Consequences

by Elyse Draper

  Cass’s breathing starts to become ragged again, “I have wondered the same things. When I was new to the veil there were so many more of us … as time has gone by, fewer and fewer cross into our realm. The older ones begin to fade, and eventually become nothing more than specters, roaming senselessly before they vanish entirely. Then there are the young ones … I’ve seen such terrible things happen to the young ones. I’m surprised you survived as long as you have; especially when I think about the state your mind was in for the first sixty years of your time in the veil. You would have been an easy meal for the Daimonion To, the evil ones.” Finally, I am starting to see where the fear is coming from … there is something dangerous in the mist, and Cass, with her perceptiveness, has watched it devour our kind.

  “Daimonion To?” It rolls off my tongue harshly with none of the elegance of Cass’s ancient Greek accent. “These are the ones you’ve been warning me about?”

  “Yes, Ellie … those are the ones. I haven’t allowed myself to care for another in such a long time; when you asked me, so innocently, to be your teacher … I almost said no. I was afraid that I may start to fade soon, but finding you may have saved me … by giving me a reason to exist. Now that I have you, a true friend … I don’t want to see you hurt. I’ve seen such horrible things in my mind; there have been times over the years I’ve wondered if I was actually Daimonion To, just for entertaining the images.”

  Tonight again, in so many hours, Cass has surprised me with her expression of concern. “Cass, you’ve referred to one in particular … ‘She already knows about you’, who is ‘she’?”

  “I’ve only seen her in my mind; she is ancient, perhaps not as old as me … but still very old, and very powerful. She understands the powers we take for granted, and can present herself in any form she wants.”

  “Cass, V could do that, too … so they’re shape shifters. I’m sorry, but that doesn’t seem too dangerous.” I can feel that shape shifting is just the tip of the iceberg when I look at the expression of Cassandra’s face.

  “You don’t understand, Elizabeth Tickle; she can pass entirely through the veil just like you; but in any form she chooses. She has an appetite for Mortos as well as Ho Thanatos … and she has tasted you. She has shown up in folklore dating back at least fourteen hundred years; she may even be as ancient as me. You know the story of Beowulf? How about dark tales of the ekmetalleftis, umm vampires ... or witches that love the flavor of children?”

  “That can’t be her … those stories aren’t real.” I try to laugh off the idea, but I can hear, and feel, the earnestness in Cass’s voice.

  “She lies dormant now, obviously not wanting to play with humanity very often over the past couple hundred years. But every once and a while, I’ll hear a tale woven around a familiar shape … and then I recognize, she is hungry. She’ll feed and go back into hiding; she has only allowed me to receive two premonitions, concerning her antics, over the centuries. We were in Turkey during the same time; she sensed me and warned me off by allowing me to witness her hunt. The Evil One not only knows what and where the future will happen, but she knows how to force others to experience the coming horror.”

  Cass relives the vision with such vicious clarity, it painfully plays across my corneas and sinks into my brain before I can try and deflect the images. Woods, cold and dark … I’m running; I can feel a fear as primitive as the earth itself. The blind terror behind the dread is timeworn and I understand immediately … this is what it means to be prey. I thought humans had grown past these instinctual feelings of being hunted; I feel small and defenseless … I need to run, to hide.

  Within the vision, when I feel the entity behind me, my stomach lurches and all my muscles tighten, “Time to fight!” The words slide through my gritted teeth as I turn ready to claw at whatever is unfortunate enough to be in my path.

  Nothing; nothing is there, just the trees lined up before me, and the soft eroding floor of the forest. Looking around I realize that I am in a time before machines … I can't hear the distinct continuous hum that my sensitive ears could pick up in the Sahara Desert. The darkness is absolute; to a human this place would be like encountering cave-darkness, disorienting and merciless. What a wonderful place to hunt, especially with Ho Thanatos senses, my mind whispers, in admiration and praise at the prime conditions for a vile and gory hunt. “My god, Ellie, did you just actually think about hunting a human?” The realization embarrasses me.

