By: Xaviere Posted on: May 28, 2004
Every single particle of air seemed to be shrouded in darkness, lying in wait
for another entity to suck up into its purblind heart. There was no light to be
found, except for a thin, pallid strip of misty glimmer that hovered under the
entrance to this hole. Though it might be a suitable habitat for those who
craved the deep gloom of the night, such as the wise-eyed owl, or the crafty
fox, for one man, it was a prison. Literally and metaphorically.
He knew not the length of his incarceration. That mattered little to him.
The one thing that was certain, however, was that he had to get out of this place.
It had been a pathetically daft mistake, one that he probably would not have even staggered near to making, even if he had been snorting absinthe or swilling down gleam (or was it the other way around - he had lost track of time...) but the results had been detrimental to the cause, and none less than embarrassing to his formerly glowing pride.
It had been two wretched months since the failed raid on the city had climaxed with the capture of many fine soldiers following an ill-prepared leader. It had been one month since the majority of those soldiers had been executed. Finally, their numbers had whittled away to a singular one, their once-glorious leader, present position in the severely depleted platoon - slumped against the far end of a cell wall, gazing with expectant eyes at the door.
The door stared back impassively, its desolate iron bolts piercing into his body as if they were arrows tipped with poison. Naturally, he had first attempted to escape, but the cell had been etched with runes and sealed with sigils so heavily that the thought made him feel that he had a flame sigil eternally attached to his head. It was little comfort to Deviticate, who by now was merely waiting for his fate. He had heard the struggles as the others had been dragged past his door, heard the screams as they were tortured, and smelt the stench as they passed by again, this time on their way to the slaughterhouse to be processed into nothing more than food for the lord of the fortress's farm animals.
His stomach rumbled. He clapped his hand to his waist and let out a wild burst of laughter. Before the events that led to the, in his own opinion, *minor* miscalculation, he could never remember being hungry. But the muscle in his stomach had withered a little, succumbing to the harshness of his surroundings, and Deviticate was reminded that mealtime was almost upon him.
As if by clockwork, the rumbling came to a rousing crescendo as a rattling at the door rose through the ranks of the air to his ears; the cacophony of a rusted key making an attempt to turn in the lock. The door crept open, easing out the cramp within its creaky hinges and suddenly the shadows were banished to their unholy hovel as the light rushed in, almost blinding the prisoner.
A squat Dwarf with an apparent paunch waddled into the cell, screwing his nose up at the unhealthy aroma. Out of all the jobs he was given to do, from mucking out the stables, fixing the this was his least favourite - having to feed the scum of the earth at the expense of his own tender sense organs.
"You're late," Deviticate drawled, a wry smile covering his lips as he shaded his eyes from the light.
"Bugger orf," answered the Dwarf, spitting in his direction. Due to his height, the Dwarf could only manage a distance of half that, and the fluid splattered like glass on the ground, closely resembling a mutated baby oyster crossed with a globule of mouldy clotted cream. "Back up against the side."
"This side or the outside?"
Deviticate enjoyed these mind-games. It gave him a chance to regain the sense of authority, albeit for a few minutes only each day, over the inferior members of the fortress. It did him little good in the long run, but that feeling meant everything, a psychedelic high. He shuffled up flush with the wall, sarcasm brimming over his face. The Dwarf dropped a tray with a bowl and wooden spoon upon it on the ground. With one stumpy foot, he kicked it towards the prisoner as if he was a dog.
"Thank you," said Deviticate, acknowledging the gesture with a sarcastic nod of his head. The Dwarf's guttural vocal cords let out a grunt that would not have been out of place in a cave of rabid lions.
"I be glad when they cut ya up like a lemon an' hang ya from t'nearest bridge," snarled the Dwarf, waggling a coarse finger at Deviticate as he swang the door closed, the hinges squealing in distress as he locked it, allowing the darkness to leak back out from its holes. Deviticate could hear the Dwarf muttering various curses and profanities in his gruff native tongue to himself as he wandered away from the corridor.
Deviticate reached over to the tray. With one bony finger, he pulled it towards himself. It was the same old slurry that he was fed day after day in this accursed place. He scooped some of the grey gelatinous gloop up with the spoon, and allowed it to trickle gradually back into the bowl, dutifully unimpressed. With the mental strength that only a man under duress could muster, Deviticate closed his eyes and poured the contents of the bowl down his throat, swallowing forcibly.
That was his daily routine.
*********************************************
Some hours had passed by for the creatures lucky enough to inhabit the outside world, but for Deviticate, it felt like aeons had passed him by in one go. Time was an illusion, and sleep was merely a clever euphemism for counterfeit death.
Sleep. He found comfort in its gentle pall, delphinising his mind into swarthy tranquillity. He could not remember the last time he had slept in a proper bed; he had become unhealthily accustomed to the wasteland of stone and iron composite that was his mattress. His dreams were dark and macabre, but he had grown so used to viewing the mental agonies over and over like the sound of the sweet vendor's ear-wrenching cries. Past the back-scrunching cramp that he was oft to obtain from this passive torture, Deviticate lay comatose, his intestines recovering after a painful bout of mechanically ostracising the grey slop from his system.
