Beneath the Mistlebells 8
#8 of Beneath the Mistlebells
A grain of sand glistens in the moonlight of an empty beach.
"Pan out,"
The beach nestles undisturbed, in some uninhabited stretch of rough and worn coastline, surrounded by the untamed jungle.
"Pan out,"
The jungle spans much of the country, where vast hills rise out of the wilderness like imperfections on the face of the planet, the bruises of a marred world, or the scars of ancient suffering.
"Pan out,"
The world shines as a marble, rolling infinitely against the dark backdrop of the cosmos, forever moving, yet fixed like a full-stop at the end of a sentence.
"Pan out,"
Beyond stars there lies clusters; vast collections of gas and rock, matter unknown to any sentient filling the wounds between worlds, beautiful arms and flowing coat-tails form the most improbable of all forms. Huge beyond hugeness, and far more besides, the galaxys spin in movements counted in eons, where a life is but a fraction of a millisecond, even for an immortal.
"Pan out,"
The-
"Pan out. Pan out, pan out, pan out!"
...What are you trying to do?
The sky turned to the stars. "Trying to find a view without you."
Ruth shielded her eyes as bright, white light filled her eyes, expecting any moment the agonising pain that she felt must come. But it didn't.
Cautiously she opened her eyes, expecting to see the destroyed remains of the Owl's home, and worse - the Owl himself. It had only been a toy, she thought. How could she have known? But she should have, she realised. As soon as she had picked up that silver car she had known they weren't merely toys.
Instead of the exploded and fragmented sight of the Owl's nest, a sight met her eyes that made her mind reel. "It's impossible," she murmured. There was Owl, frozen like a statue along with every part of his home, but suddenly seeming very far away, like there was some horrible distance between her and him. Before her eyes, it seemed to drift away from her and she stood transfixed. She could not understand what she was seeing. Soon, the scene started to fold itself up, right from under her feet, but missing her out entirely. Where before she could see a wall it would start folding into triangles. It was like the walls - no, she thought, like her very vision was made of cardboard and was shifting before her eyes.
"Owl..." she whispered, as he too started folding away, those folds forming ever decreasing triangles, tearing apart as more fractures split through the nest, until each of them disappeared with a pop, leaving behind no trace of his ever being there. Behind, the mistlebells came into focus, and before long it was as if there had never been an Owl, and never been a home between those trees. It was gone. He was gone, and she was left all alone.
"Just hold still now," came a voice.
Ruth spun around, and saw to her shock the very clearing she had first walked in to when she had arrived beneath the mistlebells. In it, stood Blue, the fox, standing at an easle with a paintbrush in hand. He grinned to her. "I want to remember this, and you. Just as you are."
She looked upon him with suspicion, and stepped forwards.
"But I wouldn't be remembering the real you if you didn't move now, would I?" he said.
"It's just you and me now, isn't it?" she said.
"Just..." he waved his hand dramatically, motioning at pretty much everything around him with the paintbrush. "Just us, metaphorically speaking. You've been a very busy little bunny, haven't you, hare?"
"My name is Ruth,"
"Is it?" he said, a little tiredness in his voice.
She stepped closer, circling around into the clearing. "How did you get this here? I recognise these trees." She looked, and indeed saw, as she was expecting, the bushes she had disappeared into darkness and the tree in which she had taken shelter whilst Blue talked to the spiders.
"They've always been here," he said, making another brushstroke.
"That can't be true. I ran so far from here to get to Owl's."
"Ran... Interesting word that. And here to Owl's. All these places. Do you remember, dear hare, when you told me that you are?"
"Are what?"
"Just are. I told you that should be enough for anyone, just being." Blue said. "But you wanted more."
She had rounded the fox by now, and she glanced past him to the easle. It was completely blank. "What are you painting?" she asked.
"A memory," he said, with a sigh. "Always painting. Always writing, me. Being creative is such a strain."
"Because you can't get it to form?" she asked.
"Now you're getting it. Well, half of it."
"And what's the other half?" she was going to get answers, one way or another. She stepped forwards, towards Blue.
