How do I get back? [Sacrifice x Vin/Day 6/D4]

How do I get back? [Sacrifice x Vin/Day 6/D4] Dec 23, 2023 21:05:07 GMT -5

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Post by fox on Dec 23, 2023 21:05:07 GMT -5

“You'll take the water from the well,” the vǫlva says.

Named spámaðr, after they came from the forest, drenched in Egill's blood.

The air inside smells of drying summer herbs. Liquorice scent of yarrow, the woody and honey tones of calendula. In the autumn of this year, the air goes cold early. The flap of the tent blows open, and her breath comes in mists in the steel gray afternoon.

“Blood given to us by the Allfather.” They stand quietly before her. “Bowed before no man –”

She turns to them, gaze moving towards the night-coloured hound panting at their side, one hand curled into the leather leash. Calmer now, tethered to the dog in the temple. The vǫlur let them keep him only for this.

“– And no beast. You will belong to the gods. You will belong to fate.”

The eve before they turn sixteen, they sit in the sacred grove with their dog, face buried in his neck.

“Let's go,” but there is nowhere to go.

He was born in the forest, they were born there too.

The trees sway with the wind and lose their leaves in the dimming light. Dark shadows drop into the browning path. He listens to the distant foxes rustle through the bushes, smells the birds and their oily feathers, tastes the heaviness of sleep. And they're here, the rush of their pulse, humming through their veins, the cadence of breath. Everything familiar in the world.

“I only need you.”

He knew them since the beginning of everything, little bright light, river eyes, gentle touch. They saved his life. And they say, in the evening, hand resting between his ears, “You saved mine.”

somewhere, the canary stops singing.

all the light leaves.

she slumps into me, Sacrifice, and i am looking at her. my hand, wet, the blade buried deep in her chest.

“i –”

the absence of sound is a sound too. Arcadia is the last thing, burning on the shore. so bright, all else turns to ash as she walks.

the bird dies.

suddenly so leaden, she rests in my arms. i let go of the glaive. hands shaking. hold her shoulders. i am not dead. it pours from her mouth, her lungs.

i am not dead.

no,

“you and me,” a whisper.

let me die for him.

but the blood only stains me. and i am not dead. and the bird is not singing. and how her face blanks. and how her arms fall, hanging off my frame.

sacrifice,

and

leaned against my chest. the water goes deafening.

i tell her,

“you were supposed to kill me.”

there is no bargaining with fate.

let her go.

i step off the pier.