behind these castle walls {LBL + Elverum, day 3}

Etheralros -- I prayed few away, resting my wounded wings on the back seat of a throne; a seat for a king. I was no king, I was but a coward. A coward never protects his people - it stings, the slash on the binding of my arteries, every time she whispers again in my ear carried from the heavens to my consciousness by the word "Velocity." It hurts every time, like a salt to a wound, it's supposed to help the both of us, it's supposed to keep us both alive. Every time I chant her name she's still alive (unforgotten, until the die our legacy dies out) she was my only friend, the only person I swore a chant to, yet I cannot muster the strength to even say her name aloud anymore. Only she keeps whispering mine, in that chorus tone, it's just one stab away, release.

I agreed to play, I never agreed to live.

Lavender pools and temptation of a bastard -- my back shivers in the ice, the stumps of my back weltering in fear of its bitterness. Glory was never raised in the cold. For lack of strength to pull myself through breathing every knife of a breath, I force my mouth back into the coat, watching the stem release from my body and leaving me again, Duncan, Saffle, Axton, Backslash and the deep voiced man, Veloc-, it's a checkmate, stutter of breath as I raise my knees to my face. This is the sight of no king, the rotting of a lion heart, rum wilting on my fingertips. I am r o t t i n g.

Tree wanderers, bridge builders -- there's a shutter in my breathing, a polaroid shot of my fall from reign; I'm not dead yet, if only. My blood spilt on the crown, at least I could die valiant. My eyes clench shut as I pull the coat collar above my head, the shadow of the throne bearing my presence. The crown is dry, the soil is not. I will not survive to see the end of these puzzles, the games built around me, because I cannot even began to solve my way out of the maze of my own thoughts. Fingernails dig into my scalp as the guise of self-perseverance, protecting my eyes from glassing over from the water freezing. Choke, ("don't choke, they tributes are worse than the lions," Saffle chants, and I can't, I can't not choke, the verge of my chest as I just try to shut it off, to explode the circuits of this fragile body I'm in charge of, to just shut it off, shut it down.

Reboot, I can no longer drive this body.)

Plague of hope, the dying of lavender -- there's a noise, in front of the throne; revolution. My head is on my own palms, not their's, and I panic. They are her friends, Vel, Villo, Valac, I cannot contort the name, Saffle bites at my ear "run you fool, run out of the guillotine, idiot, idiot, idiot," and my throat collapses, crashes under the weight of it all, I cannot suppress my own life. Teeth chew into the tips of my lips, chewing through skin, dragon fangs through heart tissue, palms covering ears, the whispers and the yelling and the reboots, my hollow heart is flooding, sinking. They are not friends of mine, but of her's, but there is no her with them, "there is no her with you, Elverum, idiot, fucking idiot, just a fool," Another voice runs together, light against the air, heavy against ears.

Oserai -- fingertips suffocate the demons stretching at my vocal chords, grinding for me to yell, scream little lion boy, no, nonono, I bite into the joints, skin punctured by the whites. "Don't you dare fucking scream," I shutter, eyes heavy with water weight and I can't stare at this wall, my heart pounds, that tick tick tick, and they're both too loud, her and Saffle and the ticking and the friends and the deep voiced man's pain, and Backlash. They're all shadows, and I cannot stare at this wall. My palm blindfolds me from the world around me. It releases, purges, the voices, the shouting and whispering and reboots and for a second I'm crashed, a muffled mess fallen upon deaf ears accustomed to the chitter chatter of "I've always wondered what life is like in other places." Blood tastes against my tongue, the sea lion and skin reborn. Reborn, I take my angel wings along with bloodshot eyes and a bottle of liquor.

And I'll fall down -- my hand takes the side of the throne, raising off my left knee. Blood wears my hand like a glove, heating the knuckles before cooling to average; average, as best as my last three days will let me think. I'll do anything to be free, and either these lions will eat me alive, or leave me to succumb to these spirits. (I can't drown them out forever.) My shaggy hair raises above the head of the throne, bag of sanity tied to my back and the poncho wrapped back around the head of my pike; backs meet the corners of my eye. I cannot stare these demons in the face, for they are not mine but her's.

Easy in the blue, they'll never leave -- my broad shoulders slump as I eye the exit to the castle, that door I should've left closed. "Run," Saffle lessons me once more, "fuck you," I state. I walk around the throne only, trying to keep my eyes on the door and not the two tributes talking, living, like Leon, and not the deep voiced man. Two who are completely whole, and one who is half a man sitting, us two are not leaving these walls ever, because we have already lost. That's the puzzle: how long until you break. 

And the answer is we won't live to see how our blood paints that crown.

I need a drink.