"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
He has grown numb to it, the stench of death.
It has so fully infiltrated his senses that it has gone from something worth noticing to simply the way the world smells. For how many times could he punish himself for all the things he could not change before he grew numb to that, too?
He had not been able to save Mazikeen. He had not been able to save his mother. And now there have been so many countless others that perhaps he cannot make each of them as important as the last.
Which is all to say that he is tired, Selaphiel.
He is tired of the grief of it. The split-bone agony of knowing and never knowing.
See how it has taken its toll. See how there had once been hope in those eyes, see how it’s gone dark. He had been so alive with fear once that he couldn’t sit still with it. It had sent him to pacing, sticking to the shadows where perhaps they wouldn’t find him. Perhaps they wouldn’t send him away.
And he sticks to the shadows now, too, for the same reasons. Perhaps they won’t find him. Perhaps he won’t have to pretend. Perhaps he won’t have to dig up whatever energy he has left for a smile, a conversation, prolonged eye contact.
He has always been a solitary creature, Selaphiel, but this is a specific kind of estrangement. He has not seen his mother since he’d apologized for not being the one to protect her. He has seen Mazikeen’s daughter–his niece–more recently than he’s seen her. He hasn’t seen Este since before he’s seen any of the others.
Could he bear to look any of them in the face now?
Probably not.
So he loiters where perhaps they won’t find him. He lingers in the Ruins, as he has for years. Because it smells so strongly of death here that he has convinced himself that this is simply the reality of the world.
It had taken Israfel so long to get out of the shadows. She had receded into herself so naturally, being invisible felt like the safest place she could possibly be. The only place that truly suited her. Half watching the lives happen around her, half so closed up within herself she didn’t even notice when the seasons changed into the next.
She can no longer remember what had been the first spark, the one that had come from inside of her and not from anyone else holding a flame. The one that finally caught onto something and made her want change. It had simply happened, and she had returned to where she had been years ago as a small filly. Practicing emerging from the shadows, practicing being seen.
In a world of colourful beings, being so gold in the sunlight made her feel too loud even without saying a word.
It frightens and thrills her all at once and she thinks that means she is finally living, so she keeps doing it.
Keeps travelling and seeing the corners of Beqanna she never dreamed about because first the forest held her captive and then it was the cliffs and moors. And now when she wanders through the strange stone features of this place and sees a haloed stranger, she approaches and it feels like the wildest thing she has ever done – so much so that her heart is racing just from this. From a “Hello.” and a softly whispered question, eager to invite conversation. “Do you know what these stones were?”
He sees her from afar.
It is impossible not to.
Even though the clouds above hang low, she still shines.
He’s never seen anything like her and perhaps he thinks to approach but thinks better of it. Because his is a life of solitude now. Because he had tried so desperately to be someone who meant something to others and it had become unbearable. He is better off alone, he thinks. Has thought for a long time now.
And, though he is intrigued, he turns away. And it is quiet for several moments while he goes on pretending that the stench of Death no longer turns his stomach. It is so potent that he does not smell it on her when she approaches. (And it’s there, of course, though he could not know that it exists only in tendrils, in wisps of her mother’s countless deaths.)
It is her footfalls that give her away first and then her voice, quiet. He turns, blinking his surprise. She is even brighter up close. Instinctively, he takes a step backward, away from her. Not because she is standing too close, but because old habits, he’s found, are nearly impossible to break.
“Oh,” he exhales, just as quiet. He casts a glance around at the wreckage cast across the landscape around them and shakes his head. “No. I’ve often wondered, but I’ve never come close to an answer.”
A young Selaphiel might have cringed with this failure. How viciously guilt would have festered in his gut! But he has resigned himself to this, too.
He could offer his name, he thinks. In fact, he knows he should offer his name. But he doesn’t, just goes on surveying the landscape. Like perhaps she will spare them both his inevitable failure at this, too.
He steps back from her and Israfel doesn't assume it is her — she has never once considered she could have any sort of effect on someone, positive or negative — but she thinks she recognizes the instinct. Perhaps she had just been a touch too close to what was comfortable. She's watched so many other conversations take place and there is such a variety in the spacing of the couples and groups it was not something she could learn from sight alone.
She does what she would find comforting if someone had come a little too close to her without her being ready for it. She doesn't move or remark upon it, allowing him to decide what works. She just lets there be a slightly wider gap between her and the angel and remains where she is with a confidence that is all shallow (though she hopes it is convincing! She loves the idea of coming across as someone who knows the meaning of being sure).
A mare with a little more practice being social may pick up on the cues and continue on her way without further conversation. Israfel, however, smiles softly before joining him in surveying the landscape around them. "I don't know what they are either." Her gentle voice is confiding, as though the fact that they both do not know this one thing has sealed them together in a pact. While it would've been nice to hear someone explain it to her, his answer suits her just as well.
Nerves continue to skitter through her veins, at once terrified and thrilled that she is attempting casual conversation with a stranger. None of her prepared thoughts come to her so she says the truth of what is fumbling around in her brain. "I thought they were giant eggs at first, but the idea of someone's eggs turning to stone feels too sad."
It is such a silly thought and Israfel has no idea until it is out there in the world. Her golden eyes widen a little in surprise that she just vocalized something without filtering it through her anxieties first to sanitize it for consumption of a youthfulness she wasn't aware she ever had. It scares the hell out of her to do so but she looks at him, wondering what he thinks of giant birds and their stone eggs.
Perhaps it is cruel to think that she might simply leave if he does not look at her. It is almost certainly dismissive, cold. But he is tired, Selaphiel. For years he had tried to hide the grief that consumed him, ravaged him, left him brittle and weak.
And then…
Something in him had changed when Firion became the hero they all needed. Their mother, Mazikeen. And no doubt there were others. It had occurred to Selaphiel then that he had never come close to being what any of them had needed and had, in fact, been little more than a burden.
That, you see, is why he had taken to the Ruins, this place of forgotten things. This is his punishment. Which is all to say that it is almost certainly cruel for him to hope that she might leave him to his self-pity if he does not look her in the face long enough. But she speaks again and he feels the strangest thing.
A mix of dread and relief.
Dread because he does not have the energy to force himself into a more pleasant shape. Relief because she has chosen to stay and there is something so sweet in that.
The mention of eggs coaxes out the softest of smiles, barely there at all. More apparition than anything measurable when he turns his head to look at her again. “Eggs?” he echoes. There is nothing mocking in his tone, just a kind of curiosity as he studies her golden face. That hadn’t occurred to him, but he thinks it is quite sad.
“My name is Selaphiel,” he murmurs eventually. Because if she is not going to leave then he may as well keep her.
