Okay, the EdxEnvy in this is kind of ridiculously subtle. But you know it's there because it's, duh, an EdxEnvy collection.
Also for anybody who happens to be living under a rock (haha) the character in this is not mine, but J.R.R. Tolkien's. I'm not saying who the character is because that would ruin it.
84. Possession
At first he thought the whispering voices were echoes of his own thoughts, so alike they were...
"...yes...just us now, just you and me and me, yess..."
He followed the echoes, trying to trace them to their source. The torch trembled in his grasp.
"...so pretty, so shiny...my precious, my precious..."
He'd long lost track of where he was. He supposed it didn't matter, but the tunnels and caves were too close for his liking. Funny. He'd never thought he was claustrophobic -
"...Who's there?" the voice suddenly queried, the rasp in it become louder. "You can'ts have it? Filthy creatures, all wants the precious, can'ts have its. It's ours!" it ended with something half scream and half wail.
His pace slowed to a crawl. The creature - whatever it was - was just around the next corner. He could hear its scratching, its breathing, its insane murmurings.
He growled softly to himself. He wasn't some soft-hearted human fool to be afraid of a ghost in the dark. So he rounded the corner -
- and Envy and the creature stared at each other for a few heartbeats, trapped in a sudden bubble of certainty and recognition.
The torch in Envy's hand clattered to the floor, breaking the silent tension and making the creature skitter away. Even in the dark, Envy could make out every feature - the few strands of hair plastered to its paper-thin scalp, the sickly paleness of its skin, the way its eyes glowed like lanterns even in the quickly-fading light of the torch...
"What are you?" he demanded, and the creature narrowed its eyes suspiciously.
"Put out the light! The light burns us, it does."
Envy stepped onto the torch, extinguishing the last flicker of flame. "What are you?" he asked again, trying not to let the irritation and disgust he felt creep into his voice.
The creature blinked, eyes huge and froglike. "They calls me Gollum."
"Gollum," Envy whispered. The name felt foul on his lips. "Hey, that doesn't answer my question at all!"
But Gollum didn't seem to be paying attention to him now, holding something small against his lips. "The ugly thing can'ts have you, precious, my precious."
At the sound of the 'u-word', Envy sprang forward with a snarl, hands transforming unconsciously into claws. But Gollum hopped out of the way with a little dance and a gurgling, guttural laugh, snickering as Envy collapsed onto the ground.
"Ha-ha! Ha-ha!"
Envy glanced down at Gollum's hand, where he still clasped the object he'd been murmuring to so fervently. It was a ring. That was all. Just a golden ring.
"Get back here, you filthy little thing!"
If he could just get a closer look...
But Gollum cackled as he leapt further into the caves, and a moment later, he'd disappeared, like he'd slipped between one reality and the next.
Envy lay on the ground for a moment, mind reeling with the surreality of it all. He hadn't taken Pride seriously when he'd mentioned that there was something living in the natural caves below the tunnel - but -
He balled his hand into a fist and punched the ground, hissing as the bones in his hand splintered and then knit themselves back together.
The Gollum and the ring...
A reptile dreaming of being human, holding onto a glint of gold...
Envy pressed his cheek against the cold cave floor, tracing patterns into the lichen. "My precious..." he whispered, and the echoes seized his words, turning his confession into a cacophony of declarations.
My precious.