Welcome to Gaia! ::

The rhythmic jolting of his carriage hypnotized Jonas as he watched the rapidly passing scenery with glassy eyes and tried, as he had for days, to understand his own actions. Why was he on his way to Oldcastle? He understood the initial motive; he had been in the city too long, he needed the country air and more pleasant scenery (and people). But why Oldcastle? He could have gone south along the river, as he had many times, and gone home. Seen his father and mother, and Jon. Even now the idea was enticing. Yet here he was, in an overcrowded carriage, rattling towards creepy, dusty Oldcastle, where the people were decidedly uncivilized and superstitious. I’ve just got to go. He thought, This trip will do me much good.

They arrived late in the afternoon, and Jonas gratefully clambered out of the carriage and stretched his cramped limbs. Carriages were not meant for gentlemen of his lank build. Tucking his glasses into his breast pocket, he took his first good look at the aged city and decided he liked it, though not as much as home.

Not knowing where he would be staying that evening, he walked through the city enjoying the scenes. The buildings here were sturdier than Palisade, built, like most places in the old days, to keep things out. All was stone and heavy dark-wood. The people were sturdier too, he noticed, with a sureness in their bearing and a certain depth to their eyes. Everyone here seemed different in some way, from the children he saw playing in the street to the old woman he saw placing a bowl of honey outside her back door. Strange people indeed, but who was he to judge?

A young man he had asked had directed him to an inn at the top of the tallest hill in town, saying it had good food and low prices. His grumbling stomach guided him up the hill, but when he got to the top he forgot any such feeling, as he stared out past the city.

The sun hit the rooftops and cast a golden glow on everything, until it was seemingly devoured by the black mass beyond. The Wardwood. It made Jonas realize how the houses around him were merely set on the earth, superficial and temporary. The mass he looked at grew from the earth, unshakable and ancient. It was impenetrable and should have scared him. But at that moment Jonas knew that he had not been travelling to Oldcastle at all. He was going to the Wardwood.