Disclaimer: Ho, knave! I henceforth disclaim! :P
Warning: Eh…Probably a dose of angst, a heap of kawaiiness?
Little Blog: I'm starting to get the dreaded 'writer's block'-- I just don't know how I am going to end this thing! I know what I want to convey…and although it isn't time to lay it to rest, yet…I don't want it to get too unbearably angst. Not too much pain and misery, even though I am known for that…heh…well, onward, to the goods!
Whispers on the wind, something is stirring in the shadows of this world…something harboring a heavy dread, a sense of foreboding. A baseless fear gnaws at my innards, permeates my mind, stretching morbid imaginings over my cloudless dreams, transforming them into nightmares of the deepest reality. I feel a presence, like that of darkness, hovering over this secret world, this seclusion from the burdens of man.
Something is happening, in these deep woods. And I know, I know in my heart…that I must discover its source…
Fastening my sash about my waist hurriedly, I glance at my aelf, smiling tightly. His face expresses nothing; it is distant, unfocused. He catches flecks of snow on his fingertips, his vision fixated on the swirling haze of white outside the abode. It is impossible for me to comprehend what is going through his lovely head now, as if a barrier has been raised against my inquiring, probing eye.
Grasping my staff, placing a gentle hand upon the small of his back, "I fear…this feeling…"
He stares hard at me, eyes glittering. Fangs just slightly revealed against his soft lips, he purrs comfort, taking my hands and pressing it firmly to his cheek, rubbing. He is so incredibly beautiful…
"There is a dark feeling within me…it builds, little by little…there is something festering in these deep woods, my aelf…" I speak tremulously, looking downward, towards the earthen floor. As if in understanding, he wraps his arm around my own, binding us together, if only temporarily. He intends to accompany me, then; yet I am not sure if it would be in his best interest. If something should happen to this being I have grown to love…I could never…I could not forgive myself, not in this world, nor in any that should follow…
"I would it you would stay out of the danger," I breathe lightly against his neck, holding him close. He responds by tightening my grip around him, squeezing my arms with his own.
"Amin khiluva lle a' gurtha ar' thar," voice trembling, he presses his forehead to mine, gazing deep into my eye, searching, it seems, for words I cannot express to him…not yet…
It is the most he has ever spoken at once, and I can only fascinate at what the meaning could be…
Squinting against the harsh light of the bright winter sun, hand as a visor, I attempt to make out blurry figures moving in a slow, steady rhythm across the immense span of wintry hills beneath us. It appears to be a heavily armed entourage of knights, each with the crest of the Vermillion Phoenix upon his armor.
I knew it to be true…
The winds billow my thin robes about my body as I raise my staff, whispering silent spells into the air. Spirits of all sources, fays of the heavens and the earth dance in patterns, encircling me entirely. This should deter them from the course they take, for a short while, at least. Searing light flashes across the sky, lightning on a clear day, heightening the shattering brilliance in the cold stillness. Darkening clouds gather fervently in the sky, swirling in an upheaval of gray cotton, cumbersome with water. Raising my slender arms to the realm of the dragons, I vociferate a spell of the ancient ones lost to the plagues of mankind's thinking. The wind is silent; suddenly, the clouds give birth to their heavy burden, pouring out a million tears upon the glittering red movement beneath the mountain.
It resembles water cleansing a deep wound. Blood in water. There is something foul in the presence of the mountain…
Turning about, the wind raking its cold hands through my hair, I meet eyes with my aelf, who watches me intently, head cocked to the side. He smiles widely, much like a delighted child, and laughs, a sweet sound to my ears.
"Lle ume quel," he giggles, sitting down upon a ragged stone jutting forth from the earth. I sigh, wander towards him, breathing unsteadily from my exertions.
"I had to do it, though I care not to toy with forces I cannot understand," gently smoothing his hair, though the harsh current of air dishevels it. "I must forewarn Sir Tamahome of this threat. They have known his path; I cannot allow them to find them."
