Authors: Rhiannon Paille
Villains (23 page)
Chapter 3
The land was nothing but an icy mass stretched across what used to be homes, fields, villages, lakes, and seas. Gajan couldn’t feel anything but the hunger, the smell of white smoke on the air, like burnt apples, sweet but bitter. The swarm did nothing but eat and with every soul Gajan took he felt lighter, different, less burdened by a past he could no longer remember. It was easier letting memories fly into the air like flocks of birds traveling south. All his memories were in the south, some place far from his current form where they couldn’t hurt him anymore.
The soul Morgana fed him hurt. Visions compacted themselves into his brain, words turned to mush and he forgot everything about the soul as it added its white matter to the mass. He wasn’t sure where it went once it was contained within him, but these were mindful things and he had no use for the mind.
They were descending again, being pulled out of the sky like little winks of waves on the ocean, one minute there and the next gone. Gajan didn’t know how that worked, being in one place at one time and then somewhere else, but when Morgana beckoned, the swarm found her.
The sound of an explosion jarred Gajan back to the charred land below him. He swooped around and around the stone building, watching fire spread with awe. As far as he knew this was the first fire he had ever seen and yet it felt familiar, the way the explosions reverberated in his form, the way rocks and debris found the sky, the way flames climbed higher and higher until they faded into black smoke, forming dark clouds overhead.
He felt the few souls inside but they weren’t dying, they were running. Anything alive made Gajan curious; since he hadn’t seen anyone alive in…he couldn’t tell how much time had passed.
Come to me my pets,
Morgana crooned.
Gajan was jolted out of his stupor, finding the little girl standing in the field far enough away from the blast. Someone limped towards her, his gait uneven, his hair slicked back into a long ponytail. He wore black trousers and a ratty black tunic, the edges frayed. Gajan felt nauseous, an instinctual longing to be nearer to the man ricocheting through him. Gajan felt himself falling out of the sky but there was no such thing as impact. He smelled tar, smoke and blood on Morgana’s hands as she petted his form, her voice soothing and sensual. He couldn’t make out what she was saying as the man squeezed his fist and his body shuddered, seeming to be transparent for a second before it reappeared, solid.
Morgana’s laughter filled the air and Gajan wanted to recoil but her hand was fixed on his tendrils and he felt paralyzed to her side. He tried to understand the distinct urge to vomit, mixed with a deep hatred he had no right to feel. As the man coughed, the feeling only put Gajan on guard.
You will like this, my pet,
Morgana sneered, her voice ringing through him like needles piercing his mind. He slipped a little, surrendering to her will. Morgana began clapping, the blood on her hands smacking together, stray iron drops suspended in the air until they fell. Morgana kicked up the mud, sending clumps of it in the man’s direction and he let out a battle cry, low and menacing.
Gajan didn’t like this at all.
He wanted to be fed, he couldn’t be fed here. All he felt was the crushing sense of nauseous churning his insides and he wanted the sky and smoke to numb all the hunger and cold in him. The other man fell on his knees and Morgana skipped around him.
That made him dizzy.
He wanted to hate Morgana, but she provided everything he needed, she owned him.
“Awake! Awake! You have many things to do, Tor,” Morgana sneered.
He had a name, Tor. Gajan was stuck on that for awhile, running the name over and over in his mind, hoping he could remember him; remember why Tor made him feel so sick.
Tor shot her a mangled look. “Where are the others? Have you summoned them to this duel as well?”
Morgana shifted towards Tor and sent a low pulse through the land. Gajan felt it quake through him, some kind of warning. “You think this is a duel?”
“There’s no other reason to attack my compound and pull me into this forsaken wasteland is there?” Tor countered.
Morgana tsked. “You are much too old to fight me, Tor. Have you any dust left?”
Tor righted himself. “I have enough to end you.”
