Was all of this his own fault — the fault of his hearing, that cursed excess of perception which drew in what others could not bear? Was this only his sickness, his weakness, his overreaching sensitivity to things that should remain unheard? Maybe he had felt her too deeply because he had never stood before absolute and unrestrained power before? He came from nowhere. From a backwater place of mud and hovels where strength meant the fists of bormen and the hides of beasts; where no wizard lingered long enough to teach, and witches struck down anyone who rose too high above the dirt.
Was that why?
Was a powerful queen who became a powerful shaman just …
… normal in the greater world?
Was this what power looked like everywhere else,
and Yu, in his ignorance,
had mistaken the discovery of her presence for a grand revelation,
and her superiority for divinity?
Nonsense! Stop rationalising! Stop patching together excuses!
None of this is normal! She is not a shaman!
Remember how she threatened the krynn!
Remember the Mountain King voice!
Remember what we saw inside!
Remember the beast!
The beast inside!
She is a —
Was all of this his own fault — the fault of his hearing, that cursed excess of perception which drew in what others could not bear? Was this only his sickness, his weakness, his overreaching sensitivity to things that should remain unheard? Maybe he had felt her too deeply because he had never stood before absolute and unrestrained power before? He came from nowhere. From a backwater place of mud and hovels where strength meant the fists of bormen and the hides of beasts; where no wizard lingered long enough to teach, and witches struck down anyone who rose too high above the dirt.
Was that why?
Was a powerful queen who became a powerful shaman just …
… normal in the greater world?
Was this what power looked like everywhere else,
and Yu, in his ignorance,
had mistaken the discovery of her presence for a grand revelation,
and her superiority for divinity?
Nonsense! Stop rationalising! Stop patching together excuses!
None of this is normal! She is not a shaman!
Remember how she threatened the krynn!
Remember the Mountain King voice!
Remember what we saw inside!
Remember the beast!
The beast inside!
She is a —
Was all of this his own fault — the fault of his hearing, that cursed excess of perception which drew in what others could not bear? Was this only his sickness, his weakness, his overreaching sensitivity to things that should remain unheard? Maybe he had felt her too deeply because he had never stood before absolute and unrestrained power before? He came from nowhere. From a backwater place of mud and hovels where strength meant the fists of bormen and the hides of beasts; where no wizard lingered long enough to teach, and witches struck down anyone who rose too high above the dirt.
Was that why?
Was a powerful queen
who became a powerful shaman just …
… normal
in the greater world?
Was this what power looked like everywhere else,
and Yu,
in his ignorance,
had mistaken
the discovery of her presence for a grand revelation,
and her superiority
for divinity?
Nonsense!
Stop rationalising!
Stop patching together excuses!
None of this is normal!
She is not a shaman!
Remember how she threatened the krynn! Remember the Mountain King voice!
Remember what we saw inside!
Remember the beast!
The beast inside!
She is a —
A brutal, bestial scream tore through Yu’s insides; a horrendous roar no living beak could ever form. The wanting part roared to drown out the voice of terror.
Yu clenched his eyes shut and drove his forehead into the table, once, twice, thrice, again, and again, and again, until the motion lost all meaning, and still, the pain was still too dull and too distant. He snapped his beak together, fast and hard. It was not laughter. It was to uncoil the crushing tension in his jaw that prevented him from screaming or even speaking. It was the desperate mimicry of sound, any sound, anything at all that was not the voices within.
Still clapping his beak, he forced the air from his lungs until he reached the edge of suffocation where breath became strain and his groan broke into a ragged tremor and then further, until it thinned into a shivering, voiceless hiss, and further still, until it became a distorted void breath. The pressure in his skull shifted. His head swam. At last, reason, frail and blinking, found its way back into the wreckage.
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