only had she ever seen churches and castles that compared to this private home, what with the large white pillars, domed ceiling and wide staircase with wings that lead off in separate directions.
The floor, she realized, was also made of marble, but had been designed to look like dozens upon dozens of puzzle pieces, put together to form a kaleidoscope picture that she assumed could only be seen from the balcony that hung on either side of the room, probably from the fourth floor. The whole house seemed to have been made from white marble, for everywhere that Elsa looked there seemed to be only more and more of it, the pillars, the walls, the stairs …
“Wait here, we’ll go find him.” Rienzi said, giving Elsa one of his sweet smiles before starting across the floor to the stairs. His footsteps echoed around the room, cutting off the soft echo of his words.
Javier was following him when he paused at the center landing and turned around, an infuriating smirk attempting to be hidden behind a bored expression. “And don’t touch anything,” he added, “Breaking something would not be a very good first impression.” And before Elsa could think of something clever to say in reply, the twins had vanished into the right wing of the house.
Left alone, Elsa felt very small against the high domed ceiling, painted to look like an open sky, with puffy clouds floating around the edges. Since looking up made her feel dizzy, Elsa turned to look around her. There wasn’t much to see once one got past the original amazement at seeing such a wonderful house, but that’s what she noticed the door. She couldn’t believe that she hadn’t noticed it before, and wondered whether if it had been there at all in the first place. From what she had seen so far, she wouldn’t go to say that such a thing was impossible.
She glanced around, the room was stifling with the feeling of her own uneasiness, but some part of her mind was telling her that she had to see what was behind that door. So making sure that she was indeed alone, she crept towards the door.
Elsa was halfway there when there began a rumbling, very small at first, and she was quite unsure as to what it was. Then the silence was shattered by a thunderous trumpet, and she looked up to see a pale grey elephant charging from the left wing, then down the stairs towards her. Her mind didn’t have time to note the strangeness of elephant running down the stairs before the gigantic beast was upon her, and Elsa did the only thing she could think of.
She whipped open the mysterious door and dashed through it, slamming it behind her before the elephant could trample her into the marble floor.
She could still hear it trumpeting behind her, but it was faint, and Elsa became more concerned with what she faced.
It was a long hallway, lined with brown doors that looked completely identical. Looking behind her, she saw that the door she had come through was no more remarkable then any of the others. It was so eerily quiet, that she thought that her footsteps seemed uncomfortably loud in the echo that followed them as she wandered forwards.
Then came the music.
It was so very soft that Elsa was certain that if she had heard it at any other time, she wouldn’t have been able to hear it at all. But within the stillness of the hallway it seemed loud.
The tune was strangely enticing, and familiar to Elsa’s mind, though familiar with the strangeness of a dream and she couldn’t remember hearing it any time before. Without really realizing what she was doing, Elsa set off down the hallway to find it’s source.
She passed door after door, noticing that they were not exactly the same after all, but had a tiny golden number pressed into the center of it, as though someone had burned it there. All the while, the volume of the music was growing steadily louder, until at last, the hallway came to an end, and she was standing in front of another door. But unlike the others, this one was dark purple, and had the number seven hundred painted in a swooping hand across the front.
It was obvious that the music was coming from inside, and Elsa possessed an intense longing to see where it was coming from, but she was suddenly afraid. Afraid of who or what was making the music, and whether they might be angry to have her wandering around there house. She recalled a name that the twins had spoken a few times: Felix. It was his house after all, wouldn’t he be angry to find her wandering around? They had told her to wait …
Before she was ready to open the door, she found that her hand was already doing it. Turning the knob that was no bigger then her fingernail and pushing open the purple door.
A great swell of music greeted her, and she felt rather like the bottom of her stomach had dropped away, making her feel light-headed as she stepped into the dimly lit room. She saw the musician first, sitting at the gigantic grand piano that took up a great deal of the room. The musician had his back to her, but she could a great amount of golden hair and a scarlet silken bathrobe draped around his slender frame.
The rest of the room was mostly in shadows, as she had realized by now that the only light was from a leaping fire in the large hearth that took up most of one wall, but she could see a large grandfather clock, three scarlet upholstered couches and a Ferris wheel the size of a monster truck tire standing on a low table.
“Felix,” came a low voice from somewhere near the fireplace, “We have a visitor.”