Morgana laughed. “You have nothing…”
Gajan cringed as the rumble became a pounding, snarling and whinnying hitting the air with a myriad of crescendos. Morgana began whispering some kind of incantation under her breath but the words were slurred and reminded Gajan of clouds. He felt himself being tossed on the breeze, moving from one place to another with subordination, finding sustenance in the darkest of places. He thought he heard a bone crack as Tor fell to one knee, and the ripple effect washed over him, turning everything that was once demonic into something else—human.
Morgana neared him and Gajan tasted swamp water on her mouth. Morgana leaned in, so close to Tor that Gajan smelled the leather, salt and metal on him. “Bring me the Amethyst Flame.”
Gajan was lost in those three little words. The Amethyst Flame. Vertigo turned the sky to a series of black spots as he fought to stay awake. He couldn’t pass out; he couldn’t go back to that place. There were more, dozens more souls than there had been the last time. He couldn’t let them take this too, whatever this was. It was at the edge of his memory but he couldn’t pull it towards him. The Amethyst Flame, it meant something, it was something to him.
But what?
Tor swung but she darted away, flitting gleefully through the mud, cackling laughter rising between snarling beasts. “You expect your small minded tricks to work on me, Morgana?”
The little girl stopped in her tracks and whirled. “My tricks have already worked. Go on Tor, try to escape, try to transport.”
Gajan looked at the smirk on Morgana’s face as Tor clenched and unclenched his fist, the sheer embarrassment and shock crossing his leathery features. Tor belonged to Morgana too, and Gajan hoped she would be kinder to him. The pounding and rumbling seemed to fade as Tor’s humanity took hold, everything about what he used to be seemed nonexistent. It made Gajan feel slightly better, but it didn’t cure the hole where his heart used to be, the crackling feeling to envelope something—someone—in his arms too impossible to ignore. He wanted the sky more than ever, unable to understand why Tor had such an effect on him.
“What treachery is this?” Tor demanded. Gajan smiled to himself, Morgana had defeated him—made him hers, like she made the swarm hers. He was nothing but a simple pawn. She seemed so innocent for someone so dangerous.
Morgana lingered until she spoke many moments later. “A trap, a trap, you’ve fallen prey to the spider and she’s got you in her web. Find the thing the spider needs and you’ll be free. Find it not and forever will you walk the earth—a human until the apocalypse.”
Tor growled. “Do you think you’ve taken anything that truly matters to me?”
Morgana scoffed. “I’ve taken everything else.”
Tor turned and Gajan felt the rest of the swarm hit the ground, taking on human forms like seasoned veterans. Gajan felt more like a wolf at Morgana’s side, he wasn’t skilled enough to emulate human forms.
“Do you truly think you’ll find them both?” Morgana called after him.
Tor stopped and Gajan felt the air change. It smelled like rain, soot and flesh. “I’ll find your wayward Horsemen, but the Flame is gone.”
That word again, that name—Flame. Gajan went to follow Tor but Morgana restrained him. He wanted to reach out—Tor knew the Flame, he knew where it went, and Gajan wanted it more than he wanted wispy white smoke. He whinnied and a loud screech erupted from his form, Morgana’s bloodied hand gripping his form hard.
Don’t forget who your master is,
she hissed.
Gajan’s screech died, but the hole in his form only expanded as Tor became a small speck on the horizon and his only chance of recovering his memories, of knowing why he wanted the Flame, went with him.
***
Chapter 4
Morgana kept him on little strings for an incomprehensible amount of days and summers all blending into each other. She forced him into battlefields, his will to resist the white smoke becoming weaker and weaker. He tried to tell himself he shouldn’t be gluttonous, that there was a reason not to devour souls, but no matter how much he reasoned with himself the hunger won and he poured liquid sunshine through his form, savoring the sweet, tangy flavor until it dwindled down and the retching, horrifying hunger returned.
The land changed so quickly after the ice cleared and civilizations rose up around it, pyramids in the desert and slaves mining for gold and jewels. He followed the setting sun, existing in dark places between days, the death toll and bloodshed enough for him to stay giddy on white matter for days. Fragmented pieces of other people’s lives played behind his eyes, an endless monotony of battle strategies, agriculture techniques and greed for gold, adding to the hoard inside his form.
