footprints in the ashes

Deimos the Reaper You can't take back the cards you've dealt on this long and lonely road to hell the throne must be such a sad and lonely place Very rarely had his eyes ever sought out the sun; warm bits of light had faded away in time, in misery, in melancholy, shifting off his icy demeanor, his indifferent artifice, with keen grace and understanding. Don’t bother with this one the world would say, wounds already too deep and festered, stranded and forsaken in the depths of his immorality. He narrowed his gaze when she strayed too far in – he preferred the soothing, solemn coating of rain, the passing of droplets cascading off his sullen brow, the drowning deluge threatening to consume him whole (it had once; he’d let it wholeheartedly, enjoyed each and every moment until it collapsed and gave way, until the clouds parted and he was alone again). He didn’t expect ochre to be staring back – had presumed fire and gold, tarnished amber, weights of a million daggers pinpointed back to his face, telling him to go, to stray, to leave. The flush spreading across her cheeks was intriguing, and he quirked his brow at its rosy appearance, but left it out in the open, not drawing her embarrassment or chagrin into the ruins. Perhaps it wasn’t truly hers and the telltale signs of her aggravation were written along her features; someone else had been given the authority, and they’d let it waste, let it rot, let it sink back into the ground. It was a shame, because tomes were privileges sometimes rarely afforded, and wisdom was a wondrous, ravenous thing – he’d stalk it just as much as an enemy or adversary, grasp it in both hands and refuse to relinquish. The Reaper noted the small moment of deflation, the way the scorching embers pop, whistle, and refuse to ignite for the slightest of seconds, and her words only confirm the suspicions. For his part, he nearly spoke against the bestial fool who ran the broken-down wares, but refrained, shaking his head instead, disapproval for those who couldn’t care for what they promised to tend. The intonation echoed through his skull, and he felt it stab him all the way down his spine. Shrugging the hypocrisy aside in her eagerness, he lifted and shifted the spine so she could read it; no sense in hiding the inevitable, because he was eroding from ignorance, and by unholy determination sought to relieve the corrosion. Rexanna’s stories and tales had rankled him, had incensed, had kindled, because he understood the message of some dreams (mountains and rivers, streams and snow, high-rising peaks with thunderous battle cries), but not the reason, not the outline, not the details; wondered how far sketches crossed, and if fates were too intertwined. The Reaper fought against the inclination; he made his own steadfast path, but sometimes it seemed familiar, sometimes it seemed scattered, sometimes it felt like a pattern, a repetition of doom and destruction, of corruption and distortion, and he balked simply out of habit. His jaw clenched for a moment, pondering how to word his interest, wondering how deep she’d end up prying, how many secrets he’d have to spill to get the information he required (or if that mattered; if he’d be just as lost as when this all started – cruel and vindictive, vengeful and brooding, a damned mess). “Reincarnation.” His eyes darted to the other tomes lined up nearby, hands itching to grab another for something to do. “The blending of past lives.”

_{Photo and Table by Time
Photo taken at Hero's Square in Budapest, Hungary}