A Toiling Darkness Page 9

  I got up, feeling semi-refreshed and stretched out as I walked over to the kitchen window. Kalen appeared outside a moment later, pulling his jacket tight against him and putting the hood up as a shield against the winds. He turned north on the sidewalk and disappeared around the corner.

  I should have killed him last night. It was the perfect chance as he lay defenseless. So why didn’t I? I even stood over him for half an hour, just staring at him, trying to figure him out. Trying to even get the blood thirst to do it. It never came. I couldn’t kill him. I even mentally came up with a damn pros list in doing it, though there is usually a con’s list that’s supposed to go along with it. The pros definitely outweighed the cons. But I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill him.

  I should have. I so should have done it.

  Then I wouldn’t have to worry about him figuring me out. When I came back last night and watched as he slept defensively in my apartment, he brought back memories. Memories of my mentor and his strong principles.

  Back when I was going by Akhlys and still in Europe while the Middle Ages were in the late stages, El had brought me to a small town where humans worked hard for every piece of food they had. It was a period where lords still existed but were diminishing as towns popped up everywhere and grew. One of the houses was on the outskirts of a town, very decrepit and lonely. We stood in the shadows as we watched through an uncommonly large window as a family settled down for the night.

  The air was clear, pollution having yet to touch the world. It’s amazing how the smell and taste of the air changed so much through the years and especially through the Industrial Revolution. But back then, every breath was like breathing in a whole new life. It was completely clean, no pollutants. The leaves were falling as winter crept up on everyone. Life and death were in the air—the life of the animals as they scurried around, preparing for winter and the death of the leaves and trees as they lost the battle to stay blossomed.

  Farmlands were already being harvested, fields growing empty as the crops were taken. The sun was low on the horizon with only a couple of birds dotting the sky. The temperature was dropping. Wisps of my breath could be seen as I exhaled.

  “Why are we here?” I had asked, in the common French language of that time period. I knew countless languages, both ancient and new. I had to, living for so damn long.

  El looked at me, his greyish-blue eyes cold and calculating. They were the kind of eyes that still came up out of the depths of my memories in moments when he would reprimand me, reminding me who I was and what I should and shouldn’t do. I still didn’t always listen to him, even though his memory has become my subconscious’ figurehead.

  “Just watch them, Melaena,” he replied, using a latin name for dark. He was the only one to call me this and somehow it became a pet name of sorts.

  And so I watched.

  The family was typical enough: a couple with a son and a whole lot of despair around them rooted to losing loved ones, probably children. This particular village had been hit hard with the Bubonic plague, especially the young. From the atmosphere and pain in this family, they were no exception. Looking at the father, I thought the other children were probably lucky, but I knew better to not say it out loud. The remaining family shirked away from the man. He sat at the head of the table while the mother filled their plates with vegetables, bread and whatever meat they were able to scrounge up from hunting, maybe a rabbit.

  The son was only about seven years old and he sat meekly next to his father, staring intently at his plate. The mother moved around cautiously, trying to do her duty as a wife while also seemingly wanting to disappear. Fear permeated the air. The mother and son feared their father.

  I cocked my head as I watched silently. The lighting wasn’t good in the house; they had one candle burning at the table and the fireplace kept only a small fire, just enough to keep the biting of the cold at bay.

  The father tore a piece of bread apart and started eating it, glaring at his wife. She finally sat down and they ate quietly. It had to be one of the most awkward and silent family dinners I’ve ever seen. And fastest. The food was there, then it was gone.

  When they finished, the wife cleared away the plates, nervously tugging on the end of her dirty blonde hair and glancing at her husband and child. She was preparing herself for something that was about to happen, as if whatever it was, was becoming a sort of routine for her.

  “Where’s my mead?” the husband asked loud enough to be heard from where we stood watching. The wife mumbled something about not having any and the man’s face twisted in rage.

  I stiffened as his rage washed over me. I even stopped breathing for a moment. It called to me, taunted me with its sweet and bitter aroma. It was sweet in its possibility but so bitter from its source. I answered that call as I gave in to temptation. The shadows in the room grew dark and daunting, the fire from the hearth dimmed. The wife paled and flinched, the son sat still with his hands in his lap and his head bowed down. He knew the routine, he knew he was trapped between his parents with nowhere to run.

  Even though I was the one darkening their room, the son and mother probably chalked it up to their fear that pounded against their chest and their overactive imagination. Well, in this case it wasn’t too overactive.

  They knew what was coming, knew already how it felt, how their skin would split open for blood to escape, how bones may break or splinter from too much strain and how they may, finally, not be able to come back from the rage that controlled the one man who was supposed to protect them.

  I smiled, tasting their fear and enjoying the flavor.

  The father grew angrier and stood up abruptly, sending his chair tumbling into the wall. The son stayed completely still and refused to move even a muscle, hoping to stay out of his father’s line of sight. The mother backed away as he approached her.

