Chapter 8
He felt
drained. It was as though the life force had been sucked right out of him. Visions of the Demon danced, and
metamorphosed in his mind’s eye. It had
taken several hours for him to stop obsessing about it. He was horrified and fascinated at the same
time. The terror of it had burned deep,
disturbing him with hallucinatory nightmares, even as he shivered in
wakefulness. The damp clouds rolled in
from the West. Once again his mind was
confronted with something he had previously regarded as a quaint fable and it
was more than unsettling to him. It
scared the hell out of him.
They had
again secured his arms, though this time Myrthis’s knots weren’t so tight. Tolian was so shaken, he could not even find
the strength to struggle. His legs were
also tied, though loosely enough for him to walk if necessary. He had thrown up a few more times, and
Myrthis had brought him water to clear the taste of bile from his mouth. He splashed some in his face, as well, the
cool water returning some of his senses.
Tolian was somewhat gratified as he noticed that Kilfrie and Amristia
were also vomiting. They looked
scared. As scared as him. No, he reconsidered, they couldn’t be that frightened.
He looked
away to the heavens to help clear his mind.
Even though the clouds were encroaching from the West, the brightest of
the comets was still visible through the cumulus veil, away high in the
East. As a boy, he had always heard
stories about comets being harbingers of misfortune and disaster. It was not lost on him how rare a phenomenon
such a triple visitation was. The way he
felt, there weren’t enough comets in the heavens to mark such a date.
In fact he
muttered, “There aren’t enough comets.”
“What was
that?” Myrthis asked.
“Oh, ah,
nothing, really,” Tolian explained, “Just talking to myself.”
Tolian
looked at her, she was obviously shaken by the experience (for somehow, Tolian
knew that they had viewed the same scene).
“Have you
ever seen, anything like that before?” he asked.
She stared
off as she spoke. “I have attended spirit visions before, I have seen through
the eyes of the wind. I have heard the
songs of the fish in distant seas and I have seen the High Druidess speak with
the Lord of the Forests and the Shepherds of Hours in their domains. But, I have never experienced anything so truly
horrifying ... ever.”
She hugged
him.
“I’m so scared,” she said. “You’re the only person who even has a chance
at stopping that thing before it destroys everything. You have got to see that.”
She caught
herself and walked away, leaving Tolian to dwell on her words. According to the prophecy, she was
right. That is, after they transform him
into a woman. For a noble prince, death
was the honorable recourse. But, if he
died, then the world had no chance left.
The Demon would win. Everything
would lay in ruin.
If the
druids were right.
Brythia’s
voice broke strongly through the disturbing with an air of other-worldly calm, “Gather
back around the fire, my sisters,” she said.
“And you as well, Your Highness,” she added somewhat self-consciously.
Her command
pulled them into an ordered state. They
moved with great speed, circling the fire.
Tolian shifted in his crouched position, still wrapped in the shock that
echoed throughout his soul. He had no
room in his head for thoughts of escape or suicide. He waited as the rest did — for Brythia’s words.
She resumed
in an authoritative
tone, “We have
seen our enemy, and if we had any doubts about the prophecy, they can be
dismissed. Our mission is to return with
Prince Tolian to Hyge Bryth; that, we knew was our goal ere we left —with only doubts and fears. Well, we have...” (Here she paused, searching
her vocabulary for the correct word, “...obtained the Prince and witnessed the
beginning of the Dark Days. Everything
has changed: a reality is born within us
... the Demon-King has entered the World; and our Champion is disinterested in
assisting us. It was not our duty to
convert him to the cause, yet it seems to me that an uncooperative champion is
a false hope, worse than no champion.”
She
addressed Tolian directly.
A heavy fear took her face. “Tolian,
after what we have witnessed, will you not put your objections behind you,
embrace our cause. Save us and everyone you have ever loved. I love you, Tolian. Please?”
She sounded like
a little girl to Tolian, though one full of fear and dark dread. It was too much for Tolian. Most of the druidesses’ eyes stared at him, pleading. (Though a
couple of eyes had glanced
at Brythia in surprise at her declaration of love). The weight of the world settled on him. At least, it felt like it. He was no coward; an idea occurred to him:
“I uh....,”
He said. “What if I lead an army of Lorm’s
greatest warriors and attacked him, er, it...right away. We could... ”
Brythia cut
him off, “You and your army would perish.
You are the only person who can defeat this Horror and then only after
your transformation. I ask you again,
will you submit yourself to your destiny?”
The
Demon’s/Perilisk’s face taunted him in his mind. It was impossible.
“I don’t
want to be a woman,” was all he could say.
“Then we
are doomed,” Lira sobbed.
“Don’t you
see...,” Amristia began to ask.
They begged.
Tolian understood; they felt he was their only hope. Maybe he was.
He didn’t really doubt anything as being possible. The World was becoming a far more complex
place for the prince.
“I just don’t
know,” he said.
He did not
doubt the existence of the Demon, he could no longer doubt the significance of
the prophecy. He was torn.
“I can’t
let my father down, I must be king after
him.”
Brythia
countered, “Your father will be the last King of Lorm, if you do not help
us. Your heir is already secured to
succeed your father.”
Tolian
looked down to the ground to avoid the frightened begging of the druidesses’
expressions. The Demon still danced and
jeered in his brain, twisting into even fouler and more obscene visages. He really wanted to help, but did not want to
sacrifice his manhood. A thousand
thoughts vied for a place in his head.
He tried to imagine what it would be like to be a woman, though his male
pride refused to indulge his imagination.
What could he do? Acquiesce and
be reduced to a female, and forced to confront that hellish fiend (that raged
still in his memory)? Refuse and
die? He could not endure the
indignation, He could not accept the
idea of his transformation. It was no
use.
He
struggled with these thoughts, oblivious to the stares of the
women. He rocked manicly on the
ground. There could only be one
decision. He could not shame the House
of Hemris, his family or his friends. He
looked up at Brythia’s hopeful face. A
sad love burned behind her tears.
Before anyone
could stop him, he leapt to his feet and hopped across the
camp. He had seen where they had kept
his sword and armor. He grabbed the
sword from its scabbard. If he could not
live as a man, he had no intention of living.
The others scrambled in surprise and alarm, then paused in shock as he
plunged his blade deeply into his chest.
His hands hurt from where he had grasped the blade, slitting open his
palms in the process. It was funny, he
thought, that his hands hurt a lot worse than his chest. The anguish in Brythia’s face was the last
thing he saw before the blackness descended upon him.
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