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There is a story... that only a few people know. It came to them as if from a dream, as they glanced innocently up at the moon in the velvet-black sky... and they felt small cold fingers tickle their spine....
“Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down....”
~~*~~
“Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down.... ”
He remembered how torturous it had been to sit through those childish games when he was little. He had never understood them at all, and cared for them even less.
“Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down.... ”
He remembered the feel of clumsy child fingers trickling imaginary drops down his spine. How he had always flinched in annoyed discomfort each time a fist thumped his shoulderblades at the words “stab a knife in your back”. Those games were so pointless, and the other children had just used them as an excuse to pound and tickle their classmates.
Sole had always hated that game. Especially the ‘egg’ part. What kind of fool allowed an egg to be cracked on his head, and then sat there while the yolk ran down his neck in rivulets?
As much as he had always loathed being touched, Sole had found the ‘knife’ part to be the least aggravating. Each time the ‘knife’ hammered into his back, he found himself trying to imagine how it must feel to have a metal blade thrust in beside his spine. Would the pain of it be sharp and narrow, like the blade itself; or would it be dull and huge, and lace out through his whole body? It was a strange fascination he knew, guessing what it would feel like, wondering what kind of pain it would cause. Only one of many signs he recognized at a young age that he was unlike his peers. A precursor to his solitary existence in the woods, away from the displeasure of human contact that he so loathed.
He kept himself busy with practical matters that concerned his survival away from the rest of mankind, and never once missed, or even thought of contact with other creatures that breathed. Anything living he touched was small and furry, and it struggled and squeaked until he wrang its neck. Then he would sling it over his shoulder, wipe his hands on his jeans, and continue on to the next trap with his bowknife in his pocket before the sun went down. He did it almost every day. Whenever there was no meat left in the cheap plastic ice-chest he used to store food, he went out and trapped and gathered like an old-west frontiersman.
In the world outside his woods, there were cars and cable and walkmans and the worldwide web and all kinds of other things that Sole had never really cared for. Those things were for People. Sole didn’t like People. They were dishonest, and immoral; they killed and raped and stole from one another, and generally were not to be trusted.
People were to be guarded against, wary of, and kept an eye on.
Worst of all were the kind ones. They did things for you, and smiled, and asked you how your day was. They tried to make you laugh, and be friends with you, and got you to open up to them and rely on them. Kind People made you feel guilty for not wanting to be around them, and not wanting to talk to them. They became soft-smiling chains that you were too hesitant to break. The guilt and their poisonous kindness clashed and ate you away inside, while you longed to vanish from their world and roam, absolutely free of binding friendship. And that was only the good ones.
No matter what kind they were, the trouble with People was that there were hundreds of them in one place alone. Thousands, or even millions, in big cities; and millions more beyond that. Just the thought of all those billions of People made Sole feel smothered. Any number of them, all packed together around him, so tightly they could have been in the molecules of air he was breathing, made a scream of fear well up in his chest.
The only nightmare he had ever woken up yelling and covered in cold sweat from, was one where he was caught in a crowd, jostling around in the deafening roar of voices as he searched desperately for some way out. The bodies around him would press so close that that he wanted to curl up into a shivering cocoon, and he would pull his arms in close to his body as he tried to stay calm, turning his head around and around, craning his neck to see past the terrifying numbers of People. Then someone in the seething crowd would bump him from behind, sending him stumbling to the black asphalt ground, where he would be trampled to death, feeling the weight of millions of feet crushing down on his head and torso and legs, walking on him as if he wasn’t even there, until he thought he would pop like a grape pressed between their weight and the pavement.
In large enough numbers, People terrified Sole. The bad ones cheated, stole, killed, and took advantage of you. And the good, kind ones trapped you, smothered you, and held you back until you thought you would go insane. For Sole, it was the closest thing there was to a living hell to even be near them. He would live very contentedly indeed tucked away in the soil and leaves and silence of his woods until the day he died.
Those were the only two things in the world he cared about with any depth at all: his solitude and his woods. Sole cared for the wide area of forest he lived in almost as much as the Earth herself. They protected him, and fed him, and sheltered him, and hid him from People, those hundreds of trunks and billions of leaves. Surrounded by their rough gray bark and fluttering branches, Sole could forget about the rest of the world and all its People entirely. And that was what made life safe to live.
Those roots were set deep into the solid ground beneath his feet, holding up the iron-strong trunks that supported his fluttering green roof, and above that lay only the same blue sky that would, and always had been there. His woods were a haven. They were stability itself.
