The ending line feels like a respite, a reprieve. It feels like cheating to say I loved this the first time I read it, but I did love it the first time I read it. So much <3
This part just kills me, and in several different ways:
England, 1349
Three figures sit on the roof of a building, watching the sunset through beaked plague doctor masks. Below them, the houses are dark, locked and shuttered against the darkness outside, against the sickness lurking everywhere.
Eventually, one of the figures speaks, in a deep, tired baritone.
PESTILENCE, I APPRECIATE YOU GIVING 110%. BUT PLEASE NEVER DO THAT AGAIN.
“So noted, lord.” The second figure pulls the mask from its face, reveals pale, sunken cheeks, colorless eyes ringed with shadow, a grey mouth pinched with some unnameable emotion. “I will admit, this particular project got… out of hand.”
The third figure laughs, low and bitter. “Clearly.”
The other two turn toward him, but he’s already spread his wings and pulled the mask from his sallow face. Golden eyes flashing, lips twisted with a grimace and bitten bloody. “I’m getting the hell out of here.”
The other two figures watch him go, one masked and one unmasked, drained to nearly nothing, emptied out by their own actions gone awry.
“I am not sorry, lord.”
I DO NOT ASK YOU TO BE. JUST THAT YOU BE MORE CAREFUL.
“I will.”
Silence settles over them, over the plague-ridden town, over England.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2017-12-19 06:52 pm (UTC)This part just kills me, and in several different ways:
England, 1349
Three figures sit on the roof of a building, watching the sunset through beaked plague doctor masks. Below them, the houses are dark, locked and shuttered against the darkness outside, against the sickness lurking everywhere.
Eventually, one of the figures speaks, in a deep, tired baritone.
PESTILENCE, I APPRECIATE YOU GIVING 110%. BUT PLEASE NEVER DO THAT AGAIN.
“So noted, lord.” The second figure pulls the mask from its face, reveals pale, sunken cheeks, colorless eyes ringed with shadow, a grey mouth pinched with some unnameable emotion. “I will admit, this particular project got… out of hand.”
The third figure laughs, low and bitter. “Clearly.”
The other two turn toward him, but he’s already spread his wings and pulled the mask from his sallow face. Golden eyes flashing, lips twisted with a grimace and bitten bloody. “I’m getting the hell out of here.”
The other two figures watch him go, one masked and one unmasked, drained to nearly nothing, emptied out by their own actions gone awry.
“I am not sorry, lord.”
I DO NOT ASK YOU TO BE. JUST THAT YOU BE MORE CAREFUL.
“I will.”
Silence settles over them, over the plague-ridden town, over England.