Then I met her lips. They were marble. A lot of things happened then. Through that contact, cold, perfect, I was pulled into her mind. Before I could even think: “Ah-ha! That’s why elves don’t touch much”, It began.
First, I thought I was dead. Then I thought I was dreaming. Then I wished I’d been dead, then, again, I wished for a dream. It had been her; with every thought in her mind. No, that’s not right, it was the smallest idea of it, of all that went on behind those eyes, dulled, violated by my pathetic mind, reality. Still, it was nearly enough to kill me.
A lifetime passed before I could get up and a few more before I understood what had happened. It took me several dozen to find her in those shapeless halls, not of thought, as you and I may think, but to thought what thought is to being, and that several times over.
A slight breeze of sadness had me crumbled, crying for weeks and the slightest sliver of her anger would make of me Elemaier; I would rampage across worlds entire, I would feel every kill, fresher than the last, kill, kill, kill. It would never be enough.
All of eternity passed as I gently touched her on the shoulder. The sensation was so strong, I clawed off my own shoulder as to not feel it anymore. Somehow, throughout all of it, my tongue hadn’t left me. Through every loss of self, suicide, nothingness, it had not withered. I heard myself whisper, softly, and then I heard myself hearing and then… “We have to go, Eila”, someone, I don’t know who, said. She smiled and we were back out again.
Gently, I let out the breath I had taken, a second ago, forever ago. Eila, once again, only smiled. She understood, then, that all her hopes had been in vain. Where, beyond the horizon, she had imagined dragons, there were only dragons. In me, where she had hoped for a man, an answer, there was only a boy.
She understood then, that she understood everything. She had already died. So she did the one thing anyone can always do. She gave up. She got up, so swiftly it was as if she had never sat down. She walked to the edge, so calm; she had never been next to me at all. And then she jumped; She had never been at all.
I looked where she hadn’t been, a second ago, forever ago, and found the night sky missing. It was in the space between the space between stars; a nothingness, new-born of her death. She had scarred the constellations. I understood then why the elves cherished stars so. Her death had taken from the night, for all futures to come. Not all of eternity could account for that loss.
And I was the cause of it.
I followed her example. I got up, so clumsily, I wished I hadn’t. I walked to the edge, like a boat rocked by waves. And then I jumped. But I couldn’t. I jumped. I jumped and then I jumped again and again. Try and try and try, always, I found myself back on the edge. I felt then, a deeper separateness. Even in this, I couldn’t hope to match her, to keep her company. Even in this, she was alone. I didn’t know if that was my loneliness or hers.
So I cursed myself. I cursed God and everything of his I knew, it all came down to the same thing. Truly, whole-heartedly, I hated God.
He would not hate me back. Try as I might, he still loved me.
“LET GO!”, I screamed, so loud, all of Ailemai echoed with my voice. I slammed the ground and almost, I split their worldtree in half. Then, one final time, with all the anger the world had ever seen, I jumped. Something caught me in the air and I looked up to the sky.
There they were, all the stars of the night sky, weaving of their light a spectral hand that caught me like the wind. Infinitely far, infinitely old, I saw the stars as what they truly were. All the souls who had given up, since the all-dawn, were there, all there, looking down at me. I heard then in the starlight, their voice, their one thought. Regret. Regret. Regret. A thousand stars begged me not to let go, as they had. I saw them, then, as they always had been. A thousand suns of regret.
A thousand hands, God’s hand, led me back down. A gust of wind, the gleam of a lantern, the song of a bird. They led me off the ledge. I took one last look where she hadn’t been, and then, I did the one thing we must always do. I moved on.