Sooner or later the day would come. It had to come.
He was walking through a field of red-veined gillyvors. The wind was ragged, and lurched at his body akin to that of a leper's gait, icy and unfriendly. The treacle skies swallowed up the stars in thick, black, voluminous swirls, and the sun was nowhere to be seen. Every time he tried to speak the wind swept his words away like a drowning man succumbing to his inevitable end.
He turned. The gillyvors seemed to copy his every move, bending in the direction that he went, dipping their veined petals whenever he dipped his head. But this time, the wind had its hand, an extra-strong gust proving too firm for the saucy flowers, uprooting them and dispersing them further afield to another person kneeling on the ground, their head bowed. Deviticate followed, revelling in the confusion. He was so close to the character he could smell the scent of orchids that they seemed to emit. The character was a woman, not overly tall, clothed in a satin dress, the colour of stratus clouds, and her face was obscured by a long grey velvet cowl over her head. The gillyvors were strewn around her. As he watched, they were ebbing away, their colour bleeding into the pallid earth.
The woman swivelled around on her knees and stared directly at Deviticate, who started back. An eerie smile crossed her plum-tinted lips, but it was not the effect of the smile that startled the great warrior. She was weeping. Weeping silent tears from her eyeless sockets. Tears of blood.
He turned to run, but a bony hand shot through the parched soil and grabbed his ankle, tripping him up, dragging him down. The woman started to laugh as he desperately clawed at the gillyvors, trying to pull himself away, but they shrivelled up into dust the moment he touched them. More hands shot up, and they clutched all over, tearing into his clothes, ripping deep into his flesh to get a better grip.
They were pulling, pulling down, dragging down...
*********************************************
"GET OFF!" yelled Deviticate, flailing in all directions, wrenching his eyes open.
The girl who had tried to wake the prisoner with a firm shake on his shoulder leapt backwards as if somebody had stitched half a dozen bombs into her bodice. The tray that she was carrying had slipped from her hands and emptied its contents over the stone. A lake of monochrome revulsion formed tributaries over the ground and soon, the cell was installed with its own miniature water feature.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF INDRANI'S EYEBALLS WERE YOU DOING?" Deviticate screamed, grabbing the bowl and throwing it at her head. The girl ducked just in time to watch the bowl rebound off a corner of the cell and collide with the door, shattering into pieces.
The girl was too shocked to respond. She stood with her hands clasped at her breast, as if in prayer, breathing rapidly. A sharp whimper floated out of her throat. "I... dinner..."
Deviticate scowled and moved into the light. The girl took a few paces backwards in fright. He could see her clearly now. She was just a young girl, probably on the eve of her eighteenth or nineteenth birthday, her brain probably not quite acquainted with the idea of moving into full womanhood just yet. She was not overly attractive but a rather plain-looking girl - her backward slouch made certain of that. Her hair was gauche and drooped tiredly over her slightly hunched shoulders.
"Come here." Deviticate's tone was militant and commanding. The girl did not move an inch. She twisted her hair around and chewed the end a little. The fear was on the verge of dribbling out of her eyes, and her teeth clattered epileptically around her mouth.
"Come here." Now his tone was gentler, and he held his hand out sympathetically to the girl. There was a momentary pause, where the girl's brain considered the idea of acceding to somebody who had until now acted like a complete madman. She took a few steps forward, and she could now partially see Deviticate sitting forlornly, obscured by the shadows, but his hand out as an act of apology.
His hand suddenly caught hold of her wrist. She started back at the ominous rattle and clank of the chains on his manacled wrists and screamed in her head, but not her heart.
"Quiet now. I shan't keep you long," he replied softly, pulling the girl closer. "Now, tell me. What happened to the usual?"
The girl mouthed, because no other sound but a whimper seemed to want to come out, "Usual?"
"Short Dwarven chap. Incredibly bad-tempered. Belly like a pair of mating elephants. What happened to him?"
The girl's face was overcome with relief, and this loosened her tongue a little. "He's... he's been reassigned. So I've been told to fill in. Until... until they find a replacement."
Deviticate watched the girl for a few moments. She was overwhelmed with fear. His previous outburst had more than likely scared the wits out of her. But she was young and impressionable, and would probably recover soon enough. He noted the fact that her eyes kept flickering to the congealing mass of gunk that was meant to be Deviticate's dinner.
"I... didn't mean to... I'm sorry..."
"Don't worry about the food. I can give it a miss for a day." He gave her hand an amiable squeeze. The girl sniffled and looked up until her eyes met Deviticate's. "A day in this place is a century's torture for me..." At the sight of the girl's hair drooping even more (if such a thing was possible) in sadness, he added, "But the image of a pretty girl is worth eternity."