I know he doesn't comprehend my words, for his eyes are filled with confusion, eyebrows raised. He smiles again, grasping at my sleeve, pulling me against him. Breathing in his delicious scent, something like pine needles, roses, and autumn…so lovely. I want to hold him closer, yet he pushes me back a little, gazing into my eye seriously, mouthing words to me in the deafening silence. I don't know if now is the right time…I know he won't understand…
"I…I love you…" I murmur into his hair, kissing his temple lightly. He holds his hand against my heart, feeling the sporadic rhythm.
"A'maelamin," Pressing slightly harder, he takes my other hand in his, caressing the palm softly. Everything is gentle, soft, soothing with him, near him. Like a honey-colored clouds in the dawn, a fluttering butterfly's wings in the sunlit shadows; wonderfully exquisite and yet, subtly evasive, sad.
The slowing of the downpour awakens my senses; quickly I stride out towards the cliff of the mountain, gazing towards the direction of my spell-storm. It seems to have halted the soldiers from further progress, but I am well aware that they will hastily continue, adamant in enthusiastic dedication to their king. In a strange sense, I have little desire to prevent these happenings from taking place; it is cruel, yet…I cannot help but feel the immense pressure of something much more heavy weighing upon my fragile, timid heart.
Having given myself as servant to Sir Tamahome, however, I cannot abandon him to the crafty wiles of man-made fate. I must seek to protect him…
Dark luminosity hovers close in my mind, a warning, a vision of unbreakable silence, glass shattering without sound. There will be consequences for my giving aid to the fair knight and his love-torn lady, and my heart cries out…
Please, let it not be my aelf who suffers….
Please, let him not be drawn into the petty affairs of humans, whether it be for love or no, for if he were to taste this bitterness, to feel this pain common to mortal beings….
I may find myself in solitude again, perhaps forever. I could not bear it. Could not.
I glance at him briefly, over my heavily cloaked shoulder, "You cannot follow me," and begin my laborious passage through the mountain path, leaning dependently upon my staff, still burning with the spell of the elements. The sky is growing black, of it's own accord; there is a massive amount of snow cradled within the thick clouds, twisting in upheaval at this new onus. I hear the rustling of dry branches; his dark form moving swiftly ahead of me, through the very air in effortless movement.
"You should not follow…or, I would it you would not run so far ahead!" I cry out shrilly, attempting to prevent him from going any farther. He ignores me entirely, or else cannot understand what it is I am trying to convey to him. My heart beats faster and faster with undeterminable dread; it swells, and engorged feeling within my center. Something…something is happening here, this night…
Running in a insufficient effort to try and catch him, stop him, I weep, struggling violently to breathe and yet keep pace simultaneously, and finding it futile, I resume a walking measure, fighting with my inner turmoil so as not to call out to my aelf the danger that I feel not to flee from this mountain in sheer terror of what I do not know, what lurks patiently all around in a hesitating moment…
I see the gates, suppress the urge to shout out a warning. I cannot give way to the monks here there is trouble afoot. It might very well be they are the informants, so I cannot call out thus hastening action. Besieged by my own decaying body, I creep to the sanctuary, using the remainder of my physical strength to push against the heavy iron doors.
He is quite surprised, if not slightly happy, in his foolish youth of spirit, to see my feeble form filling a tiny notch in the intimidating shadows of the doors. "Mage!" He starts up from his kneeling position afore the prayer cabinet; yet I raise a hand to him.
"You are in great danger. Your servant has come to subject himself to you, in any manner that he can to protect what his master holds sacred." My eye passes over Lady Miaka, dressed in the thick woolen chestnut robes of a monk, her golden eyes wide with terror, knowledge.
"They have come."
I nod, tears welling in my eye. "Had I the foresight to see it so soon, I would have removed you from this dwelling days ago," breath coming in hard gasps, the trek has let me quite unstable.
"Mage! You needn't trouble yourself with us any longer!" Springing to his feet quickly, he catches me as my legs give out beneath me. "I am sorry to have brought these difficulties to you, magician…"He vigorously wipes glittering tears from his face, which is both angry and sorrowful in his regret. "I will have my horse for you; get away, for if they come to know you are aiding us in our flight, should you be caught…"
His fear for my own well-being is genuinely touching, but he cannot realize…that I'm doing this because I truly want to, though doubt has more than once overcome me. "No, I would it I could lead you away…" sighing as he embraces me tightly, shuddering in trepidation.
