Opposites

[Wikus]

The palm of his hand ran across his strider’s hoarse hair. The flesh was greatly bleeding from the hairs, having torn his skin apart long ago and now scraping the muscle and carving lines on his bones. Wikus didn’t feel anything but pleasure, yet his expression couldn’t change their serious antic nor clear the pout he usually wore. His strider didn’t move, as if frozen in place without offering a single blink to address his rider. Wikus didn’t mind, of course, as he knew the horse was very independent. It didn’t need cuddles nor cares, no brushes nor food. It only needed freedom, something he was certain he had given it. In times like these, in which everything that mattered was the horse and rider, he often felt the need to address his missing companion. There were no doubts that they were forever bonded, even if they paid so little attention to their eternal companions. The fear of his horse leaving him alone was major most days, yet whenever they spent a moment together his doubts cleared.

The silence was absolute. The grey skies blew the mute winds, and the ashen hued grass waved around the endless horizon that opened whenever Wikus’ eyes looked up. The scene was sad and morose, bitter and twisted, bringing up a light touch of guilt whenever he stared for too long. He didn’t look aside despite having been standing in the same spot for hundreds of winters. It was only his horse what he cared about, that horse that had yet to move or react to his rider. The distant Endrykas didn’t move in all those years, maybe waiting for them or perhaps being empty of life just like the endless field that surrounded them. For him, it all felt empty and lonesome just like a flower blossoming between the rocks. His bare body, although exposed to the winds, felt no cold nor heat whatsoever. It was all swallowed by this dark smoke, liquid in appearance but easily flowing through the air, wrapping and isolating him from everyone else. Just what he needed and he wished.

Still he ran his hand on his strider’s head. Wikus had long ago lost track of why, how, or when did he began with the infinite task. Being alone felt good, and it filled him with determination. People often found joy in being with others, in sharing words and sharing smiles, yet he never felt this way. If he did once, that time had long ago passed. The lonesomeness was his ally, as calling it friend would make it a paradox. Only him and his strider in a frozen, eternal world. “One day…” he muttered, for the first time in the hundreds of winters he had been in his place, his voice aching from the sudden use of it. The windmarks across his body replied, clicking and screeching just like hundreds of insects would. Wikus, satisfied, simply nodded and continued petting his horse, planning to talk again one of the infinite number of days he’d spend waiting here.

[Amunet]

Life. There was nothing better than the feel of living creation flowing through your veins. The winds flowing, blowing. The red head was on Shetanae running the expanse of grass that seemed to go forever. The sky, the earth, the winds and the very pulse of life flowed effortlessly all around her. it was magic. The Healer pulled her strider up to a stop as the dark dun outlined on the hill against the expanse of green. The blue skies came against grey skies. The dotted cottons of white, came against darkened charcoal of overcast. This was a curious thing.

Why was this here? The Sea of grass was alive and it flowed with creation, what is this grey? The red head was cast in drapeing white that clung and shimmered in the sunlight as she peered into this grey. She moved towards the grey. The world seemed divided, cut in half as the line of clouds that met the grey was exact. This vibrant creature in white dismounted from her tall mare as her bare feet touched the ground and felt the coolness of the green. The grass parted way as she came to that dividing line. The head tilted sideways as she peered at this odd color. It had no meaning, it had no place, the word nothing, alone and dread came to mind. This creature shook her head to discard that as her hand went forth to touch this bastion of nothingness. The warm vibrant hand crossed that boundary and she found coldness.

She looked up as those brilliant light sky blue eyes saw a lone man and a lone strider fixed just as the grey grass and the grey hills was also fixed. As her bare feet moved the grass around her would turn green as she moved forward. She was the warmth of the hearth fire. She was the gentleness of a cool breeze on a sweated face. The mare neighed in greeting to the other strider finding it curious that he did nothing. The red head would give sign of greeting only to also have nothing. She stopped close to him. Her boldness brought her there. The vibrant amidst the shadowed ashen world in giving this grey land color. Giving it wonder and awe. Giving it life.

The hand came up ever so gently as the heart that burned in those shimmering eyes would find its warmth in her hand like as if it had been on a cook stove or recently warmed by a fire. This palm rested upon the chest of this lonely man. His skin was cold The brow furrowed as this was curious. How could he be so cold with so much life? Her palm would start circling in the act of warming his heart. The weight of his destitute condition reached her senses as she reached for him to be whole.

The mare curved her neck along the other strider in an attempt to liven the creature up. She wanted to play. She looked at Amunet as she wasn’t quite sure what to do with this as Striders most times were almost always on the move. This was their land. It was made for them. As descendants of Rakivas, this land was in their blood. Amunet looked up into the man’s eyes to see if she could find him within the ash and shadow. Within the window of blues was hope.

