Von raised his amber glass and returned it clear. A slight scorching of the throat, this waterfall of fire into the gullet, spirit dancing in the nose as the eye. "Tell me what changed?"Kyra looked up like one upon waking from a sleepless sleep. She stared at Von as one stares in a mirror after some absence, seeing what should be familiar look strangely unfamiliar. He tilted his balding head and raised one gray brow.
"When?"
"When you had blood on your hands and the number slain were as stars in a dark sky." His voice trailed, hand unsteady on the bottle and again his glass returned to a golden hue. "You've never spoken of the matter."
"No one has ever asked."
Von inhaled his drink allowing the fingers of libation to widen his eyes. "I'm asking. Something changed. Very subtle. And I can't put my finger on it."
"I don't know. But I feel it too. Felt it. As if I'm not alone. My hands have never looked the same. The images of that night are like cobwebs, the kind that no matter how many times you sweep them away, the next day, they're back. I remember losing control in the way that a gear slips; in the way that once it slips the first time, you always wonder when it will slip again; such that the canvas of my days is hued with crimson memory and my actions governed from the dais of an event long ago. So, I suppose, I live with a multitude whereas before, there was just the clutch of Valla, Papa and I, and life was good. And simple."
"And now?"
"Nothing seems as it was. And as it was seems another lifetime. My days dim as night in the way of a life rotating once every forty years, has turned a shoulder to the sun. An accumulation of debt greater than the days to repay it, for how does one repay a life taken. Or several dozen for that matter."
"Do you want me to answer that?"
"No."
"I didn't think so."
"Fill my glass and let us drown our answers."
Von poured. They drank.
"By the way, has Mairi spoken to you?"
"About leaving?"
"Yep."
2 comments:
I must say it, repeat, it is so wonderful, always wonderful, to see another chapter from the story. And here we have two in one day, what a treat. Four old friends come to visit a while.
What I noticed most about this chapter, or rather was most reminded of, is the authenticity of voice, the sincerity. Fiction or life matters not, truth is something we recognize. There is such straightforward openness in the manner in which she is communicating, though it is the first time that she is, that is all the more affecting. The simple response that she gives of nobody having asked her before having a prominent sense of sadness to it, but more than that it is a statement, a simple fact, accepted, without blame nor a consuming wish that it had been different. Those classic and beloved direct expressions, illustrating in such clear, lucid lines, as the cobwebs that reappear and a shoulder is turned to the sun.
Excellent chapter.
Sunshine, I feel the same way. I've missed the crew greatly and I can feel the movement of the story again. Fingers crossed. :-)
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