Dawn's light dappled through the leaves. In the grove, his head on her lap. His face, she said, was still a youth's. She found this very amusing, and his discontent more so. He could never be angry with her for long.
Long ago, a great deity was split into pieces and sealed away with a ceremonial sword. The temple erected on the precipice of their world, where night never fell.
Her mother was a priestess, the same as her grandmother. One day, she would undergo the same ceremony.
When the ritual is complete, said Mono, a body is just flesh without a home. We give it back to the elements, to be eaten.
You could leave, he said, only to hear the words aloud. You could travel the world and be free.
She laughed, soft and lilting. Would you become a priest?
Wander bit his tongue. His mouth glanced the edge of her palm.
The old story, connected by grief. If he spoke the words clawing at his throat, she would bid him no more.
A day in the Forbidden Lands passed in the span of an era. The sun remained in the sky, motionless. The need for sleep evaded him, and Agro. There were still plenty of salamanders and sour fruit in the weald. He needn't stay long enough to exhaust the land of its resources.
Dreams came to him, in the space between consciousness and the invasion of Dormin's soul into his own, forcing him into darkness. No broken bones. The devil's luck.
Blood in his body subsuming into tarry ichor. Perhaps, by the end, there would be nothing of the man Mono once loved.
Another idol crumbled. Shadows in the shape of men flocking to him, scattering at the first sign of waking. The old pull of the earth, ancient and intangible, demanded reverence.
He approached the altar, scattering the doves. His clothes and skin inundated with grime. He could have stroked back her hair and pressed his lips to her cool brow. She would wake soon enough.