The Revenants

by Geoffrey Farrington

  And this ordinary young man seemed to me at once like the inhabitant of a strange and wonderful land that I had never known or seen, his life a marvellous and intriguing adventure beyond my every experience. I longed to ask him questions. To ask him to describe the simplest things. What it was to walk in a fragrant garden while birds sang and the sun burned down bringing everything to bloom. What it was to know companionship, careless laughter, contentment and belonging. To know the intimate, loving touch of a woman. And the knowledge of death, which binds men close. I longed to throw my arm about him, to sweep him out into the city streets and walk with him as he explained these things to me. To move in the world of men and to feel through him once more a part of it. But how could I? It was too late. It was hopeless.

  And I sat and smiled pleasantly at him as an overpowering rage rose inside me and I shuddered with grief, and a voice in my head seemed to roar: “What have you done? Forsaken a life whose pleasures and rewards you in your blindness never began to see. And to have forsaken it for what? An existence that is endless darkness and death. Eternal destruction and misery.”

  And I thought with contempt of Maximillian and Hermione and their foul brood, who called themselves gods when they were maggots who crawled and fed in stench and gore. And then I thought of Helena. Helena, who had deceived me and robbed me of life and hope. And it was all I could do to prevent myself falling on the floor, pounding my fists and screaming in a fit of sheer desolation. Instead I told myself:

  “The Devil take them all. I am finished with them. Finished with her. I will not live with her in darkness and despair. I will find some other way. I want never to see her again.”

  “But really, you must forgive me,” said the young man suddenly. “I’ve been talking far too much. A bad habit of mine, I’m afraid. I apologise if I’ve been tedious.”

  “Tedious!” I said. If only I could have begun to tell him. “No. Not tedious. Not to me.”

  “But tell me something about yourself,” he went on.

  “Me? No. No. There is really nothing to tell.”

  “I can’t believe that,” he said, raising an eyebrow slightly.

  I gazed at him hard and smiled. It had just occurred to me that the hunger which first drove me to follow him had, in the course of our conversation, been forgotten. He said at last:

  “Why do you stare at me so?”

  I lowered my eyes, at once embarrassed.

  “I am sorry,” I said. “It is just that… that you remind me of someone. Someone I knew once. Someone who is no more. Only you are better than he was.”

  He smiled quickly, then jumped to his feet and said:

  “But I’ve been a poor host. Here you’ve been, wandering lost in the cold, and I’ve not even offered you any refreshment. I won’t be long.”

  Before I could say a word he disappeared into an adjoining room. Once alone I grew restless, and rose to pace about the floor. I stopped then by the bookshelves and began to scan their contents. There were volumes of poetry and literature, ancient and modern, as well as works on religion, philosophy, science and history. At last I reached out and removed a heavy book, that seemed to draw me to it in spite of myself, on the subject of demonology. I began to thumb through it quickly, more through nervous agitation than any real interest. There were many ancient, crude pictures, representing all manner of things dark and disturbing. One showed the figure of Death, clad in black robes, His face a grinning skull as He moved through the world, leaving His indiscriminate victims all about: the prostrate corpses of kings and beggars, saints and sinners, the old and the young alike. He reached out His skeletal hand to touch one amidst a crowd of travellers who laughed and revelled together, and only the one He touched saw Him and fell, his face twisted with terror.

  Another, amidst an account of the hierarchy of devils, showed grotesque, gloating fiends torturing, mutilating and devouring writhing, screaming masses of the naked damned in the fires of Hell.

  Next I saw the representation of a woman seized by demonic possession, her body twisted as she tore at her clothes and dug her nails deep into her breasts, her face horribly distorted, her eyes bulging and her tongue lolling. I slammed the book shut so that clouds of dust rose swirling from its yellowing pages. Then I asked myself: did such things truly exist – demon and elemental creatures, without material form, circling in the atmosphere like predatory birds, seeking some entry into the physical world? Was it possible for such entities to inhabit and possess a body at the moment of death? To keep it from decay and animate it that it might appear to be human, a cold husk immune to ageing, to all living infection or disease. To death itself. But worst and cruellest of all that the human soul should remain, trapped in its earthly shell, as unnatural an intruder there as the evil itself, and must watch on, tortured and powerless, while that evil drives it to create relentless destruction and terror.

