08-14-2020, 11:06 PM
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Amatic+SC" rel="stylesheet"><style> #waltbackground{position:relative;z-index:1;width:550px; padding:20px;padding-top:40px;padding-bottom:0px; background:#261a28 url('https://i.postimg.cc/hjZp94x4/fire-man.jpg')no-repeat;background-size:100%; box-shadow:0px 0px 15px #000;border:2px solid black;} #waltcontainer{position:relative;z-index:3;width:500px;margin-top:300px;padding:10px;background:#b2bac7;box-shadow:0px 0px 6px #000;opacity:0.6;border:1px solid black;border-top:0px border-bottom:0px;}#container p{margin:0;} #waltmessage{position:relative; z-index:10;text-align:justify; padding:30px 20px 10px 20px; font:12px 'Times new roman', serif; line-height:1.25; color:#020a20;}#waltname{position:relative;bottom:20px;font:52px;font-family: 'Times new roman', cursive; text-shadow:2px 2px 2px rgba(0,0,0,0.3); color:#000;letter-spacing:6px;text-align:center;}#waltquote1{z-index:35;position:absolute;top:288px;right:px;left:40px;color:#c5cdd8;font:40px 'Amatic SC', cursive;opacity:0.8;}#waltquote2{z-index:35;position:relative;margin-top:-20px;margin-bottom:14px;color:#020a20;font:15px 'Dosis', sans-serif;opacity:0.4;}</style><center><div id="waltbackground"><p id="waltquote1"></i></i>Sabrael</p><div id="waltimg"></p></div><div id="waltcontainer"><div id="waltgradient"></div><p id="waltmessage">Their forms waver there, the very sad and very dead lot of them, on the shores of the Other Side.
It is darker, but not so much that Sabrael cannot see the effects that Death has on the others. They are threadbare compared to what they were before: thin and drab and lacking density, as if one minor gust of wind could scatter their atoms to the corners of the afterlife. Their eyes, too, seem like hollowed out marbles. They are devoid of the brightness of life, lacking the spark of the alive. He knows that he must look the same. His once speckled coat is likely even more pockmarked now. His once raven hair is now surely combed with grey from root to tip. He feels the same, somehow. As if his soul is unshakeable and unwavering at its core.
He supposes he’s glad beasts can even possess souls at all – he’s never believed it before.
There is the softest susurration that starts between his ears, like a bumblebee fat with pollen floating and humming above him. It is so quiet he thinks it could be the muted sound of the waves tapping on the sand beside them, if not for its close proximity to his brain. He looks to the shoreline anyway, follows it up the beach to where the fog begins. <i>There’s a place,</i> Carnage intones, his voice a discordant companion to the gentle buzz inside Sabrael’s mind. His annoyance with the dark god’s voice is immediate, instinctual. He wants only the hum, wants to find the source of it – and he can’t hear while his murderer is monologuing.
He remembers a story, one told at his father’s knees as a colt. <i>There is a woman at the end of the world. I tried to bring her back, to make things right.</i> He remembers pieces of the story but so many others have slipped away like sand in the hands of time and youth. He does remember the clanking, though (how terrible it must have been to hear it for an eternity, how sad that his father had failed in the end). He also remembers that Ramiel is dead. Could he be here, now? Could he be trapped, too, caught in the clutches of the endless sound? Is he finishing what he started all those many years ago? The dead man draws away from the others quickly, his feet all-too-eager to drag him further into the nightmare.
The fog rushes to meet him. It is thin, at first, translucent like he himself has become. But soon (as the buzz expands to an unpleasant din) it thickens in the dead air all around him. Sabrael relinquishes hold on his form and tries to draw the dragon out, intending to borrow wings to sweep the air clear, but it is as if he is locked in. He quells the panic that starts low in his belly. The open skies feel so far away in this moment, but he has plunged in and doesn’t intend on begging at Carnage’s feet for an easy out. Beasts do not beg, only take what is rightfully theirs’. And if his father is at the end of this, he will take him right back where he belongs, too.
There is no longer anything remotely pleasant about the sound pinging through his head. There is even less unpleasantness as the fog continues to thicken around him. He can feel it press against his greyed sides now, solidifying into a pulsating, waving gel that jostles him to and fro. He can’t see anything: nothing ahead, nothing around him (besides the grey, grey fog), and not his own feet moving along the beach below him. The stallion only knows he is going in the right direction because the buzz keeps growing as the fog keeps congealing. Soon, the fog is so thick that it almost seems to move him along. It presses against his legs as the grating sound scratches the inside of his skull. He closes his eyes in pain and because it doesn’t matter if they are open any longer; he can’t see regardless.