The girl looked at Deviticate in surprise, and was greeted by a smile that bore none of the wrath from earlier, no remnant of the bowl-hurling incident. It was gentle, quieter, almost tender.
"What... who... are you?" she stammered nervously, gathering up the spoon that was an island in the pool of soup over the ground. Her first thought to the man's new stance was that of a rogue, a felon perhaps, or a con-man.
Deviticate paused. Perhaps he could use this slight dip in her concentration to his advantage.
"My Lady, am a poor man, a poor man, yes… who has travelled the world... am I addressing the lady of the fortress?"
The girl shook her head, her eyes blazing shock and confusion. "I'm... I'm just a... a fortress-dweller."
"Then, madam, you resemble a lady of the highest order... forgive me for my mistake, for your beauty transcends that which no lady could imagine having." He took her hand and kissed it with gallant dash. The press of his lips on her hand was almost enough to make her heart flutter out of her mouth and out of the door.
The girl was uncertain of what to think about the prisoner. He was definitely different to the incarcerated in the other cells - gentile, dashing, poetic, charming… She drifted off into a profound reverie. Then her ears decided to engage brain, and she suddenly drew away. Muttering voices were getting louder, passing down the corridor.
"I have to go now," she mumbled abruptly, stepping back. Deviticate rose and stepped forward.
"You‘ll come again, yes?" he said. It was a commanding question, but spoken so calmly that the girl glanced wildly at the lock on the door and back at Deviticate, then at the lock again. She began to rattle the keys in her dress.
"I... I don't know..."
"Please? It gets so... dark... here... and you lit up the room when you brought me out of my terror…" He drifted off, but kept his eyes on the girl. She was bending. He could tell. It was the way her eyes wandered to him all the time.
"I can't... I'm not supposed to..."
Suddenly, Deviticate lunged forward and snatched at the top of the girl's head, pulling back dexterously. The girl yelped and grabbed the top of her hair before looking at the prisoner again.
"Give me back my flower!"
"Now you'll have to visit if you want it back," grinned Deviticate playfully. He dangled the hair accessory in front of her, just out of her reach, whipping it away whenever she made a pass for it. It was a twisted game; he was taller than her, and she was bouncing about, trying to get her flower back. She was soon puffy-cheeked and red-faced, and she leant on the door, her lungs heaving in exhaustion.
"Fine, I'll come back!" she snapped, fiddling with the door lock. "You're so horrid!" she added as an afterthought, before slamming the door shut, deliberately crunching the key around in the lock to show her annoyance at the prisoner. It was an insult that fell far too short from Deviticate, who tossed the flower up in the air and caught it thoughtfully.
"I can wait," he murmured, a sinister smile forming upon his lips. He examined the flower carefully in his hands.
It was a red-veined gillyvor.
*********************************************
The door of the cell wobbled on its hinges as someone on the other side made a valiant attempt to unlock it. It swang open, and the girl rushed in, carrying a tray laden with food. However, it was not the hideous liquid that usually was transported to and from the kitchens (or pig-feed centre) to the cell, but a plate with a small chop of lamb, doused generously with gravy. A small snifter containing apricot brandy was at its side.
The noise she made roused the dozing prisoner, and he crept out of the shadows. The girl looked relieved to see him, closing the door behind her quietly.
"I thought you might be asleep," she said, passing him the tray.
Deviticate had painted a beaming grin over his face. He picked up a fork and began digging into the stringy muscle of the meat, savouring its taste with closed eyes. Granted, it was not the best lamb he had eaten; it was slightly too overdone for his taste, and the gravy had the consistency of water.
"A bit too well-done," he thought aloud. The girl's eyes widened anxiously, and she began shifting her weight from foot to foot.
"I had to do some chores, and I forgot to turn the lamp down, and then I had to get the brandy, and I... f... forgot... t... to" she stammered, smoothing the front of her dress down with shaking hands. Her bottom lip was quivering in fear.
"Iris, Iris!" Deviticate crawled up to the girl and pulled her down for a friendly, comforting hug. "I didn't say it was bad! Just a little overdone. Shhhh..." He patted her gently on the back, trying to stifle a choke. He was also a terrible liar. The lamb was possibly one of the worst meals he ever had the misfortune to digest, with the exception of the grey soup. "I bet you're a wonderful cook when… when presented with the right equipment. And ingredients."
Iris looked up at the prisoner, into his sympathetic, mesmerist eyes. It had been a whole month since they had first met, that fateful day when Deviticate had stolen her hair clip from her. There had been something quixotic about the whole incident, the way that the prisoner was so - how did she note it down in her diary later? - "charming and debonair about his desolate surroundings".
Yes, that was it. Charming and debonair. The ragged dark hair that flopped down in thin whirls, the rugged expression, and the captivating smile that seemed to have a drop of cheekiness and mystery injected into it. Coupled with the grubby white loose shirt that did not suppress his lean and muscular build, Iris imagined Deviticate to be some sort of lost romantic poet, banished to this Pit of Despair by those who did not appreciate his lyricisms.