  El shuffled next to me, his whole body rigid as he watched. When I glanced at him, I was expecting him to be watching the scene unfold inside. Instead he was watching me.

  Something in his expression caused my chest to clench. I didn’t like the look, but I was a fighter. I wasn’t going to let El get into my head and make me feel emotions I tossed away long ago. He wanted me to feel compassion for the wife and son. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even feel the guilt I knew he wanted me to feel. It just wasn’t there.

  I turned back to the family, ignoring him, and watched as the man beat his wife to near death. She was cowering on the floor, sobbing and begging for forgiveness as the husband hit her over and over again. All she did was cower and apologize. My nose wrinkled at her weakness. She acted as if the lack of mead was her fault when he was the man of the house. He was the one who was supposed to put food on the table, not her. I did give her credit for at least trying to protect her son from those sharp fists. She kept her husband’s focus on her instead of the child.

  The man mounted his wife and grabbed her head, smashing it once, twice, against the floor. She stopped moving after the second time. The husband leaned back, his chest heaving as he just sat there on his wife’s chest, staring down at her. The woman was barely alive. I used the shadows to reach out and feel the pulse against her neck. It was there, weak and fading. If she didn’t get help, she would die.

  The man stood slowly, the pulsating anger still in him. He cursed fluently enough that even my ears burned. The boy’s ears must have also burned because he finally made a noise and whimpered.

  Damn, he was doing so good staying quiet too. Through the whole ordeal, the boy huddled in a dark corner of the room, wrapping his small, boney arms around his legs, keeping his face tucked into his knees. Knowing his mistake, the boy unfurled and prepared to make a dash for an escape as his father slowly turned to face his son.

  I reached out again and tasted the anger, not liking the new flavor. It was a different kind of anger, leaving a sour bitterness on my tongue. He was blaming the son for something, probably everything.

  “Look what you made me
do?” he yelled.

  Seriously? He was going to blame his son for beating his wife to death. I shook my head, growing disgusted with the whole situation. Why was El showing this to me?

  The son scrambled out of the corner, trying to get away. In seconds, the father caught him and held him against the wall. His small feet kicked around a little as he scratched at his father’s hairy arms to get free. It was all pointless.

  I didn’t want to watch, I just wanted to walk away. It was something I’ve seen enough times. I didn’t need to add to my repertoire of abusive people taking their anger out on children.

  El had different plans.

  The door burst opened before I even had a chance to realize he had reached his boiling point. By the time I walked to the door, El had the man up against the wall. The boy was on the ground, coughing and crawling towards his mother, crying out for her.

  El’s rage was really something. My mentor came from the battlefields. He had fought for whichever side he thought deserved his services and could pay enough. His appearance was that of a middle-aged Swiss man with light brown hair with grey streaks, slanted greyish blue eyes, and a defined jaw line with high cheekbones. He used to be mercenary to the core. Now he just did whatever the hell he wanted. I always got the feeling he was trying to make up for what he did during the wars. Why else would he lug around medicine to hand out to the humans in need.

  The man saw El, tried to fight, and failed miserably. El’s experience became useful when he moved swiftly and with great aim. The man threw punches that relied on power rather than speed and El had more than enough time to dodge and throw in his own punches. I waited for him to use a spell or something, but he didn’t. He just kept throwing punches that hit the man in the guts, face, or chest, with only a couple kicks thrown in there. El danced around the man like a pro, taking every opening he had to inflict pain. The man charged at El and he responded by moving to the side and then shoving him against the wall.

  “You don’t have the right to be a husband or a father, not even a man,” El snarled and tossed his opponent through the window we were peeking through. Since glass was too expensive then, there was nothing to stop him from landing on the grass outside. He stood up and took off without looking back.

  What a great guy.

  I should probably just end his miserable life and do everyone a favor.

  El went for help, leaving me with the two. I simply stood there awkwardly and watched them as the boy tried to wake up his mother, crying. There was nothing I could do anyways. El eventually returned with others behind him and stepped aside as they attended to the family. We slipped out, El bruising my arm with his death grip, while no one was looking. We made our way back to the cabin we’ve been using, El leading the way. Eventually he let go of my arm and I rubbed it as the pain already disappeared along with the bruising.

  The walk was quiet and intense. Neither of us was willing to say anything. I had nothing to say and he appeared too mad to say anything. When we found the path to our little cabin and turned to walk on it, he finally spoke.

  “You felt nothing?” he asked, his body language neutral. Only his eyes showed the depth of his anger, even disappointment. I stayed quiet as I climbed over a fallen tree.

  “What should I have felt?” I finally asked. His lessons could be tiring if not annoying. We had already been together for a couple of months and I was envisioning leaving him. I used to think there was nothing he could teach me, not when I was older than him. I believed I understood life a whole lot better than he did. It took me years to realize how wrong I was. He understood so much more than me, probably still does. To his credit he remembers being a human once, before he was killed and by fate’s magic, became something else. I’m still not even sure what that something else is.

  Me? I never got the displeasure of being a human.

