Each man’s attention takes turn resting on the other and then drifting away, so much like butterflies chasing sunlight across the forest floor. Eik is oblivious to it, of course; the way the stranger’s gaze finds out the curl of his cheek, in search of stars or other mysteries. The way he finds nothing there but flesh and scars and shadows.
(Just a man, just a man, just a man and his gloom.)
It seems funny, somehow. Eik and Sirius. Ache and Serious. What a fantastic slapstick team they would make, if they weren’t so solemn and sleepy. Two dreamers in a very solid, very real world. A very small, very private smile drifts across the grey’s expression. The humor comes and goes, too lame to share, and in its place soon follows a feeling of heavy grey.
“No,” the stranger says. “No, stars live not with us.”
In the quiet at the heels of the statement, Eik sighs heavily. A swirl of steam, tiny galaxy of heat, rises like a silent prayer and vanishes into the night. “I think so too.” He didn’t want it to be true, but wanting never moved the world. Not for men like him.
When Sirius begins to walk, Eik does not hesitate. He follows without consideration, side by side with the star-flecked stallion.
“No, I didn’t.” He did not know her, or the name carved into the driftwood next to it, or the name after that. They all haunted him anyway; lost souls will come to rest in the eaves of the broken. Their stories tangled in the vast web of his mind. “Not personally. I know she--” was it too crude, to be speaking these things here and now? He hesitates only a moment. “she drowned. In the tidal wave sent by the gods.” He had not been in Denocte for that, and so he should not feel guilty. And he did not have powers to trump the gods, and so he should not feel guilty. But he guilt ate at him anyway. His magic grabbed at all the grief and sorrow and prayers in the air and it made him walk through them, and he was not strong enough to not feel remorse for all the things out of his control.
Eik hated the weight of memories. When he was gone, he wanted to be forgotten. No grave, no memorial. No candles, flowers, prayers. He did not want to linger in the minds of others, like a ghost. That was not peace.
He turns his thoughts from death (can’t stay there or we’ll drown) to Isra, and Avesta, and Aspara, and only when his leaky heart feels somewhat full again does his attention return to Sirius. The other man had a strange out-of-place-ness, which was coupled with an intense sort of calm. Like he had simply fallen into the middle of all this strange madness and was taking it all in stride. So instead of asking where he came from or who he knew among the dead, Eik wonders out loud: “where are you going?”
we know too much
E I K
of grief's two faces
(Just a man, just a man, just a man and his gloom.)
It seems funny, somehow. Eik and Sirius. Ache and Serious. What a fantastic slapstick team they would make, if they weren’t so solemn and sleepy. Two dreamers in a very solid, very real world. A very small, very private smile drifts across the grey’s expression. The humor comes and goes, too lame to share, and in its place soon follows a feeling of heavy grey.
“No,” the stranger says. “No, stars live not with us.”
In the quiet at the heels of the statement, Eik sighs heavily. A swirl of steam, tiny galaxy of heat, rises like a silent prayer and vanishes into the night. “I think so too.” He didn’t want it to be true, but wanting never moved the world. Not for men like him.
When Sirius begins to walk, Eik does not hesitate. He follows without consideration, side by side with the star-flecked stallion.
“No, I didn’t.” He did not know her, or the name carved into the driftwood next to it, or the name after that. They all haunted him anyway; lost souls will come to rest in the eaves of the broken. Their stories tangled in the vast web of his mind. “Not personally. I know she--” was it too crude, to be speaking these things here and now? He hesitates only a moment. “she drowned. In the tidal wave sent by the gods.” He had not been in Denocte for that, and so he should not feel guilty. And he did not have powers to trump the gods, and so he should not feel guilty. But he guilt ate at him anyway. His magic grabbed at all the grief and sorrow and prayers in the air and it made him walk through them, and he was not strong enough to not feel remorse for all the things out of his control.
Eik hated the weight of memories. When he was gone, he wanted to be forgotten. No grave, no memorial. No candles, flowers, prayers. He did not want to linger in the minds of others, like a ghost. That was not peace.
He turns his thoughts from death (can’t stay there or we’ll drown) to Isra, and Avesta, and Aspara, and only when his leaky heart feels somewhat full again does his attention return to Sirius. The other man had a strange out-of-place-ness, which was coupled with an intense sort of calm. Like he had simply fallen into the middle of all this strange madness and was taking it all in stride. So instead of asking where he came from or who he knew among the dead, Eik wonders out loud: “where are you going?”
we know too much
E I K
of grief's two faces
@Sirius <3
Time makes fools of us all
