Thief of Souls
Authors: Neal Shusterman
15. D
OCTOR
D
OOM AND
N
URSE
H
ATCHET
For Brian Pellar, who always reminds me to question reality
“Beware; don't whistle, talk, or laugh into the night. Night eyes are upon you. Guard your soul with light and fear, for you know not what evil lurks in the blackness of that which is, and isn't.”
âH
UALAPAI
S
AYING
Kingdom Gone
F
OUR SHACKLES
. C
HAINS POUNDED INTO GRANITE BY THE BLOWS OF THE
blacksmith's hammer.
They wouldn't kill himâfor they didn't think it possibleâso instead, they left him to suffer in agony, stretched across the face of an unfeeling mountain, forever facing east.
The harsh Mediterranean sun would rise day after day, year after year, over the island where he was chained, bronzing his ruined skin, and heating his blood until he felt it would boil through his veins. Then, at night, the mountain face would cool, draining the heat from his splayed body as the cold wind passed. The fire of day and the chill of night had taken every measure of his energyâbut it had not taken his life. He was not an immortal being, as his imprisoners believed him to be. In fact, death would have been the easier choiceâbut instead he kept himself alive by the sheer force of his will, and year to year measured the passing time by the steady pounding of waves on the shore below.
Each day, in the hours of twilight, the birds would come. They would pick at him as if he were a corpse, and his only defense was his anguished wail. The chains made sure of that. No amount of struggling could tear his arms or legs free from the anchors that held him tight to the stone.
Then at night, when the birds left, he would will himself to heal, refusing to dieârefusing to reveal his own mortality to his captors, who still reveled in the palace far above.
With each sunrise his fury grewâbut rather than letting it weaken him, he shaped his anger, and gave it focus. Then he would impel that anger deep into the heart of the mountain. He was a being of profound strength and spirit, and could accomplish such an incredible thing as feeding his anger to the mountain. He was far superior to the high-primates that infested the Earthâsuperior even to the twelve who dared call themselves gods. He had come to the Earth as a bringer of light. He had gathered The Twelve when they were nothing more than awkward human youths from distant, backward lands. He was the one who had shown The Twelve how to destroy the dark titans that had latched on to each of their bright souls. He had even offered them wisdom from beyond the bounds of this universe, and all he asked in return was that they keep his appetite sated. Yet in spite of all he had done for them, they chose to repay him by shackling him to the mountainside. If there was any goodness in him, it had been maimed by his years of suffering, leaving behind a sinewy scar of evil. And he had learned to wear that scar well.
He knew there was a way out of this hell they had created for him.
If he could survive long enough, his anger would provide him an escape.
Through thirty years of bondage, he forced his anger into the pit of the mountain, seeing in his mind the dense levels of strata that plugged the mouth of the silent volcano. He picked at that stone with his fury, creating tiny fractures in the volcanic rock . . .
. . . until the day he finally made it erupt.
After years of waiting, the eruption was sudden, quick and violentâthe mountain shook with the force of a thousand earthquakes. Immense boulders sailed across the sea and toward the mainland with the force of the explosions.
Still his shackles held.
He heard a boulder pounding down the mountain above him, but couldn't crane his neck far enough to see it. It hurtled past, for a moment eclipsing the bright sun, before crashing into the Mediterranean below.
Then he felt himself move. It wasn't just the shaking of the mountainâit was something more. He felt himself begin to list forward. The force of the boulder smashing past had fractured the stone face of the mountain! The wall of rock behind him heaved and fell forward.
The sky and Earth switched places, and switched again as he tumbled, still chained to the careening stone, certain it would take a wrong bounce and crush himâbut instead the falling stone cartwheeled him down the side of the mountain and to the rocky shore, where the immense chunk of granite shattered into a thousand pieces against the jagged rocks that surrounded the entire island of Thira.
Waist-deep in the water, he pulled his hands and legs free from the pulverized stone. The heavy shackles still encircled his ankles and wrists, but now they anchored him to nothing but air.
Far, far above, the sky burned as lava spat forth from the bowels of the Earth, threatening the great summer palace high on the mountainside. It was a citadel of splendor, carved from the stone of the mountain itself, even more extravagant than the palace on Olympus, where The Twelve wintered. He had taught them how to create such a glorious placeâas he had taught them so many things. Now that he was free, it was time for the twelve star-shards on the mountain who called themselves gods to pay their debt to him in full.
He set his sights on the great palace, and hobbling on feet ruined from thirty years in shackles, he climbed toward the home of the so-called gods.
H
UMAN SLAVES AND SERVANTS
scattered wildly, paying him no heed as he hobbled across the grand marble courtyard, his chains dragging on the smooth stone. It was then that he caught sight of the beasts. They were all around. Strange miscreations that had no business on Earth. Something that was half man, half horse galloped clumsily down the palace steps. A winged lion with the talons of a falcon clawed at the wooden door, flapping its wings. The sight of these things inspired his rage to new heights. No doubt these creatures were forged by the hands of the blacksmithâwhose talent for shaping flesh and bone must have progressed over the years. But the smith wasn't the only one whose powers had matured. In fact, all around the courtyard was evidence of The Twelve's supernatural abilities. Black scars in the stone spoke of their lightning tempers. Statuary that was human flesh turned to stone filled the grounds, their limbs and necks broken by the shaking of the mountain. A great golden mural attested to the shifting shape of the Kingâhuman to eagle, to tiger, and back again.
To see this place, one would think the so-called gods had been here for eons, instead of a mere thirty years. To glimpse their powers now, one would think they sprang full-grown from the heavens and seas. No doubt the ignorant masses of Earth were already spinning tales that implicated The Twelve in the very creation of the universe. And all because they were lucky enough to be born filled with the luminous soul of a shattered star. What would the masses think if they knew these gods they worshipped were born to the same race as themselves, only forty-five years before?
It had been an amusing-enough diversion to take these twelve, and set them above the rest of mankindâbut a diversion was all it was supposed to be. He had not foreseen them turning on him as they had. Now, in the intervening years, their powers had grown unchecked, swelling wildly out of control. They were weeds and, like all weeds, had to be torn out at the root.
An arch collapsed behind him as he crossed into the great hall. He barely flinched, for his mind was focused now. Time was short and the task immense. He could not be sidetracked.
He descended a narrow set of stairs toward the forge, as the shaking mountain settled to a slow rumble.
There, in the dungeonlike cavern of the forge, he found the blacksmith, cowering from the heaving force of the mountain. On the table lay the bronze form of a new creation: a hideous thing with snakes growing from its skull, like hair. It did not yet live, its metal not yet turned to flesh by the hand of the smith.
All around were living monstrosities in cages. Creatures clearly too vile to be set free on the island. The cages shook and rattled with the rumble of the erupting volcano. Seeing this place made it clear that this day of reckoning had been too long in coming.
“Hephaestus,” he called out to the cowering blacksmith. The blacksmith stood, a full six foot five, but still as hideously ugly as he had been at fifteen . . . on the day Hephaestus had shackled his teacher to the mountain. All that talent in shaping flesh, yet the homely blacksmith did not have the power to change his own unattractive features.
“Prometheus!” wailed Hephaestus. It was a name The Twelve had given him.
Forethought. Premeditation.
As if he were the divine embodiment of some greater plan. He abided the name, as it served his purposes, although he much preferred to be called
the Bringer,
for he had brought them all into the glory which they now abused.
The Bringer looked with scorn on the snarling, caged teratisms. “Thirty years of practice, and these monsters are the best you can create? How can you call yourself a smith?”