The Heortleas
The Heortleas.
...
An infinite void that engulfed me from within, with each passing moment, I drowned deeper into it. I feel null; my body quivering and numb.
Perhaps it was too late to ask for forgiveness.
He is here. He is watching—
Sharp throbs hit this body like a strong wave, trapping me in a trance.
From the depths inside me.
The hazy sight my eyes woke up to was slowly clearing up. I could make out a parking garage, with blood smeared all over the place. I flinch at the bloodied knife in my hand, before slipping it from my shaky left hand that was dripping with the now-cold blood. The tinnitus never seemed to come to a stop. I glance down at my stomach in horror; white clothes drenched in red. Bloodied dove-like feathers sat here and there.
My blood...? I stabbed myself?
I do not remember... a thing.
I stand up with the support of a car beside me. As I stand properly on the surface, I feel a queer sensation on my feet. I look at the concrete below, to find a Stellate drawn with blood on the centre of which I happened to be unconscious.
Then I hear the very sound at which my insides churned repeatedly.
His whispers. I can hear them.
No sound around me seemed to be echoing louder than the ones looping inside my head.
Lucielle. Lucielle. Lucielle. Repulsed. Lucielle. Return... ...ruins.
Stop. Stop. Stop.
I plead you to stop these whispers screaming into my head.
As though the weight my knees usually bear felt heavier, I crouched holding tight onto the black locks atop my scalp.
I crash onto a car behind me amidst the struggle of standing up straight. The garage around me was slowly brought to shape with my sight gaining focus for a second and losing it the next.
The raven machine that my back had crashed into, resulted in the flickering of the back lights. As if a cult were muttering prayers altogether, the rest of the cars in the garage joined whilst horns and lights danced in the quiet night.
I cannot remember a thing. The voices do not seem to retreat.
As I stumble around the endless lanes of this area, the cars continue their queer behavior. It is when I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the rear-view mirror of one of the vehicles.
Disheveled lengthy hair that was once the colour of the sky, was slowly turning black as if it were rotting into the shadows. The cuts on my face breathed as though I sinned throughout my time.
What have I done wrong...? What have I done to suffer in this manner...?
Return to feeling remorse, Lucielle.
His voice continues reminding me of my helplessness. Who is he and why am I being subjected to this hurt?
My back itches. My arm refuses to reach the spot that I must scratch the most.
Upon looking at my roughed up self in the glass of a car; to my horror, I found two alive slits that looked worse than the wound on my stomach had caved into my back without my knowledge.
Youthful laughs began carolling around the darkness. My instincts yelled that I was summoned. By these youths? What does that even imply? But whatever it may be, it appears to be a bad omen.
“It’s here—It’s here!
Dude, look—look.”
A girl whose footsteps clinked with every stride, and hair glinted golden, exclaimed loudly. The lad beside her walked closer to me. I pick up the knife I had dropped earlier. I try to speak but no sound is released.
The lad tilts his dark haired head at me, “Who cut your throat, bro?”
He tries to step closer but the girl yanks him aside. She tosses a leathered jacket at me, causing me to grip the knife that tried to slip from my hands tight. I step backward with each step she takes in my direction.
“Hey, bud. Relax. I didn’t realize we’d summoned a suicidal maniac of a creature.”
That sounds like a punishment. What calls for this odd situation?
The voices in my head paused as if waiting for these people to walk away.
“There’s feathers only on the floor. Looks like this one got hers ripped off of her.”
Before my senses could capture his movement behind me, the girl glimmering in the darkness took disappointing strides toward me.
“Come on bud—I summoned me another angel to see those wings in action.”
I am unable to comprehend their intentions. It felt as if their words tried to ring a bell in me but failed. The tinnitus returns as if my trail of thoughts walked back to all the pain.
“Nuh-uh. Not fun anymore.” The girl clicks her tongue.
“Yeah, I just feel bad now. Should we try and send her back? We either got a defect or this time we—”
The boy failed to complete his sentence as a clad iron pipe hits his head. The girl dodged the pipe and held the end of it, that she caught barely in a moment.
She examines the pipe closely, kicking her pal with her heavy, pointed boots.
“Ay, bad news. We did not claim a cute research pet this time.”
Pause.
“And you, bud—I’m sorry already.” She forces the pipe into the middle of the Stellate causing it to catch fire in its carved shape itself, as if pushing a button that made the voices return.
The voices seemed to collide strongly this time. Not only internally, but externally as well. The garage echoed with the shaking of the cars, their lights, and the singing of the horns.
The girl scoops the lad off the floor and throws him over her shoulder.
Lucielle. Lucielle. Lucielle. Return to ruins. Lucielle.
His monotonous voice was clearer and stern. My hands forced themselves to dig the front parallel to the wound on the back. Like he was the puppeteer and I, the puppet.
My memories came cascading to me as my eyes rolled back as if trying to reach toward the voices. The girl grabs my head tighter as if digging into my memories.
Forgive me. Forgive me. Forgive me Llumi. Your ripped heart. Little blob of my light. Llumi. Little Llumi. Pray, forgive me for using the strength of your petite heart. Forgive me, little Llumi.
I could faintly hear her mutter, “The heart is missing, no respiration. I was right. Lucielle, I apologize for having accidentally summoned you before your penance was over. Congratulations on involuntarily breaking out of a cell for the first time!”
He drags me all the way to a volcanic pit, but stops before pushing me in.
A small ball of light climbs atop me with the help of its tiny limbs. Llumi is smiling ear to ear. Llumi shows off the hole left from ripping her heart out amidst the battle to grant me a boon to triumph as though it were a battle scar.
She tightly embraces me, though covering only a little portion of my chest. The sight bearing her slowly dissipates, her soul returning to wherever it belongs as I finally remember what her last words were.
“Llumi-is fain.”
He drags me away from the hellish pit, but finds his arms that were dragging me by my feet empty in the next instance. It catches him by surprise.
By the time I glanced back, Lucielle threw herself into the fiery pits of hell.
She was grinning as though her happiness knew no bounds,
as if she were holding something dear in her arms.
© SiAh
Just as sacrifice may sound foolish; to those full of devotion, their foolish tree blooms with flowers of love.