Each of his pats sent a wave of excitement through her impressionable mind. He had travelled the world, was what he had said: living on a pension of carefully-crafted lies to get into the realm of high society wines, parties, and deliciously devious intrigue. He had often boasted to her afterwards that he could tell all about the dirty secrets of each and every famous, outwardly highbrow character in the land, but the fact that they would be too sensitive for her rose-chaste ears was his way of increasing the enigma around him. When he had asked her for a proper meal, she acceded to his request almost immediately - that was the second or third visit, she could not remember exactly. They all blurred into one another, into a confusing world of dreams. She was absolutely absorbed.
"Now, I'm dying for a puff from the old oak," smiled Deviticate, stroking her hair as she lay her head on his breast. "Did you bring me a pipe like I said?"
Fiddling around in her apron pocket, Iris produced a small oaken pipe and a battered-looking tinderbox, both of which she passed to the prisoner. Deviticate took the flint, and with an expert strike, a spark was produced which ignited the tinder. Taking a large chunk of the smoky fuel, he lit the pipe and placed it in his mouth.
Suddenly, he started choking, his hands reaching for his neck and seeming to engage in an act of self-strangulation. Iris had neglected to fill the pipe.
"Didn't you fill this damn thing?" he coughed, black plumes of smoke exuding from his mouth.
Iris looked up at him with sheepish countenance. "I... I thought you only smoked poetry..." she murmured quietly.
At this, Deviticate softened considerably. He brought the girl in for another hug, which to her seemed very genuine. In his head, however, he was thinking the complete and utter antithesis, possibly with a few horrid profanities thrown in that would definitely make Iris' rose-chaste ears explode.
"Poetry, eh? I can smoke poetry just as well. And the good thing about it is that you don't need a pipe." He took the pipe and hurled it across the room in abject defiance. "Let me see..." He was stroking Iris' head as he spoke. "How about a poem called... ‘A Girl Called Iris', about a girl who lights my pipe?"
Iris' eyes lit up. "My name's Iris!" she twittered happily.
Not exactly the sharpest knife in the block though, thought Deviticate. "Hmmmm… ‘her hair is as sleek as a fox's brush..."
This was a lie. As he ran his fingers through Iris' auburn locks, he was internally cringing at the sheer grease that these fence wires growing out of her head strained out on to his fingers.
"‘And her eyes to mine burn bright and lush..."
(...reminds me of a couple of mouldy grapes, to tell you the truth...)
"‘She would make any other man flush..."
(...run a mile or few thousand, more like...)
"‘For Iris has the beauty of an iris that grows near a bush.' How was that, my precious girl?"
Without warning, Iris leapt out of his arms and twirled around the cell in utter glee. "You are truly my poet, my saviour, my... my... I've run out of words to describe you! I hope you don't mind... I'm just so... oh!"
And the illusion vanished, slipping under the door, allowing the deep shadows to crawl back in with their monstrosities. Her arms flopped by her sides again, and she sighed wistfully.
"What is the matter, my precious girl?" Deviticate asked, wiping his hands on his trousers.
Iris sat down next to Deviticate, a sombre expression tainting her rosy cheeks. "If only I could be like that, lyrical and stuff..."
"I'm sure you can. In fact, I‘m sure you are."
"I know... but I'm stuck in this place... I want to sing, and... and..." She got up again, her head raised as if the stars were imprinted on the ceiling of the cell. "...I want to go to Cyrene, and sing... sing like... Raphella!"
Deviticate could not help but roll his eyes at this point. It was just his luck to have charmed a complete wet blanket of a girl, and now she was admitting to being a Raphella fanatic. He did not think much of divas, and certainly not Raphella, whose sultry songs, temper tantrums and massive fan base impressed him not. Music and poetry were not his firm interests, whatever Iris had got into her head about him. One of his fellow platoon underlings did once drag him to a Bardic Chorale gig in one of the cities, which was not so bad, if only a rowdy member of the high-spirited crowd had not punched the lead lutenist after a dispute over a staging bill, instigating a massive citywide brawl which meant that certain planned tour dates had to be postponed due to a sudden bout of ‘death'.
"Iris, Iris, my precious girl, you are my muse!" Deviticate smiled charismatically. "You trust me, my shy flower, don't you? Come here."
Just as Iris was about to move to Deviticate, the door swung open with a massive clang that sounded like mandolin strings being used to pipe-clean the intestines of a cat. The light from the outside flooded in, revealing a group of rather menacing-looking people indeed.
"Get out," the leader ordered coldly, indicating with his thumb.
Iris gathered up the food hastily and skidded out of the cell, but not without one last glimpse of her ‘poet'. The door closed behind her, and the cell was now only lit by candlelight.
