Touched and scorched by fire, caught and trapped in a vicious cycle, the nymph spiraled through the heavens and clouds, dappled by cherry blossoms, sprung by petal soft feet, hovering on puffs of lavender and clover, entrenched and ensnared by her newest mission. For the present, she felt like a snake hovering across the dainty tulips and winter violets, a sliver of vermin, a toxic incantation of the most vile, bloodied, beaten, battered without a bruise, singularly positioning herself amongst the gallows. A bestial opus, sung low and deep, into the fathoms of gods and goddesses, where their bellows hung somber nothings and deep, ricocheting laughter, where they postured justice in the fluid request of mortals, she’d been strung up by her own morals, and was left in the parallels of her appeal. Protection and sacrifice, immolations and sanctuary, bid a fluid wake of anxiety until it fluttered past her stalwart heart and poured over her seams; she was a bird, flapping her wings and tapping on her gilded hutch, clipped by her demanding, merciful flight, damned and doomed to experience pain because eventually she too would unravel it, use it, compose it, wield it, to ensure another would feel the same misery. The doubts folded over and over in her mind as she traversed amidst the holy light, because a portion of her felt she’d tread down the wrong direction, flourishing into the demonic trances and traces instead of the virtuous, the proud, the unsullied, and the other side knew she was too damned to stray away from it anyway. What was she to do if another intruder marched into their home, demanded for their children, for their palace? What was she to do if one more monster beckoned outside their door? What would happen to them when more of the ghastly, haunting images appeared, became real, became corporeal, with more than just forest kings losing their thrones to wolf skulls? How many times could she send Imogen to fight, to be mauled, to be massacred, amongst the other heathens, the other infidels, while she sat back and sang for absolution? The twists and turns were a bloody befuddlement, and as she launched over pebbles and rambled past waterfalls, she wished for a sign, a comfort, a way to ease the pain – and detested her frame even more for weakening. Eventually, she ceased movement and motion, listened to the idle chirps of her ivory kitsune, pretended not to be the rabbit, the prey, the slaughter beneath an executioner’s knife, pondered over where to find a creature willing to set her aflame, how to ensure her survival…the whirlwind divided and conquered, until she was breathless with anxiety, with apprehension, and quaked in the wind.

The sylph dipped further into her sentiments, and realized her selfish ideals, her inconsiderate thoughts, didn’t cease, distorting into never-ending shades of the despicable, yet, she couldn’t stop following them. With little resistance, Lena began another primrose path, dancing through the divine quarters, torn apart in finesse, in elegance, seeking, searching, requesting, begging, yearning for a center of serenity, for a vow of tranquility, for a composed, level head when the darkness pounded against hers. And because of his endless support, because of his unfailing encouragement, because he kept opening all of her locked cages, she chased after only one individual. As if she needed to confess her sins, the lithe laurels followed the dying remnants of his scent, balanced her gaze across their prior, shadowed dance floor, before the winds had changed, altered, left them reeling, before she slipped away to bow at the Sun God’s feet and revel in his mercy, and wondered how long he’d been gone. Had he vanished into the surroundings too, drifted away from all the horrors, all the terrors they’d witnessed, not longing to be left in the wake of the relentless (and would he frown at her slide into the audacious, so sprung by foretold images and pictures)? Had he pieced together the mysteries? Would he abandon her for her ridiculous follies, or somehow coax and kindle the starry promises from her lungs, the dying flames of her fumbled request? Would he laugh or mock her fears (for after all, she could heal herself, surely she could handle a burst of pain, coax it into a strain, an aria, a beat of time)? Or would he merely listen, a conduit, a catalyst, to extinguish and dissolve the nervous tenacity, the rampant misgivings, and the bristling hostilities brimming and shuddering through her veins?

Her eyes thought they caught a fragment of gold, and like a hungry urchin, she followed the flickering of bright hues and ambrosial champagne, prayed in ardent deliverance for blue eyes and crimson dapples, wrapped her heart and soul in tender wishes and invoked aspirations. A vibrant whisper, a hesitant murmur, a subtle croon, bubbled and burst from her lips, danced and sauntered in abysmal fortitude while her flanks heaved and her hopes burned. “Roland?”

@[Roland]