Eddie’s Words

[Edema Rue she/her]

I wanted to practice writing with a different tone, so I did, in the form of a really weird letter. Anyway, thought y'all might enjoy it  

Spoiler

I ain’t afraid of the dark.

I never have been. 

Probably never will be. 

Death is the same way. I mean, everyone always says that must be a lie. Y’know, that anyone can talk big, but folks can’t really embrace death. But not me. It sounds kinda stupid, sayin’ it like that. But I’m really not. Cause, see, I know what’s waiting on the other side. I know exactly who’ll be waiting for me. And I trust Him, y’know? I guess that sounds even more stupid to you lot. But it’s true, even if no one else ever believes it. I’m not afraid of death. In fact, I’ve always sort of looked forward to it. Got suicidal when I was younger, you know, because I figured if there was so much better than here (and I know that it is) then what was I doing stayin’ around here for? Man, it really do sound crazy on paper, don’t it?

And I ain’t afraid of the dark. That’s another one they always say has got to be a lie. People need light, and all that. Well, I’m not one of them scientists; all I know is what I feel. And the dark, it don’t make me feel scared. It’s peaceful. It’s safe. I like the dark, same as I like death.

Nah, what scares me is what happens before. Death is the same way. See, I know that if I died, I’d be home free. Nice an’ easy. But what if I didn’t? What if I messed up and had to go on livin’, for years, maybe, and people’d always be watchin’, see? Or if I got hurt real bad, and then I couldn’t really live or die. That’s what scares me. To be stuck between. Cause some people, they finds themselves homes here. And some people, they’re homes are just on the other side of death. It’s jus’ a door, see? An’ as far as I see it, I could find a home either place. It don’t matter much to me. But gettin’ stuck…yeah. That matters. That matters a whole lot.

But the dark is different. That sounds pretty obvious, I guess, but it’s true. I ain’t scared of the dark, and I ain’t scared of death. I’m scared of what happens before death, sure. And I’m scared of what happens in the dark. Before sleepin’. My mama used to tell me that I was a real creative soul, an’ I believe her. 

Cause that’s the thing about the dark. 

It’s peaceful, sure.

But it’s blank. 

An’ blank, to my head, is a canvas.

Now I ain’t some painter. I can’t draw much more than a stick figure, an’ you see here that I ain’t much of a writer neither. Not too good with words, see. So I never actually used no canvas, and I don’t do that whole “blank page” thing. I can’t make no art, not for someone else. But in my head…man, you should see all them things I can make. And the darkness, that’s when they get made. Cause it’s a canvas. 

 They told you I ain’t been sleepin’ much, an’ that’s true. Probably the truest thing they’ve told  you about me. But they ain’t told you why, or if so they lied, an’ I guess that’s what I’m tryin’ to fix here. That’s why I’m writin’ a whole letter an’ everything, see. They probably told you that I’m scared of the dark, since I almost always keep my light on. I really don’t sleep all that often. So I had to tell you that that ain’t it. I like the dark, I like it a whole lot. But the longer I think about it, the more I think I am scared. It’s jus’ not the dark that gets to me. I like sleepin’ too. But I don’t really try all that much, an’ I think it’s cause I am scared. I’m scared of me. It’s crazy, man. I’m scared of what I become in the dark. 

The lights all turn off, an’ my mind starts thinkin’, an’ all at once there it is. The canvas. My head starts makin’ all them things up, an’ then I can’t stop it; I’m just along for the ride. An’ some of those things, they really do scare me. It’s like my head just wants to make people hurt. That ain’t me, I know it, but my head sure do like to picture it. So I stopped sleeping. I stopped even tryin’ to. I guess I must’ve been thinkin’ that if I stayed up ‘til I jus’ couldn’t anymore, I’d fall asleep no problem. I wouldn’t have to worry about that whole before part. Only it’s hard to think when you ain’t sleepin’. It really is. 

An’ the next thing I know, I started havin’ these dreams! It’s crazy, man. Here I am, gettin’ myself as tired as I possibly can, an’ I ain’t even gettin’ a good night’s rest from it! I’m up all night with these dreams. They probably ain’t told you about them, since they don’t know about them, but they’s been happenin’. Near every night.

They ain’t bad dreams. But they get inside you an’ make you start thinkin’. An’ feelin’. Oh yeah, lot’s of feelin’. Mostly I think it’s been my family, an’ old friends. People I haven’t seen in years. Years, man. That’s a long time to go without your family. I always thought I hated them. Hated all of ‘em, an’ everything about ‘em. That’s how family is, right? You’re all so busy hatin’ each other that you don’t see how much you love ‘em.

I wish I could tell ‘em that in my dreams. It might feel good, you know, to tell them after so long. They deserved better than me, they really did. I ain’t what they wanted. I ain’t what they needed. But they was exactly what I needed, even though I didn’t see it then. 

So anyway, I been dreamin’ about them. I been dreamin’ about them a LOT. Any time I sleep. An’ in all these dreams, we’s always fightin’. Every single time, man! Sometimes we just yellin’, but sometimes we got actual weapons and it’s like we all wanna kill each other. An’ sometimes I just watch my brothers tearin’ at each other with just their hands. Crazy, man. It’s crazy. 

Man, I’m talkin’ a lot. I didn’t mean to do that. You’re so important an’ all, you’ve probably got all them other things to be doin’, hundreds of ‘em. You probably didn’ even read this. But I hope you will. That’s why I’m writin’ it. ‘Cause I think you might actually read it. You seem like a nice fella, on account of you bein’ willin’ to help me an’ all. Sorry ‘bout talkin’ so much. Anyway, they turnin’ out the lights now. You don’t gotta respond to me, ye really don’t. But I sure hope you’ll be able to help. I miss sleepin’. An’ I’m startin’ to think that this jus’ ain’t normal. Maybe it’s part of the…you know. The other thing they told you ‘bout me. I hope it ain’t.

Guess I'll you, then.

S-318

 

[Scars of Hathsin he/him]

3 minutes ago, Edema Rue said:

I wanted to practice writing with a different tone, so I did, in the form of a really weird letter. Anyway, thought y'all might enjoy it  

  Hide contents

I ain’t afraid of the dark.

I never have been. 

Probably never will be. 

Death is the same way. I mean, everyone always says that must be a lie. Y’know, that anyone can talk big, but folks can’t really embrace death. But not me. It sounds kinda stupid, sayin’ it like that. But I’m really not. Cause, see, I know what’s waiting on the other side. I know exactly who’ll be waiting for me. And I trust Him, y’know? I guess that sounds even more stupid to you lot. But it’s true, even if no one else ever believes it. I’m not afraid of death. In fact, I’ve always sort of looked forward to it. Got suicidal when I was younger, you know, because I figured if there was so much better than here (and I know that it is) then what was I doing stayin’ around here for? Man, it really do sound crazy on paper, don’t it?

And I ain’t afraid of the dark. That’s another one they always say has got to be a lie. People need light, and all that. Well, I’m not one of them scientists; all I know is what I feel. And the dark, it don’t make me feel scared. It’s peaceful. It’s safe. I like the dark, same as I like death.

Nah, what scares me is what happens before. Death is the same way. See, I know that if I died, I’d be home free. Nice an’ easy. But what if I didn’t? What if I messed up and had to go on livin’, for years, maybe, and people’d always be watchin’, see? Or if I got hurt real bad, and then I couldn’t really live or die. That’s what scares me. To be stuck between. Cause some people, they finds themselves homes here. And some people, they’re homes are just on the other side of death. It’s jus’ a door, see? An’ as far as I see it, I could find a home either place. It don’t matter much to me. But gettin’ stuck…yeah. That matters. That matters a whole lot.

But the dark is different. That sounds pretty obvious, I guess, but it’s true. I ain’t scared of the dark, and I ain’t scared of death. I’m scared of what happens before death, sure. And I’m scared of what happens in the dark. Before sleepin’. My mama used to tell me that I was a real creative soul, an’ I believe her. 

Cause that’s the thing about the dark. 

It’s peaceful, sure.

But it’s blank. 

An’ blank, to my head, is a canvas.

Now I ain’t some painter. I can’t draw much more than a stick figure, an’ you see here that I ain’t much of a writer neither. Not too good with words, see. So I never actually used no canvas, and I don’t do that whole “blank page” thing. I can’t make no art, not for someone else. But in my head…man, you should see all them things I can make. And the darkness, that’s when they get made. Cause it’s a canvas. 

 They told you I ain’t been sleepin’ much, an’ that’s true. Probably the truest thing they’ve told  you about me. But they ain’t told you why, or if so they lied, an’ I guess that’s what I’m tryin’ to fix here. That’s why I’m writin’ a whole letter an’ everything, see. They probably told you that I’m scared of the dark, since I almost always keep my light on. I really don’t sleep all that often. So I had to tell you that that ain’t it. I like the dark, I like it a whole lot. But the longer I think about it, the more I think I am scared. It’s jus’ not the dark that gets to me. I like sleepin’ too. But I don’t really try all that much, an’ I think it’s cause I am scared. I’m scared of me. It’s crazy, man. I’m scared of what I become in the dark. 

The lights all turn off, an’ my mind starts thinkin’, an’ all at once there it is. The canvas. My head starts makin’ all them things up, an’ then I can’t stop it; I’m just along for the ride. An’ some of those things, they really do scare me. It’s like my head just wants to make people hurt. That ain’t me, I know it, but my head sure do like to picture it. So I stopped sleeping. I stopped even tryin’ to. I guess I must’ve been thinkin’ that if I stayed up ‘til I jus’ couldn’t anymore, I’d fall asleep no problem. I wouldn’t have to worry about that whole before part. Only it’s hard to think when you ain’t sleepin’. It really is. 

An’ the next thing I know, I started havin’ these dreams! It’s crazy, man. Here I am, gettin’ myself as tired as I possibly can, an’ I ain’t even gettin’ a good night’s rest from it! I’m up all night with these dreams. They probably ain’t told you about them, since they don’t know about them, but they’s been happenin’. Near every night.

They ain’t bad dreams. But they get inside you an’ make you start thinkin’. An’ feelin’. Oh yeah, lot’s of feelin’. Mostly I think it’s been my family, an’ old friends. People I haven’t seen in years. Years, man. That’s a long time to go without your family. I always thought I hated them. Hated all of ‘em, an’ everything about ‘em. That’s how family is, right? You’re all so busy hatin’ each other that you don’t see how much you love ‘em.

I wish I could tell ‘em that in my dreams. It might feel good, you know, to tell them after so long. They deserved better than me, they really did. I ain’t what they wanted. I ain’t what they needed. But they was exactly what I needed, even though I didn’t see it then. 

So anyway, I been dreamin’ about them. I been dreamin’ about them a LOT. Any time I sleep. An’ in all these dreams, we’s always fightin’. Every single time, man! Sometimes we just yellin’, but sometimes we got actual weapons and it’s like we all wanna kill each other. An’ sometimes I just watch my brothers tearin’ at each other with just their hands. Crazy, man. It’s crazy. 

Man, I’m talkin’ a lot. I didn’t mean to do that. You’re so important an’ all, you’ve probably got all them other things to be doin’, hundreds of ‘em. You probably didn’ even read this. But I hope you will. That’s why I’m writin’ it. ‘Cause I think you might actually read it. You seem like a nice fella, on account of you bein’ willin’ to help me an’ all. Sorry ‘bout talkin’ so much. Anyway, they turnin’ out the lights now. You don’t gotta respond to me, ye really don’t. But I sure hope you’ll be able to help. I miss sleepin’. An’ I’m startin’ to think that this jus’ ain’t normal. Maybe it’s part of the…you know. The other thing they told you ‘bout me. I hope it ain’t.

Guess I'll you, then.

S-318

 

That is a really sad piece, but well written piece @Edema Rue

[Weaver of Lies he/him]

5 minutes ago, Edema Rue said:

I wanted to practice writing with a different tone, so I did, in the form of a really weird letter. Anyway, thought y'all might enjoy it  

  Reveal hidden contents

I ain’t afraid of the dark.

I never have been. 

Probably never will be. 

Death is the same way. I mean, everyone always says that must be a lie. Y’know, that anyone can talk big, but folks can’t really embrace death. But not me. It sounds kinda stupid, sayin’ it like that. But I’m really not. Cause, see, I know what’s waiting on the other side. I know exactly who’ll be waiting for me. And I trust Him, y’know? I guess that sounds even more stupid to you lot. But it’s true, even if no one else ever believes it. I’m not afraid of death. In fact, I’ve always sort of looked forward to it. Got suicidal when I was younger, you know, because I figured if there was so much better than here (and I know that it is) then what was I doing stayin’ around here for? Man, it really do sound crazy on paper, don’t it?

And I ain’t afraid of the dark. That’s another one they always say has got to be a lie. People need light, and all that. Well, I’m not one of them scientists; all I know is what I feel. And the dark, it don’t make me feel scared. It’s peaceful. It’s safe. I like the dark, same as I like death.

Nah, what scares me is what happens before. Death is the same way. See, I know that if I died, I’d be home free. Nice an’ easy. But what if I didn’t? What if I messed up and had to go on livin’, for years, maybe, and people’d always be watchin’, see? Or if I got hurt real bad, and then I couldn’t really live or die. That’s what scares me. To be stuck between. Cause some people, they finds themselves homes here. And some people, they’re homes are just on the other side of death. It’s jus’ a door, see? An’ as far as I see it, I could find a home either place. It don’t matter much to me. But gettin’ stuck…yeah. That matters. That matters a whole lot.

But the dark is different. That sounds pretty obvious, I guess, but it’s true. I ain’t scared of the dark, and I ain’t scared of death. I’m scared of what happens before death, sure. And I’m scared of what happens in the dark. Before sleepin’. My mama used to tell me that I was a real creative soul, an’ I believe her. 

Cause that’s the thing about the dark. 

It’s peaceful, sure.

But it’s blank. 

An’ blank, to my head, is a canvas.

Now I ain’t some painter. I can’t draw much more than a stick figure, an’ you see here that I ain’t much of a writer neither. Not too good with words, see. So I never actually used no canvas, and I don’t do that whole “blank page” thing. I can’t make no art, not for someone else. But in my head…man, you should see all them things I can make. And the darkness, that’s when they get made. Cause it’s a canvas. 

 They told you I ain’t been sleepin’ much, an’ that’s true. Probably the truest thing they’ve told  you about me. But they ain’t told you why, or if so they lied, an’ I guess that’s what I’m tryin’ to fix here. That’s why I’m writin’ a whole letter an’ everything, see. They probably told you that I’m scared of the dark, since I almost always keep my light on. I really don’t sleep all that often. So I had to tell you that that ain’t it. I like the dark, I like it a whole lot. But the longer I think about it, the more I think I am scared. It’s jus’ not the dark that gets to me. I like sleepin’ too. But I don’t really try all that much, an’ I think it’s cause I am scared. I’m scared of me. It’s crazy, man. I’m scared of what I become in the dark. 

The lights all turn off, an’ my mind starts thinkin’, an’ all at once there it is. The canvas. My head starts makin’ all them things up, an’ then I can’t stop it; I’m just along for the ride. An’ some of those things, they really do scare me. It’s like my head just wants to make people hurt. That ain’t me, I know it, but my head sure do like to picture it. So I stopped sleeping. I stopped even tryin’ to. I guess I must’ve been thinkin’ that if I stayed up ‘til I jus’ couldn’t anymore, I’d fall asleep no problem. I wouldn’t have to worry about that whole before part. Only it’s hard to think when you ain’t sleepin’. It really is. 

An’ the next thing I know, I started havin’ these dreams! It’s crazy, man. Here I am, gettin’ myself as tired as I possibly can, an’ I ain’t even gettin’ a good night’s rest from it! I’m up all night with these dreams. They probably ain’t told you about them, since they don’t know about them, but they’s been happenin’. Near every night.

They ain’t bad dreams. But they get inside you an’ make you start thinkin’. An’ feelin’. Oh yeah, lot’s of feelin’. Mostly I think it’s been my family, an’ old friends. People I haven’t seen in years. Years, man. That’s a long time to go without your family. I always thought I hated them. Hated all of ‘em, an’ everything about ‘em. That’s how family is, right? You’re all so busy hatin’ each other that you don’t see how much you love ‘em.

I wish I could tell ‘em that in my dreams. It might feel good, you know, to tell them after so long. They deserved better than me, they really did. I ain’t what they wanted. I ain’t what they needed. But they was exactly what I needed, even though I didn’t see it then. 

So anyway, I been dreamin’ about them. I been dreamin’ about them a LOT. Any time I sleep. An’ in all these dreams, we’s always fightin’. Every single time, man! Sometimes we just yellin’, but sometimes we got actual weapons and it’s like we all wanna kill each other. An’ sometimes I just watch my brothers tearin’ at each other with just their hands. Crazy, man. It’s crazy. 

Man, I’m talkin’ a lot. I didn’t mean to do that. You’re so important an’ all, you’ve probably got all them other things to be doin’, hundreds of ‘em. You probably didn’ even read this. But I hope you will. That’s why I’m writin’ it. ‘Cause I think you might actually read it. You seem like a nice fella, on account of you bein’ willin’ to help me an’ all. Sorry ‘bout talkin’ so much. Anyway, they turnin’ out the lights now. You don’t gotta respond to me, ye really don’t. But I sure hope you’ll be able to help. I miss sleepin’. An’ I’m startin’ to think that this jus’ ain’t normal. Maybe it’s part of the…you know. The other thing they told you ‘bout me. I hope it ain’t.

