Audrey stood at the roof of the main building, her vision fixated on all the Shadow-Trappers as they sat with the Demonic Creatures. They were all enveloped in intertwined auras, the nature of each clearly present to Audrey even without the use of her Yuran.
Every Shadow-Trapper and every Demonic Creature in existence was present here. After Jay's death, no more Shadow-Trappers were born so age was not a parameter of concern. The activity was done once every week for seven hours, but it was something only Audrey did not take part in.
Audrey's attention naturally fell on Iris, the shadow uninterested in others after having seen this done so many times. Iris worked with ten other Demonic Creatures who stood in a circle close to each other, not far from the young shadow. The auras of these eleven creatures had blended uniformly into the interior of their circle as the focus of each Demonic Creature lay on Iris's presence solely. When Iris took a deep breath so did they, and when she let go, so did they.
When the uniformity was absolute, Iris bent down on her knees and touched her right hand to the ground, closing her eyes. The energy of Earth immediately reached to her, tightly gripping her zeal. In the briefest moment of time Iris took a hold of the entire planet, the stimuli of everything on it coming to her at once.
It was a mess of sentience but Iris made sense of it all, not letting it reach the Demonic Creatures until she did so. She separated each bit of information into its own bubble, but pieces that were connected to each other could be far apart as everything could find a connection to something else.
Once the task was done, Iris invited the Demonic Creatures to this space in her mind and they followed, holding onto Iris's stability to find their way around.
In this manner, each Demonic Creature took the help of a Shadow-Trapper to interact with Earth. Azrael expressed the wish for all Demonic Creatures to be able to do so - multiple times with different Yurans, if possible - to Trina. If a reason was given or not was not known, but as Trina conveyed the request to Audrey, the latter naturally accepted it.
The cold had enveloped Sylva Vita tenderly, the sensation one that the shadows could feel no more with the exception of a few moments of lapse, when worldly feelings could return momentarily.
Audrey wondered what could be the cause. Was it a sign of how weak the Shadows had become? Or was it natural, considering the time it takes for Nature to evolve?
Even if winter was not fully felt by the Shadow Beings, it was on full display with the nature surrounding them. It even affected the bundle of auras at times, but the Shadow-Trappers tried their best to keep it away from the Demonic Creatures.
Despite becoming accustomed to this scene, there were brief moments when Audrey felt odd at the thought and sight of the present, and everything that had happened in the past.
How different were things the previous year? And the year before that? Change comes so easily, but perhaps it appears to be of a greater magnitude than it really is.
At times, it was easy for Audrey to be swept away by all the uncertainty and lose some of the composure that she had gained with such effort. In those moments, Audrey couldn't help but go to her place of comfort.
Sometimes the wave of confusion overwhelms Audrey again and she cannot help but feel the array of emotions she wishes to rise above, and she doesn't know whether she should face them or push past them. What good will facing them do when she cannot get the answers she wishes to have? What good will dwelling do when she cannot do anything to change the past? What good will ignoring them do if they are bound to come back, and if she will not have learnt from her experiences? She cannot simply forget all that has happened, and she doesn't know who or what to blame. She wonders how much of everything is her fault, her responsibility, but she now knows that it was all ultimately a part of the way nature progresses.
She knows she has to move past all of the turmoil inside, but she doesn't know how to.
Audrey's fingers pressed the keys with great control, moving effortlessly across the length of the instrument. She played with nothing particular in her mind, the tempo and notes and every other detail of the sound produced one no one could predict.
Everything that troubled her still remained inside, but it was as if each reverberation loosened it ever-so-slightly. Perhaps it gave her the illusion of letting go but the thoughts had recurred enough times for Audrey to realise she couldn't move past the sentiments she had built for the world easily, even if she now understood that the image she had built wasn't true.
But was it really not true? Did she do so many things wrongly that she had made herself incapable of experiencing life in the human manner? Were humans wrong for the way they experienced the world? Of course they weren't, but this manner was simply not right for her and the shadows. Was it because they were somehow better, or was it because they were too afraid to risk loss, something that was rampant in the way of sentience?
Many notes were now pressed together and the volume continuously grew, the vibrations traversing with more vigour now.
Duty. She is fine with new way of things, she really is. She is happy. She feels truer to herself, she feels truer to the self she saw from the past with Paliv Verasel. That did not mean that this Audrey was different from the Audrey that had become once she left home. Perhaps the first change had started even before she left the headquarters; everything had become a blur and a single moment when everything started to turn couldn't be picked. But why had things happened the way they happened? Why was all of the pain and anger and sorrow and necessary?
Why did she have to become attached to the world and force herself to detach? Why did she have to spend so much time understanding it, helping the humans in ways that made her deeply uncomfortable or in ways she could do because she cared so much, only to force herself to stop caring about it all? Why did the world give her such wonderful people only to take so many of them away so soon? Why did she have to make so many mistakes?
Audrey very dearly wished to know herself. She wished she could get the answers to her questions. She was fine being patient, but there were certain things that she could never get the answers to. Whether that was because those answers were unknown or unattainable, she could not figure out,
Audrey took a deep breath as the fingers continued with their slow movements, the room returning to a soft tone.
Audrey wished for an absolute and objective answer, but perhaps that simply didn't exist. Audrey could make sense of the way things were in a way that would appease her, create a reasoning from which she could learn and move ahead but that did not satisfy her. Sometimes Audrey felt certain things, but other times she simply wished to know how she should feel. How she should think. What she should do.
It was as if Audrey wished for answers from God, or have some sort of scientific manner to know things with absolute certainty. Audrey had spent enough time in the world to know that the fundamental manner in which anything existed was with uncertainty, however, and there was nothing she could do.
When it came to her desires, Audrey was powerless. She simply had to find a way to be okay with everything.
Even if I'm not a part of their world anymore... perhaps I can visit them. See and observe for a bit.
YOU ARE READING
The Shadows of Nature
Spiritualenature Perhaps it is the home Perhaps the destination Perhaps both. Can you push past the constraints you have inherited? Can you seek to understand that which scares you? That which you hate? That which angers you? Truth and Time, is this the prin...
