💾 Archived View for anjune.lol › w › ratsandspiders.gmi captured on 2021-12-06 at 14:29:53. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

monolalia → Writings → Two-Edge: Rats and spiders

“Hah! Catch me now, Master Smith!”

He knows what they think, knows they expect him to replay that other game ─ drooling, brooding, muttering. But that game is over, his mind a wind-swept trackless snow-waste and inconsolable howling. No more rhymes to set the pace; no fate-forging fires drive shadow-thorns across her caged granite face. His pawns have swept him off the board.

Two-Edge takes the Gatekeeper, then sets it down with a *clink*. He ponders his next move, but it's the past that has him. He wants to toss back his massive head, howl with centuries of churning anguish… but the rules forbid it.

“How ugly you are.” She is not; she is perfect. She moves like a lazy cat. He is lying sprawled across her bed, every limb a sack of dead wet sand. She runs her fingers down his ears: his treacherous, pointed ears. It barely hurts this time.

“Did I do well, mother?”

“You are a mistake, my son”, she whispers. “We’ll make sure it won't happen again. Won’t we, you and me?”

“No more rats and spiders?”

She sighs, exasperated. “You don't know what’s good for you.”

“Two-Edge?” Ekuar is concerned. “It’s your turn, half-troll.”

–––

This is a tiny shred of Elfquest fan fiction. I’m not terribly proud of it. It just seems too easy to exploit a character’s tragedy like that. Anyway: Elfquest, its logos, characters, situations, all related indicia, and their distinctive likenesses are trademarks of Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. (I didn't know you could trademark a situation, but boilerplate text is boilerplate text…)