Whisper

by Harper Alexander

  But he threw his head up and screamed at the sky – a sustained, angry wail.

  “I know what they did to you,” I went on when he let the sound chortle down in his throat. “And they should be ashamed of themselves. You don't deserve that.”

  He turned his back on me, kicked the fence – and I took my eyes from him for the first time, letting them wander over the dark as if uninterested in his fits. “Well. If that's how you feel,” I allowed, unimpressed.

  Since we seemed to be getting nothing out of one another, he opted to dismiss me as well, and took to trotting around the edges of his cage, restless and angry and set on pacing until someone acquiesced to his demands.

  As he trotted by on his third round, I put my fingers through the bars, let them trail over his moving flesh.

  He rounded at the sensation, bellowing in my face at the intrusion on his personal space.

  “You're just a big bully, aren't you?” I said. “A big bully with a temper.”

  And he proved me right by opening his mouth and hashing a spurt of flame through the bars. I had just enough warning from the furnace-sounding breath that he drew, and this time I stumbled back out of the way, my knees collapsing into a duck, to let the flame use itself up over my head. It was blistering hot, though, and after it was clear I felt the top of my head, finding some hair singed.

  That was going to be a problem. I could not stand my ground where fire-balls were concerned.

  The stunt seemed to have a negative effect on the creature, though, and I watched with interest as he lowered his head, twisted it slightly – as if babying his throat, trying to ease a painful angle.

  “That hurts you,” I observed, straightening, my brow creased with sympathy. He puffed a few defeated-sounding breaths into the dirt, grains fanning away from his muzzle and leaving a smooth little crater beneath. A moment later, the beast's ribcage convulsed, and he coughed. Just once, but it was enough to convince me. Whatever mutation had taken place inside him...it was not well-adjusted. It was a burden. Something that battled with the other parts of his nature.

  Pity softening me, I offered the piece of rabbit through the bars. He flicked an ear at me, tilting his head to eye the treat. His eyes were more bloodshot than before.

  He was by no means ready to take food from my hand, and so he turned back toward the center of the pen, tossing his head with a moody groan as he picked up a trot.

  You just aren't going to give it up, are you?

  Realizing it was time to assume more drastic measures, I waited until he was across the pen, and then did that forbidden thing: I ducked through the bars, into the pen.

  Suddenly, we shared the same space.

  It was too much – he was aware of the intrusion the instant my unauthorized feet touched down in his domain, and he rounded on me with a terrible provocation alight in his eyes. This time, he charged me at a full gallop, his knees thrumming almost clear up to his neck – a vicious, crazed run. But I absorbed myself into the zone I knew so well, the same one I had used on equines of every nature for ages, and let him come.

  The churn of his striking hooves slowed to a traceable pace, one that I measured with calculating, knowing eyes. My lips parted, and though it was drowned out by the drum of hooves and the rush of labored equine breathing, I began to whisper. I said, in those moments, the things that no one ever got to hear. The words that never made it so far as my own ears. I heard the slow-motion sound of hoof-beats and pumping breaths – the whispers that ran from my own lips only a distant echo of sinuous, ghostly nonsense. Whatever I chanted, it registered in nothing but the unseen minions of energy that floated in the air around me – charging them up, stringing them together, drawing them to me. They gathered around me like stirring spirits, creating an unseen current.

  The demon horse came at me, showing no signs of slowing. His nostrils glowed with the fire that burned within him, making the trickle of blood that ran from one side a distinct streak of rust against the rosy backdrop of flushed orange. In the slowed world I occupied, I could track the flow of the blood by a single gleaming drop, like a petal that floats down a sludge-cold stream. It ran from the cave of his nostril, down through his whiskers and over his lips, where it was flung like rabid froth off his chin.

  He was close enough, now, that I could see my reflection in his fire-bright eyes. A silhouette that burned in the windows to his soul. It was this visual that fascinated me, that kept me from anticipating the impact of the battering-ram that galloped toward me. The whispers trailed off on my lips – decreasing to a low, gradual ebb as the vision in those eyes drew me in. I found myself riveted, enraptured – thoroughly entranced in those final moments before impact.