  “No; that wasn’t my thought at all!” The sound of my own voice, in this vile place, echoed off of nothing, only reminds me that I am alone here … with ‘her’.

  Speaking to the nothingness that hold mysterious and frightening ears, “I know you can hear me. How did you work your way into my head … through Cass’s vision?” No answer; I don’t expect one … not yet at least. The introductions will come, probably about the same time she is tired of playing with me. I think about my cat, Robin, and how when he was done playing with a mouse … he’d simply break its neck and leave it on the porch to rot.

  Shuddering for a moment at the thought of being left, broken on someone’s porch, I don’t realize that ‘she’ is communicating. No spoken words, just emotions … and they are volatile and cruel. She is confirming we have an agreement; she is going to kill me, and I am going to cease to exist.

  “Lovely!” I scream into the trees. She doesn’t appreciate my sarcasm, but in her irritation she lets the emotion slip … confusion. I am not supposed to be here.

  “Ellie … Come back here right now! Elizabeth Tickle! So help me, if I have to …” I open my eyes to find Cass standing over me on the cliff’s edge. She is pale and visibly shaken; but a relieved expression lightens her face as she becomes aware that I am looking up at her.

  Smirking at her, I ask, “So help you what, Cass? What were you planning on doing to me?”

  “Look here, you little κουτσούβελο, little brat … you just about got yourself rolled right off this cliff. I thought maybe my story put you to sleep, until I noticed your trademark green threads reaching out to only the gods know where. Then you wouldn’t wake up …where in the name of Zeus were you?”

  “You sent me to her, Cass … I was in her mind.” My thoughts spread out in front of me like fishing net, so many points are connected, one junction leading to the next, but I can’t make any sense of what is in front of me. The longer I stare at the idea, the harder it is to perceive … like only being able to see the curved lines between puzzle pieces, but not being able to make out the picture.

  “Cass? If the stories about vampires and monsters are actually true … then there has to be more than one who can pass through the veil, becoming tangible enough to damage humans.”

  “Yes, Yes, I know … but they can make themselves visible, while only parts of their bodies' become semi-solid: a ghost hand appearing to smother you in your sleep, only to disappear when you wake. That is why they are perceived as untouchable and so hard to catch … they tend to feed off of fear of the mind games. Beowulf’s foe, Grendel’s mother, feeds off not only fear … but gore. She will go into a society, and search for their deepest terrors, becoming their nightmares, whole and solid. She isn’t happy until she has destroyed every last citizen, in the most horrific ways possible.

  The only saving grace for humanity’s sake is that the Daimonion To seem to kill each other with surprising regularity. Stupid territorial disputes distract them from their favorite treats … killing the young Ho Thanatos and torturing Mortos.” I can feel the anxiety pulling through her like an undertow. Cass is fighting the current, trying to keep me out of the visions that have been brought up by discussing the murders of the young Ho Thanatos.

  I ignore the compulsion to ask more about our evil counterparts, and choose to try and sooth Cass by deflecting the topic, “We need to change the subject … do you want to hear more about Japan, or maybe Africa?”

  With a touch of shame to her voice, and a bashful expression that crosses her f
ace, she confesses that she doesn’t ever leave the countries around the Aegean Sea. We are talking so freely now; when I pick up on the sensitive nature of her statement, I don’t push any further.

  “I think I would like to hear more about your time in Africa.” I can feel the excitement flowing through her … this is story time, for the lady in the bubble.

  “I flew through Africa absorbing the sensations of such a primitive land, the earth itself felt wild and untamable. Many parts were at war … the hatred for fellow men was so intense that the air, surrounding some areas, tasted of blood. I came to rest on the banks of the river Chari in Central Africa. The villagers had moored boats in the mud of the river's bank. Wading into the water in between their boats, men were pulling spears and fish from the long narrow crafts of solid wood that looked similar to canoes. I heard laughing, and felt the sense of community that was bubbling out of the village; giving me a much needed boost of happiness after the cruelty of my flight.

