Shade in the Shadows

SAMUEL i am the ocean, crawling madly at your moon. and with one wanton whoop — "You might not have said it. But you're not the first one to bring this up to me, as if it's obvious." He sighed, shook his head and pushed his hands through his hair, staring off through the shelves. "You think that your Gods are better than mine. I know that. But does that immediately mean my Goddess has to be the cause of problems here?" Sam began to climb down the ladder. "I assume by her 'eating and killing' organic life, you mean the Ascended? I'm not dead, Amalia." Stood before her, Sam held out his arms. [b]"It isn't the same as your blood. But it's fine for me and..and you can't understand how it feels to have The Voice love you." She likely never would, having well and truly chosen her corner by now, and Sam almost pitied her for it. "I am not going to admit to spreading the blight and I am not going to blame my Goddess for it either. If you want to ask me to be Provost, ask Jigano first." With that said he tried to walk past her, towards the exit. — i melt into a sycophantic soup, & all that's left to do, is giggle, fawn, and swoon.

it is both a blessing and a curse, to feel everything so very deeply

"If I'm not the only one, maybe it is obvious." The barb leaves her lips before she can think, slung back in anger and defense. She does not want to do this, to fight him, but it feels like she has no choice. Once Amalia believed that Sam understood the wrongness of the Voice, but now...

...Now he is another pawn, and it scares the girl to her core.

But are you really alive? lingers somewhere on her tongue, pushed back behind her teeth where it threatens to snap and flare like fire. But to have the Voice love her.... she shudders at the thought. "You're a pawn, Sam, to something you don't understand. Why do you think we were all locked away? Because of her. Don't you miss the sun? The feeling of rain? You have the love of the Voice, whatever that means, but what about the love of the gods?" Without the embrace of Vi, the promise of Mort, the guidance of Rae, what would she be?

Sam has been sacrificed and taken in, lost to the allure of a false idol. The baker watches as he walks away, sad and angry, her black stare hard. It is only when he disappears that she sighs, sinking down to the ground with a rough exhale, the book open in her shaking hands, her vision blurring with furious tears as she once more settles in to read.