Alain Johns (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
honest_johns) wrote2005-04-24 05:32 am
honest_johns) wrote2005-04-24 05:32 am
(no subject)
His boots are flecked lightly with blood -- a sliced throat leaves the floor very messy -- and his hands faintly smeared with it. He washes his hands for tonight, and makes a mental note to go walking through puddles tomorrow.
If he was ever of a temperment to fall apart after a battle, it was burned out of him long before he killed his first man. Perhaps he wasn't; he has a gunslinger's heart. He doesn't know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. It just is. He wonders how many people tonight fell asleep crying on a loved one's shoulder, and thinks the answer is many. Delah. He hopes they all had someone to go to, if they needed it.
Five minutes of blood and thunder, said his father and Roland's, and then the letdown. No five minutes for him or Svava tonight, but the grey letdown all the same. You stay calm and busy and competant, steady and strong for duty and for the others who need you to tell them what to do and show them how to carry themselves while they do it. And when that finally drains away, it leaves you hollow and empty. The world is always flat and dim, after a battle.
For perhaps the first time in his life, he says a silent prayer not to a death-goddess, but for one. For the millionth time, he says a silent prayer for a friend, and another for a dead man he never knew.
And then he turns the lights out, and pulls the blankets around himself, and falls asleep as quickly and easily as ever. But in his dreams are blood and loss and ka-shume, and the lingering sharp smell of cordite.
If he was ever of a temperment to fall apart after a battle, it was burned out of him long before he killed his first man. Perhaps he wasn't; he has a gunslinger's heart. He doesn't know whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. It just is. He wonders how many people tonight fell asleep crying on a loved one's shoulder, and thinks the answer is many. Delah. He hopes they all had someone to go to, if they needed it.
Five minutes of blood and thunder, said his father and Roland's, and then the letdown. No five minutes for him or Svava tonight, but the grey letdown all the same. You stay calm and busy and competant, steady and strong for duty and for the others who need you to tell them what to do and show them how to carry themselves while they do it. And when that finally drains away, it leaves you hollow and empty. The world is always flat and dim, after a battle.
For perhaps the first time in his life, he says a silent prayer not to a death-goddess, but for one. For the millionth time, he says a silent prayer for a friend, and another for a dead man he never knew.
And then he turns the lights out, and pulls the blankets around himself, and falls asleep as quickly and easily as ever. But in his dreams are blood and loss and ka-shume, and the lingering sharp smell of cordite.