A sky of green fibers rustled above Bella’s head. Clouds of woven grass bobbed on the thinnest strands like props in a puppet show. She walked green hills dotted with green trees. Her footsteps rasped over the ground. She examined the grass at her feet and found it smooth, more of a rug than a field.

None of this felt odd.

Green dawn broke as a grassy sun rose over the grassy land. In the distance, she heard the faint crinkling of waves breaking, though no matter which way she turned she couldn't find the ocean. Her heart told her it was so far away that it didn’t matter.

The sun hung high and brought a sense of peace and love. This same aura radiated out from every blade of the world. She felt the truth — every fiber of the world loved her. She kept walking and moved between rounded hills like the side of a woman in repose until she found a river tracing its way around the land’s hips and thighs. Long strands of grass rippled their way, sinuous, and coiling like snakes along the ground. She crouched beside it and listened to the fluid sound. Beneath the sound, she heard a drone — a low buzz — full of anger. She frowned and tried to focus on that note but the sun shone all the brighter and a powerful green wave of peace and love settled on her skin. She smiled up at the sun — how could she not? — and closed her eyes.

“I love you too,” she said aloud, and her words were crisp and clean.

The grassy river did not show her reflection, so she gazed down at her body. Why didn’t she remember how she looked? She knew it didn’t matter, but it made her curious.

Crouched on the grass, nude, she inspected herself and found clean white skin in stark contrast to the green world surrounding her. The green light lit her skin like a pale bud, but she knew she was not of the world, but cradled by it. How she knew this and that but not the other she couldn’t say, but the low drone grew louder until it buzzed in her teeth. She frowned. What made that noise?

Her body, while clean, was not completely intact. Broad green stitches of grass pieced her together. They crisscrossed her ribs and her groin. Her left leg was almost half grass. It looked as though someone had tied a jigsaw together. The fingers on her left hand all ended in grass at the tips and knuckles. She flexed them and felt no pain, no discomfort. Drawing her hand closer to her eye she gasped.

The stitches quivered and grew — slowly, so slowly — but if she waited long enough, she was sure they would cover her flesh until she was nothing but grass. How… curious…

The droning sound grew louder. It rose through the soles of her feet, rattled her bones, and made the top of her head throb. She felt like an egg about to crack. What made that noise? She turned and saw the rustling trees and the sweeping hills and heard the repeating fall of far-off waves, but what droned? What ached through the air and her body with such insistent anger?

The wind brushed against her ears.

“It is a dangerous sound,” said the wind. “It will bring nothing good.”

Bella frowned.

“But what is it?”

The wind wrapped around her in a warm caress. It slipped through her fingers like a lover’s grasp.

“Do you need to know?” Sadness tinged the voice. “Isn’t this enough? It is enough for me…”

Bella walked along the river as the wind pressed and brushed against her skin. The stitches tickled as they grew through her flesh and the rustling sound drowned out the angry drone for a while. She walked until tired and lay herself down against the hill’s flank. Heat seeped from beneath her as the green sun lowered beyond the green horizon.

The wind played up her body.

“Is this enough for you?” asked the wind.

Bella nodded idly, but she wondered about the drone. She could still feel it there, like a memory of toothache, but she drifted off to sleep under a blanket of warm air.

She dreamed of a black woman with a scarred smile. Her teeth flashed with ferocious laughter as blood spilled in the air. Droplets of gore suspended before Bella’s wide eyes.

“This is your blood,” the wind whispered. “She laughs at your pain.”

Bella’s heart panged, but the drone grew ever louder.

“What is her name?” Bella asked.

The black woman reached for Bella. Fingers grasping. A liquid mirror coated her grasp as she moved through the gore — droplets of blood disintegrating at her Mirrored touch.

“Her name doesn’t matter,” the wind answered. “Only her intent.”

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

The dream roiled, collapsing like a wave in slow motion.

“What is her intent?”

“She wants to destroy everything.”

“Why?”

“Because…” the wind faltered as the droning spiked. “Because someone betrayed her.”

“Who?”

“Too many people. It is her fate to be cast aside.”

Mirrored fingers were so close that Bella saw her reflection in the whorls. Pain on her face, her features coming apart as wind dissected her limbs, the blood in the air belonged to her. The black woman reached, her teeth barbed, and she echoed Bella’s pain.

“What is her name?” Bella asked again, and her voice echoed as the dream collapsed into swirling darkness.

“Her name doesn’t matter…”

“Tell me.”

“If I tell you… you will leave…”

Bella woke on the side of the grassy hill. The grassy sun floated into the sky and cast long ribbons of grassy light. Sweat clung to her skin, and though the wind licked at her with warmth, cold filled her. A droning filled her ears and blood trickled from them. Pain ached beneath her skin like wires drawn tighter and tighter.

The stitches pulled at her flesh — pulling her together, binding her. She tried to stand, but the stitches constrained her muscles. The grass held her tight as the flat stitches across her leg twined like coiling pythons. Her eyes widened as they concealed more and more of her flesh.

