Monday, October 17, 2005
PROMOS are finally over. Let me gasp and take a breath of drowned air.
None have come to this blog anymore, it has died. So it means it is safe to come out again.
Like the possum who plays dead so will I.
What can I say, i 've already done that. Played dead in so many more ways that its hard to know whence was I alive. I long to write again but i know that none of my works are particularly great. All are just practices to create character, to sustain it and to give hint to a plot.
Is it time to write another story again?
Might it be my last?
But i do know one thing for sure, The story of the shadow war will never come to the light. It has been hidden and locked away like a myth, not to see the electronic light on my computer screen. Because it is a tale not to be written but spoken.
Only then can it become legendary. It is stories that passed along from word of mouth that become more special, more personal.
But here is a story that I want written down in this cupboard of lost words, of lost stories. Tucked away like the possessions of one who clings to the past, who collects the clutter of his time to be reminisced and be put away again.
This is the story...
___________________________
Calling out his name wouldn't help him again. Webber had already done so throughout the one hour of aimless wandering he had endured. Putting his hands on his hips , he decided where next? Which direction would he walk to next?
Back? Forward? Left? Right?
No not right. He had learn along time ago that turning right is not always the right way. That right turn in the crowded market place of his hometown had gotten him seperated again from the rest of his family. Rubbing his hand over his sandy short-cropped hair. He realised how prickly it felt, tingling his palm las if scraping his hand against sand paper. He remembered how that felt, the quiet patience of sanding the wood of a well made cupboard. Built into exisence from his very own callused hands. A profession of a long forgotten past, of a time when he was not so lost as he was now.
Staring around him, all he could see was wood, living wood. Not dead and untapped like it was in his hands, as he carved the life into their stiff corpses. No, here it was almost like living in a waking nightmare. To dream that the food you once ate, has now grown teeth. In the denseness of these trees it was almost certain that they would carve out of him, the stiff path of freedom.
His stomach started to clench. Hunger. Its been almost a while since he ate. He scanned the canopy above, noticing the fading light. If he didn't find a way out of this wooden maze, he would have to stay a night in its power. Stuck within the growing oppressivness of this gargantuan monster. He had to pick a direction, sooner or later, he would find a landmark to compass his way out.
What was he thinking? To let Carlston choose the venue for their clandestine meeting was stupid suggestion. Something the guild should never have allowed in the first place.
Where was the grove? Evening was creeping up over the trees, a predator waiting upon the peripherals of day, upon the last shed of light that still reached the bottom of the forest. Soon it would be dark and Webber would really be in trouble.
Out ahead of him, a light danced among the trees, his black pupils adjusting to the ever decreasing amount of illumination, he could see the way it moved purposefully. As if heading towards a destination. It moved with increased hurriedness, and Webber by his natural instinct to survive, he followed though. Chasing after the ghostly shade, his fast-paced footsteps chased after it. Not wanting to call out, he feared that this light might belong to a more sinister being. One that might lead him down the road to perdition.
Yet once he came closer to it, it seemed to get further, a repelling attraction that symbolised how the sun ran after the moon. As the light began to fade out into the darkness, Webber was gripped with panic, not caring, he shouted out, " WAIT! Don't go! Help me, I'm lost!"
The fading light, glared in brightness again before starting its way back toward him. Increasing in its intensity with every beat of his heart. As it danced its way through the stalks, it weaved about this time in an unruly manner, swinging about as if scampering betweeen the spaces of each pump of his blood.
Stranger yet stranger still, no sound could be heard within the black forest. A deafening silence that did not break even with the approach of the glare. Webber was now trembling. A thousand and one thoughts racing through his head, what manner of a phenomenon was this? The amalgamation of light and dark closed in upon him, a barrier of thorns and atmosphere weighed heavily with the pregnant silence. He stood rooted to the ground, his feet digging into the surface, and tried as he did in his mind, he could not move. Not. A. Step.
Clenched in the gut with fear, he could not do much else but wait for the light to come closer, pulling out the hunting knife from his sleeve to hold it trembling before himself, a weak attempt at defence that his conscious mind had to obey.
The glaring light reflected in his eyes a wide-eyed terror, and with the reflection, doing as Perseus did, we see in that reflection a shadow was born. Stepping out of the light, the light in Webber's eyes dimed, and vanished.
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From there, ended Webber's memory. The last few specks of his life. Whom did he meet? What did he see? How was the suspense? Did you like the atmosphere? It can be worked upon. But I so did like that Euphemism I used. " In the denseness of these trees it was almost certain that they would carve out of him, the stiff path of freedom" The stiff path of freedom is a euphemistic way of talking about death. I might write another piece on atmosphere again. Hope you like this one.
deadnessmaster live again at 5:19 PM