  I returned the book to its shelf and began to pace up and down once again. I was thinking of all I had seen that night; of what Maximillian had told me of desire and its suppression, and remembered how, helpless in the grip of a raging passion, I had committed murder. A renewed and overpowering sense of dread and disquiet fell over me. I thought on that terrible story the boy-revenant had related in his song: of the first revenant, and his bargain with infernal forces. Could there be some truth behind it? Could I, in my human misery and weakness, and my longing to escape it, have made myself in some way vulnerable to the powers of darkness? Some submission, some unspoken spiritual pact with these powers that doomed me forever to their arbitrary domination and control.

  These things were like archaic superstitions, but all the more ominous and frightening for that. At once I felt the need to run, as I had been running since I left the house of Maximillian: running from something, a part of myself, unknown and unnamed. I made for the door, when my young host re-entered, carrying two cups. He saw my hand reaching for the door, and setting down the cups came over to me and placed one hand on my outstretched arm.

  “What is it?” he said. “What distresses you so?”

  “Distresses me?” I repeated slowly. “Distresses me? Why do you think me distressed?”

  “It isn’t difficult to see,” he answered gently.

  I looked up at him, confused. For the moment he disturbed me, stopped me from thinking, from recognising thoughts that were for now just noises in my head: angry, growling and indistinct. I stared all about the room, then back at him, into his eyes. They seemed filled with real concern.

  “Will it help,” he said, “to talk about it?”

  He had seen my need even before I had. I wanted to tell him. I needed to talk, to be freed at last from my terrible burden of loneliness. To break away all the barriers and confide in him totally. But how could I? It was impossible. He would think me mad. Or worse. If he believed me, he would shrink from me in loathing and terror. There was only one way I might feel again his alluring human life. And that was to end it. To pull him to me and absorb myself in him for a few brief moments. We might share nothing but his death. A bitter sorrow came over me as all this grew clear to underlying, half-known senses. I turned from him, pulling open the door. But he darted forward, grasping my wrists, and I did not resist him as he pulled me back to face him.

  “It won’t help,” he said. “Solitude. It will only make it worse. It won’t do you any good to wander about the streets on your own.”

  It was at this moment that my hunger returned, harsh and biting. So great and unexpected was it that I gasped and doubled over slightly.

  “What is it?” he said. “What’s wrong with you? Are you ill?”

  He took both my arms to support me. I looked up at him, felt his concern, his closeness, his warmth. I straightened up slowly. All thought and worry dissolved from my mind, and instead was only a blind need. Involuntarily my lips parted and I drew them back, grinning at him as I edged forward, grabbing his hands, pulling him to me as my breaths came in great, trembling gulps, and the muscles
in my throat grew rigid and tense. He stood and watched me, as if transfixed for the moment by my gaze. Then his eyes grew wider and his face contorted with stark fear. We struggled, and he stumbled back, pulling me with him, unable to break my grip. We wrestled for a few moments, but for all my hunger there was still a strange reluctance in me. Then as I spun him about I looked up and saw for an instant my own reflection in a small mirror that hung on the opposite wall. I barely recognised myself. Every trace of humanity was gone from my face, hidden beneath a dreadful, pallid mask of hunger and madness, gaunt and skull-like, my eyes sunken and glaring in the dull light. So startled was I by this that I ceased to fight, and he pulled free, toppling back against the wall. Then he cried out with all his strength. This shocked me, brought me back to my senses.

  “Stop it!” I hissed in alarm. “Be quiet! You’ll bring everyone in the street!” A foolish thing to say, indeed, since this was plainly his intention, and a reasonable one at that.

