TheBridge

Thank you so much for this @godmybackhurts! here we are:

"Do you ever wonder why we're here?"

For a long time Lynthea didn't respond, gazing out on the craggy landscape as whisps of her hair got stuck on her cheeks and eyelashes.

She'd had the thought as well, but never given voice to it while they were on the knife edge of survival.

But after being here for over a year and seeing this sight every day---seeing shapes and outlines in the landscape that were so achingly familiar----she felt it was time to tackle the question head on.

She turned back to Declan who was crouched near the fire, capable hands turning the roasting hare as the others worked twenty yards away to keep an eye on the bread in their rude brick ovens.

"I've wondered it for some time," she agreed, seeing the knowing in his eyes, "and I think it's time you and I found out."

Thank you so much for this @traveleorzea! Here we are:

"There was a time when you were not a friend of the dark places, and shied away from the groves where the high trees clustered together most thickly."

Her eyes, so strange now, so cold and dead, looked...through him as though she saw a world invisible to his eye.

He shuddered with a violent chill and felt that particular otherness that made him want to flee like a frightened child.

"I did not know then what I know now," she answered, but her tone was so flat and he almost thought that something else was speaking with her mouth.

"I want to help you," he pleaded, "do not walk the path of Persephone, I beg you."

For one brief moment, he thought he saw his friend again as the blue eyes flashed, but it was gone as swiftly as it had come.