This is not treachery.
This is freedom.
In the middle of Heaven and Hell, the days of rain and mist are long gone. Now, the Gap World is a kingdom of light and darkness, goodness and evilness, sunshine and clouds. When clandestine forces weave toget...
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THE WINNER WAS THE FIGHTER.
There came a time in everyone's life when they could no longer hate themselves, abandon themselves, blame themselves for all the bridges they'd burned, for all the crimes they'd committed and all the obstacles they hadn't been able to overcome. There came a moment in everyone's lifetime when they could no longer silence the hunch inside them, the terse feeling they had kept ignoring for decades on end because the world had coaxed them into believing that they were not to trust themselves.
There came a time in everyone's life when they had enough of repentant moments, words and thoughts. There came a time in everyone's life when they finally began to realize that while they'd done monstrous things, they could no longer accept to torture themselves for mistakes they'd paid for not only once, but multiple times in the past. There came a time in everyone's life when they could no longer tolerate their thoughts, their fears, the words of hatred they kept whispering to themselves, weapons aimed at their own heart.
There came a moment in everyone's lifetime when they began to realize that a real hero was not the one who had committed no crime, but the one who had accepted that to become a saint was to have been a sinner. I'd been a sinner. I'd committed crimes. I'd ended lives, friendships, relationships. I'd been a bandit, a rogue, a killer. I'd been weak, humiliated, unable to move forward and forget. I'd been timid, afraid, crying and vomiting, waking up in the middle of the night and needing people to support me through it all.
But I'd also fought for my brother, for the one that I loved, for my kingdom, for the whole world.
Now it was time to fight for myself.
I wasn't a hero. I wasn't a sinner. Expressing anger, shame, grief, helplessness didn't mean that I couldn't also offer to the ones that I loved joy, strength, affection. Needing support didn't mean that I couldn't provide support. Doing something wrong didn't mean that I couldn't do something else right.
I was a fighter. That was all I needed to be. Because the winner was the fighter; not the hero; not the villain. The winners were the fighters, which meant that me, my brother and the woman who'd seen all of me and still loved me for that, would soon taste the sweet flavor of unfettered victory.
A strong wind swept in the tavern through the half-opened window as I traced my finger around the stem of my wineglass. My brother was alive. That realization could never escape my thoughts; nothing could stop me from being rapt with joy. Even the night terrors didn't matter anymore. My brother had come for me when I'd needed him the most. I wouldn't have to be alone in flinty lands anymore, flailing like the waters of a manic river against a dam.
I got up from the chair, feet hurting but paying no attention to them since I had way more important things to do than complain about old wounds, and walked to the piano at the far back of the tavern. The innkeeper was playing cards with another villager, occupying a table beside the door. The night had fallen a long time ago and few were the people that were still here, downing drinks and talking.
I passed my fingers over the black and white keys, then brought out of my pocket the sheet of paper that Velian and I had used yesterday night to write down some lyrics. I started playing with the keys, finding out which melody that came out of them I preferred the most. I didn't think too much of it. I followed the flow, the divine, primitive force that smothered the debris I'd been left with. When I'd memorized both the lyrics and the melody, I went back home, finding Velian in the garden, Stam curled at her feet.
"I thought you wouldn't come back," she said, an embarrassed smile on her face. It seemed to me that nowadays she constantly had this wild fear that something bad was going to happen to me, that each time we said a temporary goodbye was also the last time we saw each other. The thought almost added another layer of guilt to the ever-growing list of my mistakes. I didn't let that happen.
I knelt to the ground before her. She moved forward to the edge of the chair. I gripped her hands. She closed her eyes.
"But all the roads lead back home," I replied, and when she wrapped her arms around my body, a streak of lighting flashed across the midnight sky in celebration.
A streak of lighting flashed across the midnight sky at my command, a reminder to fate that what she'd only managed to do was awake her worst enemy; a reminder to the universe that I'd started piecing myself together again. And again. And again. Expanding in the name of hope. Not impervious to the chaos, but adept at steering it toward the light.
