They Will Not Love Me, You Say?

But The Real Enemy Is The Cold. It Steals Up On You Quieter Than Will, And At First You Shiver And Your Teeth Chatter And You Stamp Your Feet And Dream Of Mulled Wine And Nice Hot Fires. It Burns, It Does. Nothing Burns Like The Cold. But Only For A While. Then It Gets Inside You And Starts To Fill You Up, And After A While You Don't Have The Strength To Fight It. It's Easier Just To Sit Down Ot Go To Sleep. They Say You Don't Feel Any Pain Toward The End. First You Go Weak And Drowsy, And Everything Starts To Fade, And Then It's Like Sinking Into A Sea Of Warm Milk. Peaceful, Like.

Speak The Name, And Death Will Come. On The Morrow, At The Turn Of The Moon, A Year From This Day, It Will Come. A Man Does Not Fly Like A Bird, But One Foot Moves And Then Another And One Day A Man Is There.

So Many Vows … They Make You Swear And Swear. Defend The King. Obey The King. Keep His Secrets. Do His Bidding. Your Life For His. But Obey Your Father. Love Your Sister. Protect The Innocent. Defend The Weak. Respect The Gods. Obey The Laws. It’s Too Much. No Matter What You Do, You’re Forsaking One Vow Or Another.

I Had These Cheap Alien Toys And I Made Up Stories For Them. They Were Space Pirates. They Didn’t Have Names So I Made Up Names. These Were The First Stories I Wrote. Even As A Little Kid I Was Thinking About Torture.

Sam Loved To Listen To Music And Make His Own Songs, To Wear Soft Velvets, To Play In The Castle Kitchen Beside The Cooks, Drinking In The Rich Smells As He Snitched Lemon Cakes And Blueberry Tarts. His Passions Were Books And Kittens And Dancing, Clumsy As He Was.