Damned

by K R Leikvoll

  “Show me.”

  His gaze softened deceivingly.

  “Think about what ties you to your Gods. Invoke them. Take all that they are willing to give you and let me see your worth, prophet.”

  Unsure of what else to do beyond what he said, I closed my eyes. I would never forget the realm of Treachery, nor the visions of the Vast Dark. The feeling of frozen agony was more real than the reality I existed in with my Master currently. The shadows greeted my mind with a mixture of Lord Nakarius’ eyes and the sight of Illyswen’s blood on my skin. The dark red flames that floated from my palm did so without sensation.

  “More. You are almost there,” my Master urged. I shot him an uneasy glimpse and saw him still smirking, though it was hard to discern whether he was pleased or plotting. It would only take me a few times of misreading his expression to assume he was always doing the latter.

  I still did what he asked and continued to push on my cursed emotions. They were strong feelings, as they produced a fiery aura around my skin, scorching the ground beneath my feet. It was invigorating and liberating to watch. Magic had always been a myth out of reach. Now, it was mine.

  “I want you to channel it as long as you can.”

  Something in my mind warned me not to trust him – perhaps the whispers from the Void. I thought about ceasing and lying that I did all I could, but I was still too naïve to fool Vince. I followed my worst thoughts down the darkest path I had ever endured, visiting every horrid memory my foggy consciousness could recall. The final one was the satisfaction I experienced when I had killed my Master during Lord Baelarius’ test. Outside of the depths of the Void, I was not immune to the bond’s effects. The idea of losing Vince was so agonizing, it brought me grief to imagine that it may be my fate. Rather than causing the fire spilling from my palms to halt, they continued to swirl and consume the room.

  Vince clapped and began to undo the clasps on the metal box. I wanted to ask him how to make it stop, but as I opened my mouth to speak, I was overwhelmed with inexplicable pain. I thought that he was using his abilities to harm me – instead, he was relaxed, calm, and out of reach. The flames and darkness ceased with my inability to focus through the sensation. I felt as though I were being burned alive, but I was standing completely unscathed. I fell to my knees, trying to breathe and tolerate it.

  “These powers do not come freely. You participated in the sacrifices of the mind, body and soul… do you understand the purpose now? When you borrow, you must always repay. If you don’t, the flames of sacrifice will consume you,” Vince explained, taking my writhing form into his arms.

  He kissed my forehead and wiped my tears while I begged him to relieve me of the fire. Rather than giving me what I sought, he chuckled like it was a ridiculous idea. I was gradually beginning to recognize his intent to torture; I clawed at him viciously and fought as hard as I could to get away.

  “Pain is a beautiful thing, wouldn’t you agree, beloved? It is the greatest teacher – the richest emotion. The more you fight it, the less it fades. It continues on and on until it pierces your soul and leaves you to rot.”

  My newfound strength was still not enough to pry myself out of his hold even though he was intoxicated. I had to change my plans to attempting to bite into his flesh as I knew his blood would soothe the flames. My teeth nearly caught his shoulder, but his grasp wrapped around my throat to avoid my desperate lunge. He stood, dragging me with him in a headlock. I could feel his skin tearing under my nails as I ripped at him furiously.

  “What I want you to learn – “ he said as he forced my struggling form into the metal crate, “—are the consequences of disobeying me. If you even think about betraying this coven, the flames of sacrifice will be the most relaxing part of your punishment.”

  “I have never betrayed our family. I swear my loyalty,” I tried to reason with him, but it was no use. The pain was already enough to make me rethink my allegiance to the Vast Dark. The last thing I saw before the heavy metal lid shut was his crimson eyes, filled with loathing.

  I continued to beg him to reconsider his actions through my torture, but he never responded. The crate was too small for me to turn in any direction; I could not even bring my hands to my lips to smother my screams. A worrisome crackling noise made me fear the worst – perhaps he was going to actually set me on fire. It was not until the crate fell into some sort of pit with a heavy crash that I was able to think through what was being done. The sound of something dense piling on the lid made me panic.