Guess I'll you, then.

S-318

 

OoOoOooOoooOooOoooOOOOoOo!

I like it! It’s great!

[The Stormfather He/Him]

Your writing is really good!

[Edema Rue she/her]

Okay!! @Wierdo @Weaver of Lies @Wittles, I finished it!!

None of this has been edited yet, but I really like where it's going and I'm excited to polish it and turn it into something amazing. Hope you guys enjoy!!

Ripping At Our Seams:

Spoiler

He wasn’t sure when he started watching her. He wasn’t sure what he’d been before he started watching her. He lived in a single, glistening moment, and she was its center. 

He saw her first in a snowstorm, he thought. Yes. It was cold, faintly windy, and tiny flakes of snow flurried about without seeming to touch the bright carpet of leaves. She stood poised on her toes, her tiny black boots crunching on the leaves. She was frozen in a moment of delighted laughter. He floated gently around her, and her laughter continued as a shape appeared behind her. Then another. Then a third.

Three familiars, brothers, twined between her legs. Black, white, and orange formed a twisted spiral around her, and she looked enticingly otherworldly. Then she tripped. One of the cats made a noise, almost a laugh. She laughed with it, lying on her back and pulling one close. Eventually she stood up. She pulled off her boots and ran barefoot across the freezing grass, laughing with a joy too wild and powerful to be kept inside. In that moment, he thought she must be the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. She grinned up at the falling snow, and the moment faded to black.

Another replaced it. It was different, but he couldn’t say just how, except that he knew it was a moment created over hundreds of hours. She sat, knees pulled up tightly to her chest, a book filling her tiny arms. The title blurred, and the cover seemed to change colors. The girl seemed to change as well, her outfit shifting and her hair changing lengths. She laughed as she read, or perhaps she was crying. He couldn’t quite tell. Maybe it was both. 

From down the hall, there were footsteps. “Luci,” a voice called warningly. He flinched at it almost at the same time she did. She scrambled to turn off her lights and ducked under the covers. From the hallway, there was laughter, then the footsteps faded. But after a few minutes, she started to tremble. She tossed and turned for a few desperate minutes, then gave in and pulled out a flashlight, picking her book back up. That calmed her. It was the dead of night when she finally shut her book. This time, she slipped into sleep easily, calmly. He watched her sleep for a few minutes before all faded to black once more.

“I’m Luci,” a voice suddenly said in his ear. He jumped, turning, but she wasn’t speaking to him. She was on a playground, squatting next to a girl who was tugging at the grass. “What’s your name?”

The new girl looked up at Luci. “My mom said not to play with you.” Then she turned away. Luci was frozen only for a moment, and then she left, bravely walking onward until she found a place alone. She sat right down in the grass and began to cry. 

Darkness.

She snipped flower petals into a thin glass vase, mixing them with sand and pebbles and the occasional snail shell. Her potion completed, she smiled and brought it inside to her mother, leaving her three cats to call to her from outside the door.

Darkness.

Luci pulled bricks out of the garden path and built herself a shop. Not a big one, but just enough that she could put different things in each of her little boxes. This one was filled with tiny rocks, that one with rose buds. One held a chicken egg, carefully positioned in a nest of grass. Another held a pile of leaves and pine needles. And one held her greatest treasure; a garden snake she’d caught and boxed in. She surveyed her merchandise, then hurried off to find customers in the form of her parents and siblings. When she returned, the snake was gone.

Darkness.

Luci had climbed out her window and onto her roof. She carried a book under her arm. She carefully pulled herself over the peak and back down, into a little alcove where she was sheltered on all sides. She opened her book, winked to the stars, and began to read poetry to the full moon.

Darkness.

Luci was crying.

Darkness.

Luci was laughing.

Darkness.

Luci sang. He couldn’t move for the beauty of her high, clear voice. She climbed trees and let her voice break free where none but the birds could hear her, and even they stopped chirping for jealousy. He watched her work through her repertoire, singing every song she knew again and again until she made up her own. 

Darkness.

She dressed up as a snail for Halloween. It made him laugh.

Darkness.

He watched her grow older. As she grew, he was aware that he was getting older too. It was a strange feeling, as if his mind was slowly becoming more and more aware. Painfully aware. Aware enough to understand when her mother swerved desperately as snow cascaded off the mountains and onto the road. Aware enough to know that it would do no good. Aware enough to watch every person on the road struggle to escape their cars, to make it to the surface before the avalanche stole their last breaths.

Darkness.

Luci sat through the funeral in a new wheeled chair. She stared at the three caskets that sat open, displayed like wares before patrons who thought to buy them with their tears. She let her father push her away from the family they’d once had, and she began to cry, raw and ugly and loud enough that the people who didn’t seem to notice became terrible liars. Her father knelt next to her, his arm in a sling. He wrapped the other one around her. 

“I don’t want to be alive,” Luci whispered. “I don’t want to be alive anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” her father said firmly. “Don’t.”

She sniffed, shaking. “I-it’s so much harder to be alive without them. I want to go home, Dad.”

Darkness.

Luci didn’t sing any longer.

Darkness.

Luci’s laughter wasn’t wild. She kept what little of it there was trapped inside her, as if by hiding it where no one could find it it would be hers forever.

Darkness.

Her father pulled a warm chocolate cake from the oven. Luci sat in her chair and watched him frost it, then helped him stick the candles in, one at a time. 19 candles. The number of years old her sister should have been. Her father’s hand shook. Luci started to cry. But, slowly, they tried to smile. Shyly, at first. It was dangerous to feel joy. But, slowly, they ate their cake, and laughed and told stories each thought the other had forgotten.

Darkness.

It was snowing. He watched the snowstorm out the same window she did. A tall man was talking at the front of the room, gesturing to symbols and words that Luci didn’t care about. She cared about the snow, and he floated towards it, entranced by the flakes that fell so slowly, so silently. 

The door to the room slammed open, and a young man stood there. A young man the watching spirit knew. His eyes were wild and his face was sweaty. His arm was shaking, pointing a gun towards the teacher Luci had ignored so easily. One child screamed, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. Luci didn’t scream. The children stood and ran. Luci couldn’t run, and her chair was so slow…

Darkness.

<><><><>

She wasn’t sure when she started watching him. She wasn’t sure what she’d been before she started watching him. She lived in a single, glistening moment, and he was at its center.

She saw him first in a huge room. It was stacked with boxes, and he was standing in its center, looking around unsurely. There was a glittering chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and a staircase curved up to an elegant balcony. That was a good word for it, she decided. Elegant. He was frozen in a moment of shock, and she floated closer curiously. He’d just begun to tremble when a tall woman with perfectly curled hair appeared in the large doorway. 

“Aaron,” she called, “go find your room. It’s up the stairs, third door on the left.”

The boy walked numbly up the stairs, hesitating when he reached the top. The carpet looked too nice for his muddy shoes. He glanced back, then kept walking. The room was empty, but she gasped anyway. It was huge.

He meandered towards the window. It was snowing outside. He shivered and reached for curtains that weren’t there. Then he, and everything else, faded to darkness.

She blinked, confused, and when she opened her eyes the world was bright again. He was in the same room, but now it had a bed, curtains, a dresser, a bookshelf. All were delicately crafted, and looked as if they cost more money than this boy had ever seen in his life…Aaron was hacking at the bedframe with a tiny pocketknife. She frowned. 

The woman from before opened the door without knocking. She saw the boy and her expression darkened. “Aaron,” she said warningly. He looked up and glared at her. “Give it to me.” Slowly, he handed her the small knife he’d been using. As soon as it touched her hand, she snatched it away and tucked it into a pocket. “Who gave it to you?”

Aaron looked at the floor. “Siel,” he muttered.

The woman cursed. “I told you to stay away from her.”

Aaron looked back up at her, meeting her eyes with a glare. “It’s not my fault! Dad told her to watch me.” 

The woman cursed again. “I will speak to him.” She crouched until she was the same level as the boy. “But you listen here,” she said. “You obey me, not that idiot of a man.”

“Why should I?” Aaron snapped.

Her eyes widened. “What did you say to me?”

He trembled, but stuck his chin out defiantly. “Why should I? You’re not even my mom.”

“Your mother is dead,” the woman hissed. “And even if she were alive, your father knows better than to marry someone like that.”

“He should have known better than to marry someone like you,” Aaron muttered quietly. Not quietly enough. The woman hit him so quickly that the watching spirit didn’t see it, only saw Aaron recoil and hold his hand up to his face. He started to cry.

“Stay in here,” the woman said coldly, “until I return for you.”

Then it was dark.

Now Aaron was sitting on a stiff gray couch. She floated closer, wondering if she could speak to him, when she heard a door shut behind her. A man with thick brown hair and a beard stepped in. He had the boy’s eyes. 

Aaron looked shocked. “Dad!” He said, leaping to his feet. 

“Sit down, son,” the man said. He wasn’t smiling. Slowly, Aaron did. “You have a responsibility, Aaron. To me. To our business. To your mother.”

“She’s not—”

“You are to respect her!” The boy’s father shouted. “Do you understand?”

“But she says such mean things about you,” Aaron whispered. His father’s face softened.

“Do you know why I married her?” Aaron shook his head. “Well, it isn’t because she loves me. And it isn’t because I love her. I don’t love her, not like I did your mother. But marrying her keeps our family safe.” 

Aaron frowned. “Safe from who?”

“From her family.”

Darkness. 

Aaron was always surrounded by people. Teachers, family, his father’s colleagues, nurses. But no friends. He sat at a table, struggling to shuffle a deck of cards. 

“This is stupid,” he muttered. “Why do I have to do this?”

An older boy, perhaps 17, laughed. “Your father’s very important. Do you know how it’ll look if his own son can’t even cheat properly? Try again.”

Darkness.

Aaron was in an alley, struggling against someone in a dark hoodie.

Darkness.

He was sitting next to a beautiful girl, his cheeks faintly red. The spirit snickered as they struggled to converse.

Darkness.

Aaron was at an auction. He sat next to his father and stepmother. 

“They’re here,” his father muttered. “Checkmate.”

Aaron’s eyes snapped to the entrance, where several people were entering…including the beautiful girl. He stood up. 

His stepmother laughed lightly. “Sit down, Aaron. You don’t need to pretend for her anymore. They’re done for.”

“You can’t–”

“We can,” His father said sharply, “and we will. Now sit. You’re making a scene.”

Aaron gave him a cold glance and walked across the room. “Audrey,” he murmured to the girl. “Come with me.” She looked at her parents, then winked and followed him out into a small side hallway. 

“What?” She asked, sounding annoyed. “Aaron, I know it was fake. You don’t have to apologize or anything, that’s just the way our world is.” 

Aaron grimaced. “I’m not here to apologize, though I’d like to do that too. Listen, Audrey.” He licked his lips. “You need to leave. My dad’s going to get rid of your whole family. I don’t know how but he’s going to do it tonight.”

She blinked, understanding. “You’re trying to get rid of us,” she said. “You want us out of the auction and out of the underworld.”

Aaron looked at her, shocked. “No, wha–no!”

“Why would you tell me?” Audrey shot back. “If this was real, then why would you tell your enemy? And don’t say because we were together. That was fake, and we both knew it.”

“Well maybe it wasn’t,” Aaron shouted. “Maybe it was more than that to me.”

Audrey blinked. For the first time, she looked caught off guard. Then she shook her head, disgusted. “Oh, you’re good,” she mumbled. “Very good. Nice move.”

Aaron hit her then. The spirit who watched flinched back. He looked faintly familiar in that moment, his face all twisted with rage he couldn’t contain. Audrey gasped, then turned and walked firmly back into the auction, chin held high. “Fine!” Aaron called after her. “I hope you die with the rest of them.”

He turned and ran outside, climbing into his car. He gasped for breath, then carefully pulled out his phone. 911. Three digits the spirit had seen him warned never to call. 

“There’s an auction,” he said into the phone. “Tons of illegal activity.” He carefully filled them in on the address, the details, anything else they wanted to know. Then he hung up and started to drive. He drove for a long time, through the city and fields. 

Then, abruptly, there was darkness.

He was in a parking lot. A parking lot she recognized well. He muttered several words that made the spirit wince. 

“Why not,” he finally said, laughing darkly. “Why not. They’re all gone, they’ll kill me if they find me. Might as well go out with a bang, right? Might as well finally make someone hurt the way they deserve to…”

He pulled something from under his seat. A slim black handgun. Then a second, which he tucked into a bag. And a third. 

Grinning, he walked into the school.

He opened the first door he saw. A scream answered him, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. One girl didn’t scream. The children started to run, to panic, to hide. The girl who did not scream struggled to turn her wheelchair. 

A shot rang out. 

Another. 

Another. 

Aaron had killed before. He’d seen blood smeared in dirty alleys and busy casinos. But this country school knew nothing of death. These spoiled children knew nothing of his world, and with his envy their blood trickled slowly across the clean white tiles. 

He stormed through the classrooms, leaving a sticky trail of red behind him.

Should he be feeling bad?

Should he be feeling numb?

Certainly he shouldn’t be feeling this good. 

This…

Alive.

Another shot. 

Another life. 

It was over so much faster than he expected. 

All at once, he had one bullet left. He opened a new door. Children were huddled in a corner behind a pile of mismatched desks. 

He grinned at them.

Placed the gun to his head. 

Darkness.

 

<><><><>

 

She was in front of him. She floated on silky, feathered wings, her mangled legs suddenly whole and new.

“You’re Aaron,” she said. 

“You’re Luci.”

A beat.

“You killed me.”

Another beat.

“I know.”

“Do you know what it did to him?” She didn’t look angry. She didn’t raise her voice, didn’t condemn him, didn’t even condescend. She just sounded heartbroken. An image floated through Aaron’s mind. Luci’s father, weeping alone beside a fresh grave that matched three older ones. “I didn’t need me to live,” she said. “But he needed me to.”

Aaron swallowed. He looked down towards the ground that wasn’t there. “I didn’t know,” he whispered.

“You…didn’t know?”

“I made a mistake,” he amended. 

“A mistake.”

“What do you want me to say?” Aaron snapped. “I killed you, and the rest of them too, and now I’ll pay for it forever. Do you want me to apologize? Do you want me to grovel and beg you to punish me?” He sneered at her, as if daring her to get angry.

“I don’t want anything from you,” the angel said.

“Stop it!” The scream tore from his hoarse throat, louder than he’d expected. 

“Stop what?” Luci blinked at him, eyes strangely kind. He hated her for it. “Aaron,” she said quietly, “do you care that we died?”

“Of course I care,” he snapped.

“Why?”

“Because–because you were all just kids. Because you had so much potential. Because–because I couldn’t see you as people, before. Because all of a sudden you have a story and a life and now it’s over and I did it.”

“Do you feel that guilt for the rest of them?”

“I–” He looked away, unable to answer.

“Do you feel it?” Luci’s voice was passionate but not angry. “Do you feel it for Anna, who was going to go on a cruise the next week? Do you feel it for Sam, who had a soccer game that night? Do you feel it for Sophie, who had 4 older brothers who would have done anything to protect her? We all had stories, Aaron! Do you feel it for the rest of them?”

“Stop!” Aaron shouted, squeezing his eyes shut. Faces greeted him. “Stop it,” he whispered.

“Our stories will never be finished,” Luci said. “Because of what you’ve done, we’ve gone from people to numbers. A statistic is all we can ever be.”

There was a long moment of quiet. “I can’t apologize,” Aaron realized. “I can’t make them matter.” Luci blinked at him silently. Somehow, she still didn’t condemn him. “I can’t help but see it as a gift,” he continued, horrified. “That world is a terrible place. Now they’re free.” He shook his head, suddenly overwhelmed with disgust and hatred. “I deserve so much worse than death.”

“You do,” Luci agreed. “The others wanted to punish you so terribly. I told them no.”

Aaron looked at her. “Why?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she murmured.

He hesitated. “Do you hate me?”

“Yes.”

“Then why?”

She took a moment to think, and Aaron felt himself shaking. A tiny voice in his mind whispered, I want to go home. Idiot, he told it. We don’t have a home. We don’t deserve one. “It’s because you’re a person,” Luci finally said. “Because I see you, and I can’t let them not see you. I can’t let them forget that you’re human. That you have a story.”

“Sounds…pretentious,” Aaron mumbled. 

“It does,” Luci murmured. “It isn’t, though.”

There was silence for a long moment. It was unnaturally peaceful. It itched at Aaron. Quiet was such a rarity. It was a dangerous novelty; quiet meant that the only sounds were his thoughts, and thoughts were the worst weapon of all. He never really had time to think. Now he wondered if that had been intentional. There was always a job to focus on, so why would he bother wondering if it was right? Now he did, and it hurt. Had he ever done a truly good thing in his entire life, even one? Had he ever wanted to? The world was better without him in it, and with that thought the peace grew stronger. 

