In some intervals, he was nothing.
 
A king of pieces and broken, fragile flesh – living off of desolation, off of isolation, just a hair’s breadth away from disaster and ruin. Master of despair, of loneliness, of the forlorn interludes with naught in between but sunken marrow, disheveled frowns, and the missing fragments floating away, away, away. They scorned him, they laughed at him, they hissed and smirked and snickered the days away, and because he was too proud, too strong, too haughty to ask, he remained caught in the dissolution, in the absence, of memories, of what could have been, and what ought to be.
 
Sometimes he saw flickers of the ocean cast over his eyes, waves seeking, absolving, breaking over the slivers and splinters of his unrelenting soul, until he gave in and wished, prayed, dreamed. He’d watch it shatter moments later, when reality carved its way through his depraved, debauched soul, cast away the virtues he’d held, clasped, and clenched, leaving him only to wonder, only to beg in the stunning, wicked silence.
 
Sometimes he heard rain patter against the cave and stood, silent and vigil, awaiting the beginning or the end, standing outside the aperture and letting it douse him – soaked, besotted, drenched in something of hers. Ghosts played across his eyes and dazzled his senses, hallucinations and stars, chimeras and wraiths, and though he never kneeled to their glorious abyss, he permitted the game – because then, and only then, he could see them as he recalled. A lady of the sea dancing, a girl with snippets of darkness and light, with flowers in her hair, with blossoms following her wake; a siren song, dreamed and drowning him whole.
 
Sometimes they simply weren’t there, and he had to admit defeat. It cursed his soul and blackened his already mottled heart, tore at any melted bits and molded it back together in more nefarious arts. It became a shrouded, bestial soul, beating in tenderness for his son, for his mountains, and for his herd members amidst and wandering, and never anything else. He didn’t ask the gods to find his family. He didn’t follow the narrow trail they’d left behind. He waited and waited and waited, loved and hated, soulless, vacant, veiled and unholy, protecting himself from the inevitable inquiry.
 
What if they never come back?
 
The Reaper’s spine prickled against the midnight void; he nearly sneered in spite of his regal indifference, poised again for another excursion with no meaning and no end. The slate of his cruel eyes caught the fibers of the Threshold’s gate and wondered how his daggers had led him here, how his soul had been trapped, ensconced, and enfolded into the locked parlors and the hooded gazes – and may have gone entirely, back into his shell, back into his abyss, had an item not caught his eye.
 
A flower, tucked and nestled amidst the moss.
 
Ivory and delicate, whimsical and winsome; a spark of hope bounded through his frozen veins and he glanced onward, his pace frenetic and fervent, because it was spring and of course there would be blossoms, petals conspiring everywhere to delude him –
 
But there were more. Blue and lavender, rosy and green, powdered and speckled, making a trail, harboring secrets, divinity…
 
He followed them in a rapid, feral pace – matched ferocity with satanic reverie, carving Lucifer rapture in the denizen of their art, of their creation, only allowing one oath, one prayer to slip through his lips (let it be her), silent, inaudible, intangible. When his movement ceased, when familiarity reigned and drummed and sang, his daughter was within his stare: beautiful, incandescent, a picture of her mother, of him, of everything he’d strived for. There was someone else there, talking, waiting, but the beast didn’t care.
 
His attention, his devotion, was solely to her.
 
“Loth-" The Lord’s throat caught on a gnarled wish and a frayed dream, twigs snapped beneath his stride as he slowly inched closer, and wrapped his head around her neck. For a few, brief tender moments, he allowed himself the opportunity, the chance, to touch her again, to ensure she was alive, she was whole, she was well, she was real, before relinquishing her back into the fold. 

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