The leader of the pack took a few more steps towards Deviticate, his nose curling at the acrid stench of rotting food and damp corners. As Minister for Security, it was not his favourite place to be at this moment in time. He would rather be sitting in his comfortable chambers, planning the next move for city defence, or being entertained by some unknown woman from the slums of the fortress who needed a quick spot of gold or few. The spiked boots on his feet that were specifically designed for kicking despised creatures had just been returned from the city cobbler with new metal caps, just for him. The creature in front of him was no exception to the rule.
A flash of uncertainty rushed through Deviticate's mind. Perhaps his time had slowly come to a close, the curtain dropping on his life before he could tell the audience his final words of wisdom, his great potential in the world to make things different, to eat proper food, sleep in proper beds, win the age-old war. Now, it seemed, he was destined for the barnyard stores as fibre for the swine in the garden.
"Good day, gentlemen… what can I do for you?" Deviticate greeted them mildly, a small smile slowly dying on his lips as the group moved to surround him. The light that usually seeped out from under the door was blocked from view, and Deviticate was entombed in forced claustrophobia.
"I must say you're all looking very well an..."
His sentence was cut short as the leader aimed a vicious kick at Deviticate's stomach, connecting firmly and causing the prisoner to gasp in pain, curling up as a protective reflex and clutching his stomach.
"My boots are fresh back from the cobbler's, and I don't like it when pieces of fecal matter like *you* get in my way," growled the leader, his mad viridian Rajamalan eyes blazing at the winded man.
"So... kind..." muttered Deviticate painfully, only to receive another kick, hard enough to blacken the bone of his spine into a gruesome pulp of a bruise. The Rajamalan leader nodded to two others in the group, and Deviticate was hauled up into a sitting position, his head lolling about in agony.
"Now, to business." The Rajamala crouched down languorously, and with a sharpened foreclaw, put it under Deviticate's chin and raised his head, peering into Iris' infatuation's face with inquisitive, catty eyes. "Why are you still here?"
"Is that a rhetorical question?" mumbled Deviticate, his head flopping downward, but was flicked up by the Rajamala's claw.
"Don't try that with me, Deviticate. Are you going to tell us about your fortress's secrets? Or are the pigs going to have to eat it out of your brain when you get sent to the barn for some spring-cleaning?"
Deviticate, with great effort, raised his head and stared at the Rajamala square in the eyes. Neither of them flinched. "My answer, as before, is no. I'm not going to tell you. And I'm going to do it just to spite you, my catty friend. Because I know that I'll be out of here before you can catch your next rat, and there's nothing you can do about it."
The Rajamala whipped his claw back from under Deviticate's chin, causing a thin trickle of blood to ooze out from the scratch. The prisoner winced, thought about licking the blood off, but then realised that most of the people in the room probably had knives to lop off his tongue, and a few other vital parts of his body too.
"Your sad excuse for wit bores me. You know, I bet you're thinking that you're going to be next in the bucket, Deviticate," the Rajamala said, pulling something out his scabbard, "but the lord and I had a little chat about your status in our dungeons, and we came to a conclusion. Do you know what this is?"
He pulled out a syringe, very similar to the ones that the harlots of the Southern Road used to get their kicks from the gold they managed to procure after a hard night's work. Skilfully, he flicked the cap off a burnished vial of birchwood and filled it up with a peculiar, clear liquid that seemed to give off an aura of malevolence each time the Rajamala tapped the glass with a claw to remove the air bubbles that had gathered at the point.
"Hold him down," he commanded.
The two people holding up the prisoner threw him to the ground and forced his arms away from his body, holding them down so Deviticate could only splay his fingers. As others came to hold down his legs, he kicked out to protect himself.
The Rajamala pounced upon the pinioned man, landing smoothly on his legs and preventing them from damaging his companions any more. Carefully, he took hold of Deviticate's right arm and pulled up the sleeve of his shirt, revealing a solitary bulging vein in a sea of pale skin.
"For every single day that you stay silent, Deviticate, you'll have a little nectar running through your system to make you think twice about defying us again."
Without another word, the Rajamala jabbed the needle into the vein, and pushed down hard on the plunger, forcing the liquid into the blood tube.
The keen howl of a man's body screaming in torture could be heard to the reaches of every turret of the fortress.
"Good day," the Rajamala nodded sardonically before he and his leather-faced cronies left the cell, closing the door so the cell was lit only in darkness.
Deviticate scrunched up his face as if his entire digestive tract was aflame. He writhed about on the ground, grasping for anything, something to stop the agony. His hand came into contact with the pipe that he had thrown earlier, and placing it in between his teeth, biting hard, he lay down on the ground in the foetal position, clenching his fists in utmost agony. He could only screw his eyes up as his body started spasming uncontrollably, his nerve endings burning, the single shot of prefarar rushing mercilessly through his veins.
*********************************************
Outside, there was nothing but silence.
It had been like that for a few weeks now, each night as quiet as the next, as monotonous as the pall of death at its own glorious funeral, for it was eternal, starless night in this place. There had not been as much as a pathetic rodent to pass by. The light that usually crawled under the door had been extinguished. This was part of the prisoner's punishment - anything that resembled the outside world, gave an impression of the outside world, was banished. It was mental torture. Food was shunted under the door like rubbish, and then it was the dregs of the grey soup of hell.
