"Who's that?"
"I don't say her name. It tends to draw her attention and we really don't get along. She makes me look like a gem of purity and devotion."
“Her name? The Power of Bondage is female?”
“She’s whatever she wants to be, but yes, generally she’s female.”
“When he was talking to me, Race said ‘she didn’t tell him I was a singer’ then before you broke through he said ‘regardless of that bitch's promises.’"
Acheron considered this.
“It’s very possible, even likely that the Power of Bondage is our pursuer. She tends to send others to do her dirty work. She has as much juice as me if not more and she’s one of Trytohn’s favorites. She’d love to see me in the Pit.” The demoness chewed her lower lip with her perfect teeth.
Stop it! Lyric yelled at himself. For once, Acheron did not seem to notice his inner conflict.
"That would also explain the trap Race led me into. I've never seen that many ogres in one place, and there's no way that little chicken shit would run through them without some kind of protection." Acheron talked to herself seeming to have forgotten Lyric and Cadence were even there.
"We were attacked by an ogre." Lyric told her. Acheron looked at Lyric, then Cadence, who nodded confirmation.
"An ogre and a half shifted human? That is definitely on purpose. Ogres only hunt with other ogres. They are extremely racist. I could see her sending an ogre, but the shifter? That doesn't make sense. She's mean enough, but shifting humans isn't her style."
"So we still don't know who's hounding us and I'm still on the hook for your contracts."
"Yup, there's no way out of it short of infernal intervention. Considering the plans they're making for you down there right now I don't see that as a possibility."
"What kind of plans are they making?"
"Who knows? Bad ones."
"Super."
They stopped short as a handsome man with a short goatee appeared on their path. Cadence assumed an attack position. The man gave her a disdainful glance before dismissing her and turning his attention to Lyric.
"Keylac." Acheron said with a sniff, "who sent you?
Keylac smiled at the demoness.
"The owner of your Singer's contract of course."
"Which is?"
Keylac's smile broadened.
"Acheron, you are lovely and terrifying as always, but you know I can't divulge that information without permission."
"Get on with it you pathetic lackey. What's your master want?"
"Simple," Keylac produced a small stone. "As promised, small, simple favors. This is number one. As soon as you meet the Prophet Man, drop this stone on the ground. That's all and debt number one is paid in full."
"What is it?" Lyric asked skeptically.
Keylac stared blankly at him and spoke slowly as though he were addressing a slow child.
"It's a stone; I want you to put it on the ground when you meet the Prophet Man."
Lyric reluctantly accepted the stone and immediately Keylac vanished in a puff of smoke that stank of frightened dog.
"Who does Keylac usually serve?"
"Everyone, Keylac isn't a name it's a title. You can always identify a Keylac by its scent. They're the bitches of Hell."
"He smelled like a scared mutt," Lyric said.
Acheron looked at him in surprise.
"Most humans can't discern the scent of a hellion." She considered him thoughtfully. "It must be the tie; it heightens so many of your abilities, that must be one.” She held her hand out for the stone. “There’s no real way of telling the purpose of this thing. Trytohn is the Prince of Lies, everything about Hell is deceptive, the only thing you can count on is that this isn’t a stone.” She handed it back to him. “Regardless, you don’t have much of a choice, you’re stuck with the bargain you made, I’d just drop the stone and forget about it.”
Lyric tried to drop the stone and found it stuck to his hand. Acheron laughed.
“You can’t drop it here; you have to drop it when you find the Prophet Man. Look on the bright side, this is one payment down, there’s only six left.”
13 THE PROPHET MAN
Another hour's hike and the river narrowed considerably.
"Shhhh" Acheron tilted her head, listening. "Hear that?"
Neither Lyric nor Cadence could hear what the demoness heard, though Lyric became aware of an odd sound inside his head that seemed to emanate from the tie. He realized though he could not hear what Acheron heard with his own ears, he could hear it through her, through the tie. This was interesting; he looked around and saw that everything had a slight visible echo, as though seeing the same scene through two different cameras. The echo was brighter and clear than what he normally saw. The more he focused on it the clearer it became.
