07-30-2021, 05:27 PM
GRAVITAS
He is tired, Gravitas.
Tired when the goddess’s wrath finds him standing there on the beach, sides heaving as he stares, dead-eyed, at the monstrous crab.
Still, his lungs burn and his knees tremble from the effort of fighting for his life and he understands, somehow, that he will be made to fight for his life a second time.
(I am too tired, he wants to tell her, I cannot possibly.
Please simply kill me. Take my life to pay my dues.
And if you want to show me mercy, please tell my sisters that I tried but it was not enough.)
But this goddess is a fair goddess, is she not? Because before she spirits him away from the beach and into the belly of some other dangerous thing, she restores him. The exhaustion is drained from his body, his breath is returned, and he feels as if he has been born anew. He blinks and he is alive again. Not only alive, but humming with life. Though the diamonds are gone and he is only a horse. Only a horse.
Perhaps, though, he can survive death a second time.
He is not a fool, Gravitas. He knows that a horse is no match for a lion. But he’d found a way to defeat the crab, had he not? The lion stalks him from the opposite end of the pit, teeth bared. The noise it makes is supernatural, something he feels in the marrow of his bones rather than something he hears. It chases tremors down the length of his spine, hitches his breath.
He has to think fast.
He glances around the pit.
Trees standing in a cluster in the center of the pit, thick, woody vines draped between them. Boulders scattered across the mostly barren landscape. Patches of scrub gras.
He will have to strike with everything he has, he knows that, and hope that he catches the lion with enough of a blow that he breaks something. But even that will likely only slow it down, he thinks. But there’s no time to think. No time at all.
His pulse thunders wildly in his ears and he is an easy target, standing there in the center of the pit while a predator circles. And then pounces, teeth and claws bared. He spins on his forelegs and kicks out with bone hindlegs and… nothing happens. His hind feet collide with the underside of the lion’s belly but do not break the skin. The collision reverberates up into his own hips, jars his own teeth, and he lurches away as quickly as he can. It does not so much as slow the lion down and panic surges through him as he springs away from the large cat with every ounce of speed he can summon.
It becomes a foolish, breakneck game of chase as he tears around the perimeter of the pit, praying that he doesn’t break a leg as he tries desperately to formulate a new plan.
This is no ordinary lion. He will not be able to defeat the beast through brute strength alone. His stomach twists with the memory of how he had surrendered to the crab and he considers, briefly, doing that here.
Will the goddess tell his sisters that he’d tried even if he died a coward’s death?
It’s on his second circuit (and the cat is gaining on him quickly) that he catches sight of them again: the vines. He does not have a lot of time to wonder if this will work or not because he can almost feel the cat’s claws skimming past his heels as they run. He ducks sharply toward the center of the pit where the copse of trees stands, flinging back his head as he passes beneath a vine, catching one between his teeth and holding it hard and fast as he continues to run with everything he has. Mercifully, it wrenches free from the tree on one end and is pliable enough to resemble a rope and his heart leaps in his chest as he turns sharply on his hindlegs, effectively clotheslining the lion with the vine.
The lion stops short, letting out a deafening roar as Gravitas leaps over its great back to wrap the vine around its thick neck. The lion struggles valiantly, but Gravitas turns to face the beast, pulling hard on the vine with his teeth. The other end of the vine has not pulled loose from the tree and he uses the leverage to tighten the pressure on the beast’s neck. It writhes and twists and Gravitas uses its moment of distraction to rear up and strike out, to knock it off its feet and onto its side. He continues to strike at its head and pull at the end of the vine still held securely between his teeth as the lion fights for both air and freedom.
And he does not go still until the lion goes still.
He does not stop fighting until he has slain the beast.
Tired when the goddess’s wrath finds him standing there on the beach, sides heaving as he stares, dead-eyed, at the monstrous crab.
Still, his lungs burn and his knees tremble from the effort of fighting for his life and he understands, somehow, that he will be made to fight for his life a second time.
(I am too tired, he wants to tell her, I cannot possibly.
Please simply kill me. Take my life to pay my dues.
And if you want to show me mercy, please tell my sisters that I tried but it was not enough.)
But this goddess is a fair goddess, is she not? Because before she spirits him away from the beach and into the belly of some other dangerous thing, she restores him. The exhaustion is drained from his body, his breath is returned, and he feels as if he has been born anew. He blinks and he is alive again. Not only alive, but humming with life. Though the diamonds are gone and he is only a horse. Only a horse.
Perhaps, though, he can survive death a second time.
He is not a fool, Gravitas. He knows that a horse is no match for a lion. But he’d found a way to defeat the crab, had he not? The lion stalks him from the opposite end of the pit, teeth bared. The noise it makes is supernatural, something he feels in the marrow of his bones rather than something he hears. It chases tremors down the length of his spine, hitches his breath.
He has to think fast.
He glances around the pit.
Trees standing in a cluster in the center of the pit, thick, woody vines draped between them. Boulders scattered across the mostly barren landscape. Patches of scrub gras.
He will have to strike with everything he has, he knows that, and hope that he catches the lion with enough of a blow that he breaks something. But even that will likely only slow it down, he thinks. But there’s no time to think. No time at all.
His pulse thunders wildly in his ears and he is an easy target, standing there in the center of the pit while a predator circles. And then pounces, teeth and claws bared. He spins on his forelegs and kicks out with bone hindlegs and… nothing happens. His hind feet collide with the underside of the lion’s belly but do not break the skin. The collision reverberates up into his own hips, jars his own teeth, and he lurches away as quickly as he can. It does not so much as slow the lion down and panic surges through him as he springs away from the large cat with every ounce of speed he can summon.
It becomes a foolish, breakneck game of chase as he tears around the perimeter of the pit, praying that he doesn’t break a leg as he tries desperately to formulate a new plan.
This is no ordinary lion. He will not be able to defeat the beast through brute strength alone. His stomach twists with the memory of how he had surrendered to the crab and he considers, briefly, doing that here.
Will the goddess tell his sisters that he’d tried even if he died a coward’s death?
It’s on his second circuit (and the cat is gaining on him quickly) that he catches sight of them again: the vines. He does not have a lot of time to wonder if this will work or not because he can almost feel the cat’s claws skimming past his heels as they run. He ducks sharply toward the center of the pit where the copse of trees stands, flinging back his head as he passes beneath a vine, catching one between his teeth and holding it hard and fast as he continues to run with everything he has. Mercifully, it wrenches free from the tree on one end and is pliable enough to resemble a rope and his heart leaps in his chest as he turns sharply on his hindlegs, effectively clotheslining the lion with the vine.
The lion stops short, letting out a deafening roar as Gravitas leaps over its great back to wrap the vine around its thick neck. The lion struggles valiantly, but Gravitas turns to face the beast, pulling hard on the vine with his teeth. The other end of the vine has not pulled loose from the tree and he uses the leverage to tighten the pressure on the beast’s neck. It writhes and twists and Gravitas uses its moment of distraction to rear up and strike out, to knock it off its feet and onto its side. He continues to strike at its head and pull at the end of the vine still held securely between his teeth as the lion fights for both air and freedom.
And he does not go still until the lion goes still.
He does not stop fighting until he has slain the beast.
