Her sword stood beside her, as though she'd tried to use it for support. There was a pool of blood beside her, the carpet underneath her dark-red and wet. She edged closer, ready to strike at the smallest movement, but then she recognized the person huddled against the wall. The feeble light of candles made its shadow appear like a monstrous, lumbering thing, and her grip on the leaf tightened. She reached the corridor and saw a black shape ahead of her. Something dreadful had happened there, and recently – the blood was still fresh. Kaho slowed down, the sacred leaf at the ready.
She was nearing the top of the stairs, and something dark was splattered on the steps, leading the way up. She felt it like an electrical current humming in her every fiber, and it made the hairs at the back of neck stand up.
The magic in the air was intensifying the higher she climbed. They painted black, moving shapes on the walls, and Kaho felt her nerves mounting. The corridor was dark but for the candelabras and the dancing flames of the candles. The air was thickening with each step and she knew the black magic was manifesting within the queen every moment, spreading like a cruel plague, and the only cure was her, Kaho. There was no time to waste her journey had taken too long already. She was panting now, rushing towards another floor. That thought had kept her calm where nothing else had. If she could spare the others from having to go through this pain, then her mission was worth it. She thought back on Lun and the other priestesses she served with – she knew the horror of what the sacred mission required would have broken them. Perhaps the Matriarch had known this perhaps this was why she'd sent Kaho. The loss of more lives, and by the hand of a priestess, was a terrible price to pay for their salvation. The huntress had fought fiercely though there was no hope, believing to her very last breath that the queen was innocent. Her side stung where the huntress had managed to strike her with her knife, though the poison was long gone. The climb was long and dizzying, and her majesty was no doubt cloistered somewhere in her chambers in the highest floor. Kaho paused to catch her breath, inhaling as deeply as she could. It pained her to even think about it, but perhaps it would be more merciful if the queen could not be saved. She could not guarantee the queen would survive the ordeal even if she managed to seal away the curse, and even if she did, what purpose would it serve? The queen would be devastated to see what had come of her actions. There was no point in questioning her reasons at this point, nothing to be achieved from solving the mystery. If the accursed queen hadn't been possessed before, she surely was now. She couldn't understand it what on earth had possessed the queen to strike a deal with the underworld? Kaho smiled sadly. Very little of the Karstian population remained anymore – if the curse wasn't stopped soon, there would be no one left to save.
She thought back on Eri's words and knew the girl had told the truth. She could tell Karst must have been a beautiful place once upon a time, but there was little left of its former glory. There was hardly a room that was not haunted by the spirits of the dead, and even the power she had was not enough to keep them at bay forever unless the source of the curse wasn't quelled. The corridors, the courtyard, the gardens – they were all tainted with the vile magic. She could not put down the sacred leaf for a moment. It seemed to press against her on all sides, constricting her throat like a shackle. The curse hung heavy over the entire area, but nowhere had it been as bad as in the castle itself the very air seemed tainted by it, and she found it difficult to breathe. Karst Castle was in an even more terrible state than Kaho had anticipated.