  I scratched and clawed at the box until my fingers bled and cracked. Much as my Master had said, the more I thought about the flames, the worse the pain became. All of my emotions had been stored in my mind, so why had Vincent decided to punish me for what hadn’t been done? Then it dawned on me.

  While I had been alternating between unbearable cries of suffering and trying to think my situation through logically, James and Raven’s words made sense. They were attempting to warn me of what I was set to face, and I had thought it was going to be an ordinary lesson. The one hope I had in my desperation was that it would only last the entirety of the fourth day.

  It did not cease, for I had been counting the minutes to redirect my focus. The hours passed with burning that never seemed to end, even when I felt I had emptied my mind. It moved beyond hours. Days. Weeks. Or perhaps a single moment of torture so great I could only comprehend it over an extended duration of time. My Master had vastly overestimated my capacity to maintain a healthy mind, such as my demonic brothers. I suppose he did not realize that my pain would turn to rage – that my morals, hopes, dreams, wants – all would crumble to ashes. The only thing that remained was my hollow, blank mind. I let the fire consume what I was – there was too much of me that wished to remain in control. Vincent may have desired that power, but what he failed to realize was that chaos would always overcome order. If his goal was to kill my spirit, he was victorious. It was his biggest mistake.

  While I was being held somewhere underneath the earth, roiling from flames, I found something beautiful. I cannot recall how long it took for me to find the sacred area of escape in my mind, but I can confirm it was when I finally felt on the brink of madness.

  The magnetic pull of Vincent and my demonic brothers was still there, no matter how far they wandered in the palace from where I was being held. Each time they came close, I screamed at them to release me. I pleaded and bargained until I had no voice. I had long lost hope that I was ever going to be freed. Those I considered the dearest – even not including my Master – did not come to my aid. I was entirely betrayed.

  The thoughts and daydreams of ending Praetis nurtured the damage wreaking havoc on my mind. I reasoned they all deserved to perish to pay reparations for how horribly I had been treated. Even the innocent were no longer innocent in my jaded eyes. My Gods were giving me permission to judge them and judge them I would. Nobody would escape justice.

  As I took a final breath before letting myself drift away, I thought only of the Vast Dark. The bond was strong, but my truths needed to be stronger. The burning was nothing in comparison to the chill of Treachery. I would not be undone by Vincent’s games. I learned how to break away.

  It took the rest of my coven years to master the art of communing with the Void alone. It was far easier to accomplish as a group, hence why they hardly traveled there by themselves. Beyond that, too long spent with your soul outside your body could leave you trapped between planes of existence. Another person to help keep track of how long you had been gone was taught as imperative. I do not believe that being the prophet is what aided me. Rather, my kin were just weak minded. They wanted powers and divinity without paying the price. Demonic energies would only grow from true devotion, which they all lacked.

  My world began to twist and invert itself, pulling me far from my Master’s control. The crimson light and gravity of the Void did not induce any fear. When I was faced with the barren, gray land of Limbo, I thought I might collapse from the f
lames dispersing. It was utterly relieving to be free from it. So much so, that the alleged fog of the Void did not seem to affect me remotely.

  I wandered the odd first layer, into mist that blocked my view from my surroundings. I still had no worries despite not knowing where I was going. I could have easily walked for an entire lifetime into nothingness, but shadows found me instead. I was fearful the first time I was face to face with my Gods. This time, I was purely interested and elated to see another presence. They did not form into a discernible figure. Instead, it trailed onward on a path for me to follow. It whispered things I did not understand, but somehow it was calming. I had faith I would not be misled by Naazvaba.

  Eventually, I came to a break in the mist. Three arches of ancient, crumbling stone connected to a central altar carved from the onyx crystals growing from the earth. The shadows were reaching out to me, guiding me up the small staircase toward the shrine.

