Story

Story, part 2

They both were silent for a while. Jenny, watching the fairies sat on a hedge as they chattered away to each other. Amy, lost in the water, and enjoying the same games she had enjoyed a million times over. Making ripple and seeing just how long she could feel them for. She knew this was a distance much further than the edges of the pool, but she could make do. After all they were both procrastinating on purpose. Soon Jenny spoke, “So,  are we going to do this?” Amy took a second before answering. Jenny let her take her time in accepting this switch back to earthly issues, in particular, the Darren issue. They definitely had to help Darren. “Aargh” was the frustrated reply when Amy finally spoke. “Fine let’s do this!”

 5

In the darkness. In the world behind. She was Queen, and the Abyss her King.

Although Darren had stepped into the Dark many times, he had never noticed the way this dimension leaked pure blackness. At times he did notice a shadow or two which seemed to move without prompting. Those shadows were often black. Black in the most pure sense. There was no shading, no way to make out anything, just black. Darren didn’t understand why, but he found those shadows disconcerting.

She enjoyed the fact that Darren was so scared of her abyss. That without even knowing why, he would avoid anywhere that her Darkness touched. Darren, who spent so long searching. Searching for a name she herself had long ago forgotten.  She loved her Darkness. Whereas to some it appeared as shadows. To her it was the most beautiful of all things. Her very own Darkness, alive and exhilarating. It was of her but also of itself. It leaked out of her and affected the world so strongly that she would sometimes gasp in happiness as she watched it work. Affecting all those around. Most of all she loved it because it protected her. It protected her from what had come before she realised she could create this Darkness. This abyss. A world where she felt at home. It protected her from the name and the memory of it. It protected her so well that she barely remembered there was a name to hide from. No, not a name. Her name. Ruth was her name now, at least it had been for a few decades. This is what she told those from the world inbetween. It is what she had told Darren the night she had met him. Before Ruth she had been named Nihil, but that name had reminded her too much of the name far too much.

She walked through the streets of Hertfordshire wishing she could fill the world inbetween with her darkness too. That she could turn this world and all its dimensions into a sanctuary, a home. Somewhere she could know for sure that she was truly safe. A place where Ruth would be her real name and the people, they would fear her...no, respect her, maybe even love.....no, she could not be loved, not by anything but the dark she had created. After all she had done, after all she hid from, she knew she could not be loved. At least that is how she felt. Yet he continued to search for her. Forcing her to hide in this petty side world. Of course she could break the dark at will, but she rarely willed this. After all, she chose to be in the dark for a reason. Living in the world of humans could only be bearable if she filled it. She nearly let out a sob at the desperateness of her own situation. She knew all too well that as long as the elementals still lived in the light, the best influence she could have is through her conduits. The ones like Darren, whose partial Dark allowed her Darkness to seep into the world. For every Darren though, there was an Amy, a conduit for the light. They bothered Ruth far more than she liked to admit. They were getting organized now. They couldn’t see it but for Ruth who had lived so long, the fact that the Sidhe had chosen a collective name for themselves and often knew at least one other very well, was a massive jump from the time of the first conduits for the light and the dark. More than that, their activities cause just as many rumours over the centuries as the elementals and dark creatures did. Yet the dark conduits were still unheard off. She enjoyed Christianity as it had so wilfully fought against any notion of other powers. They weren’t totally wrong, however their own needs and fears had led their church to seek power, riches and control. These things they sought over truth and their path had strayed from the truth long ago. A truth Ruth did not wish to remember, but one she knew she could were she to linger on it long enough.