somebody shine a light
I'm frozen by the fear in me

Rid of the monsters inside your head
Put all your faults to bed
You can be king again . . .

But how could he, when his world had come to ruin? When his sun had ceased to rise and set, the stars had died and gone out, and the rivers no longer flowed? Soon they would dry up, barren and empty, and all life would be gone—

“But you must, Mauja,” someone was saying, thick legs pressing into his spine, trapping him against the body of his child; “Your child would wish it.” What was he talking about? What on earth was he talking about? What did Tembovu know of what Snö wished? Why did he have to remain a Queen of the Edge?

But you must, Tembovu had said, and Mauja felt a racking sob tear its way out of his chest—like he couldn't refuse the giant, like a scolded, exhausted child trying to climb back onto his feet and keep running, when all he wanted was to fall into the roadside ditch and weep. Why do I have to? he wondered, and that was when he looked to Roskuld, and tried to give it to her, before sagging back against Snö's limp body and hoping the world would let him be—because he hadn't been strong enough to get up again. He couldn't keep running this marathon of life with a broken heart and pierced lungs.

Except, of course, they wouldn't let him be.

“Lee, please. I don’t…don’t want—“ I won't force you.

“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Me neither, really.

“Mauja is— was— a lead of the World’s Edge.” I suppose I was.

"And you, my friend, are you certain of this choice? You've lost something unimaginable."

Certain? Certain? Of course he wasn't certain! How could he be certain of anything, but the fucking void gaping in his chest where his heart should be? He was trying to do something at least, to not leave the Edge in ruin and confusion, like a boat in a storm but with no helmsman to steer it—in all honesty, as long as the closest horse to him had been an adult he would've tried to pawn the Edge off on them, to give them something, anything, and so that he could fade into the oblivion he craved so much.

As he looked up from Snö's body, some blood stuck on his face, he happened to catch sight of Ophelia.

He had only been slightly aware of her presence, half-convinced her voice had been some hallucination of his, but there she stood, and looking at her was like receiving a sledgehammer to the face. "And no words can offer you solace. But do you mean the words you speak?"

His daughter had died, and they were pecking at him like vultures around a carcass. It made him want to yell and storm off, to be alone with his grief, but he was trapped in the sand—there was no way he could rise up without trampling Snö, and he wasn't going to do that.

Wasn't. Going. To. Do. That.

He gritted his teeth, ears flat against his skull, soul at war; anger was spilling out the cracks, because it was easier to be angry than it was to be sad. And if Ophelia thought she had the right to be angry when Snö had just died, Mauja sure as fuck had the same right.

Like, what was she even angry about? That Mauja had happened to offer the Edge to Roskuld? That he hadn't said thank you for taking Snö's last thoughts, and speaking them out loud?

This was exactly why he didn't want to be conscious. Why couldn't they just take their bickering elsewhere, and leave him to mourn?

He couldn't find the energy to deal with it. To bother with it. His head fell down into the sand, muzzle half-buried in the strands of Snö's mane, and he closed his eyes with a sigh. “But you must, Mauja,” Tembovu was saying in his head, and Roskuld was crying, choking out his name. Was this how pitiful, how pathetic, the world was, that it could not function without him? Were they not all grown up, capable of making decisions for themselves? Why did everyone have to be so fucking scared?

"I don't care," he said flatly, his rough voice without passion, without inflection, without life. Each time he breathed, his chest was trapped between Tembovu's legs and Snö's unyielding back.

It never pressed back against him.

His world had fallen apart with these God battles, and they expected things of him still. A short, bitter laugh accompanied his tears. "Look at how much I can protect anyone," and the voice that had been so cold was rank with that bitterness as he poisoned himself. "Look at how much I want to get up each day and not throw myself off the fucking Edge!" The last was a hysterical shriek, his body convulsing with it once, digging deeper into the blood-wet sand.

"I. Don't. Care," he repeated through clenched teeth, spitting it out before the ocean pulled him under again. "You take it, then."

Just leave me out of it.

Please.

[ @Ophelia @Roskuld @Tembovu || I'm amused they thought he meant 'I want to die' when he meant 'I don't wanna lead the Edge anymore' <3 ]

somebody make me feel alive
and shatter me