Illirim
Ilirim sat perched on his friend's broad back, legs dangling. The wyvern's scales, warm as baked cookies beneath him, flexed with each powerful wingbeat. His only friend. Known for barely a cosmic blink, yet inseparable.
Since the cave. Since healing its mother. Since playing with twisted-root dolls that danced when he hummed. They soared, Desolace's grey expanse unfurling below like a rotten tapestry. He giggled, pure and sharp, fingers dancing.
Structures bloomed in his palms: a tiny crystal castle, a clockwork bird fluttering for a second before collapsing into stardust. He plucked a sphere of raw time from the air, rolling it between his thumbs like a marble. Effortless. Meaningless.
He laughed, loud and bright, eyes shining with that vacant, feverish joy. That joy... what was it? The smile slipped like water off glass.
His head throbbed, a sudden, sickening pressure behind his eyes. They twitched. Not tears. Something drier, more final. He pinched his own cheek, hard. No sting. No flinch. Just... numb acceptance. Like poking clay.
"Momma?" His voice was calm. Too calm. A still pond over drowned things. "The Walker promised we'd find you... yet here I fly, alone. Why is that, Momma?"
He scanned the empty sky, pupils wide and searching, as if she might be hidden in the purple haze. "He takes care of me. Like a father should. Maybe... maybe I don't need you anymore?"
The words tore through him. Not pain. Rupture. A feeling like a crust ripped off something deep inside. Closure? Or just... hollowing out?
The time-sphere tumbled from his grasp, plummeting silently into the grey below. His thoughts, muddy and slow, surfaced: "Why am I doing this?" came first. A flicker of the man buried under the boy.
He wasn't a child. Not really. Yet he clung to its skin. "Why?"
"Because I am your truth now," the Walker's voice slithered, oily and intimate, filling the space between wingbeats. "I am the path to your mother. To that real joy you lost. Remember the dark? I pulled you into the light. Saved you. Wasn't I kind?"
The questions dissolved like sugar in acid. His smile snapped back, bright and brittle. Joy bubbled up, artificial and overwhelming. "Yea!! YES! Come on, Wyvern! Tower Tower awaits!"
They flew on. Desolace: beautiful, soulless. A graveyard for purpose. Maybe he belonged here. The thought withered before it could root, choked by the spectacle unfolding.
"WYVERN! LOOK!" Ilirim gasped. The sun set, not gently, but in a riotous explosion. Violet bled into molten orange, streaked with impossible pinks. A wound in the grey. His smile softened. Not the manic grin.
This was different. Warmer. Real. It touched his eyes, crinkling the corners. For one crystalline second, his heart beat, truly beat, not just thumped in its cage. Warmth flooded him. Then... gone. Extinguished.
Like a candle snuffed. He looked away, the colors suddenly too loud. He scrambled along the wyvern's neck, pressed his face against its warm, scaled head, and planted a fierce kiss. "I love you, Wyvern."
The beast shrieked, a sound like tearing metal and pure affection. Love, deep and wordless, echoed back. For the boy who saved his mother.
Then, it stabbed the horizon. The Tower. Older than regret, piercing the bruised sky like a god's forgotten spear. Ilirim's breath hitched. Besides its crushing presence... a flicker. Small. Weak. Like a guttering candle.
Someone inside? Guarding? He tapped the wyvern's side, a silent command. It banked, circling down, landing with a thump that sent ash swirling.
Silence. Just the tower, hissing with ancient power, and dead trees standing like sentinels kilometers away. That small presence... closer now. Tickling his senses. Ilirim slid down, boots sinking into the fine grey dust.
He peered around the tower's monolithic base. Nothing. A game! Perfect! He placed one foot precisely in front of the other, counting with solemn focus. "1. 2. 3. 4..." His voice, a child's chant in the vast stillness, marked each step. "...One thousand twenty-two."
The archway yawned. No door. Just darkness. From within: Thud. A grunt. The sickening scrape of metal on stone.
Curiosity sparked, bright and sudden. He skipped towards the sound, light on his feet. "Okay... you two look weird!" He giggled, the sound bouncing off the primordial stone. Then he stepped through the arch.
Power vanished. Sucked out. Like a drowning gasp. An immense, suffocating weight slammed onto his chest. His heart rabbited against his ribs. His lungs burned, starved. Aching spread through his limbs, heavy and alien. Panic, cold and sharp, a feeling he usually erased, prickled his skin.
No time. The figures lay sprawled, black armor, leaf-robes. Weird, yes. But here. He grabbed them, grunting with effort, muscles straining against dead weight. Heavy toys! He hauled them back, stumbling, across the threshold. The pressure lifted. Power rushed back, sweet and familiar. He gasped, dropping them without a thought in the ash.
The feelings lingered. Shaky. Wrong. He needed... Wyvern. Safety. He bolted, a desperate sprint, and crashed into the beast's warm, solid side.
He wrapped his arms around its thick neck, burying his face in the familiar, dusty scales, hugging it with bone-creaking force. Comfort. Solid. Real. The only anchor in a suddenly terrifying world.
-