I carried my own ashes to the mountains
The question curled in his mind too.
Why? Had the storms been placed like the barrier before? To keep the Voice out? To keep the Ascended contained? So they roamed, from one land to the next, with limitations, rather than the intrigue, the knowledge, the insight, but also the potential to do damage? He wasn’t a Natural, hadn’t been immersed in their history, in their tales, until assimilation made it necessary; listening in on the vast array of conspiracies, tales, tragedies, and afflictions. The beast could only herald and conspire with what he knew, what he had, what he’d experienced firsthand – and the uncertainty in all of it still mired and ground against him. “I do not know,” was the only truth he could relay – incapable of making sense of it all. Why now? Why after all these years?
Did it come with a price? Was this just one more strand towards the ominous eaves of crusades?
His long limbs crested over the subtle rise of a hill, and he gazed out over what lay below – more barrows, more mounds, more confusion, more turmoil restlessly clattering against his brain as the words echoed. One hand went back to Zuriel’s mane, and she shook her great head, encouraging scratches, while he ceased movement and motion to ponder the platitudes. “There is something coming. Battle. War. Whatever you want to call it.” Why else would the heralds send their demigods to the Greatwood? Or wherever the Voice originated?
Why? Had the storms been placed like the barrier before? To keep the Voice out? To keep the Ascended contained? So they roamed, from one land to the next, with limitations, rather than the intrigue, the knowledge, the insight, but also the potential to do damage? He wasn’t a Natural, hadn’t been immersed in their history, in their tales, until assimilation made it necessary; listening in on the vast array of conspiracies, tales, tragedies, and afflictions. The beast could only herald and conspire with what he knew, what he had, what he’d experienced firsthand – and the uncertainty in all of it still mired and ground against him. “I do not know,” was the only truth he could relay – incapable of making sense of it all. Why now? Why after all these years?
Did it come with a price? Was this just one more strand towards the ominous eaves of crusades?
His long limbs crested over the subtle rise of a hill, and he gazed out over what lay below – more barrows, more mounds, more confusion, more turmoil restlessly clattering against his brain as the words echoed. One hand went back to Zuriel’s mane, and she shook her great head, encouraging scratches, while he ceased movement and motion to ponder the platitudes. “There is something coming. Battle. War. Whatever you want to call it.” Why else would the heralds send their demigods to the Greatwood? Or wherever the Voice originated?
DEIMOS