He didn’t let himself pass out a second time.
Passing out was the only thing he feared as a Vulture. It didn’t mean death, or non existence, but it meant facing himself, facing the souls he had stolen from Terra, the Lands Across the Stars. It meant seeing their angry faces and accepting their blunt force trauma, their fingernails digging into the flesh of the man he used to be, gouging out his eyes, ripping out his tongue, searing his bones to ash. He couldn’t be what he was and accept the backlash of consequences that came from getting too lost and falling prey to that awful dark chamber.
He rumbled over the land, a series of sage bushes and cacti amidst oily slick dirt and upturned green onions, carrots and potatoes. The village was a wasteland, people screaming and running, fire skating across their homes as men on horses adorned in enough gold for two lifetimes slashed at them with swords.
Morgana never tired of men that slaughtered other men.
She sat by the shadows, skipping, whirling and clapping, singing songs that wafted through the air with trepidation. Most of the people were too busy dying to pay attention to her, but Gajan felt her inside his mind, tugging on those strings, keeping him in line. His form passed through that of a man on fire and he braced himself for the feeling of charcoal across his lungs, smoke inside his mouth, and the crack, pop and sizzle in his eyes before they went blind.
The man fell and Gajan entered his sternum, pulling all the white matter out before it wafted to the sky. He devoured the soul before it had a chance to die and Gajan was sick on the saccharine taste of it. The body burned until the bones were blackened, skin and muscle wrapped around it like tar. He rose out of the body, noticing the village had grown quiet. The swarm had left and Morgana with them. Gajan was alone. He went to follow but stopped, contemplating his next move.
He turned, forcing his form to mimic feet, hands, and walked in the opposite direction down a washed out muddy road, nothing but trees and grayish black sky in the distance. He walked for a long time and realized he could have transported or flew, but those disorienting methods made him too dizzy and for once he wanted time—time to live inside the man’s memory.
He had a daughter, beautiful thing with blonde hair and crystal blue eyes, fair skin and a tight smile. She wore an angelic beige dress with blue bodice. She was helpful in the fields, and stables, and there wasn’t a boy that didn’t want her. The man was reluctant to give her away, waiting for the right one to come along. Gajan didn’t remember the girl in the village, he would have remembered it if he had taken someone like her. He flipped back to the man’s memories, a last picturesque view of the girl being carted off by one of the barbarians clad in gold playing across his mind. The man was defeated, he couldn’t fight the men and if he tried he’d lose his life in the process.
A summer later the same men returned and burned the village to the ground, taking all the fresh vegetables and anything of value. The man was set ablaze and there was Gajan, a reflection of himself in the man’s eyes, this night storm, something the man couldn’t fathom and couldn’t help but scream about as fire rolled along his clothes, searing his body to ash. He would have begged Gajan not to take him if he could have, but by the time Gajan entered his body, the man didn’t have words left in him.
Gajan stumbled across the land, through the forest, emerging near a stream. He hovered across it like it was nothing and pushed through tangled branches. He couldn’t feel Morgana anymore, or the rest of the swarm, their screeches and high pitched squeals were something that haunted him. He was about to give up when he heard a whip crack and stepped in line with a large stone wall overhead a sprawling city. He’d never seen anything so vast, carved out sand castles for building stretching to the horizon. The best and worst thing was the sunrise. He couldn’t remember the last time he had seen the sun and he thought it would do things to him, adverse things, but when it hit him it was like a crescendo lighting up his form with a thousand sparks. It didn’t feel good by a long shot, the hunger crunched into the crevices of his form, the souls he had trapped inside himself begging for freedom, their voices a cacophonic slur against the wild braying alarm the sun had become. The whip cracked again and he eased over the sandy stone ledge, falling. A cold chill caked the ground in a thin sheet of frost, but Gajan ignored it as he trailed the streets, men in leather and armor, women in fine dresses, children in scrubby tunics and breeches playing with wooden swords.
This was a life he missed.
This was a life he wanted back.
