"Oh, she flies through the proud darkness.
Rather than the breathless vastness of the world
And yet he did not reject the light herself.
He believes she's one of a chain," I sing.
The trees bounce back the words in due time, the breeze hushing the rustle and rattle as I keep walking, guitar in hand and strumming along to the song I pluck from the world. It is a day for something like this. I spring up everywhere, like a weed, naturally, as a matter of course. Just enough cloud to offer shade, just enough shade to let it be bright and happy and alive, and a breeze soft enough so nothing grows stagnant. It is a day for moving, changing things, leaving others behind to follow their own paths, and generally, just getting along like a little dogie.
It always amazes me, the cutoff. A battle only exists so long as there are people fighting it. As long as no one is interested in dying under a banner, then it simply ceases to be. A few days from the rank and file and there is no one who even knows there is a war going on. Not sure that's a good thing. Wars tend to be somewhat of a big deal. It's also possible that my little jaunt with the lady of death was nothing more than a skirmish contained to a valley. Or not. I am not concerned with such worldly affairs. I have a song in my heart that must be shared with the world and then we'll see about lunch. I think it's lunch time. I haven't been counting my steps, so it may even be time for dinner.
It's lunch time when I come to the river by the trail side, and I think of what I might have. All in all, it comes down to a rest on the riverbank. If anything happens to come up on the bank and offer itself to me, then we'll have a grand old time. But my feet hurt, and the sun is out. I put my hat over my eyes and have myself a good long think on what to do.
I think I fall asleep. I hope I do. It would offer the most concise explanation as to why the sky is darkening in a blood orange nova as the stars start to shine. Or maybe time is a convoluted mass of whatever the fuck it wants to be and my understanding of it is lacking at best. My guitar is still there. My money is still there. My hat is slowly shuffling away, however, in small spurts of panicked movement. I sigh. I do not like the moving hat if only because I have to roll up and chase it down. It didn't go far, but still. My arms can only stretch so much.
I pick up the hat and find the legs that decided to move the damn thing for me. It's a lizard, black in the undertone, but sparkling rainbow in the scant light. It looks left, right, up and down, before turning to me with a small hop. It blinks at me with bright eyes that seem to pierce right through whatever color I land on.
"Food," she says.
"I don't have any food, Treblex," I say through a yawn, "Do you have any food?"
My wonderful guest doesn't really respond to any of that. There is no food around so she must find food. Good for her. Maybe she'll catch a large insect or a small fish or find a large berry. I'm not sure what Treblexes eat, if anything. It might just be some remaining drive of what she was before, a manifestation of an old insanity that drives the one-word bursts.
My dreams revealed to me my path. It is a simple one, really. I will have fish tonight, caught from the river. No line or tackle or bait, other than a being so much more powerful than I currently wandering for crumbs or carcasses or again, whatever Treblexes eat.
I strip. I am one with the wind in this moment and it is all I ever wanted. Just chilly enough to get the gooseflesh up, the hair rising and the blood sharp and deadly. I close my eyes and let the last bit of the sunlight warm me before wading into the river, the silt squishing beneath my feet. Cold, so incredibly cold, so wonderfully cold and sit flows between my legs. It is all washed downstream with the rest of the snow melt from the mountains. The blood, the sun I took in, the colors I wove through song and dance. The sensations my body went through all cleansed in a baptism under early evening. Treblex does her little call from the bank. Distressed, this time. My poor hat has trapped her again and they can't seem to figure how to get out. I will deal with that later.
I open my mind to the flow of the world and find the colors I want. The hat mutes the infinite rainbow from my companion on the bank. Slightly. I turn away from that particular sun and comb through the water. We are all touched in some way by the colors we weave in our wake. The grass is green. The trees carry something similar, if a bit darker and marbled. But I look for the silver blue of dancing scales in the water. I find the aura it gives off and I move, slowly, letting my own black swirl away and mix with the river water. I am a ghost, spinning the world. Treblex cries again and if they're not careful, a bird is going to come by and snatch them away. I don't want to go through a bird for my little tricks. That would be terrible, because all birds are bastards. Not a one can be trusted.
I creep until I am within striking distance. In a flash, the water parts and I am embraced by the cold swirl, my breath fading into nothing, seized in my chest. The world goes dark, and I reach for the flash of blue silver at the edges. It's in my grasp and that's its end. We move on with the world and everything grows a bit darker. Less colors in the river, less colors in the sky, but the stars and the moon finally showing up. I smile. It's a good time for fish. I hold my prize above my head as I wade back to shore. It's a catfish, I believe. The little barbels dance and bounce with its struggles. I hold it tight and heave both of our wet bodies on the shore.
"Food!" shouts Treblex from under my hat. The scurrying goes faster and faster in frantic circles trying to escape.
"Get a fire started and I might share," I say. I shift the fish and reach for a knife. One quick motion and it goes still. Treblex is still having trouble with her prison until I find it in me to open the cell. She scampers up my arm, trying to get her share before its time. I snatch and dangle her in front of my nose.
"What did I say Treblex?" I ask with a stone edge creeping in.
"Fire," she says, still trying to get at the fish.
"We start a fire. We cook the fish. And then, we eat the fish. Do you like cooked fish?
The lizard nods and I put her down. Such a handful, that one. I heard Long Walker is a bit easier to deal with. Mostly because you just don't. A smile and a wave as he passes by and that's it. Cout has a similar deal. The people who meet with him, for the most part, don't meet with him for too long before being whisked off to who knows where. No clue about the others in any grand sense. They could all show up with baskets of cookies, wine, massages whatever the follower so wished. But no, my little dumbass lizard needs food and warmth and gets stuck in my hat when I'm not looking.
And when I am not looking, Treblex has made herself useful for once and we have a small cookfire going. She's perched on a rock, eyes closed, taking in the heat and letting the light dance across her hide. It is mesmerizing, I will admit. Almost hypnotic. Red and orange seem to be the most all-consuming as of now, but I glimpse the same blue of my fingertips on there every so often. I spit the fish and let it sit. We just wait. Like my dumbass lizard, I take in the warmth of the fire, still naked, baking the heat into my muscles.
What was not washed away, slowly unwinds in the heat. The muscles unclench and uncoil from my bones. My knots are undone. I start in the dancing lights that Treblex made. She starts as the orange red, yellow swirl, lapping tongues against the sky. Treblex grows bored and makes it my blue again, dancing with my black. They are a nice golden yellow again, with the same black. Emerald green, sapphire blue, agates and violets and every other color that can come through. The lizard watches and waves and changes the colors. I am still black and blue. My horn is still the same tapered tip. The snap of the twigs prevents me from dosing into the final rest of the day. That and the scent of the fish. I believe it's done.
Still nude, I pull myself up and pick the fish apart. One piece for me. One for my guest, careful with where I put my fingers. And together, we eat in silence as the fire dies down. We get to the bones and that's all there is to do.
