The Decent

(not first person for reasons)

The hollow was in disarray in stark contrast to it's usual spartan and clean appearance. Outside the hounds Hunter and Chaser growled and yipped in concern and empathy at the sounds that came from inside.

Walker shivered and raged about his Hollow, sweat poured from his body as the shakes of addiction unfed coursed throughout his limbs. The world pressed in around him, the sounds of the Hedge and it's thorns tortured his nights and darkened his days in fear. He whispered repeatedly like the hermitted mad men of old.

"Need to go home...Need to go home..."

He tried to ignore the prying and concerned voices of his hounds as they spoke to his mind, his detox twisted the words into threats and promises of pain. He threw what ever he could find at his door and shouted for the mongrels to be silent. The hounds howled in sorrow at the bile that poured from Walker's mouth.

They were gone, they had left him, alone and lost. His hermits, his most trusted, his anchors were gone. Had he not been loyal, had he not done his part. Why would they take from him everything. Walker screamed his throat raw as the pain of detox and the hurt of a heart freezing wracked his body.

"It's their fault..."

The whisper dripped with malice and venom. Had they not come, my Hedge would have stayed calm he thought. He thought of everything he had done to assure a quiet Hedge, everything he had done to make the local thorns safe for his hermits, for his drugs. These culprits assuaged his rage but for a moment, he had someone to blame, to punish. A mad cackle passed his lips as his hand reached for bow and quiver. As his hand wrapped around the vicious weapon crafted by the deft hands of one of his drugs, a calmness swept over him...but it would not last.

Walker's mind filled with the visions of the trespassers dead and bleeding, their blood corrupted by his weapons. His nostrils filled with the smell of their viscera and entrails, his teeth gnashed at the feeling of their dead flesh under his hands. Walker moaned. His hand released the weapon and he moved away from it as if it had struck him.

"You would make me little more than a monster, no better than the flock I have tended to!"

He yelled at the inanimate and uncaring object.

"You want the Ministry to come for me, as I have gone for others...no..no..no my lovely it will not be so. I keep the monsters, I am not one!"

a voice whispered back

"Lies.."

Walker flew into unbridled rage tearing his hollow to shreds as he damned the voice that lied so truthfully to his mind. He thrashed until his rage was spent and he fell to the ground like a broken toy. A sobbed whisper repeated again and again as outside the howls of grief filled the night.

"I need to go home....I need to go home...."