
He cast his gaze through the quiet glow of the evening fog, his eyes narrow and cautious.
His weathered cavalry boots had carried him many places—down marbled hallways, through the cobblestone streets of cities and over the rotting horrors of smoky battlefields, and now they had led him here. The path before him was long and murky, the dirt beneath him reduced to mud by the flash storms that were all too common here, the end of the straightaway clouded in the mist that hung between the ancient mossy trees anchored on its flanks. In the twisting amber haze, the Marshal was a ghostly form—his identity concealed beneath the long navy-blue cloak and officer’s hat, along with the metal star and leather gun belt that he wore underneath. He did not look back at the dirt road that had brought him here, and when he advanced forward into the misty barrier separating the outside world from the unknown, he did so slowly and steadily. His boots tread over the muck of the trail, his surroundings slowly evaporating into a universe where there was no clear up or down, no left or right. Some might have been quickly disoriented, but the Marshal continued on, marching forward into the shadow world undeterred.
It wasn’t very different than the twisting smoke of battlefields, and if you listened close enough, the low hum of the cicadas wasn’t very different than the drum of cannon fire that paired with the former. He was no stranger to either; the shadows of places like this were an old acquaintance, an inverted landscape that one could slip into without realizing. It was difficult to count paces here, but the Marshal had taken many before the warmer colors of the outside world striking the mist began to subside into colder ones—dark purples filled the haze as the specter of nighttime slipped closer and closer along with its first hints of greys and blacks. Still, the man clad in blue continued onward, drawing closer to his destination as it slowly began to materialize in the distance.
The muted candlelight that pierced the murky fog swept wide across his vision, forming a constellation of flickering orbs that danced like the apparitions of lost souls. This place was the juncture of things ancient and ornate, and the swampy gloom that hung over it all seemed poised to release an otherworldly scream. The lights came into focus as the Marshal approached the massive house, if a house it could even be called.
The word castle came to mind, a sprawling mighty castle that some long-dead king had constructed on the sinking wetlands of the American south. It had been laid tediously, brick by brick in the saturated muck that threatened to pull things down and under like quicksand—hundreds of men had labored through the scorching heat of the afternoons and the suffocating humidity of the evenings. It stood in stark rebellion to the oppressive encroachment of nature at its borders, a bastion of cruel order, straight lines and roman columns that stood against the sleepy advance of the bayou on all sides. All of that labor had happened long ago, however, and in the late evening light it seemed as if the vast mansion was beginning to lose its battle—glowing amber spilled through the gilded windowpanes in straining defiance to the gloomy swamplands, but vines had begun to grow across the stone facades above and below their inviting pulse.
The medieval-style turrets that stood on either side were powerful and stoic, but cracks could be seen weaving themselves through the structures like spiderwebs. The flickering interior of the crumbling fortress whispered a silent invitation of sanctuary from the rapidly descending darkness, but as the Marshal found himself standing in the long stone arc that led to the entrance, he paused. His cloak had faded from its powerful navy-blue to an obscure grey in the growing dusk, and as he stole a glance from side to side, the wings of the building seemed to stretch around him like arms, pulling him into its ominous embrace.
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