395. A new world, 9

(Wardah)

I knew since the very first day I saw her, with my one good eye, that she would be my chance, my only chance.

That woman, that impossible traveller. Laughing, confident, free, strong.

That demon flower... Blume. Changing, teasing, challenging.

But intelligent and kind.

Following her was my one in a lifetime chance to leave my home, not so warm. To see the worlds I barely could dream of.

I knew what trees were. But not like that. Grass, fields, forests.

Rain.

It went so fast.

I was right about her. She did help me to reach lands I never would have otherwise.

That djinn never agreed to fix my body though.

Everything went so quickly fast since we left the salt flats. Too fast.

I saw more landscapes in a few days than I had in my life.

And I saw more terrifying demons than I ever thought could walk the Earth. These lands are barbaric.

Why did she go to die inside that monster, I can't understand!

She vanished just like that after a minute of dancing with the amorphous devil, leaving me behind.

Leaving me all alone in a very strange and obviously dangerous world.

It's kind of a mix between one of my dreams, and some of my nightmares.

I saw this kind flower demon disappear and probably dying. Even though she promised me she wouldn't.

Then a day later, I saw that blinding light, and that other odd fight between light and darkness.

Everything that didn't already decay in that area was caught in fire. I could feel the burning winds reaching me even up here in the mountainous road.

I saw through my goggles the two beings they were dying as well, as the flames died around them.

What were they? Angel and demon? Really?

Where did she bring me? Everything I witness is unreal to me.

I miss the dry earth of my homeland. It was always the same. Sad, but reassuring.

Here everything is obviously wild.

I'm as careful as I can be in this dangerous lands. I'm afraid of the demons that could find me and eat me like that.

I barely sleep at night, wondering how people could live in places such as this.

~

I trot toward the dead zone.

Where the various demons and others things all went to die one against another. It was so weird.

All the ground around is now just flint stones and rocks, everywhere. The last rains finished washing most of the muds away.

In the centre of it, I find a small mound. Very slight, but with a different colour, greener.

Some earth, roughly the size of a grave.

With a long sword standing there, like the mark of a tombstone. A nameless grave.

I know what the name of one of these things was. Two actually. Rose and Blume.

Now together in death... Is that what she wanted?

I'm sobbing and yelling at her.

Is this really what you wanted Blume? I miss you...

Your heart still beats. It's still warm. It's like a living being on its own.

It's otherworldly.

The veins and arteries are all bridged together, forming a handle in the flesh of it. When I hold it like that, I can feel the blood pulsing through it. The heart is all smooth, skinless. A pure and perfectly healthy organ. It feels so odd to hold it, and to sleep close to it.

But when I begin to fall asleep, it does feel like you're there with me.

I can't deny that.

How long does this heart can live? It's not fed. It shouldn't be alive in the first place!

If that was your goal, it does remind me every day that I should be wary of things I would have ruled out as impossible otherwise.

Meanwhile, I don't really know what to do...

~

I could try my luck in any direction, or keep surviving in the surrounding areas of the dead zone.

I want to wait for a while longer around here for now.

Because I wish Blume would grow back.

She hinted at it being possible. She might return.

I'd like to hold onto her heart meanwhile, to give it back to her when she returns...

How long could it take for a being-like-her to grow back to her former self?

I don't know...

I don't know anything about this barbaric lands, aside for the few things, cryptic things more than not, that she told me...

I kick the sword to the ground, annoyed.

Then I'm feeling bad about this lack of respect, so I return it and plunge it back into the ground.

But it doesn't hold anymore. It keeps falling as I try to make it stand there.

In the end I bury the sword there with them instead. My eyes are tearing up a little.

It's the only spot around here where some earth remains. Everywhere around, it's just rocks, for now.

In a few years, I'm sure a field will cover it all, making it as if it never happened.

I drag a stone large enough to be a real tombstone, up to that grave.

I carve it.

With your names. I decorate the stone a little further over time, adding carved brambles and flowers. I make it hopefully as pretty as you always were.

I tear up more often than not, as I'm carving your epitaph.

I'm a child who grew too fast you kept saying. Torn between adulthood and childishness.

I don't really know what I am.

I know I don't like it. I know what I wish I were...

You!

I wish I were just like you. You were everything I want to be!

You were...

Why did you abandon me...

One of the last things you said haunts me particularly.

That nothing is impossible, but that you can't always make them succeed.

Something like that.

I feel like there's a clue there for me, but I still don't get it...

This new world you brought me in, it certainly is very impressive, grandiose even. But so far, it feels mostly a little sad all over.

~