  “Anger, disgust, anything negative?” The small cabin came into sight. I picked up speed wanting to get away from this conversation. He easily kept pace. “Did you?

  I shrugged. “I’ve seen worse—a man beating his family is a common occurrence.”

  “It isn’t nothing when he hurts those around him, especially family.” He sighed. “Melaena, we are powerful, similar to lords. We have a duty—”

  “To protect the weak. I know this already. You tell me nearly twice a day.” At least lords got homage for their protection. We were lucky if we could even find a warm meal in any given day.

  “And yet it isn’t getting through to you,” he snapped. “You have more power than most beings and so this applies to you especially. You fed those negative emotions. And don’t think I didn’t notice. Why? Why did you do that to him? To that family? You made the entire situation worse.”

  “It’s what I do. It’s what I’ve always done.”

  El rubbed at his face, trying to wipe away his wariness. I was his most challenging student. The Consort had sent him to me to see if I was salvageable before they came to destroy me, and El was the one who was going to try and ‘salvage’ me. I was getting to a point where nothing but other’s suffering mattered anymore. If El hadn’t come for another couple of days, the Consort would have had no other choice but to kill me, if they could. We all knew they couldn’t but they would do far worse than death. They said I was too valuable to lock up and torture forever and ever but they would if they had too.

  When he first found me, I was laughing while a group of men were sprawled around me, their senses lost, and with only the nightmares in their heads to keep them company. I was releasing so much power that I sucked out all the warmth in a three mile radius, freezing to death anything that lived. Even now, the area was still a dead zone and became one of the wonders of the world. Scientists strived to solve the mystery of the area. Life just refuses to take root there. El told me all this in his latest mail. He even sent me pictures of the area to remind me to be careful. As if I could forget what I’m capable of doing.

  Back then it took El two days to convince me to release those men from their personal hell. I wasn’t impressed with him since the Consort sent him and I already despised them for branding me. By the time he finally got me to release them, I had already grown tired with the game and didn’t care anymore. Afterwards, he just followed me around and hindered anything I did.

  And then he was expecting me to take action for the sake of the very humans who made me who I am. I failed his little test with the father, stopping him never even crossed my mind.

  “That isn’t who you are. You forget; I can see more of you than you think. I probably know you better than you do yourself. I know there was a part of you that wanted to stop him. It’s a really small piece of who you are and probably the only part of you left that cares more than you want to. Try listening to it next time.”

  “Why should I? Why should I help those who only fear me?”

  “They’re scared of you because they don’t know any better. Prove them wrong.”

  “But they are right.”

  “No, they aren’t,” he replied.

  I looked into his eyes and saw so much pain, pain I didn’t understand then and pain I still don’t understand now. It was raw enough that I had to look away. The rest of the walk was quiet. The critters scurried away in the dark, staying completely hidden but on my radar as they put distance between me and them. When we reached the cabin, we entered quietly. I threw my cloak onto the kitchen table and sat down on the couch.

  I watched as El neatly hung up his coat and started to slowly pack up. We never stayed in one spot too long. El said there were lessons to be learned in every part of the world. I, of course, didn’t agree. The same things happened everywhere. Pain and suffering was a universal epidemic.

  “Why didn’t you use any of your powers to fight that man?”

  He glanced over at me as he stuffed some items into his satchel. “He’s only human.”

  “So?” I said, not getting his point. “It would have been faster to just cast a spell.”

/>   “I already know I’m powerful. I don’t need to prove it by cursing someone a lot weaker than me.”

  I shrugged. “He’s only going to go back and abuse his family again.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I do,” I replied. “They always come back.”

  “Then her family will protect her.”

  I shook my head, wondering where all his hope for mankind came from.

  In everyone’s eyes, El was an affable medicine man. He only ever showed them that side of him. Never the ruthlessness, the emptiness he sometimes felt. He was a good man. I could admit that, even now.

  “No. Not when having even one extra mouth could be the difference between starvation and survival, let alone two,” I explained.

  “You seem so sure.”

  “So do you. It’s amazing how you’re supposed to be an enlightener and yet you’re so optimistic about humans.” Enlighteners were those who mentored other beings, helping them learn about themselves and how to control their powers. El was supposed to be one of the best. I believed it. I was still with him after all.

  He turned to me, his expression dark. Tonight was just full of disappointments for him. “Humans are more resilient than you think.”

  “And yet they die so easily. I mean, come on. They can die from the sniffles.”

  His blue-grey eyes narrowed, turning greyer as he figured something out. “Is that one of the reasons you can’t stand them? Because they die too easily?”

  “I can’t stand them because they can’t stand me,” I said without flinching. His words had hit too close to home and I refused to let him know how close. There have been humans I liked enough to care a little bit about. Then they died because they were just too damn weak.

  “What about Mother Moon?” he asked.

  I jumped up to my feet in a fit of anger. The air around us darkened, a small metaphysical wind moving around the room, whipping my hair around my face.

  “Mother Moon has nothing to do with why I can’t stand humans.”