Wind of Destruction

by Joshua Spotts

black abyss lurked within those jaws. A deep fear seethed about the whole oasis.

  I approached the cave. There was the sound of crunching underneath my feet. Many decaying corpses lay on the threshold of the cave; their mouths were open, affixed in an endless scream traveling from death into life. They had died in the midst of cowering from some great monstrosity. I could hear their screams. They seemed to clutch at me with their dead hands. I never stopped walking. Something drew me toward that cave. A power I could not resist clung to me and my unwilling steps took me further into the cave, past the bone paved threshold. The drawing power was so great that I had waded through the shallow pond without realizing the cool wetness against my dry skin.

  It was as I entered that cave that I realized what I had come upon. I had come upon the hidden stronghold of the Wolves of Fear, elite fighters who lived and fought like wolves. I was in deep trouble, but my hatred and my lust for revenge upheld my will. I wished the beasts on for I could feel their presence all around that dark cavern.

  “Come, you devils! Show your faces! I do not fear you for I am Vengeance. I will not suffer you to live.” I roared, my anger rising for no reason. The Wolves came on. With fearsome howls and blind animal rage they fell upon me from all sides. These beasts had never encountered a foe such as me. To them it was a nasty surprise. I drew on their free, wild wrath that was cast against me and used it to summon up the pond outside. I slew the nearest two Wolves with my bare hands and then launched myself to the roof of the cavern. The waters from the pond swept into the cave, sending the surprised Wolves fleeing. I laughed as I dropped to the floor. It was then I realized that they fled, not from the waters, but from what I had awakened. An iron door was hidden under the pond. I rushed outside to meet this new foe.

  The dead bodies now seemed to be moving, alive and screaming with terror once again. It was a horrible sound. A sound that could bring the bravest man to his knees in overbearing pain, the screams ringing in his mind, ever to haunt him for eternity if he survived the coming ordeal. I am not a brave man, only one driven by vengeance.

  The wailing shook the palm trees, some of which splintered and crumbled into the bottom of the pond. The iron door imbedded in the pond bottom began to glow. The golden symbols etched in it melted away. A steady pounding noise, as that of a blacksmith hammering on a glowing rod of iron, arose to create a terrible symphony with the wailing. My fear forced me to believe that one of the bodies laid its hand on my shoulder and spoke to me. And this is what that horrid sprite said, “Bow to your god. Bow to Fear, you sick murderer!”

  I turned on the bodies and with my swords chopped them to ribbons, splitting each of the heads in two. It did not stop the horrid screeching. My resolve hardened and I made it my purpose not to die until my revenge was complete. I turned back toward the iron door.

  A great wail arose from behind the door and it melted into nothingness. A black shadow arose from the bottomless pit. Fear itself arose. I had awakened a monster whose very memory had driven thousands of men insane. Now it had arisen, a monster that had been lurking in a pit for thousands of years, since its origin; gathering the souls which its brief time in the world and its lasting memory had driven to insanity and eventually to suicide. This horrid monstrosity locked its eyes upon me and realized that its memory was not in me. It had no effect on me for I was now seeing it as it was. My vengeful spirit was stronger than any fear.

  This Fear changed itself into many forms which would have turned a hero of legend into a schoolboy whimpering before the rod of a stern teacher. Finally it found what I most regretted it to find. It formed itself into the depiction of my father lying on his bed with my knife in him, the many wounds I dealt him were festering but blood was flowing freely. My stable mind began to break. Feeling began to seep into my mind and Fear’s existence sought to come in with it. The monster Fear then found my one weakness, my one fear. It transformed in my mind as my own self. I was lying on the ground, my body mutilated with many wounds and wild wyrms feasting on my flesh. One of my former brothers stood nearby. He was alive and I was dead. I was broken and Fear grew in its strength as my feelings became mingled. I was out of control.

  Then it happened, my lust for revenge and my great hate arose and cast Fear back into its pit. In my mind I saw my mangled body arise and a great wrath was in my eyes. I cast the wyrms away and then, taking my former brother’s neck in my hands, I strangled the life out of him. I threw him back to the wyrms to prey on his lifeless body. They devoured him as I roared with victory. I roared with an unearthly voice and the whole world shook at the fulfillment of my wrath. The dream vanished and Fear was banished forever from the earth. For now I had taken its existence within myself and I became the embodiment of Fear, Hate, and Revenge.

