Chapter Text
Run. Run. Keep going. Don’t stop. Weave around the silver-barked trees, leap over the jagged rocks that burst from the ground like snarling teeth from a gaping maw. When the voices grow too close or ruby light reflects off oiled horns, hide. Hide until the danger retreats. But don’t allow your guard to slip. Never leave yourself defenseless, lest they catch you.
He forced these rules through his head in a never-ending loop, reminding himself constantly. He had to keep going, even when blood coated his body from a thousand cuts, even when his muscles tore and his bones began to crack from the strain of his desperate flight. Those in pursuit of him still followed with hounds, and even over his own pulse roaring in his ears, he could hear their relentless snarling, growing louder and louder, closer and closer, snapping at his heels.
Part of him wanted to give up, but no, he couldn’t allow them the satisfaction of winning. Breathing heavily, he pushed himself harder and harder. The ravine was coming up, perhaps he could lose them over that. Yes, a flawless plan. Nothing could go wrong. New energy coursed through his body, and he sped up. Yes, he would change his course when he reached only a few feet away, and run off freely while his pursuers tumbled into the depths below, where the raging water would sweep them far away from him. The ledge was quick-approaching and he prepared himself, slowing as to let the dogs grow near, rancid breath hot on his bare heels. And as the precipice grew to be only an arm’s length away, he leapt.
In his last-minute planning, he had focused only on his idea going as he wished it. He had failed to consider the many ways that it could all go wrong. As a powerful kick shoved him from the earth, gnarled vines grabbed at him as if a reminder of his mortality tethering him to the world, and he couldn’t turn himself away. With a choked gasp of horrible realization, he tumbled into the abyss, wrenched face to face with his pursuers who had halted before they met the fate he found. He floated there, and for a moment, the grim thought that perhaps he could fly crossed his thoughts, before the icy waters of the river beneath claimed him, glittering droplets rising as if gravity halted for a single, morbid rainstorm.
The blessed child was the one to find him, a mass on the muddied bank, well over a mile from where he had fallen in. The rocks had mangled him, and the river teeth had rubbed his skin raw, but he was still alive, against all odds, though for all it was worth, he was dead to the world. The child of light looked at the child of darkness with cold interest before kneeling and lifting the sodden body with care. Vaguely, the demon-bound boy recognized the icy burn of the blessed one’s touch, but there was little he could do in response but grimace, limp in their arms, head nuzzled into the angel-bound’s chest. He could only hope that they would treat him with kindness.