I feel an anger inside me I can't contain. I can't control. And I find that I don't want to control it. In fact, I want to unleash it. I want to set it free so that it might satisfy its thirst on every innocent soul it encounters. That my rage, given shape and form, can inflict misery such as I feel it now. It only seems fair.
"It's not fair and you know it."
"Revenge! Compensation!"
It's no great surprise that none have attempted to approach me. To offer any condolences. Who would dare approach a madman? There's no better way to describe it. Not after what took place at the fires. Not after I was dragged through the harigga, screaming like an animal. I've been burning things for ahns now. The small campfire I keep among my circle of wagons was now a blazing inferno. Enough to rival that of the first fires.
When I saw it I stormed inside my wagon to find a quiva. An arrow. My lance. Even a sharp piece of bone. As it turned out, I found an oval piece of bone that I'd been working on lately. I snatched it up in my hand and immediately went to slashing and tearing at the inside of the canvas. Yes, the leather canvas that covers the dome frame. The very same one that still bore the half finished, drunken painting of a woman that no longer existed.
When I could wreak no more havoc from the inside I stormed out of the wagon and went to work on the outside. I sawed at the ropes that secured it. Stabbed and tore at the leather itself. And little bit by little bit I tore away the canvas from the frame work, leaving the interior of the wagon bare to the eye.
The only reason I didn't throw the entire, shredded canvas onto the fire at once was simple.
It wouldn't fit. It would have smothered the flames.
With the same violent exuberance I cut and ripped the leather into smaller, somewhat more manageable pieces, which were fed to the flames. That took the better part of the day, actually. With a methodical order borne by insanity, I ransacked each of my wagons. The keepsakes I'd collected over the years. The paintings from her youth. The other creations that her imagination had given birth to. They were all collected and drug out to the bonfire I had now.
Reckless? Without question. I'm sure everyone was scrambling to collect buckets of water in the event the fire truly got out of control.
But the consideration of the danger was hardly a deterrent. From that pile I'd made I continued to feed the eternally hungry flames. And with each offering the flames seemed to grow. Leaping higher into the air.
There were... intermissions. Ahns were I refused to allow the flames anymore sustenance. But during those intermissions I, the madman, was usually pacing around the fire. Flinging curses to the wind. And when it became too much for me, I would give the flames more of my past to burn away.
This peculiar ritual went on for days. During that time the madman didn't sleep. He didn't eat or drink. There were times that he merely sat on the steps of his domeless wagon, sullen and despondent. A few took that first lull to mean the storm had passed. They even attempted to approach him, but quickly learned the error of their mistake when they were chased off by threats of being skinned alive or having a quiva thrown in their direction.
When the spirit of his vengeance seemed to move him again, which was usually when the fire started burning too low for his tastes, he would rise from the steps or the ground and hurl more of the past into the flames. The thought had even come to him to find Yew and slaughter the beast. String him up and drain his blood into a large bowl. And don't think that he hadn't given a great deal of consideration to taking a torch to the source, either.
A very few could fathom the black depths of his retribution. The chilling truth of the matter was very little kept him grounded in the many years of his life. The threads that tied him to his own humanity were tenuous at best. A part of the man knew this, though. It was an understanding he had with himself. An acceptance of sorts.
By the end of the third day of this bizarre ritual the majority of the semi-circle created by the placement of his wagons had been charred to a withered black. The pile of burnt, smoldering remains seemed more like the husk of some animal cast to the flames than the keep sakes and physical memories of a lifetime. The madman, for his part, looked the true part of a madman now. The stubble on his face was visible now. There were shadows lingering beneath his eyes. His cheeks had become sunken from the days of not eating or drinking. His clothes were smeared with ash and wreaked of smoke.
It was a wonder exhaustion hadn't claimed him at this point. But even as he milled about the charred remains of his offerings, he seemed intensely alert. Far too alert, in fact. Eventually he turned away from the death that those ashes represented and climbed the steps of his wagon. Inside, he went to his personal throne of pelts and cushions where he sat, once more cloaked in his sullen and violent contemplations.