  The first archway sparked with orange, causing a vortex of fiery winds to swirl in what once was emptiness. The demonic runes, roughly translating to Lust lit up on the fractured rock. Cries echoed from it, despite not being surrounded by anyone.

  The second archway hummed to life after the first, filling with cold, gray clouds and spirals. It appeared to be raining, as I could hear the cracks of thunder, but I remained entirely dry. The demonic runes spelled out the word Gluttony. The shadows were not drawing me to those portals. Instead, my attention was focused on the third.

  It cracked with crimson before revealing to me what I was waiting for. A sheet of dark red glistened back at me, like a pit of boiling blood. When my fingertips brushed the strange fluid, it stained my skin. It was searing hot, but my time in the fire made it seem like nothing at all. The runes of the word Wrath appeared hazily. The whispering shadows conjoined and disappeared through the vortex giving me no other direction to follow. I took a deep breath out of reflex for I hardly needed to breathe anymore. No matter how unsure I felt, my faith was greater. I stepped through the scalding liquid, fully submitting to their will.

  When I emerged on the other side, I found myself to be in a strange place somewhat reminding me of home. It was a murky and grungy moor, startlingly darker than Limbo. Even my demonic eyes had trouble comprehending the marshy terrain. I took a few steps forward, sinking into a bog of mud, threatening to submerge me in its depths. Still I had no fear. I calmly continued to trudge through it, climbing out as soon as I had access to the spongy, swampy land.

  On the other side of my tiny island free from mud, I witnessed the full size of the mire, stretching as far as the eye could see, and it was not empty. The river was filled with beings of all species, writhing and trying to free themselves from their prison. I wondered if they knew that they could simply walk out to escape, but they all seemed too consumed by their situation to think clearly. They preferred to attack each other and thrash instead of leaving. Their screams were entirely silent, for not a single thing could be heard beyond the returning of the whispering shadows.

  The next time when I hesitantly stepped onto the bog, I did not fall through. I passed over it like a wraith not truly connected to their realm, following the trail of darkness that split across the land. The damned that furiously swiped at the mud did not notice my presence at all. They did not even see those suffering around them – merely their own individual torment.

  I trekked onward, daring to cross onto a mass of spongy land and leave the distant portal to Limbo behind. The specters of tormented souls did not cease with the swamp. Instead, they fought an endless war with each other, not understanding that there was nothing to fight for at all. There was nothing to be won but the misery they were needlessly inflicting on themselves. The spirits would strike others down, only for their foes to regenerate and continue the infinite battle. Their blades and weapons passed through my spectral form, unable to harm me. Like those suffering in the river of mud, I did not exist to any of them.

  The shadows continued to speak my name. The journey through the battles and ceaseless river continued for so long that I wondered if I had finally perished in the metal crate and lost my way home. Somehow, I could not even fear this, as the Void was far more interesting than my mundane existence as a slave.

  I reached a clearing in the marsh, helping me rid the souls of the suffering in exchange for lesser demons that patrolled the realm as Lord Nakarius’ servants. They had skeletal faces, black flesh and a singular red eye that helped them spot any that dare to cross from Wrath to Heresy. For the first time since I entered the Void, they noticed me as more than an astral form. They bowed their heads to the shadows that had guided me to a towering wall made of stone.

  The gate, steaming from an unknown source of heat, was the most densely crowded area I had seen yet. Living beings were impaled through the spikes that decorated the wall; each was writhing from having their flesh melted from where they hung. Demons of all sorts guarded the entrance to the City of the Damned, Dys. When I had arrived to the Void the initial time, I merely crossed through the layers straight to the doorway between Fraud and Treachery. Never before had I witnessed the titan sized home of my Gods.

  The shadowy trail parted the demonic throng so I could make my way to the next layer, Heresy. Once I was moving down the long entrance way, I heard the gate close with a hiss that sounded like it was being melted shut. I was momentarily overcome with the thought that it might never open again to let me leave. Did I truly wish to depart from this painless realm? It was painless for me – the prophet and a greater demon – at least. Perhaps Nyzara would have found Dys to be a horrific place; I thought it was glorious.

