Original Fic: Harbinger
Feb. 22nd, 2007 02:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
harahelThis...ran away from me. it's a flow consciousness kind of story that started from the idea that the word harbinger is not used enough in daily conversation. Enjoy?
The plain stretches wide and flat, a road stalking through the high graces racing out to the endless sky. A few decrepit buildings huddle together, light spilling from the doors and occasional music escaped onto the dirt. No on saw her come, but everyone felt her.
She came alone, walking with her feet sheathed in improbably high heeled black boots. A mile before she reached what passed for Main street, the wind started to pick up and blew her trench coat and jet black hair in every direction.
The air grew chill and inside their homes families huddled together. The men and woman at Nag's Head Bar and occasional Grill talked louder and drank more, deafening themselves. The Harbinger moved there on instinct.
The first thing they noticed was the way she moved. It was subtly wrong somehow as she slid onto a bar stool. Like her body bent in ways it shouldn't. The bartender coughed and moved over to her slowly. After long years of slinging booze, he knew better then to act surprised or unduly interested in a customer.
"Getcha anything?"
She stared at him for a long moment. Her eyes were an ordinary blue, but one was so bloodshot it made his own ache in sympathy.
"Water." Nothing odd with her voice. He slid her a glass of water. The hand that slid around it was bare of polish and jewelry. At second glass, he thought he might be wrong about the polish because he could see a reelection of the bar in her bitten down nails.
"You're not from around here?" Motherly Maria asked next to the girl. The bartender slid away, leaving her to deal with this anomaly.
"Oh, I'm from a little bit of everywhere."
"A traveler! Have you been to London? I've always wanted to go."
"It's a city." The girl said noncommittally, rightly sensing that Maria needed little to go on. And at least her chatter kept the circling men at a distance.
When Maria was finally spent on discussing the wonders of the city, she finally found the breath to ask another question,
"What is it you do, sweetheart? While you travel? Do you work for Avon?"
I am a Harbinger. I stand on the tip of a storm, the skies grow yellow at my back and the clouds loom together above my head. The edge of reason is at the end of my heel and the doom of a nation can ride in on my hair. I am a warning, a threat and a promise. I loom over all creation, lurk in the corners of your mind and turn your hopes to ash. But I am not the storm, I am not the chaos. I am only the beginning. The red carpet and the first flash of credits on the screen.
"A bit of this and that." She doesn't smile at Maria. The poor woman doesn't deserve that. "Mostly that."
"There's not much of anything to do here these days." Maria sighs and leans on the bar. "Farming has all been bought up by big companies and the interstate draws everyone else away. This town is a dying place."
"Already dead." Maria turned in surprise to one of the older gentlman, who sat nursing one beer all night, every night. There were customarily three of them and they all lived together in a ramshackle place three miles from town. Some said they were brothers, but Maria was never quite sure. Anyway, it would have been a scandel years ago, but they were old withered things now and no more harmful then the single beer they each nursed.
"Now Charlie, that ain't true. We're still here, aren't we?"
"And we're not to far from death, miss." Said the second man. "Just ask our new friend."
The Harbinger watched them closely.
"Oh, sweetheart!" Maria cried. "That eye of yours is bleeding!"
One pale hand flashed upwards, then descended slowly.
"It happens. Genetic thing."
This seems to sooth Maria though she continues to eye the bar napkin the girl is using to keep the blood from running down her face. She chatters to fill the silence and the Harbinger stares at the three men.
Outside there is a snap of thunder.
"Ms. Maria, might we talk to the girl alone? Think we've got a job for her."
Maria looks at Charlie and then back at the girl.
"She's just a young thing."
"Oh, she can handle herself right enough."
Maria got up slowly and moved back to the table where her husband was losing a poker game.
As a unit the three men and the girl moved to an empty table in the back. The glass of water in her hand was tinted pink with her blood. She sipped at it.
"It's been a long time." Said Charlie. The other two men nodded in unison. "Had lots of storms here before without seeing you."
"Tonight is special."
"We like it here. It's quiet and the people are only nasty behind closed doors. We grow our own food. It's a good way to live."
"It sounds nice." Already she is bored, making conversation to pass the time.
"Call them off."
She laughs, bitter, long and deep. The mortals around them freeze at the sound, but do not acknowledge it once it has past. They fall back into their conversations, moving closer and their voices rising.
"I do not have that power, any more then you do."
"You have always led them. They are a pack of dogs and you are their master."