And up until one night, coming back to the rough rectangle of logs he was constructing into a scrappy little cabin with a load of new meat slung over his shoulder, there was nothing he feared or did not know in his woods.
~~*~~
This body itched and was thick and coarse and impossibly clumsy, as creatures of the flesh usually were. It was so heavy. Jumping, even a little ways off the ground, brought one crashing back down as if gravity wanted to crush one into the dirt with the decomposing leaves. It even felt heavy and clumsy when it walked, as it was intended to. This cursed body didn’t even have wings on it; it was trapped hopelessly in contact with the filthy, rough, stone-and-stick-strewn ground.
On top of that, it was always, always touching something. Cursed skin. It felt absolutely repulsive on everything. The soles of these feet were constantly being jabbed and razed and pricked, and the ugly little toes on them must have been stubbed on every rock and log in the cursed woods. The palms and fingers of these hands were covered in scrapes and cuts from briars and thorned things and bark on trees that could tear skin raw as easily as one can shred new green leaves. Every little branch and twig in the way grated sickeningly across the pink skin of these palms and fingers; such coarse, torturous contact that one could feel it grating in these teeth and bones like lead. The sharp little branches that these hands could not push out of the way had left all lengths of sore, raised scratches all over the exposed skin of this cursed body, which hurt even further as new scratches were carved over them.
Of everything else, the face of this body felt the most like a prison. It was thick with stretching skin and disgusting holes. Five of them: one on either side of this head, surrounded by rubbery, creased, repulsive frills called ears; and two little ones inside a squashy lump called a nose, hanging above a big, wet, slimy mouth. This face also had things called eyes. They trap one behind this thick flesh face, attached to the top of this clumsy body, and one looks out from them like a window, in a single, narrow direction. This body’s long silver-white hair falls into these eyes and pricks them, and gets tangled and knotted in the cursed branches, so that it hurts and makes these eyes water when one tugs and strains to get loose.
That too, is a thing of creatures of the flesh: hurt. Every aspect of this inferior form feels things, and it is almost more than one can take. Creatures of the flesh do not understand what it is like to never have felt pain before. They are all too stupid to conceive of something as unfathomable as a being that does not hurt. The first, and every injury thereafter, felt to one as if the skin of this body would be screaming if it possessed a voice. And if that were not enough, it then dulls and throbs and feels unbearably hot. Streaks of burning heat are etched all over this body’s repulsive skin.
Even in the absence of these searing, pulsing scratches, this whole cursed body is nauseatingly warm. Especially in the cursed bright sunlight that hurts these eyes. It makes one feel like one is on fire. At least in the Underworld, the very worst of places one used to think, it is dark; unlike this blazing, blinding place full of harsh sunlight. One does not see how the gentle, chill Moon could ever be called kin to such a flaming brute as the Sun. Only water eases the powerful heat, however it is biting cold and leaves this skin clammy and moist, so that dirt and leaves and all manner of uncomfortable things stick to one. Then the burning hot sun dries the dirt on this skin, and leaves one feeling as unbearably rough and parched as a gritty stone. The icy feel of water is nothing at all like the coolness of moonlight. Water, like everything else in these miserable woods, is another cruel punishment one has been made to endure from inside this flesh body.
It is almost enough to make one weep; like foolish creatures of the flesh do when they are bone-weary and utterly alone. All that is left for one to do is recall back to the time before this exile.
Those nights consisted of the deep and endlessly black sky, dusted with stars a million that showed white like a pricked finger shows red. One beamed down with one’s uncounted, uncountable brothers, over the world of these things and creatures of flesh and substance without ever having to touch them. Effortlessly between the leaves and branches, without being scratched and scraped and hurting, to play across the forest floor in puddles, without getting caked with dirt and stumbling on hard rocks. All melding together into a great silver shine from one’s Mother; Selene, the Moon.
They laughed, one’s brothers, when one made fun of the poor stupid flesh creatures. They jibed along with one and danced around as the leaves rustled. ‘All the humans’ poems and songs are inspired by us and our Mother,’ they giggled and flickered, ‘we must be greater than they; the poems proclaim it!’ Mother said nothing to them. ‘Maybe one night we will come and all the humans will be gone,’ they said as they stilled and began to wonder, ‘what will we do then?’
‘Dance with joy!’ One cried out, one’s mirth flashing with a single fluttering leaf, ‘What good are flesh creatures, least of all humans? They have no purpose!’
