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When We Die
We are drifting, we
falter at the gates of some
unfamiliar place and
when the light dims,
when we plummet
into some depths,
some great chaos,
We find ourselves lost
in some eternal hell
of unbeing.
We are lost
in souls.
We aren't different
when we die.
ASHAMIN
BEAUTY IS PERCEPTION
BEAUTY IS PERCEPTION
To Ashamin, whose emotion and desperation had overcome him, everything happened at once. The surroundings spun out of his control and he realized with a sudden lurch of his heart and his uneven consciousness that nothing was as he thought.
Behind him, the canine creature that he had sensed cried once more. The cry was louder now, and he realized he was a fool to ever mistake it for one of Imogen's playful chirps. There was sadness here that Ashamin could not imagine the Kitsune ever feeling in the company of her bonded.
Ashamin knew, then, too, that whoever walked with the creature was not Lena, but someone else entirely. He froze; fear devoured him. His long tail dripped slowly down the arch wall, sliding onto the floor in a quiet lack of ceremony. He lifted his gaze to stare at the wall before him, dimly lit and revealing the faint reflection of a long, straight glow and ripples of amber. It was not Lena who stood at his back: the back of a fool. It was someone else entirely, someone Ashamin had never before known.
He was too scared to turn and face the other. He was endowed with a desire to become something better, but not the bravery such a hope required of him. He stood silent, waiting for something unexpected, perhaps the sharp crack of hooves upon his spine or the tough bite of sharp canines at his hocks. He stood silent even as she spoke. He stood waiting, stood wondering if now, somehow, he would die.
Maybe the fear of his end was because death was on his mind. Maybe it was because of the haunting image of his father's corpse, growing colder by the second, emptying of its soul. Maybe Ashamin just wanted it.
But no matter what it was that stopped him, he could not bring himself to answer the mare as she spoke. And it became clear, in the crystal tones of her voice echoing across the cave, that she who stood closer to the entrance was a mare. Ashamin considered her words carefully, trying to piece together their meaning and what little he might be able to learn about their speaker.
The mare sounded young. Younger even, perhaps, than he. If only he was brave enough to turn and look. If only she could say something to ignite something other than his cowardly sorrow, his impassioned, impossible pain. She spoke to him what seemed to be unfortunate truths. Truths of death, of utter decay and the meaninglessness of life. If we were never alone were we ever ourselves? Ashamin couldn't stop wondering.
But no, it couldn't be true. What she said, he could not let himself believe it. With the sudden rage he had hoped for, he swung around to face her, his long tail a whip, his black eyes lit by the glow of her horn, and--by faith, by any faith Ashamin had ever even thought he might have believed in, she truly was the image of tragic beauty in youth.
And though her companion, some horned beast with the build of a wolf, the eyes and perhaps even mind of a predator, had drawn closer to Ashamin, he did not care. He advanced, moving past the shadows cast by the smaller, mournful companion. He pushed past all fear, all rational thought, and brought himself close to the mare, his face just inches away, his rough horn threatening to scrape the skin on her nose. He wanted to make himself taller, to tower over her height and the delicate perfection of her horn, but all he could do was lift himself in the faintest rear. He landed with a soft clattering of white, cleft hooves on ice, and spoke.
"None of this," he answered her, his voice clearer than he had ever before heard it since the death of Veril, clear with determination borne of experience, and his heart thudding in his chest,
"none of this is true!"
He pulled his body past her, letting it perhaps brush her side in some sort of latent emotional threat, and let his long tail thrust towards her chest as it sliced through the air. "We aren't who we were when we die," Ashamin went on, his voice beginning to lose its confidence. The echoes of his tone started to shake and scatter in the cave; his heart slowly began its mournful, shattered descent into reality. "We're alone then, because we can't bear to think of ourselves as with anyone else. We can't bear to cause that much grief with our passing," Ashamin continued, his voice starting to sound pleading. He walked past the mare, looking out beyond the cave entrance, back to where he had come from. Maybe he should never have left. Maybe he should have lain at his father's side to die, after all.
"We're different when we die," he said in a mere whisper, to himself but still loud enough for his strange company to hear.
We had to be different when we died, he thought. We just had to be.
That couldn't have really been his father lying there, dead in the snow.
That couldn't have really been the end of all he'd ever loved: lying there, dead, in the snow.
The mare made a parting comment, something Ashamin barely understood. Something he couldn't make himself care about.
"My space?" he asked, his voice a defeated rumble strapped to the pounding in his chest and the blood rising in his ears. "Faith knows I don't belong here," he said aimlessly, something like a chuckle falling from his lips, breaking to pieces where it fell.
In quiet, in the horrible realization that life had an end but love never would, Ashamin silently continued his speech.
I belong with the dead.
[[For Sikeax. Sorry this got really long, you gave me all the muse and Ashamin all the feels. ;-;]]
Table by Jen, with help from Avis
See Ashamin's profile for more information about Lochan, Rakt, and his various items.
All magic and force allowed, barring death and permanent injury.
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