“My voice does fine enough on its own.”
“Then how do we know about the Quietus?” Seeker smiled. “I will have you know that the Orders have many eyes and ears, all around the Kingdom. If you plan on taking some kind of action that will be contrary to the wishes of the people, then we will know about it. It’s better to back an Order now. That way, should you make an undesirable decision, the Order you chose can step in to quell the strikes of the villagers and help to soothe their troubled minds.”
“Good night, Seeker,” she said, waving a hand toward the guards. “I’m sorry, but I won’t even think about making such a difficult decision until I have at least slept on it. Thank you for bringing all of this to my attention.”
“Good night, Queen Catherine,” he said with a bow. “Please hurry with your decision, before others catch word of what we have discovered. It could already be too late to fight against the fallout.”
* * *
They gazed at the stars, fighting sleep. Bastion took a deep breath which turned into a yawn, and Daisy rubbed her eyes with the back of her left wrist.
“Hey, Daisy,” Bastion said, breaking their long silence. The noise slightly startled her as he felt her shake. She chuckled to herself and awkwardly reached over to punch him in the chest. He laughed, and she joined in with him after a moment. Daisy sat up and looked down at him, as he looked steadily into her eyes. She gave him a smirk and then shook her head.
“No,” she said quickly. “No, Bastion.” Her thick, throaty voice just made him smile again. He enjoyed hearing her speak. Even when she said normal, everyday things, they suddenly became alive and unique. He could get used to hearing her talk for a long, long time.
“I didn’t even ask you anything,” he chuckled.
“I already know.”
“Do you now?”
“Every boy I meet gets there at some point. Some sooner than later, but it always happens. I’m sorry, love. I won’t be your girlfriend.”
“Wow,” Bastion said, placing his arms underneath his head and closing his eyes. “You must be a mind reader.”
“What?!” Daisy scoffed, punching him in the chest again. “You can’t be serious. You were really going to ask me out on a date?”
“Well, why not?” Bastion asked, opening his eyes. “What’s wrong with it?”
“I just met you this morning.”
“That’s why it’s called dating. You get to know the person. Geez, I didn’t ask you to marry me. I don’t get what the big deal is.”
“You’re not ready,” she said, her voice becoming solemn. “Otherwise, I would consider it.”
“What is it?” Bastion asked, sitting up with her. “Bad breath or something?”
“Nah,” she laughed, turning to face him. “It’s the fact that we got a lot more training to do. You’ve been out the social game for far too long. You’re barely ready for a friend, let alone romance. Takes a lot of responsibility that you won’t know how to handle. Trust me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I know I’m making this sound like you’re a little kid and all, but please don’t take it that way. It’s just…lots of boys go around asking out girls like it’s the thing to do, when all they really want is a kiss. And it’s not like how us girls see it. When we think of our first kiss, we think of fireworks and explosions and weddings and meeting our soul mate. We think it’s the beginning of our fairytale, but for the boy? Heh. All he’s thinking about is how cool it is, or its some right of passage. We’re thinking romance, he’s thinking new experiences. You get what I’m saying?”
“Sort of. But that’s not what I was thinking.”
“Yeah, I know. I know. You think I’m cool and interesting, maybe even pretty, but that’s only because I’m the first girl to give you the time of day.”
“What’s so wrong with that?”
“Because you don’t even know what you want yet. Who knows? The second girl you meet by the real one you need, but you’ll be so focused on me that you don’t even realize it. You gotta take your time with these things. Besides…being a boyfriend, a real boyfriend…you’re not ready for that.”
“So you’ve said,” he sighed, leaning back onto the grass. “Just forget it.”
“Just this last thing, and I promise I’ll let you be.”
“Fine. Go ahead,” Bastion muttered. “What is it?”
“When you go searching for love…it means you’re looking for that piece of you that will make you whole. You’ve already gotten to know yourself. What makes you tick. What you’re good at, and what your limitations are. At that point, you know yourself so well, that you realize just how incomplete you are. That’s when you begin looking for your other half. That one person that is so amazing, so breathtaking—and you’re the only one that sees it among your friends. Because you know. You just know that you’ve found them. And they realize it too, and suddenly, the world stops spinning, and time stands still...and it hits you. You realize…that you weren’t even born until that moment. Your life was nothing before then, and you can see the path before you, and it’s just…”
Daisy stopped to bow her head between her knees. Bastion got up and wrapped an arm around her.
“Daisy, are you okay?”
“I’ve got to go,” she said suddenly, jumping up to her feet. “I’m sorry, Bastion, but, um…I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”
“Okay,” he whispered. It was all he could manage. Daisy nodded, a sole tear flying from off her cheek. Then she sprinted off, leaving him troubled and confused. He sat there for a few minutes more, thinking about what she said, what they had talked about over dinner, and what life would be like in the castle.
Once again, she had been right. He didn’t know himself.
Not one bit.
There was only one moment in his life in which he thought he did, but that had been all wrong. It had to have been.