Mother ’s voice was like silent mercury that thickened one and weighted one down through the silenced leaves, pressing one towards the forest floor with each inaudible word:
Nothing of substance is of no worth... You are a substance of nothing, and what is your worth? A single human pays homage to everything it sees with its eyes, tastes with its mouth, hears with its ears, and touches with its hands. You do nothing but ridicule the homage paid you by that human heart of substance. Away with you, to learn what you scorn. You will not return to me until you have gathered the worth of a heart....
One’s glow was gone, and one’s omniscience reduced to a narrow scope behind something thick and cumbersome. One felt--with horror--the coarse p***k of soil pressed against this face and body, and the limbs themselves were so heavy they could have been stone boulders. One could not move for what seemed like the span of the Earth’s creation, and was forced to lie in the filthy loam, feeling the sensation of insects’ tiny legs crawling across this repulsive pink skin. One could not hear the voices of one’s brothers anymore, and Mother was little more than a pale ghostly whisper to these flesh senses. Loathsome things of substance chirruped and croaked through the forest all around one, confusing one’s new ears with their graceless, unbeautiful sounds. One tried to call to Mother, to plead forgiveness, and one felt the sound push up inside this throat and vibrate sickeningly against the rough dirt of the ground in a disgusting moan. It made one’s new skin crawl to hear the ugly voice this form had.
One’s entire forced mortal existence has been filled with nothing but pains and aches and deepest repulsion. And it continued until our uncle Helios, the Sun, rose and forced one to seek shelter. One strained this body to crawl into a dirty hole at the base of a toppled tree, where the tangled hanging roots formed a screen against the harsh rays that would have swallowed up even Mother’s shine. It terrified one to be surrounded by a light as overbearing as the sun’s rays. One feared that the sun might burn up this flesh body and our cousins, the rays, would smother one’s own weak beam forever with their harsh, rowdy antics.
The earthen hole and a thing called sleep, that creatures of the flesh do when their heavy bodies are too exhausted to see and hear and feel anymore, were Mother’s only blessings. One curled up like a sentient animal inside the safe darkness of that filthy cave and learned how to close these eyes and push aside these torturous senses, and slept. Until the sun went down and one’s raucous cousins were gone, these eyes were forced to see nothing but comforting blackness devoid of stars and silence reigned absolute. One woke again to the familiar darkness of night, and crawled out of the ragged hole to crouch atop the mound of dirt and roots, looking up into Mother’s soothing light.
One had missed Mother’s silver face, and the touch of soft cool moonlight was the only welcome sensation on this ugly skin. Sitting in this body atop a heap of dirt in the forest, bathing in the beams of one’s brothers as if they were the only things that kept one alive, it made one long for home. One wanted nothing but to go back to the way things had been before Mother became angry with one. To rejoin one’s pale brothers, poking fun at the world of substance underneath Mother’s watchful eye. Whatever it took to go back, whatever it took to satisfy her; one would obtain it. One would ‘gather a heart’s worth’. One will swear it over one’s own glow.
One’s gaze snapped down from Mother’s face at the crack of a twig close by.
A creature of the flesh--a human--was staring at one in pure wonder from across the gap in the woods.
A heart’s worth was staring one full in the face.
~~*~~
Sole stared at the creature that sat gracefully on top of the ball of roots and dirt. It was gazing up into the shaft of moonlight that fell through the branches like a melancholy ghost in a spotlight. It was neither male nor female, and still the smooth lines of its bare form were mesmerizing.
The creature’s arms were wrapped around its own feminine shoulders in blatant insecurity, and its long legs were splayed out and bent haphazardly on either side. The long hair that spilled partway down it’s back was smooth silver, and it seemed to match the light pouring out over it from between the leaves. The face it turned toward Sole was as pale and blank as sculpted ivory, with ice-colored irises and smooth features that blended its nose and mouth with the rest of its unlined face. It moved fluidly as it turned its head, and then froze with the stillness of a watched animal, never moving its clasped arms or legs in the slightest. Sole saw the thick dirt smudges and pinkish scratches all over the creature’s pale skin. There were a few small leaves tangled in its beautiful hair, and a dark bruise tinted a spot of its genderless chest almost blue in the moonlight.
What kind of creature was this that looked so human, and so inhuman in the same glance?
It looked at him as if it didn’t really know how to make an expression. Sole could see the corners of its formed mouth pulling, just barely stretching higher, lower, then wider, as if in indecision. Then its mouth opened slightly, and closed again, as if it were testing how it felt to open its mouth, but not enough to speak or make a sound.