Careful, that's how Singers get lost, Acheron admonished. It's one thing to view the world through my eyes; it's another to prefer it to your own sight. I believe Singers call it the siren song.
That was familiar. Lyric learned about the siren song early in his fifth measure. Time and experience cause Singer and Verger to become more and more attuned to one another. The siren song is the desire for the Singer to leave behind their own body and live in the more highly sensitized Verger form. The Guild warned students at length about it and Lyric was so well indoctrinated he had never thought he would be a candidate for it. Like so many who fall into harmful addictions, he had no idea how subtle and seductive it would be.
Lyric paused his ruminations long enough to notice he had stopped walking and Cadence was staring at him with a look of concern.
"Sorry," he said, blushing. "I got distracted for a moment." Acheron chuckled behind him. Looking ahead, he said. "I hear it!"
Cadence cocked her head to one side and focused on listening. Lyric heard it plainly now. Up ahead a man shouted angrily, a second man cackled in response. They pressed on in the direction of the voices and soon broke free of the trees to see a shirtless well-muscled man with bronze skin, faded jeans and white hair standing on their side of the river. Armed with a long pole that had a hook at the end, he was using it to try to clear some debris from the bottleneck in the river.
"Now dammit Joe, cut it out! Being crazy is one thing but you're just being a jerk!"
An old man on the opposite side of the river had a large axe in his hand and with far more strength than Lyric would have thought possible, felled a sapling. He then proceeded to pick up the young tree and throw in the river, adding to the mess the other man was trying to clear out.
"Why are you doing this you psycho? I have to get this cleared up so I can go inside and prepare for Miss Matilda's visit!"
"You don't listen!"
"Crazy old coot, that cypress is older than you, it's not falling on anything!" The man continued trying to clear up the jam.
Acheron gestured to the old man across the river.
"I'll bet anything that's your Prophet Man. Drop that stone and let's see what happens."
"I can't do that,” Lyric looked at the stone in his hand. “Whatever it does it can't be good. If this man has been touched by the Voice, he's a child of Light. I won't do something that might harm him."
“It doesn’t work like that, Lover. Hell has a tendency to make things happen even when you don’t want them to.” As if on cue, the stone suddenly grew hot and Lyric dropped it in surprise.
He attempted to scoop it back up, but it rolled away from him as though it had a mind of its own. It came to a stop against a huge cypress tree, close to the size of the Sta Catoe giants, growing beside what logic declared must be the man's cabin. As soon as the stone stopped, the ground began to shake and with a tremendous crack, the enormous tree ponderously gave in to gravity's demands and toppled over reducing the cabin to flat kindling.
The man with the pole stared in open-mouthed shock at what used to be his home.
"Okay Errol," called Joe, "I'll stop. You can go inside now." With that and
another insane cackle, he turned and disappeared into the woods.
The man called Errol surveyed what used to be his home in shock for several seconds before he noticed the trio watching him.
"Did you see that?" Incredulity dulling him to the appearance of three strangers. "He called me outside an hour ago to clear away this jam that he is obviously responsible for," he said shook his pole in the direction the old man had gone. "He said I should take my time because my cypress would be falling soon. He said I would have a bad day if I decided to clean my house."
Lyric looked helplessly at the man, at a complete loss. He was responsible for the man’s home and could not do a thing to make it okay.
Acheron spoke up.
“I’m sorry about your house, handsome, but we really do need to talk to your friend. Can you tell us where he lives?”
"No, nobody knows where he lives." The man called Errol seemed unsurprised the trio wanted the crazy old man. "Plenty of folks from Sta Catoe and further come to see him. There's a footbridge down around the bend a ways. Cross over and start walking and he's likely to find you."
Acheron thanked the man and gave him one of her magical smiles, he grinned like an idiot until he looked back at his house. Cadence grabbed Lyric’s arm and towed him after Acheron in the direction Errol had indicated. As they walked and Lyric struggled with his guilt he noticed Acheron was quiet. Silence from Cadence was expected but the demoness tended to be an incessant chatterbox. Lyric watched her out of the corner of his eye, wondering what demons think about. Acheron looked at him directly.
