I CAN'T TELL IF IT'S WORSE TO WALK THROUGH
a forest with a path or without (a path). / damage done and damage made. / can I be gentle? / I mean / can I be gentle☼
The realization is closer than anything to hell.
It is winter and it is dark. The night is not clouded; in fact, it is almost perfectly clear, and the moon is round and full in the middle of the sky, half-way through her nightly arc across the cosmos. The grass in the plain, which normally rises flaxen-gold to her stomach, is dead and flat. (She is trying not to think of her stomach.) The corpses of each blade crunch beneath her hooves, mingled with a fine coat of frost, as she walks the crest of a gentle hillside. Her magic is absent. When it stirs, she feels other things inside of her stir with it, and, and-
Her thoughts have been a cacophony of no no no for – she can’t put a name to the amount of time. It doesn’t mean anything to her, anymore, but she wishes that it did. Seraphina does not like to admit to it, but there have been many moments in her life when she has thought to herself, I cannot do it. She has never felt any of them so deeply, so sharply, as she does the one that she is standing in.
She did not think that she would live past a year. (In many ways, she was right.) She did not think that she could serve as a proper Emissary. (She was right.) She did not think that she would make a good queen, though she wanted to be one. (She was right.) She did not think that she would be able to defeat Raum. (She was right.) And oh, Seraphina did not want this. She would not have chosen this. When her gaze strays to the soft, silver swell of her sides, barely noticeable now (but not for long, she suspects), she knows that she would not have chosen this.
And: when she thinks I cannot do this this time, her worst fear is that she will be proven right all over again.
She stops beneath a gnarled and barren tree. Any refuge that she finds beneath its empty branches is pointless; it is either dead or sleeping, and probably dead, and the black arc of branches and thin trunk provide no shelter from the elements, or from the bite of winter cold. She barely feels it, though. She isn’t cold. She knows that she should be, that she always is, but she isn’t.
Seraphina doesn’t want to go home. She wants to be anywhere else. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go – so now she is here, in a place that she has scarcely ever visited, hoping to find some semblance of reassurance (or a distraction, at least) in the utter insignificance in the winter-crushed landscape.
Ereshkigal, her black form like a cloaked reaper in the branches above, whispers between her ears in a voice that is the upward curve of a sneer. “What are you going to name them?”
When she whispers a response, she speaks it aloud; her voice quakes, and then falters entirely. “Them?”
Ereshkigal smiles. In the sheen of pale light, the arc of her teeth puts her in mind of a crescent moon. “There are two.” She knows, of course. She would - the demon, the soul-collector, the judge. Somehow, Seraphina does not want her to look at her. Somehow, she does not want her to look at them.
She feels that her legs might give out beneath her weight, but, instead, they lock beneath her, going stiff and straight as oak. (They are quivering, and not from the cold.) Not one, but two. Of course. Of course - she cannot even bear the thought of one, but there are two. Seraphina feels like she could sob. She feels like she could weep, and she could collapse, and she could crumble. She longs for it, even.
She does not cry. She does not weep. No wordless sobs pass her mouth, or bubble in her throat; not even a silent tear tracks the charcoal curve of her cheekbone. The only thing that escapes her lips is a ghost-white exhalation, the pale heat of her breath against a vast and nebulous winter sky.
@ absolutely anyone || still working on figuring her out like this; bear with me || lily wang, "prayer"
Sera || Eresh
a forest with a path or without (a path). / damage done and damage made. / can I be gentle? / I mean / can I be gentle☼
The realization is closer than anything to hell.
It is winter and it is dark. The night is not clouded; in fact, it is almost perfectly clear, and the moon is round and full in the middle of the sky, half-way through her nightly arc across the cosmos. The grass in the plain, which normally rises flaxen-gold to her stomach, is dead and flat. (She is trying not to think of her stomach.) The corpses of each blade crunch beneath her hooves, mingled with a fine coat of frost, as she walks the crest of a gentle hillside. Her magic is absent. When it stirs, she feels other things inside of her stir with it, and, and-
Her thoughts have been a cacophony of no no no for – she can’t put a name to the amount of time. It doesn’t mean anything to her, anymore, but she wishes that it did. Seraphina does not like to admit to it, but there have been many moments in her life when she has thought to herself, I cannot do it. She has never felt any of them so deeply, so sharply, as she does the one that she is standing in.
She did not think that she would live past a year. (In many ways, she was right.) She did not think that she could serve as a proper Emissary. (She was right.) She did not think that she would make a good queen, though she wanted to be one. (She was right.) She did not think that she would be able to defeat Raum. (She was right.) And oh, Seraphina did not want this. She would not have chosen this. When her gaze strays to the soft, silver swell of her sides, barely noticeable now (but not for long, she suspects), she knows that she would not have chosen this.
And: when she thinks I cannot do this this time, her worst fear is that she will be proven right all over again.
She stops beneath a gnarled and barren tree. Any refuge that she finds beneath its empty branches is pointless; it is either dead or sleeping, and probably dead, and the black arc of branches and thin trunk provide no shelter from the elements, or from the bite of winter cold. She barely feels it, though. She isn’t cold. She knows that she should be, that she always is, but she isn’t.
Seraphina doesn’t want to go home. She wants to be anywhere else. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go – so now she is here, in a place that she has scarcely ever visited, hoping to find some semblance of reassurance (or a distraction, at least) in the utter insignificance in the winter-crushed landscape.
Ereshkigal, her black form like a cloaked reaper in the branches above, whispers between her ears in a voice that is the upward curve of a sneer. “What are you going to name them?”
When she whispers a response, she speaks it aloud; her voice quakes, and then falters entirely. “Them?”
Ereshkigal smiles. In the sheen of pale light, the arc of her teeth puts her in mind of a crescent moon. “There are two.” She knows, of course. She would - the demon, the soul-collector, the judge. Somehow, Seraphina does not want her to look at her. Somehow, she does not want her to look at them.
She feels that her legs might give out beneath her weight, but, instead, they lock beneath her, going stiff and straight as oak. (They are quivering, and not from the cold.) Not one, but two. Of course. Of course - she cannot even bear the thought of one, but there are two. Seraphina feels like she could sob. She feels like she could weep, and she could collapse, and she could crumble. She longs for it, even.
She does not cry. She does not weep. No wordless sobs pass her mouth, or bubble in her throat; not even a silent tear tracks the charcoal curve of her cheekbone. The only thing that escapes her lips is a ghost-white exhalation, the pale heat of her breath against a vast and nebulous winter sky.
@ absolutely anyone || still working on figuring her out like this; bear with me || lily wang, "prayer"
Sera || Eresh
I'M IN A ROOM MADE OUT OF MIRRORSand there's no way to escape the violence of a girl against herself.☼please tag Sera! contact is encouraged, short of violence
