Sanctuary (Dominion)

by Kris Kramer

  “We play our game once more.” The voice spoke to me, but I didn’t dare say anything back, for fear that I’d be found. The wind tugged at me, a sign that the vortex was getting closer, so I darted to the larger rocks behind me, at the base of the mountain, and I discovered a cave, filled with blackness so thick that it threatened to engulf me if I stepped inside. Even so, I was tempted to run in and hide, that is until I saw a pair of giant red eyes appear from deep within its bowels.

  “But this time will be different,” the voice rumbled. “This time, I’ve changed the rules.”

  The red eyes growled, and I backed away, feeling the wind wrap around me, desperately trying to yank me away.

  “This time, I shall drink deeply from the chaos sown in my wake.”

  The voice laughed, and the world shook. I felt my feet leave the ground, and I squeezed my eyes shut as the wind whipped at my face. My arms were leaden, useless, as were my legs, which flailed about in the air. I could only feel the gusts tearing my body apart, and the thunderous booming cracking my bones. My body was ripped to pieces, and I ceased to be in this world, but not before knowing that a face stared back at me from within the vortex – the smiling face of my enemy.

  *****

  I awoke, with a cry of despair caught in my throat. My vision was blurry, my heart raced, and my head pounded as if being drummed with a hammer, from the inside. Once I finally calmed myself, and focused on my surroundings, I recognized Lorcan’s tent, and never was I so glad to find myself in that crazed sorcerer’s dwelling. I think I could have woken chained to a wall in a Frankish prison and I’d still be ecstatic to be on real and solid ground.

  Avaline lay next to me, asleep, but when I saw her, I recoiled. The image of her holding Ewen's face as his humanity disappeared turned my stomach, and my first instinct was that I’d been played for a fool all this time. I’d let myself believe she was only a sick woman who needed to be healed. I'd forgotten that her touch put the demon in his head. Lorcan made it all happen, but Avaline was his tool, and now, I didn't know what to make of her.

  Lorcan. He’d shown his true self in there. The demon held him in thrall, like Caenwyld, only Lorcan's methods were far more terrible. Caenwyld brought misery and death in his wake, but Lorcan twisted life itself. Some malevolent force resided within both of them, the same that seemed to fill that cursed dungeon. The evil I’d witnessed in there, and in that dream, was more potent than anything I’d felt in my life. Something stirred in those depths, maybe even the demon himself, commanding Lorcan to bring him souls to destroy.

  "Awake now?" he asked, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. The sorcerer sat on the floor behind me, legs crossed, leaning over a collection of bones. I didn't answer. I tried not to even look directly at him, afraid of what I might see. "It's about time. I’ve been waiting since yesterday to speak to you. Priest.”

  He struggled to stand, leaning heavily on his cane, then he walked over to me and stared down at my prone body for a long moment. Suddenly, he crouched, grabbing my robes and pulling me close. "You felt it, didn't you?" he whispered, his breath stinking of cabbage and onions. "You felt the power. He was inside you, wasn't he?" I closed my eyes, squeezed them shut. I didn't want to face him. "Tell me, you spineless turd!” He shook me. “Tell me!"

  I said nothing, refusing to relive those moments. He threw me back to the ground with a strength that belied his appearance. He paced in a circle around my huddled form, his face contorted in a wicked mix of ecstasy and pain.

  "You came face-to-face with my master. You felt him surround you, cradle you, and now you try to keep that from me? I want to know! I want to know the awe you felt in his presence. I want to see him as you did!" He was in a rage now, far more so than when he questioned me about God and magic, and I feared his next actions might be what Cullach warned me about – opening me up and spilling my entrails.

  “I don’t know what I saw,” I whispered.

  “You do! You know exactly what you saw! Admit it, you dog!”

  “I don’t know what I saw,” I repeated.

  “You lie!”

  “By God, I don’t know what I saw!” Lorcan’s eyes widened, and at first I thought he was surprised by the force of my words. “You have to believe me.”

