as if a glass could contain the sea, offspring

[Offspring]

You're looking at an absolute zero;
I'm not the devil but I won't be your hero.

  He is tense.

  Ire is festering within the tight hearth of his chest, but it does not show on the surface – the fire is tightly concealed, burning brightly only within the confinement of his breast. His muscles are coiled tightly, stirring beneath the inky surface of his blackened skin, blanketed in a plethora of scarring accrued over the many, seemingly endless years he had lived, and his stride is powerful and deliberate. He does not want to dwell for long within the darkness of the woodland; not with the ease and security of the humid volcanic island beckoning him to return to it.

  The silence is heavy, while his mind is occupied, mulling over the exchange between he and the Queen of Nerine – he can hardly suppress an eye-roll at her outburst; he understood the anger, but not the scathing words and disrespect that had accompanied it. He found her crawling beneath his skin – there was only one other that had ever managed it, and she had not fought fairly. While he struck out at her with the strength of his limbs, she had attempted to take his life with the secretion of poison, and there were few he loathed as much as he loathed her.

  Ah, but with time and with the steady presence of Warrick along his side, his frustration wanes, his mind drifting elsewhere while his dark, scarlet gaze searches the darkness before them. He is not the one to break the stillness lingering between them, and an eye steadies upon him for a moment, while the girth of his body presses past a dark and winding pine, scratching his hip against his brittle bark. He is quiet, contemplating his words, rolling each one over in his mind – he has found that he had come to respect Warrick over time, and with every passing day, he is drawn to him, recognizing the promise of comraderie within his calm and affable demeanor.

  He does not take his opinion, nor his loyalty, for granted.

  ”I will ensure that Hyaline is given the aid that it requires to be as it once was,” he muses thoughtfully, his heavy baritone rumbling and echoing within the thickness of falling dusk. ”but not for Nayl. I will do so for Amet. He will see his own strength and promise in time and he will break away from Nerine, I am certain of it.” He pauses, glancing to Warrick for a moment, studying the intensity of his tightened jaw. ”and Hyaline will thrive.”

  A sigh emerges then, and then, a soft chuckle, rumbling inside of his throat. ”She is the mother of your children, Warrick,” he utters softly. ”I would not have it any other way. I trust your judgment; your relationship with Amet has proven to me that you are a good judge of character. You would make an excellent Head of Peace – and perhaps, in time, Overseer, should you desire it.”

  His stride has come to a stop, with the pale moonlight draped over the darkness of his skin, while his deep, maroon gaze searches his own within the twilight. ”I cannot be Overseer forever, nor do I desire to be. I will need someone to take my place,” he muses. ”perhaps, Head of Peace for now, and then – more?”

OFFSPRING

another zealot with the weight of the fucking world