“So what happens now?” He asked. 

“Now you have a choice to make.” 

Aaron blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Well…” Luci hesitated. “We made a choice. A dangerous one. A difficult one.” She met his eyes, and she smiled. It felt like a gentle rainfall after days of heat. It felt like loving wind and swaying trees. It felt like home and it felt like Luci. It felt like what he’d always wanted and never had. It made him want to rip himself to pieces in an attempt to find something that was worthy to even imagine it. “We forgive you.”

“What?!”

“We forgive you,” Luci repeated, and for the first time in years Aaron felt his eyes begin to sting and his throat begin to tighten. “You don’t deserve it. But this is the way that we choose to live, and it leaves you with your own choice.”

“I—” Aaron’s throat closed up tighter. His mind seemed completely blank. Were there any words to be said? A tear spilled over and down his cheek. He didn’t move. He was terrified that if he did he’d curl into a ball so tight he’d never come out. Another tear fell.

“Do you believe you can do good?” How gentle Luci was. How kind. How filled with grace. I killed her.

“I don’t know,” Aaron whispered.

“Do you want to?”

He met her eyes, then closed his own. Did he? Her smile floated back to him. “Yes.”

“We’re sending you back,” Luci said. “You’re going to live, and you’re going to live well.”

Aaron swallowed. Nodded. “What do I need to choose, then?

Luci cocked her head. “You choose what you’ll do with your life. You don’t need to tell me, but you need to choose now how you’ll live.”

Aaron nodded again, hating his trembling lip. “Why are you doing this?”

“It’s like I said,” Luci murmured. “You’re a person. And me, I’m a dreamer. I look at you and I see dreams that haven’t had a chance to form.” She smiled a smile that was sadder than weeping. “We weren't the only potential that died that day.” 

“You really believe that.” Aaron wasn’t sure if it was a question or the awe he couldn’t quite express, but Luci nodded.

“I believe in what you can be, once we rip out your seams.” 

“My…”

“Your seams. The places where you are held together. It’ll hurt. It’ll hurt terribly, because you need to be ripped apart stitch by stitch. You’ll fall apart and lose everything you thought made you who you are. And then, if it’s possible, you’ll grow. And I believe that you’ll grow into something incredible.”

“Right,” Aaron whispered, overwhelmed. 

“Right,” Luci repeated. Her eyes were bright and determined as her tone became businesslike. “Here’s how this works. Your gun misfired, leaving you with severe head injuries, but survivable. You’re only 15, which makes it a possibility that they’ll let you live. A very, very slim one, but it’s there, and that’s all we need. We can’t affect the world too strongly, but we can tilt it just right. You’ll never be free, but you’ll be alive, and they’ll want to turn you. They already want to spin you into a tragic fairytale, so your job is to change. You will never be the hero. But you don’t have to be the villain.”

 

<><><><>

 

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold  as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to--?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci.

I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

And here's just part 4 if you don't want to read the whole thing lol, I know it's way longer than most stuff I post here.

Spoiler

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to change?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci. I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But all miracles aside, you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

 

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

1 minute ago, Edema Rue said:

Okay!! @Wierdo @Weaver of Lies @Wittles, I finished it!!

None of this has been edited yet, but I really like where it's going and I'm excited to polish it and turn it into something amazing. Hope you guys enjoy!!

Ripping At Our Seams:

  Hide contents

He wasn’t sure when he started watching her. He wasn’t sure what he’d been before he started watching her. He lived in a single, glistening moment, and she was its center. 

He saw her first in a snowstorm, he thought. Yes. It was cold, faintly windy, and tiny flakes of snow flurried about without seeming to touch the bright carpet of leaves. She stood poised on her toes, her tiny black boots crunching on the leaves. She was frozen in a moment of delighted laughter. He floated gently around her, and her laughter continued as a shape appeared behind her. Then another. Then a third.

Three familiars, brothers, twined between her legs. Black, white, and orange formed a twisted spiral around her, and she looked enticingly otherworldly. Then she tripped. One of the cats made a noise, almost a laugh. She laughed with it, lying on her back and pulling one close. Eventually she stood up. She pulled off her boots and ran barefoot across the freezing grass, laughing with a joy too wild and powerful to be kept inside. In that moment, he thought she must be the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. She grinned up at the falling snow, and the moment faded to black.

Another replaced it. It was different, but he couldn’t say just how, except that he knew it was a moment created over hundreds of hours. She sat, knees pulled up tightly to her chest, a book filling her tiny arms. The title blurred, and the cover seemed to change colors. The girl seemed to change as well, her outfit shifting and her hair changing lengths. She laughed as she read, or perhaps she was crying. He couldn’t quite tell. Maybe it was both. 

From down the hall, there were footsteps. “Luci,” a voice called warningly. He flinched at it almost at the same time she did. She scrambled to turn off her lights and ducked under the covers. From the hallway, there was laughter, then the footsteps faded. But after a few minutes, she started to tremble. She tossed and turned for a few desperate minutes, then gave in and pulled out a flashlight, picking her book back up. That calmed her. It was the dead of night when she finally shut her book. This time, she slipped into sleep easily, calmly. He watched her sleep for a few minutes before all faded to black once more.

“I’m Luci,” a voice suddenly said in his ear. He jumped, turning, but she wasn’t speaking to him. She was on a playground, squatting next to a girl who was tugging at the grass. “What’s your name?”

The new girl looked up at Luci. “My mom said not to play with you.” Then she turned away. Luci was frozen only for a moment, and then she left, bravely walking onward until she found a place alone. She sat right down in the grass and began to cry. 

Darkness.

She snipped flower petals into a thin glass vase, mixing them with sand and pebbles and the occasional snail shell. Her potion completed, she smiled and brought it inside to her mother, leaving her three cats to call to her from outside the door.

Darkness.

Luci pulled bricks out of the garden path and built herself a shop. Not a big one, but just enough that she could put different things in each of her little boxes. This one was filled with tiny rocks, that one with rose buds. One held a chicken egg, carefully positioned in a nest of grass. Another held a pile of leaves and pine needles. And one held her greatest treasure; a garden snake she’d caught and boxed in. She surveyed her merchandise, then hurried off to find customers in the form of her parents and siblings. When she returned, the snake was gone.

Darkness.

Luci had climbed out her window and onto her roof. She carried a book under her arm. She carefully pulled herself over the peak and back down, into a little alcove where she was sheltered on all sides. She opened her book, winked to the stars, and began to read poetry to the full moon.

Darkness.

Luci was crying.

Darkness.

Luci was laughing.

Darkness.

Luci sang. He couldn’t move for the beauty of her high, clear voice. She climbed trees and let her voice break free where none but the birds could hear her, and even they stopped chirping for jealousy. He watched her work through her repertoire, singing every song she knew again and again until she made up her own. 

Darkness.

She dressed up as a snail for Halloween. It made him laugh.

Darkness.

He watched her grow older. As she grew, he was aware that he was getting older too. It was a strange feeling, as if his mind was slowly becoming more and more aware. Painfully aware. Aware enough to understand when her mother swerved desperately as snow cascaded off the mountains and onto the road. Aware enough to know that it would do no good. Aware enough to watch every person on the road struggle to escape their cars, to make it to the surface before the avalanche stole their last breaths.

Darkness.

Luci sat through the funeral in a new wheeled chair. She stared at the three caskets that sat open, displayed like wares before patrons who thought to buy them with their tears. She let her father push her away from the family they’d once had, and she began to cry, raw and ugly and loud enough that the people who didn’t seem to notice became terrible liars. Her father knelt next to her, his arm in a sling. He wrapped the other one around her. 

“I don’t want to be alive,” Luci whispered. “I don’t want to be alive anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” her father said firmly. “Don’t.”

She sniffed, shaking. “I-it’s so much harder to be alive without them. I want to go home, Dad.”

Darkness.

Luci didn’t sing any longer.

Darkness.

Luci’s laughter wasn’t wild. She kept what little of it there was trapped inside her, as if by hiding it where no one could find it it would be hers forever.

Darkness.

Her father pulled a warm chocolate cake from the oven. Luci sat in her chair and watched him frost it, then helped him stick the candles in, one at a time. 19 candles. The number of years old her sister should have been. Her father’s hand shook. Luci started to cry. But, slowly, they tried to smile. Shyly, at first. It was dangerous to feel joy. But, slowly, they ate their cake, and laughed and told stories each thought the other had forgotten.

Darkness.

It was snowing. He watched the snowstorm out the same window she did. A tall man was talking at the front of the room, gesturing to symbols and words that Luci didn’t care about. She cared about the snow, and he floated towards it, entranced by the flakes that fell so slowly, so silently. 

The door to the room slammed open, and a young man stood there. A young man the watching spirit knew. His eyes were wild and his face was sweaty. His arm was shaking, pointing a gun towards the teacher Luci had ignored so easily. One child screamed, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. Luci didn’t scream. The children stood and ran. Luci couldn’t run, and her chair was so slow…

Darkness.

<><><><>

She wasn’t sure when she started watching him. She wasn’t sure what she’d been before she started watching him. She lived in a single, glistening moment, and he was at its center.

She saw him first in a huge room. It was stacked with boxes, and he was standing in its center, looking around unsurely. There was a glittering chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and a staircase curved up to an elegant balcony. That was a good word for it, she decided. Elegant. He was frozen in a moment of shock, and she floated closer curiously. He’d just begun to tremble when a tall woman with perfectly curled hair appeared in the large doorway. 

“Aaron,” she called, “go find your room. It’s up the stairs, third door on the left.”

The boy walked numbly up the stairs, hesitating when he reached the top. The carpet looked too nice for his muddy shoes. He glanced back, then kept walking. The room was empty, but she gasped anyway. It was huge.

He meandered towards the window. It was snowing outside. He shivered and reached for curtains that weren’t there. Then he, and everything else, faded to darkness.

She blinked, confused, and when she opened her eyes the world was bright again. He was in the same room, but now it had a bed, curtains, a dresser, a bookshelf. All were delicately crafted, and looked as if they cost more money than this boy had ever seen in his life…Aaron was hacking at the bedframe with a tiny pocketknife. She frowned. 

The woman from before opened the door without knocking. She saw the boy and her expression darkened. “Aaron,” she said warningly. He looked up and glared at her. “Give it to me.” Slowly, he handed her the small knife he’d been using. As soon as it touched her hand, she snatched it away and tucked it into a pocket. “Who gave it to you?”

Aaron looked at the floor. “Siel,” he muttered.

The woman cursed. “I told you to stay away from her.”

Aaron looked back up at her, meeting her eyes with a glare. “It’s not my fault! Dad told her to watch me.” 

The woman cursed again. “I will speak to him.” She crouched until she was the same level as the boy. “But you listen here,” she said. “You obey me, not that idiot of a man.”

“Why should I?” Aaron snapped.

Her eyes widened. “What did you say to me?”

He trembled, but stuck his chin out defiantly. “Why should I? You’re not even my mom.”

“Your mother is dead,” the woman hissed. “And even if she were alive, your father knows better than to marry someone like that.”

“He should have known better than to marry someone like you,” Aaron muttered quietly. Not quietly enough. The woman hit him so quickly that the watching spirit didn’t see it, only saw Aaron recoil and hold his hand up to his face. He started to cry.

“Stay in here,” the woman said coldly, “until I return for you.”

Then it was dark.

Now Aaron was sitting on a stiff gray couch. She floated closer, wondering if she could speak to him, when she heard a door shut behind her. A man with thick brown hair and a beard stepped in. He had the boy’s eyes. 

Aaron looked shocked. “Dad!” He said, leaping to his feet. 

“Sit down, son,” the man said. He wasn’t smiling. Slowly, Aaron did. “You have a responsibility, Aaron. To me. To our business. To your mother.”

“She’s not—”

“You are to respect her!” The boy’s father shouted. “Do you understand?”

“But she says such mean things about you,” Aaron whispered. His father’s face softened.

“Do you know why I married her?” Aaron shook his head. “Well, it isn’t because she loves me. And it isn’t because I love her. I don’t love her, not like I did your mother. But marrying her keeps our family safe.” 

Aaron frowned. “Safe from who?”

“From her family.”

Darkness. 

Aaron was always surrounded by people. Teachers, family, his father’s colleagues, nurses. But no friends. He sat at a table, struggling to shuffle a deck of cards. 

“This is stupid,” he muttered. “Why do I have to do this?”

An older boy, perhaps 17, laughed. “Your father’s very important. Do you know how it’ll look if his own son can’t even cheat properly? Try again.”

Darkness.

Aaron was in an alley, struggling against someone in a dark hoodie.

Darkness.

He was sitting next to a beautiful girl, his cheeks faintly red. The spirit snickered as they struggled to converse.

Darkness.

Aaron was at an auction. He sat next to his father and stepmother. 

“They’re here,” his father muttered. “Checkmate.”

Aaron’s eyes snapped to the entrance, where several people were entering…including the beautiful girl. He stood up. 

His stepmother laughed lightly. “Sit down, Aaron. You don’t need to pretend for her anymore. They’re done for.”

“You can’t–”

“We can,” His father said sharply, “and we will. Now sit. You’re making a scene.”

Aaron gave him a cold glance and walked across the room. “Audrey,” he murmured to the girl. “Come with me.” She looked at her parents, then winked and followed him out into a small side hallway. 

“What?” She asked, sounding annoyed. “Aaron, I know it was fake. You don’t have to apologize or anything, that’s just the way our world is.” 

Aaron grimaced. “I’m not here to apologize, though I’d like to do that too. Listen, Audrey.” He licked his lips. “You need to leave. My dad’s going to get rid of your whole family. I don’t know how but he’s going to do it tonight.”

She blinked, understanding. “You’re trying to get rid of us,” she said. “You want us out of the auction and out of the underworld.”

Aaron looked at her, shocked. “No, wha–no!”

“Why would you tell me?” Audrey shot back. “If this was real, then why would you tell your enemy? And don’t say because we were together. That was fake, and we both knew it.”

“Well maybe it wasn’t,” Aaron shouted. “Maybe it was more than that to me.”

Audrey blinked. For the first time, she looked caught off guard. Then she shook her head, disgusted. “Oh, you’re good,” she mumbled. “Very good. Nice move.”

Aaron hit her then. The spirit who watched flinched back. He looked faintly familiar in that moment, his face all twisted with rage he couldn’t contain. Audrey gasped, then turned and walked firmly back into the auction, chin held high. “Fine!” Aaron called after her. “I hope you die with the rest of them.”

He turned and ran outside, climbing into his car. He gasped for breath, then carefully pulled out his phone. 911. Three digits the spirit had seen him warned never to call. 

“There’s an auction,” he said into the phone. “Tons of illegal activity.” He carefully filled them in on the address, the details, anything else they wanted to know. Then he hung up and started to drive. He drove for a long time, through the city and fields. 

Then, abruptly, there was darkness.

He was in a parking lot. A parking lot she recognized well. He muttered several words that made the spirit wince. 

“Why not,” he finally said, laughing darkly. “Why not. They’re all gone, they’ll kill me if they find me. Might as well go out with a bang, right? Might as well finally make someone hurt the way they deserve to…”

He pulled something from under his seat. A slim black handgun. Then a second, which he tucked into a bag. And a third. 

Grinning, he walked into the school.

He opened the first door he saw. A scream answered him, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. One girl didn’t scream. The children started to run, to panic, to hide. The girl who did not scream struggled to turn her wheelchair. 

A shot rang out. 

Another. 

Another. 

Aaron had killed before. He’d seen blood smeared in dirty alleys and busy casinos. But this country school knew nothing of death. These spoiled children knew nothing of his world, and with his envy their blood trickled slowly across the clean white tiles. 

He stormed through the classrooms, leaving a sticky trail of red behind him.

Should he be feeling bad?

Should he be feeling numb?

Certainly he shouldn’t be feeling this good. 

This…

Alive.

Another shot. 

Another life. 

It was over so much faster than he expected. 

All at once, he had one bullet left. He opened a new door. Children were huddled in a corner behind a pile of mismatched desks. 

He grinned at them.

Placed the gun to his head. 

Darkness.

 

<><><><>

 

She was in front of him. She floated on silky, feathered wings, her mangled legs suddenly whole and new.

“You’re Aaron,” she said. 

“You’re Luci.”

A beat.

“You killed me.”

Another beat.

“I know.”

“Do you know what it did to him?” She didn’t look angry. She didn’t raise her voice, didn’t condemn him, didn’t even condescend. She just sounded heartbroken. An image floated through Aaron’s mind. Luci’s father, weeping alone beside a fresh grave that matched three older ones. “I didn’t need me to live,” she said. “But he needed me to.”

Aaron swallowed. He looked down towards the ground that wasn’t there. “I didn’t know,” he whispered.

“You…didn’t know?”

“I made a mistake,” he amended. 

“A mistake.”

“What do you want me to say?” Aaron snapped. “I killed you, and the rest of them too, and now I’ll pay for it forever. Do you want me to apologize? Do you want me to grovel and beg you to punish me?” He sneered at her, as if daring her to get angry.

“I don’t want anything from you,” the angel said.

“Stop it!” The scream tore from his hoarse throat, louder than he’d expected. 

