Immolation of the Moon

By Ashley Mason

Forma /frumô

They knew naught where it came from, only that one day it was there.

Derkaz / Deorcnes

The man could feel the curved stones of the well pressing upon him. His legs ached with an uncomfortable numbness, cramped in the oppressive space, arms laid limp by his sides as if weighed down by an unseen presence. The ground beneath him sodden, with the strong stench of putrid waters that hung in the damp air. He winced to the blinding bloom as he peered skyward. The dying light tumbled down from the circular opening far above, fading into the dark deep in the belly of the pit.

Averting his gaze from the light, he resigned to the darkness that embraced him. Welcoming it. Heavy was his heart, crestfallen and lost to the inevitable end that he had awoken and all that brought him here. An undeniable ache of a rotten soul riddled with worms. Whispers of the earth crept through the stone from between the cracks. He heard them all in their pleading, wishing them to leave him be.

Leuhtaz / lēoht

The blazing orange light cascaded across the bedroom in the brilliance of the morning sun, rousing Wim from his troubled slumber. Despite the sun’s blessing, the open space among the rafters remained enshrouded in a peculiar, unnatural darkness. Pulled from the nightmare before its conclusion, he gazed ensorcelled into the void above trying to divine meaning to the dread that lingered in his belly. The foggy recollections obfuscated his thoughts to its significance and no answers were to come to the light. No reason to its being that plagued his dreams and left him bereft.

The hazy spell was broken by another, a girl no older than 9 autumns; his daughter, Clara. Brighter than the morning sun, she lit up the room as she jumped onto the bed, giggling as she voraciously tickled Wim. He cast his absurd thoughts aside, if just for a moment, melting to Clara’s warming presence. His laughs ringing hollow to the space above.

The days were short. The morning sun to break the horizon skipped across its edge all to briefly before sinking to give way to the long dark soon thereafter. The creeping darkness consumed the listless light. Their quaint home crested atop a hill that overlooked the village of Abscheu, far enough away from the hubbub of many and the wintry chimney smoke- it troubled Clara so. With the tightening grip of winter their stores shrunk to dismally low levels with little chance of a caravan or merchant coming for some time, the path to the south blocked off by an avalanche of snow. Many feared they would not survive the deepening dark of winter. Many thought they would go starving mad.

The prior evening’s fall capped the piercing, evergreen trees and blanketed the ground with a delicate layer of snow, turning to mud where the pair had walked back and forth. Wim tended to the loft of pigeons. A morning ritual that kept him sane through the days, occupying his thoughts from the worst. The pigeons flocked to the handfuls of scattered seeds and grains tossed across the muddied-snow as he cleaned their dovecote. It stunk no less with the thinning of the flock to the winter’s cold and Wim’s desperate needs to survive. The dovecote nigh silent to the sounds of their cooing of late. Clara always followed behind Wim during the morning to tend to her own little squab. She’d named them Meri, all ruffled feathers with few patches of yellow down and a stubby tail. Meri nestled to the warmth of Clara’s cupped hands, as cosy as it were under its own mother’s wing, huddled against her feathered breast.

Meri wasn’t the only one to rely on Clara, being the only fledgling to survive the biting season. For Wim, Clara’s bright smile and incurable laughter offered all the reason for being; the shining hope to the dark days; the reason to carry on. Wim did all he could to provide for Clara, warmth and shelter and food for her belly. Yet he felt shamed. The fireplace reduced to smouldering cinders, the roof leaked in drips and drops with the melt of snow, and he could only offer stale bread and old stew, boiled down to a thick sludge that didn’t smell right, masked with herbs and pepper. He would make sure she was to survive the worst of winters and the strangeness abound town, for a better tomorrow, one far, far away from here.

