#sceshar

“She’s not right.” “She’s cursed.” “What’s wrong with her?” Some of the crowd thronged around her in a suffocating circle, gawking; others filed out of the room in aversion and disgust. No one offered her a hand, but only their cruel and unnerved gapes. The fragrance of marigolds was the only thing keeping Sceshar anchored to her sanity. I know the verse, she kept thinking, though that was far from relevant now. Illuminated by the stage lights, she was singing. She felt almost regal then in her glittering gown, her aria in the ears of so many adoring onlookers. The audience—her audience—was fascinated by her. If only in that theater she was the queen, loved by all. She was consummate, utterly without defect. The god is seen raging afar With all his men of might, Like blazing comets scattering death Through the red, feverish night. As she sang she grew cold, and her skin began to itch as though dry. But the show must always go on—and on it went, even when she felt her movements grow laborious and clumsy. As she raised her arm heavenward she noticed the scales which had begun to form upon it. Then she choked. Her voice, at once mellifluous and silvery, began to rumble and rasp. In a rest she cleared her throat, but when she projected again the sound produced was a startling screech. For only a handful of seconds thereafter could she form the shapes of the words in her mouth; her teeth had developed sharpened points and her tongue grew long and slender. When her song turned into something wholly animal, she collapsed. She huddled in a pile, her spine and limbs twisted unnaturally. Those who had admired her only minutes ago now looked down on her in alarm and repulsion, the hideous truth about her revealed. Lastly even that floral scent abandoned her—and Sceshar was no more. A pair of skinks scampered out of the dress she’d been wearing and disappeared beneath the stage.

A dense amethyst haze envelopes Sceshar. Her eyes pan down to find that so thick is the fog even her knees fade from view. She hears the sound of the sea, of water rolling against a hull, but she can see neither sun nor star; she cannot tell where she is. Suspended in a void, she can no more steer her ship than she can guide her feet. Her arms, she realizes, are laden with tools for the task she cannot perform: charts, a compass, a sextant, and an hourglass. Her fingers unfurl and release them, and rather than falling they peacefully dissipate. Then, looking ahead, she sees before her a single playing card. It levitates in the air before her eyes, its back a shifting image of joined hands. Her palms bare, she reaches to turn it. The card splits into four at the brush of her fingertips. She withdraws her hand to study her new options: a marigold slowly shedding its petals, a placidly turning windmill, a zeppelin draped in black banners, and a shield forged in the shape of an armor fish. She contemplates each card a long while. She is partially aware that some of them are decoys though she cannot tell which. She knows that once she chooses the mist will begin to lift so she may direct her vessel once more, and also that she will not be able to change her mind once she has selected. It is a riddle with no wrong choice, but a demand for the right one. Her fingers weave.