By The Darkness

This story is best told by starting at the end.

Though, of course, the beginning is the most logical place to start, it is not how best to tell my tale. Thus, I will begin with the end, at how I arrived to come sit by this fire in a small cottage at the edge of the world.

You remember, do you not? I came at night, just over a month ago. I was battleworn and weary and had naught but my broken lyre. Ten strings it should have had, but only one or two were left truly playable. My wondrous tail was thin and twiggy, with the colour mostly dulled. What was once bright and clean, vivid colour ...

I must have looked awful.

Unclothed. Uncouth. Undone.

I apologise. How the ending began of this story was not my fault.

Even at darkest night the winds of Fallien blow bitter and hot. They are unforgiving - like the depths of hell have opened up and are arising through a geyser endlessly into the sky. Though the wicked sun does not warm the sand and dust there is still a heat that bites.

Either way I could not stop walking. Not stop climbing. Not stop. For anything.

Especially not for the darkest of demons that was tracking me, after swearing vegeance on my soul. I could not hide, for the dunes were endless and there was no oasis in sight, and I had nothing to lay on the sand to try to stave off the heat. To make it worse the demon himself exuded a rippling horror that made the air miles about him stifled and lacking in moisture.

Indeed, the situation was not ideal. Even at night, when the desert was supposed to be easier to travel in I still could not stop.

Not stop. Not stop. Not stop.

For the demon was coming, following me, wearing me down. Every time I looked back I could see those red eyes appearing on the dune behind me. If I paused to strum my lute and attempt to send a chord to deafen him he could gain that extra bit.

I did not know if he could even hear me from this distance.

It was best to increase it.

Keep going. Do not stop.