As Wim scraped up the droppings into a bucket and replaced the bedding of hay Clara kept gazing back through the open gate, to the path trailing from their home to the town of Abscheu. Wim could sense her wishes, knotted and ever-tightening in endless thoughts. He couldn’t recall how long it had been- days or weeks- and he was clueless how to tell Clara her mother wasn’t coming back. She’ll be back soon, he said, lacking conviction in his voice. In Clara’s silent reply, Wim couldn’t tell if she believed him or found the truth in his lie. 

Avoiding the overwhelming tension that pulled taught, an unspoken question lingering on the edge of Clara’s thoughts, Win stepped from the dovecote. His duty done. A pigeon caught Wim’s attention as he stored the bucket and shovel. From their foraging a white worm dangled from its beak. The pigeon’s black, beady eye locked onto him in its unnerving gaze, as though another spoke to him through their eyes before whacking the wriggling worm against the ground till it stopped it’s struggles and the pigeon swallowed it whole.

Wim shooed the pigeons away, returning inside.

Clara reluctantly followed behind.

Lyġe / lugiz

Wim welcomed her tender touch, ensnared by her spider’s web of love. Wrapped up in the passionate embrace, a touch like icy wisps danced over his naked flesh. It was a strange love he could not fathom. Rooted deep in his heart the bitterest disdain concealed by a loving embrace; flowery words tainted by a cruelty they often bore. Vivid. Richly. Putrid. It clung to him like congealed blood and fat, burning upon his flesh. 

Trapped by her love, he cowered.

Forma /frumô

I looked down upon the village and watched their consumption in disgust. A madness, spreading like the plague. They’ll likely devour me too before long. 

Derkaz / Deorcnes 

In the darkness, time held no place. The opening overhead offered no clues to the days gone or the hour it held, trapped in an endless singular moment in time, the moon forever glowing in all it’s grandeur. 

What does it matter anyway, death would come for all soon enough, he thought. 

From between the eroding stonework of the well a worm emerged. Pale white, blindly surveying its surroundings. Did it sense Wim’s presence nearby, searching for him? A messenger? Following the first, more appeared from all around, squeezing their way through seemingly from nowhere, then, at his fingers, the sodden earth seethed as worms penetrated through the ground like seedlings seeking the pale moon light above, answering the calling from beyond the glow. 

Wim’s body ached, different from the physical restraints of the well that bound him. A constriction gripped his chest as his breathing drew shallow. A churning sickness swirled in his belly, a foul taste rising to his mouth watching the worms creep, stale and ashen as a gross hunger pleaded. How long had it been since he last ate or drank? Wim sensed the worm’s wordless desires through the throbbing pulse of their squirming knot of their heart, conspiring along side his sudden and insatiable appetite. Was it their desire, calling him? Or was it a delusion, his mind absorbed into the endless void he suffered.

Dare I...? 

The question lingered longer than he’d liked. Disquieted by his thoughts, he dismissed the notion as it flourished to a forbidden deathly flower; such absurdity shouldn’t be entertained, not even for the sweetest of its tastes or to stave off an unpleasant of deaths. But the sensation smouldered like a pit of embers within his abdomen, a beguiling voice pleading to consume for all it’s wants.

Wim tugged on the maiden worm. It didn’t resist as he plucked it from its home accidentally tearing the squishy thing in two. A trail of black seeped down the mossy stone as its other half shrivelled back into hiding. A heavy resistance pulled on his arms, counter to his motions as he brought the worm closer to his lips. As it thrashed in its gleeful death throes visions of his wife’s hollow and empty eyes thrust to his mind. Her eternal gaze upon him as the ache in his belly enflamed, doubling over in anguish. He flicked the worm away, repulsed by the rising urge it brought and the pain he’d suffered. Be quiet, he muttered angrily as he mushed it into the soil. 

Quiet!

Pulling away his hand away Wim knocked something. He peered down to see a skull by his side. Small. Like that of a child’s.