Suddenly, he found his thoughts wandering—to a dark forest of purple trees and intertwining branches. He had been taken. Along with several other children from the Kingdom of Allay. Back then, it wasn’t known yet as the Siege of 88, but they had certainly felt the significance of such a slaughter.
He had been in his bed sleeping soundly when a loud tapping noise awoke him. Throwing the blankets off of him and walking over curiously to the window, he was surprised to see a wide set of eyes and white teeth staring back at him, the rest of the facial features invisible to the eye. He jumped back, a little afraid, but then he figured that it was nothing—that it was nothing more than a trick of the light.
After all, the eyes and the teeth weren’t moving, even after he had acknowledged their existence. He climbed back up to his feet and approached the eyes and teeth again, craning his little neck back and forth, looking for the rest of the face. And then the teeth opened wide and rushed toward him, crashing through the window and sending him back onto the floor.
As the shards of glass fell around him, there was a loud thud next to his ear. He winced and turned his head away instinctively, but then he looked back. He had to look back. There was a leg, unlike anything he had ever seen. It was pitch black, and it nearly blended in with the shadows. If it wasn’t for the liquid-like form it was composed of, he wouldn’t have noticed its shape once his eyes adjusted. He craned his neck to get a better look at the whole body, but then it ran off, crashing through his bedroom door and out into the hall.
He scurried to his feet, and winced as he stepped on a shard of glass. He lifted his left leg off the ground and ripped the small shard from his foot, throwing it behind him. He wanted to see the creature. The kind of thing he had only seen in his dreams.
He was just about to tip toe over the glass field when a bloodcurdling scream pierced through the night. He stopped short, and stood still, his arms held tightly at his sides. The sound had come from outside the house.
It was only then that he remembered the broken window. He looked behind him, and another scream sounded off,
further in the distance than the first. He didn’t know what to make of it. He had never heard such sounds in the village before.
Then another scream shook him to his core, nearly sending him flying off his feet. It had come from inside the house. And it had sounded familiar. A woman’s voice. MOM!
He ran across the shards of glass, caring little for his own safety, but that was a mistake. It was too much of a shock to his little system. He ended up falling forward, sprawling onto the floor awkwardly as his feet throbbed. He dared not stand back on his feet. Not until the shards of glass were removed.
Another scream sounded off again. This time it was throaty and wet. Urgent and animalistic. He didn’t know what it meant, but he tore the shards of glass from his flesh like they were splinters. Feeling satisfied, and ignoring the blood the removal had produced, he ran as fast as his small legs could carry him to his parents’ bedroom.
He thrust open the door, and there he remained.
The thing. His dream. It was on the bed, and it was doing something to his parents’ bodies. He couldn’t tell, but there was a lot of movement. Shreds of their blankets floated through the air. Their lifeless bodies seemed to wriggle, and the creature was flailing wildly.
His mind told him to run, but the creature had to have known he was there. He had slammed the door open so hard. And his mother had told him so many times before that it wasn’t good to slam the doors. Now he knew why.
The creature continued its work, as he decided to try leaving, whether the creature had seen him or not. He took one step backwards, and a slimy hand wrapped its fingers, one by one, around the surface of his face. It yanked him backwards, and somehow he didn’t scream. His heart felt like bursting, his stomach was nauseous, and he was so terrified that he nearly went unconscious…but he didn’t scream.
It was another creature that had grabbed him. Except this creature didn’t want his parents. It wanted him. It reached out with its other arm, and its fingers appeared to stretch out like rubber, until they were so large, they were able to wrap around his entire body. It yanked him toward its chest, and there he stayed, fastened tight. The creature settled back down onto only three legs instead of four, and then it turned, and began running.
It leapt out the window, and his nose narrowly missed a shard of glass sticking up from the bottom of the sill. They both met the night air, and he shivered. His eyes felt heavy, and he was beginning to feel woozy, but he didn’t know why.
He tried to stay awake, but he couldn’t. There were fires all around him. The people were screaming like his mother had. More creatures, scurrying across the ground and rooftops, were permanently silencing his neighbors. He saw a glint of something bright in the distance, and he realized that it was no ordinary light. It was an eidolon, piercing through the dark and the evil, a beacon for all that was good and righteous in the world. That was what his storybooks had said.
The Sages had arrived. He would be freed soon. They would revive his parents with their mystical powers, and he would be given a treat for being such a brave boy. He only had to stay awake and wait for it all to end. He wouldn’t get a treat if he fell asleep. They would say he had slept through the whole thing.
And that wasn’t true. He had seen the creatures.
He didn’t realize he had fallen asleep. Or maybe…maybe he was still asleep. Because he had to be dreaming. The village he had known all his life was no longer in sight. Now it was darker than ever. And even when his eyes adjusted, he didn’t know what to make of his new surroundings. There were dark purple trees, with branches so thin and creepy that he thought they were going to reach out and snatch him up at any moment.
The lush grass he had once known was replaced by dead soil. The warm and soft arms of his mother were now slimy fingers, still wrapped around his abdomen. He stretched his neck up, and saw that there were three other creatures walking ahead of him. They also had children under their bellies. He thought he saw Yeor. He hoped not. Yeor would say that he hadn’t been brave. He always lied like that.
