The beach is black and naked; no other words depict the stark scene. Not desolate, or abysmal, or abandoned. Naked, in an unexpectedly vulnerable way. Naked in that there is nothing on the shore save for sand; and beneath the tall black cliffs the beach stretches even darker. It is daytime but dark, overcast. The sun never shines on this beach even when it escapes the confines of the winter clouds. Rain falls, sometimes, as you walk; and it buffets the face hard enough to sting, to feel like salt instead of water. Perhaps it is the sand, getting whipped up by the wind, striking you—but no, you know it is the water from the sky and then as you step imploringly closer to the surf you realise it is coming from the sea. The wind is whipping it from the edges of the white, curling surf; it strikes you not only in actuality but in contrast, in the way there is such a clear divide between sea and shore. You don’t understand. You feel as if you are staring at a lover’s quarrel; the man is striking his chest, shaking his head, restraining himself from touching the woman. And the woman stands crossed-armed and turned away, flushed and furious, tears shining diamond-bright in her eyes. Yes. That is the sea and the shore and staring at it you understand some irrevocable damage has been done, some inhumane comment has been made, something irreparable. 

You are consumed by the sensation there is something you not only can do, but must do. And so you begin to move more rapidly toward the line of sea and shore; surf and sand; only to discover there is no crashing sound, nothing save a nearly silent shush shush shush. Although you are running now, slow and leaden, you cannot grow nearer; the sand stretches limitless between you and the sea you try to reach, sickeningly slow. At last you stop and turn back toward the right. Breathing heavily now and thoroughly distressed,  you begin to trot the narrow line you had before, between the towering cliffs and the ocean. The sand shifts underfoot and the wind whips up with more ferocity; underfoot the beach if shifting, exposing more and more sea-smoothed rocks. You begin to notice pieces of white; when you pause to admire them you realise they are shards of bones. Some are small and indiscriminate, fishes and birds. Others are larger and you do not stare at those for as long.

Endlessly, it seems, you walk. You walk long enough you forget where you are walking. In fact, you are at the end of the beach, where it meets the jutting, unforgiving rocks that rise from the sea and become cliffs. You do not know how you got there, or why it happened so suddenly. You do not know why you were walking or why suddenly your feet are in the surf and you are turning to look out at a horizon—

covered in ghosts.

Ghosts of every colour. Atmospheric, they billow with mist, more coloured clouds than bodies. They fill you with ghastly horror and what becomes even more horrific is the metallic paint covering them. It drips into the sea and from their faces; it covers their bodies in arcane, nature-inspired symbols. Silver, and gold, and copper drips into the sea and your stomach churns with something unnamable. They are staring at you, through you and it is only now you realise you are also a ghost carrying chains and dripping metallic paint. It burns, hot and dripping.

They are chestnut clouds, grey and black, a white so brilliant it blinds you; roan, grullo, and more. One is stepping forward and you do not know why she looks different, why she is the only one with spiralling horns and a tiger’s tail; why she wears tiger’s stripes and bold markings uncharacteristic for the rest. She is speaking to you and the words come through disjointed, bewildering. 

“Why—

did you leave?

you were supposed to…

protect—

—they took us all and….

—our Souls?—

what about… our

souls?”

You are reeling. She is stepping out of the sea, dripping water and shapeless, lips drawn back into a ghastly smile with shark’s teeth. You are afraid and begin to press back, against the sea. The other ghostly figures press upon the shore, bringing with them the tide, and you are now chest-deep in the water—

“your name—“

they say it again and again 

“your name—?”

and you say, “Orestes.” 

They begin to laugh. They sound like hyenas. 

"That's the wrong name."

It doesn't make sense as they crowd you.



@Dune

Well. It’s your dream—

and even if you know it, even if the back of your consciousness you turn your head fitfully on your desk and mumble something in your sleep, even if it is only a dream—

when you plunge into the sea

it feels like drowning.

More fire than water; a held breath that almost immediately expires. You inhale water as if it had once been your rite, as if the gesture is as habitual and mundane as taking a breath of fresh mountain air and when you do, you die all over again.

Don’t worry.

You’ve died before—and those memories are in the amorphous horses that follow you down, down, down, 

and even as you dive you are living through a hundred multitudes of lives, lives you have already lead and lived and died in, lives where you were still not enough—

the spirits remind you what the spears felt like lodged in the breastbone (it punctured the lung just enough you drowned slowly in your own blood)

the spirits act out each visceral ending, each carnal and warlike defeat—

the weighted fish nets leaving you to bake in the sun you’d later worship,

the way in one life they cut off your head and brandished it from their battlements 

The laughing follows you and so does that naked blackness, so does the vivid reliving of each of your deaths. You are looking now at the stranger who accompanies you; he takes the shape of another ethereal spectre aside from the light above his brow, luminescent and white, bright enough you can’t stare at it—you want to ask why he is there, some other thing, but don’t, but can’t—

deeper

deeper

deeper

have you ever seen the bottom of the sea?

No. 

Yes.

It seems familiar; but the moon is familiar, too, when you stare at it from 238,900 miles away. 

Your hooves sink into the silt; something slithers out from beneath the billowing cloud and is gone, gone. You glance at your companion, feeling—strangely—as if they should guide you. You are not even certain of their gender; you are not even certain if you know them. Only that they are not usually in this dream, and this is a dream you have had many times.

At the bottom of the sea the spirits do not follow.

“I’m supposed to die again.” you speak it aloud into the water; it comes out in a language you can’t remember how to speak when you are awake, primitive, like whales screaming into the deep.

There is something about the way even this far below the darkness is barren, naked. You begin to walk and each step you take your body takes the form of something else, gone too quickly for you to recognise your own changes. 

You are speaking faintly. “There is an altar here…” Even as you say it you do not know if it is true. The confession emerges vaguely, from the many journeys to the bottom of the sea. Phantom shapes dance in the water near them; bulbous; sharp; billowing; if you look too closely they disappear. 

And you are wandering in the dark, the deep, with a hundred lifetimes in your eyes, and a hundred ways to die—

do you remember,

—and the silt is billowing into intricate shapes—

do you remember when,

you jumped from a cliffside crying for peace

and 

they

Bound

your 

screaming

Soul? 

Perhaps it’s here. And that thought carries you further, directionless; perhaps it’s sunk like your body was meant to when they sentenced you to death, when they bound you in iron and cast you into a storm—

“I’m supposed to die again.” And now your voice is quiet, contemplative. “... just one more time…” 



@Dune