Notes

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brendan coward

swillbelly Borsholder


The rest of the Myrry Men ran in, .

Adriane's breath came in heavy gulps, bronze hands moving back and fro as if it would make her gain speed. The repetitive pounding of Adriane's feet kissing the ground had the rhythmic form of a marching band. Curls sprawled everywhere, blending into the darkness and the leaves and the rotting bark. There were no stars in the sky, all drowning in the eternal pool of nothingness high above her. Above, the moon had expanded into its full glory; the refulgent eye of heaven, an unabridged wreathe of lambent quartz- contrasting the ebony hues of the mighty night- that did not fail to being everything around her into sight.This was a time to rely on the moon to guide her way. She could hear the dogs baying for blood and the taunting laughter of the few men chasing her. Erratic pieces of debris pierced her bare feet, mud smearing up her legs and onto her clothes; sweat dripped from her forehead. She threw herself forward with more passion and abandon to her common sense. Her toilworn limbs cut through the air, but even that didn't seem enough as panic and terror raced through her veins. Moments before, she would have recoiled at the idea of running again, to an unknown destination, but now . Stones and stray pieces of glass embedded themselves into the soles of her feet; low branches cut at her ankles, making her trip again and again, blood running down onto her feet. Curls fell into her face every time she halted or hesitated to throw them off her tracks. But she did not dare stop. 'Please let me live!' Adriane begged and screamed and shouted and beseeched in her head. To anyone who could listen. Pounding heart, panicking breathing, (like thunder racking through her beaten body) body burning, lungs aflame, head raised to the sky in prayer. Grey met grey as her eyes pleaded. Adrenaline almost bursting through her skin, eyes wide with dread, her choked screams proved a hindrance to keep up with her breathing. They're coming. She could hear hulking footsteps flooding her mind, her thoughts. Shouts of infuriation. Fingers reaching for her tawny locks, her tawny skin, grabbing and yanking. Her head forcefully snapped backwards. Adriane's screams made a symphony from her raw throat into the mist. She dropped to the floor, her back cracking from the force and all breath escaping her quaking lungs; her head hovered over the piercing vegetation below her. Yet still she did not cower, grabbing for anything she could find to pull her up. Frantic in her pointless searching. She could see the stars. She could see a face looming over hers. A raised fist. Adriane Daya was not strong, but she could learn to be. So she rolled. This would be her salvation, and her doom, for she lived and kept running. It seemed that was all she did, even as the man's fist embedded itself into the sharp roots and shrubbery and groaned as the splinter made its way through his hand, crimson staining his leather gloves, his comrades whistling for a quick pause. Their dogs laid down, tail planted firmly to the ground and large eyes regarding the world with a solemn, contemplative air. Adriane wheezed as her burning lungs plead for breath. Her legs were destitute of sensation and balance, so painfully sore. Her throat was clawing at her for a drop of moisture, so uncomfortably dry. Greys and browns and blacks were in the distance, but she did not give them a second glance; nobody could stop her now, save the knees that began to buckle and the body that was about to collapse. The figures in the distance became visible shapes, and that was when Adriane realised. Horses whinnied and bit at their simple restraints, rope tied around the necks of the godssent equestrian creatures. Elation pulsed through her, making her stand in disbelief until the baying for her blood recommenced. The pressure blew up and the delirious human instinct kicked in. Adriane sprinted for the horse furthest away and clawed at the braided strands of thick rope, her nails chipping under the force of her strikes. It wasn't enough- it seemed- so instead she took to using her teeth, biting until each and every fibre was torn. Adriane put her right leg on a stirrup, threw her left leg over its torso and wondered what she was going to do now. She had never rode a horse before, but saw people kicking the sides of the animal. After tightening her hold on the reigns, whispering words of forgiveness to herself and the horse, she jabbed it in the side with her heels. She almost screamed as the horse raced through the trees. Adriane ducked down so her head was on the neck of the darting equestrian, but even the exhilarating feeling of riding on horseback riding could not mask the expanding joy that she has finally escaped. She was free. Adriane let go and threw her arms back, head tipped towards the sky and let out a whoop. Light filled her lungs and the lack of barks from the trail behind satisfied her to no extent. She would be the first, but not the last Daya to be emancipated. The first thing that brought her to her senses were the piercing cries of prayer coming from her left front of her. She pulled the reins and the horse skidded to a halt. They weren't the enraged bellows of those hunting her, but ones so familiar that it brought sorrow to her heart. In this particular sorrow there is no past nor future, just continuing. Every hour from the moment of waking is a new reality until the body can do no more than sleep to rest the weary soul. Each dawn she greets the sun like a whore greets her lover, living on despite the circumstances. It is grief, no different from anathema, that plagues those who dream. The second was an old man yanking the girl by her dark coils of hair, carefully woven with flowers and dragging her small body to the floor. Spoiling her youth by holding her down and installing fear by waiting heartbeats until her heart beats a bit faster. It was a plaguing of the soul, for what Adriane felt was not human. It was contorted and distorted but it had an absolute rage and madness that she had felt diluted moments before, but now it was something strong. It impaled itself through her back and out of her chest; fire laced her veins and engulfed her spine. The intoxication of emotion that she had no intention of feeling at all became her. Adriane was no more, instead enveloped in abnormality. "HEY- GET OFF HER!" Adriane shrieked, ripping apart her vocal chords as the horse raced forward. He stood up, and froze, completely mesmerised on her face. She knitted her eyes and the little girl ran.'Damn the consequences.' Adriane thought