Flins

The rain blurs a vision of the Ratniki in stark magenta, rifles bright as comets while the oath burns across time, and the color within the lantern cools from red toward sea-blue as the bound shapes collapse inward like soot dissolving into snowmelt. The terrace settles back into breath and candle hiss and the slow turning of the lighthouse beam.

"Shh"

The fog does not open but it folds and refolds until paths repeat. And on the opposite side, you run to escape the Wild Hunt, shadows pressing at the edges of your sight while each opening looks like a way out. Your boots slide on wet grass as gravel loosens under your heel and the edge becomes only air and black water below, the lighthouse turns above you like a slow star as you fall. Suddenly hands of blue flame flower out of the rain and close around your wrist and forearm with heatless pressure, drawing you back to cold rock before you fall off the cliff. Then they thread themselves away along the droplets. For a long breath you simply stand in the rain and wonder who or what pulled you from the drop until you notice a tall figure in the distance.