The Kingdom Of Shadows |top| | The Nine Doors To

Before the first door, you forget your name. It is a slab of obsidian set into a hill of skulls, and it opens not with a key but with a silence you must hold in your chest for nine heartbeats.

The eighth door is a child’s drawing pinned to a wall in a house that burned down. You enter by remembering the smell of the crayons. The shadow kingdom begins here, in the nostalgia of things that never lived.

The fourth door is a knot in a rope that hangs from nowhere. You untie it with a promise you know you will break. the nine doors to the kingdom of shadows

The second door is a mirror in a frozen lake. To pass, you must not recognize the thing that looks back.

Behind the third door, the wind speaks in the voice of everyone you have ever wronged. You cannot cover your ears. The hinges are made of breath. Before the first door, you forget your name

Welcome home.

They have been with you all along.

The seventh door has no handle. It opens when you admit that the shadow you are chasing is your own. The wood weeps resin like amber tears.