His neck grew tired, along with the rest of his body. Why was he so exhausted? He had gotten plenty of sleep…
He was thrown in a cage with seven other children.
A steel cage that had not been melded or crafted properly. The bars weren’t smooth poles. They were jagged and sharp, with slivers of steel sticking out, pricking anyone they came into contact with. The floor had a blanket, but it was scratchy and smelled like dried urine. There was limited space to maneuver too, as there was only a couple of square feet available for each child.
The first time someone had shoved him accidentally into one of the bars, and a sliver of steel had pierced his skin, he cried out, and screamed that he was done playing the game. He wanted to go home. He wanted his parents. And all he got was chuckles from the shadows. The other children began screaming and crying with him, but no one came to shut them up. Their captors allowed them to cry, until there were no more tears. They screamed until their throats were parched and felt like sand. With hoarse pleas, they made requests for water, but little came. Just the random bucketful of dirty water that was randomly thrown into the cage from the outside. After the first day has passed, the children had become more behaved, waiting for the buckets of water with wide open mouths, as eager and anticipant as baby birds.
The light was dim, and from what he could gather, they were in a bare room. No beds. No toys. No escape. He didn’t know what it meant, but he needed a way out. He was tired of peeing on himself, and stretching his neck out for the handful of water he would receive from the bucket every few hours or so. He was hungry, but there was no food. When would there be food? Would the creatures let them go?
He learned that the answer to his last internal question was a resounding no, especially once the first child was taken out of the cage. It felt like a few days had passed, but he wasn’t exactly sure. He didn’t really care. He was just concerned for the child they had just taken.
The room was suddenly flooded with lights, and his analysis had been correct. The room was bare, except for the cage full of children. He didn’t know how they were able to turn the lights on and off like that, but years later, he surmised that the Quietus had stolen the technology from their Prattlian neighbors. Without those lights, the torture might have been more bearable.
He watched as one of the creatures dragged the little boy’s arm to the center of the room.
Suddenly, the creature transformed, dropping its monster shell in what seemed like seconds. The little boy stopped squirming, and just stared up at the woman in surprise. The children in the cage leaned forward, just close enough to avoid being stabbed by the slivers of steel. They watched as the creature turned to woman let go of the little boy. The little boy didn’t run.
He just stood there and waited for something.
And then something came. A scythe. Stabbing the boy right through the chest.
The lights dimmed on impact.
The boy died instantly, but something awakened in every child standing up in the cage.
They understood now. This was no dream. Their nightmares had taken them away from their parents, and they would do with them whatever they pleased.
This horror. This truth…in an instant, it aged Bastion more than he ever wanted.
The next day, another cage was added to the room. This time, it was filled with Langoran children. The next hour, another cage was thrown into the mix, this time with more Allayans. As the years went on, more cages were added to the bare room, each filled with children.
All of them screamed and cried. All of them grew hungry and scared. After a few more days, the creatures began to feed them. The children didn’t know what the meat was, but they didn’t care. All they knew was that it would fill their bellies.
Eventually, they realized more truth. That filled bellies meant experimentation.
The creatures would come in the next hour and begin picking out children. The lights would always be turned up to the max,
and a show would always be performed for all in attendance. Sometimes it was a simple, quick death, but often, it was torture.
Raw, unbridled torture.
Eventually, the children that survived for a long time became experts. Giving in to the darkness that slowly wrapped its long fingers around their young hearts, they would become cold and observant. They would mumble and comment, on how the creatures were doing it all wrong. How if they wanted this result, they should have done that. They began forming tiers within their cages, pushing those that they didn’t want to the front, so that the creatures could grab them first. The “leaders” of each cage, usually the biggest kids, would fight back the others once food arrived. The leaders would ration out the food, giving small morsels to each of them to survive, but not enough that their stomachs would protrude. That honor would be reserved for the new guy or girl, or the outcast, who would usually eat the excessive amounts of sustenance with glee. With stomachs full and a smile on their stupid little faces, the creatures would come, and experiment on that child next. The smiles did not last long after that.
The tortures were long and meticulous, and many wouldn’t survive, but if one did, they knew that they were given a reprieve while they healed. The creatures would ignore you for at least a few days, and that was all anyone wanted.
For better or worse, it was how Bastion ended up becoming the longest surviving child.
He was scared the first time he was grabbed. He had seen eighteen deaths at that point, and he was sure he would be number nineteen. Tears had somehow replenished themselves, and he screamed for mercy, but he didn’t fight the creature. He knew it was no use. If Daddy hadn’t been able to stop the creatures, and he was the strongest man in the world…what hope did he have?
They began with a substance that he had seen before. An acid. He knew it would kill him almost instantly, but that was better than the slow ways. The acid came down upon his head. It was hot and the feeling was excruciating, but…his skin did not burn or crackle or tear. He remained whole.
Of Heroes And Villains (Book 4) Page 12
