BARDLORE

The demon that had been tormenting him took his face in it's hands One hand slipping back to stroke over his hair Not unlike trying to calm a frightened horse But Wilhorn was no horse Wilhorn was barely an animal, closer in that moment to a rag used To wipe blood from the face of your enemy as a show of submission The edges of this memory were stained with blood of elf and bird alike The half-human Because, really, wasn't he? He was far less pretty than an elf, far less strong On his knees in a sticky-slick wetness Seeping into the wood of the queen's finest ship Wilhorn dared not think too hard about the memory's edge Being akin to the knees of his pants in that moment This demon This wretched, hellish creature that had fallen Towards the white-haired boy like hail to cobbles Stood above him now, holding his head So it could not fall under it and shame's own weight Black, cool claws, slotted against his cheek No threat besides presence No stimuli able to reach him besides what the demon was forcing him to take A still air, free of the torture the crew had endured for the past 10 months And yet the softness was torture in and of itsself It felt so cold it burned You've won, the demon spoke Voice echoing around him in double, triple, quadruple harmony Amusement in it's tones as obvious as the pain also carried within You've won, and now you must simply close the box As Wilhorn came back to his senses Tucking his hair behind his ear and glancing up from his journal To watch his husband catch a fish bare-pawed from the waves Crashing onto the beach their nice Quaint house sat on, he couldn't remember the rest He couldn't remember what the demon meant But, with the vague feeling of being a doll left to sit on a damp basement shelf And the scent of smoke engraved into the deepest folds of his brain Wilhorn couldn't help but feel that the lapse in memory was for the best