Miaka is hurriedly gathering a few bundles together, packing them in saddlebags, "We should not hesitate," she vociferates faintly.
"Look you, mage and friend," Tamahome stutters through tears, clenching his teeth, "Get ye away from here! We shall manage, I will find somewhere we can hide…"
"But I cannot let you…! You know not this darksome mount, sir; I know it, well like a child does it's mother; if you would only but follow for a little way…the soldiery is coming close, they are informed, so we must take another road…" I tear away from him, distressed at his insistence, as if he feels my foreboding too, that something, something…
Dodging out into the softly falling snow, I hoist a saddlebag onto the waiting white horse, stumbling blindly. A hand seizes my shoulder.
"Mage, you are going to suffer great loss from this," an aged monk prophesies, wheezing hoarsely, "I sense your nightmares every time you exhale."
"Lay off your foul hand!" I push him away fiercely, and he topples into the barren gray snow. He chortles to himself, frightening me, yet not to give up the oath of servitude towards this man I have come to love as a brother.
"Don't spit your old condemnation at me, you stinking lout! Burn me then, Heaven," I scream into the wind, "I'll feel first your flames before I permit you to devour these souls, having done nothing to bring wraith upon themselves yet to love!"
I feel familiar energy surround me enticingly, flicker lights the color of lilies in the spring. When they hear my pain, they comfort me. I see some hundred monks, donned in black tattered robes, standing in front of me, in a semi-circle. "What is it you want," I rasp.
"They shall not leave this place."
"Here is the end of their treason."
I am vastly outnumbered, and though I can summon the elements, I am leery to perform such tasks , as it would but sap my strength. Moving slowly towards me, in a strange, disgusting pattern, singing a dirge with the voice of demons, I back up against a body of armor, Tamahome. "Sir," I whisper shakily, "You must go 'round the sanctuary, to avoid them. I will handle this. Please," clutching his arm, "Follow what I say: There is a path behind the ritual bell, leading to a steep downward slope. It will be difficult to overcome, but you must or death will have you. A water cave is in a small clearing in the immediate wood, you will hear the water. Hide in the waterfall, it will be very cold…" I shove him, weeping, "Go!"
He cries out to me an unheard response, then mounts his horse ferociously, holding tight to his love as they race away…
And now…
Here, alone, I must somehow stay them here, in battle, though I know…
I will die this night. I will pass into the world of shadow, deepest sleep.
They fall upon me, shrieking bloodthirsty howls, the sound of wind coursing through my chamber in mid-winter, raven cawing on a dark summer night at the monastery, when I was a boy…
Close my eye tight, feel a cool numbness penetrate my being…
Then a scream a scream shattering the entire world, the very mountain crumbling beneath it's power. I hear blood spilling out over the earth; devastated cries silenced abruptly, the thud of bodies on the dampening white ground.
Peeking out, my arms brought instinctively over my head and neck, I see…
I see him, covered in their scarlet blood, smattered on his lovely face and hands. Blood running freely over he ground, out of their eyes and ears, mouths; pumping hearts strewn on the ground mercilessly. He stares at me, hapless in my mortality, moaning words of terrible mourning. He crawls over to me, cradles me for only a moment, as I muffle shrieks of pain and utter horror into his chest, his rapidly beating heart; then he grasps my face in his bloody hands, trembling.
"Rima! Sii'!" he pulls me up, points in the direction of my fleeing knight's trail. "Rima!" He frustrates, pushing me hard, "Sii'!"
"I…I'm sorry," I murmur , crying freely now as I run, fast, down the awkward path, glancing back at him as he stands still, watching me disappear into the steep crag of the mountain.
"Amin mela lle, Chichiri," I hear him cry.
0.0 What next?
Chichiri: Even I'm cooorious, no da!
Tasuki: …No comment. Bt at least I get to kick some serious old fart ass! Yeehaw!
^-^' Review? ^-^'