  “I decided to walk through the village, following a sensation I couldn’t explain. About a mile from the river was where I felt the source of the consciousness. I knew someone was there, even though I could only see the barren earth around me. So I stood calmly and absorbed the heat on my face, admiring the beautiful contrast of colors from the bright, blue sky and the sandy, tan terrain. After waiting for at least a couple of hours, the presence must have decided that I wasn’t going away. He formed, from the heat waves flowing upward off the earth, to stand right in front of me.

  “When he grabbed a hold of my hand, his fingers looked as if they could wrap entirely around mine twice. Everything disappeared below my wrist as he gracefully enclosed my palm. Following the line of his forearm, his lean muscles flexed showing tight ligaments and tendons on top of his elbow joint. He easily stood two feet over my five-foot-six-inch height. Looking up into his eyes, I was surprised to find, drifting through the dark brown almost black, there was an echo of a slate blue-green. Slightly muted, his eyes reminded me of a thunderstorm rolling in over the sea, at night. His face was kind, and his stormy eyes smiled as he introduced himself.

  “My name is Zuvan. I have never seen a Gabon as fair as you.”

  “His English had a French lilt; I couldn’t believe my luck, to find we understood each other … then again, the Ho Thanatos always seem to understand each other no matter the location. When he spoke again his expression turned quizzical. “The light that surrounds you is shifting in colors like an iridescent feather. Why … je ne sais pas. Peut-être, you are not like me?”

  “For the first time, I noticed the light that flowed eagerly out of his pores. Starting next to his dark skin as a deep blue, almost Payne’s gray, the glow quickly became a bright, hot-white halo encompassing his entire body. I wondered, why hadn’t I noticed the light when I first saw him?

  “Beautiful and frightening, power oozed from his long, muscular frame. I was reminded of a time when I had entered Christopher’s waking mind and was torn down by the intensity of his emotions, collapsing on the floor … absorbing his fear and anger had crippled me. As I was lying there before him, Christopher watched my body expel his toxic emotions in some kind of light show. I wondered if that was how Zuvan projected this radiance: forcing emotions out of his skin. Shifting my perspective back through the cocoon of light ─ his dark skin was such a contrast; I had to squint to bring him into focus.

  “The scars from past fights formed ropes on his flesh that ran across his cheek and down his neck, and then hid under his linen shirt. The scarring looked as though he fought lions, before his death; I knew better though … the cruelest animal on earth, humans, had made these. Yet his stance remained relaxed, only accentuating his kind face and friendly smile.”

  Cassandra leans back on her heels with her eyes closed and a small dreamy smile forms on her mouth. “He sounds lovely, Ellie … tell me more about your time with Zuvan. Please.”

  Looking at Cass, I start to understand the loneliness of her existence; I hope she will eventually tell me why she made herself into a recluse. When she raises one delicate eyebrow, waiting for me to continue, I recognize the hungry expression that only intense curiosity can create … so I continue.

  “Zuvan and I sat on the warm ground; even sitting, he towered over me. But strangely enough, I didn’t notice, because his personality had such a calming, balancing effect. He smiled innocently and nodded as I told him my name, looking as if he had always known it. He kept touching my skin like a child intrigued by the fur on a caterpillar.”

  “Zuvan, I know you have been exposed to fair-skinned people before … what is so fascinating about my skin?”

  “Not so much your skin, as that you are ‘like me’, and I’ve never seen the shades of color that flow out of you. Every time I think I might recognize the hue, it shifts again with each new expression you show on your face. It is very beautiful; I do not think I’ve ever seen anything quite like it … except perhaps in oil spilled on the surface on water.” The look on his face was penetrating; oddly though, I wasn’t self-conscious under his scrutiny.

  “What do you think we are, exactly?” I was looking for a teacher, and Zuvan seemed very capable of the task.

