I can sense the coming Winter. The daylight hours are cut shorter every day, fewer and fewer revitalizing rays of the Sun to be caught.
I know what comes with the Night. Every night. The numbing cold. The Dreams.

Even in the warmest days, I found myself thinking of the coming Night, more and more with each passing year. The yearning to find myself a shelter for my soul, a respite from the ever-Dream, from roaming the Fallen Realms.

Living in hope that once, there will be a day so warm... That its warmth will stay with me through the Night. But...

I've been told.


You have been told, indeed.

Yet you tried to run. To chase the Sun, again and again. Like a fool, sustained by a fool's hope.

You rejected the Night, every time you stood on the precipice, every time you had almost embraced the peace of Knowing. Your wish, the wish to throw your very Being into the embrace of trusted hands...

Here, in the dark, it becomes real.
It is a different Reality. One where your worries, your cravings, your fears... They disappear.

At Night, you are in My grasp.
A mere Puppet, as you wished. Feel no claws, feel no cold, feel no pain. Not even the touch of Death nor Hate itself could hurt you.
You are in the hands you always trusted to carry you... Through your very own Bleak Midwinter.

Yet you still shiver at My touch. There were others you met in the daylight, others whose embrace you yearned for...

But they are gone.


As I have foreseen, as I have promised.
Only you cannot let go of the memories.

Against all my teachings on the Nature of the World you faced, all you have been shown in the Fallen Realms, a fool's faith is the one thing you cling to.
That if you run one more time, it will be different. That by a decree of Fortune, your pendulum will come to rest at the most brilliant of Days, a Day not followed by Night.

No, my dear. Do not struggle, do not run.
For every nightfall, you will end up here, a plaything of mine.

And remember...
I was manifested into form by your Rage never spoken, by the Pain never seen, by every desperate Desire you did not make known.
By every Injustice you quietly witnessed, by every Betrayal, real or imagined.

You fed me those feelings, for they were unwise, for they did not stand against Reason.
As the strong consume the weak, you had hopes that I would consume your Weakness.

So I did, and here you are, what is left without it...
A Puppet.

And so it shall remain, unless you take back what once animated you. Unless you can live with what you were.
Until then, my dear...



I OWN YOU.

---

Given that in November, winter is truly coming soon, as well as riding the recent wave of spooky Halloween vibes, I settled for another more gloomy piece. This time, it's from the incredibly talented  lokrial, whose scalework is truly impeccable, together with a great sense of the ominous mood. She truly captured the darker side of me brilliantly.

The theme spoke to me as a product of lengthy brooding reflection that often strikes in the autumn days. Reflection on the death of friendships, of people, of social spaces, of will to put in effort. The accompanying confusion, the questions to ask of one's conscience. Is it all my fault? Is the world simply this way now? Wouldn't it be easier to just... Withdraw? What price would I pay for an attempt at being... Relatable?

Questions with no easy answers. But only time will tell. In the present, it is what it is. After every night comes a day, just like after every day comes a night. New things are found just as old ones are lost. Panta rhei, everything flows.

I'll send this one off with some music.
The Foreshadowing - Fallen Reign

Naturally, art credit goes to the artist:
Her submission can be found here: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/62851322/

Both plushy and possessed versions of Arcdanis belong to me.