My Letter to You

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This is not for you.
Posts: 153
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My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Thu Apr 27, 2017 4:25 pm

One thousand, seven hundred and eighty eight days, twelve hours, and thirty two minutes.

I use days because it sounds better than years. Half of this coping thing is making up an illusion of things being alright when they are anything but. And now, while I'm staring at my dirty project splayed out over the forest floor with bits and baubles to make it all seem more official, I'm remembering our conversation.

"You don't care about anything, do you?"

The words cut like a butter knife- in that they don't. But the sentiment is annoying. I care about things, I thought to myself as I roll my payment into the center of this slapdash circle of gem dust and manticore blood. I care about plenty of things, I reassured myself as I began setting my candles down at measured intervals around the circle. I care about the Clover, and I care about the Family, and I also care about those stupid kids we looked after for a while. That's why I do all this instead of drink brandy on the beach in Sibiayad. I'm doing it for you.

The sound of breathing brought me out of rehearsing the argument I'd use for next time I see you. Some of it was mine, some of it was the Payment's.

This one's a whore I flashed crowns at in Sibayad. I felt tired today after our botched trip up the mountain, so I took a short cut. Her skin is rich like dark coffee, and her hair kept in braids. I had to gag her, because she wouldn't stop crying. She mentioned she had a family, had a son, but I didn't believe her. I had someone tell me once they're from a rich family and would pay me handsomely for his return, but he couldn't name the house he was apart of. People will say say anything if they think it means self preservation.

This is when you ask me those stupid questions again. "Since when did other people's lives matter less than your own?" I hate that one the most. Before our little chat, I liked to think that I wasn't all that bad of an individual. I give to charity, I feed the hungry, I look out for the kids, I bring order to where there is otherwise chaos.

I'm a good person.

I caught myself humming a tune this time, while I spoke the words like reciting old psalms in church when I was someone else. She didn't even look like a person, all splayed out and drawn with red lines in geometrical designs-- and it was funny because I couldn't remember when the whore ever did look anything more than shapes and lines. For a second I thought I saw your face instead of hers, and my knife fell to it's mark a little prematurely. It fell over and over and over and ov-

"At least I'm still human."

That's the last thing you said that I remember. And I'm thinking about that now while I'm throwing my disgust anger focus, into my work. I thought about the old wolf (whose probably dead by now) and what he said.

"It's when you stop feeling anything that you're in trouble kid."

So now I'm staring at this mess I've made all over the forest floor where everything has gotten unnervingly red and the ringing in my ears is deafening. I'm looking at this corpse, this life that I've stolen for my benefactor to pay off the time I bought with blood and I'm thinking about the potential existence of this now motherless boy, and I'm wondering what you're going to say when you can smell the death on me and I'm picturing that scathing disgust in your eyes and I'm stabbing the body again that I can't even see past the tears and I realize I can't remember that song I was just singing and--

I don't care.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Tue May 02, 2017 7:19 am

One thousand seven hundred and ten days, five hours, and eighteen minutes.

I spend a lot of time in the farmlands, watching the farmers work. They work tirelessly, day in and day out, and when I was young I remember finding some magical awe in their labors. How they went to the task every day without complaint and without fail, tending the soil and trimming the wheat. But now that I'm older, I can't find the same magic anymore. It's just a thing that happens, with no real relevance or baring on me or my existence. But I come here when I can anyway, and sit up on a hillside waiting for the moment when I remember what made it special in the first place.

Getting older, I notice a lot of things have lost their magic. When I arrived to the city I used to play music all the time (that's how we met, remember?) and I liked meeting new people. I played for myself even if no one was there and no one listened. Now I can't remember when I last tuned the lute that old leper gave me. I follow the motions of getting out of bed or whatever pile my latest binge has left me in, brush my hair, wash my face, and do the routine. I look forward to visiting the dog outside the city. I feed him treats and he presses his doggy face into my hand.