  “For my people, we are Gabon. We are guardian angels to family … our present and future generations. To tell the truth, I have only met one other guardian during my travels, as I followed my familial lines. The other was cruel. Even though I was curious about him, I did not like being around him; especially after I watched him spread a plague through a village of his family’s enemies. He could make people believe they were sick … sick enough for their bodies to show real symptoms; but with no way to heal the illness, they would inevitably die. I learned quickly that not all Gabon are fair or just … we are as open to temptation and vindictiveness as any living human.

  “Ultimately, deciding to leave behind his brutality, I went in search of ma famille; those being slaughtered, fighting against impossible odds. I found what I was looking for in the north, where the rebels have been constantly at war. Then I saw you fly over … and I had to follow; the curiosity was overwhelming, I must admit.” He smiled sheepishly and looked at the ground as if embarrassed to admit his inquisitiveness.

  “I do think we are alike; although, I do not think I’m actually a Gabon. I lived in London during my human life, and died during World War Two … but I think our connection is not where we lived or died, but that we were both gifted in life, and passed ‘here’ after death. Zuvan, did you have any special gifts when you were alive?”

  “Yes, I can control fire … that, which gave me a sense of power in life, is also what took my life from me. I think you may be correct, we are alike … but we are still very different. What was your gift, my dear friend?”

  “Zuvan was the first being I had met who could manipulate elements; everyone else I’d met, influenced minds, not environments. I started to think that maybe he would be the one who could help me return to Christopher; the one who could help me become solid enough, for long enough that I could stay firmly with Christopher forever.

  “I can feel others’ emotions, and touch minds to ease psychological pain … but I can’t seem to do that with our kind, only humans.”

  “Ha, oh, Ellie, you have much to learn then … we are alike, we are all connected in this world. Understanding and communication should be as simple as falling asleep … hmmm, maybe, you should try to relax.”

  “Zuvan sat patiently with me, meditating, and allowing me to experiment on his mind, until I could read his thoughts as well as my own. I asked questions the entire time and he gave me answers; but in every statement made, he prepared me to understand that his answers were only opinions. I needed to find my solutions, for myself. When I was able to overcome my own limitations, and understand just how simple it was to read his emotions, I tried to go deeper than reading, and reached out to touch his mind.

  “My stomach twisted, as I watched the pain of his personal history unfold: images of
death, bloody and gruesome scenes that I could never imagine. I wondered how he could possibly have become such a kind soul. I saw that under his linen shirt he was hiding the mottled scars of destroyed flesh all across his back. The cause of those scars showed me the scene of his torture, while learning to control his gift as a boy.

  “He was showing me what he wanted me to see; I had no power to poke through his thoughts. He was allowing me to witness only certain parts of his pain. The images were so intense that I didn’t realize I was screaming louder than the burning boy in his memory … until Zuvan pulled me away and forced me to breathe. Looking into his eyes, I couldn’t stop my tears from falling; fire still seared my back painfully… even though, I was no longer in contact with his horror.

  “He lifted me on to his lap and wrapped his long arms around me, whispering the entire time, “You’re okay now; just breathe … I’m so sorry, Ellie. I had no idea you actually feel what I feel. I thought maybe you were an observer, a witness … not a sufferer. Mon dieu! Comment peux j’être si stupide? I am so stupid … please forgive me.”

  "As I sat embraced by Zuvan … the pain started to subside, and I gently probed at my back to see if I was now, also, covered in burns. The reaction had been so sudden and overwhelming … I started to think, maybe, my mind had been protecting me from the intensity of touching another Ho Thanatos.

  "As a form of apology, and to take my mind off of the pain we now shared, Zuvan led me to a park in southern Chad. It was one of the most beautiful places I had ever seen. The Zakouma National Park, there in the middle of a country that has known war for generations, was one of the most welcoming and friendly nature reserves you would ever want to visit. They had set up a restaurant and huts that mimicked the local villages, but with all the amenities. I marveled at the ingenuity, and Zuvan joked that I hadn’t seen anything yet." I can see Cassandra daydreaming about where I've been and what I've seen.