Statues

This is unedited, it's like 5am, I'm tired, needed to write it, and I have not yet decided how it will end, but it was starting to get repetitive. Enjoy anyway.

Inspired from this and this.

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Coming from a small house with open windows that was perched on a ledge was the sound of soft music. The music was created from windchimes, birds and the sound of the softly plucked strings of a harp. Though a modestly sized house it was richly appointed with an artist's crafts. Paints, stones, marbles, all manner of canvases and eisels gave life and breath taking color to every room.

One room especially was lavishly appointed with riches and things that did not suit the rest of the house. A sunken floor in the middle of the room, a row of windows for a full view of the beautiful lands, and instruments of strange craft and polished wood and other materials, perched carefully and gleaming in the sunlight. Sitting on a large and well-patterned pillow in the center of the room was a beautiful young woman, her dark brunette hair pulled back and teased into an intricate knot; her honey eyes lowered and painted with the hues of the rainbow; her pleasing mouth and slim waist. She was dressed in a series of expensive and carefully crafted clothing and she wore incredibly detailed jewelry from her head to her ankles. Perched next to her was a harp of which there was no comparison: its dark marble bow with the head of a silver dove and its golden strings, so fine and elegantly crafted they were nearly invisible, and as her fingers floated along the music that came from it was so ethereal she seemed a muse incarnate.

He called her Airlia. When Dimitri woke in the morning, he roused her from her sleep to play for him. Only after he had finished his daily work and gone to sleep would he allow her to attend to her own needs, so needy for her music was he. As an artist he found himself very particular about his habits. He could not paint, sculpt or design without Airlia's music.

Dimitri had struggled as an artist, traveling on foot to sell his wonderful, but lacking, pieces. He had no home of his own and hardly any currency to pay for the week's meal. Until he heard Airlia playing a silly tune on a flute, wandering in the woods while playing a game. When he heard her play he took out his sketchbook and began drawing. So full of creativity he was, when his charcoal had crumbled, he used the colors of the earth itself to paint on his parchment. He had never sold so much in one day, when he presented his art to the town in the late afternoon.

He sought her out in the woods again, and this time he snatched her away. She did not protest, being mute, but she was wide-eyed and and youthful, and knew no better. He took her to her modest home days away and gave her his old work room, using the rest of his house. His only condition was that she play any instrument. At first she wore rags and played the wooden flute he'd heard. But as Dimitri's sketches sold, he was able to buy paints and canvas. When those sold, he was able to afford bigger paints and canvases, and then stone and chisel, and then marble. With this, he had to travel, in order to sell. To keep Airlia where she was, he told her that should she ever leave the confines of his home, a witch would find her and slay her on the spot.

Youthful Airlia knew no better, and nodded. She was fed and taken care of, and had no reason to leave, assuming that one day her family would come to see her themselves. While Dimitri was away, she would only sit and watch the trees blowing in the wind, listening to the chatter rise from the town below. She listened to silence.

Whenever he returned, with more money as always, he always brought a gift. A mandolin, a new outfit, gorgeous jewelry, pretty flowers, treats for her to eat, and all manner of things, until the small, empty space that was once splattered with paint and charcoal became a living shrine for her. Dimitri could never move into a larger home, in order to keep the allusion that she was trapped fresh in her mind.

He had brought her a solid gold harp meant to rest in her lap. No matter what instrument he brought her she understood it and played it without thinking. The harp she delighted in, and one day he brought her the dark, gold-touched instrument with the invisible strings, and she longer played the other instruments he had given to her.

Dimitri had painted her picture a dozen times, but never sold them, and never showed them to her. He would sit a room away and watch her play, painting or sketching. He did this from every angle, and kept them all hidden away.

Dimitri lived like this for many years with Airlia. As a true artist he never sought to corrupt her or steal her innocence. His interest was only in using her as a muse and he feared her so delicate that should he ever advance towards her, the spell would shatter and he would become penniless again. It became difficult with her growing beauty, made all the more so because her skin was as milky as pure white stone, her cheeks with only a hint of rogue. He would delight in her interest in the small packs of kohl he would bring her, and knew that as he slept, she used the moonlight to apply it. Thus he brought her more. From the deepest of red roses to the brightest of shimmering purples, and she used them all, pleased to have pleased him every morning and night.

It was when Dimitri returned home to find Airlia's harp laying lifeless on the pillow she used to sit at, the rest of the house empty. This was when Airlia was well into womanhood, and Dimitri was heartbroken and a fool.

He began sculpting. He had more riches than he could consider, and he had only kept her around because of her company. Aside of Airlia, he was just a lonely man, and without her he felt he was nothing. Though his talent was there, his work lacked something without his muse's music to fuel him.

Sculpted anyway, he did. He attempted Airlia. Months of work, and he could never quite get the face right; the body shape was too plump, the lips too thin, the eyes too wide and the hair of a blonde rather than a brunette.He sculpted anyway, finding the stone warming to his every touch, the facial features shifting ever so slightly whenever he looked away and back.

The statue had grown fond of Dimitri, and as he tended to every curve of her body, every facet of her being, she felt her heart begin to beat, her smooth, white stone skin prickle at his touch, and she wished to speak but she had no voice, and only ears. She heard him murmur her name softly, "Galatea", hum tunes, whisper lullabies to himself and she yearned to sing to him, to play one of the beautiful instruments that sat gathering shimmering dust in the sunroom.

When Dimitri slept she would stretch her arms and touch her hair, but she could never leave her plinth, even though she had ten round and plump toes to wiggle around. Her heels would never lift all the way.

The day Dimitri declared her hopeless and gazed sadly at her face, setting her aside in a dark corner of his workroom, Galatea could feel her heart break. She watched as he created other statues like her, slaving away to recreate his beloved Airlia.

It was years of watching him, hoping he would notice her. He had forgotten her presence entirely, and while he sold the other statues that had some likeness to her, more or less, she was left alone in the corner, occasionally dusted off, but never touched like he once had.

But at last, after years of waiting, Airlia appeared. The white stone did her no justice. The rosy cheeks, the dark lips and honey eyes, the soft brunette hair. But it resembled her, and when she had emerged, Dimitri had stopped to weep. He crafted her so elegantly, so carefully, it took him almost a full year to finish it. He settled her arms and body in such a way that, when he was finally done, he laid down to rest in her arms, and on her stone bosom. He wept then, too, and begged aloud for her to only play something for him, anything! He placed the dark, lovely harp in her arms, cradling it as her statue had cradled him, and begged for her to play. But nothing happened.

Galatea, heart broken and now sick with jealousy and all manner of feelings, could not stand to watch it any longer. This aging, handsome man weeping over the statue of a lost loved one, when she was there, ready to give him all the love her being contained, and more! When Dimitri had finally fallen asleep, Galatea reached and retrieved a chisel, and began to chisel her being apart. By morning, she was much worse off.

It was then that Dimitri took notice of the stone bits all over the floor. He muttered over the mess, and then noticed that Galatea was missing pieces. He touched her ruined face and dragged her from her corner into better light, and settled her before Airlia. While he worked to smooth her over and fix her features, the same as before, he would speak with Airlia, and sometimes plea for her to play a song for him, just one more.

Though his heart was with Airlia, his attention and hands were on Galatea, who had missed the warmth they brought. Every night, Galatea would retrieve the chisel and ruin some other part of her being, until at last Dimitri had repaired her to the size of grown woman's hand. So small was she, he set her on the table next to his tools.

Every day Dimitri would beg the statue of Airlia to play him a song. He would polish Galatea and her, and care for them both, but neither every spoke back.