T E N E B R A E
On my body, the grace of shadows
and in my heart: all Hells
and in my heart: all Hells
This is not the first time he has come to the edge of the world where the sea reaches out into nothingness.
But it is the first time since she asked him to find her, if he wants to.
He doesn’t.
And yet he does.
He comes because of her, not for her. Tenebrae steps out, up to the edge of the cliff and gazes down, down to where the ocean crashes into the earth.
Tenebrae is stark against the pastel sky, all light sinks into him. The Disciple draws all to him like he has swallowed a star, leaving only the black hole behind. The world trembles around him, it trembles for him. At his back Veneror looms like the cross from which he will run.
She has become his punishment and yet, he fears she might taste like his salvation. Ah, treacherous thoughts breed as vipers within him. They bite as his soul where it lies cradled in religion, gilded with holiness.
Yet what part of him will she leave holy? His prayers no longer feel earnest, he feels the ache in his knees now where once he felt nothing as he prayed to Caligo within her temple.
Whom is he to worship if not Caligo? Before him the ocean is too much like an altar. He turns, away from the water and the girl who commands it, who fills up every part of him that Caligo relinquishes. He wishes the goddess would not lose so easily. He dares not think that it might be he that prizes Caligo’s grip free from all the places that she holds him.
A woman turns from where she watches the sea. The wind carries the taste of salt from her skin. It drowns him. Air is not enough, not any more. Tenebrae follows her as her thin, sea-film fins catch the light and glimmer, sunlight across waves. She is the tide coming in, the monk little more than flotsam in her flow. He follows, closer, closer, until, until…
Boudika rises from the sea. All in him turns to darkness and conflict. He stops approaching the girl with her trident of sea-green horns. The monk inhales and all of his breath is filled with the wildness of sea-salt. The kelpie licks her lips - how many times had he seen such a gesture? How many times had he seen blood upon her lips: his, a seal’s, her own…? The monk stops, a swallowing darkness stood sentinel above the beach. Boudika and the girl come closer. They are creatures of the sea and should be so far from him, a man who should concern himself with gods and the celestial bodies of the sky… But all he watches is the ocean. He is Icarus, his wings are melted and the sea is rising, rising to meet him with every passing moment.
He feels Boudika’s teeth about his throat, over her scar where the is skin is puckered and twisted and tight. His body is hers, his soul Caligo’s and Tenebrae stops, torn. Boudika smiles at the woman, the girl who watched the sea as if a part of her is lost there. He thinks he might know how that feels.
The kelpie speaks and it is ocean song: salt and pearls, sea-spray and coral. They are innocent words that fall from her tongue, past her too-sharp teeth. His own teeth grit and his shadows billow like a gathering storm.
He turns, back to his goddess, back toward Veneror where his piety waits and his brothers who do not stray like he. He has not come for Boudika, he has not.
He has not.
@Boudika @
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