Leuhtaz / lēoht

Wim awoke in panic, sweat soaked through his night clothes and musty blankets. Paralysed by the trepidations in his heart, he lay staring into the darkened space among the rafters. It swelled. Roiling. Breathing. His hand reached out tentatively beside him, searching for that something that was missing- his whole world, his life. It offered little reprieve knowing the space beside him was empty, only the lumpy hay-filled mattress on which he slept. Did it suggest the worse or offer hope in his heart that she was outside waiting for him.

However, Wim couldn’t rouse himself from bed to seek the unwanted truth that awaited him in the other room. He lay there, bewitched by the brooding miasma above.

Would she...? 

No. Don’t ask.

The rouge-tinted-orange of the dawn shone through the window; the room burned brightly in its brilliance of the new day with a promise that happiness could exist. All an illusion. A trick of the mind into believing in hope, manifesting a truth into existence where none could be found.  When in fact, it was nothing more than a curse.

Lost to the swirling darkness, Wim barely noticed the door burst open, and leaping from halfway across the room Clara slammed into him. Flipping the worn blanket from him, she urged him to rise with the sun. She rolled in behind him and heaved with all her might to force him from bed like he was a hibernating bear (not that Clara would for a bear). Sluggish to clear his thoughts, all but dismissing the nightmare welling in the hollow pit of his stomach, he relented to her wishes.  

In the living area, Wim reheated the stew upon the fire and served them both. There wasn’t much left to share. Wim discretely served himself half as much before tearing a chunk stale bread for Clara, resting it atop her stew. Clara would rebuke him, sharing her half in return if she only knew. 

Wim couldn’t bear to see her suffer. Worse than the dire winter and starving to death, the notion of heading down to the village for some supplies of any kind and leaving his daughter alone kept him close to home and uneasy. He couldn’t take her along, serving to spare her from the villager’s ramblings that hungered for something more than a morsel to keep from starving. Nor leave her alone, as he feared worse what they would do in his absence. They sought madness. Though he could not deny the need to do more than keeping their solitude and for praying the pass to melt. What good that did, he thought. They would starve before long with the Gods watching.

Every waking moment Wim could not escape the sense of the world opening-up to consume him and his beloved daughter. The space overhead shrouded in the unnatural dark, following him from room to room. A nebulous miasma, analysing his every motion and reading his every thought and feasting upon his anxiety and fear from the beyond their realm of reality. To escape outside, stepping beyond the bounds of their home the sky opened wide to consume all in its glorious orange glow, to praise and worship. 

Was madness the only answer? 

Wim endured, biding time for the mountain pass’ wintry obstruction to melt with a break in the cold, and then he would take his daughter and brave the journey southward bound, far from Abscheu. Far from the insanity.

Lyġe / lugiz 

A face hollow; a vacant countenance.

It peered at him no less. Not out of curiosity. Judging. Condemning. Many hundreds of hollow eyes lined its face, all varying in size, a tiny mouth with pincers clacked wordlessly beneath. Through the many empty sockets of its eyes glistened a beautiful void, with the brilliance of a clear night sky and a dazzle of vibrant colours swirling in a pool of ink. Its bulbous body rose from the dirt and mud and worms, sloughing the earth like a second skin. Reborn. From it’s hind, the flesh parted down the middle and peeled away in two layers, unfurling to reveal a double pair of wings shaking off its dormancy. The fore wings thick and leathery, the dark hue of red, faint veins pulsed throughout. The hind pair far thinner, like delicately flayed flesh stretched thin and strung out on display. Coarse white hairs sprouted from the concealed under-hide, cracked and filled with holes. Not unlike those of its hollow face, though tightly knit and almost uniform in its structure. It reminded him akin to a bee’s hive growing within the abomination, or was it made from it? Did they hold something within, its young waiting to feast? Worms that thrived in the earth or had they long since grown infertile. Useless. Hollow. A womb desolate.

Forma /frumô

I remember her dimpled smile and that green calico dress she loved to wear. She begged her mother to make it for her, just to look like her. A smaller version of her mum. But that’s not true. Not at all.

