December 06, 2024, 10:05 AM
(This post was last modified: December 06, 2024, 10:06 AM by Anselm.)
back dated to *vague gesturing* shortly after Heda dies ;-; Sorry it’s so late - I wanted his current thread with Heda to progress a little first. AW! tags for reference: @Malakai @Heda
He couldn’t do it.
Selfish, maybe - but what drove him now through the sleeting misery of rain was an obstinate sense of loyalty. His sons deserved a mother.
And he —
Heda’s scent had been so very difficult to pull from the threads of winter and dead earth. Her progress had been affected by the disease that ransacked her senses — the only saving grace in this wretched situation. Anselm more than once doubled back — and when he hit the shore he lost her scent entirely, its molecules ripped apart by the scouring tongue of the wind.
But he had known, looking at that distant island, that it had been their home once.
On the beach, he recognized one other stale scent lingering. The daughter with the oozing head wound.
He crossed the choppy water and by no small miracle made it to the other side. Emerging dripping wet and cold, Anselm found no trace of her here.
It was not until he crossed over a bare and sorrowed hill that he picked up another trace; fading, but there.
Burying his head into the stiffened winter grass, Anselm inhaled desperately; he sniffed over every bare patch, he raked, he crossed back to the first scent over and over and over and yet still he could not make sense of the pattern;
Until at last his eyes were drawn to the long hill and the pieces — if they could be called that — began to play in his head.
Dread filled his senses. He knew her march was likely fatal — but he needed his own closure. He needed to know she had not been dramatic; and a huge, aching part of him wished this to be so. Wished that she was being myopic, or pessimistic — or anything but dead.
The scents here were thin, abused by the raw air. He searched desperately for more clues, but there was only a handful — and their offering so scant that he was left with little.
Sitting down, exhausted beyond reckoning and on the cusp of a bitter sob, Anselm’s gaze turned across the copse and fell — with a chill shuddering through him — on a fresh patch of disturbed earth.
December 07, 2024, 04:32 PM
The ghost had taken herself to ground.
Sickly; withering from the inside, she thought, and so she made a small cold bed for herself in some forgotten corner of the island, and she slept. Around her the world went forgotten. @Cobalt might have found her sometime during her long sleep, but if he had, she didn't know it.
Blue was sure for a time that she was dying. But she didn't. Her sickness ebbed like the tide, ever-present but lessening each day while her strength returned. One day she simply woke and found herself strong enough to wander the island, fish a bit for herself. She took a small meal and took in the scents that had come and gone since she'd last walked the sands.
A fresh one lurked among them; unfamiliar.
Blue trailed it until she found the grieving grey-furred man, a stranger cloaked in sorrow. The island seemed to do that to people. Even her. She sat some distance away, watching him without expectation for now. Maybe he only wanted to pay his respects and leave.
Sickly; withering from the inside, she thought, and so she made a small cold bed for herself in some forgotten corner of the island, and she slept. Around her the world went forgotten. @Cobalt might have found her sometime during her long sleep, but if he had, she didn't know it.
Blue was sure for a time that she was dying. But she didn't. Her sickness ebbed like the tide, ever-present but lessening each day while her strength returned. One day she simply woke and found herself strong enough to wander the island, fish a bit for herself. She took a small meal and took in the scents that had come and gone since she'd last walked the sands.
A fresh one lurked among them; unfamiliar.
Blue trailed it until she found the grieving grey-furred man, a stranger cloaked in sorrow. The island seemed to do that to people. Even her. She sat some distance away, watching him without expectation for now. Maybe he only wanted to pay his respects and leave.
December 09, 2024, 09:25 AM
It couldn’t be. Not Heda. Not his son’s mother —
He could not move. It was as if his world took on an opaque hue to it and the edges were fraying, everything peripheral falling away into black. And while he bid his legs to move they could only languish; as if the ghost of his motor function had slowly been eaten away here.
Something in the corner of his vision.
Heda?
He turned slowly, eyes widening while a soft gasp left his lips.
But it was not her — just another vagrant, he guessed. Thin and rangy and —
Wait.
Had she done this? Had she killed Heda?
Anselm felt an ember flare in his chest. Suddenly, his limbs obeyed him. He stood upright immediately, nearly unbalancing himself with the movement.
He could not move. It was as if his world took on an opaque hue to it and the edges were fraying, everything peripheral falling away into black. And while he bid his legs to move they could only languish; as if the ghost of his motor function had slowly been eaten away here.
Something in the corner of his vision.
Heda?
He turned slowly, eyes widening while a soft gasp left his lips.
But it was not her — just another vagrant, he guessed. Thin and rangy and —
Wait.
Had she done this? Had she killed Heda?
Anselm felt an ember flare in his chest. Suddenly, his limbs obeyed him. He stood upright immediately, nearly unbalancing himself with the movement.
Did you do this?His voice thrust to the wind, his teeth feeling a need to make his pains known.
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