  Then it hit. Like a tidal wave, it shattered my perspective, my whole world – flinging me like a rag doll and plowing me under. I don't know what I had thought – that the animal would stop short of harming me, just like any other. That it would dodge away at the last instant.

  Perhaps I had known all along it would go through with it. But something greater had rooted me in its path, convicting me to the outcome.

  In the blast between launching and hitting the ground, my star-stricken, suspended senses immersed me in a vision from my past. I saw it slide by me on a plane from another dimension, my flight through the air drawn out to witness the replay.

  It was of my mother, laughing. Swinging me around by my hands as she spun in dizzying, joyful circles. A breathless merry-go-round of momentum that hung by the threads of my fingers. The world was a blur in those moments; there was nothing but her and me, our eyes and smiles connecting us, focusing us, centering us.

  She ended the revolutions, like always, by pulling me upwards as she stopped, tossing me up into the air where I was weightless and dizzy for one single breathless moment before she always caught me, and hugged me to her chest.

  But in the moment that she should have caught me, the real world intruded on my vision, and I hit the ground instead. It slammed the breath from my lungs, the world from my vision. I lay flat on my stomach, my rib throbbing, my head jarred to the side. After what felt like an eternity, air breathed back into my lungs, and I felt the sting of dirt against my cheek. My lashes fluttered, and dim visions of the world filtered through to me. I had not the motivation or sense to move, though, and so I laid there. Somewhere far-off, I was aware that I shared the pen with the demon horse, and was now laying vulnerable in the dirt, at the mercy of the creature's wrath.

  But he didn't come back to finish the job. Perhaps knocking the sense out of me had been enough to satisfy him. Perhaps he thought the job was finished.

  My heart throbbed in my head. A sickening feeling. Like a flopping fish, I thought – wet and unruly out of its intended catalyst.

  For a time, I labored to bring breath into my lungs without straining what felt like a dozen injuries. I forced the swell of my lungs to increase gradually, popping things back into place one by one, and finally let out a sigh of relief and lay there enjoying the feeling of breathing in peace.

  That's when a second source of breath whuffed nearby, and I felt a dusting of sand blow against the back of my neck. It was warm – warmer than any ordinary breath.

  For a moment my breath stopped – but I eased it back into play, measuring it back to what it had been. Maintain a neutral air, I urged myself, not wanting to shatter any fragile moments as the demon horse inspected my downed form. I heard the creak of his joints as he moved a step closer, and let him sniff at my shoulder. He could sniff out something he didn't like any instant, I knew, and rear up with a scream to pound me to a pulp, but something in me promised he wouldn't.

  A moment later, I felt his breath on my neck, and his whiskers tickled the exposed flesh there. I bit back a giggle. Giggles were surely not a language that this fellow spoke. He nudged my skull with his lip, then moved down my body, giving me a thorough sniffing. I knew I didn't dare move, and so I kept stock-still – even as my arm went to sleep, bent underneath me.
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br />   Working his way back up my leg, the creature stopped at my pocket, and I could hear him snuffing at the contents in recognition.

  Ah, yes – the meat.

  It must have been protruding to some degree, because he jostled at my hip only a few moments before finding purchase, and I felt the offering slide out as he extracted it. A smile touched my lips.

  After devouring the morsel, he checked for more, still able to smell it on my clothing. There was nothing there, of course, but he seemed unsatisfied settling for as much – and the next thing I knew, he bit down on the pocket itself and the flesh that happened to be beneath it, and I bit my lip hard to keep from yelping.

  Finding that what was left wasn't to his taste, he left off and sniffed around the ground instead, as if he might discover a few extra crumbs. Meeting only with disappointment, he lost interest in the game and momentarily moved off.

