Sorrow’s Steel-A Prologue

Well, seems like it’s about that time of the year. Merry Christmas y’all. Hope your day is as great as mine. Now I present you the much anticipated prologue to my WIP. This is under copyright. This is very meloncholy. You have been warned. Now if only sarcasm could travel well in the written word…

 

Sorrow’s Steel

Prologue

A light drizzle fell from the somber-looking sky. My intolerance for pain resulted in the release of a sigh. I pulled my damp coat closer to me, the wool doing little to keep the
warmth in to face my frozen heart. It was useless, like most actions of mine
nowadays.

My head fell behind me to face the crowd of voices. Profanity was slung from
sailors, squabbles permeated the chilling air, and my attitude was like that of
the landscape: sullen and best described as gray. A sad irony was in that
description, one I didn’t want to let travel down my twisted path of lies.

As I ignored the callous crowd, my eyes squinted down to the crashing waves
underneath me while a frown drew itself onto my face. Aching hands grasped the
wood, holding me from going overboard. A sense of nausea ran through me, most
likely the result of my many years on land. But once again, a choice I had no
control over. That was becoming all too common in my life.

The biting of the graying sea scratched at me underneath my hood, something the
winds couldn’t do after trying so hard this past voyage.

Coldness draped itself on my drooping shoulders. I sighed again, angry at the
world and its dark humor. Why had it come to this? No answer from my fishing.
Like always. They were question riddled without an answer.

My blue eyes slid over as a body flew past my peripheral vision. I ignored the
shadow as quickly as it had passed. Thievery was wasted here. Wordplay on
lesser men was wasted here. Thinking was waster here. But maybe that could play
to my advantage. Probably not, though.

I turned around to pity the sea, its ever-expansive waters a grace to this
world where sin waded through its majesty.

As a shout rang through the ship of, “Land ahoy!” a figure passed by my eyes,
the shiny ovals far out in the distant. He fell to face death known around
these parts as sharp stones gouging themselves from the carved ocean. The death
was quick, too quick, too subtle. The tower beside his body was still.

I looked around to the masses where nobody cared. Nobody’s sight didn’t even
pass over to the man’s terrible predicament. But then again, no shout was heard
from his mouth. It was a silent and lonely death, like all of them.

I messed with my silver ring, deep in thought. I pondered the idea as we made
our way toward the graying land called Gwyrdion. Gray cobblestoned streets
under gray stoned buildings lay in this place, my new home, my new prison. The
melancholy city muddied my vision as the cold entered my mind.

Death was a curious thing. It was an idea we knew so little of, yet it was
probably the biggest part of our enigmatic lives. It existed solely for the
knowledge that we are mortal, we are weak. It was something I had struggled
understanding, comprehending for a very long time, too long of a time. But
this, this savage act of cruel fate was senseless. Suicide was the man’s
intolerance of too much pain, too much suffering. But what did the common man
know of misery? True misery?

So little. An answer that was almost as befuddling as my mind, my very
existence.

We crossed the dreaded waters, that idiot’s consequences unnerving me in no
way. Pain was the satisfaction of our deeds, no matter how they went, how they
were. It was all nonsense, all too much to understand and wish to comprehend,
so I let it go for now. But it would resurface, its waves stronger than last
time, for I knew the sensation all too well.

I leaned over the railing one last time, allowing a whisper to escape my weary
mouth. Although I knew the words well in my thoughtful mind, the wind still
brushed my voice away, clouding my words.

“How long will I evade death? How long with this agony persist?”

Another question no one would be willing to answer. It was an answer I was
willing to chase. It was all disheartening, bleak in outlook.

But give it time. Give it a chance. And give it hope.

For it was all I had in this cynical world; this world full of sad heroes.