Word of the City...

"The Cuidad...the city is starting to crumble..." Justin's words echo through my mind. "The buildings are crumbling to dust. Some of us--we're just fading away...like we never even existed. What's happening to us, Tor?..."

This seems to be a common question. Why does everyone seem to think I have the fucking answers?!

I don't have them anymore than you do, but I'm gonna have to find some.

According to Justin, there is dissonance in the Ciudad de Monstruos...discord & fear. Our safe haven, where those who were different could flourish & thrive...is in a state of panic.

No one knows why parts of the city have crumbled into nothingness. Creatures who've always been allies are turning on one another without provocation. Even more are simply gone. Those that remain seem to be slipping through the cracks more & more often...seeking shelter in other realms. There are probably more of us here, in your world, than I'd realized....

.....

I remember our city in all it's splendor. The Festival of Darkness in the Ciudad...

I'd walk through the cobble stone streets, lined with burning torches & tiny stryngs of electric lights....the smell of meat roasting on spits opening your nostrils...

Music in the air--the sounds of stringed instruments & pounding, thrumming drums moving your feet through the street. & the sights--there was so much to see, you couldn't take it all in. Trinkets & talismans, adventures & stories to be told. Creatures of all ilk...feathered, spined, & spiked....winged, & stone, air-bourne & amphibious alike...cavorting & dancing under the night sky.

One moment could stretch on endlessly; you could get lost in it. Never to return. I did once...but that's all gone now.

Justin tells me the streets are empty now. There is no more dancing....

Tonight I feel eyes all around me. I haven't heard from the boy--who calls himself "Ch1M3Ra"--in several days. I wonder if he fares well. I hope so...

I watch the shadows above me with guarded eyes. The stone gargoyles all seem so still. & then one seems to shift restlessly, just a fraction...He ruffles his wings, spreads them, & leaps from his perch, diving into the clouds...

Is he friend or foe?

I shift into a raven--& the transition is seamless. I take to the sky myself, & trail him distantly...

Or so I think--until another pounces on me from above. The weight of the gargoyle drags me down, plummeting to the earth. His claws tear at me & I let out a screech. Black feathers scatter, & I struggle in his grasp. Out sized & outmatched, I shift again--into a dragonfly, & slip between his claws. Just in the nick of time.

Unable to slow himself in time, the gargoyle crashes headlong into the pavement. I hear the screeching of tires & distant screams as I flutter ever higher.

But I can hear rustling wings from all directions. They're masked by clouds...

The sky is teeming with gargoyles tonight...