He remembers something.
Like a bird, it flits from one edge of memory to another. Pale-winged, crusted with salt. It has no voice; it arrives silently, as if time has eroded the sound, reduced it to nothing more than a grainy film. It consists of a single scene — a faded slideshow. Foam white on the waves. The horizon a strange, colorless blur far beyond. And between that and here — no — that and him — dark spires bobbing skyward.
He cannot say why it comes to him now, on the weathered steps of the dead bridge. Perhaps because this wreck calls to mind a different one, the carcass of a dark and rotten thing bobbing slowly to shore. Perhaps because Caido is full of rot, and so this memory surfaces first, a lone point of clarity burning in a sea of jumbled sensory recording. Regardless, here is it: Seiji, peering down into the darkness, remembering a time when darkness delivered a gift on his doorstep.
He does not remember anything beyond that moment: his younger self standing barefoot and half-awake on the beach, leaping over the first splintered wreckage toward the massive shape beyond. He knows only something must have been inside. It burns with such dark clarity in his mind. As if it were the most important moment of his life. And yet it comes without context, without order. Did it happen months ago? Years? Did it happen at all?
He ruminates on this, and finds himself still over the abyss. Seiji does not expect it to gift him anything. Not this abyss. Not this moment. But he lingers nonetheless, somehow soothed by the darkness, the imminent promise of eternity hanging in the air. He has wandered away from home, away from the dusty corridors and the lonely sound of Auni's hooves on the floor. Something eats at him inside, something as low and dark as the air below him.
He is too withdrawn to notice anything going on around him.
Like a bird, it flits from one edge of memory to another. Pale-winged, crusted with salt. It has no voice; it arrives silently, as if time has eroded the sound, reduced it to nothing more than a grainy film. It consists of a single scene — a faded slideshow. Foam white on the waves. The horizon a strange, colorless blur far beyond. And between that and here — no — that and him — dark spires bobbing skyward.
He cannot say why it comes to him now, on the weathered steps of the dead bridge. Perhaps because this wreck calls to mind a different one, the carcass of a dark and rotten thing bobbing slowly to shore. Perhaps because Caido is full of rot, and so this memory surfaces first, a lone point of clarity burning in a sea of jumbled sensory recording. Regardless, here is it: Seiji, peering down into the darkness, remembering a time when darkness delivered a gift on his doorstep.
He does not remember anything beyond that moment: his younger self standing barefoot and half-awake on the beach, leaping over the first splintered wreckage toward the massive shape beyond. He knows only something must have been inside. It burns with such dark clarity in his mind. As if it were the most important moment of his life. And yet it comes without context, without order. Did it happen months ago? Years? Did it happen at all?
He ruminates on this, and finds himself still over the abyss. Seiji does not expect it to gift him anything. Not this abyss. Not this moment. But he lingers nonetheless, somehow soothed by the darkness, the imminent promise of eternity hanging in the air. He has wandered away from home, away from the dusty corridors and the lonely sound of Auni's hooves on the floor. Something eats at him inside, something as low and dark as the air below him.
He is too withdrawn to notice anything going on around him.
the Archangel
Baker ✓
Age: 30 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Age: 30 | Height: 5'6 | Race: Demi-god | Nationality: Natural | Citizenship: Stormbreak
Level: 5 - Strg: 49 - Dext: 45 - Endr: 52 - Luck: 49 - Int:
JYOTI - Mythical - Starwhale (Humpback)
Played by: shark
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,667
MP: 2830
Change author:
Posts: 3,098 | Total: 4,667
MP: 2830
05-30-2019, 08:03 PM
She is shrouded in starlight, eclipsed by the creature who swims by her side. Rarely does Amalia tether the whale, but in this place she is made uneasy, coaxing and coercing Jyoti to remain nearby. Something about the endless fathoms which extend far below- the girl shudders to think of it, so generally she does not.
Indeed, she rarely thinks about this place at all, if she can avoid it, as though by taking it from her mind she can will it to no longer exist. The Bone Bridge is not a place she loves (though perhaps few are, in the Hollowed Grounds, especially now that she ha seen the world, tasted freedom and towering trees). This is not a place of joy, but it is one of memory, shifting shadows and half-caught words spoken long ago by silken tongues. Ghosts live here, the girl knows, phantoms of childhoods spent on this path. She does not like to think about it, except for once a year when she does. Then she walks the path above the nothing, a private pilgrimage for her and her fears, a tradition Amalia carries on from a time when she was not alone.
She is not alone today. Each step of bare feet on the Bone Bridge is lit by singing stars. In some ways, Jyoti is a better companion than her mother: less judgmental, more cheerful, curious and eager and wholly unafraid. In other ways, though, she makes the trip harder. The baker is not yet so old that she does not wish to hold a hand, find stalwart solace in the presence of others, have fears absolved by a depreciating laugh. Amalia may not have liked her mother, but she loved her as a daughter will, carried her close as steaming coal and ached in her absence, even now.
Discontent she carries on, until there comes another who rises in the dark, a figure on the narrow path. Drawing short, the girl stares, black stare narrow as she awaits its dissipation, anticipating this, too, to fade back into mist. But the figure does not vary, does not drift away; so Amalia takes a careful shift, her hands upon the starwhale, her bare feet shifting on the stone. "Who's there?" she calls to the ghost, the wind, half expecting the void below to reply with nothing but an echoing laugh.
Indeed, she rarely thinks about this place at all, if she can avoid it, as though by taking it from her mind she can will it to no longer exist. The Bone Bridge is not a place she loves (though perhaps few are, in the Hollowed Grounds, especially now that she ha seen the world, tasted freedom and towering trees). This is not a place of joy, but it is one of memory, shifting shadows and half-caught words spoken long ago by silken tongues. Ghosts live here, the girl knows, phantoms of childhoods spent on this path. She does not like to think about it, except for once a year when she does. Then she walks the path above the nothing, a private pilgrimage for her and her fears, a tradition Amalia carries on from a time when she was not alone.
She is not alone today. Each step of bare feet on the Bone Bridge is lit by singing stars. In some ways, Jyoti is a better companion than her mother: less judgmental, more cheerful, curious and eager and wholly unafraid. In other ways, though, she makes the trip harder. The baker is not yet so old that she does not wish to hold a hand, find stalwart solace in the presence of others, have fears absolved by a depreciating laugh. Amalia may not have liked her mother, but she loved her as a daughter will, carried her close as steaming coal and ached in her absence, even now.
Discontent she carries on, until there comes another who rises in the dark, a figure on the narrow path. Drawing short, the girl stares, black stare narrow as she awaits its dissipation, anticipating this, too, to fade back into mist. But the figure does not vary, does not drift away; so Amalia takes a careful shift, her hands upon the starwhale, her bare feet shifting on the stone. "Who's there?" she calls to the ghost, the wind, half expecting the void below to reply with nothing but an echoing laugh.
Amalia & Jyoti
born from dark water, daughters of the rain and snow