01-23-2019, 07:19 PM
and lord, I fashion dark gods too;
He almost laughs, when she answers. Another chord of nostalgia rings in his mind. It had been similar, in his first death, though he had let his own flames consume him before Atrocity could do anything.
She would have killed him, though – of that he has no doubt. There had been such livid hated in her eyes.
(It was a look he would become used to, but then, it had been almost strange, to see such hatred from his own child. Now, it’s almost strange not to see it.)
The world around them changes from lair to beach, the air smelling now of salt and decay, familiar and almost sweet. He lets her shape the illusion, gives his magic to support it, but to her to guide. She may not be aware she’s doing it. He does not peek, does not want to know what’s next, wants to be surprised.
(Though he has a good enough idea of how the story ends. It’s how they all end, isn’t it?)
“She must have hated you,” he says, but whether to himself or to her, it’s not quite clear.
He waits, to see if her daughter will materialize, if they will see this through, but instead she turns her back to the waves, which begin to fade.
Not that, then.
He sighs, and he looks at her. Her statement is an attempt at honesty, or maybe just boldness. It’s a line he’s heard before. Sometimes it’s true.
“Being dead is easy,” he says, “it’s the act of dying that’s often so terrible.”
Being dead was one common state. But dying? There were a hundred different ways, a thousand.
The waves are back, and crashing louder – at his command, this time.
“Are you so above basic instincts, Ryatah, that you would feel no fear in death’s coming?”
He steps back, erects an invisible barrier between them. The waves that had once been so distant rush closer, rushing about her ankles, splashing against the barrier as he watches. He’s tightened the barrier around her, too, confining her to a smaller space. Speeding up the job, though it will take long enough – he wants to offer her the opportunity to realize exactly what’s happening.
“Tide’s coming in,” he says, as if he’s an observer on the beach, a passerby, “but it won’t bother you.”
At her knees, now, the water foams and surges.
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