August does a good job of swallowing back the sense of foreboding that threatens him when he looks down from a hilltop at the dark-tassled corn. He is helped in this by the glasses of richly golden dandelion wine he enjoyed back in the city; likely he oughtn’t be drinking at all, not with business later on, but it felt decidedly un-Denoctian not to. When he makes his way down to the entrance, where revelers are knotted together in groups small and large, neither does he turn down the cinnamon-spiced shot of bourbon he’s offered. It’s with that small fire still burning down his throat into his belly that he steps between the twin pumpkin-headed scarecrows marking the entrance, and the wide and wind-blown prairie vanishes from view.
Maybe more than anything else, it’s a sense of morbid curiosity that’s led him out here. After all, it was another Sideralis maze where Raum kidnapped Queen Isra and tore out Acton’s throat; some part of him wonders if this was the same ground watered by the man’s blood. Of course that would be the height of poor taste, but with the shadows the color of deep bruises and the corn’s long leaves scraping against one another the thought lingers like a scent.
But August’s guard doesn’t stay up for long. Lamplight spills across the path every few yards, and the sound of laughter carries better than the wind does through the rows and rows of stalks. Once, he finds a grinning old mare in one large dead-end handing out candied apples and cups of cider; a few twists down the path he is momentarily caught in a flock of weanlings wavering between terror and delight (of course, at that age they mingled well together).
Soon after he parts their company he finds himself at a crossroads. Both paths curve away into darkness; the stars are just blooming overhead. August goes left, and hopes it leads him to an exit; his buzz is quickly fading and hunger beginning to take its place. At least, he figures, if it came to it he could just eat his way out of the maze.
That’s when he comes across the stranger. When the stallion jumps, August startles back, with a laugh just as quick to follow; he sweeps his gaze across the striking young man with a grin. “I’ve been told on occasion I am something else,” he says, but adds nothing else when he notes how intently the stranger is listening. To humor him, the golden stallion twists an ear, holding his breath for the space of a couple heartbeats. “No,” he admits, and almost goes on to say that it is probably only the group of children, hot on his heels -
But then he does hear it, and it is not children, or unicorns, or anything else he’s passed. There is a thump, and a rough slither, like something heavy being dragged. His silver-eyed gaze meets one of bright blue. “Oh, that?” August’s tone belies the way his hairs prickle along his neck, the way the scrape and sigh of the leaves is suddenly enough to make him tense. He thinks again of the youths: terror and delight.
“Shall we try and find it?” he asks, all cavalier. The sound comes again, closer, and all at once it seems absurd that no matter where he turns, his back is to a shadow-thick wall of corn. His grin feels to him like it is flickering like the lanterns. “Or we could wait, and see if it does the work for us.”
Maybe more than anything else, it’s a sense of morbid curiosity that’s led him out here. After all, it was another Sideralis maze where Raum kidnapped Queen Isra and tore out Acton’s throat; some part of him wonders if this was the same ground watered by the man’s blood. Of course that would be the height of poor taste, but with the shadows the color of deep bruises and the corn’s long leaves scraping against one another the thought lingers like a scent.
But August’s guard doesn’t stay up for long. Lamplight spills across the path every few yards, and the sound of laughter carries better than the wind does through the rows and rows of stalks. Once, he finds a grinning old mare in one large dead-end handing out candied apples and cups of cider; a few twists down the path he is momentarily caught in a flock of weanlings wavering between terror and delight (of course, at that age they mingled well together).
Soon after he parts their company he finds himself at a crossroads. Both paths curve away into darkness; the stars are just blooming overhead. August goes left, and hopes it leads him to an exit; his buzz is quickly fading and hunger beginning to take its place. At least, he figures, if it came to it he could just eat his way out of the maze.
That’s when he comes across the stranger. When the stallion jumps, August startles back, with a laugh just as quick to follow; he sweeps his gaze across the striking young man with a grin. “I’ve been told on occasion I am something else,” he says, but adds nothing else when he notes how intently the stranger is listening. To humor him, the golden stallion twists an ear, holding his breath for the space of a couple heartbeats. “No,” he admits, and almost goes on to say that it is probably only the group of children, hot on his heels -
But then he does hear it, and it is not children, or unicorns, or anything else he’s passed. There is a thump, and a rough slither, like something heavy being dragged. His silver-eyed gaze meets one of bright blue. “Oh, that?” August’s tone belies the way his hairs prickle along his neck, the way the scrape and sigh of the leaves is suddenly enough to make him tense. He thinks again of the youths: terror and delight.
“Shall we try and find it?” he asks, all cavalier. The sound comes again, closer, and all at once it seems absurd that no matter where he turns, his back is to a shadow-thick wall of corn. His grin feels to him like it is flickering like the lanterns. “Or we could wait, and see if it does the work for us.”
August - -
there's a lover in the story
but the story's still the same
but the story's still the same