  Row after row of trenches were dug on either side of the boulevard of bones I tread on. Forms indiscernible of their species, gender, or origin, were entrapped in each one, though they could simply climb out at any moment if they so wished. Like the beings impaled on the walls, those ensnared in their escapable tombs were melting and reforming. It was as if liquid metal was being poured onto their flesh, but there was none in sight.

  The tombs of fire ended once I came across demons that appeared more humanoid than the alien beings I had encountered. They were interested in me, but none dared to speak in my presence. It was not because I was untrustworthy – I was placed so highly above them that they were no more than grains of sand in comparison. They bowed deeply to me, mouthing demonic incantations of blessings. It was my first time meeting the heretics of the Void – those with the crucial role of feeding the Vast Dark into the universe for higher demons to harness. They tortured the souls of those sacrificed to Azotl for entertainment, helping trap those negative energies for future use.

  The demon heretics lived very well compared to those residing in the other realms of the Void, as they benefited from being allowed to travel Dys as they chose. In every direction they could be seen tormenting souls with cheerful grins. Some were being quartered repeatedly by oxen beasts, always regenerating to have it happen again. Another group was allowed the chance to flee, only to be hunted down by screeching gargoyles for an infinite meal. I even passed an arena made of bone, where they each fought to the death with a lesser demon in the form of a two-headed hound. None survived, and yet they were rounded up continually to be eaten once more.

  Dys felt endless as I grew accustomed to the shrieks of pain that filled the air. They were so loud they even reached the ruins of Dys, where Fraud and Treachery resided. I had finally discovered the source of the noise. Nothing was more prevalent than my shadowy guide. The murmurs were happening in my own mind, not existing for others, as I realized. I never tired or slowed my pace, feeling more drawn each moment to find the source.

  I roamed the city until I reached a place where the bone road cracked and splintered downward, further into the depths of the Void. A line of winged Minotaur that guarded the entrance to Violence kneeled at my feet, giving me their loyalty at the sight of my glory. The boulevard had turned to broken brimstone, likely scalding to walk over, but I felt no pain. A ri
ver of blood flowed through the hellish plane, reminding me of the portal I had stepped through in Limbo. It was boiling and set aflame, burning the souls that were trapped to suffer. I had thought of fire and blood as opposites – one causing agony, the other giving relief. Here it was all the same.

  I felt no trace of pity in my being for those drowning in my blessed drink of life. They were prevented from leaving by demonic centaurs, marked by the third eye of Lord Nakarius. Any time a member of the damned attempted to crawl to the safety of the brimstone, they were shot backward by a tirade of arrows. They would stay agonized temporarily, but they were always doomed to attempt their escape again. This cycle repeated forever until the river met the end of my path. All that was left in front of me was a black forest.

  Nevertheless, the shadows persisted to call me toward the ruins of Dys. The mightier lesser demons were all far more interested to dwell in the central parts of the city, leaving only shrieking harpies of scale and feather remaining. The trees reminded me much of the ones that Raven had summoned in the library – dead, barbed and gray, twisting toward the sky with little purpose. It was impossible to completely drown out all of the screaming between the demons and the souls that I nearly lost track of which way the shadows wished to guide me.

  My body had become entirely transparent when I reached the edge of the forest, on the outskirts of Dys. I took a moment to come to terms with the idea that I may never leave the Void again. Somehow, I was content with it; unable of experiencing fear of anything. The comfortable smothering of my bond was enough to nurture what resentment I held for my Master. He doomed me to wander that plane for an immortal existence simply because he could not stand the idea that he was not in the utmost place of power. His hierarchy was threatened. Instead of choosing to treat me as his Queen, as an equal, he fought like an insolent child. I was incapable of rationalizing how someone so old could lack honor and maturity.