"A memory is a recollection of the senses. There aren't any, here. Narry a one. Not a single eye, or nose. We're locked up here without them."
"I have a nose," she said, uncertainly.
"Do you? Prove it. Ever smelt anything?" he asked, lowering his paintbrush and turning to the hare.
"I... I think so?" she said, uncertainly.
"How about an easy one. Ever seen anything?"
"Of course. I'm looking at you right now!"
"Ah, but who's looking out through those eyes?"
"It's me," she declared. "Ruth."
The fox shook his head. "Strange name that. Not really much of a name at all. Wonder why you chose it," he said, stretching and leaning against the easle. "Ruth... It's ruthless less the less. Would that make you more or less ruthless, or would you say you're more or less ruth?"
"It's just Ruth."
"Really? From what I just saw you've been pretty ruthless. Have you been anything but ruthless since you arrived at that name?"
She was inches from him now. She felt anger. She felt tension. She just wanted to break free from all of this.
"I warn you," Blue said, "It's no better out there than it is in here."
She darted forwards with her paw, expecting the fox to dodge, or otherwise to resist her. He must know, she thought, of her power. Instead, Blue raised a paw to hers, and as they collided she felt resistance. "That's funny," she murmurred, as a rush of consciousness flowed through her. She was suddenly aware of the essence of her friends and enemies swimming within her. Then the world went dark, the light retreating rapidly from the mistlebells, leaving only her and Blue in a tiny little circle, palm pressed against palm.
"An old dance this," Blue said, as suddenly a half-dozen essences flowed around their paws like ghosts. She recognised them, flowing out from her heart and curling around her wrist - the spiders, the toad, and all others besides - along with more she did not recognise. She looked on with surprise, seeing an equal number of strange, unfamiliar essences flowing from the fox, dancing around their wrists. He stepped forwards. She stepped back. "A dance as old as thought," Blue continued. "Sparks and jolts, bringing mind to creation, bringing heart to rock."
He leaned in to her and she felt powerless to resist, as her hand slipped around his waist, and his slipped around hers, and then her legs started moving in their own accord, those glowing essences flittering around like insects. Like ladybirds.
"A one, two, three, a one, two, three," Blue whispered as they danced. She followed those steps with no conscious thought of her own. She realised, after a time, that her friends were guiding her feet, and then, suddenly, she felt herself guiding the dance. "There, you're getting the hang of it."
"What am I doing," she asked.
"We're dancing."
"Why?"
"There's a dance for everything, my dear," he said, "A dance for love, a dance for loss, and a dance for a fractured soul. Just hold still now," he said, and she felt herself tumbling backwards before being dragged back up, a wave of brief nausea flowing over her.
"What was that?"
"Your body is trying to wake you up," he said with a sad smile.
"But I'm already awake!"
"Are you?" he asked. "You came to me for answers. Here is one for a question you never asked, but always needed to. I spoke to Owl once," he said, as they swiftly changed direction. "I told him about love. I told him about loss. He wept for days, as I had wept for days. From those tears he formed another, and called him Toad. Toad was everything that was beautiful about loss, but without the heartache I had shared with Owl.
"There was more; I spoke to Mouse. Mouse was brave, but when I told him of love and loss he took himself into the dark. He said he would bring light there, but when I saw him leave he had my darkness, when he returned, he had left it there. He buried it in the dark. I never asked him about it. He wanted me to call him by a new name."
"This answer isn't making any sense," Ruth said.
Blue continued, another sharp jolt in their dance, their feet moving in unison. "And then there was a hare. An unsignificant speck of curiosity, untainted by my loss, untainted by the dark, but too small to be scared. There was she, so far apart from the wounded men, yet drawn towards each in turn.
"I was not the first, you see my dear hare. There were other splits before me, and those I hold within me now are no different a mess than those you hold in you."
"What happened, Blue," she said, a tear forming in her eye. She felt suddenly tired. "Why did we all end up this way?"