Between the gaps of the bandage, Bella spied a ragged scar. Grey scar tissue glowed stark upon her skin. She reached a stiff finger and poked at the bandage, shoving it aside to see the scar.

A rune.

“No,” said the wind, softly, so faint. “You’ll only hurt yourself again.”

Bella gritted her teeth as she pulled against the bandages. Her fingers became claws as she ripped the bandages from her legs and revealed the scars up the inside of her thighs.

[Long Blade of Butchering Skies]

The droning burst inside her mind and became a resounding shriek. Bella closed her fingers around the runeblade. The world trembled as she stood. How could she have forgotten the weight? The feel of her soul in her hand and the keenness of her weapon?

She opened her mouth, and the howl issued forth between her teeth, the hurricane screech of a whistling wind through the high crags of a destitute world.

“What is this place?”

“I am healing you…”

“You have trapped me.”

The grassy sun glowed with its green light of warmth and love.

“No…”

But the word, light as air, was a lie.

Bella gripped the handle until her knuckles shone white as bone. The stitches restricted her, and she moved like a wooden puppet, but the strings belonged to her.

She lifted the sword high. Runes burned as it sang to her, through her, and Bella swung the blade down and sliced the world apart.

Darkness blossomed before her, and it stank of fresh-cut grass.

Beyond it, lay the world, and Bella stepped through.

###

Bella gasped as she sat up sweaty and confused. Threads of grass fell about her like cobwebs in the wind. They fluttered on her warm breath, the stink of sweat and illness rising, and blew away from her. With each grassy wisp that disintegrated, she felt the memories of the dream fading, but the impression remained.

She clutched the runeblade still, and the glowing runes lit the surrounding space. A red nylon roof loomed close, and walls pressed upon her. She sat in a small tent.

“Are you alright?”

Oriz sat behind her, voice and face creased with concern. The feature would seem so foreign to anyone who witnessed the calm alien woman, but Bella knew that a heart filled with emotion raged beneath her grey skin.

She tried to croak something, but she felt completely withered. Oriz placed a bottle to her lips and helped tip water down Bella’s throat. She drank thankfully, eyes closing as Oriz helped her drink. The support of her lover’s hands was as strong as ever and she leaned against the warmth coming from those fingers. The runes of her sword ebbed, and the fierce light died down to cryptic embers that played across the walls of the tent.

After slaking her thirst, Bella looked around.

“What happened?”

“You suffered,” Oriz’s eyes glinted with tears. “In a fight with a mantis a wind blade technique. It tore you apart. You almost died!”

Bella closed her eyes and tried to remember beyond the rustle of grass in the shadows. She opened her eyes to see Oriz leaning close.

“What did you do to me?” she gestured at the drab wrappings of dried grass around her. “What was that?”

“It’s an advanced technique from my sect. I have only used it a few times before, and never in such an unprepared environment. It pieced your body back together.” She brushed a finger along Bella’s left leg. “Look at these scars. You were so close to…”

Oriz’s voice choked, and Bella looked away from the intense emotion. There was a drone in her mind, but the sound faded when she released her tight grip on the sword. Was it the sword speaking to her? Or was it something else?

She examined the scars on her leg. A pink patchwork traced up from ankle to groin. Surprisingly, her foot had been completely spared. The carved grey runes remained ragged and primitive. She knew they marked her soul as much as her flesh, for they had survived her Epiphany of the Flesh transformation.

“The cocoon,” Bella said. “I dreamed I couldn’t leave.”

“Really?” Oriz said. “I’ve never been inside. I only know that it is a dream. What happened, it wasn’t real. You were always going to leave. As soon as you were healed, I would have opened it. In fact,” Oriz trailed off as she studied Bella head to toe, more of a medic than a lover. “Are you sure you feel alright? I tried to account for the influence of your runeblade but I’ve never heard of someone cutting themself out of the cocoon.”

“I’m fine,” Bella said, too firmly, and she saw Oriz wince back. What was happening here? Why did she feel a deceit? “What has happened?”

Oriz bit her lip, uncertain, and then words spilled from her. She recounted the journey to the cave, her argument with Zoe, the fight in the cemetery, and how the Black Star fled. She told of the run through the town and the disintegrating storm.

“... we’re in a cave in the island's belly. I don’t know the plan, though Anton’s eye told me Zoe returned.”

Bella’s eyes flashed.

“Zoe survived? And the chains left? She must be devastated.”

Bella tried to stand, but her head spun. She fell forward onto her knees.

“Bella!” Oriz said. “Are you alright?”

“I don’t feel… great.”

“You’re still recovering,” Oriz said as she steadied Bella. “You shouldn’t have cut your way out.”

“I felt trapped…” Bella grasped Oriz’s fingers, before gently lifting her hand away. “Please, I need space. I need to get out of this tent. I need to see my friends.”

Oriz looked at her, eyes wide, an unreadable — alien — expression on her face. And Bella’s heart pounded.