The worst part was that sometimes, a faint dim evanescence of candlelight could be palpable under the door, and then it would flicker away as fast as a firefly's wing. It could merely have been a hallucination.
It was one night when this daily ray of hope fluttered back to the door, waiting for a moment. It slid across, gradually filling the whole crack with its pale glow. It paused there, this time for longer than it usually did.
"I know it is you," a soft voice spoke from the abscesses of the shadows.
The light flickered briefly.
"You have not been visiting me, my precious girl, and yet you return every day to sit outside my door."
No response.
"Open the door... open it, my shy flower... I have missed your sweet company."
A destructive rattling of the lock of the door destroyed the tranquil air, and the door creaked open little by little, revealing the face of Iris, illuminated only by candlelit glow.
"Come closer," the voice replied.
Iris did not move. Her eyes were white with fear, for she could not see past her elbow-length into the cell, it was so murky. Carefully, she took one step into the cell, but as she did, she accidentally knocked the door, causing it to close behind her with a clang that echoed deep within her warm and giving heart.
"Closer, my precious girl..."
Another step. There was no more sound.
Suddenly, a hand shot out of the darkness and caught hold of Iris' left shoulder. She whipped around, and gasped at what she beheld.
It was her ‘poet', but in what shape now! His shirt, it was usually grubby, but the sleeves of the arms were speckled with brownish-red splodges. The left sleeve had been torn off, leaving a ragged edge at the elbow. His face was bearing the marks of pain and woe, and his hand seemed to shiver as he touched her shoulder.
"What... what happened?" she whispered, the candle in her hand shaking, causing pinpoints of light to dance over the walls of the cell.
"First, my dear Iris, where have *you* been?" Deviticate spoke, turning her around to face him. "I hope you have not been avoiding me..."
Iris' breath was fast and shallow as she thought of what to say. "The Security Minister said that I wasn't allowed to bring you your dinner any more... that you'd been a bad man, and somebody would see to it... is it true? Have you been bad?"
"I have only been as bad as that oversized cat has been," said Deviticate with a sarcastic twinkle.
Iris drew back from the prisoner, the candle lighting her fear on her face. "He told me... that you'd... killed people!"
"He is not lying."
Iris' face stretched as she raised her eyebrows, her eyes widening in shock. "You're a murderer! A cold-blooded..."
The girl was starting back like a frightened foal, and Deviticate realised that all he had been building up to, everything that he had worked for over the months, was on the verge of toppling over his head.
"Iris..." He moved towards her.
"Don't touch me! Don't come near me! MURDERER!"
"Iris, Iris!" Deviticate cried, falling to his knees in front of her in as much of a dramatic manner as he could muster. He was glad that his friends and family were not here to see this blatant, humiliating act of grovelling to a tedious girl. "It was all in the name of my art! All for the poetry, yes, poetry comes from blood, my flower..."
"Horrid, horrid, horrid!"
Deviticate fumbled around the ground, looking for something. Iris was moving to the door, as fast as she could in the darkness. She was his last chance, his only chance, simple though she may be, she was vital to him, his sole cause. He had to play his final card from his remaining shirt sleeve.
"Look at me, Iris, just look!" exclaimed Deviticate suddenly.
Iris turned around, and saw the prisoner slide towards her, his manacles clanking quietly around his wrists.
"I have *bled* for you, my precious girl, yes, I have bled..." His voice was quiet and sinister. "My whole existence revolves around you… I have written for you, in my own blood… I slit my wrist with some wood splinters that I found, and scrawled it down in the blood... look!"
He passed her a fragment of fabric, which she examined carefully. It was a part of Deviticate's left shirt sleeve, and upon it, he had written a poem... her poem... ‘A Girl Called Iris'. She closed her eyes, recalling that last night that she had visited him, recalling his words to her. They had played a waltz on her heart strings, as tender and as soft as the beams of the moon, and they struck another dance, a quickstep in her breast.
"If you must leave..." came the quiet, sombre voice of Deviticate to break her reverie, "...do not forget your poet..."
Iris opened her eyes, and turned to face Deviticate. Her eyes were glistening with tears, clear pools of melted diamonds trickling down her cheeks in rivers of torment. She did not see a murderer - why had she labelled him so unkindly? The man in front of her, he was no murderer, but a tortured soul stuck in this place of torment. How could she shun him, prone upon his knees, looking so forlorn and sorrowful. Suddenly, she flung herself at him, hugging him tightly.
"I'm sorry! I don't know what I was th... thinking!" she sobbed.
"I forgive you, my shy one, my precious flower..." Deviticate said. Admittedly, he was getting tired of her pet names, and her naivety was getting on his nerves. He would have to end his 'fluffy bunny' act as soon as possible, before it ruined his plans completely.