Blue hesitated, and suddenly their dance was broken, the two bodies, hare and fox, a hair's bredth away from one another. "I..." he said eventually. "I am tired of bearing this burden," he said, his ears lowering submissively and his eyes staring into the hare's. "I have conquered many with my sadness, just as you have with your curiosity. I could take you too, and fill you with regret, and fear, and agony. I have walked these woods too long. It is time we looked beyond the mistlebells. I submit to you, dear hare. I warn you, it's no better out there than it is in here."
"You keep saying that," she said, uncertainly.
"Just hold still now," he said, then all of a sudden there was a rush of activity in those essences. They spun around her, and with a powerful surge that made the hare gasp, they struck her heart, a dozen wants, dreams, desires, feelings and emotions striking her at once. "Strange," Blue said with a chuckle, as suddenly the light around him began to fade, and she felt one more essence being drawn out through his palm. "You have his eyes."
The first thing that hit her was the cold. She felt groggy, and her head pounded like she had smashed it against a wall. She was wet too, and couldn't open one of her eyes. As she opened the other a torchlight shone in, making her blink and close it immediately. She groaned.
"How in the- just hold still now," came a voice. It seemed distant, and echoed in her ears. She felt like her ears had popped. Everything felt somehow out of place.
"You'll be okay," the voice continued. "Just don't move."
She tried to nod, but was immediately struck with such pain that she settled for groaning instead. She opened her one good eye cautiously. The light was gone, but spots covered her vision, leaving her staring bleaky into the dark. She slowly started to recognise where she was, the wheel in front of her, the dashboard behind it, and a cracked and crumpled windscreen met her eyes. It was about that moment that she realized she was upside-down.
A memory flicked back to her. Stepping out of a car, following a man into a house, almost slipping on the ice at the gate, but he had been there to catch her.
She felt sick, glancing desperately around. Her eyes trying to adjust to the dark. She felt wet. "Was that blood?" She thought.
Drinks, perhaps too many. One following another to lubricate her words, to grant her freedom to say what she really wanted. He was drinking too. They were good in each other's company. The best, like she'd always dreamed of. Not quite, but close enough not to care. He led her upstairs.
Her seatbelt had saved her, she realized. It was the only reason she was still in her seat, albeit hanging upside down with it digging into her chest. She glanced out of the side window. The owner of the voice was nowhere to be seen, but in the distance she could see some other vague shape she felt she should recognise. She narrowed her one good eye.
It was later now. After the deed. She was arguing. He was shouting. She wanted something, but he didn't, and he wanted something she regretted giving. She called him a bastard. He called her a slut. She had walked. She hadn't picked up her coat. That must be why she was cold.
They were dead, she thought. As soon as she saw what those rags were around what turned out to be another vehicle. Had to be, she thought. It was smashed to pieces, and none of those remains were moving. There wasn't a shred of doubt in her mind.
She knew she shouldn't have got behind the wheel. Somewhere in the back of her mind, behind the ringing shouts of anger and betrayal - behind the sudden hatred and desperation to be free. Beyond the insult and indignity. She was just too deafened to hear it.
The man had returned. He wore a high visibility jacket and had eyes that said too much. "You'll be okay," he lied. "You're not badly hurt," he fibbed. "We're going to get the jaws and get you to hospital," he said, with practiced reassurance. She wasn't okay. A weight was building in her heart that threatened to choke her, but for all the adrenaline in her blood she couldn't feel the tears.
Too fast, but what was the use in caring. He hadn't cared. She had been willing to give everything, but instead, there was nothing. It was like pouring her emotion into a void, and the void only gave back spite. The world was an uncaring, random place, and she, like a bullet fired into darkness, was just another random curve, bringing joy or sadness in ways no one could tell. She barely saw the family car pulling out in front of her.
She had closed her eyes, wishing to never see again. Wishing to never hear again. Wishing to never think again. When she opened them, she was on a stretcher, being bustled under white lights, with important looking people asking important questions and making important decisions. She didn't want to know any of them. She didn't want to think about any of them. She wanted nothing but silence. It was too late.
It was too late.
The End.
.
.
.
Something, somewhere awakens, and looks upwards, towards the light. It speaks.
"I just had the most amazing dream."