(no subject)
First gen, Daemon and Alaude. Deathfic. Obv. pretty heavily influenced by Terry Pratchett's Small Gods. Read that instead.
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When he wakes there is sand stretching infinitely in all directions. It’s ground into his skin where his cheek was resting on the dunes; in his hair; grains trickling in the tops of his boots, littering the folds of his clothing. He shakes himself with distaste, sweeping at it impatiently and dragging his nails back over his head until his scalp feels raw and only half de-sanded. Disgusting. Still, it’s a distraction from the oppressive heat. At least for a few moments, at least while he’s still fiercely cudgeling his brain trying to unravel the mystery of where he is.
There was an island, before. A memory, figures like bitter nostalgia. He remembers the battles hazily like a man recalling a story once read secondhand to him. Earlier is sharper: the sway of a ship’s deck beneath his feet, sway of flickering flames at a candlelit dinner . A pocketwatch weighted with more than metal and gears, an engraving known by fingertips and by heart. A soft-eyed man who smiled too readily, a quiet-eyed man who smiled hardly at all. Others. Some of the memories are so sharp and vivid they seem more real than the desert he stands in, painfully real, edged enough to wound though he couldn’t say quite why. He sways, feet seeking purchase in the shifting sands, finally standing upright and proud at the top of a dune.
For miles and miles there is nothing at all. The air hangs heavy and motionless with heat, almost too thick to breathe, and he chokes on it. Water--he doesn’t know how long it’s been since he’s had it, but he knows that he will need it before long. A place to begin. A shimmer on the horizon of sunlight glancing off a pool. An oasis, an illusion? He suspects, but the truth is there is nothing else at all. Even an illusion is better than emptiness.
The fourth time he arrives at a destination to find only sand he grits his teeth, grinding sand, and fights the temptation to lash at something. There is nothing to lash out at, nothing but the sand, treacherous and slipping forever beneath his feet. His muscles ache; he’s been walking for hours, seen nothing but dunes and dunes and dunes. Reigning in his frustration tightly he descends the next dune on tired, unsteady legs--feels his balance shift as the slope slides beneath him, too late to stop his headlong tumble to the bottom.
When he sits up again, spitting out more sand and scrubbing it from his face with the back of one gritty sleeve, teetering on the verge of simply sitting there and not rising again--there is a pair of boots. Low and practical, marching rather than riding boots. He knows before he looks up, he thinks. Before his gaze takes in the long, heavy coat--eyes like ice, hair fine and blazing pale under the glaring sun. It’s incongruous like a glacial breeze. He should be sunburnt and sweaty, dingy with sand rather than pale and pristine and calm. It makes no sense; none of this makes sense.
“You’re late,” is all Alaude says, staring down at him impassively. It galvanizes him at last to shove himself to his feet and gather his dignity about him like a shroud, straightening imperiously only to wobble again in the sand. He teeters; Alaude’s hand closes around his forearm like a vise and keeps him upright.
“Oh, indeed? Late for what?”
He scans around him, half hopeful and half... Daemon has never known the emotion of fear, or anxiety. Sick anticipation. There is no sense in beginning now that he is already dead. And he is dead, he’s quite certain. After all, the man keeping him on his feet with cool, steady hands is the most real thing he’s felt in time untold, and he knows this man is dead.
“You know. Don’t waste my time asking.”
It’s been years, years and years but Daemon knows this voice enough to catch the faint softening around the edges. As close as Alaude knows how to approach something like gentleness.
“I had no idea time was at a premium here,” Daemon counters acidly, staring out across the dunes. They seemed no smaller than before, and the heat no less oppressive. But there was a tiny piece of emptiness in some way diminished at this moment. It was almost with reluctance that he shrugged Alaude’s hand off and took one step away. He wants to ask but can’t quite, not for some time. They walk in silence: insubstantial sand crunches under insubstantial boots.
“My understanding was that we were intended to walk this stretch alone. I’m curiously misinformed.”
Alaude shoots him a look, familiar exasperation and something quiet and unreadable mingled.
“Are we,” he replies. “I don’t follow meaningless rules.”