Derkaz / Deorcnes

The well towered over him, embracing him. The blooming light at the end a distant reality he could barely remember. From years of disuse and all but dried up, the stonework of the well succumbed to the elements and encroaching nature. Roots caused the stonework to shift and disfigure its form, a thick mud seeped through the gaps like the earth was bleeding. Worms writhed within, faint whispers imploring his attention. Nothing he could discern clearly from the cacophony of hundreds little worms, only the pleading hunger to be sated. 

Through the many, one familiar voice cried out. Though its words foreign to his ears they spoke, their meaning wasn’t lost from the sensation crawling under his skin, undeniable to their vehement deprecation and disgust. He touched the damp earth and the voices ceased their murmuring, listening in reply. Attentive to his needs. Was it all in his fractured mind, lost to the darkness? After a moment’s quiet they squirmed in between his fingers, his hand sinking into the earth as that one voice whispered to him; Kind and generous. Beguiling. Comforting...

Wim wrenched free from the grasp. The child’s skull shifted as the reality of the words echoed in his mind, punctuating through all the voices. He feared of what they meant. Hated them, knowing they held him hostage. 

KILL HER!

Leuhtaz / lēoht

The well at the bottom of the hill had long since dried up and its wooden housing dismantled. The rope and bucket cast to the side, while the wooden frame and roof shingles broken to bits and used to tide them through the bitter cold of winter. Wim preferred being surround by spruce and birch than people, out of sight of the village and their heavy-handed preaching and condemnation of others, to reflect in quiet by the well. A place of solace. A place to hide.

Clara peered inside the well trying to pierce through the impenetrable gloom that swelled at the bottom, for no other reason than her curiosity. She turned her head the side and listened intently, hand cupped around her ear while the other protected her squab from the cold, close to her breast. Clara held her breath for a moment, focusing only on the sounds of the deep darkness. From her countenance, something didn’t seem right. A sense of worry and confusion painted painfully upon her face, a touch of concern behind her hazel eyes.

It couldn’t... No. 

The pit of his stomach caught in restless turmoil as his irrational nightmares crept into the waking world. Even out of sight of the village and the vile abomination he couldn’t escape its looming shroud that gripped them every day. The well overflowed with it’s foreboding presence, chilling his ande as he fought against the all-consuming dread.

Had Clara sensed the same? 

...As above, so below...

Wim hadn’t taken a step towards Clara to pull her away when he noticed the muddied snow at his feet convulse and throb. The words of another wormed into his conscious; vivid and putrid. Wim watched as Clara held the squab so sweetly in her hands, seated on the edge of the well. A smile to lighten the world. A heart to warm the soul. 

The miasma all consuming.

KILL HER!

Triwwiþō 

Partake in the flesh and promise to me.

Lyġe / lugiz 

Swift and powerful, the creature struck from its quietude. Wim nary a thought to react before it seized him in its spiny pincers. The faintest of touches upon his flesh as it begun spinning him between its spindly legs, its abdomen tucked underbody weaving a viscid thread forming a misshapen cocoon, leaving his face untouched save a few stray strands. The creature cradled him from a dendroid canopy webbing overhead- roots of the celestial. It reached to its hind with its fore-legs, collecting a viscose fluid that seeped from the numerous holes, feeding him tenderly with the beads of life like the dawning dew. It’s hollow eyes eternal, staring at him as he suckled on the golden substance. An underlying sweetness lingered between mouthfuls only to be washed away to the initial bitterness that came with each serving. Thick in his throat. Clinging to his lips.

Caught in her embrace, the cocoon wrapped taught as he feasted upon her succour. Waves of euphoria washed over him, escalating with each mouthful, dripping from the corners of his lips till he shuddered in climatic pleasure. His body slackened, held aloft by the roots. Mind awash in nothingness. In the hollows of her eyes worms fell on him like a congealed guck. Too weak to resist and struggle, he let them in.

