Plurk paste

♱ REVERBERATE .𖥔˖

He stood where the light always found him—center stage, haloed by a sun that never looked my way. I used to think it was the gods who favored him, the way the people clung to his words as if they were prophecy. And maybe they were. Everything he said sounded like truth, even when I knew it was dust wrapped in gold leaf.

I watched him all my life. Not by choice, but because my life was shaped around his. From the moment I could walk, he was already running, already adored. I hated him for it. Or maybe I hated that I loved him despite it. It's hard to tell the difference when you're made of contradictions.

The oracle warned him once. Said the days would bleed. He laughed, loud enough to hush the wind, and I laughed too, like I always did. But I watched the shadows grow longer that day. I counted the steps he took away from me.

We were born from different wombs, but I used to think our souls came from the same storm. He taught me how to make beauty out of pain, how to bleed into words and call it art. And I loved him for it. Gods, I did. I still do.

But love is a complicated thing. It sours when left in the sun too long, when you realize you're not the painter but the paint. The muse, never the hand. The whisper behind the roar. They never saw me. Not really. Only as a reflection of him.

Sometimes I wonder if it was ever envy, or just a longing to be whole. To be seen. To feel the weight of a name not borrowed or inherited, but earned. And I did want to help him, at first. To hold his hand as we lifted Rome from the ash and flame.

But then the dreams came. Red ones. Sharp. And I woke with my hands aching for something more than poetry. Something final. Something that would make the world say my name without his echo riding on its back.

The blade is not the end. It is a beginning. A brushstroke. A hymn. He will die a legend, and I—well, I will live in the pause after his story. I will be the silence that speaks louder.

I never wanted his crown. I wanted his gravity. And tonight, with the stars burning like open eyes, I will carve my name into the spine of fate. Not as a traitor. Not as a brother.

But as the weight that made the world turn.