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ways_back_room2004-07-26 03:42 am
aj_crawley) wrote in ways_back_room2004-07-26 03:42 am
ATTN: EVERYBODY
Stop what you are doing RIGHT NOW. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kassandraloxias wrote Crowley+Iskander. I think I'm going to cry.
One day this will be Asia Minor. Now it is the sand-swept, burning
edge of the world. There is a tent pegged over a square patch of scrub
and gravel, and in the tent are two men. One is dying. One may not be
a man at all.
It is just one tent in an encampment of thousands, and it is very
plain. Tar-and-canvas sloping chamber, camp stool, camp bed, pile of
weapons, water pot. The man on the bed might be any soldier wracked
with flux and fever. But his cup, where he has thrown it in his
delirium, is gold, chased with twined serpents; his armor and his
saddle and tack are shot with gems.
"Hephaistion. Hephaistion, water. ...Please?"
The man at the bedside, he arrived -- not by the tent-flap -- five
minutes ago. He has been standing, gazing, breathing in the smoke and
the scent of herbs and illness. He answers, if not to the name. There
is a cup in his hand now, brimful, beaded with droplets of cold. The
tent in the middle of the sun-lashed plain is suddenly, blessedly
cool.
The standing man is tall, and has not seen sickness a day in his
life. His eyes are strange -- his eyes are yellow, slitted, sinister,
unreal -- but expression is somehow clear in them, and he is stricken.
He is a man old enough to be a hard and terrible fighter -- he is
older, older -- but his eyes and the sinking, grieving lines of his
skin are soft.
When he can move, at last, he moves in anger like a sword falling. He
goes to the bed and he kneels, and easily as breathing scoops the sick
man up by the shoulders. "There, boy. Drink." His voice is dark and
brusque.
The man in the bed was a boy, not so long ago. His face is unlined,
golden, guileless: the sun loved him. Leant back and braced against
the stranger's arm, he looks rumpled and fragile -- his muscles are
burning away -- and his skin shines searing hot. He trembles, where
his body has been hauled up from the piled bedding..
"Cold, gods, please, cold..."
"Hsshhh." It is meant to be comforting, but it is a hiss. The
cupbearer winces, and warms the burning boy. He has no need of
blankets.
The cup spills, a little, at the corners of a cracked and bleeding
mouth that must once have been sweet: generously fashioned, wickedly
smiling, those lips that mutter and fail in fever-dreams now.
Half-conscious, the boy struggles; his throat works, he convulses.
"Iskander." Soft, but a summons. "Be still, Bright One. It's water,
just water, it's clean--" The stranger sounds a strange shade of frantic.
"Drink. I don't know what to do. I don't know what else."
Iskander. His name is Iskander. Far in his fever, this he remembers.
The young man goes still enough for water to slide down his throat.
The trickle that races down his neck -- every line of him is perfect,
not of this world, his neck is a strong slender reed -- seems to
vanish into his skin, but maybe only because he is so fevered. His
curls, golden, are darkened with sweat to dull-bronze.
"Who are you? Where is.... oh, where--"
"I'm nobody. No one. Sleep now, go to sleep." And the dark man, the
interloper, sings. It is not a song with any words in it. It is the
Music, and it does not belong in a dying man's tent or in any place in
mortal time. But he sings, all he can remember, the endless, endless,
endless calling song to the seas, to the stars, to every other singer.
Only a little dissonant, the tune. It makes Iskander quiet, for a
while. Then he jerks, fingers pressed like talons into that other
man's shoulders, near where the man has unfurled soft shadow-black
wings. He sobs. He sobs.
"Papa," he says, and his eyes open, wild, slitted and golden and strange.
kassandraloxias wrote Crowley+Iskander. I think I'm going to cry.One day this will be Asia Minor. Now it is the sand-swept, burning
edge of the world. There is a tent pegged over a square patch of scrub
and gravel, and in the tent are two men. One is dying. One may not be
a man at all.
