#bc ye

His back is to the village, knowing well that the greatest threat to his safety comes from beyond the trees, and what little they can see of his face is obscured by his veil, but Shamura imagines that his eyes are closed.

They consider their options for a moment; it is too early for anyone other than the Lamb, the night guards and that day’s designated kitchen staff to be awake, and Narinder himself often stays in his hut until well into the day, when he is certain he won’t need to face his once-siblings. 

If Narinder is out this early, it means one thing; Aym and Baal are with their mother and Narinder could not sleep.

Making their decision, Shamura folds their hands under their robes and approaches their brother.

Narinder’s ear twitches as they sit next to him, and he makes no complaint. It’s as close to an invitation as he’ll willingly give.

(Shamura remembers, in fragments, a kit standing in their library, wide eyes bright with curiosity and excitement. A moment that, at the time, had felt so innocent, so normal- of course Shamura would share their library, their knowledge, with their younger brother. It’s a choice Shamura often regrets; would things have been different, they wonder, had they listened to the Elders and discouraged Narinder from learning? If their brother had only read the books on his own domain- had he learned only what he needed to know, would anything have changed at all?)

Shamura closes their eyes, breathing out steadily. Blood drips down their face, the injury just as fresh as the day Narinder gave it to them.

“You should have changed your bandages first,” Narinder says lowly, voice oddly soft. 

“I am no stranger to blood, brother,” they answer simply. “No, no stranger to blood... this has been our lives for a millennium now. I am no stranger to blood.”

There’s no answer, and they continue to sit in silence as the sun slowly rises above the treeline. Behind them Shamura can hear window shutters starting to open as the early risers of the village begin their day.

“... I apologize for what I did to you,” Narinder says, voice hardly more than a whisper, but his words echo in Shamura’s ears. They open their eyes and glance at Narinder, finding his two eyes still closed but his third cracked open, gazing in their direction. “I was angry and lost control of myself. It is no excuse. I have lived every day for a thousand years regretting it.”

Shamura takes a moment to collect their thoughts, clinging to this moment almost desperately. Memories, they find, are hard to hold onto, but they don’t want to forget this. “Why?” they ask, closing their eyes again. “You did what you had to in order to escape. Who can fault one for that? Any of us would have done the same.”

“... You did not forget me,” Narinder says, as if it explains everything. “You thought of me. I could feel your grief every day. And you gave me Aym and Baal.”

“... I did not want you to be alone.”

Its a confession they vaguely remember telling the Lamb, but words they have never told Narinder himself. Of course, they hadn’t ever visited Narinder in that between place before; the Afterlife is not a place for the living, after all, and until Shamura was slain they had no right to walk into that blinding light.

(They don’t remember what it was like, being dead. They would think it a relief, a mercy, if they didn’t know how much care their brother put into shaping the worlds for every soul that passed through his gates. Curiosity, after all, is what drives discovery, and discovery creates knowledge; and curiosity, as such, burns inside them, wondering about what After world their brother would have given them to.)

“Thank you,” Narinder says softly, and Shamura doesn’t respond. They don’t need to.

“... I apologize, as well,” Shamura says instead. Narinder tenses next to them as they continue, “The prophecy we received did not need to come true. It was merely a self fulfilling prophecy; in our attempts to stop it from coming to be, we simply set the act in motion. From the moment we fought over your ideas, we were already lost.

“Only, instead of being lost as a family, we lost it all.” They open their eyes and turn to look at Narinder, only to find him looking back at them. “We said that death is unchangeable, but how could we make judgment over your domain? Perhaps it was not your ideas we feared, but change itself.”

Shamura looks out over the fields as the first of the farmers begin their morning tending, the roots and vegetables not quite ready to be picked. It’s quiet, the kind of quiet that Shamura is no longer used to.

“Perhaps the world was ready to change,” they finish.

There is silence for only a few moments, and then Narinder laughs- something deep and quiet, not really amused. It’s the kind of laugh one laughs when something tragically ironic occurs, when one laughs because the only alternative is to cry.

He turns away.

“The irony,” Narinder starts softly, “is now that I live among the realization of my plans, I am finding it... lacking.”

“How so?” Shamura asks.

“It appears that, with the absence of permanent death, the living have lost value for life,” Narinder explains simply, finally folding his hands in front of himself. “Without an end, life ceases to be precious. My gates are never empty of souls, for the false idol only holds onto those under their care, yet just this night alone I have seen what the living will do when they do not fear the permanence of death.”

“Perhaps one day you can find beauty in that. It is what you wanted all those years ago.”

“But not like this,” Narinder says. “Resurrection was not meant to be used so frivolously. Death was never meant to be avoided completely. There are worlds beyond my gates for every one of these souls, sitting empty now. Perhaps the resurrected would prefer to be there- but how would they know? They are not like you or the other Bishops, nor like Aym and Baal or even the false idol. They cannot remember After.”

Shamura refrains from stating that they do not either; hours, at length, spoken with Heket, Leshy and Kallamar have all but confirmed that they couldn’t remember the world that Narinder had carved out for them, either.

(Or maybe they lie and just don’t want to remember.)

“Yet, I suppose you are correct,” Narinder gives. “This is ultimately how resurrection would always go. The living fear what they do not know, and no matter how many sermons are given, they will always fear the After. This is how it always would have ended. I should have listened to you.”

“Perhaps we should have all listened to each other,” Shamura compromises, unfolding their lower hands. They set one on Narinder’s shoulder and ignore the flinch he gives. “Perhaps we should have had a conversation, rather than a screaming match?”

Narinder relaxes, leaning into Shamura’s touch, and Shamura is reminded that he likely hasn’t been touched in a thousand years. Sure, they know, he likely held Aym and Baal when they were confused and scared kits in need of guidance still, but a giant would hardly even feel the touch of an ant.

They pretend not to notice, for his pride’s sake.

“I must take my leave now,” Shamura says. “I am meant to be helping with breakfast.”

“Go, then.” Narinder hesitates as Shamura stands, then adds, “Thank you for sitting with me. I...”

I missed this, are the words he doesn’t say. Shamura hears them anyway.

“I feel the same,” Shamura says, smiling at him. “We should speak more often. I have missed you, brother.”

With those words, Shamura turns and walks towards the kitchen. They trace over every word that was spoken, repeating the scene over and over again.