The creature’s eyes were like beams of pale light to look into, and Sole could almost see the stirrings of unfathomable thought behind them. They held him steady in their sight without wavering, and things seemed to be flickering in them all the while. There were light shadows cast beneath the creature’s compelling silver brows, which seemed to be somewhere between a gentle glare of distrust and a captivating gaze of fascination. The silver lashes that framed each icy-pale eye were almost as invisible against the creature’s skin as tapered white lines, and the points of darkness, the pupils of the creature’s eyes, stood out piercingly calm in their white frames.
Sole couldn’t seem to look away from those sharp dark points ringed with ice. Even as the beautiful creature moved, gracefully slipping down from the mound of scraggly roots and dirt towards him, he only vaguely thought that this might be a dream; the only one where he hadn’t gone to sleep.
The creature, less than a few feet in front of him now, was tall and thin as a willow, and even without the glow of the moon’s light, seemed to be slightly luminescent. The closer it came, the more real the pale creature seemed, and the more compelling it was. It was less and less of a fantastic vision with every passing moment, and growing more tangible still. The creature now seemed to be more a genderless, unfamiliar person, rather than the strange inhuman thing it had seemed a moment ago. The longer he looked, the more of its transience he saw.
As the being reached out its ivory hand to touch him, as if Sole were a hallucination it didn’t believe in, a slight frown crossed its eyes and the very corners of its smooth mouth turned down, almost in distaste. The hand hesitated for a moment and the tapered fingers curled a bit, before the being’s ghost of an expression softened away, and Sole couldn’t be sure if he had imagined it or not.
When the pale creature’s hand touched his chest, it prickled the hairs on the back of Sole’s neck with how human it felt. It was warm, like anyone else’s hand, and solid, but it wasn’t the same as another person’s. Only the tips of the fingers touched him, still curled slightly, like when one is forced to touch something unpleasant. Its palm, starting with the heel of the creature’s tapered hand, lay flat as the fingers began to stretch out. The being’s smooth face never changed.
A flash of something crossed its eyes, as Sole felt the creature’s ivory fingertips begin to sink numbly, effortlessly into his chest.
Sole was still fascinated as he felt the creature’s hand reach in up to its narrow wrist, like one sifts through fine sand, and close around something.
He couldn’t seem to draw a full breath into his lungs as the creature’s hand gripped the thing inside his chest tight. Sole’s vision, still locked to the creature’s stark irises, started to unfocus as he felt its other willowy hand brace his shoulder and begin to slowly draw out its closed fist. Sole was aware of the thing in his chest dragging, resisting as if it knew it was being taken from him, and he grew lightheaded as it fought harder. He felt suddenly unable to breathe, and the pit of his stomach lurched as the creature pulled its hand free and stepped back, its tapered ivory fingers wrapped around a small misshapen glass object.
Sole was dizzy and his eyes wouldn’t focus as the creature watched him sink to one knee in the black dirt. Its staring pale eyes still held him transfixed. It clutched the glass thing to its dirt-streaked chest without looking away, and the corners of its unfathomable mouth might have tilted up into a shadow of an expression. Sole’s vision was too blurred, and his breath came short and fast as he stared hazily up at the willowy silver-haired creature.
It looked on indifferently as Sole slumped over onto the loamy forest floor.
~~*~~
One’s skin crawled at the memory of these hands touching the human’s chest. It had been so uncomfortably warm, far hotter than one’s own flesh prison, and clothed in a thickly-spun fabric that rubbed coarsely against the skin of these hands. One didn’t know how the human could stand it.
But that was of little importance now; one had obtained the ‘heart’s worth’ that one needed to return home.
One turned the small glass thing over in these hands, watching how the sparse light of dawn caught in its misshapen form. It looked like a walnut large enough to fill one’s entire palm, nothing but smooth wrinkles and waves that snagged the light and glinted in the near-darkness. One had thought that it would have been a smooth, uniform orb, not wrinkled and imperfect like it was. It made one satisfied to know humans had imperfect hearts, especially since they idealize them at every turn, building them up romantically as godlike forces that overcome all. This ugly little glass ball was all a human heart could even hope to be, and one had only to drop it to destroy it. Such paltry things these hearts were. Why in the name of Creation would Mother have asked one to gather such a worthless object? One didn’t understand it at all, but it mattered little: One had only to sleep through another day, and Mother would welcome one back among one’s brothers, to shine down from above this wretched world of substance and flesh creatures.
