Nothing is Truly Lost
The details of his life are scattered and the curious may seek them out. They appear in brief flashes, like sunlight glinting from a knife-edge. Sometimes we choose the path we follow. Sometimes our choices are made for us. And sometimes we have no choice at all.
He said little and was patient. He left no footprints and cast no shadow. He left slowly with reluctance, leaving the safety of the light for the chill certainties of darkness. And he entered into the pallid shadow of reality. All sense of where he is, who he is and where he's going has been swallowed by the dark. And he walked through the stars and sky, a trinity of dreams beneath the moon.
He sits there realising that his life is over. He is dead. There is no doubt of that. There is nothing in his space but darkness and cold and silence.
It is never only a dream. Here ,less than other places. In a city where the streets are paved with time, one cannot seek love and return unscathed. He seeks and he has been scathed enough in his time.
When he dreams, sometimes he remembers how to fly. Does he really remember how to fly? And forgets when he wakes up? Or was he just dreaming he could fly?
And his dream is a bright place filled with frightened people and fast hard things that hurt and wound. No matter. He swore he would remain by her side forever, and until death parts them. He must walk until once more they are reunited.
What's done cannot be undone. Or very rarely. And definitely not this time. He looks down as he feels the void take over his limping body. That red stuff, that's blood that is. Meant to be on the inside, it is. Bad sign if it's not on the inside.
He gets ready to give in. There's a moment of fear in returning to sleep. A hesitation: there are darkness beyond the curtain of waking, and the shadow-plays clutch at your heart. Too late. It is time for him to walk the abyss. He fell. His face undefeated. His eyes still proud.
Given time, a yarn is spun or what was once. Given time, The tale of a forlorn lover will be told. And given enough time, and the right audience, the darkest but sweetest secrets will spill into curiosities.
Stories have happy endings. If you know where to stop. The real problem with stories, if you keep them going long enough, they always end in loss.
When a world ends, there is always something leftover. A legend perhaps, or a vision, or a hope. And if there's a moral, no one knows what it is, save maybe that we should take our goodbyes whenever we can.
Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow-truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot.
This is a work of fiction. All the characters in it, human and otherwise, are imaginary, excepting only certain of the fairy folk, whom it might be unwise to offend by casting doubts on their existence. Or lack thereof
-Neil Gaiman-
