06: Legacies: Neverwherefic
By dizmo, for archedies
Legacies
They were my legacy. Passed from my blood-soaked hands to his. The spear, the knife, the advice. With the spear went the mission, that had pushed me, driven me for so long. The hunter and the hunted. The Beast and I had both in equal measure.
And I knew already I had lost. But I was determined not to be defeated. So the mission was handed on; the drive was handed on. Richard accepted both well enough, and I offered what help I could.
The Beast did fall.
Yet it was not at my hands.
The irony is almost sickening. Perhaps it is punishment for my betrayal, for my singleminded focus on it at the expense of all else.
Perhaps.
It is too late now to wonder.
The spear and the mission were not all to the legacy. There was the knife, and, as with the spear, it was not bestowed alone. With the knife came the status. I was no longer the greatest hunter. The knife did not indicate that, but it symbolized it. At least to me. What it would mean to others, I slowly found myself not caring about.
What others will think is something of the future. A future of which I suddenly find myself in short supply.
Thus, the last of my legacy. He must know how to pass through the labyrinth safely, if he is to have a hope of even facing the horrors beyond, much less besting them. So I tell him how, with my fading breath.
Yet even that gift has a stowaway. My hope. My hope to undo the bad thing that I did, in whatever small way I can. My hope that even this small resumption of my guardianship over the Lady Door might have an effect. My hope that my life, my hunt, my focus, were not all in vain. Not for others. For myself. For the hunt, in the end, is not man hunting beast, nor beast hunting man. It is man hunting oneself. To root out the Beast within, and destroy it, else it destroy you. Had it not taken me until this point to realize it, perhaps this point would not have come.
Or perhaps it would.
For perhaps I succeeded after all.
I can only hope.
I can.
I do.
Legacies
They were my legacy. Passed from my blood-soaked hands to his. The spear, the knife, the advice. With the spear went the mission, that had pushed me, driven me for so long. The hunter and the hunted. The Beast and I had both in equal measure.
And I knew already I had lost. But I was determined not to be defeated. So the mission was handed on; the drive was handed on. Richard accepted both well enough, and I offered what help I could.
The Beast did fall.
Yet it was not at my hands.
The irony is almost sickening. Perhaps it is punishment for my betrayal, for my singleminded focus on it at the expense of all else.
Perhaps.
It is too late now to wonder.
The spear and the mission were not all to the legacy. There was the knife, and, as with the spear, it was not bestowed alone. With the knife came the status. I was no longer the greatest hunter. The knife did not indicate that, but it symbolized it. At least to me. What it would mean to others, I slowly found myself not caring about.
What others will think is something of the future. A future of which I suddenly find myself in short supply.
Thus, the last of my legacy. He must know how to pass through the labyrinth safely, if he is to have a hope of even facing the horrors beyond, much less besting them. So I tell him how, with my fading breath.
Yet even that gift has a stowaway. My hope. My hope to undo the bad thing that I did, in whatever small way I can. My hope that even this small resumption of my guardianship over the Lady Door might have an effect. My hope that my life, my hunt, my focus, were not all in vain. Not for others. For myself. For the hunt, in the end, is not man hunting beast, nor beast hunting man. It is man hunting oneself. To root out the Beast within, and destroy it, else it destroy you. Had it not taken me until this point to realize it, perhaps this point would not have come.
Or perhaps it would.
For perhaps I succeeded after all.
I can only hope.
I can.
I do.