Overhead, with no dome to cover the wagon, the Sky spread over him.
"It's not fair and you know it."
"Revenge! Compensation!"
It's no great surprise that none have attempted to approach me. To offer any condolences. Who would dare approach a madman? There's no better way to describe it. Not after what took place at the fires. Not after I was dragged through the harigga, screaming like an animal. I've been burning things for ahns now. The small campfire I keep among my circle of wagons was now a blazing inferno. Enough to rival that of the first fires.
When I saw it I stormed inside my wagon to find a quiva. An arrow. My lance. Even a sharp piece of bone. As it turned out, I found an oval piece of bone that I'd been working on lately. I snatched it up in my hand and immediately went to slashing and tearing at the inside of the canvas. Yes, the leather canvas that covers the dome frame. The very same one that still bore the half finished, drunken painting of a woman that no longer existed.
When I could wreak no more havoc from the inside I stormed out of the wagon and went to work on the outside. I sawed at the ropes that secured it. Stabbed and tore at the leather itself. And little bit by little bit I tore away the canvas from the frame work, leaving the interior of the wagon bare to the eye.
The only reason I didn't throw the entire, shredded canvas onto the fire at once was simple.
It wouldn't fit. It would have smothered the flames.
With the same violent exuberance I cut and ripped the leather into smaller, somewhat more manageable pieces, which were fed to the flames. That took the better part of the day, actually. With a methodical order borne by insanity, I ransacked each of my wagons. The keepsakes I'd collected over the years. The paintings from her youth. The other creations that her imagination had given birth to. They were all collected and drug out to the bonfire I had now.
Reckless? Without question. I'm sure everyone was scrambling to collect buckets of water in the event the fire truly got out of control.
But the consideration of the danger was hardly a deterrent. From that pile I'd made I continued to feed the eternally hungry flames. And with each offering the flames seemed to grow. Leaping higher into the air.
There were... intermissions. Ahns were I refused to allow the flames anymore sustenance. But during those intermissions I, the madman, was usually pacing around the fire. Flinging curses to the wind. And when it became too much for me, I would give the flames more of my past to burn away.
This peculiar ritual went on for days. During that time the madman didn't sleep. He didn't eat or drink. There were times that he merely sat on the steps of his domeless wagon, sullen and despondent. A few took that first lull to mean the storm had passed. They even attempted to approach him, but quickly learned the error of their mistake when they were chased off by threats of being skinned alive or having a quiva thrown in their direction.
When the spirit of his vengeance seemed to move him again, which was usually when the fire started burning too low for his tastes, he would rise from the steps or the ground and hurl more of the past into the flames. The thought had even come to him to find Yew and slaughter the beast. String him up and drain his blood into a large bowl. And don't think that he hadn't given a great deal of consideration to taking a torch to the source, either.
A very few could fathom the black depths of his retribution. The chilling truth of the matter was very little kept him grounded in the many years of his life. The threads that tied him to his own humanity were tenuous at best. A part of the man knew this, though. It was an understanding he had with himself. An acceptance of sorts.
By the end of the third day of this bizarre ritual the majority of the semi-circle created by the placement of his wagons had been charred to a withered black. The pile of burnt, smoldering remains seemed more like the husk of some animal cast to the flames than the keep sakes and physical memories of a lifetime. The madman, for his part, looked the true part of a madman now. The stubble on his face was visible now. There were shadows lingering beneath his eyes. His cheeks had become sunken from the days of not eating or drinking. His clothes were smeared with ash and wreaked of smoke.
It was a wonder exhaustion hadn't claimed him at this point. But even as he milled about the charred remains of his offerings, he seemed intensely alert. Far too alert, in fact. Eventually he turned away from the death that those ashes represented and climbed the steps of his wagon. Inside, he went to his personal throne of pelts and cushions where he sat, once more cloaked in his sullen and violent contemplations.
Overhead, with no dome to cover the wagon, the Sky spread over him.
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