"If they are a pack of dogs, then I am the fox." A small vein goes crimson in her good eye. "I cannot go, but they will follow. I cannot take in a breath without them catching scent of the exhale."
"Then lead them away at least." Charlie pleads, his compatriots stare at her with well worn hope.
"To where? This is what is planned, this is where I am told to run. If I deviate..."
"What?"
"Then they will finally catch me and there will be one less of me."
The three men fell silent, reaching for one another under the table. They have always been three , to lose one would be to lose the self and it takes their collected will to ask her anyway.
"People will perish. We will perish."
"People always perish."
"But..."
"You are not in disposable. You have taken yourselves from the world, holed away here. You cannot expect honor and special treatment for that." The fine line of crimson is spreading, cracking to finer veins.
"We are the husband of Hecate, split in three, but also one by the Goddess herself. Without us, who will reign her in and keep her from splitting the world against itself?"
The Harbinger waved their concern away, her nails flashing like lightening.
"Have you seen her?"
The three men look grim.
"A hundred years ago or more?"
"Your wife/wives are long gone. I do not know where, neither I nor any of my sisters had a hand in it. You are no longer necessary."
"She is not gone!" The second and third men insist in unison. "She is the earth and the wind."
"You know that is not so. She is only herself and some power and now no longer even that."
A thunder clap breaks just overhead, shaking the building to the foundation. Pink water slopes over the glass rim staining the wood table.
"They come. I must go."
"You will stay." One gnarled hand wraps around her wrist. "And for once you will witness what you bring."
"Release me." She tugs at his hold, but it is still strong, stronger then her own.
"Sit down."
"Please!" Desperation edges into her voice just as the first drops of rain hit the roof. The left eye is leaking bloody tears faster then the napkin can absorb them and the right is starting to drip.
"Sit down."
She sits heavily, trapped and locked down and blinded. Thunder cracks and the rain starts to pound down in earnest. Her groan is only just covered by the noise.
"The pressure...from the inside out." She gasps.
"Some storm." Someone near them mutters.
The wind whips in, slamming the door against the wall until it's wrestled shut and locked for good measure. In complaint it whistles through the floor and batters at the windows, covering up the increasing barrage of moans from the back table.
The three old men watch (it would be cruel to look away, to force this on her and not watch the results) as the tears carry away the false human eyes. The blood drys and her true self peers out, black as her hair and absorbing what is rest of the light. Her cheeks sink and her skin cracks, melts.
"Get me outside." She orders with what is left of her voice. "Can my murderers do that for me at least?"
As one, they gather her. The improbable boots are to much for her and she must be carried. The others protest as they go out into the storm, but the wind and rain carry it all away.
Outside things are gearing up to a fever pitch. Everything smells like rain and debris travels through the streets at an alarming rate. The town is being wiped clean, wiped off the earth though it doesn't know this yet. They set her down in a chair in the middle of the empty street. Her hair and skin slide off under the pounding water, they merge into the street, swept off by the drain run off.
Her bones are made of obsidian. It gleams in the flashes of lightening and she rises from the chair and stretches up her long arms. Voice gone, she makes do with gestures, spreading her arms wide towards the three men and in that last moment, it feels like gratitude. The long chase is over, the dogs have gotten the fox and a last flash of lightening immolates her completely.
They watch as the storm tears the town apart.
At first they do not quite see her because it has been so long and there are other things concerning them. She was never a lady to be ignored. Marilyn Monroe, Shirley Temple and Katherine Hepburn stride towards them, melding into and out of each other, one three one three... and slap them across the face.
"You killed our daughter." The Hecate accuses.
"It was her time. They are growing old Mother." Charlie speaks slowly, hands wide in an old gesture. See? I'm unarmed, it says.
"Younger then us. Far younger."
"We too are old. It is time to rest."
"And let the elemants lay down their weary heads? The end of the world is not so easy to accomplish."
"We are not the alpha."
"Nor the omega." Intone the second and third man.
"Bullshit." The Hecate stamps her pretty foot. "I am Mother. I am Wife. I am Withering. Who would go forth without me? Who would journey without a companion?"
"There are others. And we are weary. Lay down with us."
The Hecate looks at the crumpling town. Houses are ripped from foundations and the water level is rising to their ankles. A freak storm. A storm of the Valkyries, of Zeus, of Kali. Nothing will live when the storm is finished and within weeks, abundant life will spring from the overwatered ground.
"The cycle is wearying, our time has passed. We are not remembered." Said Charlie.
"They remember me."
"As a bogeyman. A figure in spell books and half forgotten stories. Lay thee down, rest your head on our chest and let the storm take us."
