Ouroboros Spine xlvv. before he gets there

the weight upon his back barely registers before his legs collapse, and he crashes to the ground without time for conscious thought, head striking a rock with a horrific crack. blackness consumes him, and he does not feel the piercing sting of claws against him. he doesn't feel his skin splitting, entrails freed, throat lacerated and spitting warm life into the grass...

instead he feels the warmth of golden light seeping through places torn asunder, the buzz of healing flesh knitting itself back to unity. he feels a great pulse all around him, a steady staccato drum, a song that thrums through his veins and lulls all the thought from him, until reality bends and warps to the shape of it.
cortland, the song whispers, and it knows him. it knows his secrets, his sorrows, the deepest desires he holds close to his chest. it knows his loves and his losses, all the feelings that had defined him in life.
and gently, steadily, it takes each of them. soul stripped bare and wrought anew, the child developing within lotë becomes something else, something more. the song of cortland tobias mayfair does not end, but changes; a new chorus set over a melody as old as time itself. the soul knows, for a fleeting instant, that this is not the first time it has been rewritten.
and then that fades away too. the whispered song blurs and blends, death knoll turned siren song to lure the ancient weary soul to new life, the promise of eternal youth.
inkalorë, the song whispers, and it knows them.

inkalorë baptiste begins as they'd ended: quiet, peaceful despite the chaos of circumstance, drifting slowly back from the vastness that had swallowed them as if waking from a deep sleep.