Omitome’s hooves stopped splashing. Instead, they struck the air with the ring of a hammer on an anvil. They were rising, not into the sky, but into the Thinning . Elara gripped the mane, her knuckles white. She could see the village below, frozen like a fly in amber, every raindrop suspended in mid-air.
"Four for the soul," Elara choked out, her voice echoing in a place with no wind.
She stood at the stall of , a mare whose coat was the color of a bruised plum—dark, deep, and shimmering with an iridescent violet in the right light. Omitome wasn't a plow horse or a racer. She was a "Four-Stepper," one of the rare beasts rumored to be able to walk between the layers of the world. Omitome_-_Girl_with_Horse_-_1-to-4_.zip
Elara leaned low over Omitome’s neck. "Faster, girl. We’re almost out of time."
Omitome let out a piercing neigh that shattered the silence. The world folded. The valley disappeared, replaced by a landscape of white sand and obsidian towers. They had reached the Fourth Step—the shortcut through the world’s spine. Omitome’s hooves stopped splashing
As they broke into a gallop toward the treeline, the world began to blur. The green of the leaves didn't just pass by; it stretched into long, emerald ribbons. The sound of the rain vanished, replaced by a rhythmic, metallic humming.
The rain didn’t just fall in the Lowlands; it claimed the earth, turning the valley into a silver-grey mirror. For Elara, the sound of the downpour against the stable’s tin roof was the only song she’d known since the Fever took the village. Elara gripped the mane, her knuckles white
They had exactly one hour before the fold snapped back. If they weren't across the third valley by then, they wouldn't just be lost; they would become part of the wind.