No. No. Too spacious. Too open, too bright. What he looked for eluded him, and yet, he kept marching on. Through dark halls, through dank rooms, through his wobbly-kneed state and incrementally increasing fatigue. He breathed in dust that must have been centuries undisturbed and rubbed his watering eyes against that which he’d stirred up with lurching strides. His earlier struggles through the weather had left him terribly off-balance, and it was taking a long time to right his senses again. An uncomfortably long time.

Finally, he came across one that felt right to the itchings.

It was a bedroom. A child’s bedroom, judging by the moth-eaten stuffed animals scattered about, and the cheery white and blue color scheme of anything painted or fabric’d. Make no mistake though, this room was in no better shape than the rest of the house. The colors were darkened by deep shadows. There were no windows to shed their light; only dead lanterns and half-used candles. The fae wandered in. His eyes drew upward to a hanging mobile of cotton-sewn clouds. A part of him wished he had something to start fires on him, so that he could explore the room in greater detail. But the itching part of him had no protests. This was small, cozy, dry. This would do.

Do for what? Why?

The itchings gave him no answer that he could hear.

There were other things that weren’t forthcoming with their stories either. Fenn wandered over a lumpy rug to part the canopy of the bed. He ran his hand along the faded duvet, staring blankly at the dust the accumulated on his fingers, and intricate wispy patterns underneath the settlings. This place really hadn’t been inhabited in ages, had it? Though, perhaps this state of emptiness wasn’t that long to an elf, was it? This was Raiaera after all. Letting out a held breath, the sprite wiped his hands off on his cloak. It occurred to him that he’d probably never know the circumstances behind this castle’s ruin, or who once lived here. He’d only know what little he could through what had been left behind. The physical building, the furniture that had been forgotten… he could only speculate.

Perhaps natural disaster.

Perhaps a coup. Perhaps fright caused by the distant machinations of the long-dead Corpse War. Perhaps, a chain reaction of people heading out for greener pastures.

Perhaps, nothing he knew of at…