I don't know if I'd say I'm bored of it. No one gets bored of being alive after all except the truly batty. But I think I've started to realize and accept the truth of it. There's no magic reason why the farmer works so hard. He does it because he must. Like I get up in the morning and sit through meetings, shmoozing and mingling, going through the same routine to get you to like me just a little more because I have to. I know it's stupid, but I was hoping that when I became an adult, it'd be fun. I'd have the freedom to do all the things I always wanted to do but now that I'm here with these numbers staring me down, it doesn't feel like that at all. They're just things.

I've seen the worst this city has to offer and I'm slowly becoming one of them. Or maybe I already am and can't admit it.

You're wondering why I keep telling you this. I'll tell you a little secret.

I'm telling you because

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Sat May 06, 2017 7:26 am

One thousand, four hundred and six days, twenty three hours, and forty seven minutes.

Every time I go to sleep I think of that dog. I can already feel you rolling your eyes- I've told you about it a hundred and ten times already. The kids in the slums- the part of town I promised you hadn't been, where the streets are rampant with litter and blood, bodies of fresh and old corpses and dead eyes in bodies that writhe in the shadows and follow our every step. Where we found the Mice, surrounding that dog.

It was cute, did I tell you that? Brown short fur and funny disorganized spots with a funny crooked nose. His ears- well I don't know. The kids had already cut his ears off when we got there. Same with his tail. They surrounded the dog, some prodding it with sticks and the others holding it down while Two-Knives put his knife to its furry face. Giggles and laughter were offensively out of place, but there they were, trespassing on this scene that made my stomach tighten with my fists.

I do a lot of terrible stuff to terrible people. But dogs are good.

This isn't the dog that keeps me up though.

The dog I'm thinking about was all gray and shaggy, we found it on our way back from visiting the Mice. It was growling and biting at some dwarf down the street, after it's meal pouch I think. When we got close I was going to try and- I don't know what I was going to try to do, I hadn't worked it out yet before it lunged to bite Innogen.

I didn't even think about it, my club swung and broke the thing's spine, and then I swung again to confirm the kill. It wasn't clean, or professional, but it was done without any real thought or effort into it.

Dogs are good, I used to think. But this one tried to hurt someone who I don't think even has the stones to fight away a mugger if her life didn't depend on it. I stared at the fluffy remains as the dwarf grabbed it by it's haunches and dragged it back into a house. I tried to find what I thought was so special, so different about a dog from a cat or a bird or a cow or, even a person. I thought how much the dog's body moved like all the corpses I've dragged across streets and roads and docks. It really wasn't any different.

But it keeps me up. Why did I used to think dogs deserved more sympathy than people? You might ask, 'well when did you decide people didn't deserve sympathy?' and, I'll go ahead and remind you where I found the first dog and who did that to it.

I have Two-Knives's left knife. I stare at it when I can't sleep and wonder if he was always a tiny jerk or if he ended up that way. If dogs are made bad or if sometimes there's just bad dogs.

I need to find better hobbies.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Sat May 06, 2017 7:29 am

One thousand, three hundred and ninety nine days, twenty three hours, and forty seven minutes.

Tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Fri May 12, 2017 8:21 pm

Eight hundred and eighty two days, six hours and three minutes.

We never talk anymore. I see you every day and the thought occurs to me to strike up conversation, go on a walk and pretend that everything is normal and this is all a bad bender we'll laugh about when we're older. I know that's not us anymore. I don't talk. You're still you.

Yet here I am writing to you again because I want someone to tell me what I want to hear even if it's not the truth.

I've been thinking for a while now- maybe this cult business I'm bathed in isn't all it's cracked up to be. Maybe it's better to be loved than feared and maybe because I don't feel bad doing bad things- maybe I should do good things so I can feel good instead. I could be someone people look up to like Dragonsong. I could be someone who still laughs even though the odds are against me and everything is stupid like Dawnfire. Maybe I could stop beating slummers and petty thieves for not respecting us and start investing time with winning hearts and minds like Innogen.