  He cried out again, louder still, and I turned and ran, along the passageway and out the front door. By now the snow had almost stopped, but it lay heavy all about, and I stumbled through it down a narrow, empty street nearby. I went on down this backstreet, down towards the river past dark dirty slums, where the bricks and pavements stank of squalor and urine, even though covered with snow, growing more noisome and oppressive with every step I took. And still my head swam and I ran, not looking where I went, until at last I blundered into a pile of wooden boxes outside a dirty shack, knocking them down and slipping over, crashing into the soft snow. I went to rise, leaning up, but my mental turmoil overcame me, draining my strength, and I sank back down again.

  Then from somewhere nearby came a faint whisper that in the still and quiet I heard clearly.

  “’Ere,” it said, “wot’s ’e doin’ ’round ’ere?”

  Another whisper responded.

  “Look at ’im. Drunk out of ’is ’ead.”

  “Rich, an’ all, by the look of ’im,” said a third.

  There was a low chuckle.

  “Looks like it’s our lucky night.”

  Then there were footsteps approaching, crunching in the snow. Slowly I climbed to my feet. Three ragged men stood before me. I stared at them dully, and they back at me.

  “Garn,” said one at last to his companions. “Get ’im. ’E’s too dead drunk to make any trouble.”

  I prepared to run. I often drifted through such wretched poverty stricken areas as this, where it was poorly lit, densely populated, and easy for me to feed; and it was not uncommon to find myself followed by one or more of the scores of sinister figures that lurked behind every dark corner, lured by my good clothes and the promise they gave of a full purse. Of course these cut-throats never represented any threat to me. I could lose them without effort in the night lanes – although to lose them was usually the last of my intentions. Now one of the men, the biggest, came at me. I watched him closely, making ready to evade him and escape. But I did not. I stood and watched him advance. I would run no more. I was tired of running. My attacker drew close. He was huge, towering above me, and broad: a great brute of a man, with a leering mouth, thick arms and a bull neck. His small eyes glistened malevolently as he raised his massive fist, ready to bring it crashing down onto me. I watched the fist descend, and to my eyes the movement seemed so cumbersome and slow I nearly laughed up into his idiot face before reaching out to intercept it. I caught his wrist and held his arm, suspended above me, heard him gasp and felt his shudder at the coldness and strength of my grip. Slowly I tightened my hold, twisting his arm, and watched enthralled as the expression upon his coarse features turned from arrogance to panic and fear. I felt his limbs stiffen and his strength crumble before me. Then his legs gave way and he sank wailing like a child to his knees, grimacing in pain and shock. A tremor went through me as I looked at him, writhing abject and helpless. I was going to kill him. I wanted to kill him. The raging hunger was in me, and now I would not resist it. I wanted to kill! To immerse myself in death, to swallow up all my fear and confusion in sensual oblivion. For my every sense was alive and ready, and power pounded in me. The power of the night, to be suppressed and denied no longer. Power to be released.

  My eyes blazed and his were dull, mesmerised with fright. I bared my teeth in a great snarl of excitement and rage. My hand slammed into his face, hurling him back, rolling him over and over across the ground. The air was saturated with the scent of blood, filling my senses, wiping away what remained of my reason so that I stood growling and grinning like some maddened animal.

  Another of the men drew a knife now and charged at me in panic. I faced him, waiting until he was upon me, then moved forward and pulled him to me with such speed that his knife swiped the air behind me. I pushed my face close to his and felt his strength fail as I looked into his eyes, gloating and savouring the moment of terror I inspired before tearing his throat, tasting the fount of blood that poured out, then hurling his body to the ground.

  The last of them cried out and turned to scramble away blindly. He made no more than a few steps before I was on him, gripping his shoulders, pulling him down. He went to scream, but only gurgled as I pulled him to me and pinned him down, as his warmth and life flowed through me.

