Raymond.
and at his feet they'll cast their golden crowns
when the man comes around
Raymond had not properly shared words with the flower maiden since their altercation at the Dusk Court gates nearly two months ago. It was a long time to seethe, a long time to burn, and if he had not been fully consumed with the pursuit of distractions that pointed him away from the still-festering wound at his heart he might have seen fit to appear with more than a perfunctory word once every few weeks.
Regardless, he did not expect the young mare to alight like an eagle before him, wings mantled and eyes ablaze with the intensity of her fury. He backed away a few steps, eyeing her sidelong as one might a wild bison snorting a challenge, debating whether his next move should be stupid or insane because there was no exit to be had.
He didn't want to fight her.
But he had no answer for the rebuke she offered in lieu of a greeting, no clever quip or heavy dose of sensibility to swat down her zealous fervor. More importantly, he had no time.
I did not save Ruth for you to lose hope on her now, Raymond.
The words stung, and he pursed his lips on a defiantly-raised head, tail-tip twitching its uselessness like a metronome until she drew a dagger of her own. Instinctively he squared off into a ready stance, blade arching high, before the dagger made its wicked cut -
- not at him, but at the space between them, opening a bright wound in the fabric of reality as he had seen only in the most unstable parts of the riftlands. This time he leapt away, toward Florentine, his expression an uncertain grimace. The portal bloomed like an ugly flower and writhed in the air before them before stabilizing with a gust of dusty, fetid wind. On the other side a grey waste of an ancient civilization lay across an empty field before them, all crumbled towers and half-standing parapets adorned with poles from which the flags had long, long ago rotted away, leaving the remains to jut like bristling spines over the carcass of a million shattered lives. The sky was yellow with dust, that world's sun a pale ember peering through the gloom. If ever a poet had described purgatory, Raymond was sure that would be it.
The girl was mad.
"You can't do this, Flora! She's gone. Don't kill yourself for a memory."
But as quickly as she had opened the portal, Florentine stepped through. And Raymond, unwilling to let the girl die for nothing, followed after with the taste of bile rising in his throat.
Regardless, he did not expect the young mare to alight like an eagle before him, wings mantled and eyes ablaze with the intensity of her fury. He backed away a few steps, eyeing her sidelong as one might a wild bison snorting a challenge, debating whether his next move should be stupid or insane because there was no exit to be had.
He didn't want to fight her.
But he had no answer for the rebuke she offered in lieu of a greeting, no clever quip or heavy dose of sensibility to swat down her zealous fervor. More importantly, he had no time.
I did not save Ruth for you to lose hope on her now, Raymond.
The words stung, and he pursed his lips on a defiantly-raised head, tail-tip twitching its uselessness like a metronome until she drew a dagger of her own. Instinctively he squared off into a ready stance, blade arching high, before the dagger made its wicked cut -
- not at him, but at the space between them, opening a bright wound in the fabric of reality as he had seen only in the most unstable parts of the riftlands. This time he leapt away, toward Florentine, his expression an uncertain grimace. The portal bloomed like an ugly flower and writhed in the air before them before stabilizing with a gust of dusty, fetid wind. On the other side a grey waste of an ancient civilization lay across an empty field before them, all crumbled towers and half-standing parapets adorned with poles from which the flags had long, long ago rotted away, leaving the remains to jut like bristling spines over the carcass of a million shattered lives. The sky was yellow with dust, that world's sun a pale ember peering through the gloom. If ever a poet had described purgatory, Raymond was sure that would be it.
The girl was mad.
"You can't do this, Flora! She's gone. Don't kill yourself for a memory."
But as quickly as she had opened the portal, Florentine stepped through. And Raymond, unwilling to let the girl die for nothing, followed after with the taste of bile rising in his throat.
@
aut viam inveniam aut faciam
