Work Text:
Send my regards to the gravediggers. Not because
I care, but ‘cause I’m gonna wear their faces like
unshed skin. Dead skin, really, crumpled feathers and
crisp leaves spilling silt-stained over twig-thick shoulders.
If the leaves weave themselves into a dusty gold
halo on the small of my back, where the knives don’t
bleed, I’ve earned it! See, that’s the issue with mercy.
At least an iron fist can be honest.
Apologies, wild things, but you’re gonna learn
that every raindrop burns, or I’ll— kneelbowquick and wait.
Ichor is a mouthful of worm-eaten wood. It'll
bubble muddily in my sleeping windpipe, and, well,
that’s the honest price of our ninth paradise. Blood. Mine.