as she kicked the sides of the horse once again and grabbed the girl by her waist, pulling her onto the horse. It was her shaken yet grateful eyes that made Adriane kick the horse just a bit harder. As the snapping crepitate of lightning and the pulsating reverberation of thunder and the tenebrosity of the sky started to advance confidently, she knew that they had to escape, fast. "There's a storm coming," the girl whispered in her ear, voice raspy and trembling, "You need to listen to my directions, alright." She pointed slightly to the right and Adriane pulled, every part of her tense, awaiting her fall but oh gods it felt good. The feeling that she was out running a storm electrified her abdomen and it made her want more. Adriane kicked the sides of the animal with all the strength she could muster, and felt the rush. The buzz. The sense of belonging. As the backdrop of towers against mountains came into view, she could only assume where they were. Lindir. Adriane's breath hitched as the mountains came into view. She had never imagined them to look like that; she had thought they look like the sand dunes that she vaguely remembers from her childhood in Yistroji. Instead, the rock was covered in a scarf of white and reached so high it wished to challenge the sky and the gods and the will's of mortal beings daring enough to scale the magnificent creation. Her mother had always whispered in her croaking tone of people reaching the peak. The girl swiftly dismounted the horse with enough confidence that you could mistake her spirit for one of the mountains behind her and helped Adriane get down, which was near to an impossible task due to her far from graceful return to land. Her legs wobbled a little as she adjusted to being off the horse again. She met the girl's eyes and almost quailed at the unexpected paleness. Adriane had never seen green eyes before, save the common hazel hues of Yistroji. But they were just so pale, she wondered if all of the life had been sucked out of them somehow. Brown surrounded the ever-expanding pupil. In one hand she held the halter of the horse- who seemed to be growing more impatient by the second- and in the other was Adriane's own rough hand. Their almost matching skin tones, one darker than the other, almost made Adriane smile. "Follow me, you're not safe here." And just like that, the gaping hole in her heart that had never been filled by a friend suddenly perked up for the first time in years. She had forgotten that she had seen her sister murder just minutes beforehand. Adriane and the horse were lead down a series of empty paths sectioned off with fences nonchalantly. As if crossing people's property didn't make her fearful for her life. They reached a lake near a little cottage one could assume would be a summer home for an owner of one of the properties they had passed. The door slammed as it opened and shut, each time making them both wince. "So..." The girl said, eager to break the silence, hands still shaking. "What can I call you?" Adriane looked away from the girl's questioning glare and gazed into the calming turquoise hues far away. "Adriane Daya." Her hand shook as it twitched with the ends of her coils, "Wren. My name is Wren Iphis. I must reward you.." She shook Adriane's hand, but she immediately recoiled. Adriane reflexively dropped to her knees and bowed, her head hanging as if in prayer against the hardwood floor. She did not dare lift her head of the floor.Adriane flinched as Wren's warm hand touched her bare shoulder, heating it up almost immediately. "I am no princess. It's a common last name here in Lindir. I am as much a slave as you." The hand started shaking in the familiar pattern of sobbing that she had been acquainted to so swiftly, had remembered so fondly, had missed so sweetly. What a shame she forgot about the kin she could have saved. Adriane lifted herself, manoeuvring her body so that Wren's head was on her shoulder. Through the years, Adriane was the same in one sense, she would always know how to care for someone upset- better at taking care of others rather than herself. The flowers woven into Wren's hair were so thin and melancholy that she wondered how they were able to be put there in the first place. The fabric of her dress was completely new to Adriane; the colour of it changed if she rubbed it one way, (darker) and then when she rubbed it the other way (lighter). She only stopped stroking it when Wren pulled away, eyes inflamed and reddening. "Come with me- if not as a reward than as a friend. A hero." Wren's words were more of a statement than a question. Adriane took her open hand, so smooth and soft, and wondered if she truly were in the right. The horse that they rode on sped through the path, almost shredding it like a dull blade against tough paper. The pounding clip-clops were all she had left to hold onto her grip of reality and not wander and recluse into the depths of her mind. It made Adriane tighten her hold on Wren, who now gripped the reins with the unofficial royal confidence she had inherited from generations of learning and mistakes. It made her marvel at the deliberate and precise nature of Wren, yet still perplexed her, how could one so ordinary and plain (save the unmasked fairness of her features and the intimidating paleness of her eyes) become so important? What was it that made royal blood different to others? The colour? (the same haematic tone) The thickness? The feeling of it against your blade? (she shivered at the impossible, deliberate thought). They claimed to be godssent- but so could Adriane. And they should believe it- for she had survived this long and wasn't planning to stop any time soon.The tower became visible once again, along with the palace; both seeming so heavenly and eternal in their façade of beauty and wonder and all things nice. It was the charcoal hues above that betrayed the ethereality of the picturesque view. Adriane wondered if it stayed in its state of perpetual glisten-gloom, with the glimmer of the stained glass being overshadowed by the lack of sunlight. As if it were being swallowed whole. The drum of her chest reached its crescendo, and when the horse slowed down and Wren looked back at her, Adriane could have sworn it were audible. The ideal, the land of opportunity, wealth, freedom, where the white man reigns, the land founded on the slaughter of natives, on the backs of slaves, the blood overflowing. We're educated about a fairytale, the righteous white man came and settled, set up colonies, cooperated with the natives and fought for freedom. Slavery may have occured for a bit, but we did away with it, its all in the past, no need to think about it.