  I drew a steadying breath, and dared to move a muscle for the first time. Keeping the motion slow and deliberate, I freed my numb arm and carefully pushed myself over until I lay half on my side and half on my back, able to keep tabs on things over my shoulder.

  Alert to my movement, the demon horse watched me. He didn't immediately charge me again, intent on pummeling me into eternal submission underfoot, and I took that as an encouraging sign. There was a slightly softer look in his eyes now, as if the morsel I had brought for him had eased the worst of his temper. So long as I stayed in my position of submission across the pen from him, it seemed we were on cohabiting terms, for the moment.

  Progress.

  I sat there, scarcely moving, for what must have been an hour – maybe two. Letting him grow accustomed to my presence. Eventually he took to pacing again, rushing up and down the fence line, but he ignored me in the center of the pen as he did it.

  Finally, I deemed enough time to have passed, and aspired to stand. I got to my feet at a maddening pace, my joints and bones creaking with every painstakingly ascended inch. When I had risen all the way to my feet, the beast stopped to face me, seeing what I was up to.

  “Hey there, fox...” I whispered, acknowledging that we saw each other.

  He looked at me a moment, then pawed the ground. It seemed more for effect this time, though, and I dared to hope the 'whisper' energies had finally started taking some effect.

  He remained very showy with his aggressive abilities as I toyed here and there with pushing his limits, but it seemed we had satisfied the 'charge' impulse for the night. I was thankful for that, nursing my rib with every motion that I dared to make.

  Every chance I got, I met the beast's eyes, trying to hold them – encouraging the practice of us looking into one another. At first his attention could not be held long with the practice, but it seemed to catch on more and more, until it was as if he actually saw something in me, and wanted to look deeper, curious about the nature that resided there. Eventually he met my eyes and didn't look away, and after holding his gaze for good, solid five minutes, something clicked in my instincts. It was time to take this a step further.

  Slowly, but without hindrance, I moved forward from my stationary observation point, and simply closed the distance between us. He stomped when he recognized me advancing, issuing a fierce warning sound from his throat. When that didn't work he weaved his head back and forth, working up a fiery breath, threatening to unleash it if I came any closer. It was a bluff, though – somehow I knew.

  At my failure to heed the warnings, he half-reared, insistent, but then dropped back down to all-fours and fell silent, his fits having finally met their indifferent match.

  That's it, lover...

  I fought down the elation that clamored to celebrate as I drew dangerously close to him. I could feel the warmth emanating from his body now, could smell the scent of meat that came with carnivore territory.

  His nostrils flared, taking in my own scent. They dilated and contracted, more rapidly as I came to stand in front of him, each breath testing what I was made of on a more intimate level as I drew nearer.

  Then I surpassed that great head of his, never taking my eyes from his, and drew alongside him. Fighting the quiver of fingers, I lifted my hand slowly from its place at my side, canceling the space between us, watching him for signs... His ribcage heaved, his breaths nervous and untrusting – but it was this swelling from within that pressed his own side against my palm.

  Suddenly, I had my hand on him.

  He was unnaturally hot, which could have been expected, but the degree of heat surpassed what I had surmised. Despite the flame that I knew resided in him, I hadn't expected it to feel so transparently as if some terrible, furnace-worthy fever raged inside him. I could feel it, though, radiating hotter and hotter – and it made me think it might very well burn him up from the inside out, if he aspired to engage it too ambitiously.

  My brow crumpled in further concern, dismayed by every additional depth of this creature I explored. It's just one unfortunate contingency piled on top of another with you, isn't it? I directed a stream of empathetic telepathy. Poor thing. I willed soothing vibes into my hands, and ran them slowly over his ribs. And it was as if the greater life went out of him. He did not melt like a pool of butter into my fingers, but the aggression became a thing of remission. I could see it in his eyes, still, a demon ripe to lash out at anyone else who crossed him – but not me. Not the one that brought soothing waves with her.