"You can just ask Lover, I don't have any secrets from you."
Lyric blushed. She went on as though the question had been asked.
"I'm thinking deals made with Hell are not easily manipulated. What was the purpose of that tree dropping on the man's house? It's odd; the Prophet Man obviously knew it was going to happen. He even took steps to ensure Errol was out of the way. So was the purpose of the stone fulfilled, or was it stopped? Or, as I suspect, is there more to come?”
“Why do you care?”
Acheron gave him a look that made him question his IQ for a moment.
“I care because if this old man managed to outsmart Hell, we might have someone who can actually help us."
Lyric did not respond, they made their way across the bridge and walked back up river in the direction the old man had gone.
* * *
Keith Normvy fell to his knees before his mistress. Lisian gestured for him to stand.
"No time to waste. Somehow, the prophet man survived. That bitch Acheron also managed to get back to the Singer. Concentrate on Lyric, I want him dead. I will send help to occupy Acheron and the prophet."
"It will be done, mistress."
Lisian caught his chin in her hand and stared intently into his eyes.
"Don't underestimate the demons singer, pet. He's powerful."
Normvy grinned.
"So am I."
* * *
"Lyrical Sound of the Evening." Lyric whirled at the sound of his full name. The old man sat crossed legged on a large fallen tree they had just passed. How did he manage to escape the attention of all three of them? Lyric looked around and saw that Cadence looked as startled as he felt, though she immediately placed herself between him and the old man. Acheron on the other hand didn't look startled at all; she calmly looked the old man over, a thoughtful expression on her face. Perhaps he didn't surprise all of them.
"The Demoness Acheron," The old man smiled. Acheron's eyes widened at his casual mention of her name. "Yes, I know you Fallen One. I know who you are and what you want." Now Acheron looked startled. A look of genuine pity touched the man's weathered features. "I truly wish I could tell you that it's possible, but I simply don't know. That particular secret has not been given to me. All I know is that Lyric is your best bet."
"What kind of shit is that?" Acheron asked angrily. "I don't need to know what I already know." Turning to Lyric, she said bitterly. "When you're done here, just call, I'll be listening." She vanished with her customary lilac afterglow hanging in the air.
The old man seemed unperturbed by the demoness’ anger. He turned his smile to Lyric.
"You are the Prophet Man?" Lyric asked.
The old man chuckled.
"Some people call me that. Personally, I think it's a bit ostentatious. I am whatever the Composer means for me to be, sometimes the Song reveals some of what's to come. Sometimes He gives me understanding of what is. None of it is I though, as you know Lyric. Like you, I serve the Composer in whatever way He desires with whatever gift He chooses to give me at the time. My good friend Errol calls me Joe. What would you like of me, my young friend?"
""I’d like to know what happened to my parents."
Joe raised his eyebrows in surprise.
"Is that all?"
"I would like to know if there is a way to sever the soul tie without killing myself, but Emma is the priority."
Joe looked at Lyric thoughtfully before replying.
"Emma is alive and safe. She will likely need your help eventually, but she is in no immediate danger."
"Where is she?" Lyric pressed. "Why is there a crystal statue of her and the rest of my town just out of sight? Who has her and why? And what about Niq? He's not even a statue!"
The Prophet Man held up a restraining hand.
"She's safe for now, that's the extent of my knowledge. There is no danger immediately threatening her, or Niq for that matter. Let's discuss the issue that has a deadline."
"That's all you've got? No immediate danger? What kind of prophet are you?" Lyric unsuccessfully struggled to keep the anger out of his tone.
"I am a prophet of the Composer. The Voice speaks to me and I repeat what I hear. The Song sings in my heart and tells mysteries I haven't the words or wit to divulge. My brain is constantly touched by fire and no sweeter agony exists than the knowledge that even though I have failed my Lord in the worst ways imaginable, he loves me and uses me anyway." Joe's voice remained calm and quiet, which seemed to hammer the power of his words even deeper into Lyric's mind, awakening that deep part of him that struggled to understand the Score of Creation. "I cannot lie about what I know, Lyrical Sound of the Evening. Nor can I demand revelations not given to me. Shall we carry on?"
