[The cave. Images surface, incomplete and pale, but definite: the monster with many legs. The girl, running. The knife. Koltira is suddenly, briefly uncertain. He stares at her as though he can't make sense of her, like she's a puzzle piece that he can't quite make fit.
The effort fails: fresh jolts of agony slice through his legs, up into his stomach, across the soft, still organs in his body. Spiking in his sluggish blood. He runs a hand down his face, and his clawed gauntlets leave thin trails of black blood in their wake.
He can't think. He cannot reason. He has to make it stop. He has to make everything stop.
(The butterflies are beautiful, blue like the spring sky in Eversong Woods, shimmering and bright.)
no subject
The effort fails: fresh jolts of agony slice through his legs, up into his stomach, across the soft, still organs in his body. Spiking in his sluggish blood. He runs a hand down his face, and his clawed gauntlets leave thin trails of black blood in their wake.
He can't think. He cannot reason. He has to make it stop. He has to make everything stop.
(The butterflies are beautiful, blue like the spring sky in Eversong Woods, shimmering and bright.)
(He can't think about that now.)
(He can't think.)]
Run.
[He snarls it, even as he advances.]