Further into the cavern where the dead rested, the gallery opened up to a vast, nearly round chamber. This place, however, was missing the boxes that held the human skeletons inside. Instead, the walls glittered with light and flowstones adorned the rock.

A red circle was drawn on the floor, the paint now so faint it was hard to trace the line.

Oracle stepped inside the circle, then motioned for me to follow without turning back to look if I did.

I watched her raise her hands up in the air, tilting her head upwards as if giving a signal to something I couldn't see and then, a few minutes later, she whipped around and looked right at me.

Eyes that didn't see bore themselves at me.

"They are restless now that they can feel you, Scarlet," she said, taking a step closer to me. "The spirits of the dead," she added before I could voice the question.

Swallowing back my words, I waited for her to continue and tell me what we were doing here and watched her as she sat cross-legged on the moist floor.

"Come on. Sit." She patted the spot in front of her, just a few inches from where my bare feet were planted against the ground, and stifling a sigh I did as I was directed.

"I want you to be very careful, Scarlet. This circle won't protect you if you go too far, so you need to listen to me very carefully and do exactly as I say. You hear me?"

I nodded but then, remembering that she couldn't actually see me, said, "Yes, Oracle."

"Good. Now, close your eyes and think about the dead."

Think about the dead? Really?

"Think about what you felt when you were on the other side. Relax and remember that feeling," she went on and although I knew I had to do as told, I couldn't help but wonder how she knew that I could remember.

But then again, Oracle knew everything. Even things you didn't want her to know, she knew it all.

"Don't think useless things but do as I say," she snapped, her voice firm and stern.

Taking a deep, calming breath, I tried to remember how it felt back then.

A particle in the world. Vast. Calm. Empty.

Once I had thought that death was scary, that it was something you overcame with effort, but truth was, after having a taste of what it really was I knew that death was like floating. Following the motion with no thought of how to stop it.

That motion was the only thought. There was nothing except that motion and the darkness.

You'd think that being in complete darkness would be scary, that you'd want to get away from the black world you'd fallen into, but it wasn't like that.

Calm. Serene. Nothing existed but you and the motion. You didn't care that you couldn't see. You didn't care that you didn't feel like your old self.

"Now, find them." It was Oracle's voice in my eardrums. "See them."

And as soon as the words penetrated my mind, I could suddenly see.

I was no longer riding the motion in my own world. I was a part of another world, a world that was illuminated and filled with so many people who all watched me as I passed them by.

I was back at the cavern but now, instead of boxes with skeletons inside, I saw people leaning against the rock walls. Eyes empty, probably mad with their reason lost after death, they watched me but did they really see me?

I wasn't sure that they could see me. All I knew was that somehow they knew that I was there. Their hands reached for me, not really trying to grasp but more like they were just trying to find a direction to go.

They knew I was there but they couldn't see me. It was the only explanation for what they did, how they tried to reach for something but never managed to take a hold of it.

"Do not linger close to them for too long or they will be able to sense where you are." I heard Oracle say in my mind. It was so odd, beyond odd to be able to hear her when I felt like I was walking outside my own body.

Indeed, it was exactly what I was doing.

I walked further into the gallery, my eyes stopping for a fraction of the second on the faces of so many people, each and every one of them dead in the most literal sense.

Why are they still here?

"That's enough. Come back now," Oracle said in her voice that traveled from one world to another. "Come back before they start absorbing your life."

Is that even possible? I thought but decided not to question her statement. Turning back to retrace my steps back to where my physical body sat on the cavern's floor, I noticed the dead's movements were now more hectic – swifter and with a direction in their purpose.

"Quickly, child. I can feel them stirring up!" Oracle's voice shouted inside my mind.

She didn't need to tell me. I'd already seen how they turned those dead eyes my way whenever I stepped closer to them.

"Run, moon-kissed. Get back before they get enough reason to come after you!"

It was easier said than done. With each step I took back, my feet became heavier. A weight I hadn't felt on my way forth was suddenly making the motion of my spiritual body slow and strenuous.

A scream rang in my ears and a second later, I felt a hand clasp around my elbow.

Glancing back, I saw a woman holding onto me, then screamed, "She got me, Oracle. What do I do?"

Listening for an answer through the haze my world had become, I tried to struggle against the dead grip of the woman.

No answer ever came.

The dead's eyes stared at me, the woman's jaw stretching as a gurgling sound came out of these ghostly lips.

Another scream came from somewhere behind her and, averting my eyes from the woman, I saw the rest of them coming our way.

She shut her mouth, then opened it again.

What is it she wants to tell me?

However, before even a sound came from the woman's lips, something crashed on her, making her lose her balance. I used the dead's momentary distraction to rip my arm of her grasp and shove her away.

And then I ran, followed by the screams of the dead and that gurgling sound their lips seemed to be producing as they chased after me.

The line of the circle loomed in front of me and I saw my body and that of Oracle inside the circle before I dived right in.

Pain. Red hot agony invaded my every cell as once again body and soul became one.

Minutes that felt like hours later, I finally opened my eyes to a world that was a whirlwind of images spinning in front of my sight and as soon as I did I felt bile climb up my throat.

"Deep breaths, child. It's going to pass soon," Oracle assured, placing a hand on my shoulder as I squeezed my eyes shut to stop the sudden vertigo.

"You did good, Scarlet." I heard her say, her voice still having that eery echo to it I'd heard back when I was with the dead but just then, the way her voice sounded to my ears was the last thing I thought about.

"You have to be fucking kidding me, Oracle," I told her, chancing a glance at her.

She had some serious explaining to do.