He quickly swept those thoughts away, patting the girl. She looked at him in utter despair. Gently, Deviticate rose to his feet, embracing her, and finally, drew her in for a sweet, single kiss. Iris did not resist, for it would have not been as exciting if she had pulled away. Instead, she melted in his arms, her heart and soul surrendering to his seductions.
"We must flee, Iris, leave this pit," Deviticate said, after Iris had recovered.
"Flee?"
"I can take you wherever you wish... but I must get out of here, and I can do it only with your help."
"That's breaking the rules though!" replied Iris, breathless already, not sure what to think.
"I can't stay here... look at me, Iris... they feed me this food that would make leeches vomit... I am kicked and my body beaten by the Security Minister and his aides... they inject me with venoms every single day, and they keep me in perpetual darkness. I would have gone mad if it wasn't for your candlelight, my shy flower... to see your beautiful face once more..."
"But… but to leave? My mother..."
"I can take you to places you've never seen, Iris! Yes, I can even take you to Cyrene, to sing… that is your heart's desire, isn't it? Yes, you can fulfil everything you ever wanted to do but never could in this dump of a place..." He drifted off, observing the girl in front of him carefully. She was so young, had her whole life in front of her, and she was wasting it all on him. For his own selfish whims.
"Will you help me?" he murmured quietly.
She did not speak.
Then, out of the recesses of her mouth, echoed the lonely word, "Yes."
"Then you must do this for me. I need you to send this note via the swiftest bird you can find. We leave tomorrow." He passed her another scrap of fabric, which she immediately tucked into the top of her dress. She turned to leave, but Deviticate had something else to add.
"You are the only one I could bleed for, Iris."
She looked at him, and then silently left, enshrouding the cell in sable darkness once more.
*********************************************
The time until the next night could not fly by more rapidly.
Deviticate had already gone through the nightly ritual of venom-shooting; his body was sweating from the effects of the lethal fluid, and his arm still trickled with a thin line of coagulating blood. The remnants of the oak pipe were clenched between his teeth, but tonight would be the last time. He was hopeful of that.
He sat in his usual corner, patiently watching the door. He, of course, had no guarantee that the girl would come, but she always came. She was smitten by his silken words, on a high from smoking his poetry, seduced by his intricate disguise. There was no question about it: she was as malleable as clay, and Deviticate was her potter.
The door rattled, and a hunched figure wearing a cloak shuffled into the room. She rushed up to him, and with a shake of the keys, picked one out and quickly undid the manacles around his wrists. They fell to the ground with a dull clang.
"My shy flower, I knew I could trust you, the moment we first met," smiled Deviticate. "Do you have the key to the courtyard?"
"Here." Iris passed him a large iron key from her ring. "That's the master key to all the doors." She paused for a moment to catch her breath. "I've got food, water... and a piece of rope to climb down the walls… oh, isn't this all terribly exciting!"
"Great. Whatever," Deviticate answered, completely uninterested in the girl's babblings as he made for the door. His wrists ached in relief, for the manacles seemed to have shrunk around them, constricting movement for so long. He was walking in angles that he had not walked for in ages, the cramp that had cursed his limbs for so long was vanishing. He followed Iris to the place that he had mapped out, the far rampart. He knew that it was unguarded at this time, for it was his mistake to the whereabouts of this rampart that led to his capture. Iris, as a fortress-dweller, knew the area like the hairs on her head, and soon Deviticate was inhaling the first clean, odourless, untainted air that he had missed for the past few months.
Iris tied the rope to a small hook meant for raising the fortress' standard, and slung the rest over the side of the stone. She had carefully knotted it to make it easier to climb down, and was just about to do so, when Deviticate stopped her.
"What are you doing?" he asked benignly.
"Fleeing. I thought that's what we were doing," said Iris, before climbing up on to the edge again. Deviticate pulled her back down.
"I have some unfinished business before anybody goes anywhere," he replied.
Iris blinked in surprise. There was a hint of malice in her poet's voice that she had never heard before. Perhaps the excitement of the hour had made her imagine it. She stepped back from the edge, and watched as Deviticate took the remaining pieces of the oak pipe, wrapped in a bloody piece of his shirt, and dropped it over the edge. There was a dull thud, so quiet that only the condors in the high tower could just about hear it, and the oak pipe was no more than a few pieces of splintered wood.
Moments later, a rough hand appeared at the top of the rope. It was attached to a rough-looking Xoran, who clambered over the rampart wall and landed smoothly on the ground, the crescent moonlight glistening darkly off her midnight blue scales.
Iris watched in shock as more and more people climbed up the rope and found themselves standing in the circular section of the rampart. Then the flow of people desisted, and the rope flapped pointedly in the wind. They were all armed with sharp, malevolent weapons, some that she only thought existed in her books.
"Meet my friends, Iris," Deviticate spoke, a dark smile sliding on to his lips.
"They... they don't look like poets..." she whispered.