Without speaking, they both became one. They curled together on the ashes of their daughter and let the storm take them.
The plain stretches wide and flat, a road stalking through the high graces racing out to the endless sky. A few decrepit buildings huddle together, light spilling from the doors and occasional music escaped onto the dirt. No on saw her come, but everyone felt her.
She came alone, walking with her feet sheathed in improbably high heeled black boots. A mile before she reached what passed for Main street, the wind started to pick up and blew her trench coat and jet black hair in every direction.
The air grew chill and inside their homes families huddled together. The men and woman at Nag's Head Bar and occasional Grill talked louder and drank more, deafening themselves. The Harbinger moved there on instinct.
The first thing they noticed was the way she moved. It was subtly wrong somehow as she slid onto a bar stool. Like her body bent in ways it shouldn't. The bartender coughed and moved over to her slowly. After long years of slinging booze, he knew better then to act surprised or unduly interested in a customer.
"Getcha anything?"
She stared at him for a long moment. Her eyes were an ordinary blue, but one was so bloodshot it made his own ache in sympathy.
"Water." Nothing odd with her voice. He slid her a glass of water. The hand that slid around it was bare of polish and jewelry. At second glass, he thought he might be wrong about the polish because he could see a reelection of the bar in her bitten down nails.
"You're not from around here?" Motherly Maria asked next to the girl. The bartender slid away, leaving her to deal with this anomaly.
"Oh, I'm from a little bit of everywhere."
"A traveler! Have you been to London? I've always wanted to go."
"It's a city." The girl said noncommittally, rightly sensing that Maria needed little to go on. And at least her chatter kept the circling men at a distance.
When Maria was finally spent on discussing the wonders of the city, she finally found the breath to ask another question,
"What is it you do, sweetheart? While you travel? Do you work for Avon?"
I am a Harbinger. I stand on the tip of a storm, the skies grow yellow at my back and the clouds loom together above my head. The edge of reason is at the end of my heel and the doom of a nation can ride in on my hair. I am a warning, a threat and a promise. I loom over all creation, lurk in the corners of your mind and turn your hopes to ash. But I am not the storm, I am not the chaos. I am only the beginning. The red carpet and the first flash of credits on the screen.
"A bit of this and that." She doesn't smile at Maria. The poor woman doesn't deserve that. "Mostly that."
"There's not much of anything to do here these days." Maria sighs and leans on the bar. "Farming has all been bought up by big companies and the interstate draws everyone else away. This town is a dying place."
"Already dead." Maria turned in surprise to one of the older gentlman, who sat nursing one beer all night, every night. There were customarily three of them and they all lived together in a ramshackle place three miles from town. Some said they were brothers, but Maria was never quite sure. Anyway, it would have been a scandel years ago, but they were old withered things now and no more harmful then the single beer they each nursed.
"Now Charlie, that ain't true. We're still here, aren't we?"
"And we're not to far from death, miss." Said the second man. "Just ask our new friend."
The Harbinger watched them closely.
"Oh, sweetheart!" Maria cried. "That eye of yours is bleeding!"
One pale hand flashed upwards, then descended slowly.
"It happens. Genetic thing."
This seems to sooth Maria though she continues to eye the bar napkin the girl is using to keep the blood from running down her face. She chatters to fill the silence and the Harbinger stares at the three men.
Outside there is a snap of thunder.
"Ms. Maria, might we talk to the girl alone? Think we've got a job for her."
Maria looks at Charlie and then back at the girl.
"She's just a young thing."
"Oh, she can handle herself right enough."
Maria got up slowly and moved back to the table where her husband was losing a poker game.
As a unit the three men and the girl moved to an empty table in the back. The glass of water in her hand was tinted pink with her blood. She sipped at it.
"It's been a long time." Said Charlie. The other two men nodded in unison. "Had lots of storms here before without seeing you."
"Tonight is special."
"We like it here. It's quiet and the people are only nasty behind closed doors. We grow our own food. It's a good way to live."
"It sounds nice." Already she is bored, making conversation to pass the time.
"Call them off."
She laughs, bitter, long and deep. The mortals around them freeze at the sound, but do not acknowledge it once it has past. They fall back into their conversations, moving closer and their voices rising.
"I do not have that power, any more then you do."
"You have always led them. They are a pack of dogs and you are their master."
"If they are a pack of dogs, then I am the fox." A small vein goes crimson in her good eye. "I cannot go, but they will follow. I cannot take in a breath without them catching scent of the exhale."
