ANDRAS DEMYAN
who would believe the fantastic
and terrible story of our survival?
who would believe the fantastic
and terrible story of our survival?
The woods are silent. The scattered birds are perched nearby, eyes wide, waiting. Here they are, two sides of the same rotten coin, two stallions and a bag and some seeds in the dirt, and Andras can hear the enging of his heart clunk as its pieces fall into place. Then, the groaning. Then, the bubbling. He does not share Mathias' laughter, does not even avert his gaze, does not move an inch. Mathias' insults land in the pit of Andras and the heat spikes behind his eyes, hot and white.
He is trying to swallow a thing that crawls up his throat from the black pit of his stomach. He is trying to swallow some laughing thing, some raving thing, something that feels better than it should when the painted stallion fixes his single eye on Andras and some echo of danger passes over him. A shiver rolls from between his ears to the base of his tail. It feels too good.
"Well," Andras says with every cell in his body either screaming or laughing, the wild crackling of his hateful heart the loudest thing he's ever heard. His teeth are still clenched, clamped tight, as if the act of breaking his teeth would set him free. They do not break, and he does not feel free. "I rarely have anything useful to say."
The pegasus smiles now, wolfish and unkind.
"But, since you insist," he says, and slides out of the doorway, inching closer, close enough that he's sure Mathias can hear the hum of his black core. It is dizzying, staying alive - staying calm, when you have never known peace. And here is this thing in him, urging him onward, a recollection of purple bruises and the sting of impact and blood, spit in the dirt. Something worse than the anger. "I was mostly wondering who you were. So... who are you?"
He is hoping.
Andras refuses to acknowledge what he's hoping for, and he's not sure he knows, anyway, but there it is.
Hope.
He is trying to swallow a thing that crawls up his throat from the black pit of his stomach. He is trying to swallow some laughing thing, some raving thing, something that feels better than it should when the painted stallion fixes his single eye on Andras and some echo of danger passes over him. A shiver rolls from between his ears to the base of his tail. It feels too good.
"Well," Andras says with every cell in his body either screaming or laughing, the wild crackling of his hateful heart the loudest thing he's ever heard. His teeth are still clenched, clamped tight, as if the act of breaking his teeth would set him free. They do not break, and he does not feel free. "I rarely have anything useful to say."
The pegasus smiles now, wolfish and unkind.
"But, since you insist," he says, and slides out of the doorway, inching closer, close enough that he's sure Mathias can hear the hum of his black core. It is dizzying, staying alive - staying calm, when you have never known peace. And here is this thing in him, urging him onward, a recollection of purple bruises and the sting of impact and blood, spit in the dirt. Something worse than the anger. "I was mostly wondering who you were. So... who are you?"
He is hoping.
Andras refuses to acknowledge what he's hoping for, and he's not sure he knows, anyway, but there it is.
Hope.
@
they made you into a weapon
and told you to find peace.