“Stop what?” Luci blinked at him, eyes strangely kind. He hated her for it. “Aaron,” she said quietly, “do you care that we died?”

“Of course I care,” he snapped.

“Why?”

“Because–because you were all just kids. Because you had so much potential. Because–because I couldn’t see you as people, before. Because all of a sudden you have a story and a life and now it’s over and I did it.”

“Do you feel that guilt for the rest of them?”

“I–” He looked away, unable to answer.

“Do you feel it?” Luci’s voice was passionate but not angry. “Do you feel it for Anna, who was going to go on a cruise the next week? Do you feel it for Sam, who had a soccer game that night? Do you feel it for Sophie, who had 4 older brothers who would have done anything to protect her? We all had stories, Aaron! Do you feel it for the rest of them?”

“Stop!” Aaron shouted, squeezing his eyes shut. Faces greeted him. “Stop it,” he whispered.

“Our stories will never be finished,” Luci said. “Because of what you’ve done, we’ve gone from people to numbers. A statistic is all we can ever be.”

There was a long moment of quiet. “I can’t apologize,” Aaron realized. “I can’t make them matter.” Luci blinked at him silently. Somehow, she still didn’t condemn him. “I can’t help but see it as a gift,” he continued, horrified. “That world is a terrible place. Now they’re free.” He shook his head, suddenly overwhelmed with disgust and hatred. “I deserve so much worse than death.”

“You do,” Luci agreed. “The others wanted to punish you so terribly. I told them no.”

Aaron looked at her. “Why?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she murmured.

He hesitated. “Do you hate me?”

“Yes.”

“Then why?”

She took a moment to think, and Aaron felt himself shaking. A tiny voice in his mind whispered, I want to go home. Idiot, he told it. We don’t have a home. We don’t deserve one. “It’s because you’re a person,” Luci finally said. “Because I see you, and I can’t let them not see you. I can’t let them forget that you’re human. That you have a story.”

“Sounds…pretentious,” Aaron mumbled. 

“It does,” Luci murmured. “It isn’t, though.”

There was silence for a long moment. It was unnaturally peaceful. It itched at Aaron. Quiet was such a rarity. It was a dangerous novelty; quiet meant that the only sounds were his thoughts, and thoughts were the worst weapon of all. He never really had time to think. Now he wondered if that had been intentional. There was always a job to focus on, so why would he bother wondering if it was right? Now he did, and it hurt. Had he ever done a truly good thing in his entire life, even one? Had he ever wanted to? The world was better without him in it, and with that thought the peace grew stronger. 

“So what happens now?” He asked. 

“Now you have a choice to make.” 

Aaron blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Well…” Luci hesitated. “We made a choice. A dangerous one. A difficult one.” She met his eyes, and she smiled. It felt like a gentle rainfall after days of heat. It felt like loving wind and swaying trees. It felt like home and it felt like Luci. It felt like what he’d always wanted and never had. It made him want to rip himself to pieces in an attempt to find something that was worthy to even imagine it. “We forgive you.”

“What?!”

“We forgive you,” Luci repeated, and for the first time in years Aaron felt his eyes begin to sting and his throat begin to tighten. “You don’t deserve it. But this is the way that we choose to live, and it leaves you with your own choice.”

“I—” Aaron’s throat closed up tighter. His mind seemed completely blank. Were there any words to be said? A tear spilled over and down his cheek. He didn’t move. He was terrified that if he did he’d curl into a ball so tight he’d never come out. Another tear fell.

“Do you believe you can do good?” How gentle Luci was. How kind. How filled with grace. I killed her.

“I don’t know,” Aaron whispered.

“Do you want to?”

He met her eyes, then closed his own. Did he? Her smile floated back to him. “Yes.”

“We’re sending you back,” Luci said. “You’re going to live, and you’re going to live well.”

Aaron swallowed. Nodded. “What do I need to choose, then?

Luci cocked her head. “You choose what you’ll do with your life. You don’t need to tell me, but you need to choose now how you’ll live.”

Aaron nodded again, hating his trembling lip. “Why are you doing this?”

“It’s like I said,” Luci murmured. “You’re a person. And me, I’m a dreamer. I look at you and I see dreams that haven’t had a chance to form.” She smiled a smile that was sadder than weeping. “We weren't the only potential that died that day.” 

“You really believe that.” Aaron wasn’t sure if it was a question or the awe he couldn’t quite express, but Luci nodded.

“I believe in what you can be, once we rip out your seams.” 

“My…”

“Your seams. The places where you are held together. It’ll hurt. It’ll hurt terribly, because you need to be ripped apart stitch by stitch. You’ll fall apart and lose everything you thought made you who you are. And then, if it’s possible, you’ll grow. And I believe that you’ll grow into something incredible.”

“Right,” Aaron whispered, overwhelmed. 

“Right,” Luci repeated. Her eyes were bright and determined as her tone became businesslike. “Here’s how this works. Your gun misfired, leaving you with severe head injuries, but survivable. You’re only 15, which makes it a possibility that they’ll let you live. A very, very slim one, but it’s there, and that’s all we need. We can’t affect the world too strongly, but we can tilt it just right. You’ll never be free, but you’ll be alive, and they’ll want to turn you. They already want to spin you into a tragic fairytale, so your job is to change. You will never be the hero. But you don’t have to be the villain.”

 

<><><><>

 

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold  as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to--?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci.

I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

And here's just part 4 if you don't want to read the whole thing lol, I know it's way longer than most stuff I post here.

  Reveal hidden contents

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to change?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci. I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But all miracles aside, you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

 

oh wow! that is amazing!

[Weaver of Lies he/him]

58 minutes ago, Edema Rue said:

Okay!! @Wierdo @Weaver of Lies @Wittles, I finished it!!

None of this has been edited yet, but I really like where it's going and I'm excited to polish it and turn it into something amazing. Hope you guys enjoy!!

Ripping At Our Seams:

  Reveal hidden contents

He wasn’t sure when he started watching her. He wasn’t sure what he’d been before he started watching her. He lived in a single, glistening moment, and she was its center. 

He saw her first in a snowstorm, he thought. Yes. It was cold, faintly windy, and tiny flakes of snow flurried about without seeming to touch the bright carpet of leaves. She stood poised on her toes, her tiny black boots crunching on the leaves. She was frozen in a moment of delighted laughter. He floated gently around her, and her laughter continued as a shape appeared behind her. Then another. Then a third.

Three familiars, brothers, twined between her legs. Black, white, and orange formed a twisted spiral around her, and she looked enticingly otherworldly. Then she tripped. One of the cats made a noise, almost a laugh. She laughed with it, lying on her back and pulling one close. Eventually she stood up. She pulled off her boots and ran barefoot across the freezing grass, laughing with a joy too wild and powerful to be kept inside. In that moment, he thought she must be the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. She grinned up at the falling snow, and the moment faded to black.

Another replaced it. It was different, but he couldn’t say just how, except that he knew it was a moment created over hundreds of hours. She sat, knees pulled up tightly to her chest, a book filling her tiny arms. The title blurred, and the cover seemed to change colors. The girl seemed to change as well, her outfit shifting and her hair changing lengths. She laughed as she read, or perhaps she was crying. He couldn’t quite tell. Maybe it was both. 

From down the hall, there were footsteps. “Luci,” a voice called warningly. He flinched at it almost at the same time she did. She scrambled to turn off her lights and ducked under the covers. From the hallway, there was laughter, then the footsteps faded. But after a few minutes, she started to tremble. She tossed and turned for a few desperate minutes, then gave in and pulled out a flashlight, picking her book back up. That calmed her. It was the dead of night when she finally shut her book. This time, she slipped into sleep easily, calmly. He watched her sleep for a few minutes before all faded to black once more.

“I’m Luci,” a voice suddenly said in his ear. He jumped, turning, but she wasn’t speaking to him. She was on a playground, squatting next to a girl who was tugging at the grass. “What’s your name?”

The new girl looked up at Luci. “My mom said not to play with you.” Then she turned away. Luci was frozen only for a moment, and then she left, bravely walking onward until she found a place alone. She sat right down in the grass and began to cry. 

Darkness.

She snipped flower petals into a thin glass vase, mixing them with sand and pebbles and the occasional snail shell. Her potion completed, she smiled and brought it inside to her mother, leaving her three cats to call to her from outside the door.

Darkness.

Luci pulled bricks out of the garden path and built herself a shop. Not a big one, but just enough that she could put different things in each of her little boxes. This one was filled with tiny rocks, that one with rose buds. One held a chicken egg, carefully positioned in a nest of grass. Another held a pile of leaves and pine needles. And one held her greatest treasure; a garden snake she’d caught and boxed in. She surveyed her merchandise, then hurried off to find customers in the form of her parents and siblings. When she returned, the snake was gone.

Darkness.

Luci had climbed out her window and onto her roof. She carried a book under her arm. She carefully pulled herself over the peak and back down, into a little alcove where she was sheltered on all sides. She opened her book, winked to the stars, and began to read poetry to the full moon.

Darkness.

Luci was crying.

Darkness.

Luci was laughing.

Darkness.

Luci sang. He couldn’t move for the beauty of her high, clear voice. She climbed trees and let her voice break free where none but the birds could hear her, and even they stopped chirping for jealousy. He watched her work through her repertoire, singing every song she knew again and again until she made up her own. 

Darkness.

She dressed up as a snail for Halloween. It made him laugh.

Darkness.

He watched her grow older. As she grew, he was aware that he was getting older too. It was a strange feeling, as if his mind was slowly becoming more and more aware. Painfully aware. Aware enough to understand when her mother swerved desperately as snow cascaded off the mountains and onto the road. Aware enough to know that it would do no good. Aware enough to watch every person on the road struggle to escape their cars, to make it to the surface before the avalanche stole their last breaths.

Darkness.

Luci sat through the funeral in a new wheeled chair. She stared at the three caskets that sat open, displayed like wares before patrons who thought to buy them with their tears. She let her father push her away from the family they’d once had, and she began to cry, raw and ugly and loud enough that the people who didn’t seem to notice became terrible liars. Her father knelt next to her, his arm in a sling. He wrapped the other one around her. 

“I don’t want to be alive,” Luci whispered. “I don’t want to be alive anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” her father said firmly. “Don’t.”

She sniffed, shaking. “I-it’s so much harder to be alive without them. I want to go home, Dad.”

Darkness.

Luci didn’t sing any longer.

Darkness.

Luci’s laughter wasn’t wild. She kept what little of it there was trapped inside her, as if by hiding it where no one could find it it would be hers forever.

Darkness.

Her father pulled a warm chocolate cake from the oven. Luci sat in her chair and watched him frost it, then helped him stick the candles in, one at a time. 19 candles. The number of years old her sister should have been. Her father’s hand shook. Luci started to cry. But, slowly, they tried to smile. Shyly, at first. It was dangerous to feel joy. But, slowly, they ate their cake, and laughed and told stories each thought the other had forgotten.

Darkness.

It was snowing. He watched the snowstorm out the same window she did. A tall man was talking at the front of the room, gesturing to symbols and words that Luci didn’t care about. She cared about the snow, and he floated towards it, entranced by the flakes that fell so slowly, so silently. 

The door to the room slammed open, and a young man stood there. A young man the watching spirit knew. His eyes were wild and his face was sweaty. His arm was shaking, pointing a gun towards the teacher Luci had ignored so easily. One child screamed, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. Luci didn’t scream. The children stood and ran. Luci couldn’t run, and her chair was so slow…

Darkness.

<><><><>

She wasn’t sure when she started watching him. She wasn’t sure what she’d been before she started watching him. She lived in a single, glistening moment, and he was at its center.

She saw him first in a huge room. It was stacked with boxes, and he was standing in its center, looking around unsurely. There was a glittering chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and a staircase curved up to an elegant balcony. That was a good word for it, she decided. Elegant. He was frozen in a moment of shock, and she floated closer curiously. He’d just begun to tremble when a tall woman with perfectly curled hair appeared in the large doorway. 

“Aaron,” she called, “go find your room. It’s up the stairs, third door on the left.”

The boy walked numbly up the stairs, hesitating when he reached the top. The carpet looked too nice for his muddy shoes. He glanced back, then kept walking. The room was empty, but she gasped anyway. It was huge.

He meandered towards the window. It was snowing outside. He shivered and reached for curtains that weren’t there. Then he, and everything else, faded to darkness.

She blinked, confused, and when she opened her eyes the world was bright again. He was in the same room, but now it had a bed, curtains, a dresser, a bookshelf. All were delicately crafted, and looked as if they cost more money than this boy had ever seen in his life…Aaron was hacking at the bedframe with a tiny pocketknife. She frowned. 

The woman from before opened the door without knocking. She saw the boy and her expression darkened. “Aaron,” she said warningly. He looked up and glared at her. “Give it to me.” Slowly, he handed her the small knife he’d been using. As soon as it touched her hand, she snatched it away and tucked it into a pocket. “Who gave it to you?”

Aaron looked at the floor. “Siel,” he muttered.

The woman cursed. “I told you to stay away from her.”

Aaron looked back up at her, meeting her eyes with a glare. “It’s not my fault! Dad told her to watch me.” 

The woman cursed again. “I will speak to him.” She crouched until she was the same level as the boy. “But you listen here,” she said. “You obey me, not that idiot of a man.”

“Why should I?” Aaron snapped.

Her eyes widened. “What did you say to me?”

He trembled, but stuck his chin out defiantly. “Why should I? You’re not even my mom.”

“Your mother is dead,” the woman hissed. “And even if she were alive, your father knows better than to marry someone like that.”

“He should have known better than to marry someone like you,” Aaron muttered quietly. Not quietly enough. The woman hit him so quickly that the watching spirit didn’t see it, only saw Aaron recoil and hold his hand up to his face. He started to cry.

“Stay in here,” the woman said coldly, “until I return for you.”

Then it was dark.

Now Aaron was sitting on a stiff gray couch. She floated closer, wondering if she could speak to him, when she heard a door shut behind her. A man with thick brown hair and a beard stepped in. He had the boy’s eyes. 

Aaron looked shocked. “Dad!” He said, leaping to his feet. 

“Sit down, son,” the man said. He wasn’t smiling. Slowly, Aaron did. “You have a responsibility, Aaron. To me. To our business. To your mother.”

“She’s not—”

“You are to respect her!” The boy’s father shouted. “Do you understand?”

“But she says such mean things about you,” Aaron whispered. His father’s face softened.

“Do you know why I married her?” Aaron shook his head. “Well, it isn’t because she loves me. And it isn’t because I love her. I don’t love her, not like I did your mother. But marrying her keeps our family safe.” 

Aaron frowned. “Safe from who?”

“From her family.”

Darkness. 

Aaron was always surrounded by people. Teachers, family, his father’s colleagues, nurses. But no friends. He sat at a table, struggling to shuffle a deck of cards. 

“This is stupid,” he muttered. “Why do I have to do this?”

An older boy, perhaps 17, laughed. “Your father’s very important. Do you know how it’ll look if his own son can’t even cheat properly? Try again.”

Darkness.

Aaron was in an alley, struggling against someone in a dark hoodie.

Darkness.

He was sitting next to a beautiful girl, his cheeks faintly red. The spirit snickered as they struggled to converse.

Darkness.

Aaron was at an auction. He sat next to his father and stepmother. 

“They’re here,” his father muttered. “Checkmate.”

Aaron’s eyes snapped to the entrance, where several people were entering…including the beautiful girl. He stood up. 

His stepmother laughed lightly. “Sit down, Aaron. You don’t need to pretend for her anymore. They’re done for.”

“You can’t–”

“We can,” His father said sharply, “and we will. Now sit. You’re making a scene.”

Aaron gave him a cold glance and walked across the room. “Audrey,” he murmured to the girl. “Come with me.” She looked at her parents, then winked and followed him out into a small side hallway. 

“What?” She asked, sounding annoyed. “Aaron, I know it was fake. You don’t have to apologize or anything, that’s just the way our world is.” 

Aaron grimaced. “I’m not here to apologize, though I’d like to do that too. Listen, Audrey.” He licked his lips. “You need to leave. My dad’s going to get rid of your whole family. I don’t know how but he’s going to do it tonight.”

She blinked, understanding. “You’re trying to get rid of us,” she said. “You want us out of the auction and out of the underworld.”

Aaron looked at her, shocked. “No, wha–no!”

“Why would you tell me?” Audrey shot back. “If this was real, then why would you tell your enemy? And don’t say because we were together. That was fake, and we both knew it.”

“Well maybe it wasn’t,” Aaron shouted. “Maybe it was more than that to me.”

Audrey blinked. For the first time, she looked caught off guard. Then she shook her head, disgusted. “Oh, you’re good,” she mumbled. “Very good. Nice move.”

Aaron hit her then. The spirit who watched flinched back. He looked faintly familiar in that moment, his face all twisted with rage he couldn’t contain. Audrey gasped, then turned and walked firmly back into the auction, chin held high. “Fine!” Aaron called after her. “I hope you die with the rest of them.”

He turned and ran outside, climbing into his car. He gasped for breath, then carefully pulled out his phone. 911. Three digits the spirit had seen him warned never to call. 