~~*~~
Sole woke to the wet chill of the dead leaves and green shoots pressed into his face, and the heady smell of earth in his nose. He bolted upright from where he lay on the ground in the middle of the woods, looking all around for the tall pale creature he had seen in the night. The shafts of morning sunlight blazed between the bright green leaves overhead, illuminating every inch of soil on the forest floor, but the willowy being was nowhere to be seen.
The creature’s ice-colored gaze was still burned into Sole’s mind’s eye, and he stared into space as he recalled the subtle details of the pale, lineless face with startling clarity. The unnamed expression he saw there tortured him, and he remembered the hands that had rested on his shoulder and sank into his chest, feeling the back of his neck prickle all over again. The spot where the creature had pulled something from felt distinctly empty and hollow, and it ached slightly and made him restless. Again the creature’s ivory face drifted across his mind, its silver hair and lashes diminished in comparison to the piercing calm of its eyes in his memory.
Sole touched his chest where the creature’s hand had been, half expecting to find a gaping hole there, and even more taken aback to touch nothing but his unmarred cotton shirt. He looked at the sunwashed mound of dirt and scraggly tree-roots where the creature had sat under the moonlight. Had it been a dream? He recalled the feel of the creature’s hands on him and the vivid piercing image of its gaze. It couldn’t have been a dream, he knew as he felt the hollowness in his chest beneath his hand. It was all too real.
Sole stood up from the chilly moist ground and dusted the fragments of dead leaves from his clothes; his jeans felt so stiff that they could’ve scraped his palms. He found the spoiled meat on the ground where he’d dropped it the night before; the little animals were grayish and bloated as they hung from the strings by their stiff paws. He would have to bury these and hope there was something fresh caught in one of his traps, and it would take him the better part of the day just to check them all.
And he was right; by noon he was barely half done, and only had a scrawny squirrel to show for it. By the time the forest had started to become tinted orange as the sun dropped lower in the sky, Sole had caught only another squirrel and a rabbit, and still had to skin and dress them before it got dark. All day, thoughts of the pale creature in the moonlight had invaded his mind’s eye and refused to be pushed aside. It was making him unbearably frustrated, so that both the second squirrel and the rabbit had almost had their heads twisted clean off when Sole wrang their necks, and the hollow spot in his chest ached strongly. It was near to driving him crazy, and every unbidden thought about the pale, captivating creature that was impossible to ignore made it that much worse. Nothing would put the mesmerizing vision of the creature out of Sole’s mind. It practically ruled him.
He could do nothing without getting lost in thought about the expression on the creature’s molded face, or trying to imagine what its silver hair felt like. The memories felt like vivid dreams that had spiraled out of control and taken over him. In every sense of the phrase, Sole was slowly becoming obsessed. By the time sundown came, he was all but ravenous to have his thoughts be his own again.
It was as horrible as being around People; Sole was sure of it. His thoughts were possessed by the image of the beautiful, genderless being sitting in the moonlight. He was steadily losing his ability to function, and memories of pale hands and piercing eyes were smothering his own thoughts. He was losing control, and it threatened and disturbed him deeply.
Sole had never wanted this choking obsession with another being, and now it had taken him by surprise and left him vulnerable. And vulnerable was not something Sole would allow himself to be. His mind and his thoughts were his own, and he would take them back no matter what it cost him. Before the aching hollow cavity in his chest could kill him or his delirious mind could swallow him up, he would find the creature and end it.
~~*~~
One was awake, and agonizingly aware as the death of another day came. One listened from inside the filthy hole, to the sounds of annoying little birds that did nothing but chirp piercingly until sunset, and twitchy little animals with their bulgy black eyes, all settling into the silence of the coming night. One could not hear the musical shrills of the bats with these thick flesh ears, but one knew that their tiny shapes had been flitting above the tops of the trees for hours now. One could barely stand the waiting, but one dared not venture out into the brighter light this day; not when one was so close to Mother’s redeeming. Instead, one had crunched this clumsy body into a tight knot and lain as still as the thick smell of dirt in the air, with the human’s heart clutched awkwardly against this chest, watching the blaring rays and their father the sun fade to twilight behind the hanging roots.
Emerging into the damp air, one felt the trailing roots scrape sickeningly across the skin of this back, and only tightened one’s grip on the wrinkly glass heart against this chest and looked skyward. It was so close. One was almost home.
