“And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry void,
likeness, image of mystery,
felt myself a pure part of the abyss.
I wheeled with the stars.
My heart broke loose on the wind.”
drunk with the great starry void,
likeness, image of mystery,
felt myself a pure part of the abyss.
I wheeled with the stars.
My heart broke loose on the wind.”
The Circle would tell him, them, that the silence is a gift. There is no greater treasure than to hear only hymns in your bones, nothing more valuable in this life or any other than to let go of that which shackles you--and to bind yourself with holier rope.
It is still binding. It is still taking away.
It does not matter, anymore. It has gone the way of most other things: if he feels or has felt anger at all it is no more than a blurred reflection of it, like squinting in the dark. If he is anything at all it is gray shapes caught by the moonlight, obfuscated by all brighter, more beautiful things.
The silence is palpable when he closes his eyes. Jask feels it against his cheeks when he bends his neck to pray. He feels it in streets full of people and he feels it as they circle like vultures, with hungry faces and the gnashing teeth of curiosity.
There is a fight in the square, knives and threats and the glint of hot steel in the still-warm winter sun. Jask shoulders into the crowd, the red of his robes cleaving its way toward the center, red like blood against the pale brown stone of the city, like a fan-tailed fish floating through the reeds.
He looks at her. Straight into the heart of her. He does not see anything that he does not see in himself. And when he follows her away from the crowd he is not sure why.
"It is a pretty dagger." he says, smiling in a way that does nothing but fold the corners of his mouth. It does not touch the rest of his lips. It does not tense his face. It does not reach his eyes. It is not even a smile at all, really.
@teiran yikes this is bad sorry