  I departed from the oasis and for three pale moons I wandered in that desert. To survive I slaughtered caravans and ate the camels. The goods which they were carrying I burnt in giant pyres. The more cautious caravans sent scouts ahead and would skirt around my blackened haunts. I remember one caravan implicitly. I had by this time begun to enjoy the sight of fear within my victims’ faces, the sight of me reflected in their terrified eyes; this caravan carried women and children as well as armed men. War had broken out in the fertile lands and these refugees were crossing the desert, seeking refuge from violence. I followed them for three days, my animal natures, given to me by the Wolves, were fading and I had grown more cautious.

  My nights were full of peaceful sleep. The desert was calming my rage and causing me to kill for survival, not for revenge. It was at that time, between those three moons, that I believed my humanity blown away with the harsh desert sands.

  It was on the third night that I struck. One of my former brothers was dressed in civilian clothing; I spotted him that night as I circled the camp. I knew he felt my presence for he twitched when I reached out to him with my mind. My power had grown a hundred times since I had last seen or felt one of the Order. His mind was out of practice and soon he fell into a deep sleep, his power flowing into me. A slender woman knelt next to him weeping, for he was dead and she was his wife. The caravan had encamped in a small oasis. By morning nothing was left, all the plant life was shriveled and dead. The waters dried up in flames from the power that was scattered about me as I exacted my rage against the companions of my former brother. His body was shriveled like the plant life. Men, women, children, none escaped. I piled up all the bodies and standing on top of the mound I raised my arms. I let power flow from me and a giant pillar of fire shot into the air. I leapt from the mound as fire came up from the depths. The fires of my rage consumed the innocent and I cared not.

  In the midst of a savage sandstorm I departed from that scorched ground. The storm traveled with me as a stalked through the desert, my taste for revenge renewed and my anger fanned by the harsh sand.

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  Quest of Doom

  My hate knew no boundaries. Conscience was replaced with my lust for revenge. Fire, water, heat, cold, sand, and snow, through all these elements I trekked. Scaling mountains of fire, swimming across rushing rivers, neither of these, Nature’s powers, stopped me in my advance as I persevered toward the place I had once known as home. I followed the will of my corrupted heart which led my feet on a rapid path to fulfillment of my revenge or the sudden end of my existence. I knew not which of these, these paths of hidden destiny, my swift journey would give me. I began to doubt my abilities to survive and my will began to weaken until I found what I believed to be the edge of the forest in which lay the stronghold of my hated enemies.

  My sore feet, my weary muscles, my weather beaten skin, all ceased to hurt. My passionate hate rose in my blood and I smiled, the air tasted like freshly spilled blood. I had caught my enemy in one of his horrid sacrificial meetings. I drew my swords; the enemy required assistance in his bloodletting, assistance in the cutting of themselves which those imbeciles did to please the pathetic gods which they served. For me, for myself, I knew
only one god. That one god was my Hate; my god Hate had conquered the embodiment of Fear. My god’s consort was Revenge. As my enemy had created his own gods so had I, my god was better…my Hate would conquer their gods of sword, nature, and life.

  I rushed through the woods, the very vines, which normally hinder other men, danced out of my path as I rushed onward. Enormous trees were cast aside at the presence of my power unleashed. Their roots tearing from ground and throwing dirt up as a whirlwind would with an old fence. Blood rushed through my veins. I could feel Hate’s anxiousness to wreak revenge upon the enemy of my heart. My sight faded and all my actions were guided by a blinding, searing, horrid urge for vengeance, but vengeance for what? I had forgotten why I sought to kill those I had grown up with, those who had raised me. Then it came, I knew why, why I had to kill these men. No, they were not men. They were less than dogs, less than the black raven that lives by feeding off flesh! My rage until that point was nothing. When I knew why I sought to slaughter my enemy, when I thought of how they betrayed me…Ah…lust for Revenge and Hate rose so great that soon, as I ran,