As the Crows Fall | ONC 2020 Grand Winner

xii | To Lose a God

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Ruwei does not mourn her sister's death.

She never tells people aloud, the words far too bitter for them to swallow, but she holds them dear in her heart.

She does not mourn Ruyue's death and she never will.

Every person dies. That they first lived is a testament to that. Death is the subtle language that life speaks, each loss but a drop of ink in the book of the universe.

Her sister's is no different.

It is her life that Ruwei mourns. The overblown beginning, with loud wails and raucous laughter. The bright youth and marble skies, the ups and downs, the ebb and flow. Joy comes and goes within the pages of her life and ends with the slow slide downhill, the page crumpled and crushed, burned and worn, tattered at the edges until it eventually dissolved to dust.

No, Ruwei does not mourn her sister's death.

She only mourns that it was not her choice.

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The memory falls away.

Ruwei finds herself back in Douxiu, but it crumbles all around her and the necklace that she'd had clenched in her hand is now naught but ash.

She stands in the empty cavern, alone. Muted sunlight filters through the hole in the ceiling, dirt and dust falling all about her in the dying cave, and she wonders idly if she ever left at all. She touches her face and her fingers come away clean.

No blood. No dirt. No pain.

With trembling fingers, she lowers her hand and turns in a slow circle, the looming shadows growing as rainclouds build overhead. It had been warm this morning, but as morning bleeds into afternoon and that memory seeps into her mind, the storm clouds gather up above and Ruwei isn't sure she's ever felt this empty before.

No, not empty.

Abandoned.

"Xuanwu?" she whispers.

And for the first time in four years, she receives no answer.

A loud crack sounds overhead and her head snaps up as the cave ceiling breaks open, a ragged crack running down the wall, sending debris and rocks tumbling all about her. They fall into the once dark waters, waves rocking that which was once calm.

The crows are screaming.

She sinks to her knees as the cavernous walls fade to dust and bone. Wind blows about her and a storm builds in the wake of the god who left her behind.

She can't keep her eyes open anymore.

And now the crows are dying.

She does not see it, but she can feel it, and they fall about her like rain.

The deafening sound of falling stone echoes all about her and it drowns out all else. The waters rush through the dying caves, the usually torpid streams now violent and deadly.

Ruwei does not leave.

She remains, kneeling among the destruction and neglect, and sends waning wisps of prayers to the god that can no longer hear her.

All in good time, Xiao Wei, the waters seem to whisper. You've found what you seek.

How? she wants to scream. I haven't found anything but ruin.

But she doesn't. She can't. She simply kneels in the dying temple and lets it fall.

Bie danxin, Xiao Wei, is the reply that rides the dying echoes of the wind. Wo hui baohu ni. Always.

She doesn't let herself even hope that she heard those words. The soft, distant caress of a god that is no longer hers brushes her shoulders, pulls her close, holds her tight, lets her go.

Xiangxin wo.

Trust me.

And all around her, Douxiu collapses to nothing.

When she opens her eyes again, she is in the cemetery of Qinglong, lying before an empty grave.

The rainclouds that threatened overhead now break open. All around her, crows fall from the sky like ashes in the snow. Their cries are more like screams as thunder echoes and lightning flashes, but through it all, the only thing she hears is silence.

As the crows fall and the winds rage, she curls on her side on the ground, and for the first time in many years, she lets herself cry.

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bie danxin (別擔心) - don't be worried
          bie (別) - don't
          danxin (擔心) - worry, fret

wo hui baohu ni (我會保護你) - I will protect you

xiangxin wo (相信我) - trust me