[b]Miriam, Chapter 29: The Owl and the Kitten[/b]

	"Who are you...?" The owl asked her. Naturally the fowl did not speak for it had no vocal chords - It was a bird. But instead it hooted and the sound bounced between the dark walls of the dome shaped building and became the sentences that Miriam heard, the result was an oppressive and unnatural voice which seemed animalistic and strangely regal. The connotations of the bird's original sound still permeated the echo but she had no trouble understanding it. She just had trouble getting a grip! 
	"Please stop that." She murmured, low enough not to cause an echo at all. The owl hooted.
	"Who are you...?" It echoed its own echo now. Miriam had gotten over her original freak-out and wouldn't allow the magical and nonsensical to frighten her any longer, she was magic herself, wasn't she? 
	"I can't believe I'm doing this." She groaned and rolled her head before looking over at the owl who sat perched on its seat, feathers puffed for comfort and amber eyes staring at her with a predator's gaze. Miriam had sat the cage down next to her and sat herself against the rigidly closed door. The room around her was dark still except for the blue light that shone on the pedestal where she had first found the cage. 
	"Why did the door close?" She asked the air. She wasn't going to start talking to the owl just yet. There was a limit to the insanity and she rose her voice so that it could bounce across the walls and form an echo. Which as she had expected replied.
	"...Door close..." Sounded her own voice. "..Close... The Door closed. I closed... The door closed." It was her own voice, distorted to speak the words her captor wanted it to. Miriam frowned and held a balled up fist against her mouth while sighing.
	"Why?" She spoke resoundly, wanting the echo to catch her words.
	"Why... Why...Why, to serve Fate. Of course." Miriam's echo replied. It didn't have emotion in its voice, no more than Miriam's original voice had had but she still found it amusing the way it formed sentences, whatever -it- was. Miriam opened her mouth to speak again but the owl hooted once more. 
	"Hoot!" It echoed. "Hoot... Who... Who are you?"
Miriam felt compelled to reply now, if only to get on some terms with whatever kept the door shut.
	"I'm Miriam." She said. And looked around for the echo that vibrated to reply.
	"Miriam. ... Miriam... Miriam's Marsh... Marsh the Profound... Marsh the Elucidated..." Her echo said.
	"I don't know what that means." Said Miriam once the echo had died down.
	"That means... Means... That means of blood... Means of daughter..." Her echo said. Miriam replied once more before the echo had died off completely. "..Daughter.."
	"Are you going to let me out of here now?" Her voice blended together with the previous echo.
	"Daughter...Now... -er.. Here... Let Daughter out... Dau-..lter.. Walter Here..."
	"Yes. Walter is here. I'm taking this owl." Said Miriam, looking around the room at her spacious conversational partner. 
	"This owl... This owl..." The echo began to falter. "This owl..." Miriam looked around, it didn't seem as if it had anything more to say, or at least with that echo.
	"Hello?!" voiced Miriam. "Hello... Hello... No..."
	"What do you mean no?!" Shouted Miriam at the room. "No...! No...!"
Miriam angrily scrambled to her feet, her Midway coat fluttering about her as she got up. 
	"Screw you. I'm getting out of here." Her voice created an echo but if it was a reply wasn't important, Miriam ignored it and turned toward the shut door. She pushed against it but it would not budge an inch. 
	"Mpfh." Huffed Miriam and blew up at her black hair. She then threw her hand forward in that way she had seen the Black sorcerer do when he used his shadow vines. There wasn't a response. Miriam fluttered her hand about randomly as if imitating a spellcaster then thrust her arms forward. "Magic!" She said loudly and it echoed.
	"Magic... Magic... Magic..."
Nothing happened. Miriam adjusted the sleeves of her coat and then flung her hair back. Looking around the dark room for a moment.
	"I order you to let me out!" She proclaimed and then flicked her eyes about. It was worth a shot.
	"Let me out... Out... Me out... Out of time." Her voice echoed. Miriam groaned and surrendered, instead she looked over toward the owl in its cage. It looked back at her with its round eyes and blinked once. She bent down and picked the cage up. Then the silence of the dome room erupted in a tremor and rumble of stone that had come from the wall. As if something had hit its surface. 
