not heroes any longer - we are tragedies of firelight and flesh
unholy sacraments of blood and broken bodies
Broad shoulders and Atlas ways had characterized his existence; and now it pummeled, cracked, and frayed, encouraging him to sink below its weight. For his crimes and penance, for the lives he couldn’t save, for all the multitudes, fractions, and factions that bore nothing but tombstones, catacombs, and phantoms – Rexanna’s to be added to the conflagration of horrors and terrors. Ghosts in shells and fragments, joining the others in their solemn graves, reminding him of his limitations, of his mistakes, of calculations rendered and gone horribly awry. Maybe time would give him the expanse, the healing, he required – until something else snapped, until something else unfurled, until some other failure rang its siren call and he inclined towards its reckless endeavors out of habit. No more he yearned to beg and plead, because he was gone and done, because there was nowhere to flee from the self-loathing, because every breath was a reminder that the Penumbra was no longer here.
A great shuddering exhale left his chest, and he stared straight ahead, into the ether, into the void, into the darkness (waited for something to swing, to decimate, to lacerate). His eyes only inclined back towards her on the silent word, on the stretch of steadfast faith and hope, on whims that represented beliefs and creeds; on the wedding gift not with him now, but in his bag. The Sword ducked his head out of shame and humiliation, clenched his jaw tightly, and wondered how anyone could tolerate his presence. Capable of destruction and not much else; a never-ending ruin from the hilt of his blade, down to the restless, chaotic semblances of his heart.
Her murmurs nettled and thorned into his side, and he lifted a palm to drag the tears reforming in the corner of his eyes, striving to steel, to fortify, for the rest of the agony to come. Not just his to bear, but the Harpy’s; the brutal resignation of things eternally lost between them. No further attempts at reconciliation. No mother to offer rancor towards. No remnants of another time, another place, where it hadn’t all been so wicked, so draining, so obliterated.
The Shield’s offers were benevolent, but he’d be the one to take Kiada’s anger, rage, malice, and everything else in between, the responsibility laden upon him, the fool who’d set it all in motion. “I will tell her,” uttered on a sigh, on the foreboding measures yet to come. Maybe she’d burn and curse him and he’d lose her too.
The fiend swallowed down another rising bout of bile, the choking noose closing over his throat, fingers clasped and intertwined within hers, shaking his head, the uncertainty, the unknown, clawing down his chest, eating away at marrow and bone. Another scar, turned inward, carved out in eclipses and daggers. Deimos didn’t know what he needed – had always mourned alone, quietly, in the corners of a world far, far away, left to become shadows, mist, and abhorrence, returning as nonchalant, as chilling, as the mountains they’d resided within. “You are here.” Which was far more than he deserved. “That is enough.”
A great shuddering exhale left his chest, and he stared straight ahead, into the ether, into the void, into the darkness (waited for something to swing, to decimate, to lacerate). His eyes only inclined back towards her on the silent word, on the stretch of steadfast faith and hope, on whims that represented beliefs and creeds; on the wedding gift not with him now, but in his bag. The Sword ducked his head out of shame and humiliation, clenched his jaw tightly, and wondered how anyone could tolerate his presence. Capable of destruction and not much else; a never-ending ruin from the hilt of his blade, down to the restless, chaotic semblances of his heart.
Her murmurs nettled and thorned into his side, and he lifted a palm to drag the tears reforming in the corner of his eyes, striving to steel, to fortify, for the rest of the agony to come. Not just his to bear, but the Harpy’s; the brutal resignation of things eternally lost between them. No further attempts at reconciliation. No mother to offer rancor towards. No remnants of another time, another place, where it hadn’t all been so wicked, so draining, so obliterated.
The Shield’s offers were benevolent, but he’d be the one to take Kiada’s anger, rage, malice, and everything else in between, the responsibility laden upon him, the fool who’d set it all in motion. “I will tell her,” uttered on a sigh, on the foreboding measures yet to come. Maybe she’d burn and curse him and he’d lose her too.
The fiend swallowed down another rising bout of bile, the choking noose closing over his throat, fingers clasped and intertwined within hers, shaking his head, the uncertainty, the unknown, clawing down his chest, eating away at marrow and bone. Another scar, turned inward, carved out in eclipses and daggers. Deimos didn’t know what he needed – had always mourned alone, quietly, in the corners of a world far, far away, left to become shadows, mist, and abhorrence, returning as nonchalant, as chilling, as the mountains they’d resided within. “You are here.” Which was far more than he deserved. “That is enough.”
what use have we for feeble hymns of wasted faith;
for sordid songs of glory?
DEIMOS
