The Anchor

Statues

Long ago we had a purpose. Long ago our souls hadbeen buried to live forever. There was a way to come back. But it has long been forgotten. The makers of our prisons had died, not able to join us. At first we had to accept our fate. Learning to love our stone coffins, but nothing lasts forever. Long after we were supposed to have been remade we still stood. Frozen in time as the weather ate away at our flesh.

We watched with lifeless eyes as the world rose and fell. The war, the violence, the pain others had was a constant in all time. But even we could fall victim to war. We watched, wishing to blink as the arms of others cracked and shattered to the ground. There was nothing we could do but watch as one by one, everyone of us fell apart. We went, one finger at a time, not without pain but with a pain frozen with us as well. Every limb burned away and others were carried off. Others fell down, mind filled with cracks. And thousands of years worth of knowledge and life was swept away with other rubble. Sometimes we were rebuilt. Our bodies abominations of dead and alive. Lifeless stone sewn onto our frozen bodies.

Soon enough I found myself forgetting who I was. I knew I was alive. I knew I once had a purpose. I knew I was frozen out of time. I knew I was alone. I knew it was no longer "us" it was "I"

As new empires took control, I found myself with new pain. My ear was chipped away, my nose was hammered off. My dress was decorated with cracks. It seemed like this would last forever. It seemed like it already had. Eventually the world around me fell before I did. Vines started crawling up my dress, and mold grew on the braids in my hair. I started hoping he nature would take me. That eventually I might become dust for trees to take root in but I keep surviving.

Every night, I couldn't sleep. I just kept surviving. In my good ear, I could hear the bugs crawling around, the birds singing as I was washed with moonlight. One night, when my tired soul was dreaming, but asleep but not fully conscious, I heard a rustle in the trees. That kind of thing wasn't unusual, however the voices after were. "Omg! Is that a person?" Said a human voice. I hadn't heard a human voice in years.
"That's a statue, idiot," Another voice, there were two people this time, twice the life.
"It was dark!"
"Look up...you see that, yeah it's the moon!"
"It looks like a person, okay."
"It's so tilted though,"
"Maybe its a ghost!"
"I hope it's a ghost."
"Sarah, I told you we're not summoning a ghost." That made three. Their footsteps got louder and soon I could make out the outline of a person.
"If they ghost is here we wouldn't have to summon it," She let out meekly, almost an afterthought.
"Guys chill, lets just try and summon a ghost anyway so Sarah's happy," The first person said.
"Why?! No, I'm not summoning anything, okay, that's not why I came here," The third voice spoke up again.
"Oh really," Said the first two voices in sync, before they burst into giggles.
"Well...we brought all the stuff," The girl, Sarah said.
"I mean, maybe you're just chicken..." For a second it was silent, then the first two broke out into mimicking a chicken.
"Fine!" The third voice let out, exasperated. "This is a stupid idea though,"
They were getting quiet, the only noise they made was a light rustling. Then, a click; light danced around my feet. I knew if I looked down I would see candles. I'd grown up in witchcraft, I remembered. I was here because of witchcraft. They circled around me and started chanting, they spoke the most atrocious Latin I've ever heard. They weren't going to free me, I realized. They didn't know how to free me. It was probably all some sick joke to me. Their chanting got louder and until a grew dizzy. Really, really dizzy. For the first time in thousands of years, I passed out.
—————
I looked around. I was in a body, a real human body. The sun was still hidden or I'd been asleep for far too long. But I could see the broken ruins of what were once houses behind me. I stood up and brushed myself off, but these were not my clothes. I looked around slowly becoming more frantic. I was wearing pants, but was in a girls body. I saw my prison. The crackled marble and vines across everything were a thorn in my side for 200 years.

I couldn't miss the obvious life oozing out of the eyes. Someone was in there, in my prison and I was free. I was probably the last person to know the spell, I had to free her. There was a chipped stone on the ground, near my feet that once were my feet and I picked it up. Knowing nothing could hurt more than that prison, I took a breath and cut a thin line on my upper arm. Not yet stinging, my arm gushed blood. I painted both thumbs in it before I stepped up on the pedestal she was on and cupped her face. While chanting the words I couldn't soon forget, I ran my thumbs over her cold, empty stone eyes. I could see something click in her as I smiled at her. She was still frozen.
"Hello," it was more of a question than a greeting. Her stone jaw crawled open and gravely words escaped in my voice.
"It's...all...your...fault..." she was practically growling at me. "It's...all...your...fault..."
"It's...all...your...fault..." she wouldn't stop saying it, she wouldn't blink and my blood was running down her face. She reached out at me with a sharp finger, never stoping her chant. I backed up as far as I could and she ran her finger over what once was her face that I now possessed. She cut in, pain immediately stinging. I jumped back. My stomach dropped as I fell back. And  groped the air for purchase that wasn't there. A thick crack echoed through the air as the girl ripped herself from the statues base. There was another rip and she slowly walked towards me.
"It's...all...your...fault..."
"It's...all...your...fault..."
"It's...all...your...fault..."
She was walking closer, she was walking faster. I had to crawl backwards to escape getting stepped on. I looked her straight in her eyes, bleeding with my own blood before I scrambled up and ran. Her footsteps were heavy on the forest floor, but even louder on the stone ruins around me. Every transition onto stone she would stomp on the ancient bricks surely cracking them. I couldn't keep running, my lungs were tired and I wasn't used to any movement. I cowered behind the remains of a wall. Trying to pant without giving away my position. I heard the light taps of her feet on the stones, echoing around so I couldn't tell where she was.
The stones in front of me shattered and rained down on me. I stumbled back, my heart beating too fast to realize what I was doing. She stepping through the opening, and jumped down on my ankle. I couldn't crawl backwards any more but I kept trying.
"It's...all...your...fault..."
"It's...all...your...fault..."
"It's...all...your...fault..."
She stepped off my ankle, and onto my thigh, immediately shattering the bone. Another step, my hip, another step my ribs. She rocked her feet on the broken bones everything sending shooting pain to my head. It all hurt so bad. I wanted it so stop. I would to anything to make it stop.
"It's...all...your...fault..." she picked up her foot, letting all the weight of 5'3'' of pure marble sink into my shattered bones. Everything burned. It was like my entire body inside and out was set on fire. She took another step right on my windpipe and my neck shoot with pain one last time before everything went to black.