	"What the..." Said Miriam before suddenly the round wall exploded in a showering hailstorm of coloured bricks that clattered with great momentum against the floor. Out of the large plume of dust that came with the destroyed wall was a large figure that flew, no, fell through. The huge figure crashed roughly into the center of the dome and destroyed the pedestal. Miriam clenched the handle of the cage and the owl within fluttered anxiously.
	"What the hell?!" Miriam exclaimed and looked over to where the wall had busted. The dust shot into itself and shaped into a singular, collected sphere of dust and plaster and there was a whirring sound of air before the large sphere suddenly shuddered and flew forward, exploding once it hit the large figure that had previously flown through the wall. Miriam smartly made some distance, still carrying the cage with the owl while looking back at the large hole in the wall. She wasn't going to try to flee until she knew it wasn't going to explode again. There was a screech and Miriam looked back toward the center, skidding to a halt. The head of a humongous bird peeped up from the cascading dust that filled the air, its beak long and pointy and its colour brown with white spots around its eyes that ran in a long stripe around the dome of its large head, almost like a circlet or a crown. The owl stretched its wings out toward its sides and Miriam noticed it had not two, but four wings. A second smaller pair that sat just beneath the regular set of wings. Due to the size of the fowl the wingspan covered almost the entire building. The bird screeched again and moved its bendable neck in recoil as a flurry of the ruined bricks were being flung toward its head. It then threw its four wings back together again and Miriam immediately lost her footing, the air pulled out from under her. She was dragged a few feet with the sheer power of the draft but could scramble up. Her owl hooted violently and shook about in its cage that was rolling speedily in motion with the wind. Miriam quickly got up and grabbed the handle, she glanced toward the monster owl who was now pointing its craning head forward, beak opened in screeching protest. Miriam ran toward the exit, it would be her best bet! And there in the still settling dust she noticed the Wizard, who when noticing Miriam stopped his hand motions and in the blink of an eye appeared out of thin air just by her.
	"Miriam!" He said loudly above the screeching of the monstrous owl.
Miriam was a bit baffled to say the least and flicked her eyes from the wizard to the owl.
	"Y-yeah?!" She stuttered nervously. Walter saw the cage she held.
	"Get out of here! And whatever you do don't let that out of its cage!" He ushered her away and she felt more than compelled to obey. Running toward the large hole in the wall. Walter had turned back to face the gigantic bird and seemed to be flinging some spell against it, Miriam didn't pay much attention and ran straight for the exit instead! She rushed through the dust and ruined bricks and exited onto the square from where they had first come. She turned but couldn't see anything but dust inside, still making some distance. There was a sudden gust of air that exited the hole and then she spotted a large pair of amber eyes that glared into her directly. Miriam blinked and the owl in its cage purred a growl. The monstrous owl immediately shot out of the building and in one motion tapped its talons against the ground in prancing, spreading two of its four wings wide. Feathers flew about it and the creature was badly scruffed from being thrown into buildings like it had but it did not lack in speed. With no time for a reaction Miriam found herself squeezed into the grip of a talon and she lost her breath. Suddenly she felt the pressure of gravity and draft of air as a deafening woosh sounded from four giant wings being fluttered at once. Miriam clenched her eyes and her grip of the cage and felt her heart drop into her stomach as the sudden rush of elevation sprung against her. When she opened her eyes again she could see the dome building below, and the rest of the ruined city. Miriam gasped and moved for something to hold onto but found herself entirely locked in the talons of the large bird, oppressed by its grip but safely kept within. Her own owl hooted wildly and thrashed about the cage in displeasure. Miriam looked up and saw the brown feathers that were her sky now. The bird soared deftly in the black sky, occasionally using its smaller set of wings to keep it adrift. It screeched, some of its body bruised and hurt from the beating. Miriam gulped down heavily and clung to the iron cell of her fellow captive. Looking down at the sprawling ruins beneath her that were quickly becoming blurred. She would have screamed for Walter but the distance was already so large and the wind deafened all of her protests.
	"Well. Shit." Said the prey.