Butcherbirds

Away from the City, Away from the Light.

He turns the last corner before the bridge and finds a mountain of a man, six foot tall and broad standing on the other end of the bridge.

His horse is gone.

The man doesn’t notice him, and Seth decides not to change that situation.

He takes the service stairs that circles one of the pillars supporting the bridge. It leads to the bottom of the ravine. It leads nowhere.

He notices niches in the cliff faces and decides to wait it out there. He’s not sure if he can keep this up for long, objects in his line of sight double and the urge to vomit is just barely being suppressed.

He’s nearly there, ten steps, a sprint and he can sit against a jagged cliff face to stop himself from loosing consciousness and hope, pray he doesn’t bleed out.

He makes it to the niches, except it isn’t a niche, but a passageway hewn into the cliff face.

His decision to continue down the passageway and wherever it leads him probably isn’t smart, but he does it anyway.

Maybe it’s a trap, maybe it’s a way out of this hellhole.

Maybe it’ll be a way Out.

It is almost defiantly not a good idea.

Quarter of a hour later and the only thing that’s keeping him upright is his hand pressed to the damp side of the passageway.

He also can’t see a thing, the passageway is pitch black, and if it wasn’t, his vision has tunnelled to the point of near blindness.

He can’t find in him to care, and he carries on regardless.

That’s is until he hears footsteps for the second time.

He pushes of the wall and points his sword blindly in to the gloom, swaying dangerously.

He hears someone shout something, but his brain is too busy telling his body to clock out to register what was said.

It’s only when his knees hit the hard rocky floor that his brain catches up with his ears that he realises what was said.

A name.

The last thing that runs through his head is that name.

“Jed” he whispers, before the numbness takes over.

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