Laughing Carrion

[Evanuri 345]

 

On heavy legs, a Mali’ame very nearly crawled from the precipice of once fertile, green earth now ravaged by colorful; hex-maddening taint. Fingers stained in pricked carmine; both of trickling sanguine and carmine-red ilmyumier which embellished his dusky skin. Though now ravaged by battle, several of his markings held desire to be retouched and repaired in the wake of their damage. Folly for later.

 

Now grass again was green, and earth brown in wet, luscious mud. Rain showered upon him, who fell to his knees and exalted the heavens in the pain of his failure. A quarry, stolen from him a second time; eviscerated and snapped away before his eyes where he once stood on success’ threshold. The final mantlepiece could have been his, and wild victory resting upon strong shoulders. Now the zealot was broken, and sick from the blight he traipsed on. A guffawing crowish laugh was heard from on high, as the Mali’ame stared atop a tree, leaves decayed. A vulture watched him and made its noises, nearly ridiculing the elf for his missteps. It boiled him, stained veins bulging in their rage. He was one to throw fits, lifting an old stone from the earth to throw at the buzzard.

 

It was as if fortune flew on the wind, then, the sharpened rock twisting through the air to meet its mark. He threw it, he thought, in futile protest of the laughing. Yet, somehow, by the grace of creation itself, the cast stone struck the carrion bird in the head, sending it to the earth below. Desperate, the Mali’ame ran towards the creature, gouging his blade into its neck and filling an empty skin of its blood before clawing hands tore feathers and stuffed them away; in pouches, pockets, cases, quiver, anywhere a feather might go.

 

The sounds of desperate, hungry carving would squelch through the night. A hunger crying not for a meal, but for victory, as meat was flayed from bone and carcass of bone, skull, was mounted upon wood. Sharpened ribs made a mantle that the Mali’ame donned with broken pride, as a limp took him back towards his Enclave.

 

Spoiler

OOC: This vague post and story was the epilogue of a several-hours slog and days of chasing an in-game quarry, both times having his goals swiped from him by others which claimed the victory themselves. The vulture is an ode to those who swiped away the victory Gilliaen desired. This is the victory he claimed, in the wake of his defeat. A desperate, almost pale victory.