  “By God?” he said, and I saw the contempt spill from his eyes. “Your Christian God has no power here. None! He’s lost this land, because we have taken it back! And it won’t stop there!”

  He began to pummel me. Normally, his punches had the force of a child, but his bony arms and hands hit me with a fury that seemed to add strength to each blow, and his knuckles poked deep into my body with every hit. I was still recovering from whatever lingering effects that dungeon had cursed me with, so I curled myself into a ball and suffered his onslaught.

  “The old gods will return! They will lead us back to glory! The Christians will die!”

  I suffered his tirade, because it was easier than trying to argue with him. Eventually he tired of wailing on me and he used his stick. The blows came slower, but harder, and more painful, but still I took it. I was tired and weary, and I prayed for him to tire himself out and leave. That’s what would happen, I told myself. Just let him beat me until he has no strength left. Then it will be over.

  Sure enough, he stopped, deciding instead to pace back and forth in front of me, scowling, baring his teeth like a wolf. I glanced up at him, like a wounded, beaten dog, hoping that he would cease his punishment. And that’s what he did. He turned away from me, and I finally started to breathe again.

  But then he turned to Avaline.

  Before I knew it, he’d grabbed her by the arms and lifted her up and over, onto her back. She cried out in surprise, and tried to push him away but her efforts were unfocused and futile. He yanked her dress up, exposing her legs to the thigh.

  “No!” I leapt toward Lorcan, but his fist caught me square on my chin and sent me sprawling to the floor, as flashes of light danced before me. I tried to stand back up but then I felt a solid kick to my ribs, the same ones that still hadn’t quite healed from the beating the Vikings gave me, and I fell to the ground like a stone, curled into a ball as pain shot through my body and all the air left my lungs. I gasped, but each breath seemed to take forever.

  I heard grunting. I looked over, without thinking, to see Lorcan already on her, her dress and his robe both hiked up, and I turned away in revulsion. I couldn’t let him rape her. I had to stop him, but I couldn't move from this spot on the floor. My chest and my lungs burned, and my body refused to heed any command I gave it to move. So I just lay there instead, staring at the floor, unsure of where my eyes should be. I couldn’t watch him do this to her. But I couldn’t look away as if it wasn’t happening, either. A horrible sickness formed in my gut, and spread all throughout my body. I vomited, and the sheer act of my body tensing caused even more pain to flare through my chest. I cried out and fell back to the floor, whimpering and moaning.

  Something moved at the corner of my eye. Avaline’s arm lay on the floor between us, her hand reaching out for me. I stared at it, not sure if I should take it. I looked at her eyes to see them staring back at me, not averting them as she normally did. She wasn’t afraid or angry. Her eyes didn’t have the darkness in them. She only looked to me for reassurance. She needed me. She needed my touch, and her hand vainly grasped for it.

  But I couldn’t reach back. I couldn’t take her hand. Not now. She was part of it. Her, Lorcan, the demon, they were all connected, part of this malevolent scheme to corrupt everything I held dear.

  I looked in her eyes. Always the eyes. And I saw no trace of evil. Just sorrow.

  And I turned away.

  After it was done, Lorcan left the tent without a word, and I cried, reveling in my misery until I became numb to it. I no longer had the strength to see this journey through to its end, nor did I want to. I embraced my weakness, and I lay there, ready for death to take me if it so chose. I wouldn’t even fight it. Whatever battle God ha
d chosen for me to take part in, I had lost. And I waited for the gates of Hell to take me, if only to free me from this terrible moment.

  *****

  I woke the next morning to find myself alone in the tent. I wasn't tied, but I made no attempt to get up or move around. Instead, I laid still on the floor, holding my sore chest, not willing to face the world. What was left to face? Everything was darkness and misery. Everyone was tainted, even me.

  Worst of all me.

