Gray : Present One

His shadow is gray, pooled at his feet

A gray wizard

Black poison drifting from his pipe

Dying by his poems

Gray fading to gray

A small gray wizard, dying by his poems

A snake of black smoke as his company

But his ghost still sits

On a cliff over the sea

Shedding bloody tears,

A snake of black smoke

As his lonely company.

____________________________

“‘And shall the raven fall, empty, white, into the rising arms of day.’”

The old man who sat across from Fell widened his eyes. When he managed to speak, his voice was trembling. “If I may ask,” he said carefully. “Where did you hear of that spell?”

Fell smiled faintly, and made a dismissive gesture with his hand. “A friend. Now, what does the spell do?”

“I can’t—“ the old man began. His eyes raced away from meeting Fell’s gaze.

Still smiling, Fell banged his fist firmly against the surface of the table. The loud, ringing sound caused the old man to flinch violently.

“What does the spell do?” Fell inquired again, slowly.

A short moment passed. The man clenched his teeth, and tentatively glanced at Fell’s icy eyes. “It’s very old,” he finally began. A drop of sweat raced down the side of his aged face. “Very uncertain. If the spell fails—“

Instantly, Fell cut him off. “I didn’t ask for anything that you’re saying,” he stated flatly. “I want to know what the spell does. Precisely. With nothing left out.”

The man exhaled shakily. He wiped his sweaty palms against his robe. “It brings a body back from death. Both the body and mind. But it’s incomplete. The body will keep rotting, although very slowly, until it crumbles into ashes. It’s unsure and risky. Please, if you’re planning to use it…”

Without any immediate response, Fell stood up from the chair. He beamed brightly. “I’m not,” he replied to the old man’s words, and began to head to the door. His footsteps were soundless, the heel being put against the ground first.

He put a hand on the door to push it open. At the last second, he turned his head around halfway. “Did you ever hear what the beggars are singing nowadays?” he asked softly. One of his eyes gleamed. “‘A small gray wizard, dying by his poems’… Have you heard of it?”

With his face visibly contorted with confusion, the old man shook his head. Fell nodded absently, his eyes visibly lingering on other thoughts.

“I thought so,” he murmured and stepped through the door, shutting it behind him quietly.

* * *

A tendril of black smoke curled into the air.

Gray lowered the pipe just enough for him to blow out another plume of dark smoke, then closed his lips around the end of the pipe again. A breeze passed him, and his gray hair fell into his identically colored eyes.

He reached beside him and grabbed another handful of red, dried leaves. With a pale hand that had a blue tinge, he stuffed the leaves into the bowl of the pipe and lowered the circular opening into a small lamp that sat beside him in the daylight. When a wisp of black smoke began to come out from the pipe again, he deeply inhaled from it.

The air that swirled around the cliff was cold. Rocks that made the cliff were icy, black and rounded. Below the endless drop of the cliff, the sound of running water came.

A hand reached out from behind Gray. It was slightly darker than Gray’s, with no blue to the skin tone. As quickly as a snake, it knocked the pipe out of Gray’s hand. It spiraled down the cliff so far down that Gray couldn’t hear it reach the water.

Numbly, Gray blinked. It was a couple seconds until he finally muttered, “Pipe.”

Fell, who stood behind Gray, frowned. He had his white hair tied back in a short ponytail, with one gray eye and another white. Unlike Gray, who simply wore a gray shirt and pants, Fell had himself dressed in a red velvet robe, and white, creamy attires in overall.

“Do you say more than one word?” Fell muttered, and tugged Gray up by his shoulders. “Come on, Gray. Remember me? Fell? We’re friends.”

“Pipe,” Gray responded instead, and shifted to the side to free himself of Fell’s grasp. “Pain.”

Fell gazed deeply into Gray’s eyes. After a minute, he broke off the gaze and pulled out a long sword from his waist. He grabbed Gray’s right hand, brought it up to eye-level, and ran the blade along the palm swiftly. Black blood ran down Gray’s wrist.

“You’re dead, Gray. You don’t feel pain. Now, tell me if you remember. Friends? You made the promise.” Fell told Gray softly.

“Promise,” Gray pronounced. His gray eyes wobbled, and he released a breath that was still partially black into Fell’s face. Fell frowned in disgust and waved the smoke away. “You,” Gray finally choked out. “Betray.”

For a moment, Fell paused, then smiled at Gray brightly. “But the spell you cast on yourself still worked, didn’t it? That’s why you’re still like this.”

When Gray exhaled next, there was no hint of the black smoke in his breathing. He grabbed Fell’s hand and placed it on his own hand. “Cold,” Gray managed to say. “Blue.”

“I know. That’s because,” Fell stopped speaking for a split second. “You’re dead. Right?”

Three drops of brown and black blood fell from Gray’s eyes. “Friends,” he whispered, “Fell.”

Fell looked at Gray and cocked his head to the side. Then, slowly, he beamed, curving his white and gray eyes. “Gray. How about this?” he whispered, and pulled his hand away from Gray’s swiftly. “I’ll give you a new pipe. I’ll be your friend again. But right now, you need to come with me. I need your magic.”

“No,” Gray shook his head. “Lie.”

The smile that Fell then gave Gray was dripping with terribly sweet crocodile tears. “Look at yourself. You may have been the greatest wizard before, but now you can’t even speak because you’re tongue is rotting. If somebody just gives you a simple tug on the arm, it falls off. Your magic will cost you your… life, if I can call it that anymore. You’ve even forgotten your name.”

“Stop,” Gray muttered hoarsely. “Okay.”

“Okay? Okay what?”

“I, help you. Magic. Give you, magic.” More droplets of dead blood ran down his cheeks. He coughed into his hand, and black blood came forth.

“Good. It’ll be just one spell. Right?” Fell inquired, smiling a tilted smile. “Just one spell.”

Slowly, Gray reached forward with cold, blue fingertips and put them above Fell’s beating heart. “You,” he gasped out. Tendrils of blood dripped out of his mouth. “I. Kill.”

“After the spell, okay, Gray?” Fell clapped Gray on his shoulders. “One more magic. Understand?”

Gray took a shuddering breath. His face was now half covered with brown and black liquid. “What,” he said. “Spell?”

“To save the kingdom,” Fell responded. “Right? You did it one time. You can do it again.”

“Then,” Gray whispered through the blood in his eyes. “Why? Why, kill? Me?”

“So you could kill me. Don’t you recall, ’Remember, promise—‘“ Fell stopped, and waited for Gray to continue.

For a long time, Gray kept his lips firmly shut. When a wind threatened to separate him and Fell, he, at last, spoke. “‘If I, perchance, kill you,’” he rasped out with difficulty, a new flow of blood beginning from his mouth.

“‘Then you have to kill me,’” Fell finished for Gray. “Right?”

Without waiting for Gray to reply, Fell pulled out a wooden pipe from inside his robe. He reached down, and grabbed a handful of the red leaves to squeeze it into the pipe. After lowering the pipe into the lamp, he kicked it off of the cliff.

Wordlessly, Gray took the pipe from Fell and placed it into his mouth. Black smoke covered his eyes.