Something pressed at the edge of his memory that made him feel heavy. He tried to grab it but it crumpled in his makeshift palms and faded into the nothingness inside him. He was nothing, he’d never have this—he’d never be alive again. He wended through the labyrinth-like city, tall stone walls branching into courtyards with ivy trellises, fountains and private quarters held behind sheets or strings of beads. It reminded him of somewhere that once felt like home but also felt like a distant star.
The whip cracked again and he found them, the sparring ring, two boys in their early teenage years circling one another, the adjudicator on the sidelines cracking the whip and yelling orders in a language that felt wrong on Gajan’s tongue. The boys struck one another repeatedly with wooden swords until one of the sharper wooden sides of the blade slid along the other boy’s bicep, bright red blood trickling down his skin. The adjudicator called the match, but it wasn’t with fanfare. He tossed a cloth at the wounded boy while Gajan’s mouth watered at the blood. He was catapulted back to the bramble castle, to Morgana’s bloodied hand and the smoke rising out of it—Ambrose. Glittering white, bruised sand castles and tanned men with dark beards—a girl with a tangle of black hair and fair skin, emerald green eyes. Aulises.
He almost fell, feeling the wall behind him. As shapeless and weightless as his form was he couldn’t pass through anything solid. He tumbled along the wall until he found an opening and raced through the streets wanting solace from this ugly monster he had become. He wanted to forget all the things he used to know because they caused him more pain than hunger, than cold.
He fetched up against a doorway and wanted to retch but he wasn’t corporeal. Horror etched across his face as he looked up and found himself in what could only be called the private chambers of a peasant. A young warrior laid on the bed, the wound on his leg festering with what Gajan knew would become white matter. It was leaking out of him as he died and Gajan, too weak from the ordeals he had been through, crossed the floor and covered the boy in his dark storm, knowing he only had moments before death.
The woman in the corner of the room gasped as the man took in a shuddering final breath and let it out. Gajan folded himself into the center of the man’s chest, reaching in for every bit of white matter he could gorge himself on. The women shrieked as Gajan lost himself inside the pulsing quake of a heartbeat, blood coursing through veins, the body fighting to live despite the soul being spent. Gajan struggled but the body captured him in its iron talon-grip and he gasped in a breath—a real breath out of lungs that didn’t belong to him.
He opened his eyes, inside the body of the warrior, a woman with light brown hair and soft brown eyes staring at him with awe. She beamed, the grin spreading from ear to ear and clasped her hands together, a slur of words Gajan didn’t understand falling out of her mouth. She ducked out of the room, shaking the beads covering the door and Gajan tried to stand but failed, falling face first on the floor.
The impact was enough to bring back every memory he lost.
His name was Krishani.
And everything that had happened was her fault.
Kaliel.
He let out a roar as the carousel of images bombarded him, her shy face behind the waterfall, her tear filled eyes the moment the Vultures took him. All her whispers and all her sweet nothings and all her destruction from one terrifying explosion to the final apocalypse that turned the land to ice.
It filled him with hate.
Pure hatred.
He wanted to find the girl and strangle the life out of her for the way she thrust him into the arms of Morgana and made him her puppet. He seethed, wanting nothing more than to destroy the vile Amethyst Flame. He remembered everything and it burned through his core, igniting every one of the souls he had stolen, forcing guilt and anger to trace outlines along his form. He gasped as the body snapped, a white light lancing across his temples as he exploded out of the body.
Krishani braced himself on the doorjamb, beads knocking together like they were being played by the wind and before anyone detected him he fled into the sky, leaving the horrifying thought of the girl he used to love as far behind him as he could.
The swarm was angry. Morgana was angry. When they found Krishani in the sky he was trying desperately to keep the things he didn’t want to forget and forget the things he didn’t want to know. Neither of those things was easy to do. The swarm called for him, using the only name they knew. “Gajan,” their hoarse whispers hit him and he recoiled, hating the name that had become his.
“I’m not—” he began but he couldn’t finish the sentence because he couldn’t remember his name.
***