  I thought about last night, and the memory of it churned my insides. I wanted to be sick again, but I wouldn’t. I held on to that sickness, and I let it wash over me, tightening my stomach and chest, burning my cheeks and forehead. I needed the pain and the agony. It was my punishment for failure, not just for letting Lorcan do what he did, but for believing I could ever stop it. Right and wrong held no more meaning. Every step I took in this world, I looked for some shred of hope and justice, only to be reminded that neither existed if men simply chose to ignore them. Now I understood why Arkael left. I’d come here to be part of a war, thinking I could change the unrestrained desires of men. I’d thought this power to heal would be my weapon, and my renewed faith would be my shield. I would stand up against the inherent evil in man, like he had done. But there was no justice. Violence begat violence and death begat death. An endless cycle of terror. Exactly what the demon wanted.

  After a while, though, the normal urges of my body crept back in. My stomach rumbled from hunger, my back hurt from lying on the ground, and I didn’t have the energy to continue wallowing in depression without knowing what might be happening in the world outside. So I dragged myself off the ground, and I stood there in the middle of the tent, working up the will to go outside. My eyes, however, found the spot where Lorcan had committed his violation. I don’t know what drew me to it, though, except maybe to mark it in my memory as another reason to hate myself.

  Outside the tent I found Sefrid, sitting in her same spot on the ground, scrubbing dishes and pots. A few plates sat next to her with the remains of food on them and my hunger flared again. I frowned at missing lunch, and turned instead to look at the fort across the bay, but just seeing that place made me shiver.

  "Sefrid," I asked, almost afraid to hear the answer. "Where's Avaline?"

  Sefrid glanced at me, her probing eyes taking in my disheveled state. "She's with the sorcerer. He took her back to the dungeon."

  "How?"

  Sefrid shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. She seemed calm this morning when he walked her outside. I was surprised you weren’t with her."

  My heart fell, and I had to sit down to keep from falling. This was my death sentence. My only protection in this camp was my ability to keep her calm. Lorcan told me my life depended on that one simple provision. Now he could torture or kill me as he liked. But with death finally upon me, I realized with a calm indifference that I wasn’t scared. Though, I couldn’t decide if that was because I really did want to die, or if I just expected God to snatch me from its clutches once again.

  “Was she okay? Was she hurt?”

  “Not that I could tell." Sefrid looked at me curiously. "Should she have been?”

  “No. Of course not.” I stared at the ground for a long time, so Sefrid returned to her work. After a while, though, I couldn’t bear the silence. “I failed her yesterday.”

  Sefrid raised an eyebrow at me. “How?”

  I gave a curt laugh, but there was no joy in it. “By being myself.”

  "I heard him, when he shouted at you."

  I nodded absently. “Do you know what he did next?”

  Sefrid’s eyes widened for a moment, and her lips tightened. Then she forced a calm expression back to her face and looked at her pots. “Let’s not talk of last night, Daniel.”

  “Why not?” I shook my head in disgust. “This is all happening because of me. It’s my fault Ewen came back. It’s my fault Avaline is here. It’s my fault Lorcan did what he did last night. I failed her,” my voice fell to a whisper, “and so many others." I looked at the sky, and for some reason I only just now decided that it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. “I’m going to die for this.”

  “You’re a fool.”

  I blinked in surprise, and looked at Sefrid, who puckered her mouth in disgust. “What?”

  “You’re just like all the other Christians. You think you’re at the center of the world no matter where you go. You think your precious God weaves the events of the world around you as you flit this way and that, like a hummingbird.” She shook her head in disappointment. “You think far too much of yourself.”

  “How can you say that? I talked Ewen into coming back here. I’m the reason he’s trapped in that dungeon.”

  “Lorcan is the reason your friend is in that dungeon.”

  It's not that simple, I wanted to say. It’s never that simple. But the argument faded as I remembered that horrifying place.

  “The dungeon,” I said, “what did I see in there?”

  “I told you that you would see what your God has wrought.”

  “No. There was nothing of God in there.”

  “Your God created the world, did He not? He created good and evil?”

  “God created the world,” I explained, “but man created evil.”