The song gave a last graceful arch, and just as the musician was playing the final chord, Elsa realized that it was the same tune that had accompanied her encounter with December, which she realized only then, she had never figured out where it was coming from. Then the pianist was turning around, and Elsa found herself faced with the fearsome Felix she had heard about … only to find that he wasn’t fearsome at all.
What she was greeted with a smile that would have made even her mother like him, as brightening and luminous as the sun. From behind round, gold-rimmed spectacles, he was looking at her with a slightly vague expression in his tawny gold eyes, as though he had just woken up. His hair fanned out from his head, obviously uncombed and made him look like a slightly bemused lion.
“Oh, hello,” he said, tilting his head to the side and looking at her as though he wasn’t entirely sure of why she was there. “Who are you?” He was around her mother’s age, but had fewer lines to show for it, though she did notice creases around his eyes, the kind you could only get from smiling.
“My name is Elsa,” Elsa replied, straightening herself and feeling rather like she was being examined very closely. She was about continue, and explain why she was wandering through his house, when another man melted from the shadows, making her jump.
He was on the shorter side, with long crimson hair tied back from his solemn face. He was wearing a floor length blue cloak, fastened with a bronze medallion on the left side that matched the color of his eyes, a bright bold blue. “Elsa Blackwell,” his said coolly, his voice was deep and reassuring. Though there was something rather animal and predatory about him that slightly disturbed her. “I have heard about you, December found you if I am not mistaken?”
Elsa was unsure of how to reply to this, and he was giving her the oddest expression. Somewhere crossed between hostility and amusement when Felix cut in, saving her the trouble of replying.
“Don’t frighten the poor girl, Oblivion.” The golden-haired man said with a light laugh, “She’s had a long journey, I heard that –“
“Wait,” Elsa interrupted, too surprised worry about being rude. “You’re Oblivion?” She couldn’t help but to stare, the man was intimidating, but she had expected someone a little more … a little more … she wasn’t even sure.
Oblivion’s mouth gave a small upward twitch, “Yes, I am. You’ve heard of me then?”
“Well, I … I mean December, uh, Javier … he—“ she stopped talking, when she realized that Oblivion was chuckling, though she thought that it sounded more like a growl then anything else.
“Well, it is a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance then.” He said, giving her a deep bow, which she would have thought was quite polite of him if she hadn’t suddenly noticed his hands.
From what she could see of his lower arms, they were perfectly ordinary until they met his wrists, then they became strangely twisted, and though he still did have five fingers, they were elongated and knuckled, even his fingernails were long and broken, making him look truly animal indeed.
Elsa stifled a gasp as Oblivion must have realized what she had seen and quickly drew his hands within his cloak once more. He turned away quickly, so she couldn’t see his expression. His must be embarrassed, she thought, a strange tingling ghosting up and down her spine, What a horrible thing to have become of you!
Suddenly the door Elsa had entered through banged open and in rushed Renzo and Javier, both breathing hard with their hair sticking out at all angles, though no where near as messy as Felix’s.
“There you are!” the twins cried in near perfect unison, though one of them sounded relieved while the other angry. Elsa could guess which was which.
“We’ve been looking everywhere!” Rienzi declared, his relief obvious as he staggered forwards, still gasping for breath. “I told you to stay in the entrance hall.” Javier had suddenly become very erect, he had suddenly noticed Felix and Oblivion, the latter still facing away from them. But Felix was eyeing tem with his large golden eyes, bearing an altogether resemblance to an owl.
“I’m very sorry about her—“ he jabbed a thumb in Elsa’s direction while dropping in a deep bow. Elsa had a passing thought that they did a lot of bowing in Merriot all the while being annoyed at being referred to in such a manner. “—wandering in here, I’m sure you two were discussing very important matters.”
“Actually, we were wondering what color of ice cream they would be serving at breakfast.” Felix replied with a small, dreamy smile. “They served that excellent blue kind yesterday, and I thought that they might be serving purple or red.”
This statement was met with a short silence, Elsa couldn’t help but think that he was even crazier then he looked, but if there had been a reply to that from any of the others present, it was interrupted by the arrival of the elephant.
I'm trying to say this as kindly as possible. Oh, why am I even bothering no one's probably even going to read this. 