A dream.

Walking in a dream I came upon this city, empty and terrible. Echoes of those living etched in its vaults, stone clad streets gaping empty, laughing at me as I walk. Dreams can do that to you I thought as I kept on under the grey sky, death patiently keeping pace at my shoulder. As I came out I found myself by the sea, its stillness unbroken by waves. Dreams can do that too I thought as I gazed upon it. I saw others around me, aimlessly walking. Somewhere someone dropped, there’s nothing I can do, I decided, as I trudged on through the ash filled landscape. And as I watched them fall, one by one, it slowly dawned upon me, living, isn’t that’s what they call it? Living.

As I woke the next time my desolation had grown, as some great worm burrowing, nibbling away at my heart. Carefully I made ready for this last day of days. People make do living their lies I thought, hoping to buy themselves free, not so I. I’d learnt that lesson all to well, no such thing as buying yourself free. Wherever you go, you take yourself with you. Once more wondering the purpose of living I carefully dressed. Hearing them celebrating, their world defined in possessions, not so I.

‘The last era upon us’ I thought, the one where beast’s rules free. Knowing, yet refusing to know, choosing lies before truth. Under my mound I felt a world ceaselessly grind, raped beyond reparation, turning beaten submission. “I bleed” it whispered. Girding myself, grim foreboding honing my thoughts. “The time is upon us.” Words ringing in my ears, my stead awaiting, chillingly still in the mornings weak sun. As it cantered out I heard the world whisper “Why me?” “Why not?” my steed neighed, nostrils widening red in rapture smelling fields of green.

So the last turn arrived.

The sound of those life’s taken as chimes dipped in horror, wet notes failing unto silence. My sword whispering out from its scabbard, gleaming, reaping. Too long did you sing I think as its hunger slowly stills, and under bleak stars I look upon my work. A world silent, a sun kissing an earth tainted red. “A work well done” my sword whisper, satiated.

I opened my coat to breath, those last mouthfuls of chill air clothing me in a ghostly mist. “Where’s my spouse.” I heard a voice whisper, forlorn in greyness. The norns calmly starting their spinning anew. “Where’s my life.” watching the web grow. As I lay myself to rest I prayed to this being my last turn too, only to hear my sword whisper “Soon.” anticipating.

To see, my doom. To see, no harder punishment can be. Long time I’ve been, and none the easier it becomes, worlds bleeding into one, red soaked earth. Would I to die I’d count myself blessed my last thought.

I too, once as you.

As I woke I saw her, standing in the opening, the light enshrouding her in a golden nimbus. In a gloria of colours once more transforming me to my youth. “There you are.” I heard her say as the rock melted before my eyes, drawing back, once more to let me roam. My nemesis, my love, coming to me. Wished I did for it to never stop, but as dawn rose filling my cave with its first grey light I found myself alone again, her presence mere a dream. So I walked, the world quiet, waiting its rebirth. Countless miles my feet took me, where I did not care. As days came and days went my feet refused to stop, my need too great, in search for what I did not know. Finding the sea I couldn’t go on, the waves refusing me, the baleful voices of those slain forlornly whispering empty promises from its depth. How long I stood there I do not know, but hearing a seagulls lonely call I at last woke up. Searching I saw a solitary building, a light tower on a cliff, balancing at its very edge overlooking the ocean.

Seeing it, driven by a sudden foreboding, I turned to flee. But my feet, traitors both, refused to give and finally I had no choice but go. It was cold, so very cold as I ascended its bare cold rock, step by halting step, the climbing hard. There was no welcoming light for me, its windows watching me disinterestedly, studying me with the bare eye sockets of ghosts. Coming in I found a winding stairwell leading upwards and starting to walk I felt the world recede before my feet, as if my life was ending here and now. I laughed at my sudden hope, but stopped as I heard the walls empty echoes answering, deriding what remains of dreams I still cherised.

The stairs never seemed to end, but as I found myself unable to walk one more step I looked up to, at last, find the end of them, the silhouette of a door hiding in its shadows. The door was old, refusing to open, dusty spider webs and dried out husks, life’s long gone filling its frame. So hard to open, so hard and as I did it felt as if something inside me tore, still, open it I did. Inside I found a old chair, a rickety table on three legs with a wooden box resting upon it. I went over to sit myself down, the windows empty hole giving me a free sight over the ocean, the dark grey sky flickering with the suns rays breaking through the cloud cover. Sitting there I found my pain grow, deeds and sights raising from the depths of my memory to haunt and taunt me anew.

Into the darken night I sat, unmoving, lost in my revere of all what once was, her smile, my touch, the care we took to please. As the lonely dawn at last broke I slowly opened the box, in it was a black feather and a red stone, with it a carefully wrapped yellowed paper. I lifted it out to read. “A heart, mine to take, now returned.” I looked down, and as I did I felt the stone pulsate in my trembling hand, singing a life of its own. Lost in dreams I lifted it up, veins pulsating with a richly red as I placed it to my chest. I thought I heard her laugh and as the world faded I could see, as she once was, waiting with her hands outstretched. The last memory my returning the feather to the sky.

Free.