light and dark

The wind whipped around the board, a veritable fortress buttressing the embankments. The men were hollow shadows of themselves, skin straining to stretch over their bodies. The board was glowing with an energy that could only be described as purple. You looked too close or too long at it, and you would be taken into the throes of madness. Would descend into something close to despair and destruction. Look too closely at the board, and you would see a throbbing power, you would see sounds, you would hear the green and yellow, and red, and purple dancing and intermingling. You would smell the ground beneath your feet, and your nostrils would feel the gravel underneath. Would feel the sand whipping around. Fire would be heard as it burned you. Thunder would be smelled as it roared. Madness would descend upon you, gripping onto you tightly. Tighter and tighter, tighter and tighter. Until naught remained but an empty shell. As it was, the shadows that had been watching the board had dispersed. They could not handle the madness either. The sounds cracked through the air like whips of thunder. Each piece being placed on the board, no matter how gentle, no matter how softly, though it was neither, each piece being placed on the board caused the sounds to echo like yodelling in a canyon, like shouting in a caved tunnel. Loud, echoing, sharp. The two men playing were not immune to the awesome power of the board or the forces or whatever it was. Their hands and feet were worn down, aged by many thousands of lines, lines that were so many in number, that their hands seemed sliced very finely, or made of sand. Their faces too were marked by lines like infinite scars. Their eyes still sharp and shining. Their noses made more prominent by the fact that the skin around them had sunk deeper into their faces, cheekbones showing, skin everywhere had sunk further into their bodies, hiding, a recluse. Hair was brittle, and felt it would be blown away any second. By the constant flashes of thunder, it would be shown to be white. Bones peeking out through skin. They were only alive by the power of the board, and once this was done, the prophecy told that they would fall down. Dead. No more. Fade away, like dust. Falling down would be the first sign for the earth to rend itself apart. Mountains would crumble like dust, lightless, weightless. Seas would burn. The sun would be covered by shadow. The moon would crack in half. The end would be upon them, the earth destroying itself. That was what they fought for. That was the battle being played out over the board. And still it did not seem that one was besting the other. Light and dark fight one another in a very intricate, very precise dance. They are symbiotic creatures, synergetic forces. Everything comes together as one. Light and dark are two forces born of the same mother, nursed by the same milk.