“There’s an auction,” he said into the phone. “Tons of illegal activity.” He carefully filled them in on the address, the details, anything else they wanted to know. Then he hung up and started to drive. He drove for a long time, through the city and fields. 

Then, abruptly, there was darkness.

He was in a parking lot. A parking lot she recognized well. He muttered several words that made the spirit wince. 

“Why not,” he finally said, laughing darkly. “Why not. They’re all gone, they’ll kill me if they find me. Might as well go out with a bang, right? Might as well finally make someone hurt the way they deserve to…”

He pulled something from under his seat. A slim black handgun. Then a second, which he tucked into a bag. And a third. 

Grinning, he walked into the school.

He opened the first door he saw. A scream answered him, and then another, and then there was a chorus of them, all mixing in a terrible cacophony of sound. One girl didn’t scream. The children started to run, to panic, to hide. The girl who did not scream struggled to turn her wheelchair. 

A shot rang out. 

Another. 

Another. 

Aaron had killed before. He’d seen blood smeared in dirty alleys and busy casinos. But this country school knew nothing of death. These spoiled children knew nothing of his world, and with his envy their blood trickled slowly across the clean white tiles. 

He stormed through the classrooms, leaving a sticky trail of red behind him.

Should he be feeling bad?

Should he be feeling numb?

Certainly he shouldn’t be feeling this good. 

This…

Alive.

Another shot. 

Another life. 

It was over so much faster than he expected. 

All at once, he had one bullet left. He opened a new door. Children were huddled in a corner behind a pile of mismatched desks. 

He grinned at them.

Placed the gun to his head. 

Darkness.

 

<><><><>

 

She was in front of him. She floated on silky, feathered wings, her mangled legs suddenly whole and new.

“You’re Aaron,” she said. 

“You’re Luci.”

A beat.

“You killed me.”

Another beat.

“I know.”

“Do you know what it did to him?” She didn’t look angry. She didn’t raise her voice, didn’t condemn him, didn’t even condescend. She just sounded heartbroken. An image floated through Aaron’s mind. Luci’s father, weeping alone beside a fresh grave that matched three older ones. “I didn’t need me to live,” she said. “But he needed me to.”

Aaron swallowed. He looked down towards the ground that wasn’t there. “I didn’t know,” he whispered.

“You…didn’t know?”

“I made a mistake,” he amended. 

“A mistake.”

“What do you want me to say?” Aaron snapped. “I killed you, and the rest of them too, and now I’ll pay for it forever. Do you want me to apologize? Do you want me to grovel and beg you to punish me?” He sneered at her, as if daring her to get angry.

“I don’t want anything from you,” the angel said.

“Stop it!” The scream tore from his hoarse throat, louder than he’d expected. 

“Stop what?” Luci blinked at him, eyes strangely kind. He hated her for it. “Aaron,” she said quietly, “do you care that we died?”

“Of course I care,” he snapped.

“Why?”

“Because–because you were all just kids. Because you had so much potential. Because–because I couldn’t see you as people, before. Because all of a sudden you have a story and a life and now it’s over and I did it.”

“Do you feel that guilt for the rest of them?”

“I–” He looked away, unable to answer.

“Do you feel it?” Luci’s voice was passionate but not angry. “Do you feel it for Anna, who was going to go on a cruise the next week? Do you feel it for Sam, who had a soccer game that night? Do you feel it for Sophie, who had 4 older brothers who would have done anything to protect her? We all had stories, Aaron! Do you feel it for the rest of them?”

“Stop!” Aaron shouted, squeezing his eyes shut. Faces greeted him. “Stop it,” he whispered.

“Our stories will never be finished,” Luci said. “Because of what you’ve done, we’ve gone from people to numbers. A statistic is all we can ever be.”

There was a long moment of quiet. “I can’t apologize,” Aaron realized. “I can’t make them matter.” Luci blinked at him silently. Somehow, she still didn’t condemn him. “I can’t help but see it as a gift,” he continued, horrified. “That world is a terrible place. Now they’re free.” He shook his head, suddenly overwhelmed with disgust and hatred. “I deserve so much worse than death.”

“You do,” Luci agreed. “The others wanted to punish you so terribly. I told them no.”

Aaron looked at her. “Why?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she murmured.

He hesitated. “Do you hate me?”

“Yes.”

“Then why?”

She took a moment to think, and Aaron felt himself shaking. A tiny voice in his mind whispered, I want to go home. Idiot, he told it. We don’t have a home. We don’t deserve one. “It’s because you’re a person,” Luci finally said. “Because I see you, and I can’t let them not see you. I can’t let them forget that you’re human. That you have a story.”

“Sounds…pretentious,” Aaron mumbled. 

“It does,” Luci murmured. “It isn’t, though.”

There was silence for a long moment. It was unnaturally peaceful. It itched at Aaron. Quiet was such a rarity. It was a dangerous novelty; quiet meant that the only sounds were his thoughts, and thoughts were the worst weapon of all. He never really had time to think. Now he wondered if that had been intentional. There was always a job to focus on, so why would he bother wondering if it was right? Now he did, and it hurt. Had he ever done a truly good thing in his entire life, even one? Had he ever wanted to? The world was better without him in it, and with that thought the peace grew stronger. 

“So what happens now?” He asked. 

“Now you have a choice to make.” 

Aaron blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Well…” Luci hesitated. “We made a choice. A dangerous one. A difficult one.” She met his eyes, and she smiled. It felt like a gentle rainfall after days of heat. It felt like loving wind and swaying trees. It felt like home and it felt like Luci. It felt like what he’d always wanted and never had. It made him want to rip himself to pieces in an attempt to find something that was worthy to even imagine it. “We forgive you.”

“What?!”

“We forgive you,” Luci repeated, and for the first time in years Aaron felt his eyes begin to sting and his throat begin to tighten. “You don’t deserve it. But this is the way that we choose to live, and it leaves you with your own choice.”

“I—” Aaron’s throat closed up tighter. His mind seemed completely blank. Were there any words to be said? A tear spilled over and down his cheek. He didn’t move. He was terrified that if he did he’d curl into a ball so tight he’d never come out. Another tear fell.

“Do you believe you can do good?” How gentle Luci was. How kind. How filled with grace. I killed her.

“I don’t know,” Aaron whispered.

“Do you want to?”

He met her eyes, then closed his own. Did he? Her smile floated back to him. “Yes.”

“We’re sending you back,” Luci said. “You’re going to live, and you’re going to live well.”

Aaron swallowed. Nodded. “What do I need to choose, then?

Luci cocked her head. “You choose what you’ll do with your life. You don’t need to tell me, but you need to choose now how you’ll live.”

Aaron nodded again, hating his trembling lip. “Why are you doing this?”

“It’s like I said,” Luci murmured. “You’re a person. And me, I’m a dreamer. I look at you and I see dreams that haven’t had a chance to form.” She smiled a smile that was sadder than weeping. “We weren't the only potential that died that day.” 

“You really believe that.” Aaron wasn’t sure if it was a question or the awe he couldn’t quite express, but Luci nodded.

“I believe in what you can be, once we rip out your seams.” 

“My…”

“Your seams. The places where you are held together. It’ll hurt. It’ll hurt terribly, because you need to be ripped apart stitch by stitch. You’ll fall apart and lose everything you thought made you who you are. And then, if it’s possible, you’ll grow. And I believe that you’ll grow into something incredible.”

“Right,” Aaron whispered, overwhelmed. 

“Right,” Luci repeated. Her eyes were bright and determined as her tone became businesslike. “Here’s how this works. Your gun misfired, leaving you with severe head injuries, but survivable. You’re only 15, which makes it a possibility that they’ll let you live. A very, very slim one, but it’s there, and that’s all we need. We can’t affect the world too strongly, but we can tilt it just right. You’ll never be free, but you’ll be alive, and they’ll want to turn you. They already want to spin you into a tragic fairytale, so your job is to change. You will never be the hero. But you don’t have to be the villain.”

 

<><><><>

 

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold  as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to--?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci.

I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

And here's just part 4 if you don't want to read the whole thing lol, I know it's way longer than most stuff I post here.

  Hide contents

The beginning was the hardest. 

It took time to recover. He was consistently being guarded, and the nurses always watched him with something between terror and loathing. He didn’t have his phone, but even if he did he knew what he’d find. They let him watch the news, after all.

The underworld’s oldest and most dangerous criminals caught in the most successful raid anyone could remember. Stolen riches thought long gone were found and returned to their owners. And all this on the eve of the day that the son of one of these very criminals committed an unprecedented school shooting. 8 dead. 19 injured. 

He trembled every time he saw it. When he couldn't stand to see his face and the faces of those he loved plastered around the news anymore, he turned it off. But just sitting was worse. Children danced through his mind. When he slept, he dreamt of Luci. Sometimes she was an angel. Sometimes she was a bloody corpse. Occasionally she encouraged him. Often she condemned him.

He started to wonder what was real. Had he imagined his talk with her? Who was he to think that she’d really give him another chance?

But they let him live.

Unforgivable, the judges said.

Theirs are not the voices that matter, the angel shot back.

Darkness.

Power is intoxicating, and admiration is addicting. In a strange and terrible twist, Aaron abruptly had both.

It was a new kind of difficulty. They put him in with dozens of other teenagers who knew exactly who he was. They tried to rope him into the hierarchy, to force him to lead them. After he got in a few fights, they left him alone. But they respected him. If he mentioned in passing a fondness for cards, he’d wake up the next morning with a faintly worn deck in his shoe. If a new kid came in who didn’t understand the unwritten rules, Aaron never had to explain them. Within a week, the newcomer always seemed to fall into line. 

Intoxicating. Addicting.

Aaron wanted it.

He wanted it so badly it hurt, and the only thing keeping it out of reach was a promise he was no longer sure he’d made. 

And then there were the adults. They treated him like a wild animal they were desperate to control. Some were afraid. Most were simply angry. 

“You shouldn’t be alive,” one of the guards muttered. I know. “They should have killed you.” I know. “You will never amount to anything.” I know.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I already am.

Darkness.

They took him to see his father, once. Aaron saw him through a thick glass pane. His father yelled and raved and told him he should have just died.

Aaron couldn’t answer him. He couldn’t say a single word.

Darkness.

He was in line for food. Chin down. Eyes up. It was important that he didn’t seem rebellious. But he couldn’t ignore them, either. They were always watching him, and so he watched back. It was survival…he saw her for a split second, out of the corner of his eye, and whirled. He sprinted over and spun Audrey around…to see that it wasn’t her. The girl facing him looked terrified. 

He turned away, walking numbly down the hall. Too many people were watching. His room was peacefully deserted, so he walked to the back and sat on his bunk. 

You don’t have to be the villain…

But it was so much easier. It was what they expected. It was what they wanted. Surely nothing he did now would really matter.

We weren't the only potential that died that day…

“Fine,” he growled at the floor. “Fine.”

Darkness.

Aaron started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

It was with a nervous heart that he brought his notebook to his skeptical caretaker. She flipped through it. At first her face was as flat and cold as usual. Then her brows creased. Then her eyes widened. “What is this?”

“It’s…” Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s something I can do.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re—you’re trying to change?”

He nodded. Chin down. Eyes up. That’s how you survive. Slowly, he lifted his head. “I am. And I’m going to keep trying.” I’m not just surviving. I can’t.

She pursed her lips. “Do you have any idea how hard this is going to be?”

Aaron nodded again.

“But you still want to try?”

“I guess I do,” Aaron muttered. Something flashed in his eyes. Anger, or maybe determination. “You don’t have to help me. But I’ll find a way to do it anyway, and I don’t think you want to see how.”

“Is that a threat?” To her credit, she sounded neither afraid nor angry.

Aaron winced, remembering he was walking on eggshells. “No,” he said, eyes on the floor. “It’s a promise. Let me change, and I swear I won’t disappoint you.” Or you, Luci. I’m trying. 

Darkness.

It took longer than he wanted. It took meetings and conversations. It took a carefully composed mask that he couldn’t let down. Not in his room, not in the showers. All it would take was one second of anger and he’d lose any progress he’d started to make. So he only screamed in his dreams. He threw his anger into a messy notebook, then tore the pages to shreds. He could never let them see.

But it worked. Painfully slowly, it worked. After nearly three months, they gave him a guitar, and he started to play. He changed his thoughts to notes and hesitantly coaxed them into melodies. 

It was ugly.

It was miserable.

Several pages were ripped apart that first week.

And yet, he learned.

You don’t have to be the villain.

Darkness.

They started to hate him. The other kids. He got into more fights. It worried him, what the adults would think, so he didn’t fight back. He hated himself for it, and so did they.

“This,” the warden said, “is quite the turn of events.” Aaron didn’t say anything. Chin down. Eyes up. Never let your guard down. Survive. “When you got here,” he continued, “they worshiped you. Now I think they’d kill you if given the chance. Why?”

Aaron shrugged.

“Not good enough,” the man warned. 

Aaron let out a breath, feeling cracks spread across his mask. “I’ll tell you why,” he spat. “It’s because I’m becoming something they can never be.”

“And what is that?”

“Someone who’s strong enough to say no.”

Darkness.

Luci watched him.

He was sitting nervously on the edge of his bed, tapping his foot to the rhythm of a song only he could hear. He didn’t see it, but the others in the room were glancing at him. A few with anger and hatred, yes, but most seemed purely envious. 

His eyes were open, it was dangerous to close them, but his mind was far away. The fingers of his right hand twitched, as if plucking at strings. 

Ms. Jensen, his caretaker, stepped into the room, heels clicking. The others stiffened. He didn’t move.

“Aaron,” she said sharply. 

He blinked, and his mind was back. He stood up and followed her.

Darkness.

Aaron was raised on economics and eloquence.

Luci was raised on moonlight and magic.

And for the first time, Aaron began to understand it. 

He saw the magic.

He saw it in the faces of everyone who surrounded him.

He saw it in perfectly formed letters, and ink on paper.

But more than that, he heard it. 

He heard it in the cadence of voices, in the notes of alarm bells, in the words that fit together as if they’d been made for each other. He heard it in the falling rain he’d never see, and in scattered laughter that was far too rare. 

So he wrote about it.

Then he played about it.

Then he sang about it.

And that was magic too.

Darkness.

His caretaker seemed almost to get younger as time passed. She was warmer. It was like she’d remembered how to care. Against his better judgment, Aaron found himself leaning on her. Working with her. Asking questions instead of arguing. 

“Aaron,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

“We need to talk.” He followed her into her office. She looked nervous. That was odd.

“What’s up?” He asked. 

She hesitated for a long moment. “You’ve been here almost two years.” Aaron nodded. “You’re 17.” He nodded again, feeling a sinking sense of dread. “You know that…well. Your being here at all is a miracle. But all miracles aside, you can’t stay once you turn 18.” Aaron looked away. It had been on his mind far too often, recently. “Since no one knows your birthday, they’ll take you on the third anniversary of the day you got in here.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Aaron blurted. 

She looked up. She met his eyes. She let out a breath. “No.”

Aaron felt as if he’d been hit in the gut. He struggled to breathe. “I—I won’t be able to play there,” he whispered.

“No,” his caretaker said. “It’ll—it’ll be a lot worse.” Her eyes seemed faintly misty. She really had changed. “You don’t belong there.”

Aaron spent a long moment quiet, brow furrowed. He wouldn’t be able to continue the way he had been. These years had been a gift, but they were far too short. He would spend the rest of his life in whichever prison they left him in to rot. 

You choose what you’ll do with your life.

He’d made that choice. He wasn’t going to stop now. It was just a matter of how he continued.

“I’d better get to work, then,” he said. “Is there anything else?” She blinked at him quizzically, and he shrugged. “Ms. Jensen, I knew I couldn’t stay here forever when I started this. I guess it was just a matter of time. We have one year. Did you think I was going to spend it wasting around and dreading what I can’t change? Nah.” 

He smiled at her. It felt good to smile. He’d have to do it more often. “I’ll do as much as I can this year. I’ll have to learn to write sheet music. I can still write in there, yeah?” At her nod, Aaron continued. “Then I’ll keep writing songs. Maybe a book or something, I don’t know; I’ll have years. I’ll send them to you. You don’t—you don’t have to do anything with it, unless you want to. I can’t ask you to keep spending so much effort on me. You’ve already done so much, and—”

“Aaron,” Ms. Jensen said.

Aaron stopped. “Yeah.”

“You’re a really good kid.” That hit harder than he expected it to. How long had it been since anyone had said that? Guilt burned through him.

“I killed eight people,” he muttered to the ground.

“I didn’t say you were a perfect kid,” she said. “And I didn’t say you should walk free. But you’re a really, really good kid. Of course I’ll keep helping you.”

“Right.” Aaron’s throat tightened. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “One mistake doesn’t define you. No matter what they tell you in there. You’re more than the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

Darkness.

Chin down.

Eyes up.

Darkness.

We weren’t the only potential that died that day.

Darkness.

You don’t have to be the villain.

I’m not.

Darkness.

Not all angels are in Heaven.

Not all angels have wings.

‘Cause you,

You’re right here,

On this earth beside me,

And you’re an angel just the same.

Not all magic is in wands,

Not all magic is a spell.

‘Cause you,

You’re laughing,

On this earth beside me,

And that’s magic just the same.

