Immortal by age. He wakes in a cave. A dark one. Silence filling the gaps where the light ran. He crawled to his feet; boney legs like white stilts, carried him forward. His ribs on show for no one. His grey skin inhumanely tight against his bones, accentuating his gaunt stomach and face. His sharp teeth exposed; the lack of lips conceals nothing.
He doesn't recall when he last woke up. Nor does he care. Every memory is like a distant light out in the ocean... slowly fading out. Valueless. His steps deliberately slow; he's in no rush after all. His long fingers bend round the neck of the cave's entrance, as the first trickles of light touch his dark grey skin. He steps out. His tall form is no longer hidden in the absence of light. His broad shoulders make him impose, as his vacant grey eyes scan around with gentle detachment. His legs carry him out silently. His form hiding and reappearing as he walks throughout the trees.
He stops at a river. Watching the water run infinitely down into the setting sun. He sits; his legs hang down, letting the trickles of steady water tickle his feet. His breathing soft... and low. His grey eyes are not unlike silk hugging around cold ice. He stares at the running stream, watching his reflection ripple against the clearness of the water. The tightness of his jaw cuts the light like a knife. His mind blurry, the memories stand still with vacancy. His eyes weary... holding enough weight to wear down steel gates. A mind full of so much knowledge to lock down library doors without a word... But a heart so heavy, to weigh down the earth's surface with each step he takes.
But he has no care for his effect on the surrounding world. He exists. Letting the infinite moments pass smoothly through his fingers. His observant eyes have seen them before, so many times... countless times. He stares out into the silence of the growing night...
But then it breaks.
His head slowly turns to the soft noise of rustling behind him. Eyes cut through the bushes like a hawk; inspecting every ragged, but slow movement that inches towards him. He stands against the noise; his curiosity piqued despite himself. And out steps... a girl. A starving one. He lost the need for food, but this girl seems to be devouring him with her gaze alone. A soft face that's been gaunt with hunger, warm brown eyes with an underlying danger, and silky blonde hair tattered with wildlife.
"Your starving". A ghostly calm voice, soothing almost, but detached from any empathy towards her current state.
She trembles with a weak nod. Her movements show restraint. Her teeth slightly barred, and her eyes like predatory slits; cutting through the flesh without even a bite, which he found useless for a human girl... that was until her eyes snapped a dark, red.
"A ghoul..." he trails off. A soft statement, rather than a question. His cold blood shows no fear. He only sees a girl. One with no choice. "You haven't eaten in..." he inspects her state with calculative eyes "weeks".
She tries to take a step back, but her legs refuse. Her eyes pleaded with welling tears. Tongue dry without the blood that begs to taint her mouth; blood running cold without the warmth of a meal. Her fingertips are already fading into small, but lethal claws.
But then he paused...
A subtle brown coloring his grey eyes. The tears on her face fall against the still water in his mind.
And then he heard her voice...
"Please" ... A soft... sweet, and desperate voice trembles from the little girl. Her hands tremble with need, and her eyes stare with utter hunger, and innocent desperation.
He freezes. But from the opposite of everything that is cold. A torch melting the ice over his frozen heart. He slowly touches his own face; his gentle fingers tracing the ivory skin under his eye where he feels... A tear. He looks at her barred teeth, watching her stomach twist painfully with hunger. The dusty cogs in his mind he never had to use, start to turn in this dire moment of need. He thinks... he knows, he hesitates... but with a decisive movement...
He exposes his neck.
Her teeth momentarily relax... shock. Her pink irises run along his hazel eyes in search of deceit... But only finds the deepest feeling of selflessness, she's ever let her eyes rest on. New tears start to spit out her face, but not from pain. She's just overwhelmed. She makes an unconscious leap, and falls into a hard bite against his neck. Her eyes glow in relief, though her conscious whispers to her... "guilt".
Frozen. His gaze torn upward...
His arms that were outstretched, slowly wrapped around her. Rivers of fulfilment drowning out the pain. His hand hesitantly... moves to thread through her hair, feeling the softness soothe his skin. He finds his vision blurring, but the tightening hold of the girl and this sudden desperation for warmth keeps him awake, for just a bit longer. His eyes trace her slowly relaxing form, awed at the sight of her finding comfort in his cold embrace...
And he finds himself dying, with a smile on his face.
