CHIAROSCURO

A tall, lonesome peak stood amidst the clouds like a heaven-piercing spear, adorned in nothing but frost and cold. While the shimmering sun’s rays may be cast upon its surface, no warmth had ever – or would ever – thaw it completely. It stood defiantly amidst the clouds, baring its proud chest against the world standing small beneath it.

Atop it, at the very edge, his legs hung over the ledge, sat a youthful looking man with melancholic expression. Cold wind brushed past his cheeks, causing his long hair to flutter backward, yet, despite his ever-so-rosy cheeks, the youth didn’t seem to mind the harsh cold. His two arms were pressed backwards, used as columns to support him, his back slightly arched, chest caved in.

What used to be a tinge of loneliness surrounding Lynne’s brows was now a cloud, as though the entirety of his being was being defined by it. Past the sounds of occasional hush of a wind, the world remained silent, and it is in silence that voices begin to emerge. From nigh inaudible whispers to agonizing screams desiring to penetrate your very core. It is these moments of silence which bring to surface the memories buried in the long past flow of time. It is during these moments that one wishes to turn back the hands of time, only to find it impossible.

Lynne looked back fondly at his past twenty years’ worth of memories. It is because all of them that he sits at the edge of an endless fall, gazing over a distant horizon where golden of sun spilled over into blue of the sky like ink. A faint smile escaped his lips as he took a deep breath and nimbly leapt onto his feet, stretching out. Just as he did, he felt the space behind him tear open and a familiar face appear: Retch. Appearing as stoic and as heroic as ever, he walked up and stood next to Lynne, eyes focused on the distant sun.

“… took you a long while.” Lynne said.

“You could have at least let us know where you were going,” Retch said. “We thought you ran.”

“I thought about it.”

“And?”

“I’d much rather fight a God.” Lynne said, smiling lightly.

“Is that so?”

“What about you?” Lynne asked. “Nervous?”

“Why would I be nervous?”

“… yup, I’m a fool, asking a stone wall about these things called emotions.”

“Are you nervous?” Retch asked, glancing at Lynne.

“Hardly,” the latter said. “Mostly tired.”

“You don’t seem tired.”

“I never seem tired.”

“… perhaps it all lacks a personal touch,” Retch said, the tone of his voice slightly mellowing. “But we are – no, I am – grateful you’re braving this storm together with the rest of us.”

“… it all still seems so surreal,” Lynne said, sighing. “To be honest, I’m just waiting to wake up from a long-lasting dream, back home, where I’ll find my dad doing taxes and lecturing me about the importance of knowing Magic.”

“… it does sound like a pleasant moment.” Retch said, smiling faintly.

“It’s one of the funniest things I’ve realized about living while growing up,” Lynne said. “Most often, I find myself yearning for the moments I used to dread. Like school days, going back home after staying past the curfew, dreading meeting my friends after having done something embarrassing the day prior…”

“… bliss compared to today, aye?” Retch said, chuckling.

“Ha ha, you could say so,” Lynne laughed lightly, scratching his nose. “But, I gotta admit, this ain’t half-bad either. Just look at this view,” he said, smiling. “Had I stayed home, I never would have seen it.”

“… you really surprise me.”

“I do? Great! Means I’ve still got it!”

“Something about you seems far too ethereal to be real,” Retch said. “As though you were divined upon the World for the sole purpose of fighting with us. To enter our lives as a mere story, but to leave them as a soul-carved legend.”

“… maybe I was, maybe I wasn’t,” Lynne said. “But, I feel the same about everyone else, as though none of the relationships I formed meant more than a spiral forward toward that intangible goal I was chasing since the day I knew what a dream was… as though everyone lost their meaning past fulfilling their purpose for my betterment.”

“… maybe we are, maybe we aren’t,” Retch replied in kind. “In the end, does it matter though? You can’t blame invisible, abiding hands for your own choices.”

“… I don’t,” Lynne said, glancing at him. “It would go against all I chose to believe, after all. Did you ever hear about the tale of Dancing Serpent?”