Oh,

It’s magic just the same.

Your quiet smile,

Your glowing eyes.

Not all angels are kind,

Not all magic is lies.

‘Cause you,

You ripped out my seams,

And you,

You let me grow,

And you’re an angel,

Just the same.

Aaron smiled, sliding the page into an envelope.

Darkness.

 

Incredible!

[Scars of Hathsin he/him]

That was amazing @Edema Rue I am a hard person to make cry, and if I had not been at school I probably would have.

[Edema Rue she/her]

On 5/25/2024 at 6:54 PM, RoyalBeeMage said:

oh wow! that is amazing!

Thank you!

On 5/25/2024 at 7:51 PM, Weaver of Lies said:

Incredible!

Thanks so much!!

1 hour ago, Scars of Hathsin said:

That was amazing @Edema Rue I am a hard person to make cry, and if I had not been at school I probably would have.

Aww, thank you so much.

[Edema Rue she/her]

Lights in the Dark:

Spoiler

The boy strode through a darkened battlefield of the dead and the dying. The only light was a faint glow that spread from his hands to cast a faint warm glow over their pained faces.

“I want to go home,” a voice whispered. He looked down at a hand that clutched at his leg. “I want to go home,” the person said again. Their face was bloody and bruised. He sat and brushed the hair from their eyes. He took his own canteen from his belt and held it to the lips of the dying man. The boy knew he would recover. But the man was hurting so desperately now and the boy felt old scars ache at the man’s pain. He stayed for a long while and did he could. Finally, he stood and continued walking.  

“Why?” A new voice called. “Why me? Why here, why now, why?” The boy reached for the figure, but they pulled away. The boy knew that they’d never reach back.

But he kept reaching anyway.

Someone grabbed his arm, leaving a handprint of blood and dust on his white robes. “I can’t,” the girl said. “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” he murmured kindly. “I know you can.” 

“I can’t,” she choked desperately. Her strength was fading away. She coughed weakly into the muddy ground. “I can’t.”

The boy held her until her eyes shut for the final time. Then a soft light spread from his hands as he gently lifted her head. After a dangerously long moment, her eyes opened. They were clearer now, and she smiled. He smiled back, and stood, helping her to her feet. Now she followed him as he wandered, and there was a bright light that seemed to flow from her, desperate to bleed out into the darkness. 

While the boy cleaned an oozing wound, the girl held a sobbing child. Light spread from both of them into their patients. One followed them; one did not. They continued on. More began to follow. As the light brightened around them, it seemed to show just how large the battlefield was. How dark. How bloody. Pieces of their group started to flake away.

The light in the girl’s eyes dimmed. She seemed to trudge along. She lifted people by rote, barely hearing their thanks. Their light never seemed to shine quite so brightly after. 

The boy looked up from a limp body to see her beginning to walk back into the darkness. He leapt to his feet and ran after her. When he reached her, he folded her into a dangerously tight embrace. Her scars, the ones that should have been long healed, had opened up, and blood drip, drip, dripped from torn flesh. 

She pulled back. “I can’t,” she said miserably. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” the boy said. “I understand. I promise, I understand. I’m right here beside you, every step of the way.”

“You love them all so much.”

“And I love you too,” The boy said“I love you more than I can ever say. Can’t you feel it?”

She looked away. “You don’t want me.”

“I do.”

“I’m just more work for you.”

“You aren’t.”

“I haven’t actually helped anyone.”

“You have.” She fell silent. “Come home,” he begged. “We want you.”

“I don’t have a home,” she said. Slowly, slowly, she fell to her knees. The boy tried to cajole her. He tried everything he could think of. She began to hate him for it. 

So, though he never forgot her, he began to love her from afar.

He continued healing.

Light spread. 

Others fell, and he did all that he could to lift them up.

He sent some of his best, bravest, and most sure followers to the girl. She refused to even look at him. But the light in her heart started to shine, if faintly. And she started to heal the fallen, though many of those she helped never came to the boy. She lived, despite the black rot of hatred that seemed woven through her heart. She breathed even as she bled.

The boy smiled.

And he kept loving her.

He kept reaching for her. He was relentless in his pursuit. Her anger did not daunt him, and her hate couldn’t make him pause for even a moment. He wouldn’t stop loving others to pursue her, but he cared for none of them less than the others. 

“Why?” A man asked him once. “Why do we matter to you?”

The boy smiled. “I know you. I have felt as you feel, and I have lived through each of your hells. With all this, how could I not love you?”

“But we make so many mistakes,” the man mumbled. “We keep messing it all up.”

“I know,” the boy said. “But you’re still trying, aren’t you?”

The man was quiet for a long, long moment. “A child died yesterday,” he finally said. “In my arms. She could have lived. She didn’t, and it was my fault.” The boy reached and put his hand on the man’s arm, then pulled him into a hug. The man began to weep. “I did everything I could,” he whispered. 

“I know,” the boy said.

“If it was someone else, they could have saved her.”

“Maybe,” the boy acknowledged. “But no one else did it. You did.”

“She didn’t deserve it,” the man said. “She was so young.”

“No,” the boy agreed, “she didn’t.”

“Why?” The man begged.

The boy gestured at the expanse around them. Endless darkness, lit only by the light of his followers, there seemed to be broken bodies everywhere they looked. In the distance they could hear the clashing of weapons. There were groans from the injured. But among those who glowed, there was laughter. “We live,” the boy said, “in the most terrible war that has ever been. Not everyone will live. We are to do what we can. We are to love, and to hope, and to trust that this moment is not forever.”

The man nodded. He was not a man of many words, the boy knew. He spoke only when he was comfortable. Or when he was breaking. “Do you still care?” He blurted. “Even though she died. Do you still care for me?”

The boy smiled his kindest smile, and in that moment his eyes were as beacons of the purest flame. “Of course. And I always will.” The man stood with a blazing light and a bounce in his step. 

The light began to spread. Suddenly there were dozens of shining hearts, then hundreds, then thousands. Some of the wounded refused to accept care. But the battlefield, though still dark, and still filled with despair, began to learn hope. It suddenly did not seem quite so expansive. Light spread, and laughter began to overpower the screams.

And yet.

And yet.

And yet.

It seemed as if for every person who found light, someone lost it.

It seemed as if each time a fight ended it sparked three new ones.

But the boy didn’t stop hoping. He didn’t stop trying. He seemed to dance around the bodies, each footprint blazing a trail for others to follow. He lifted and he served. He cared for those who spit in his face, and loved those who left him. He bandaged wounds and healed aching souls.

There was no routine. The boy’s care was never done on a schedule. He loved them genuinely. He took his time with each of them, and allowed them to learn as slowly as they liked. Sometimes they left. 

Sometimes, they came back.

“I’m sorry,” the girl said. “I’m so sorry.”

“I forgive you,” the boy replied.

“I hated you so much,” she said.

“I know.” The boy met her eyes. “But I never stopped loving you.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again.

“It’s already been forgotten,” he said, offering his hand. She took it. “Let’s get to work, then? There are people who need you.” The girl smiled, and her light burst out so brightly it startled those who stood near.

So they worked.

She struggled. He lifted. He gave, and gave, and she started to learn. People rose and fell. People healed and people bled.

But finally, finally, the sun began to rise. 

@The Wandering Wizard, I think you might like this one <333

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

20 hours ago, Edema Rue said:

Lights in the Dark:

  Hide contents

The boy strode through a darkened battlefield of the dead and the dying. The only light was a faint glow that spread from his hands to cast a faint warm glow over their pained faces.

“I want to go home,” a voice whispered. He looked down at a hand that clutched at his leg. “I want to go home,” the person said again. Their face was bloody and bruised. He sat and brushed the hair from their eyes. He took his own canteen from his belt and held it to the lips of the dying man. The boy knew he would recover. But the man was hurting so desperately now and the boy felt old scars ache at the man’s pain. He stayed for a long while and did he could. Finally, he stood and continued walking.  

“Why?” A new voice called. “Why me? Why here, why now, why?” The boy reached for the figure, but they pulled away. The boy knew that they’d never reach back.

But he kept reaching anyway.

Someone grabbed his arm, leaving a handprint of blood and dust on his white robes. “I can’t,” the girl said. “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” he murmured kindly. “I know you can.” 

“I can’t,” she choked desperately. Her strength was fading away. She coughed weakly into the muddy ground. “I can’t.”

The boy held her until her eyes shut for the final time. Then a soft light spread from his hands as he gently lifted her head. After a dangerously long moment, her eyes opened. They were clearer now, and she smiled. He smiled back, and stood, helping her to her feet. Now she followed him as he wandered, and there was a bright light that seemed to flow from her, desperate to bleed out into the darkness. 

While the boy cleaned an oozing wound, the girl held a sobbing child. Light spread from both of them into their patients. One followed them; one did not. They continued on. More began to follow. As the light brightened around them, it seemed to show just how large the battlefield was. How dark. How bloody. Pieces of their group started to flake away.

The light in the girl’s eyes dimmed. She seemed to trudge along. She lifted people by rote, barely hearing their thanks. Their light never seemed to shine quite so brightly after. 

The boy looked up from a limp body to see her beginning to walk back into the darkness. He leapt to his feet and ran after her. When he reached her, he folded her into a dangerously tight embrace. Her scars, the ones that should have been long healed, had opened up, and blood drip, drip, dripped from torn flesh. 

She pulled back. “I can’t,” she said miserably. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” the boy said. “I understand. I promise, I understand. I’m right here beside you, every step of the way.”

“You love them all so much.”

“And I love you too,” The boy said“I love you more than I can ever say. Can’t you feel it?”

She looked away. “You don’t want me.”

“I do.”

“I’m just more work for you.”

“You aren’t.”

“I haven’t actually helped anyone.”

“You have.” She fell silent. “Come home,” he begged. “We want you.”

“I don’t have a home,” she said. Slowly, slowly, she fell to her knees. The boy tried to cajole her. He tried everything he could think of. She began to hate him for it. 

So, though he never forgot her, he began to love her from afar.

He continued healing.

Light spread. 

Others fell, and he did all that he could to lift them up.

He sent some of his best, bravest, and most sure followers to the girl. She refused to even look at him. But the light in her heart started to shine, if faintly. And she started to heal the fallen, though many of those she helped never came to the boy. She lived, despite the black rot of hatred that seemed woven through her heart. She breathed even as she bled.

The boy smiled.

And he kept loving her.

He kept reaching for her. He was relentless in his pursuit. Her anger did not daunt him, and her hate couldn’t make him pause for even a moment. He wouldn’t stop loving others to pursue her, but he cared for none of them less than the others. 

“Why?” A man asked him once. “Why do we matter to you?”

The boy smiled. “I know you. I have felt as you feel, and I have lived through each of your hells. With all this, how could I not love you?”

“But we make so many mistakes,” the man mumbled. “We keep messing it all up.”

“I know,” the boy said. “But you’re still trying, aren’t you?”

The man was quiet for a long, long moment. “A child died yesterday,” he finally said. “In my arms. She could have lived. She didn’t, and it was my fault.” The boy reached and put his hand on the man’s arm, then pulled him into a hug. The man began to weep. “I did everything I could,” he whispered. 

“I know,” the boy said.

“If it was someone else, they could have saved her.”

“Maybe,” the boy acknowledged. “But no one else did it. You did.”

“She didn’t deserve it,” the man said. “She was so young.”

“No,” the boy agreed, “she didn’t.”

“Why?” The man begged.

The boy gestured at the expanse around them. Endless darkness, lit only by the light of his followers, there seemed to be broken bodies everywhere they looked. In the distance they could hear the clashing of weapons. There were groans from the injured. But among those who glowed, there was laughter. “We live,” the boy said, “in the most terrible war that has ever been. Not everyone will live. We are to do what we can. We are to love, and to hope, and to trust that this moment is not forever.”

The man nodded. He was not a man of many words, the boy knew. He spoke only when he was comfortable. Or when he was breaking. “Do you still care?” He blurted. “Even though she died. Do you still care for me?”

The boy smiled his kindest smile, and in that moment his eyes were as beacons of the purest flame. “Of course. And I always will.” The man stood with a blazing light and a bounce in his step. 

The light began to spread. Suddenly there were dozens of shining hearts, then hundreds, then thousands. Some of the wounded refused to accept care. But the battlefield, though still dark, and still filled with despair, began to learn hope. It suddenly did not seem quite so expansive. Light spread, and laughter began to overpower the screams.

And yet.

And yet.

And yet.

It seemed as if for every person who found light, someone lost it.

It seemed as if each time a fight ended it sparked three new ones.

But the boy didn’t stop hoping. He didn’t stop trying. He seemed to dance around the bodies, each footprint blazing a trail for others to follow. He lifted and he served. He cared for those who spit in his face, and loved those who left him. He bandaged wounds and healed aching souls.

There was no routine. The boy’s care was never done on a schedule. He loved them genuinely. He took his time with each of them, and allowed them to learn as slowly as they liked. Sometimes they left. 

Sometimes, they came back.

“I’m sorry,” the girl said. “I’m so sorry.”

“I forgive you,” the boy replied.

“I hated you so much,” she said.

“I know.” The boy met her eyes. “But I never stopped loving you.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again.

“It’s already been forgotten,” he said, offering his hand. She took it. “Let’s get to work, then? There are people who need you.” The girl smiled, and her light burst out so brightly it startled those who stood near.

So they worked.

She struggled. He lifted. He gave, and gave, and she started to learn. People rose and fell. People healed and people bled.

But finally, finally, the sun began to rise. 

@The Wandering Wizard, I think you might like this one <333

Oh my! That was amazing. One quick question though I know that you don’t plan anything before but is the entire world just one endless war?

[Edema Rue she/her]

11 minutes ago, RoyalBeeMage said:

Oh my! That was amazing. One quick question though I know that you don’t plan anything before but is the entire world just one endless war?

In this case, yes, actually. But the rising sun means the end of that war

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

Just now, Edema Rue said:

In this case, yes, actually. But the rising sun means the end of that war

So is it kind of like an endless cycle?

[Edema Rue she/her]

1 minute ago, RoyalBeeMage said:

So is it kind of like an endless cycle?

Hmm…

I don’t think so.

Maybe.

But I don’t think so.

It felt nice to write something hopeful, since a lot of what I write is so dark, so in this case no, I don’t think it’ll keep on repeating.

[Edema Rue she/her]

Hey, sorry I know I just posted BUT GUYS THIS ONE TURNED OUT SO GOOD

It needs a ton of editing but I’m so happy with it. I hope y’all enjoy, let me know what you think!!

Every Heart That Shatters:

Spoiler

“The haart,” Professor Linset crooned, “is a strange and rare creature. I doubt that you have ever seen one.” He stepped up to a large cage as he lectured. In its center was what seemed to be a ball made of solid black stone. “No other creature is as strong. And yet no other creature can break so easily. Would you like a demonstration?” 

Without waiting for an answer, he moved closer to the cage. He bent down, and when he stood he was holding a sword. “This,” he said, “is one of the most deadly weapons that can be made today.” He slid it through the bars, then slammed it down on the poor creature. The haart didn’t even seem to notice as the blade clanged off its skin. The professor hit it again, stabbed at it, smacked it. Finally, his point proven, he set the weapon aside. 

“This haart is strong. If it dies, it will be its own fault. Ah, ah, but we’ll get to that in a moment.” The man smiled and moved across to another cage, this one covered by a large cloth. He pulled it free. The creature inside was small, white, and smooth. It looked almost like a snake, only it was wider, shorter. Friendlier. It chirped softly at the light. “And this,” Professor Linset said gleefully, “is a haart as well. It’s younger. And it has been perfectly sheltered. Never hurt. Never broken.”

In one smooth motion, he picked up the sword and slammed it through the cage, into the haart.

Deep crimson blood flowed from the wound as the animal collapsed, lifeless.

“A haart that has never been broken is weak,” the professor said coolly, admiring the red as it dripped from the steel. “But hurt one too often, and the haart will die just the same.” He gestured at the first cage. “That creature will never open. It will never allow itself to be vulnerable. And so it will not eat, and it will not drink. It will die of thirst because it cannot allow itself to become weak for a single moment, not even in order to survive.”

The professor spun on his heel, and for a moment it seemed as if he’d left. Then he returned, pushing a third cage.

“And this is a haart in its prime.” This creature was also curled into a ball. But it was not so deep a black. And as the professor crooned to it, it began to tremble less. He stroked its back gently, and it hesitantly unfurled. “A mother haart is cruel to its offspring. She cannot protect them, for if she does, they will never survive once they leave her care. And she cannot hurt them too much, for then they will die just the same. 

“She must teach them when to open, and when to close. They must learn who to let in, and who to keep out at all costs. If a young haart fails to learn, it will die.

“But do you know what the most deadly thing that can happen to a haart is? It can be tricked. Betrayed. An open haart is utterly vulnerable, and if it opens for the wrong person…” He spun, slamming the sword into the final cage. The gray haart inside became a splatter of blood. He set down the sword and slowly stepped towards his audience, lifting the head of the young man who was tied to a chair.

“I opened my heart to you, Dorian.”

Dorian didn’t answer. He looked up at the professor through bleary eyes, then spat at him.

