Even with her magic, the road wore them hard. A week with barely any food left them tired and rapidly approaching the cusped hands of death.
As darkness falls, the plains begin to awaken. The droning hum of insects and birds consumes the still air around them. Herron thinks to himself that perhaps this is where they will die tonight. Perhaps, someone has followed them, perhaps someone has seen a bounty, or a militia has been sent after them. After all, they are just a pair of young, stupid, scared adolescents. His mind races, Ada senses something is amiss and smacks him on the back of the head. "Gather yourself." She declares. Herron is frightened, he has never heard her speak with such aggression. Herron believes Ada has always had it out for him, yet he never knew to what extent. His mind is further disquieted. Herron ponders, "If she'll hit me, if she thinks she can control me, who knows when she will sell me off, when she'll use her magic and smite me." He stares at Ada with eyes burning, about to cry. "She knows this," Herron thinks. "Should I survive with her, I must be able to meet her intensity." With great resolve, Herron puffs up his chest in obvious fashion, and Ada all but laughs. She knows who he is, she knows he will be back to tears come nightfall, hell, she will be too.
The dripping becomes a dirge. Slowed to a heartbeat, less. This is night incarnate. A concentrated blackness, overwhelming in scale. It squeezes and rings you like a towel. The walls suddenly shoot out beyond the threshold of the abyss and a sense of space places you as not an individual, but as a point. An infinitely small and transient being that can be anywhere and everywhere yet you are here. You think about your choices along the way and what brought you here but this changes not the drip drip drip of the ivory silk falling from above.
She stares up in wonder, this is the first time he has seen her express anything that isn't malaise. He feels but for an instant a sense of beauty, it masks the dripping. He wishes he could hang onto this moment forever yet before long she returns to the earth, eyes cold, normalcy returned. They walk and walk and walk and walk.
YOU ARE READING
Unjust Demize: Book One - Return of The Father
FantasyThis is no joke, this is when the father come back. Meet HERRON our lively and acute hero. A young man long situated with the trappings of ordinary life as a Blacksmith. He was quite content with the life of a simple blacksmith until the recent pass...