Panic floods him then and he calls out for the dragon in desperation. His sides are heaving and he draws in shaky breathes, frantic for air. Wings explode out from his sides, but they are puny, weak things that are a mockery of their usual selves. They are still clawed at the end, however. Seemingly of their own accord, his wings madly claw at him, reaching for every inch they can in their lessened state. He feels deep furrows in his neck and at his sides, even in his ghostly state. Blinded and shaking from the bone-rattling buzz, it takes all his willpower to shift the wings away before they do any further damage. He is allowed a final breath in his dead lungs before the solidified fog presses into his nostrils and mouth.
In the next horrifying moment, the fog dissipates. With his eyes still closed, Sabrael only knows by the way it releases him as if by a mold. He nearly falls and barely catches himself from then tumbling down the cliff he finds himself atop.<br><br></p><p id="waltname"></p><p id="waltquote2"></i></p></p><br><br></div></div></center>
It is darker, but not so much that Sabrael cannot see the effects that Death has on the others. They are threadbare compared to what they were before: thin and drab and lacking density, as if one minor gust of wind could scatter their atoms to the corners of the afterlife. Their eyes, too, seem like hollowed out marbles. They are devoid of the brightness of life, lacking the spark of the alive. He knows that he must look the same. His once speckled coat is likely even more pockmarked now. His once raven hair is now surely combed with grey from root to tip. He feels the same, somehow. As if his soul is unshakeable and unwavering at its core.
He supposes he’s glad beasts can even possess souls at all – he’s never believed it before.
There is the softest susurration that starts between his ears, like a bumblebee fat with pollen floating and humming above him. It is so quiet he thinks it could be the muted sound of the waves tapping on the sand beside them, if not for its close proximity to his brain. He looks to the shoreline anyway, follows it up the beach to where the fog begins. <i>There’s a place,</i> Carnage intones, his voice a discordant companion to the gentle buzz inside Sabrael’s mind. His annoyance with the dark god’s voice is immediate, instinctual. He wants only the hum, wants to find the source of it – and he can’t hear while his murderer is monologuing.
He remembers a story, one told at his father’s knees as a colt. <i>There is a woman at the end of the world. I tried to bring her back, to make things right.</i> He remembers pieces of the story but so many others have slipped away like sand in the hands of time and youth. He does remember the clanking, though (how terrible it must have been to hear it for an eternity, how sad that his father had failed in the end). He also remembers that Ramiel is dead. Could he be here, now? Could he be trapped, too, caught in the clutches of the endless sound? Is he finishing what he started all those many years ago? The dead man draws away from the others quickly, his feet all-too-eager to drag him further into the nightmare.
The fog rushes to meet him. It is thin, at first, translucent like he himself has become. But soon (as the buzz expands to an unpleasant din) it thickens in the dead air all around him. Sabrael relinquishes hold on his form and tries to draw the dragon out, intending to borrow wings to sweep the air clear, but it is as if he is locked in. He quells the panic that starts low in his belly. The open skies feel so far away in this moment, but he has plunged in and doesn’t intend on begging at Carnage’s feet for an easy out. Beasts do not beg, only take what is rightfully theirs’. And if his father is at the end of this, he will take him right back where he belongs, too.
There is no longer anything remotely pleasant about the sound pinging through his head. There is even less unpleasantness as the fog continues to thicken around him. He can feel it press against his greyed sides now, solidifying into a pulsating, waving gel that jostles him to and fro. He can’t see anything: nothing ahead, nothing around him (besides the grey, grey fog), and not his own feet moving along the beach below him. The stallion only knows he is going in the right direction because the buzz keeps growing as the fog keeps congealing. Soon, the fog is so thick that it almost seems to move him along. It presses against his legs as the grating sound scratches the inside of his skull. He closes his eyes in pain and because it doesn’t matter if they are open any longer; he can’t see regardless.
Panic floods him then and he calls out for the dragon in desperation. His sides are heaving and he draws in shaky breathes, frantic for air. Wings explode out from his sides, but they are puny, weak things that are a mockery of their usual selves. They are still clawed at the end, however. Seemingly of their own accord, his wings madly claw at him, reaching for every inch they can in their lessened state. He feels deep furrows in his neck and at his sides, even in his ghostly state. Blinded and shaking from the bone-rattling buzz, it takes all his willpower to shift the wings away before they do any further damage. He is allowed a final breath in his dead lungs before the solidified fog presses into his nostrils and mouth.
In the next horrifying moment, the fog dissipates. With his eyes still closed, Sabrael only knows by the way it releases him as if by a mold. He nearly falls and barely catches himself from then tumbling down the cliff he finds himself atop.<br><br></p><p id="waltname"></p><p id="waltquote2"></i></p></p><br><br></div></div></center>