It is just one tent in an encampment of thousands, and it is very
plain. Tar-and-canvas sloping chamber, camp stool, camp bed, pile of
weapons, water pot. The man on the bed might be any soldier wracked
with flux and fever. But his cup, where he has thrown it in his
delirium, is gold, chased with twined serpents; his armor and his
saddle and tack are shot with gems.
"Hephaistion. Hephaistion, water. ...Please?"
The man at the bedside, he arrived -- not by the tent-flap -- five
minutes ago. He has been standing, gazing, breathing in the smoke and
the scent of herbs and illness. He answers, if not to the name. There
is a cup in his hand now, brimful, beaded with droplets of cold. The
tent in the middle of the sun-lashed plain is suddenly, blessedly
cool.
The standing man is tall, and has not seen sickness a day in his
life. His eyes are strange -- his eyes are yellow, slitted, sinister,
unreal -- but expression is somehow clear in them, and he is stricken.
He is a man old enough to be a hard and terrible fighter -- he is
older, older -- but his eyes and the sinking, grieving lines of his
skin are soft.
When he can move, at last, he moves in anger like a sword falling. He
goes to the bed and he kneels, and easily as breathing scoops the sick
man up by the shoulders. "There, boy. Drink." His voice is dark and
brusque.
The man in the bed was a boy, not so long ago. His face is unlined,
golden, guileless: the sun loved him. Leant back and braced against
the stranger's arm, he looks rumpled and fragile -- his muscles are
burning away -- and his skin shines searing hot. He trembles, where
his body has been hauled up from the piled bedding..
"Cold, gods, please, cold..."
"Hsshhh." It is meant to be comforting, but it is a hiss. The
cupbearer winces, and warms the burning boy. He has no need of
blankets.
The cup spills, a little, at the corners of a cracked and bleeding
mouth that must once have been sweet: generously fashioned, wickedly
smiling, those lips that mutter and fail in fever-dreams now.
Half-conscious, the boy struggles; his throat works, he convulses.
"Iskander." Soft, but a summons. "Be still, Bright One. It's water,
just water, it's clean--" The stranger sounds a strange shade of frantic.
"Drink. I don't know what to do. I don't know what else."
Iskander. His name is Iskander. Far in his fever, this he remembers.
The young man goes still enough for water to slide down his throat.
The trickle that races down his neck -- every line of him is perfect,
not of this world, his neck is a strong slender reed -- seems to
vanish into his skin, but maybe only because he is so fevered. His
curls, golden, are darkened with sweat to dull-bronze.
"Who are you? Where is.... oh, where--"
"I'm nobody. No one. Sleep now, go to sleep." And the dark man, the
interloper, sings. It is not a song with any words in it. It is the
Music, and it does not belong in a dying man's tent or in any place in
mortal time. But he sings, all he can remember, the endless, endless,
endless calling song to the seas, to the stars, to every other singer.
Only a little dissonant, the tune. It makes Iskander quiet, for a
while. Then he jerks, fingers pressed like talons into that other
man's shoulders, near where the man has unfurled soft shadow-black
wings. He sobs. He sobs.
"Papa," he says, and his eyes open, wild, slitted and golden and strange.
no subject
*weeps*
Such talent we have around here. It really amazes me.
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And the dark man, the
interloper, sings. It is not a song with any words in it. It is the
Music, and it does not belong in a dying man's tent or in any place in
mortal time. But he sings, all he can remember, the endless, endless,
endless calling song to the seas, to the stars, to every other singer.
Only a little dissonant, the tune.
That was lovely. Sigh...
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That's absolutely beautiful, so well done.
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Amazing.
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In fact, I already said it to you.
Those last two paragraphs... It's not that they're beautiful, although they are. It's how sharp they are, the glinting broken-glass blood-edged perfection that your best writing... by which I mean, almost all your writing... carries with it.
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I'll be over there, crying my guts out.
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*cries*
*a lot*
...and because Celtic myth is one of my obsessions, I can't help but be reminded of Lugh coming to the almost-mortally wounded Cuchullain by the grave-mound at Lerga ...
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That was beautiful.
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So very wonderful . . .