His Poison is My Blood

Chapter 3

Simple observations through each sense available. A hand perched at the top of the steering wheel, the bustle of people that froze into the sea by night, a rumble of traffic by night. All had been nothing more than familiarity, adapted since youth, and now that he was laden in a world from the view of drivers passing by, the grown of an engine, the nerve-wracking clunk that came with each turn of his own vehicle. Foreign to those who walked among him, foreign to his own hands as they ached for the chill that came through blinding turns and the chance of being knocked by someone who dared think too far. 

The privation of it all, lack of sound drawn as candle flames danced along the walls in their long draws, only to stop and inhale between their speech, drops left to dip among the balcony window from the downpour of the night. Longing for more than this silence that gnawed him awake, all too much of a resemblance of that frozen-still world he had been discarded into by that singular fatal step. 

In which means, from then and now, past and present, did it matter what was to come in the near future? Surely yes, otherwise they would be stuck in this moment forever, time stopped by it's second hand, and he would be left at the end of a bed far too grand for his own needs, a room far too large for one singular person, and a million thoughts hushed in the demand of it all to stop. Something he had only wished for in desperate hours, the one's that creaked in his bones, hallowed them and created pockets of air for them to hibernate in until his bones cracked, muscle fell apart from their mold, and arteries snapped in millions. 

Only a few more drops could splatter, surely the rain had not been that heavy, otherwise it would have woken him, even in the worst of the storms would he wake to watch the downpour. They had gone on for what could be deemed hours, though if that was the true time he was sorry to say. 

One mere squeak from the door hinge it would have been over, someone would have been alerted, a guard slipping into trances having been worn from the night shift awaiting shift replacement, the royal advisor who only slept so far from his own room. That squeak could have ruined it all, as though he wasn't already on the path of being known as he slipped about the halls, socks occasionally losing to the slick floor. 

Had the Queen done this? Had they also roamed the halls in their pristine clothes, with their life that seemed pieced together but from inside they felt the pieces breaking apart? Did they feel like they were broken? 

Arthur realized how ridiculous of a question that seemed. He had curated this world from his own words, his own hands, pens and paper bought through his own money. This world was bound to him. 

Which was the very reason all of this was happening, another writer would have made it about finding true love, achieving the impossible, an adventure with enlightenment, anything that made it hopeful. Yet, here he was, now living the life of not only a pampered monarch but a soon-to-be corpse. 

At that, he snickered. Hands clasped over his mouth as he looked around to ensure he was still alone. At ease, he turned to rest on the windowsill, looking out upon the land adorned by the moon, no artificial light that he could see. 

Nights like these, where he couldn't sleep, where he drawled on about the worst of life, he wound up at the same door, aware the person he sought was well asleep. After the first knock, he would wait, only to settle by the door and manage to rest for that moment, always dragged back to his own room by morning. Until they became roommates, at some point he would be caught in the midst of his walks, brought back and held until able to rest easy. 

"You're doing it again." A mumble under his breath, able to catch a glimpse of his reflection in the window. A glance tossed over his shoulder, nobody. Nobody would come to take hold of him, no one had for quite some time. Instead he had grown accustomed to walking for hours on end until fatigue caught hold of him.