Linset’s lip curled. “I’ve thought often of what I would do to you, when I found you.” Dorian glared at him. “If I could break your heart I would, but you’ve hardened it since I last saw you, and I am not patient enough to wait for it to starve on its own.”

“So?” Dorian spoke for the first time. His voice was flat and emotionless. “Get to the point.”

The professor’s eyes darkened. “I’ve been thinking,” he sneered, “that we ought to play a game.” 

Dorian’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”

“There is nothing I wouldn’t do.”

“Even to me?”

“Especially to you.”

“I won’t play,” Dorian warned. “I’ll die first.”

“We’ll see,” the professor said. “You can be made to care.”

“Kill me,” Dorian demanded, straining against his ropes. He didn't seem to notice the way they dug into his skin. “Right here, right now.”

Linset raised a single eyebrow. “What’s this? My Dorian, begging?”

“I’m not begging,” Dorian growled. “And I’m not yours.”

“Aren’t you?”

“I’m not,” Dorian said. His eyes were cooler and sharper than the steel of the professor’s blade. “And you’re too cowardly to kill me.”

The professor surged forward in one smooth motion, knocking the chair backwards to the ground. Dorian grunted at the impact. 

“I’m no coward,” Linset breathed.

“Prove it.” Dorian’s eyes hadn’t softened. “Kill me.”

Linset didn’t answer, instead tipping the chair back up. It was a sturdy wooden thing and hadn’t even chipped at the fall onto hard stone. “Death would be too kind for you.”

“You’re scared,” Dorian snapped back, quick and sharp as a whip. “You can’t stand to watch me die.”

“Please.” Linset snorted. “If I thought death would hurt you, I’d run you through now. Brother.”

“I’m not your—”

“Don’t lie to me!” There was a pause as both men took furious breaths. “You know who you are.”

“I do.” Dorian was pulling harder now, his wrists beginning to bleed from the effort. Still, he was so blinded by anger that he couldn’t care about the pain. “And I was never your brother.”

“Is that so?” Linset reached forward and dragged his finger around Dorian’s neck, following the deep scar of a noose that hadn’t quite finished its job. A scar that was mirrored around Linset’s own neck.

“My scars tell my story,” Dorian said, meeting Linset’s eyes. “But they do not define me.”

Linset scoffed. “You can’t escape your blood, Dori.”

Dorian could have kept yelling. Could have told his long-forgotten brother not to use that nickname. He wanted to. But he was tired. And as he’d said, he was through with games. “I already have. Lin.” Then he let his chin fall back onto his chest, his hair falling forward to conceal his face. Linset kept yelling for what must have been hours, but Dorian refused to reply, and eventually the young professor left, promising to return with pain Dorian wouldn’t be able to ignore.

Dorian tried not to care, but if he was being honest with himself, he was terrified. Lin’s words haunted him far more than he wanted to admit. A haart that has never been broken is weak. But that didn’t make the breaking hurt any less. That hurt was the reason broken hearts were stronger; the scars, the calluses, the cruelty. It was how you stayed stronger than your opponent.

I opened my heart to you, Dorian.

He had. He well and truly had. He’d only told the truth; Dorian deserved everything that Lin would do to him.

But he hadn’t lied either. 

He knew who he was.

And as terrible as his betrayals had been, they were justified.

Dorian shook his head softly, glancing at the broken bodies of the haarts before him. Justice was cruel. It was cold. He’d lived by its principles long enough to see what it could do to a person. It was not a kind path to follow, and for the briefest of moments, Dorian doubted. He’d known this course was foolish. He’d known it would be hard. 

But it had felt so right. 

And just as he’d told Linset, he really had escaped his blood. He’d found a place where he was more than the scar around his neck. He’d found a family he chose. A family that would have helped him change, if these old people, these old strings, hadn’t started yanking on him.

So what now?

He was…

He was home.

He should have been dead, but of course Lin and the others would want vengeance. And although the Lin that Dorian knew and hated was often stupid, he was also one of the most intelligent men alive. If he wanted Dorian to hurt, Dorian would hurt.

Idiot. If you’d just stayed away. If you’d just learned when to harden your heart. 

But Dorian hadn’t learned.

And when a young haart failed to learn, it died.

Dorian squeezed his eyes shut, cool certainty weighing on him. He was going to die. Oh, they’d stretch it out as long as they could. But they’d tire of him sooner or later. And they’d kill him or leave him to rot, it made no difference. 

Slowly, slowly, he grinned.

They thought their hearts were cold and unbreakable.

But Dorian understood things they could not imagine.

Where they saw steel, he saw glass.

And he intended to see it shatter, even if the shards that remained were sharp enough to slit his throat.

 

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

9 hours ago, Edema Rue said:

Hey, sorry I know I just posted BUT GUYS THIS ONE TURNED OUT SO GOOD

It needs a ton of editing but I’m so happy with it. I hope y’all enjoy, let me know what you think!!

Every Heart That Shatters:

  Hide contents

“The haart,” Professor Linset crooned, “is a strange and rare creature. I doubt that you have ever seen one.” He stepped up to a large cage as he lectured. In its center was what seemed to be a ball made of solid black stone. “No other creature is as strong. And yet no other creature can break so easily. Would you like a demonstration?” 

Without waiting for an answer, he moved closer to the cage. He bent down, and when he stood he was holding a sword. “This,” he said, “is one of the most deadly weapons that can be made today.” He slid it through the bars, then slammed it down on the poor creature. The haart didn’t even seem to notice as the blade clanged off its skin. The professor hit it again, stabbed at it, smacked it. Finally, his point proven, he set the weapon aside. 

“This haart is strong. If it dies, it will be its own fault. Ah, ah, but we’ll get to that in a moment.” The man smiled and moved across to another cage, this one covered by a large cloth. He pulled it free. The creature inside was small, white, and smooth. It looked almost like a snake, only it was wider, shorter. Friendlier. It chirped softly at the light. “And this,” Professor Linset said gleefully, “is a haart as well. It’s younger. And it has been perfectly sheltered. Never hurt. Never broken.”

In one smooth motion, he picked up the sword and slammed it through the cage, into the haart.

Deep crimson blood flowed from the wound as the animal collapsed, lifeless.

“A haart that has never been broken is weak,” the professor said coolly, admiring the red as it dripped from the steel. “But hurt one too often, and the haart will die just the same.” He gestured at the first cage. “That creature will never open. It will never allow itself to be vulnerable. And so it will not eat, and it will not drink. It will die of thirst because it cannot allow itself to become weak for a single moment, not even in order to survive.”

The professor spun on his heel, and for a moment it seemed as if he’d left. Then he returned, pushing a third cage.

“And this is a haart in its prime.” This creature was also curled into a ball. But it was not so deep a black. And as the professor crooned to it, it began to tremble less. He stroked its back gently, and it hesitantly unfurled. “A mother haart is cruel to its offspring. She cannot protect them, for if she does, they will never survive once they leave her care. And she cannot hurt them too much, for then they will die just the same. 

“She must teach them when to open, and when to close. They must learn who to let in, and who to keep out at all costs. If a young haart fails to learn, it will die.

“But do you know what the most deadly thing that can happen to a haart is? It can be tricked. Betrayed. An open haart is utterly vulnerable, and if it opens for the wrong person…” He spun, slamming the sword into the final cage. The gray haart inside became a splatter of blood. He set down the sword and slowly stepped towards his audience, lifting the head of the young man who was tied to a chair.

“I opened my heart to you, Dorian.”

Dorian didn’t answer. He looked up at the professor through bleary eyes, then spat at him.

Linset’s lip curled. “I’ve thought often of what I would do to you, when I found you.” Dorian glared at him. “If I could break your heart I would, but you’ve hardened it since I last saw you, and I am not patient enough to wait for it to starve on its own.”

“So?” Dorian spoke for the first time. His voice was flat and emotionless. “Get to the point.”

The professor’s eyes darkened. “I’ve been thinking,” he sneered, “that we ought to play a game.” 

Dorian’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”

“There is nothing I wouldn’t do.”

“Even to me?”

“Especially to you.”

“I won’t play,” Dorian warned. “I’ll die first.”

“We’ll see,” the professor said. “You can be made to care.”

“Kill me,” Dorian demanded, straining against his ropes. He didn't seem to notice the way they dug into his skin. “Right here, right now.”

Linset raised a single eyebrow. “What’s this? My Dorian, begging?”

“I’m not begging,” Dorian growled. “And I’m not yours.”

“Aren’t you?”

“I’m not,” Dorian said. His eyes were cooler and sharper than the steel of the professor’s blade. “And you’re too cowardly to kill me.”

The professor surged forward in one smooth motion, knocking the chair backwards to the ground. Dorian grunted at the impact. 

“I’m no coward,” Linset breathed.

“Prove it.” Dorian’s eyes hadn’t softened. “Kill me.”

Linset didn’t answer, instead tipping the chair back up. It was a sturdy wooden thing and hadn’t even chipped at the fall onto hard stone. “Death would be too kind for you.”

“You’re scared,” Dorian snapped back, quick and sharp as a whip. “You can’t stand to watch me die.”

“Please.” Linset snorted. “If I thought death would hurt you, I’d run you through now. Brother.”

“I’m not your—”

“Don’t lie to me!” There was a pause as both men took furious breaths. “You know who you are.”

“I do.” Dorian was pulling harder now, his wrists beginning to bleed from the effort. Still, he was so blinded by anger that he couldn’t care about the pain. “And I was never your brother.”

“Is that so?” Linset reached forward and dragged his finger around Dorian’s neck, following the deep scar of a noose that hadn’t quite finished its job. A scar that was mirrored around Linset’s own neck.

“My scars tell my story,” Dorian said, meeting Linset’s eyes. “But they do not define me.”

Linset scoffed. “You can’t escape your blood, Dori.”

Dorian could have kept yelling. Could have told his long-forgotten brother not to use that nickname. He wanted to. But he was tired. And as he’d said, he was through with games. “I already have. Lin.” Then he let his chin fall back onto his chest, his hair falling forward to conceal his face. Linset kept yelling for what must have been hours, but Dorian refused to reply, and eventually the young professor left, promising to return with pain Dorian wouldn’t be able to ignore.

Dorian tried not to care, but if he was being honest with himself, he was terrified. Lin’s words haunted him far more than he wanted to admit. A haart that has never been broken is weak. But that didn’t make the breaking hurt any less. That hurt was the reason broken hearts were stronger; the scars, the calluses, the cruelty. It was how you stayed stronger than your opponent.

I opened my heart to you, Dorian.

He had. He well and truly had. He’d only told the truth; Dorian deserved everything that Lin would do to him.

But he hadn’t lied either. 

He knew who he was.

And as terrible as his betrayals had been, they were justified.

Dorian shook his head softly, glancing at the broken bodies of the haarts before him. Justice was cruel. It was cold. He’d lived by its principles long enough to see what it could do to a person. It was not a kind path to follow, and for the briefest of moments, Dorian doubted. He’d known this course was foolish. He’d known it would be hard. 

But it had felt so right. 

And just as he’d told Linset, he really had escaped his blood. He’d found a place where he was more than the scar around his neck. He’d found a family he chose. A family that would have helped him change, if these old people, these old strings, hadn’t started yanking on him.

So what now?

He was…

He was home.

He should have been dead, but of course Lin and the others would want vengeance. And although the Lin that Dorian knew and hated was often stupid, he was also one of the most intelligent men alive. If he wanted Dorian to hurt, Dorian would hurt.

Idiot. If you’d just stayed away. If you’d just learned when to harden your heart. 

But Dorian hadn’t learned.

And when a young haart failed to learn, it died.

Dorian squeezed his eyes shut, cool certainty weighing on him. He was going to die. Oh, they’d stretch it out as long as they could. But they’d tire of him sooner or later. And they’d kill him or leave him to rot, it made no difference. 

Slowly, slowly, he grinned.

They thought their hearts were cold and unbreakable.

But Dorian understood things they could not imagine.

Where they saw steel, he saw glass.

And he intended to see it shatter, even if the shards that remained were sharp enough to slit his throat.

 

I love how this flows from a biology lecture to an act of revenge 

[Edema Rue she/her]

14 hours ago, RoyalBeeMage said:

I love how this flows from a biology lecture to an act of revenge 

Thank you!! I got the idea and couldn’t stop myself  

[Edema Rue she/her]

Heeyyyyyyyy

I got some Liz for y’all

So you guys know that I’m garbage at planning stuff out, which doesn’t really work for longer projects. So sometimes I write scenes like this, which is basically just me trying to develop the world or magic system, but in character because that’s the only way I can do it.

 So uh, I know this feels super exposition dump-y and is kinda confusing, but now I mostly understand my own magic system, which is nice

Spoiler

“Come on.” Death’s voice was sharp and precise. He refused small talk, and Liz had learned better than to try. “You have someone to meet.”

Liz blinked. “Who?” Death didn’t answer, and she suppressed a sigh. Still, it was something to do, and the things she was learning only grew more astonishing. Death started walking, and Liz followed. Traveling was strange here. Nothing ever changed, but she could feel when they left Death’s domain and entered neutral territory. He’d never taken her out here, and she frowned. Who, exactly, are we meeting?

Then, in the abrupt way of gods, a figure stood before her. Liz studied him carefully. He was perfectly opaque, but his skin was entirely colorless. Death had tried to explain the nature of the gods to her, but it was difficult to make sense of it. The more influence over mortals a god had, the more opaque they were. And the stronger their influence over other gods, the more vibrant they appeared. Death called them Tol and Tos. Tol for mortals, Tos for gods. Liz knew that she appeared nearly transparent, but was just as vibrant as Death; to anyone who saw her, she was clearly an Heir. So the god in front of her had very strong Tol, but nearly no Tos. Usually, that meant a Fragment: when a powerful god’s domain grew too large, they broke apart, leaving behind dozens, or sometimes hundreds, of minor gods. Fragments were rarely this powerful, though. Liz looked at Death. He didn’t move. 

“Relk,” Death said. Liz thought he sounded faintly disgusted, but it was so subtle she could have imagined it. “My Heiress.” 

The god—Relk?—nodded to Death. “Have you trained her?”

“Some.”

“What does she know of the rest of us?”

“Enough.”

Relk snorted. Liz blinked. Death rarely showed human mannerisms, but this creature wore them like a new coat that hadn’t yet lost its charm. He flaunted them about carelessly. He turned to her. “Look at me, Heiress.” Liz met his eyes. “Do you know who I am?” Liz glanced at Death, then shook her head. “I am the god of shame,” he said. “Fragment of Love.” Liz frowned, and he nodded, looking vaguely pleased. “Your mentor hasn’t taught you about the rest of us, has he?” Liz shook her head. It was disconcerting, communicating with a god this way. Death refused to acknowledge nonverbal communication; if Liz wanted him to know something, she had to say it, and say it clearly. But she’d been told that the others would take her speech as an insult, so she said nothing. 

Relk stepped back. “You have work to do, Death.” 

Death met his eyes calmly. “Do not presume to advise me.” Liz started; Death spoke to this god the same way he spoke to her, a mortal. Was he that powerful? Or simply that proud?

Relk looked unnerved. “I have a test for her.”

“I am aware.”

Relk shifted. Liz wondered if Death noticed how nervous this god was. “Right.” He coughed, and a human child suddenly appeared next to him. No color, and even more transparent than Liz. He was crying. “Kill it,” Relk said. “Use whatever magic you can.”

Liz looked to Death. He gave her a single, sharp nod. She stepped forward, placing her hand on the wretched creature’s cheek. He looked up and met her eyes, then opened his mouth to speak. She could have killed him in a dozen ways, with or without magic. She could have been dramatic. She could have been cruel. But above all, Liz was efficient, and always had been.

She stepped back, and the child was dead. He faded from view.

Relk cocked his head, and Liz felt a sort of probing. “You regret his death,” he said, surprised. “But not out of guilt.”

Liz hesitated. This wasn’t a question she could answer with a nod. “You may speak,” Death said.

“He was a human,” she said. “It would be a…it would be disappointing to have broken a tool before I could use it.”

“You speak the truth,” Relk murmured. He gave Death a sharp nod and turned self-importantly. Then he was gone.

Death turned and started walking back. 

Liz followed. “What was that?” 

“That,” Death said, “was the blind testing the blind.” Liz blinked. “He is a fool,” Death continued. “Tell me why.”

This, Liz thought ruefully, is much harder than killing some child. “He…thinks too highly of himself.” Death said nothing, so she continued. “He thinks his Tol gives him a right to more Tos. And he took a name.”

“Why is it foolish for a god to take a name?”

Liz winced, scrambling for words. She found none. “It’s…flamboyant?”

“It is,” Death said. “But it’s more than that. It’s a sign that mortals have begun to influence him.”

“Why?”

“He adopts their customs. He is too proud. He allows emotion to swallow purpose.”

“And you don’t?” Liz asked, carefully keeping her tone neutral. Death rarely spoke so freely.

“Correct,” he said. “That is the danger many Fragments and younger gods face. They refuse to keep Acolytes, and so they mix with the mortals. They live as much in the world of men as of gods, and so they are weak. There is another term for such as they are. Ton. It is the influence mortals have over gods. It cannot be seen here, and so many refuse to accept it.” Death stopped and turned, his face inches from Liz’s. “You have less Ton than any mortal I have ever seen. That is why you are my Heiress. You will not be one of them.” He turned and kept walking.