"Then lead them away at least." Charlie pleads, his compatriots stare at her with well worn hope.
"To where? This is what is planned, this is where I am told to run. If I deviate..."
"What?"
"Then they will finally catch me and there will be one less of me."
The three men fell silent, reaching for one another under the table. They have always been three , to lose one would be to lose the self and it takes their collected will to ask her anyway.
"People will perish. We will perish."
"People always perish."
"But..."
"You are not in disposable. You have taken yourselves from the world, holed away here. You cannot expect honor and special treatment for that." The fine line of crimson is spreading, cracking to finer veins.
"We are the husband of Hecate, split in three, but also one by the Goddess herself. Without us, who will reign her in and keep her from splitting the world against itself?"
The Harbinger waved their concern away, her nails flashing like lightening.
"Have you seen her?"
The three men look grim.
"A hundred years ago or more?"
"Your wife/wives are long gone. I do not know where, neither I nor any of my sisters had a hand in it. You are no longer necessary."
"She is not gone!" The second and third men insist in unison. "She is the earth and the wind."
"You know that is not so. She is only herself and some power and now no longer even that."
A thunder clap breaks just overhead, shaking the building to the foundation. Pink water slopes over the glass rim staining the wood table.
"They come. I must go."
"You will stay." One gnarled hand wraps around her wrist. "And for once you will witness what you bring."
"Release me." She tugs at his hold, but it is still strong, stronger then her own.
"Sit down."
"Please!" Desperation edges into her voice just as the first drops of rain hit the roof. The left eye is leaking bloody tears faster then the napkin can absorb them and the right is starting to drip.
"Sit down."
She sits heavily, trapped and locked down and blinded. Thunder cracks and the rain starts to pound down in earnest. Her groan is only just covered by the noise.
"The pressure...from the inside out." She gasps.
"Some storm." Someone near them mutters.
The wind whips in, slamming the door against the wall until it's wrestled shut and locked for good measure. In complaint it whistles through the floor and batters at the windows, covering up the increasing barrage of moans from the back table.
The three old men watch (it would be cruel to look away, to force this on her and not watch the results) as the tears carry away the false human eyes. The blood drys and her true self peers out, black as her hair and absorbing what is rest of the light. Her cheeks sink and her skin cracks, melts.
"Get me outside." She orders with what is left of her voice. "Can my murderers do that for me at least?"
As one, they gather her. The improbable boots are to much for her and she must be carried. The others protest as they go out into the storm, but the wind and rain carry it all away.
Outside things are gearing up to a fever pitch. Everything smells like rain and debris travels through the streets at an alarming rate. The town is being wiped clean, wiped off the earth though it doesn't know this yet. They set her down in a chair in the middle of the empty street. Her hair and skin slide off under the pounding water, they merge into the street, swept off by the drain run off.
Her bones are made of obsidian. It gleams in the flashes of lightening and she rises from the chair and stretches up her long arms. Voice gone, she makes do with gestures, spreading her arms wide towards the three men and in that last moment, it feels like gratitude. The long chase is over, the dogs have gotten the fox and a last flash of lightening immolates her completely.
They watch as the storm tears the town apart.
At first they do not quite see her because it has been so long and there are other things concerning them. She was never a lady to be ignored. Marilyn Monroe, Shirley Temple and Katherine Hepburn stride towards them, melding into and out of each other, one three one three... and slap them across the face.
"You killed our daughter." The Hecate accuses.
"It was her time. They are growing old Mother." Charlie speaks slowly, hands wide in an old gesture. See? I'm unarmed, it says.
"Younger then us. Far younger."
"We too are old. It is time to rest."
"And let the elemants lay down their weary heads? The end of the world is not so easy to accomplish."
"We are not the alpha."
"Nor the omega." Intone the second and third man.
"Bullshit." The Hecate stamps her pretty foot. "I am Mother. I am Wife. I am Withering. Who would go forth without me? Who would journey without a companion?"
"There are others. And we are weary. Lay down with us."
The Hecate looks at the crumpling town. Houses are ripped from foundations and the water level is rising to their ankles. A freak storm. A storm of the Valkyries, of Zeus, of Kali. Nothing will live when the storm is finished and within weeks, abundant life will spring from the overwatered ground.
"The cycle is wearying, our time has passed. We are not remembered." Said Charlie.
"They remember me."
"As a bogeyman. A figure in spell books and half forgotten stories. Lay thee down, rest your head on our chest and let the storm take us."
Without speaking, they both became one. They curled together on the ashes of their daughter and let the storm take them.