Deviticate strode out to meet the people, who all saluted him respectfully as he examined the line. The Xoran who had ascended first came to meet him. She was obviously somebody of some importance, as Deviticate gave her a hug, patting her back.
"All due respect, sir, but you look like... the Underworld warmed up..." the Xoran spoke, holding a rapier and a pair of knives out to Deviticate, which he took.
"Whatever drains my looks feeds my brain," was the answer. "Now, we are here to finish off a job that I, and I take all the blame for this, went slightly wrong."
"Job?" Iris murmured confusedly. He had not mentioned to her anything about a ‘job'.
"Saveria, here is the master key to all the doors. You know the drill as well as the first lot did."
The Xoran nodded. "Rivers of blood," she acquiesced.
"Rivers of blood?" gasped Iris in shock. This was definitely not in the plan.
"Just one thing, Lord Deviticate," Saveria said, licking her lips with a scarlet forked tongue as she pointed her whip at Iris, "what's your wife going to say about your little bit on the side there?"
"Wife?!" Iris clawed at Deviticate's shirt. "You're... you're married?! But..."
"Just kill everyone, Saveria," said Deviticate coldly.
"Kill? But my mother's on patrol tonight!" squealed Iris, glancing from Saveria to Deviticate and back again.
"Very good, sir," Saveria acknowledged, and to the rest of the group, she bellowed, "You heard the man. The walls shall be painted in red tonight."
The group turned geometrically and marched out of the ramparts. Deviticate rubbed his hands together in disturbing glee and turned to face Iris, who had an expression that was half-shock, half-anger, plastered in cadmium red over her face.
"Now, for you, my sweet..."
"YOU BASTARD!"
"Iris, quiet..."
"FIRE! FIRE! BLOODY MURDER! HORRIDNESS! HELP! HE…!"
Deviticate caught the girl from the back of her trailing long hair and pinioned her arms to her side, clamping his other hand over her mouth and dragged her to the rampart wall. She was a mousy girl, but she could definitely shout and ruin the whole aspect of surprise that he had planned upon the fortress. He despised playing the role of the charmer - it was dark fun to begin with, but now he had returned to the dominating, hard man that commanded respect and allegiance from all corners of the world, and Iris was no exception. That was how he truly appreciated life.
"Did you think that ever I loved you, you silly girl?" sneered Deviticate, shaking Iris cruelly so her head rolled back and forth over her neck. He grabbed Iris' hair and pulled it back so her head was drawn back, revealing her pale neck. "You were easy to seduce, with your stupid airhead stuck in a cloud... life is nothing like a novel, you should know that! Your poet is nothing but a dream, you hear me? None of it was real, and you fell for it! The adventure ends here, my precious girl..."
He threw his head back in wild, spiteful laughter that rang out over the fortress walls, pulling out a knife and placing its freshly-sharpened virgin blade over her neck. The condors on the tower leapt into the air and soared off into the darkness. Intertwined with the laughter was the muffled sound of sobbing from a tortured girl, for it was she who had been tortured all these months, in her head and her heart. The laughter got louder, and louder, until the echoes were echoing off themselves. Only the animals in the trees could see what was going on.
Suddenly, the laughter stopped as abruptly as it had begun. The condors paused in mid-flight, confused, floating off the air currents, wondering what had just happened.
It was quite an abrupt change. The laughter changed to a sharp cry of surprise, to a cough, a choke, and then strangulated gurgling as Deviticate released the girl from his grasp. She jumped away and turned to watch what had just occurred.
She had taken the other knife that the Xoran had given him and stabbed him up through the ribcage, piercing through both lungs, and impaling his ruthless heart all the way through to the hilt, the blood pouring over her hands as if it was red wine being emptied out of a bottle.
He started spitting black bile, and blood started to drip from his nose, getting runnier and runnier. Unbeknown to either pair, the knife had been fully envenomed, ready for the very purpose of giving instant death to an unwilling victim. He slumped down the wall, clawing desperately at the blade through his chest, dyeing his shirt deep crimson. Iris stepped away slowly, watching her poet's final death throes, reaching out of her, gasping her name, before his head lolled on to his chest, and there was no more sound.
He looked so peaceful in death, she observed afterwards.
Iris climbed up on to the rampart wall and watched the chaos down below, a battlefield that she had unwittingly instigated. The cries of shock and surprise as the army burst through doors, setting fire to the fortress and killing innocents; the wailing of women and the screams of men as they met their final sight of their murderers. The cry that stood out the most was the one that shrieked, "Betrayed! This is surely a betrayal!"
She stood up on the wall, her grey cowled cloak waving in the wind, her hair blowing out behind her as if she was a finely-carved figurehead on a ship.
"Betrayed," she murmured faintly. "This is surely a betrayal."
With all the slayings, all the fires, all the deaths, nobody noticed another one, another death, the soft splash like a frog in a pond on the far end of the moat, a solitary red-veined flower floating on the stagnant surface, before it drowned its petals, succumbing to the darkness.
FIN