It did not seem an unusual night.
But he was not himself lately, or rather himself was in a constant state of change, and the details he would have normally paid close attention to passed unnoticed: the vastness of the sky and the hungry pulse of the night air and how the starlight kissed the canyon walls, where they folded into shadow, and looked like a thirsty knife.
The strange thing is that he did not feel the loss of these details which once seemed as essential as air. (How many times have you longed for that wide open sky, the unintelligible caress of the moonlight?) Their absence did not compare at all to the absence of the living. His queen, who was in a hundred ways more than a queen to him, was gone and the world had yet to reorient itself, although really it never would-- he would have to shift his perspective, and with enough time the strange would begin to seem normal.
But he is a stubborn creature, and terribly self-indulgent when it comes to pain, and he does not want a change of perspective. He wants his friend back, his guide, his partner. It does not matter that all the wanting in the world will get him nothing, for grief brings him to a place where there is no logic, just an endless shade of silver-blue. To distract himself he is thinking of Isra and what she's doing now (he figures someone else is falling in love with her, right at this very moment) and feeling torn between relief and agony at the knowledge of how far she is when the sound of steps brings the world back into focus.
The sun has been gone for hours now, and the heat from the canyon walls has long since simmered away into the cool night air. Eik stays still where he is, body coiled in anticipation, and when the stranger rounds the turn their eyes meet like fists.
There is no silence in the world anymore, not for those with ears to listen. The not-silence hangs for a moment, and then it is gone- "Odd time for a stroll." Where the starlight bounces off sandstone and hits his face, it conveys no expression other than fatigue. "The capital's that way." He gestures with a flick of his nose towards the direction the other man came from.
E I K
grief can be a kind of music
that knows how to rise like the sea
But he was not himself lately, or rather himself was in a constant state of change, and the details he would have normally paid close attention to passed unnoticed: the vastness of the sky and the hungry pulse of the night air and how the starlight kissed the canyon walls, where they folded into shadow, and looked like a thirsty knife.
The strange thing is that he did not feel the loss of these details which once seemed as essential as air. (How many times have you longed for that wide open sky, the unintelligible caress of the moonlight?) Their absence did not compare at all to the absence of the living. His queen, who was in a hundred ways more than a queen to him, was gone and the world had yet to reorient itself, although really it never would-- he would have to shift his perspective, and with enough time the strange would begin to seem normal.
But he is a stubborn creature, and terribly self-indulgent when it comes to pain, and he does not want a change of perspective. He wants his friend back, his guide, his partner. It does not matter that all the wanting in the world will get him nothing, for grief brings him to a place where there is no logic, just an endless shade of silver-blue. To distract himself he is thinking of Isra and what she's doing now (he figures someone else is falling in love with her, right at this very moment) and feeling torn between relief and agony at the knowledge of how far she is when the sound of steps brings the world back into focus.
The sun has been gone for hours now, and the heat from the canyon walls has long since simmered away into the cool night air. Eik stays still where he is, body coiled in anticipation, and when the stranger rounds the turn their eyes meet like fists.
There is no silence in the world anymore, not for those with ears to listen. The not-silence hangs for a moment, and then it is gone- "Odd time for a stroll." Where the starlight bounces off sandstone and hits his face, it conveys no expression other than fatigue. "The capital's that way." He gestures with a flick of his nose towards the direction the other man came from.
grief can be a kind of music
that knows how to rise like the sea
@Erasmus <3
Time makes fools of us all
