Title: Just This Once
Author: Rhea Logan
Summary:It's so hard to just walk by anything that bears the
memories of the past and remain unmoved. Even when you're the last one
others would expect to hide such pain. A short character study on
Zaphkiel, to help my writer self wake up from long, deep slumber.
Disclaimer: Not mine. I can only wish P
Once more. Just this once.
The quiet whoosh announced the opening of the passage to the secret chamber, just as Zaphkiel pulled the book from the shelf. The quickly dismissed thought that he had not come here for this lingered in his mind a little longer than he would have liked. He hesitated. So, for a change, his duties would wait. Just this once.
Around him, the almost eerie silence told him he was alone, yet he felt far from peaceful. It always proved so hard to silence that pounding heart, when he made futile attempts at fooling himself that he would only pass quickly down the dimly lit corridor. That he had done his penance and no further was needed. That if only he let go, peace would once more be on his side.
The last place in Heaven where he could still be himself, as yet undiscovered by others, held something he was drawn to stronger than his will could resist. A shrine of sacred memories that he had made unholy, dirty; by the deed he had committed that had brought about the beginning of his end... the end of her beginning. He deserved no forgiveness, and so he would not seek it. He, himself, had called it the highest crime. Indeed, it was no less than that.
His life had long since entered the path of sheer irony. That hidden place where his name or rank no longer mattered, where his work was done, was the very same place where he often forgot the purpose it served. He had dedicated himself to continuing what she had started, and yet... not even the members of the resistance had ever seen his true face. The one that showed as all the masks he had carefully crafted cracked and fell apart.
Anael, Anael. He would often allow himself to be taken by the illusion of his own mind, one among many that haunted his thoughts. He would let himself be swept away on a wave of sweet, delicate scent his memory stored still, after all this time, even though it was all but there. Over and over again, he would replay the scenes long passed in his mind, cringing unchangeably every time the soothing past was riddled with flashbacks tainted red.
He had lost his sight then and there, in that cursed basement eons ago; not days later, at the hands of the White Council. His eyes had closed along with hers; his last breath escaped him as it had escaped her. After that, the air had gone thick and still, and the light was forever gone. He knew hunger, that burning flame that consumed him. He knew regret as he began to fall apart, and what distinguished him from a ghoul was that he had not rotten away. Yet.
The one that once had just one wish - to make one light shine in his clouded eyes, was no more. She never knew that, even in the bloodshed brought about by his hands wielding deadly weapons, she had been that light to him, the only way back he knew. She was gone now, and he had begun to whither away; a slow slide down his private slippery slope.
Two lives had been cut by his own one hand that night. Of the two that died, one left nothing behind, the other - a blind, empty shell. Of the two that he had killed, Zaphkiel had no doubt which should have been spared. Had the choice been mine, he would often think, yet the cold hand of truth never failed to correct him, as it tightened its grip upon his heart. He knew. It was mine, and so is now all fault.
He couldn't help but shiver, reaching out his hand to touch the figurine embedded in the wall in front of him. Far too many times had his mind convinced him that the warmth he almost felt before his hand even touched the sculpture was real, that instead of the cold, heartless stone, he would touch her soft face again. Just once. Just this once, he had begged illusion to fool him, but she had no mercy left to spare him. Between the two, the unspoken, bitter truth was as clear as day - thrice he would be judged, once for each wound he had inflicted upon Anael. There would be no more mercy than he deserved.
The guilty deserved none.
Sliding his trembling hand, ever so slowly, down the perfectly shaped cheek, he let the endless white of his vision conjure up the image from what his fingertips could read. He no longer trusted his memory to bring him the release he craved; the picture of her was drawn in blood on the pages of his mind. Such flawless structure of stone that could never dream to match the beauty of the woman it imitated multiplied the loss by a thousand. Countless times before had he studied the curves of her nose, the tiny lips drawn together in eternal silence, those eyes, closed like his own these days. On the outside, he appeared unmoved as that stone under his fingertips, yet on the inside, his forever burning heart allowed for no mistake. She was dead, as cold and still as this very sculpture, while his unworthy, pointless existence continued; day by day, month by month, year by year.
Anael, Anael. Just once. Just this once, reach out for me and still this heart, just as I had stilled your own.
He had not cried for her, not until all was said and done, and solitude released tears that flowed freely from his sightless eyes. Then he had wept, for no longer could he harden his heart against this pain. What became of the one who was once fierce and proud was but a shadow, cringing at the sound of his voice, the touch of his hands upon his face; forever changed. Not by the blade that had cut his throat, not by his own blood that he had wished to drown in, but by hers - the bittersweet taste he had felt on his lips ever since he had planted the last kiss on her stained face.
Not until days had passed and he had finally fallen asleep to wake from the first nightmare, did he know the change that had claimed him. Illusion had indeed devised a different plan entirely, after a fashion he had not known before; as merciless as it could be. He had not recalled having dreamt before, not even as he had taken lives without so much as a blink. His nights had been empty as had been his heart, and too lightly had he taken the warning that it would not last forever. Time would come to pay, he had once been told, and come it had.
He could cry and he could beg, and the cold stone before him would still remain unmoved. How fate had turned the table only he could tell; hers was the heart that had trembled in worry and fear when she lived, and he had been like this stone; composed of ice and malice unrivaled by that of another. Now, in this dimly lit chamber, he had come to learn the cruelty of this chill, to feel, down to the last fibers of his body, the depth of the cut it carved in him every time he begged to no avail. Such was this fate now, to push onwards only for her sake, and before his footsteps led him, humbled, before this sculpture of stone, he would tell himself that his acceptance was complete.
Had his heart been blinded as had been his eyes, he just might have believed that for a little longer.
He had brought this upon himself willingly; Zaphkiel, the Great Throne, now leaning limply against the heartless stone. His burning cheek against the cold of the figurine, he found himself small and insignificant, pleading wordlessly with the afterimage of his beloved to put his heart to rest. No lower could he go than to beg for death, he knew, and yet the temptation proved strong, holding him up by the throat even as he wished to finally fall. That stagnant state of being between life and death abode by the rules of neither Heaven nor Hell, and it never would. His otherwise monochrome memories filled his mind with dread when they turned red; a perfect contradiction of bloody, burning crimson and the stinging touch of ice.
It's no more than you deserve, his mind would tell him, and amidst the icy waves of resignation washing over him, he would bow his head before his fate. Yet before he gathered the scattered shards of his heart to make it seem whole again, before his masks clung back to his face, he would let himself whisper against the face of stone. He would not acknowledge this as a hopeless try; one day, just one day, maybe it would come to pass.
Humbled, he would plead, so long as he drew breath.
Once more. Just this once.