  “Interesting notion,” she said. She put away her rags and looked at me, cautiously. “What you saw was the evil from one man being put into another. That is what Avaline does. Her touch allows her to take and hold the worst parts of a person’s soul within her own, and then pass it on to someone else. Lorcan has been using her to create an army for Cullach. He looks for the largest, strongest men he can find, and then puts in them the touch of madness, over and over again until they’re insane. And then, he will release them upon the world. An army of relentless savages who will destroy everything in their path. That is the breadth of Lorcan’s simple, yet terrible plan.”

  My mouth opened but it took several horrifying heartbeats to form any words.

  “Why would he do that?”

  Sefrid shook her head sadly.

  “I don’t know. Cullach and Ruark gain very little from this, at least from what I can see. But, I’m sure Lorcan has some motive for doing what he’s doing. Who can make sense of his twisted little mind?”

  My shoulders sagged.

  “I think I know. Lorcan has in him the mark of a demon. I’ve seen it before, and I’ve seen a man who can stop it. I’d hoped he might be here, but he’s not. I haven’t seen him anywhere I expected to.”

  “Who is this man?”

  “He calls himself Arkael. But to be honest with you, I’m not even sure he’s a man. He might just be a dream. A reckless dream born of a fool.”

  “There shall be a miserable desolation of the kingdom,” Sefrid said, as if reciting the words, “and the threshing floors shall become again forests.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Her lips curved in a faint smile. “A prophecy of my people. It means we should all be wary of the storm to come. Things are about to become... unpleasant.”

  “We have a simpler saying that means the same thing,” I frowned. “Dark days are coming.”

  A raider approached us. He watched me with a sneer on his face.

  "You, priest. You're to see Cullach. Now."

  I just stared at him blankly at first, then nodded solemnly. This was it. My death march. Lorcan didn’t need me, and Cullach didn’t trust me, so there was no reason to keep me alive. What did it matter, though? I’d thoroughly failed everyone I’d ever known or cared about. My life was nothing more than a curse and a burden on those around me. I deserved to die. It would be so much easier that way.

  I slumped my shoulders and took another look at the sky. Sefrid prodded me, probably worried about keeping the Irishman waiting. I smiled at her, grateful for her company these last few days, and I hoped that if today would be my last day on this world, I at least wanted her to think better of me than she had when we first met.
She looked at me curiously as I stood and left, following the man across the camp.

  We arrived at Cullach’s tent, where I was told to wait outside. The raider stepped through the flaps, and when he walked back out he was followed by other men, both of whom were heavily regaled in gold and silver, almost as much as Cullach. I suspected they were his lieutenants, and though they watched me curiously upon leaving, I didn’t pay much attention to them.

  The Irishman led me inside, where Cullach sat on a rickety wooden chair that seemed out of place among the finer treasures he had on display. Stacks of furs, a leather saddle and harness, various weapons, and a stand for his chain armor surrounded him, along with several chests and sacks, though most seemed to be empty. His wealth, while impressive, also seemed subdued, though that didn’t keep me from wondering if my head might soon be part of his collection.

  “Back from the fort?” he asked. I nodded, and he frowned in thought. He eventually motioned for me to sit on a small, woven wool rug near the fire, which I did. Cullach watched me the entire time, as if calculating my weight or perhaps my value as a slave, all while sipping what I guessed to be ale from a gilded, tin cup. Finally, he set the cup down on the ground and leaned back in his chair. "I was Christian once," he began, casting a curious glance at me to gauge my reaction. But I had none. "I was raised as such back home, in Ireland. I believed in God, and in Jesus Christ, and the Virgin Mary. The apostles. Satan. All of that. I was the son of a chieftain, and my mother made damn sure I had a priest following me around every day, reciting passages from the Bible, all of which I ignored, of course. This priest, though, his name was Fergus. When you showed up here I was reminded of him.”

  I stared ahead dutifully. I didn’t intend to be rude, I just had very little desire to grovel for my life, a life that was slowly losing its value to me because of the pain and heartache involved.