And that, it seems, is good enough for him. He lapses into quiet again, walking perhaps the slightest bit closer. Daemon doesn’t complain.
////
When he wakes there is sand stretching infinitely in all directions. It’s ground into his skin where his cheek was resting on the dunes; in his hair; grains trickling in the tops of his boots, littering the folds of his clothing. He shakes himself with distaste, sweeping at it impatiently and dragging his nails back over his head until his scalp feels raw and only half de-sanded. Disgusting. Still, it’s a distraction from the oppressive heat. At least for a few moments, at least while he’s still fiercely cudgeling his brain trying to unravel the mystery of where he is.
There was an island, before. A memory, figures like bitter nostalgia. He remembers the battles hazily like a man recalling a story once read secondhand to him. Earlier is sharper: the sway of a ship’s deck beneath his feet, sway of flickering flames at a candlelit dinner . A pocketwatch weighted with more than metal and gears, an engraving known by fingertips and by heart. A soft-eyed man who smiled too readily, a quiet-eyed man who smiled hardly at all. Others. Some of the memories are so sharp and vivid they seem more real than the desert he stands in, painfully real, edged enough to wound though he couldn’t say quite why. He sways, feet seeking purchase in the shifting sands, finally standing upright and proud at the top of a dune.
For miles and miles there is nothing at all. The air hangs heavy and motionless with heat, almost too thick to breathe, and he chokes on it. Water--he doesn’t know how long it’s been since he’s had it, but he knows that he will need it before long. A place to begin. A shimmer on the horizon of sunlight glancing off a pool. An oasis, an illusion? He suspects, but the truth is there is nothing else at all. Even an illusion is better than emptiness.
The fourth time he arrives at a destination to find only sand he grits his teeth, grinding sand, and fights the temptation to lash at something. There is nothing to lash out at, nothing but the sand, treacherous and slipping forever beneath his feet. His muscles ache; he’s been walking for hours, seen nothing but dunes and dunes and dunes. Reigning in his frustration tightly he descends the next dune on tired, unsteady legs--feels his balance shift as the slope slides beneath him, too late to stop his headlong tumble to the bottom.
When he sits up again, spitting out more sand and scrubbing it from his face with the back of one gritty sleeve, teetering on the verge of simply sitting there and not rising again--there is a pair of boots. Low and practical, marching rather than riding boots. He knows before he looks up, he thinks. Before his gaze takes in the long, heavy coat--eyes like ice, hair fine and blazing pale under the glaring sun. It’s incongruous like a glacial breeze. He should be sunburnt and sweaty, dingy with sand rather than pale and pristine and calm. It makes no sense; none of this makes sense.
“You’re late,” is all Alaude says, staring down at him impassively. It galvanizes him at last to shove himself to his feet and gather his dignity about him like a shroud, straightening imperiously only to wobble again in the sand. He teeters; Alaude’s hand closes around his forearm like a vise and keeps him upright.
“Oh, indeed? Late for what?”
He scans around him, half hopeful and half... Daemon has never known the emotion of fear, or anxiety. Sick anticipation. There is no sense in beginning now that he is already dead. And he is dead, he’s quite certain. After all, the man keeping him on his feet with cool, steady hands is the most real thing he’s felt in time untold, and he knows this man is dead.
“You know. Don’t waste my time asking.”
It’s been years, years and years but Daemon knows this voice enough to catch the faint softening around the edges. As close as Alaude knows how to approach something like gentleness.
“I had no idea time was at a premium here,” Daemon counters acidly, staring out across the dunes. They seemed no smaller than before, and the heat no less oppressive. But there was a tiny piece of emptiness in some way diminished at this moment. It was almost with reluctance that he shrugged Alaude’s hand off and took one step away. He wants to ask but can’t quite, not for some time. They walk in silence: insubstantial sand crunches under insubstantial boots.
“My understanding was that we were intended to walk this stretch alone. I’m curiously misinformed.”
Alaude shoots him a look, familiar exasperation and something quiet and unreadable mingled.
“Are we,” he replies. “I don’t follow meaningless rules.”
And that, it seems, is good enough for him. He lapses into quiet again, walking perhaps the slightest bit closer. Daemon doesn’t complain.