“… I have,” Retch said, a faint smile appearing on his face. “One of my favorite stories from childhood days.”

“I feel a whole lot like him,” Lynne explained. “Drawing circles and tip-toeing around the edges, always on the fence over taking that final, most important leap.”

“In the end, though, he did dance,” Retch said. “Rejecting world’s mockery altogether at that.”

“… legs make you a walker, not a dancer,” Lynne mumbled under his breath softly. “As eyes make you see, not behold. As hands make you touch, not feel. To dance you need a Soul, to behold a Mind, and to feel a Heart. Isn’t it amazing how the entire concept of Magic is stored in an old folk tale, yet so few will ever realize it?”

“I’ve lived much, much longer than you,” Retch said. “And both the World and the people inhabiting it never ceased to amaze me.”

“I envy that.” Lynne said.

“Then live to be my age.” Retch said.

“Not that,” Lynne said, shaking his head lightly. “But the fact that you can see the beauty all around you, even after so many years.”

“You don’t?”

“… ha ha, no, no, I still do,” Lynne said, chuckling. “But, the colors are slowly fading. There’s no doubt that if I were to ever reach your age, I’d be nothing but an old, bitter and sour man whose only purpose is to make days of others filled with misery and nothing else.”

“… you’re a good man, Lynne,” Retch said. “And you will always be good, at least in my eyes.”

“… that’s rich, coming from someone who, just a few weeks ago, told me that if I want to do a good deed, I should think about what I’d usually do, and do the exact opposite of that.” Lynne said, smirking lightly.

“The other Five Guardians, myself included,” Retch said. “All had to sacrifice a fair share of things, no doubt. But, practically since the day we were born, we knew what we were getting ourselves into, and we had a choice: whether to reject our position and live out our lives any way we saw fit, or to harken to tales old and become the Guardians—“

“—you’ve already told me that tale plenty times,” Lynne interrupted, sighing lightly. “But, believe it or not, I don’t care much for what you think of me, or any one of those smiling faces who offered me gemstones in spades and enough resources that could have produced millions of Mages back home. I’ve committed myself to this purpose, and that’s all there is to it. And, as I’ve already said, I’m rather excited about battling a God. It’s been a long while since I felt my bones bleed and my heart wailing and clawing for death. There’s beauty in such pain, believe it or not.”

“… it’s been awhile since I was allowed to draw from the knowledge I obtained from philosophy books without being mocked for it,” Retch said, laughing lightly. “Perhaps there was no more fitting way to end our prelude, no?”

“Is there anything more beautiful than two grown men speaking vaguely about the things they themselves barely understand, all the while retaining serious expressions?” Lynne said, beaming forth a brilliant smile. “If that isn’t living, I don’t know what is.”

“Best of luck, Lynne.” Retch said, extending his arm forward. “May your Soul, Mind and Heart never cease to breathe life into your incredulous existence.”

“Likewise, old man,” Lynne said, accepting the handshake and smiling lightly. “May yours do the same.”

A few moments later, Lynne was left alone yet again at the mountain’s peak, overlooking the fading horizon. Colors blended as though brushed by painter’s hand on a canvas of dreams, surreal yet almost tangible by the virtue of their existence. Lynne extended his arm forward, opening it freely and grasping toward the tiny sun in the distance, as though attempting to grab it. Faintly smiling, he lowered his arm and looked down the mountainous slope leading through wet clouds with an excited expression. Pushing forward, he hung slightly over the edge, his two hands tucked into his coat’s pockets.

“… it is time for me to dance as well,” he said lowly. “For the first and last time.”

He flung himself forward and began falling down freely, holding back his breath as he felt cold wind pierce his cheeks. His hair and coat fluttered backward, his face slightly distorted, yet still a smile emerged on it. Free, unbound, content and blithe, as though, with the fall, he was leaving behind his life-long albatross, setting forth his foot on the last, winding road of life.