It turns out they're part of the big joke too. They were never 'good' people. They're just like everyone else; seconds away from detonating a street with vast levels of destruction. Weak wills and no conviction which leaves me wondering if I'm the idiot standing here ready to die on this hill because gods damnit- this is where I stand and this is where I'll die because go choke on your ledgers and order.


There isn't any magic in the world- just cogs to a machine that keeps on turning.

Maybe if we can sit and talk together, we could make something more for ourselves.

But there it goes. Tick tock tick tock.

I don't have time for that.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Fri Jun 02, 2017 5:22 am

Four hundred and eighty six days, two hours, sixteen minutes.

I threw the books on the ground, occult texts and age old blood rite instructions spilling over onto the ground with thoughtless abandon. There's no reason to do this, but to me it felt appropriate. Among those pages is very likely the solution to this count down looming over my thoughts and actions. However, not at a price I'm willing to pay.

The day you left is the day I decided I was done with this garbage. With your absence came freedom from burdens I didn't know I had been carrying: guilt binding me like a noose on execution day. I'm drunk on my liberation, lost in the euphoria of 'what now'.

My room is small and quiet, still stained with the stench of bitter almonds and kerosene. What used to be familiar sets me at discomfort. I want to leave this place and never come return, but I know if I did He'd find me and escort me home with a smile and a knife behind his back. I thought about handling this per Omerta; but I'm afraid I need Him as much as He needs me.

The noose is gone but He's still here with the knife and the smile that makes me feel certainty.

You're gone now. There's only one thing left in my way.

And then I'm coming for you.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Tue Jun 06, 2017 7:01 pm

Three hundred and seventeen days, four hours, and twenty nine minutes.

Familiar faces no longer fill my life. I stand at the counter where there used to be laughter and scheming and find it empty.

Everyone has moved on. Wheels keep turning but I'm still here at my counter serving drinks to the ghosts of times long past. I feel myself growing smaller and smaller while I look at paintings depicting heroes and leaders that will be remembered, noting my absence amongst them.

When I'm gone will you remember me? Or will I have been another wasted potential in a sea of losers and degenerates.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

This is not for you.
Posts: 153
Joined: Thu Nov 24, 2016 10:22 pm
Location: Playing dressup with newbies

Re: My Letter to You

Post by This is not for you. » Fri Jun 16, 2017 4:10 pm

I left Him in a six foot grave just off the coast of Arelith, a little lonely islet, vigilant against the waves and the souls consumed by them. He told me when I met him he was shipwrecked a time on a place very similar, and that is how he came to have his particular persuasions and beliefs. I asked him before I did it, would you do anything for me?

And he said yes.

I can't really be to blame then, he was willing to die for me and I put that to use. Now he's dead and I'm not and I'm on top and he's below.

But then there was you.

I told you this and you took it with barely a ripple to your features. I watched as the consequences and the terms swayed into my favour and the realization that you'd been out played dawn in your eyes. But you didn't have to end up like him. We could've moved on and done it ourselves like we always have- we could've kept on keeping on. I own this city and you could've been there with me but instead you asked me,

"Do you really think there's going back from this?"

I'm all the things you hate about yourself you admitted. I'm ambitious, ruthless, cold and decisive. I am absolute, and final. If I am all these things, then what are you?

I'll never know now. My opportunity to put the pieces together left with each passing number of our count down, the door closed when our pistols fired. I kissed you before I threw you into that skiff because I wanted you to know in your final moments you were not alone. As I tossed your bleeding body onto the rowboat I knew this was it, this is the end and I couldn't understand why after all our talks that lead into the small hours of the morning and all of the arguments and times we've shared together this, this is what you wanted.

My heart aches as I sit at my empty bar where even the ghosts of better times have abandoned me. But I take a breath, I take a drink, and I remember,

This is but a moment, and like all moments before it, this will pass.

Good-bye, Declan Addams.
Sydney Harrow (Disguised) wrote: You can chop with almost anything, with the right attitude.
Varania Sylanna wrote: Tell: Why is my alignment constantly tested by idiots.

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