HEAR WHAT IT SPOKE
UNDERNEATH
Eik thinks the ringing of the bell is just another private sound that echoes in his mind (bells chiming, doors creaking open and slamming shut, whispers) until the Solterrans slowly fill the streets, trudging toward a destination that to him is at once known-- the source of the ringing-- and unknown-- what lies there?
He stands unmoving, a lone dusty rock in a river of flesh, and eventually he is not alone. There is another, moving upstream. They stand-- she with shining eyes and he with the opposite, eyes so dark that no light escapes-- until the river runs past and only the two of them remain.
When he gently reaches out to read her mind, invasion being almost second nature at this point, well... the true experience cannot be adequately depicted, for it involves senses foreign to all but Eik... but...
it could be most succinctly described as taking a plunge into caustic darkness. Once the shock of it passes, you hear snippets of thought which echo with a sense of great distance, as though the sound traveled through water. All the while you realize the dark water is not water but a sea of writhing black snakes, and there is no light at all except-- when he withdraws he is staring into those lighthouse eyes and for all their brightness they only make him think of the absence of light.
His ears are lowered, his nostrils flared. The feeling of dipping into her mind is painful even after withdrawing, the way acid on the skin will eat its way through to flesh, to bone. He paws at the stone street, not understanding the one word he heard chanted in that writhing darkness like a prayer.
"What is Eshek?"
His voice would echo in her head as a sound with no discernible source. She would know, of course, who the message was from. He knows it would be prudent to leave-- prudent to run. Still, he stands there grinding his teeth and still, the bell tolls.
@Eshek
Time makes fools of us all