  I felt his breath beneath my fingers, saw the soul in his up-close eyes, and the only conclusion I could come to was this:

  “You aren't this fire, are you?” I murmured knowingly to him. “You're just the instrument. The tragic, enduring instrument.” I moved back up to his head, dared to stare him straight in the face and take that face in my hands. He resisted at first, his neck going erect, his muzzle rising so that he breathed directly into my own face.

  His breaths poured into my face, rang in my ears like the tide, and the voice of that beautiful lost shore returned to my inner being. My lips parted, stricken with euphoric awe. I wanted to laugh, but I was breathless with amazement for its return, having forgotten what it felt like.

  I heart it, Jay. I hear it again...

  I gazed in awe at the instrument before me – the instrument I had no sooner pegged for the catalyst that it was than it proved its nature manifold, and brought that other, unexpected tune back to my ears.

  In that moment I saw the creature before me in magnificent light. An unfortunate but enduring bridge of evolution, that came up for air from underneath the burdensome cards it was dealt kicking and screaming, putting up a fight, rising like a phoenix from the ashes.

  That conviction, and the instrumental metaphor that came to mind considering his nature, brought a name to my lips that demanded to be spoken, bestowed upon him. It fit as a name predestined by God himself, and I opened my mouth as its honorary messenger, and breathed it upon him:

  “Crescendo.”

  Twenty-Nine –

  Crescendo. That thing in music that brought everything up to climactic speed, when the chords got bigger and louder, an ordinary melody suddenly taken to greater heights, a finale-like sound hammered out on the fateful keys. Crescendo. That thing that enhanced the music to the point where the instrument trembled with the power of it, struggling to contain the unfurling spirit of it.

  Crescendo. This creature before me. This rising, evolving beast with a war song inside him.

  The demon inside you writes your music no more, I declared to him, as though there were no question of him hearing the prose of my thoughts. I will ride you. And you and I will command the drums by which you will hammer the earth that spawned you back into submission.

  *

  It was Toby who found me, when dawn came and went and the awakening of the world found me in that corral still. He wandered up, perhaps drawn by the unusual silence emanating from the region that kept the demon horse. Wariness lit his face when he saw me. And for the first time, he sounded like Jay when he spoke:

&n
bsp; “What are you doing, Alannis?”

  “What does it look like I'm doing?”

  “Something you should never have seriously considered for a moment.”

  “Who says I had to consider it? This is my calling.”

  He eyed the beast that stood without aggression behind me, willingly sharing my company now. “I'm getting the Lieutenant.” This was out of his comfort zone – and out of his element.

  Good for him.

  When he returned with Sonya, minutes later, the demon horse had taken himself across the pen behind me, searching for breakfast. The Lieutenant's face was a cross between stony and stormy – with some of Toby's wariness mixed in.

  “Miss Wilde–” she began, but I stopped her.

  “I think you might want to reconsider your words, and perhaps whatever method you're using to win this war right now, before speaking,” I said boldly.

  She shut her mouth a moment. Considered me. “Why?”

  “Because,” I revealed from the center of that death-trap of a corral, my voice ironic as I confessed my new discovery: “I can whisper to demon horses.”

  *

  I stood at the threshold of Jay's tent, remorse in my stance, but also – some quality that willed him to listen. He looked up, and knew. I couldn't say what he knew, and in all fairness I don't think he could, either. But he knew something. Could read the nature of something in my stance. On my face. In his gut.

  “Jay...” I started, regretfully, trying to be gentle. But there was no way to say it that would rest well with him. The Lieutenant had asked me if I wanted her to do it, but I had refused the offer. While he would have taken it better, coming from her – he would have no choice, but to – he deserved to hear it from me.

  He stood as I struggled. Faced me.

  So he was prepared to be a man about whatever it was, but somehow that didn't help me. “I...used my gift, on the demon horse,” I managed finally, spitting out a starting point. Ignoring the inevitable dismay and trepidation that pained his eyes at the revelation and where it was going, I plowed onward. “Last night... I went in there. I whispered to him. I tamed him–”