Check out the fallen Paintings

Tame creeped down the hallway, his eyes bouncing from the loose pile of broken furniture and picture frames to the light coming from around the corner at the end of the hall. The grit that was coating the carpet runner in the hall was thicker here, practically silt deep enough to cover the carpet completely in places. He knelt when he reached the nearest one, turning it over to get a look at the front of it. The frame was broken in two places, so he had to lift it with both hands and the water that had come through the area had not been kind to the oils.

The front of the painting was a jumble of colors with almost no detail remaining, but it looked like it might have been a painting of the castle itself. The colors were still bright however, and it seemed to be a daytime scene from some long ago, happier time. Tame shrugged and set the painting aside, moving to the next one that was propped somewhat against the broken pieces of some sort of end table.

“Hmmm...this looks smashed. Whatever happened here, it looks like something big and wet came barreling down this hall, judging from the pile of kindling these...what were these?” Tame picked up what he assumed was a leg and turned it over in his hand. Despite being snapped into several pieces, the quality of craftsmanship was still obvious. “Tables? Vanities? Hell if I know. It’s junk now.” He dropped the piece back into the silt and grabbed the second painting.

This one had managed to partially escape the water damaging the previous painting had taken. Several figures stood together in what looked vaguely like the main foyer he had entered when he had first come into the castle. Arrayed on the stairs, the figures were all obviously female and dressed in what looked like it had once been high end dresses, but much of the finer details were lost. “Well, damn...this place used to be populated with pretty girls? Just my luck that now all it has is monsters and shitty magical items.”

The third and fourth paintings didn’t do anything to clear up what was going on either. Both had significant water damage and one was almost shredded entirely by what could only have been a massive, clawed foot of some sort. Both paintings showed more figures from what he assumed were happier, times in the past, but their faces were ruined beyond recognition. All Tame could piece together was that there seemed to be two figures that were more prominent than the others, a dark colored mare and a pale, almost white colored mare. Either they had some very funky manes, or the splotches of gold meant that they had worn crowns.

Tame pondered all this for a few more moments and then set the paintings aside and stood once more, brushing the silt off his hands.

Author's Note

Go Back Upstairs (links back to the original story)

Check out those shadowy Doorways

Check out the flickering Light