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»› C A S S I U S ‹«
Misplaced was the gray, in the thick of bodies that surrounded him in the Basin. Mass specters that grew in the distance, so physically near – and consequently miles and years away from his wandering honeyed eyes. A slave has unraveled his shackles, and yet, still, the world overhangs above him and beyond him, preventing his spirit from tasting the tranquility of a land filled with milk and honey. A promised land only dreamt of, and barely believable. Out of reach and pleasant hopes awarded to those who only sought to drink in its kind mystery, escaping misery with foolish wanting.
But here he was, unbound by chains or the scrupulous eyes of the sentries set on guard. No wavering whip that cracks into the air, or the trembling bodies of friends – lives, brimming full of potential – slowly fall apart in every way imaginable. Heroes died unsung, and cowards – like he – lived to sing and breathe another day.
It always started by seizing his chest first. The toxic thoughts of mind and memory congeal, and spread their poison with a familiar taste. And the only thing that prevents him from loosing air, from loosing his mind are a few simple words; just keep breathing. Just keep breathing. Always breathing. From a crawl and push of air, to the rustle of leaves or the hollow, heavy droll of the mountains singing, remind Cassius he is quite alive. Pushing back their faces, their voices that haunt his dreams and the smells and the tears that drive the poison further into his veins.
Until he finds himself alone and purposeless in the valley of his new home, aimless amidst the fold just as the sun peaks the crests. With a startled awareness, one that brightens as the day progresses, he shakes off the memories that have led him to this foreign place. Not without the toll of a sleepless night, slowing the stallion’s steps and fog his tumbling mind. He has no use for it the further it swirls – so as it tumbles without any true direction he wanders just the same. Unsettled and hollowed out by gleaming, nightmarish eyes that wait for him in the forests– or the cracked and dried lips that anticipate every drip of water that pools from elevated slopes, and feed the verdant grasses below his hooves.
These apparitions have somehow led him closer to the warrior-prince. Hues of black ink, and cool indigo asunder on the floor. This place is holy, perhaps, and trespassers like himself – a vagrant, an ignorant child – finds himself misplaced and embarrassed to see the General just as so. Despite the nobility that imbeds itself within his dark crown, and inhabits the bone and sinew that provide rest, for one who has been relentless, foreboding, hard-working in their lands.
There are creatures ahead that block the path to the King’s tomb. And despite their presence, the gray tries to spy the swell of the warrior-prince’s chest for signs of air. As Cassius’ body, tensing, coiling for fear and reluctance, his mind is settled by the simple assessment of the stallion’s well being. He has no idea how his presence might effect the curious things that lurk the grounds. And saves him space between them and their monarch.
But before he can relinquish his gaze from their faces, as his tail twitches and sways, he notices the jostling charms that break between his thoughts of caution. Attached to a branch, an acorn – and there beside it – blue, blue as the rain or deep oceans, blue as the sky that lays bear today with the subtle stroke of sunshine.
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