#I guess??? idk i'm listening to gazelle twin

[hotniatheron]

If you're still taking the sentence starter prompts, 6 or 16 (from angst) with Silverflint please? x

send me a prompt

16) “Are you hurt?” “No.” “Then why are there bruises all over your face?”

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It’s late and quiet when Flint wakes. 

Too quiet.

At first he can’t figure out why it’s too quiet or what it is that has him so disturbed. Then he turns and see the bed is empty.

He sits up with a sigh and lights a candle, though he dreads getting out of bed in the chilly winter air. He steels himself before he throws back the covers to get out of bed and go look for Silver.

He expects to find him downstairs, sitting beside the fire and smoking as he’s made a habit of these past years. The dark of the tavern sends a chill up his spine, the silence foreboding. The fireplace is cold, with no recent evidence of fire.

“Silver?” he calls out into the dark and he gets no answer. 

He creeps forward into the room, trying his best not to jump when there’s a shifting of shadows and then Silver seems to take shape from the darkness itself in front of him. His face is half shadowed with the dark shine of blood turned black in the moonlight.

“What happened?” Flint says, rushing forward to cup his face. “Are you hurt?”

“No,” Silver whispers, even as he flinches away from Flint’s touch.

“Then why are there bruises all over your face?” Flint asks, holding the candle up to look at him. The empty look in Silver’s eyes when he glances up at him is enough to raise the hair on the back of his neck.

“This isn’t real,” Silver says, looking around him. “You’re not real, you’re dead.”

“I think I’d know if I was dead,” Flint says, pushing Silver’s hair out of his face. He grimaces at the mess of red and blue it is, skin already purple in some places. “What the fuck happened to you?”

“I was on the island,” Silver murmurs not looking at him. “That fucking island, looking for you.”

“I’m right here,” Flint says.

“When was the last time you left the house?”

“What?”

Silver grabs him by the front of his shirt and gives him a shake.

“When’s the last time you left the house?!”

Flint opens his mouth to answer, then pauses. He’s sure he went to the market three days ago. He went outside to water the garden yesterday. Didn’t he?

“You can’t answer because you haven’t,” Silver says, voice rising on the edge of hysteria. “You can’t, because you’re dead! None of this is real!”

“If it’s not real then why can I touch you?” Flint asks, placing a hand on Silver’s chest.

With horror, Flint watches blood bloom beneath his hand until it soaks the front of Silver’s shirt.

“I can’t feel it,” Silver says, voice hitching, eyes wild as he pushes away from Flint. “I can’t feel it. I haven’t eaten. I haven’t slept. I don’t know what day it is. It’s always night in this house. You’re always asleep in bed, waiting for me to return.”

Dread fills Flint until it’s wrapping around his throat, making him gag at the scent of blood that fills the room. The scent of loam and rot. The scent of a grave.

“Then what happened to you?” he asks. “Why are you covered in blood? Who hurt you?”

“You’re dead,” Silver says, staring down at his hands. There’s a knife in one, slick with blood, and Flint closes his hand over it. Blood starts to pour from Silver’s sleeves, coating the floor.

“What did you do?” he demands. 

“You’re dead,” Silver says, trembling. “Have been for years. There was a boy.....a map....”

Pain, sudden and hot like iron, strikes Flint in the head and he rears back, feet slipping in the blood spreading across the floor. He barely managing to catch himself against the wall. Silver looks monstrous, blood pouring from the crown of his head as Flint watches.

“What happened to you?” Flint whispers, sliding down to sit on the floor with a gasp, struggling to breathe. He turns and retches, trying not to scream when dirt splatters on the floor.

“You died,” Silver says, hand curling around the knife. “And everyone wanted Captain Flint’s treasure. So I killed them.”

“This isn’t real,” Flint gasp, even as the room around them starts to fade, the scent of damp earth filling his nose.

“No, it isn’t,” Silver says, even as he begins to fade back into the shadows. 

“Then what am I?” Flint asks. “What is this?”

“Just a dream.”

-

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-

Flint opens his eyes to darkness, cool and quiet. 

It’s late.

He turns and finds the bed empty. With a sigh he throws the covers back and lights a candle to go looking for Silver.

There’s no answer in the dark when he calls out his name.