jamie
01-31-2021, 07:04 PM
Jamie
There is still much for the shadow thing to learn.
And how magnificent that he should learn in this crushing, impenetrable darkness.
How fortunate that Beyza should have made it so.
It is death he explores now. It is death that draws him to the forest, where the flora has begun to wilt in the darkness. Death on such a massive scale that it makes him tremble just to be near it. His magic feasts on this death, devours it, and emboldens him. Oh, it makes him feel invincible, this shadow thing, for death belongs to him and he belongs to it.
He moves slowly, savoring it. And he stretches his mind, testing his abilities, stretching the fingers of his psyche out into the darkness to see what he might hear, what he might feel.
He feels her sorrow before he hears her. It carves out a home in the cavern of his chest and he follows some invisible thread through the darkness (how easy it is for him to navigate it, he who has always lived in the shadows) until he finds her. She is made of the same things the trees are made of and he understands immediately that she, too, will die. There is nothing mournful about this realization, though, because he does not grieve dead things. He envies them.
He hears her, though she is no longer speaking, like her words are echoing through the forest in waves, raking through the darkness only to return to him. He blinks and struggles to shut off whatever part of his brain is so receptive to these pulsing soundwaves.
He studies her a long moment, discernible from the darkness only by the freakish yellow eyes, before he closes up whatever space remains between them. “Why do you mourn it?” he asks, his peculiar head tilted. “Do you fear death?”
And how magnificent that he should learn in this crushing, impenetrable darkness.
How fortunate that Beyza should have made it so.
It is death he explores now. It is death that draws him to the forest, where the flora has begun to wilt in the darkness. Death on such a massive scale that it makes him tremble just to be near it. His magic feasts on this death, devours it, and emboldens him. Oh, it makes him feel invincible, this shadow thing, for death belongs to him and he belongs to it.
He moves slowly, savoring it. And he stretches his mind, testing his abilities, stretching the fingers of his psyche out into the darkness to see what he might hear, what he might feel.
He feels her sorrow before he hears her. It carves out a home in the cavern of his chest and he follows some invisible thread through the darkness (how easy it is for him to navigate it, he who has always lived in the shadows) until he finds her. She is made of the same things the trees are made of and he understands immediately that she, too, will die. There is nothing mournful about this realization, though, because he does not grieve dead things. He envies them.
He hears her, though she is no longer speaking, like her words are echoing through the forest in waves, raking through the darkness only to return to him. He blinks and struggles to shut off whatever part of his brain is so receptive to these pulsing soundwaves.
He studies her a long moment, discernible from the darkness only by the freakish yellow eyes, before he closes up whatever space remains between them. “Why do you mourn it?” he asks, his peculiar head tilted. “Do you fear death?”
( FROM THE DESTRUCTION, OUT OF THE FLAME
YOU NEED A VILLAIN, GIVE ME A NAME )
YOU NEED A VILLAIN, GIVE ME A NAME )
@[linnea]