Work Text:
In your
Dream
(it’s not a dream)
There is a man hovering over you, only a face and a pair of hands, only a dark beard and eyes like twin coals, only the cold rim of a cup against your lips,
Drink, my friend, he says, or his mouth does, but he—
(it’s not your friend)
In the steely night, silver-smooth, you don’t have a voice or a word or a name. R, you hold in your eyes, R, U, but are those letters about to tell you of runes? Are runes the beginning or the end?
You cannot open your eyes. You do have eyes, and maybe they are already open. Through a slit like a crack in a wall, there you see a dark-haired boy praying, blunt hands covering his face. Overhead, a spider dangles. It settles on your forehead and grows and grows.
(it’s a memory, this one)
In your—dream—the collar is tightening, but the spikes are sheathed. In your dream, your friend is a boy holding you by the wrists and promising you a kingdom. Doesn’t he know that you never asked for a kingdom?
Rumil we are surrounded what do we do they’ll never make it past the bridge Feanor built that bridge and he does not lie
(Rumil.)
Drink, my friend, just a little longer now
Taste seems strange. You find it again: bitterness, and dread. What is the man who is not your friend doing to you? Are you a whole body, a whole man, for something to be done to? The spider is gone but the maps remain. The maps are gone but there is always a boy by your bedside. Sometimes the boy has a knife, but he doesn’t kill you.
Maybe that is because you are already dead.