KILL HER!

Forma /frumô

They slaughtered the weak, the unworthy. Those without the appetite or desire to partake in consumption. All but her, my lovely.

Derkaz / Deorcnes

Wim gazed upon the blinding circle, his only piece of sanity in the dark- the false moon to hold dominion over all. Its presence remained a lost reverie to a reality he once knew, a meaningless memory in the presence of his fate down in the pit of his own making. Nothing he felt was real, only a figment of reality in the moon’s gaze. Or was it all somehow real in perpetuity of his demise, one he could not escape. The presence of the moon inviting him into its embrace. The false moon watched him eternally, for all the good and bad it may be. How could he trust what he didn’t know. How could he know otherwise.

Manifesting a new reality in the light of the false moon, one of hope.

Lies. More lies to cope.

...

A waxing crescent crept from the edges of the celestial glow above to consume all like a ravenous god, blotting out all ‘til naught of the light could be seen. A halo surrounded the eclipsing body, a faint blur of reality coming to focus writhing violently before crashing upon him with a gut-wrenching thud, knocking the air out of his lungs. He didn’t look. He somehow knew what it meant-- from a reality some time ago coming in horrific flares as he regained his breath. Brilliance of the moon came full again as he felt the weight of this fallen star upon his lap. The voices’ curses turned into a torrent in their multitude, unending in their revulsion and merriment.

MIÞ MĒR GEBUNDEN!

Forma /frumôThe dark moon swirled, the luminous white line bordering its form. It wriggled. It pulsed. I can feel it. Inviting.

Blut /  blōþą 

The idyllic charm of the morning glow vanished, pale and ashen in the space shared by the darkened miasma overhead. Wim waited in anticipation for her arrival, gazing at the vacant ceiling as an all-consuming sorrow filled his heart to overflowing. He couldn’t tear his focus from the space above. Breathing, in and out, conjointly. The miasma feeding upon his emotions as he relived the nightmare. Thoughts fluttered like stray dreams of another life, another time and place he could not understand. The wretched nightmare replaying, over and over, all visions ending with a fallen body held in his arms. He dared not look, closing his eyes tight to deny the very possibility. Deny a reality he didn’t know but felt all too real.

He prayed silently to the burning sun for Clara to burst though that door with her morning ray of brilliance. 

Its absence; its response. 

Forma /frumôWould they live in praise of their god, spreading their madness beyond Abschu like a wildfire or would they rather die in the fires of their god enflamed? A sacrifice to those greater among the stars.

Derkaz / Deorcnes 

Wim’s flesh itched. It crawled with worms burrowing blindly through his body like it was already theirs to consume. A gift to the abandoned god. Would they erupt through his skin like fat little hairs? Would they feast upon the muscle and bone within, till he was nothing more than a vessel for something else? Becoming something more than he had ever dared to dream? 

Leuhtaz / lēoht

Wim sat cross-legged by the fire pit as he had many wintry mornings with Clara. The cold wrapped him up in the presence of the empty fire, offering its own meagre comfort he didn’t deny. A unfamiliar embrace, a promise not filled with lies or deceit. The cushion beside him remained vacant as he cradled Clara’s little squab in his hands, holding them close to his bosom. It was all he could do to keep from the grasping the blade and taking it upon himself. 

He'd rather let madness take him. Take his fill till naught remained of himself than accept any part of the lie that consumed his reality. Tears rolled down his cheeks, warm upon his cold skin. Meri snuggled into his hands. A radiant warmth it shared with him, relying on his in turn. 

His protective hands… 

What good were they to Clara.

Forma /frumô

I asked her to hide, somewhere out of sight. Away from the burning fires that consumed, where none would think to search. Only give her time. A chance to escape their mania and survive to see another day. 

