The Songbird stifled, grew instantly aware of how she’d upset him. Painstakingly, slowly, she covered herself back up into the florets of composure, into the idle blossoms of calm, lithe contortions, sniffled only once, drumming back the tears from where they’d pooled, tucked her emotions away, away, away, hidden all the more. She forgot her suffering, she whittled away her distress, and she waved away the rigid desolation. Like armor, she deftly strung together the woven lacings of her serenity, of her tranquility, even when they’d been so quickly fettered by the presence, by the appearance, of a boy she’d known to be gone. The naiad hollowed out another bit of herself, secretive and furtive, stood like a vessel, like a shell, amidst the grand tundra and the scenic vows, trying to forget the ghastly images his fallen frame had left behind. But they were so vivid, so strong, so bound to the center of her mind; every time she blinked there was his collapsed form, no more breaths taken, no more heartbeats woven, a lad given no more chances. Then, a ghost, a wraith, a phantom, he was back again, the tangible poltergeist fluttering away, confused, scared, causing her to falter in her taut fortitude. Lord, she was so confused, so perplexed, so baffled, because she couldn’t make sense of his renewal, when she’d so clearly mourned his battered remnants, and a lingering sigh made its way past her lips, tremulous and quavering, the last snippets of her weakness puffed and exalted into the enigmatic mist. The nymph almost thought to look down, to stare upon the ground as she bore the truth for him, but thought better of it, sculpted steel and warmth back into her eyes, held softness and dulcet quandaries across her lids, along her features. “I remember that time quite well, but its not the one I speak of.” Not when he was a demon, thrust into their midst with scarcely naught but memories of wickedness, but when he was a corpse (and here she struggled again, her stomach twisted into a derisive, rancorous knot, as if she shouldn’t tell him, as if the very picture and tapestry of his cadaver scorched back over her mind; she was incapable, she was weak, she was worthless). Her stare flicked over his frame, very alive, very whole, and the durability of her aria coasted over the wind, enduring in the great mysteries, in the strange upheaval, in the ghastly, ghostly exchanges. “Do you recall being in the caves?” She started and held no means of stumbling again. “Searching for the murderer?” Blunt, honest, forthright, yearning to atone for something she had no control over.

@[Öde]