04-02-2021, 08:34 PM
Hey all you cool cats and kittens
Amarine's face had jolted some of the mist of the Afterlife away. The white-faced mare had watched her once-ward turn and leave. The Fairies asked for help. She had watched Ama leave, frowning, wondering if her suspicion had been warranted. It wouldn't have been the first time some other spectre came to her with a familiar face, this place is full of more trickery than the Living World had ever held. But Neverwhere is not built for regret, her heart does not hold onto those things, and if the stilled thing in her breast twinges even a little when Ama turns away with promises on her lips, none of it reaches that gnarled, burnt face or the pale ghost-blue eyes.
How much time has passed?
The silver grass shudders, rustling with a breeze that she cannot feel when she turns back to the herd of placid faces around her. She knows a few of them, knows that red spotted mare with the witches' knots in her mane and the bay colt with the crooked blaze leaping tussocks in the field like his leg was never broken. It was simpler, then. It was easier. There were fewer decisions to make and they all led here, in the end, led to these endless, peaceful fields. But she's not the same as she was, the world turned out so much bigger. That old tugging feeling re-ignites, the itch that sets her wandering away from safety, from security, and without a word or even a nod, she leaves these remnants of her old family as easily as she did once upon a time.
Actually, it's even easier, this time.
The landscape shifts suddenly, like a dream, blending abruptly into something else, her hooves loud on the slick, wet rock. She thinks it looks cold, although she doesn't notice it, and then, like water spilling from above, she feels the cold, the damp chill crawling under her coat like thin fingers. But something is missing, some detail lost. Her head feels stuffed full of dry leaves that rattle against the back of her eyes, too dull and dusty to remember what is missing, and the stocky mare shakes her head against the sensation.
Stop.
She swings her attention back the way she came but that sweetly shining place has faded away, only dripping granite and those frigid tentacles hugging tight to her skin. Until she can't breathe. She gasps, but the feeling like suffocation doesn't waver, she coughs, and the compression tightens around her ribs. She coughs and...
She coughs and she knows what's wrong - there's no plume of fog dusting her vision like dragonsmoke. There's no breath like there's no heartbeat. She's already dead. The cold terror Thing that holds her clings more tightly, but can the dead die again? Ever cynical, Neverwhere pauses and calms the beatless heart in her chest. There is nothing terrifying about the cold, she's survived enough winters to know, and the tight press of her lips becomes that trademark frown, one burned ear falling back.
I'm leaving.
It's a thought that booms against the frigid rocks, bouncing soft and inexorable as distant thunder. She can feel her bones, dry, pale, stretched across with piecemeal skin and threads of cream-colored hair. Pale eyes blink and open on nothing, on white. She is blind again. Or perhaps it is only fog. Someone dark passes her, he's soft at the edges, dappled, scentless. He doesn't see her and Neverwhere says nothing. Instead she steps forward; it's just one step, she hasn't even moved, but the fog breaks and there are tears on the other side. Blue eyes full of tears and again Neverwhere thinks she knows this face.
Lilliana.
"What are you doing here?"
Amarine's words fall from her lips before she can snatch them back.
How much time has passed?
The silver grass shudders, rustling with a breeze that she cannot feel when she turns back to the herd of placid faces around her. She knows a few of them, knows that red spotted mare with the witches' knots in her mane and the bay colt with the crooked blaze leaping tussocks in the field like his leg was never broken. It was simpler, then. It was easier. There were fewer decisions to make and they all led here, in the end, led to these endless, peaceful fields. But she's not the same as she was, the world turned out so much bigger. That old tugging feeling re-ignites, the itch that sets her wandering away from safety, from security, and without a word or even a nod, she leaves these remnants of her old family as easily as she did once upon a time.
Actually, it's even easier, this time.
The landscape shifts suddenly, like a dream, blending abruptly into something else, her hooves loud on the slick, wet rock. She thinks it looks cold, although she doesn't notice it, and then, like water spilling from above, she feels the cold, the damp chill crawling under her coat like thin fingers. But something is missing, some detail lost. Her head feels stuffed full of dry leaves that rattle against the back of her eyes, too dull and dusty to remember what is missing, and the stocky mare shakes her head against the sensation.
Stop.
She swings her attention back the way she came but that sweetly shining place has faded away, only dripping granite and those frigid tentacles hugging tight to her skin. Until she can't breathe. She gasps, but the feeling like suffocation doesn't waver, she coughs, and the compression tightens around her ribs. She coughs and...
She coughs and she knows what's wrong - there's no plume of fog dusting her vision like dragonsmoke. There's no breath like there's no heartbeat. She's already dead. The cold terror Thing that holds her clings more tightly, but can the dead die again? Ever cynical, Neverwhere pauses and calms the beatless heart in her chest. There is nothing terrifying about the cold, she's survived enough winters to know, and the tight press of her lips becomes that trademark frown, one burned ear falling back.
I'm leaving.
It's a thought that booms against the frigid rocks, bouncing soft and inexorable as distant thunder. She can feel her bones, dry, pale, stretched across with piecemeal skin and threads of cream-colored hair. Pale eyes blink and open on nothing, on white. She is blind again. Or perhaps it is only fog. Someone dark passes her, he's soft at the edges, dappled, scentless. He doesn't see her and Neverwhere says nothing. Instead she steps forward; it's just one step, she hasn't even moved, but the fog breaks and there are tears on the other side. Blue eyes full of tears and again Neverwhere thinks she knows this face.
Lilliana.
"What are you doing here?"
Amarine's words fall from her lips before she can snatch them back.
That bitch, Neverwhere
@[Lilliana]
