WITH ALL THE DEAD WORDS
WE CARRY AND CANNOT USE
Silence was once mine, and no one could ever take it from me.
Some people say the same about their voice, but I knew that to be untrue. I knew how tongues could be ripped from the mouth. I had seen how the throat could be slit, just so, not to kill but to silence.
Not to mention the sounds they could force from you if they knew you would make it: the begging and the whimpering, the kicked-animal bellow of submission. I hated these sounds. I hated to think of myself making them.
But something was changing in me. Something was growing, hungry, selfish.
-
I was only a quarter mile into the catacombs. Some rich librarian (I know, I know-- rich librarian? Solterra never ceases to surprise) had chartered an expedition to search for an ancient library, so close to being forgotten it existed only as a myth-- its story whispered around the fireplace, wondered about in the slurred space between waking and dream.
I was only a quarter mile in and already I missed the sun. I had never appreciated it until it was gone-- they say that’s how it often goes. When I heard footfall behind me, I quickly turned and raised my torch against the tomblike darkness. I stared without fear into the shadows beyond the torchlight, and I asked in a voice that did not waver:
“Who’s there?”
I was bigger than my silence. Better.
[changed to be open on 11/22 <3]
