IN A YELLOW SEA
“I’m sorry.”
Dune had not realized he trusted the other man until trust was gone. The spear lowered, aimed at his neck. There followed a deep sense of betrayal, and immediately afterward a self-loathing for being so stupid. The obelisk, the tree, the vulture-- was it all a deception on the dreamer’s part, consciously or not, so that Dune’s sense of danger would be misplaced?
“I have to,” he said. I have to.
Dune pictures the other man asleep somewhere on a feather bed, surrounded by books brushed with gold, scented candles, fresh flowers. All that opulence, and in his dreams he couldn’t help but to guide his spear to a stranger’s throat and push.
The third and final thing he felt was anger.
His ears are flattened, his teeth exposed in a snarl. A low growl rises from deep, deep within the bay. “I pity you, king,” he spits. Dune would live and die in poverty, always hungering for more-- always hungering-- and it was terrible, and it was suffering, but he would never willingly change places with Ipomoea. Those born to privilege festered on their bounty; they grew so soulsick they spent each nights wallowing in fucked up dreamscapes like this.
He doesn’t pause to wonder “maybe this man is different. Maybe he was not born to this. Maybe he deserves a second chance, like everyone else--” Because he is angry, and anger does not want to leave room for anything else. It spreads like fire and in response magic trembles in Dune, all quivering silk. It wants to rage through the fabric of this world. It wants to bring the sky down, smother them both in creamy blue.
Alas, all his magic can do is run back and forth along the walls of Dune’s body. Spines emerge from the stallion’s back with a rip of flesh. His teeth grow long and sharp, the dagger at his side long forgotten. Dark, leathery wings erupt from his shoulders and unfold in the harsh sunlight, dripping red blood in the sand.
Dune knows this doesn’t matter. He knows this isn’t real, that death in this place will just bring him back to the body, gasping and greedy for air. When he speaks again, smoke trails from his nostrils. “Do what you must.” He steps forward and leans into the spear until blood is drawn, a promise clear in his dark gaze:
It won't change anything.
@Ipomoea o_o,
(you're welcome to kill/maim and/or powerplay dune. anything goes!)
