The Path Unseen (Being a New Story - In Many or Few Parts)

The scrivener scurried down the spiral staircase, her long woollen robes gathered up in one hand, the other clutching a bunch of scrolls and parchment. Down and down she went, her footfalls clacking skeletally on the stone steps. No doubt if she had needed to draw breath she would by now be quite breathless. Thank the Lady she was no longer cursed with such worries. Down and down, she ran.

Three doors stood at the base of the towering stairwell. Two identical, locked heavily, all dusty cobwebs and rust-tinged hinges. The third stood open, a balmy draught wafting gently through the gap. Her sense of smell had long since been left behind, victim to the ruination of the grave, but she could see the heavy smoke of incense on the breeze.

“Two locked, one open” She muttered like a prayer, and passed through the entrance to the room beyond.

Upon a dias in the rooms centre three tall chairs stand like thrones. Upon the left and right sat figures cloaked and cowled. Hunched over, their only movement a rhythmical breathing - soft, yet hoarse, ancient. Old, thin fingers grasp the arms tightly of each seat as if holding on in anticipation. Fear.

“You seek The Path Unseen?” A rasping voice at her back. The light brush of a finger on her shoulder. She stammered her reply “I ssse..ek thhhe… I seek The Third Way”.

“You have what we asked for?” An unseen hand took the papers from her trembling grip.

“Bu..” confused she tried to respond.

“How could we know?” the figures spoke as one. Three now they sat, hooded heads leaning as if to read the papers held before them. Whispered voices, muttering and murmurings. Affirmations of what was written. Curses and praise, all the same voice. All around. Her head swam with them.

“All paths lay before”, they spoke in trinity “and behind us”.

“We must look to all paths. All choices. New and old. Things we thought hidden and lost. Keys to places we had forgotten. Yet some remember still…”

The incense, the voices, the figures. The incense, the voices, the figures. The incense, the voices, the figures. She moved a bony hand to head, rubbing her parchment thin skin. Closing her eyes briefly, her head and heart pounding. Feelings she had not felt since… since before she cared to remember.

“Here, The Third Door on the Left…” A gentle hand guided her to the door, ushering her from the room.

And then she was stood again, before her desk within the library. The sun was setting to dusk through the massive leaded windows. Her papers still clutched tightly in hand.

And the spiral towers of The Third Way turned. Within the fortress-like structure bolted doors were flung and opened wide, whilst others slammed shut, barred and locked forever.

A new path had been found.