[Wikus]

He only felt cold in her touch. Looking down with sleepy eyes, inattentive and apathetic would be his world, a place where nobody existed but the gray being he was. His hairs, long and plain as the withered grass that covered the earth. Staring at her and titling a head to the side, his grey eyes would meet hers and lock, bound by invisible chains that trapped him inside. Many centuries had passed since he began seeing grey, that being the color of his being and the color of his world. Looking into her eyes, however, he felt a small glimpse of… color? It was perhaps his imagination, once again playing tricks on him just as it had done several times in the past, being responsible of keeping him company by remaining silent. Blinking as slowly as his world was, he stared into her eyes.

“Who goes there? Another soul as lost as mine? Another traveler of the grey plains? Company is not what I seek, for company only brings me pain.” He’d monologue, his voice solemn and morose, torn by time and pain alike. He didn’t touch her, despite her touch only giving him cold. Hundreds and thousands of other beings had passed beside him, most of those not even giving him the worth of looking at him, others looking at him with pity in their eyes. Some stayed and tried to socialize, only getting the silent response of his apathy. She would leave, just like everyone else, just like everyone that entered his sad little world. This world was his gift and his domain, and the grey skies sang his name in painful cries and mocking giggles. Despite not quite liking it, it was his only home and the place he would remain for the rest of eternity. Often fate was like that, planning something behind a creature’s back and watching them suffer try to escape the inevitable.

“The mountains are plain and the rivers are dry. The skies are dark and the sun is cold. The grass does not grow, and the flowers never bloom. Tell me that is what you seek, and you may remain here. Otherwise, you better leave before pain traps you here with me.” As he said this, vines with menacing thorns began climbing up the man’s leg, wrapping around him and causing the grey blood to flow down onto the grey soil. There was no pain in his careless features, only the same morose dark smoke that partially covered him. Exhaling slowly, he finally broke eye contact to look upon his horse, still petting him even if he didn’t look. He didn’t remember the horse’s name, having forgotten it long ago back when he forgot his. Perhaps he never knew it. His horse still didn’t move, frozen in time, not breathing but instead just letting the world reflect in its black eyes. Just like his, those eyes lacked any kind of gleaming light within. The arrival’s horse was trying in vain.

“We often walk in place, have you noticed? We wake and we sleep in the same bed, in the same room. We travel and we fight only to end up in the same soil we were born in.” Turning towards the female once more, this one his free hand would move to place itself on her own chest, just where her heart lied. Just like he felt only the cold of his world in her touch, she would feel the warmth and hope of hers. It just so happened that she was lost in another world, where those emotions did not exist. “Tell me what you feel, and I will tell you who you are.”

[Amunet]

The man before her spoke. The words were as cold as his skin, harsh and devoid of life or emotion. This may make some turn away and discard the man. Some would offer scorn or even worse, nothing. Those brilliant light sky blue eyes shimmered with a countenance that spoke of a soul that spent lifetimes vibrating the very essence of her being to shine out towards everything she sees. It was strong, it was everything, it was one thing. It came on the breeze that flowed from behind her into the grey as the green eddied around her feet and spoke the one word, Love.

The warmth of her gaze did not waver as she answered his first question. The silken voice that would lay like honey to the ear and feel like a warm blanket to the soul would utter a name. “I am a child of the wind, a child of life, a child of the heart. I am the whisper in the soul that brings joy and happiness. “

Those light sky blue eyes were wide and open as a child’s would be. It was kindness and compassion that laid within. Even as the intertwining thorns came up to claim the man yet did she not give up. They are not dry nor are they plain, nor are they with nothingness. Look upon them with my eyes if you dare.” There was fire in her words. A fierceness undeterred by grey and shadow. “the shadow you are now you allowed to be, but it doesn’t have to.”

“I live. “ She said to him simply. The hand didn’t move from his skin as those kind eyes opened wider as her chest breathed in and that which she is was right on the very skin of her being. Her white garments did not soil and the grass beneath her feet would start to become green and flowers bloom. Shetanae did not know what to make of the still shadow of the strider that said nothing. The strider fell in behind her companion to nudge her elbow. The mare did not like this place and as maternal as the mare felt. Shetanae felt it best to try and convince her rider it might be best to get back to safety.

Amunet was not one to back down, especially when it came to saving someone or helping someone. The notion that some people could not be saved was not a conscious nor a subconscious thing. The girl yearned to save and make better. Her soul held with it the sigil of the Goddess of Healing and it blazed upon her face like glittering jewels. “It doesn’t have to be this way. I am Amunet.”