InsaneJournal

WhØ: all
Ѡhεre: where
Wheת: Day 154, ?????
WhДt: game 1ØØ

[The Arena is not as it usually is.

The dawn that breaks over the judge's throne is a fractured thing; bright rays mixed with pale and trembling fingers of light, spots that through the arena seen clear while others still cling to the false night. Here, where the light falls, ruined buildings look whole again, colours lively and fresh. Where a ray falls there, there is no stone at all; the broken archway is instead the spreading limbs of a great tree, reaching for the sky. Pieces of road disappear into patches of deep water, waves crashing on nothing at all.

Here, where darkness stretches, the scenery itself seems to unravel. Lines fray and images fade, as if spun on a tapestry that is but a single pulled thread from being nothing at all.

The air is heavy and full of a pressure that settles behind the eyes, and it's quiet, so quiet, but the echo of sound unheard fills the air . . . murmurs of voices, words without meaning, the soft clack of a shuttle moving through thread.

The throne, when you look, is empty. But when you don't—when your attention strays, when the pressure builds—there may almost be a woman there, a small hand-loom on her lap, a scarf wrapped about her head. Her face is old but kind, unmistakably beautiful despite its age, and her smile is a gentle one.

In front of her there are fourteen large looms, each strung up with one of fourteen unmistakable shades.]

Hero . . . hero . . . hero . . .