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Chapter 5 for TOSD

Transcript:

My pace from the grove was a quickened one. And as I made my way far away from that place of lies and black leaves, I stumbled into a clearing. I basked in the light shown from the trine-moons, and as I did so, it felt empty. Or rather, I felt disconnected. Had I strayed from the path? Or hath the path strayed from me? At that moment, the light I basked in was a material one, devoid of the divine and the transcendental. I would have wept, but the tears I offered were spent from my previous encounter.

And so, with that, I was left to do what all mortals are bound to do, I was left to find answers; and in pursuit of that wisdom, I hoped to find the warmth in light's embrace.

As I made my way deeper into the clearing, a forest became apparent upon the horizon line. I carried myself through the open field, and as I did, the path shining from starlight grew dimmer with every step I took. And yet more steps were taken towards the forest upon the horizon's edge. Until the rising and setting sun and moons cast not a path for me to travel but instead lent light to make a path as I traveled.

And as I carried on aimlessly, the days grew together, my breath grew heavier, the shadows crawled along the light's edge, and yet I continued to gaze, seeking an end to that walk forever. Soon I was fumbling my footing and stumbling, stooping so low that my body had fallen forward. My head hit a grassy knoll as I collapsed onto the horizon's edge.

Something about me felt off at that moment. Perhaps it was another trap conjured by that liar. I lay there, conscious, staring into the night sky. I pined for the place from whence I came. I closed my eyes to reflect more clearly on my earliest memories, a time before the marriage of starlight and the spiraling night. And yet those memories seem so faint, so distant already, that they lay beyond the grasp of my recollection. They feel closer to my dreams than memories forged from a mind I once possessed. And as I drifted deeper into my thoughts, the sleeping dream crept into the crypt that was my newfound mortal mind.

Engaging in the sleeping dream, I unearthed memories beyond my recollection. Like a grave robber amid royal catacombs, I stole from these images of what were. Every memory was like a lifetime; in one, I was a beggar, smoking the short end of a second-hand cigarette. In another, I was a king, seeking to provide the means for the meek beyond the meager. I was grasping for an identity, a new desire wrought by my mortal coil.

In disturbing these dead thoughts, the forgotten spoke to me. Aspects of people, facets of thinking, and culminating concepts were awakening; a legion of memories all left to me before the unity through calamity. A chill of fear washed over me as I gazed into the infinite depths of this wasteland. It was not a place of dreams but a plot for thought to be buried. Feeling overwhelmed and unprepared, I tried to wake up.

As consciousness came into sight, a grip made by those that linger, the forgotten, was lying upon my leg. I was left helpless and faced with the potential fate of a never-ending slumber, so long as the grip persisted. 

Into the shadow, into the void, I cried out for help. My cries were met with the moans and death throes emanating from the dying memories that clung to me, not wanting to be forgotten again. And if it were up to me, I would remember the things, but they have faded so totally that they resembled one another.

The forgotten writhed into and out of one another, like black smoke billowing out of a chimney.

Its hazy grip loosened around me, and finally, it came into one. It was now a shadow cast from my feet, but before I could ponder this, my body was jostled. I was so close to knowing who I was. I had to continue the dream to understand the shadow I cast so I might understand myself and my past.

However, the vision trembled, and reality beckoned me. As I slowly ascended back into consciousness, the shadow I cast from my dream descended into forgetfulness.

           As my eyes opened, my sightline was graced with a new face. The stranger's complexion was sun-kissed. Her hair was brown with lighter streaks strewn throughout; it descended from around her head, framing her visage within a canopy of perfect spirals. Golden eyes grasped the attention of my gaze as she bent over to look at me. Her hands were overlaid with ornate silver gauntlets and still sat firmly against my shoulders. She was the jostler, and she was a miracle in that moment of sight.

"I've never seen eyes like yours before. Hey, do you need help?" Her voice was soft and warm.

Her lips moved slowly to a pace dreamlike.

"Am I awake, or am I still dreaming?" I asked, and as I asked, a whisper met it, and a hush said in my head, 84.

"You're not dreaming. More importantly, you look like shit," the jostler said bluntly.

"What do you mean?" 80.

"I mean, I wasn't sure if you were asleep or dead. Just look at yourself." her words fell upon me, and as they did, my eyes followed them, and my eyes saw me, chest to toe. My skin was wrung against my ribcage, and my feet were bleeding. The skin on my soles was tattered, hanging like fabric, blowing in the breeze. My feet's flayed nature carried past my ankles and stopped upon my lower calves. They were marks laid into me from the dream, but as to what caused them, I could not remember.

I then looked back up at her, and as I did so, the sun arose. And as it rose, it ran against her, and she glowed like a lantern holding the day.

"I think I need help," I uttered 75.

"I think you do too." She laughed nervously to herself and raised herself, still looking down at me. She was wearing a full suit of armor. The plates seemed to have been made from pure silver and were expertly ornate. The armor plates were covered in imprinted floral accents. And among those accents, cuts that ran shallow and deep riddled the armor plating. Each mark tells a tacit tale; to the same degree as the marks on my legs, these were memories manifested.

"Can you stand on your own?" She asked.

"No," I replied.

74, a whisper hissed.

She sighed, then she knelt. She lifted me from the ground, yet in my current state, my burden was but a feather. Her golden eyes gazed into mine, and it was then that I saw her. Not the beauty capturing the light, but the soul behind the light she captured. And it was through this light I gleaned truth through sight. And as I gazed, I peered behind her curtain and saw someone else.

           Then I realized her surface was, but a beauty put on, like a garment stitched to the skin. It was convincing enough, but the one beneath was true. And she beneath the beauty, the truth beneath the lie, who captured my sights beyond the surface. And it was at that moment she dropped me. My boney frame bounced onto the grassy knoll.

"What did you just do?" She asked, anger rising against the back of her words.

"I looked through the window you left open." 66.

"What? Like the saying? Windows to the soul, and such? Try and speak plainly and explain yourself."

I simply nodded back and smiled at her response.

"Anyway! When you looked back, as you put it, I was overcome with dread. And in my dread, your eyes spun like starry pinwheels. I felt bare as your eyes spiraled, it frightened me, and I dropped you. Did you cause that ill-feeling?" she demanded an answer.

"Ill feelings were never intended. I wanted to witness you." 56.

"Witness me? Like, see me? You can see me just fine. It just felt like you bore witness to more than simply me."

"A mortal might understand that I saw into them, and who I saw was not what stands before me." 37.

She looked down at me; her beauty was marked with a pensive expression. She then said, "tell me. Just who did you see?"

"I saw someone beneath the surface. That person was holding on. And as I saw, I felt; and I felt her desperation. She is who you were, and you from then does not want to be forgotten." 1 a whisper sighed.

"You see more than most, I take it. Luckily for you, I work for someone who might want to meet you." She kneeled again and picked me up gently. My form laid across her arms like a bundle of sticks. My limbs hung from her, and as they did, they drifted side to side; she then made our way into the forest behind.

As I was carried past the tree line, a cart sitting on a dirt road met our sights. I was soon set into the cart, with the pit of my knees resting on the box's bottom edge. My legs, from calf to toe, hung off its end. My arms sat outstretched, hanging from the edge of either side. My neck rested against the top edge, with two handles on either side of my head. She moved behind the cart with grace, and from jostler to a carrier, to pusher, she moved us forward.