| CHAPTER FOUR |
| Cairon awoke to find himself passing through clouds and then into the purple sky, back into the yellow and green clouds and then to purple again. He looked down to find that he was far away from The Maze of Haze and was now over the swamps of Sadness. A dark figure darted across the swamps as silently and as quick as the speed of light. Cairon's vision became blurry and he realised that he felt sick and dizzy. He raised his head up again to find that he was resting on the young mare who had chatted with him beside the waterfall, his coat was warm and Cairon felt that he would die happy if indeed he did resting there in the horse's hair. In fact Cairon had come very close to dying and had it not been for the Quickness of the young horse he would have existed no more in Fantastica, he would have become lost forever in the clutches of the Nothing. The young horse now aware that his companion was awake turned his silky head, eyes a blaze and smiled at Cairon. "You decided to stay." "I had no choice", concluded Cairon still unsure of what had just happened. Then looking down at his hands he noticed they were no longer the colour of ebony, but now a grey colour, as grey and cold looking as rocks. "The Nothing!" He exclaimed. The young mare just nodded sullenly in response, and then added, "you came very close". Cairon shivered at the thought of being sucked into the Nothing. He had 'wanted' to join it, compelled by a desire to forget, forget everything and become a slave to some unknown force. The fact that he had 'willingly' gone towards the Nothing scared him. "Where are we going?" Asked Cairon. "To see an old friend", concluded the horse. Cairon was about to ask who when he was overcome with tiredness and fell fast asleep, again. When Cairon awoke he found himself lying by a tree that was covered in black sticky mud. He found that his clothes were covered in this mud substance also. Where was the young mare? Cairon could see a white figure moving towards him and as his eyes adjusted to the form he saw that it was he. "We are here to find Morla, the aged one. He will know who can restore your strength", said the young mare. " If you were not the one in this state I would have said yourself, but I'm afraid that your own strength will not surfice. You have little power left while in the clutches of the nothing", said the horse sadly. "Yes..yes my good friend. Morla will know", and with that Cairon let his eyelids drop as he lay in a state of blind consciousness, if one may call it so. Cairon's eyesight had grown dim and his lungs felt as though a tight fist was squeezing them, wrenching out all his life and energy. He was barely alive. Love, the name of the young mare (and so we shall now call him) made his way through the swamps of sadness with great woe. With each step he felt the opppressiveness of the swamp's gloomy atmosphere envelope him and stifle him, yet he was resolute: "I WILL find Morla", he declared to the still silence of the swamps. "I will...", but Love had lost his trail of thought for before him he saw hoof marks in a grassy and almost soil part of the swamps. The horse knew these marks, these belonged to a horse named Artax. The very horse that belonged to Atreyu, the one chosen for the great Quest. Atreyu had been here! As Love followed the hoof prints more closely he found that they suddenly disappeared by a large black pool of mud, and he could not find the trail that almost certainly should appear on the other side of the mud. Looking into the pool he shuddered for he knew that death had come there. He felt a chill in his blood and the air was unfriendly. Love backed away from the pool and turned right around. "Atreyu!" he shouted, but there was no response. "Atreyu!" He repeated, yet the answer was the same. Was the death of Artax alone? Was Atreyu also dead? Love stay stagnant as the pool before him for quite some time in complete agony of mind. He could not believe what he had found. Then his face changed from that of a face in torment and confusion to one of determination and an indescribable amount of inner strength. "Cairon. If all else fails I shall save Cairon and leave this World knowing that I did what was my purpose and longing to do: to save life". COPYRIGHT PINKCLOUD 2002 TO BE CONTINUED SOON.... (last updated 7th January 2002) |
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