  We lay there until I felt once more the rigid, final shudders of death against me, beyond the great spasms of pleasure and swirling visions that accompanied them. Then I threw his limp body aside and rose unsteadily. The big man, the one I had struck down first, was on his feet again: stumbling, half-conscious, his smashed face a mask of dripping blood. I reached him before he saw me and grasped him about the neck, my hunger for death even yet unsated. In an instant I ripped his throat, and he dropped to the ground with a crash.

  I leaned down, grabbing his head, twisting it to face me, staring into the wide, lifeless eyes.

  “Lucky,” I said, blood welling from my mouth, running down my chin, “is not the word I would have used!” Then I sank down to my knees, my head spinning wildly.

  I knelt for several moments, breathing hard and deep as my savage fit passed rapidly into drowsy bewilderment, as if emerging from a trance. The madness, the awful lust that had plagued and pursued me since I had witnessed the horrors at Maximillian’s house, was gone.

  Suddenly there were footsteps running all about. I looked up to see a crowd of men with lamps standing nearby.

  “There he is,” cried one of them. “There’s the madman. There’s the murderer.”

  The young man whose home I had run from must have alerted his neighbours. And of course it would have been easy to follow my tracks in the fresh snow. I watched them, blinking, dazed, as they moved in a single mass towards me. Then there were gasps, screams of disgust and outrage as they saw the bodies of my attackers. Then they looked at me in total horror as I rose to my feet. And indeed I must have been a fearful sight, gorged and smothered in blood.

  A cry of “Murder” echoed all about me, and at once four big men moved out of the crowd and stood before me. Others moved up behind them, their eyes glaring with menace as together, warily, they began to advance on me.

  I stood and watched them stupidly. My head still spun, my vision still blurred. Bloated, half-numb with shock, I had no strength left to fight them, no presence of mind even to escape. I could only look down at the victims of my rage and reflect that they were right to fear and despise me so. I had destroyed not for my protection, but from sheer intoxication with my own power – I, the weakling, the invalid. I had been as a mad dog.

  Strong hands suddenly grasped me from behind, and the men in front rushed me. They were blind and mad with hate, but I, knowing how totally I deserved it, merely submitted to them. They grabbed at me and struck me, and I was lifted from my feet as they swarmed all about me; howling, punching and clawing, tearing at my clothes and hair. I knew that they meant to kill me. What I did not know was whether they could.

  Then at once they were gone, letting me fall heavily to the ground. I looke
d up in weary surprise. The small crowd stood, their faces frozen, their eyes wide and gaping as they stared beyond me, as if they had all quite forgotten me. Slowly I turned my head. My body jolted with shock. From out of the shadows behind had emerged a terrible form. Its eyes blazed and its features were livid with horrible fury. It advanced swiftly, its teeth bared, its arms outstretched, hands clenched like talons ready to grab and tear at anything in reach. It was several moments before I realised it was Helena.

  She stood above me, snarling and spitting like a harpy, or some awful demonic image from a medieval tapestry, glaring upon the petrified crowd. And then all her fury was gone, and in an instant she was transformed from raging fiend into cold, arrogant beauty. She spoke, her tone soft but all the more deadly for that as it cut through the night air.

  “The first of you to move,” she said, “will die. As they died.” And she swept out her arm in a gesture towards the mutilated bodies.

  She reached down, taking my arm, pulling me to my feet. As I rose I felt a trickle of blood fall from a cut on my lip. But I felt no pain or injury. Apart from a few scratches I was unhurt. Now Helena pushed me forward, past the staring crowd that stumbled back to let us pass. And so we moved unmolested through that jungle of stupefied eyes that looked on me as the eyes of that young man had: that saw Helena and I for what we were – unnatural and inhuman – and could not bear what they saw. It was now at last that I understood why Helena had made me what I was: the utter loneliness and misery that must have driven her to it. And I remembered what Maximillian had told me: that we might find human love or companionship only to watch it shrivel and die. It was only now that I saw beneath those words and understood them totally. Together we moved swiftly away into the dark lanes.