zargrof

[zargrof]

Beutiful and full of poetry like words. Would love to hear more of this world of yours. Good job

bleached out

Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial Prompt 308: The Price of Peace

[Summary: a man finds a woman he knows, but she doesn't know him]

“I hoped,” he says, “that I’d find you here.”

She looks up from the bush her fingers have been carefully carding through. A bow slung over her arm, a couple rabbits in a brace from her hips, tell the story of what she’d been doing before his horse had come cantering on in, relief bursting from his face like spring rain to fresh new leaves. His knees had shaken in a way they’d never known to do during all the horrid wars, blood splatter against his mouth and her valiant shouts ringing his ears. All that horror, and it’d been seeing her – finding her again – that’d threatened to make him kneel.

All that horror, and yet he’s never known anything worse than the way her brow gently crinkles as she says:

“Because you knew me, I guess?”

I guess. It’s the sword to his shield, puncturing through with a failed block. It’s the Witch’s hand about his throat, stars in his eyes, and her magic trembling the plinth they’d stood on until the whole place had begun to fall. There'd be a price for that, they’d told her long ago. To challenge such as the Witch who would not go down without a fight, who had gifts and devices beyond reckoning. To remove such a stain would take bleach of the highest power – he’d just never thought it’d be this powerful.

To catch on her hands. To eat away her.

The lands are at peace. His wife doesn’t know who he is.

He swallows, hard and heavy, in a throat that’s not crushed because she stopped it. It’s her old bow she’s still got, the sentimentality lost to her. It’s her old eyes still, velvet smooth even as they pass over him without recognition.

“Have others found you then?”

She twitches her head, the smallest shake before her eyes start to wander. Towards another clump of bushes, or maybe the tree by it, but either way her feet are starting to lead her there. He follows, keeps pace. Can’t bear to take his eyes off her as if that’ll lose her again. It’d been that before. One moment he’d collapsed from it all. The next she’d been gone.

“I just know,” she says after a moment – a few moments. Her fingers find another strand of bush to examine, drift past. He has no idea what she’s doing, considering she’s not picking the berries, not pruning loose twigs. It seems illogical. Maybe it is. Maybe it’s just that way to him. He’d listen, learn everything about it if she’d tell him. It’s what he hopes he’ll do; why he’s packed up everything important to come here, when people had spoken of a strange woman up in the mountains near where she’d been raised. If she’ll have him, he’s going to be here. The rest of the world has its peace, but he can only find his in knowing her, however that might look.

“But you don’t know who I am.”

She looks at him, some sort of amused pity in her eyes. “I’m guessing you’re important?”

He swallows. Gods, but she’d looked at him like that the first time they’d met.

“I’m… I was,” he settles on. It’s not his intention to bulldoze. To forcibly shape her back into what she was – no matter how much he wants who she was, it wouldn’t be right to impose such will. If she remembers, that’s that. He just wants to be here. “I hope I could perhaps become important again.”

Her eyebrow raises; her hand combs through the bush. “You mean to stay.”

“If you’ll have me.” He finds himself shifting, straightening all awkward. “I’m sure I could have some sort of use for you.”

“What if I don’t want anyone else around? I’m quite enjoying the solitude.” Her fingers toy, then lift to rest on her arm, tapping away.

“Then… I suppose I’d leave.” Even if it’d be tantamount to ripping out his own heart. To leave, to move on – because he’d have to, if she’d made that decision. He’d have to do other things even if he’d always have that hope, but he couldn’t just sit on the border of her world and interfere that way. It’d mean this chapter would be closed; he’d not have the excuse of searching for her to halt the requests.

“Polite,” she comments. He just nods. Waits for her judgement.

This, too, is familiar. Her eyes, her look, and he’d been waiting for her judgement back then. She’d been the striding dawn, he the hill to hold the shadows. He’d waited and felt this strange flutter among his ribs; little did he know he’d be feeling that and more for the rest of his life, waiting for and looking on her.

He wants to keep looking at her and feeling it. Not just feeling it alone.

“You can stop for dinner, at least,” she decides, tone painfully mild. Like he’s just a stranger walking past her camp, not the love of her life – the love of her former life, really. Like a splinter dug into his heart’s flesh, he can’t forget that. The life she has now isn’t the one she’d had, the one she’d wanted to share with him. He is a stranger.

But maybe he can try and find some common ground to change that.

“Thank you.” His head bobs another nod. “I promise, I don’t mean to intrude any longer than you permit.”

She looks at him. Something long, something still mild despite the intensity.

“Oh,” she says. “I think I can trust that.”

[zargrof]

more roys

[zargrof]

a deckhand is a subspecies of maid that is also a pirate. if deckhands acquire enough booty, they have the ability to transform into a pirate cook, or other type of pirate maid. it's somewhat similar to the hive behavior of maids and knights around a princess, except instead of a castle and a princess, the hive revolves around a captain as queen and a large boat as a living space.

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u heard him ladies

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*Manic Laughter*

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almost time

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this idea has been done and will be done again… this idea has been done and will be done again. not all of my writing has to be entirely original. people will read my works for the creative intricacies that I weave through each of them. it does not matter if my works have similarities, it’s what makes them so entirely mine. this idea has been done and will be done again. nothing is truly original. this idea has been done and will be done again. this idea has been done and will—

[zargrof]

BUDDY you're a BOY you're a BIG BIG BOY you're a BIG BIG BIG BIG BIG BIG BOY you got mud on your face you BIG BIG BOY kicking your can all over the place singing WEE wee WEE wee WEE wee WEE wee

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God loves you.

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Our little stupid conversation means more to me than you think

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Some mental wellness Talking Heads

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sevika/ambessa commissions for jeangreysmask on twitter

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sevika/ambessa commissions for jeangreysmask on twitter

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Sis, you've got a log tf in. Your siscon posts aren't doing good anymore. Log in. Log tf in.

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looks at you

[zargrof]