We all fall down
Ithanar Islesun knew his end would come eventually.
But not like this.
No, he wanted something swift, sudden… merciless almost.
Instead, the elf’s end…
It is slow, spreading, creeping; a plague of corrosive pain, festering within and then spreading, forcing through to a surface of anguished screams bursting through mortal seams.
As he crawls forward through rubble, barely able to scrape at dirt and grass with marred hands and broken fingers, the old spellbreaker comes to a realization.
What he wants doesn’t matter.
Won’t matter.
Perhaps may never matter.
The end never had mercy for those who were the cause of their own demise.
Especially Ithanar, for not only has he caused his own end…
But that of others.
He played and then fell into fire, tampered with too much, overloaded and short-circuited.
Now he is nothing more than figurative ash, a remnant of the ancient elven glory trampled beneath frost and an icy-fanged fate.
“TANRAE!”
There.
“ILTHERIA!”
Dead.
“QEREN!”
Where?
Such questions already have their answers, but need not be acknowledged.
No, Ithanar doesn’t temper his denial for it bites and barks alongside the pain, the fury, the anger, the rage, the sadness, the sorrow…
The nothingness.
The void.
“ITHANAR!”
No.
It… no… let me…
Leave me be…
He hears them now, footsteps on the grass and rocks, bounding toward him with haste.
Instead of crawling to them however, Ithanar tries to leave them behind, trying to scramble as best as a broken elf can. He finds no purchase in hands that cannot work, in broken fingers in the dirt.
“No… please… no, no, no…”
More shouts. Closer now, more frequent.
Please… no… please… just…
Just leave me be… here…
Ithanar can’t find the words, for he refuses to acknowledge them.
But he knows deep down…
The world in this moment holds one truth for him, harsh, inconvenient, and cruel…
A twisted turn.
This is no end.
“ITHANAR!”
Just leave me be…
Here in the wood of gnarled and twisted trees…
(This is a beginning.)
@stormandozone also sent this prompt in as well, so I am tagging them here! Tagging @entropytea for her character Qeren is mentioned.
