Barrow Fields my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly

for my own timeline sanity ill slide this in closer to this date if thats ok? but tbf yunxu's timeline is already a mess 8)

he was too afraid to stop.

the day bled into night. darkness gathered over him, and his entire leg had locked up, forcing him to walk slowly and with painful stiffness, but he kept moving. stopping risked the leviathan catching up to him.

more than that, stopping risked him remembering exactly what had happened on that cliff, in more vivid detail than colorless flashes of teeth and crumbling earth.

the coast led him through thick seaside woods, along a drop perhaps even more inadvisable than the last. when he peered over the edge – too curious to do anything but, despite it all – the only thing beneath was jagged rocks and seaspray. then through rolling green fields, pockmarked with odd mounds that made the fur on the back of his neck prickle despite his fur being nearly cemented to his skin with blood and water and salt.

and the rain didn’t stop. it came heavier, it came lighter, but the horizon was permanently masked in a veil of grey.

he concentrated on keeping his breath even, staring intently at the ground. he’d passed the point of too exhausted to keep looking over his shoulder a long time ago; now it was just a steady march, his thoughts completely disconnected from the mechanical motions of his body.