Ankyra Sound out of the will came life

the morning is partially cloudy, warmer than it's been.

scarab emerges from the grotto — explorations taking him deep into the underground haunt to squint lapis lazuli gaze against the sunlight as it drifts over his face. it is warm and he resists the urge to burrow back underground. the grotto has taken new shape; once familiar tunnels collapsed while new ones opened up and revealed themselves to him.

after his altercation with the stranger; chasing her from his his his sound he has taken refuge in the familiar chambers of his birth place. the warm baths, the bejeweled chambers, the ones covered in vines and mosses. that is where he sleeps, upon a bed of moss and draped in tickling vines, sharing the space with the fruit bats that dwelled in the darkest corners of the chamber. scarab does not mind their company. they investigate him and he allows them their curiosity but mostly, they let the seawitch to his own devices.

mine mine mine

the sound, this grotto. it was his. his safe haven. his death. his rebirth.

scarab stretches languidly, working out the stiffness of his limbs from his slumber and heads to the beach where he gathers up fish unfortunate enough to be caught in the seaweed that litters the beach and came in and left stranded on the high tide.