Mother was bright and shining cold behind the muted leaves of the trees, silently watching over one’s brothers as they streamed and fractured down through the stirring leaves in shafts of glow. The wind rustled the forest, drowning out the sounds of the crickets in a single steady hush of sound. One crawled wearily to the top of the mound of filthy dirt and roots, repulsed by the coarse soil slipping between these cursed fingers and toes and grating against these ugly knees. An icy little beam tumbled down on the human’s heart, laughing and glinting in and along its strange wrinkles as one held it protectively close.
‘A heart’s worth’. The price of one’s passage home.
Mother’s light felt calming as one raised one’s ugly flesh face to look at her. She hung there, passive and beautiful, filtering her cold light down on all the worthless world of substance. One missed hearing the ghostly whisper of Mother’s voice, as only one’s brothers the Moonbeams could hear her. One missed the lilting giggles and touchless flutter of one’s brothers all around, playing and making fun under Mother’s watchful shine. One longed to be rid of this disgusting flesh body, to be welcomed back by Mother’s chill light and calm whisper.
The wind brushing across this bare scratched skin made one shiver as one held up the twisted little heart. It winked and twinkled in Mother’s light, and one’s brothers danced around it in shafts of curiosity, as if examining this crassly imperfect thing of substance. One waited, this flesh body tingling strangely with impatience, for Mother’s approval; waited agonizingly for her acceptance to come, and to become a creature of light once more.
The only sound was the smothering rustle of the wind in the leaves, lingering in the air endlessly, making one feel as if time had frozen.
Why was Mother silent? Why did she not turn one back to the form that all her children were born to? Why did she do nothing? Was this ugly little thing not a heart’s worth?
What had one ever done wrong to deserve such endless torture...?
~~*~~
Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down....
The creature’s graceful arms were raised in offering, it’s flawless face turned up to the moonlight filtering down through the leaves. It sat on the ball of dirt and roots as if it were pleading, with its dirt-streaked legs folded haphazardly, silver hair spreading down over its smooth shoulders from its longing face. The expression there was almost painful to see, and the graceful lines of its body seemed to be straining towards the moonlight with its raised arms and the small glinting thing offered in its perfect white hands.
In maddening fascination, Sole crept close to the beautiful prostrate creature. He made not a sound, moving stealthily through the thin little bushes and tall stalks of plants like a hypnotized predator, but his mind refused to quiet.
Visions of those hands on his shoulders, of those stark piercing eyes that seemed to look right through him, images of the strange, mercurial grace with which it reached out, or the helplessness of its lithe arms wrapped around its pale shoulders, assaulted him again and again. He was near to screaming for his own thoughts back.
Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down....
The remembered feel of those hands on his shoulders compelled him nearer, watching the moonlight on the creature’s silver hair deliriously, and all the while, he was rabid with frustration because he could not make himself turn away. He did not want this. It was overpowering and crushing, as if he couldn’t breathe on his own anymore. It was crippling him, and he was desperate to have his freedom back.
He would end this; now.
He would stop it cold, and things would be as they were.
Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down....
Sole could see nothing but the graceful shoulderblades veiled with strands of silver hair, hear nothing but a frantic roar. He had no limbs; no legs, no arms, no hands. The noise was everywhere, so loud that it invaded his vision, muffling the edges and narrowing it to livid sharpness as he stared.
It seemed for a moment that the air itself was stagnant, strangling him with the deafening ringing between his ears. And then the entire forest came rushing back to him, clearly and lucidly, and he felt the cold metal of his bucknife in his fist, and the deceptively live warmth of smooth pale skin against his clenched hand.
Perhaps it was imagination warped by delirium that sounded like the eerie little voices of children, chanting and giggling like ghosts on a playground...
“Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down.... ”
~~*~~
The story goes that the creature died, and its blood ran silver down its back as the heart dropped from its hands and cracked, and its body melted away, still reaching for the glinting fragments of glass.
The story goes that the boy still wanders in a crazed delirium between the shafts of moonlight, hearing them giggling and flitting when the leaves make them dance, constantly searching for the one who stole something from him. Constantly searching for another glimpse of silver to give away a clue to where it hides.
The story goes that if you stand very still and listen; underneath the gusting wind, you may hear the rustle of his footsteps through the brush.
The story also goes that when the boy cuts his hand on a twig, it spatters a drop of silver on the moonlit leaves behind him.
And when you hear the giggling laugh of little voices:
“Stab a knife in your back;
Let the blood drip down, let the blood drip down.... ”
....Then he is very near you, and you must run.
~~*~~
End
 Mitsukeru Furidomu · Sun Nov 25, 2007 @ 01:09am · 2 Comments |
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