The TwiceBorn

And I Buy All My Days

"In prospect or contemplation, love is where it seems to be. Reach in to lift it out and your hand misses."--Winterson

The aleskin slipped from Gre’s fingers and fell to the wet ground, unnoticed.

“He’s done it,” He said aloud, without thinking. “He’s killed the Twiceborn.”

Islinn’s scream raked his senses. At first, he couldn’t understand how so much despair could be contained within a sound.  He turned to her and the expression on her face at that moment…that moment of knowing…broke his heart and made him fiercely glad he’d never had a woman love him.  Not if this was the way it all ended up.

“Islinn…”  He reached out to her and she pushed him away, still staring out onto the grass, her eyes wide and unblinking.   She slapped his hands away yet never looked at him as though he were some noisome fly buzzing about.  A simple distraction to keep her from realizing…

“Islinn.” 

He spoke her name again and stepped in front of her to block her view, knowing it was the only way he could gain her attention.  To block what had just happened, if only for a short moment.

 Her eyes jumped from his chest to his face and as he looked at her, and struggled for words, he saw in her expression the mistake he had made in bringing him and Aubery to this sad and unexpected conclusion.  And he wanted to take it all back.

“I have to go out there.”  She stated and all he could do was nod.  The rain had settled into a soft whisper around them and Gre spied a hint of light off on the horizon. 

The thought of everything settling back into hazy and orderly warmth and the sun, once again, bearing down regardless shook him deeply.  A distant mutter of thunder whispered across the sky and Gre watched as the light on the horizon reluctantly spread and grew.  The storm had come and taken away everything he so hesitantly knew and left him standing in a world he’d never imagined…yet still looked strangely the same.

He held his hand out to Islinn and she clutched it with both of hers as he walked her out onto the grasses.

The Twiceborn wasn’t dead, not yet, but Gre had seen too many battles and he recognized a fatal wound when he saw one.  She rolled in the mud, frenzied with pain.  For whatever reason, she wasn’t as eager for death as her clan had been and Gre felt pity as he watched her writhe.

Islinn tried to pull loose but Gre tightened his grip as he studied Aubery.  It occurred to him that he was seeing how legends began.  Tales would be spun end over end, sung through ballads and told in hushed tones about cookfires.  Whispered in taverns.  Aubery had achieved exactly what he wanted.

  And all of it was written in the dirt and mud embedded on his face.  A frightening thought emblazoned itself in Gre’s mind and that thought made him hold tighter to Islinn as she struggled.

He was made for this.

Gre watched as Aubery stood over the Twiceborn and nudged her with his foot.

“Looks like your gods favor me now.” He stated, but the impact of those words was blunted as he struggled for breath.  Gre noticed that the boy’s legs were trembling like a new-born foal’s, which only reinforced his wonder that Aubery was still alive at all.

Luck of the devil.

 The Twiceborn twisted away from the prod of Aubery’s boot and the boy knelt down, a look of horrible fascination on his face.  His hand reached out and grasped the dying girl’s shoulder and forced her onto her back.