04-23-2023, 01:16 PM
An angel.
He thinks, seeing the gilded silhouette approaching him. His eyes are not yet adjusted to the light, and he blinks up blearily at the stranger. Perhaps I haven’t escaped after all, he muses. Perhaps I am well and truly dead. Or mad. But the ground at his feet is silty and red, not soft like the sand of the Other Side. There is a dusty, slightly-burned scent to the air like grasses left to wilt under a hot summer drought. He remembers that smell, despite being nearly mad with plague the last time he walked through it. Pangea. The place he helped raise, once. The place where he had done his unwitting penance for a crime he would gladly commit again.
His life has always been full of ironies.
The pale angel moves closer and he realizes that it is merely a woman. He is glad he hadn’t called out for his father. Even he knows that two miracles in a day would be impossible, though his heart was always more naïve than his head – it had always been a problem. Ramiel tries to stand out of politeness to address her, but sinks back down again when he knows that his legs will fail him still.
“Being trapped in rock for decades will have that effect, apparently.” Even his breath is stunted, like he is not familiar with how to take a true draw of air. He tries then, almost choking on the dryness of the desert air as it fills his lungs. This discomfort is welcome at least. It makes him wants to take more in, to greedily take his fill in a way he hasn’t been allowed for too long. “I promise I am not usually so frail.”
And it is true. All the muscles he’d worn scaling up and down the Dalean mountains had long ago sloughed off. He was sunken in in places that had once been filled out. His stormcloud coat was now drab and dull. But there was a spark in his golden eyes that had never left. They shift from the mare to take in the proper view now, to see exactly where he had resided all these years.
“So things have changed again, am I to assume?” How else could he be here now? What new horrors have come through as well? Because Beqanna like her changes with a side of despair and a touch of suffering, usually. Ramiel looks back at the woman, wondering if and how it has affected her. But she asks about his smile and that is all it takes for it to reappear on his otherwise serious lips. “I didn’t think I would ever get a second chance. Once I can feel my legs again, I intend to take it.”
He thinks, seeing the gilded silhouette approaching him. His eyes are not yet adjusted to the light, and he blinks up blearily at the stranger. Perhaps I haven’t escaped after all, he muses. Perhaps I am well and truly dead. Or mad. But the ground at his feet is silty and red, not soft like the sand of the Other Side. There is a dusty, slightly-burned scent to the air like grasses left to wilt under a hot summer drought. He remembers that smell, despite being nearly mad with plague the last time he walked through it. Pangea. The place he helped raise, once. The place where he had done his unwitting penance for a crime he would gladly commit again.
His life has always been full of ironies.
The pale angel moves closer and he realizes that it is merely a woman. He is glad he hadn’t called out for his father. Even he knows that two miracles in a day would be impossible, though his heart was always more naïve than his head – it had always been a problem. Ramiel tries to stand out of politeness to address her, but sinks back down again when he knows that his legs will fail him still.
“Being trapped in rock for decades will have that effect, apparently.” Even his breath is stunted, like he is not familiar with how to take a true draw of air. He tries then, almost choking on the dryness of the desert air as it fills his lungs. This discomfort is welcome at least. It makes him wants to take more in, to greedily take his fill in a way he hasn’t been allowed for too long. “I promise I am not usually so frail.”
And it is true. All the muscles he’d worn scaling up and down the Dalean mountains had long ago sloughed off. He was sunken in in places that had once been filled out. His stormcloud coat was now drab and dull. But there was a spark in his golden eyes that had never left. They shift from the mare to take in the proper view now, to see exactly where he had resided all these years.
“So things have changed again, am I to assume?” How else could he be here now? What new horrors have come through as well? Because Beqanna like her changes with a side of despair and a touch of suffering, usually. Ramiel looks back at the woman, wondering if and how it has affected her. But she asks about his smile and that is all it takes for it to reappear on his otherwise serious lips. “I didn’t think I would ever get a second chance. Once I can feel my legs again, I intend to take it.”
Ramiel