Derkaz / Deorcnes

The villagers threw stones and rotten food at the heretics, cursing their name under the sky of the fiery moon. Wim could bear it all, protecting Clara from the worst of what came. Clenching his teeth to the pain, he wouldn’t let them hear him scream, submitting to their desires. In his arms, Clara remained stoic and tenacious, strong like her mother. She did not whimper to the barrage of detritus and insults determined to break them, for being too weak and unwilling to accept the neophytes’ blessing. Clara would never, Wim determined, for love of no god would she partake. 

Against the burning sky- their world in flames, the abomination taken upon judgement of the realm of reality by Wim only enflamed their passion, far from his desires to banish them – the villagers raised their hands in praise to the flames of revelations and the voices erupted into revelry, chanting wiðsōgi. From the crowd, a voice reigned proud, and Wim’s heart sank to that familiar beguiling tune. Her sweetest chords tainted with a mad lust for the forbidden flesh, manipulating the wills of men and women to her own, as one voice. One purpose. The bitter taste of disgust rose to his mouth akin to the abomination’s ochre flesh as her defiled love churned the rabble in a voracious frenzy.  Wim comforted Clara, saving the last of her moments from hearing her mother’s maddening curses upon them, promising a beautiful future far from the hysteria of the villagers and their abomination. He stroked her hair, picking out bits of leaves and dirt and rotten food, whispering all she needed to hear.  If only he could save her.

Droplets fell upon his skin from above,  the unwanted touch of a gods blessing. It stung like needles. Gazing heavenward, the raging flames licked the clear night sky, tasting the twilight stars of the unknowable. The unknowing. As the faint smell of burning fat piqued his senses, cheers erupted and the downpour that came. Flesh seared, branding the pair in the molten aspect of the villagers’ conflagrated god for eternal blasphemy.

Only one love. All as one flesh.

Anointed, born screaming.

Forma /frumô

Would I follow the same? Could I possibly? Did I? No. Nonono. Never. It wasn’t. No!

Leuhtaz / lēoht

Wim looked down upon the village, remembering where they first met. He wished he’d never. He’d seen her by the stables, adjoining the Inn where merchants would come and go with the turn of the seasons- the snow to melt and warmer spring to follow. A merchant all the same, following the trade, seeking a place to stable to her horse and to rest her head for the evenings. She had a silver tongue to beguile, and a fuller figure, ample of bosom to entice and enchant the wills of many men. How could he forget... Not that she would let him. Her voice dripping with sweetest of honey. But her eyes…. They were always hard, the darkest of blues nigh on black with luminous limbal rings that bled black into the whites. 

He couldn’t forget her even if he wanted, even if she permitted such of him. Her will seared into his unconscious emotional responses; recoiling to a raised hand no matter how gentle; cautious to a sweetened voice, no matter how tender the words. 

For what she given him and all she’d taken; Everything and everything. 

Were they ever different. The two as one. 

And now.... Nothing.

Forma / frumô 

A humbled village turned savage, their eyes wild in the frenzy they consumed. I called her name. My voice may well be torn from me. The roaring fire that drowned out the enraged villagers also drowned out my own words. 

Where are you, Clara? 

Leuhtaz / lēoht

A weave of white substance spread across the village rooftops like tree roots entwining themselves through the homes. Wim’s gaze followed the forks and divides of white back to the source; a sluggish mass draped half across the village and stretched further onto the snowy hillside and lost into the forest’s dark beyond. The stark, silky black against the crisp white glistened in the roaring fire’s light, it’s limacine shaped clearly defined by the snow. A white line traced along the undulating length, creating a halo to its form. It pulsated, a throbbing deep in his heart calling to Wim. More white substance regurgitated from its orifice, spread its hooks deeper into the village, trailing down the walls and penetrating into the earth.  