Liz was following numbly, trying to figure out if that had been a compliment or an explanation, when a thought occurred to her. “They hate you,” she said.

Death blinked twice, his expression neutral. “Yes.”

“But you have such strong Tos.”

For the first time she could remember, Death looked pleased. “I am foreign to them. I stay removed from their pettiness, and so when I deign to speak, my words carry weight.”

Liz nodded, accepting his answer. But she frowned. “That’s not all, though.”

“No,” Death said. “It isn’t.” He stayed silent for long enough that Liz started to think he’d never answer. Then he continued with three words that chilled her blood. “Even gods die.” Liz froze. Death slowly and deliberately smiled. “They do not like me. Nor will they like you. But they fear us.”

Heart pounding, Liz felt her lips matching his smile, though she wasn’t aware she’d given the command. “You mean when they are replaced by an Heir?”

“Yes.”

“But that's their choice. They don’t have to take Heirs, do they?”

“It’s…complicated,” Death murmured. “Politics, you see. They can be convinced. If I want a creature dead, be they god, fragment, or mortal, they won’t last long.”

“Then why not kill all your enemies?” Death stared at her for a long moment, and she winced, understanding. “Politics.”

“Go on.”

Liz nodded, trying not to let her annoyance show. “If you did it to all of them, it wouldn’t work as well. It’s like you said. Tos works best when it isn’t abused.”

Death nodded, looking thoughtful. “For a mortal, you learn quickly.”

Liz blinked. It was a day of many surprises. “Thank you.”

“Select several acolytes to return with you. It’s time you learned to fight.”

“I can fi—”

“Fight like a Goddess. Not a mortal with a piece of shiny metal, unless that’s what you’d like to be forever?”

“Right.”

 

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

6 hours ago, Edema Rue said:

Heeyyyyyyyy

I got some Liz for y’all

So you guys know that I’m garbage at planning stuff out, which doesn’t really work for longer projects. So sometimes I write scenes like this, which is basically just me trying to develop the world or magic system, but in character because that’s the only way I can do it.

 So uh, I know this feels super exposition dump-y and is kinda confusing, but now I mostly understand my own magic system, which is nice

  Hide contents

“Come on.” Death’s voice was sharp and precise. He refused small talk, and Liz had learned better than to try. “You have someone to meet.”

Liz blinked. “Who?” Death didn’t answer, and she suppressed a sigh. Still, it was something to do, and the things she was learning only grew more astonishing. Death started walking, and Liz followed. Traveling was strange here. Nothing ever changed, but she could feel when they left Death’s domain and entered neutral territory. He’d never taken her out here, and she frowned. Who, exactly, are we meeting?

Then, in the abrupt way of gods, a figure stood before her. Liz studied him carefully. He was perfectly opaque, but his skin was entirely colorless. Death had tried to explain the nature of the gods to her, but it was difficult to make sense of it. The more influence over mortals a god had, the more opaque they were. And the stronger their influence over other gods, the more vibrant they appeared. Death called them Tol and Tos. Tol for mortals, Tos for gods. Liz knew that she appeared nearly transparent, but was just as vibrant as Death; to anyone who saw her, she was clearly an Heir. So the god in front of her had very strong Tol, but nearly no Tos. Usually, that meant a Fragment: when a powerful god’s domain grew too large, they broke apart, leaving behind dozens, or sometimes hundreds, of minor gods. Fragments were rarely this powerful, though. Liz looked at Death. He didn’t move. 

“Relk,” Death said. Liz thought he sounded faintly disgusted, but it was so subtle she could have imagined it. “My Heiress.” 

The god—Relk?—nodded to Death. “Have you trained her?”

“Some.”

“What does she know of the rest of us?”

“Enough.”

Relk snorted. Liz blinked. Death rarely showed human mannerisms, but this creature wore them like a new coat that hadn’t yet lost its charm. He flaunted them about carelessly. He turned to her. “Look at me, Heiress.” Liz met his eyes. “Do you know who I am?” Liz glanced at Death, then shook her head. “I am the god of shame,” he said. “Fragment of Love.” Liz frowned, and he nodded, looking vaguely pleased. “Your mentor hasn’t taught you about the rest of us, has he?” Liz shook her head. It was disconcerting, communicating with a god this way. Death refused to acknowledge nonverbal communication; if Liz wanted him to know something, she had to say it, and say it clearly. But she’d been told that the others would take her speech as an insult, so she said nothing. 

Relk stepped back. “You have work to do, Death.” 

Death met his eyes calmly. “Do not presume to advise me.” Liz started; Death spoke to this god the same way he spoke to her, a mortal. Was he that powerful? Or simply that proud?

Relk looked unnerved. “I have a test for her.”

“I am aware.”

Relk shifted. Liz wondered if Death noticed how nervous this god was. “Right.” He coughed, and a human child suddenly appeared next to him. No color, and even more transparent than Liz. He was crying. “Kill it,” Relk said. “Use whatever magic you can.”

Liz looked to Death. He gave her a single, sharp nod. She stepped forward, placing her hand on the wretched creature’s cheek. He looked up and met her eyes, then opened his mouth to speak. She could have killed him in a dozen ways, with or without magic. She could have been dramatic. She could have been cruel. But above all, Liz was efficient, and always had been.

She stepped back, and the child was dead. He faded from view.

Relk cocked his head, and Liz felt a sort of probing. “You regret his death,” he said, surprised. “But not out of guilt.”

Liz hesitated. This wasn’t a question she could answer with a nod. “You may speak,” Death said.

“He was a human,” she said. “It would be a…it would be disappointing to have broken a tool before I could use it.”

“You speak the truth,” Relk murmured. He gave Death a sharp nod and turned self-importantly. Then he was gone.

Death turned and started walking back. 

Liz followed. “What was that?” 

“That,” Death said, “was the blind testing the blind.” Liz blinked. “He is a fool,” Death continued. “Tell me why.”

This, Liz thought ruefully, is much harder than killing some child. “He…thinks too highly of himself.” Death said nothing, so she continued. “He thinks his Tol gives him a right to more Tos. And he took a name.”

“Why is it foolish for a god to take a name?”

Liz winced, scrambling for words. She found none. “It’s…flamboyant?”

“It is,” Death said. “But it’s more than that. It’s a sign that mortals have begun to influence him.”

“Why?”

“He adopts their customs. He is too proud. He allows emotion to swallow purpose.”

“And you don’t?” Liz asked, carefully keeping her tone neutral. Death rarely spoke so freely.

“Correct,” he said. “That is the danger many Fragments and younger gods face. They refuse to keep Acolytes, and so they mix with the mortals. They live as much in the world of men as of gods, and so they are weak. There is another term for such as they are. Ton. It is the influence mortals have over gods. It cannot be seen here, and so many refuse to accept it.” Death stopped and turned, his face inches from Liz’s. “You have less Ton than any mortal I have ever seen. That is why you are my Heiress. You will not be one of them.” He turned and kept walking.

Liz was following numbly, trying to figure out if that had been a compliment or an explanation, when a thought occurred to her. “They hate you,” she said.

Death blinked twice, his expression neutral. “Yes.”

“But you have such strong Tos.”

For the first time she could remember, Death looked pleased. “I am foreign to them. I stay removed from their pettiness, and so when I deign to speak, my words carry weight.”

Liz nodded, accepting his answer. But she frowned. “That’s not all, though.”

“No,” Death said. “It isn’t.” He stayed silent for long enough that Liz started to think he’d never answer. Then he continued with three words that chilled her blood. “Even gods die.” Liz froze. Death slowly and deliberately smiled. “They do not like me. Nor will they like you. But they fear us.”

Heart pounding, Liz felt her lips matching his smile, though she wasn’t aware she’d given the command. “You mean when they are replaced by an Heir?”

“Yes.”

“But that's their choice. They don’t have to take Heirs, do they?”

“It’s…complicated,” Death murmured. “Politics, you see. They can be convinced. If I want a creature dead, be they god, fragment, or mortal, they won’t last long.”

“Then why not kill all your enemies?” Death stared at her for a long moment, and she winced, understanding. “Politics.”

“Go on.”

Liz nodded, trying not to let her annoyance show. “If you did it to all of them, it wouldn’t work as well. It’s like you said. Tos works best when it isn’t abused.”

Death nodded, looking thoughtful. “For a mortal, you learn quickly.”

Liz blinked. It was a day of many surprises. “Thank you.”

“Select several acolytes to return with you. It’s time you learned to fight.”

“I can fi—”

“Fight like a Goddess. Not a mortal with a piece of shiny metal, unless that’s what you’d like to be forever?”

“Right.”

 

Now that is a well written exposition dump. Wasn’t all that confusing. Really enjoyed that!

[Scars of Hathsin he/him]

I really enjoyed it as well. The magic system is intriguing. Wish I could come up with something like that. Good Job.

[Edema Rue she/her]

5 hours ago, RoyalBeeMage said:

Now that is a well written exposition dump. Wasn’t all that confusing. Really enjoyed that!

9 minutes ago, Scars of Hathsin said:

I really enjoyed it as well. The magic system is intriguing. Wish I could come up with something like that. Good Job.

Thank you guys! I’ve never really developed a magic system since I usually just write short stories but I’m liking how it’s turning out, and I’m excited to keep figuring out her story.

[Scars of Hathsin he/him]

Please keep us update, I want to hear/read more...

[Edema Rue she/her]

32 minutes ago, Scars of Hathsin said:

Please keep us update, I want to hear/read more...

I will!! If you want more, this is the link to almost everything I have written with her so far in chronological order. A lot of it will get cut, and it’s all super messy lol but it’s getting there!

[RoyalBeeMage he/him]

6 hours ago, Edema Rue said:

I will!! If you want more, this is the link to almost everything I have written with her so far in chronological order. A lot of it will get cut, and it’s all super messy lol but it’s getting there!

it doing great so far!

[Edema Rue she/her]

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA LIZ

guys I had so much fun writing this, please please please read it and let me know what you think!! 

Isn’t it beautiful?

Spoiler

Lizzy,

There is such a strange beauty in fury. I’ve always seen it, but it was the way one sees royalty; from a distance, in a carriage, something to be admired and avoided with equal care. But there is something different about it now. Is it dangerous to want it, my friend? I hope it isn’t. Rage is what I have left, after all…it is my power and my solace, my god and my lover and…well. It’s nearly stolen the title of my dearest friend from you.

When last you wrote, you said you thought you might be insane. You concluded that it didn’t matter, and I must agree. There are days, late at night, when I can’t help but laugh. I sit in the darkness and it bubbles up from inside me and explodes out into the world. It is raw emotion that cannot be contained and it is beautiful. It is the sort of beauty that I can’t quite put into these words, but I don’t need to, do I? You know the sort. 

I am so very angry, darling, and the thought makes me laugh. They have no idea what’s coming. And my plans are weaving together so wonderfully…

Isn’t it a beautiful world, my friend?

Beautiful. 

I know you see it.

When last I saw you, I watched you kill a man. You control yourself so carefully, now, but your eyes are as alive as they ever were, at least to me. And do you know what I saw in them?

I saw delight.

I saw my laughter, echoed in the shine you can’t quite hide.

Because you saw beauty.

What a world we are making, my friend! We may be little more than mortals, but we live as gods, and this world is our clay, our canvas, our parchment. 

You may not hear from me for several weeks, perhaps longer. But do us both a favor and keep from worrying. 

I’ll be busy shaping the untold future.

Siylna

 

Liz’s gaze rose from the parchment, up to the gaudy curtains and rich chandelier above her. She grinned, a dangerously open expression that was far from wise. Oh, Si…Her friend had allowed her emotions to best her logic. She was changing the world, sure enough, but it was not according to design or pattern. 

The pair of them had danced along the razor edge between insanity and genius for years, and it was a pity that Si had succumbed. Liz tsked softly, mentally noting that she’d need to ask Death to speak with Rage. Si needed to be kept in check for a little longer…Liz made another mental note. Ien wasn’t ready to rule, but he never would be. She’d move the plan forward. It was quicker than she liked, but a necessity. The bet could not climax if Si was lost in her own mind, and Liz needed a climax. Because Si was right. She did see how beautiful the world was. She felt the laughter inside of her, and she let it flow freely, because it was beautiful.

I saw delight.

Yes, Liz was delighted. But it hadn’t overcome her, and it wouldn’t, not as long as she lived. Because this life, this bet, this climax, it would not end her story. There was a world of gods just outside her reach, and so she’d keep her wits about her for the day she joined them. 

Standing, Liz made her way to the door. She hesitated for only a moment before opening it. The pair of assassins outside straightened upon seeing her, and she nodded to them, continuing through the corridor, then down, down, down. The thick carpets became marble became worked stone became gravel. It was dark in the dungeons, not that Liz minded. She almost felt safer here than in the king’s chambers. Certainly the assassins did, as several of them were lounging about like cats in the sun. 

“Fetch him,” she said to one of them. She didn’t need to clarify who. “Take him to our usual room.” The assassin saluted sharply, then faded into the shadows as she rushed to obey her Empress. Liz moved down much more slowly, so that by the time she reached Mari’s cell, Ien and the assassin were gone. 

Mari glared at her. “I thought you were above gloating?”

Liz raised an eyebrow. “That was petty.” The girl’s lips pressed together tightly, and she said nothing, so Liz shrugged languidly. “I’m not gloating. If you must know, I came to tell you a story.”

Mari’s anger came so quickly she choked. “A story. You want to sit here and spin tales as if you aren’t going to beat Ien within an inch of his life, then send him back and expect me to heal him.”

Liz let her gaze harden. “Iendenn Marsvall is the reason for what I’ve become. Everything happening outside these walls is his fault.”

“That isn’t true,” Mari growled, “and you’re too smart to pretend that it is.”

Liz watched her, allowing her eyelids to grow heavy and condescending. The little mouse is growing claws…good. Perhaps this timing will work well enough after all. “You bore me. So hush now, little Mouse, and listen.” Mari inhaled sharply as her jaw was forced shut. If she cared to, Liz could have empathized with her: the feeling of your own body betraying you was far from pleasant.

“Once upon a time,” Liz began, “there was a girl who dreamed. She dreamed herself a whole life beyond her home, and she went after it with a dangerous lust. She learned, and as she learned her world grew. She fell in love, and then the only part of the world that mattered was her piece of it. She was potential incarnate, and she was surrounded by friends and blinded by love.

“But, as always happens in stories, it could not last. The father of her lover found her and made her hurt. He didn’t kill her, because that would have been a waste. He forged her into the weapon he needed her to be…and so her dreams started to change. She dreamed of revenge.

“Now her lover is breaking, her dearest friend is insane, and she rules the world.” Liz laughed softly, allowing Mari’s mouth to open. “I know Ien has told you my story, girl. It is not one with a happy ending, not for any of the players. And you, little Mouse, have become one of them.”

She rather enjoyed watching the color drain from Mari’s face. And though it once would have sickened her, she enjoyed what came next, too.

***

Ien wasn’t sure what was going on. An assassin had taken him from his cell and taken him to the room where Liz would…entertain herself. But she hadn’t come, and after over an hour the assassin had returned. This was new. It was dangerous. 

They rounded a corner and Ien froze. There, at the end of the line of cells, something dark and sticky was trickling out into the corridor.

That was Mari’s cell.

[chapter break]

He didn’t recognize the primal gasp that left his throat. He didn’t remember running, only that all at once he was outside her cell, staring at where she lay in a puddle of her own blood. So much of it. Too much of it. But she was breathing, if just barely. Ien was numb as the assassin forced him into his own cell, locking the door and stalking away. 

“M-Mari?” He choked. Her eyes fluttered open, but they were unfocused and glazed. “No,” he breathed, and suddenly that was the only word in his mind. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. He would not let her die. He wouldn’t let the girl he loved be broken. Not again. He would not be powerless to save her. Not again.

She would not die.

Ien let out a roar, and something inside him clicked into place. Light exploded out from him, stretching towards Mari. It was blinding. For one short moment, there was only light.

Then it faded. 

But Mari sat up, looking as confused as Ien felt. Ien felt his hands shaking, felt sweat dripping down his neck. He took a long breath. Then another. What was that?

“Ien?” Mari said. Shaking, she stood and crossed to the bars that separated them. 

He reached through and clasped her hand. “You’re okay?”

“Y-yeah. No. But yeah.” She cocked her head at him. “What did you do?”

Ien shook his head. “I don’t know,” he murmured, pulling her arm through the bars and pressing his lips to her fingers, as if to remind himself that she was here, that she was okay, that the blood covering everything was no longer coming from her. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

Mari shrugged, squeezing his hand. “I don’t know why I thought I was immune to her.” She shrugged again, her shoulders pulled forward, as if she was trying to fold in on herself. “I’m scared, Ien. It hurt so terribly. I thought I was going to die.”

Ien leaned forward, pressing his forehead to hers in the space between the bars. “I won’t let her,” he growled. “I promise, Mari. I’ll protect you. And we’ll make it out of here, and fix everything she’s broken.

“I promise.”