|
Shadow corrupt, blackness melted into obsidian statue, with a marble skull for face and white armor, the armor made of bones from ancient warlords, resting upon her blackened shoulders. She does not walk, but stalks the night as if waiting for the prey to fall upon, teeth bared, ears pinned, eyes wild and dark and promising pain; she is scarred and wise, bitter and feral, unpredictable and mad as the rabid dog, but as sane as the hunting wolf. Lady Death is a contradiction, an oxymoron, a series of conflicting promises and is a conflicted being; passionate, resolute, firm in her beliefs and jagged dark dreams. Silent as a predator after its prey, she wanders and watches and observes with the detachment of the scientist watching the rat writhe in pain; no regret, no sorrow, no pain nor anguish. Reality in all brutality, that she is and more. Untameable, unable to be held nor controlled, always pulling and testing boundaries, the kelpie in it's bridle, a hardly containable hellion you can never turn your back on, lest she rip your head from your neck and eat you whole.
This is Confutatis, Lady Death, Queen of Shadow and midnight mysteries, of the things that go bump in the night, ruler of monsters that hide in closets.
It is one of the days of many she has spent in solitude and conformity, careful to keep herself free from the scrutiny of Seele Glassfox and Eris Madeyes, one of the more recent one where the moon sits sweetly in the sky, serene and pretty, shallow and fake. Confutatis prefers the dark, the night that holds her dear, but what she misses in the pitch blackness of Before, when the moon and stars did not decorate the sky. At least the sun, so bright and so blinding, has not returned. If she had it her way, it never would, and that would be her happy ending. But it is not so; one day she will command the world and rule it, but not today, and even she cannot order the gods around. The skullface does not speak, does not lavish praise and attention; she watches with her cold yellow eye, twisting her lips into a sickly parody of a smile, as she finds Bloodmane blocking the pathway.
Bloodmane, mistress Eris, Madeyes, Madwoman, the mare she does not like, too driven and too wild, too unpredictable. Allies, her cracked mind reminds, but Confutatis' coarse tail flicks across her flanks, and her head tosses, scattering the thoughts of empty promises and falsities. The second mare, a unicorn, pretty and petite, young and untainted, an urchin still wet behind the ears, wandering alone. How would the blood look spilled across her rich umber coat? Lock-jawed, straight-legged, stone-eyed, Skullface halts behind her, nostrils quivering as they inhale the cold air hardly lessened by the cool moon's light.
"You will not leave." Her voice a hoarse crack of the whip, the crunch of gravel and groan of ancient trees slowly falling in the windstorm strong. Blatant disrespect, flagrant and unabashed, she ignores Eris, but for the surliest of surly nods, the tiniest dip of her head. You are not better than me, pretty mare. It twists her gut, dries her mouth, acrid tastes on her tongue. How they all hide it, their madness, their wildness, their pure and wholesome incompleteness; let it out. Let it burn and sing and watch the world crumble beneath you. Stop hiding; stop playing your game of charades, pretending to be everything you are not.
Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.
"Silverhorn, look in the waters." Voice grates, chokes, growls, rumbles. Hoof falls. Glistening water sprays, tepid and frugal yellow-brown. Dead, white and grotesquely water-logged, scream and moan and cry out. They burn and itch to be let out, to walk the lands. One day, but not today. Is there a necromancer in these lands? A raiser of the dead, controller of nefarious spirits? Flowers blessed by the moon blossom at the edge of the flat, glass waters. Silver and white and cream. "You can be one of them. Throw yourself in, take your chances, charcoal mouth. They will drown you, and you will die among the countless others."
Yellow-eye lifts her gaze, trying to find Eris'. "You can fall in the waters, Silverhorn. I'll push you in, bitch throwing the bone to bury."
CONFUTATIS
and when you meet me, you at long last acquaintance yourself with death in all its magnificent glory.
|
.svg/2000px-Google_Chrome_icon_(2011).svg.png){kind=icon}