Lyric nodded silently.
"There is more than one way to sever the tie. The obvious one is dying; the other is singing for the Composer and asking him to rewrite the score. Every Singer has a large part in the score, so I don’t know if you’ll get what you want that way. Then there's the possibility of contracting the Power of Bondage, Lisian, a demoness whose power rivals Acheron’s herself. She will sever the tie for you for a price, though not likely one you want to pay. Her prices tend to lead souls away from the Voice and you may never find your way back." He continued his appraisal of Lyric in silence a moment. "I have a question for you, young man. Why do you want this tie severed?"
"She’s evil!” Lyric exclaimed in disbelief. “She is the very thing I've pledged my life to fight against! She represents everything evil and wrong in creation; being tied to her is unacceptable. I’ve actually considered taking my own life just to be free of her. I don’t want to be responsible for the atrocities she commits while she’s tied to me!”
"Certainly not, your own sins are more than enough for you to be responsible for, aren’t they?” The Prophet Man asked sharply. “I don’t think I can help you.” The old man leapt nimbly from the log and walked away.
“Wait!” Lyric chased after him with Cadence on his heels. Joe didn’t stop walking as Lyric caught up to him. “Please, I need your help. I have no idea where to start or what to do. If you have knowledge that will help me why won’t you share it?”
“Didn’t they tell you boy? I’m crazy! I don’t much care what you need. I need peace, and I need to help my friend Errol repair the damage to his home. Go find someone else to help you.”
“What did I say t
hat has offended you so?”
Joe rounded on him fiercely.
“Everything about you offends me boy! What is that girl’s name?” he stabbed a finger at Cadence.
“Her name is Cadence,” Lyric answered, confused.
“Who is she?”
“She’s my protector.”
“Really? The function of this beautiful, strong, skilled and extremely lethal young woman is simply to protect you? She has no history? She has no dreams? She has no goals of her own?”
“She said she’s here to protect me!” Lyric answered angrily. “She can’t talk. I’ve told her she doesn’t have to stay but she is insistent. Being that she’s saved my life more than once, I consider her good company. Why does any of this matter to you?”
“She’s not a pet!” Joe roared as he stepped toward Lyric furiously shaking a finger in his face. The Singer found himself backing up in spite of himself. “How many times have you tried to communicate with her? To understand her? To hear her song? I know soul singers. The entire point of your first measure is to learn to listen. You are taught to hear the music in the Score that sings through all of creation. Your ears are blessed with the knowledge of mysteries the rest of the world longs to understand. This girl may not speak but she can communicate. How many one sided conversations have you had with her without even so much as attempting to listen as much as you talk?”
Lyric began to answer but the Prophet Man held up his hand.
“You asked a question boy. Listen to the entire answer. Your demoness is right, you’re not a Singer, you’re the theory of a Singer.” Lyric blinked in surprise, there weren't a whole lot of ways Joe could have known what Acheron said to him on Dacapo “If I were to give you plain answers you’d end up doing far more harm than good. Cadence is a glorious miracle. She is a treasure that should be appreciated and cherished. I will not tell you why; you must listen to her and understand. Then you will know why. Fallen or not, Acheron is an intelligent, beautiful creature sung into being by the Voice, and He weeps over her. She stands to pay far more dearly than you do if your situation is not resolved carefully. You have learned to hate her kind so much that you think nothing of what she faces - only what you face. You are selfish, Lyric. As long as you remain so, your situation is hopeless. You offend me because you are able to hear and understand more than most of us and you walk around with your eyes shut tight, your fingers in your ears and singing your own petty little songs when you have within you the stuff legends are made of. You offend me because you take for granted the gifts lavished upon you by the Composer and keep your eyes fixed so firmly on the mud you never see the beauty of the stars.” The old man paused, his chest heaving and face red. Immediately he calmed down and smiled sadly. “You are a fool, Lyric. A selfish, petty, fool. I can’t help you the way you want. If you want more answers than I’ve already given you must give up something dear to you. Something you don’t want to part with. What will you give for your answers Lyrical Sound of the Evening?”
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