Wim craned his neck as he hung from the matrix of white, sticky roots. The abomination upside down as the world burned, unconcerned as it lay among the fire. The flesh to sear and smoke, sizzle in its own vessel. A vessel born of another realm, of an entity unknown. The flames licked the smoke-filled sky, ash falling like snow as their homes burned for the nameless, the unknown mass. Smoke blotting out the stars and those that live within- unseen from those above, lost to void. From the white matrix in which he hung crawled his beloved, her spindly legs delicately manoeuvring the rooftops and the sticky roots. She lowered herself close, studying him. After a moment, she moved on. Unconcerned. 

The cocoon lazily spun back and forth to take witness all that burned and the many other cocoons hanging like rotten fruit of the earth. In between brief glances in the fires’ light he spied the many hapless victims, their faces pallid and hollow. He knew he would not see her among them, despite his denial. Her fate lay elsewhere, deep down where he left his heart at the bottom of the well. 

Lost in damnation, unborn in the flesh of Radsla.

Derkaz / Deorcnes (Snaw anda ysel)

The moon burnt a pale red with the flickering flames rising into the night sky. Embers drifting upon the currents up high, falling ash like snow upon the ground. The villagers called for blood as everything burned around them. A new winter born of their insatiable appetite, one deserving as was his.

They found him cowering down the well, a young body cradled in his arms. They called for blood and oil as the fire raged and ravaged the village and their god. Down the well the viscous black cascaded by the bucket, one after another till the screaming stopped.

Wim cradled Clara, melted as one.

Herte / Hertō (fērstu leuba) 

He held her tiny form in his arms. She was so small. So frail. Holding her in one arm close to his chest, skin upon skin, soothing her with every loving heartbeat. A light flutter of her eyes, she snoozed peacefully. She did not cry or scream to the unknown. The embrace, the warmth he felt gazing upon her pink bean body and puffy cheeks. Lips like the tiniest of peach slices. She was skinny as a worm but had these puffy cheeks he could not forget. She shifted, kicking a leg out. He panicked, afraid he’d hurt her, holding her too tight. Another’s hand rested upon his forearm. It will all be ok, it said. 

It will be all ok. 

Forma /frumô  (Weordleas)

I couldn’t bring myself to peer down inside. The burning stench was enough to know, stinging my senses. My heart petrified.

Leuhtaz / lēoht (Ysel anda snaw)

The village remained dark in the dim morning light. Thin wisps of smoke rising from the rubble of crumbled stone and charcoal. Not a single sign of life or death among the ashen village to be seen. The wretched abomination gone, erased from any form of reality. Wim mused idly if it had it be consumed or burned to a puddle of fat and skin… or merely no longer.

Not that he cared for the answer as he headed down the hill, his gaze cast away from the embers of a village. Through the ash and snow, he trudged down the steps that led to the well, a place that once held the serenity of his mind and peace in his heart. All that it once promised, left nothing but despair and heart ache. He stepped to the edge of the stonework of the well and peered down the darkness to catch the familiar swirling miasma, tiny tendrils reaching upward to him, yearning for him. 

He wanted to laugh in the face of the absurdity- the cruelty of fate. But the growing, hearty mirth turned to maniacal tears and mournful howls with the ashen world deaf to his torment. Crashing to his knees, he brought the cold blade to his throat and pressed it firm to his skin, threatening beyond all he could know for he knew it was not his life he held. The pounding of his heart deep in his ears, the seething animosity and anguish coursing through his veins. 

The fading laughter turned to wisps in the chilled air, as he drew the blade quick.

Triwwiþō (einaz) 

I know the sense of struggle, of restlessness. Agitated within like a squirming worm outside of his moist, terrestrial domain. But I feel none of it. Words swathing through my thoughts... And yet nothing.

I am a scream without a voice.

In the vast emptiness of it all, I feel not alone. I am swarmed by it. Drowned in it. Choking. I feel connected to more than myself. More than the stars cast out before me. It lulls me, tugging at the edges of my minds and coaxing me further into the nebulous consciousness.

It’s numbing. My senses emancipated. 

It is a greatness to desire or a sin?

Who am I to know... 

Who am I to deny.

By Ashley Mason