The silence within the church was utterly palpable. I could swear it’s sadistic presence was draped over me for the hours that I sat on the cold floor of the church. Cecelia and Phern were both sitting opposite the campfire they had struck up with habitual speed. Clearly the heavy blanket of silence was wrapped around them as well. Every second trudged on to a minute, then to an hour, until we had been sitting in complete silence for nearly 3 hours.
It didn’t start that way, mind you. Phern, for what’s its worth, did her very best to cheer me up following my untimely realization of my current fate. “You can’t sink into the flabblebog!!” She spoke enthusiastically, as if I was supposed to know what in the world a flabblebog was. Judging by the expression that descended on Cecelia’s, I would hazard that she was just as clueless as I was. The way Phern said it, I could only assume she meant it as a sort of pep talk to keep me from becoming too negative.
With time I’m sure she’ll begin to understand that pessimism might as well be the very blood that runs through my veins. With time? That’s assuming I even decide to stick with the odd duo before me, or that we don’t die in a matter of days. Or- I suppose they would die, I’ve found myself eluding the concept as of late. After Phern’s initial attempt at lifting my spirits, my own insistence on needing some time to think ushered in the tense silence that lurks even now. My stomach growling was one of the only sounds that permeated the eerie silence.
“You made it seem like you two have dealt with a lot of Deathless.”
I wasn’t exactly sure what led me to blurting out the thought. I had been chewing the sentence in my mind for the past hour, nearly saying it numerous times before pulling back at the last second. It seems my luck ran out, because the words were floating through the air before I had realized they even left my thoughts.
“Oh we’ve dealt with plenty.” Cecelia responded shortly. Her tone of voice implying that she had every intention of leaving the conversation dead in its tracks, only for the momentum to be transferred to Phern as she spoke up. “Yeah! It’s like, kind of our job? It’d be a little embarrassing if we hadn’t actually hunted any of your kind, right?”
Your kind. That felt wrong, but I didn’t speak up to correct the enigmatic woman, after all, she wasn’t technically wrong. Even worse than being categorized as a kind of other was the revelation that these two seemed to have a lot of experience killing the exact monster I had now become.
“Apologies if this is a little blunt, but why exactly have I not been ‘hunted’ as you said?”
“Because you’re somewhat of a mystery, bandit. I don’t like to be kept in the dark”, same here, I thought. “So I’m keeping you around until I figure out what exactly you are.” Cecelia broke off yet another piece of bread from a larger loaf. Each time she pulled more of the loaf out of her small handbag I couldn’t help but wonder how there could possibly be more. If there were not much more serious topics at hand, I would have asked what kind of magic was on display. Based on the size of the handbag it was carried in, my first thought would be for some kind of dimensional expansion enchantment, but that magic tends to be extremely expensive. It’s possible that instead she was utilizing a food based conjuration magic, but that would no doubt show some obvious signs of creation from inside of the handbag, which could almost certainly-
“Bandit, eyes are up here, not on my rock hard loaf of bread. Care to answer my question?”
“Um, oh, I was just-“ my face reddened considerably despite my self assurances that none of my daydreaming or staring was mean to be predatory.
“…what was the question?” I ask meekly, attempting to not only recover from my embarrassment, but push the conversation beyond the point where I’d had to think of it any further.
“Do you have any violent urges?”
My stomach growled once more. Great timing, stomach.
“No, I don’t. C-can I have some of that?” I gingerly pointed to, in her own words, her rock hard loaf of bread.
“Did I offer you any?” Cecelia spoke calmly and coldly, like any time wasted while speaking was going to land her a fine.
“No.”
“Oh, okay. Well I think that answers your question then.”
“But both of you are eating it!”
Phern looked at me with another lopsided smile, letting out a short giggle before saying “That’s because it’s our food! It’s not like we wouldn’t share if we could!”
I just sat and stared, clearly not following what seemed to be laughably obvious to the two of them.
“Oh my gosh wait he doesn’t know! Throw him the bread CiCi! Come on!” Phern was once again wrapped up in an ever growing excitement, like a kid in a carnival who assures their parents that they only need one more chance to win the prize.
Cecelia tossed me a small piece of the bread and smirked. I caught the piece of bread and stared at it intently. There had to be something I’m missing here. But for the life of me, I couldn’t figure it out. For someone who prides themself on being incredibly intelligent, I felt anything but.
Fuck it.
I ate the bread, figuring I could get whatever practical joke this was out of the way instead of dragging it out any further.
They poisoned it. The bread tasted like some rotten excuse for compost, too vile for even flies to bother with it. How they managed to poison this bread without me noticing was truly impressive. I choked on the bread, spitting out all that I could onto the ground in a heaving fervor. Like some sad joke, I was going to die for a 3rd time, and the 2nd time by these very same women no less!
“Oh he’s theatrical! What a drama queen we have with us today!” Phern happily watched my untimely death with glee, seeming to care little that I was about to be shunted off this mortal coil once more.
“Okay, fun’s over. Stop being so over the top. You’re making it seem like you’re going to die.” Cecelia looked incredibly unimpressed with me. I, on the other hand, felt a flush rise to my cheeks as her words finally set in. No poison, it seemed. Perhaps I was a little dramatic.
“What was wrong with it?!”
“Nothing. Your body just can’t process it anymore. Deathless are strictly carnivorous, leaning towards the more raw and fresh side of meats.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?!”
“I was waiting until you were hungry. Figured your dinner won’t be appealing to you, so I needed you to be desperate for the food.”
My face paled as I started to connect the dots. I was hoping that I was completely off the mark, but as Cecelia stood up and gestured towards the back of the church, I knew I was right.
“Greg” Cecelia stated plainly.
“Greg!” Phern stated not so plainly.
Greg was my dinner. I would say I could hardly stomach the thought, but I would be lying, as the very idea of his somewhat fresh corpse lit a lingering fire in the pit of my stomach. It was small at first, but rising alongside my hunger, I couldn’t deny that a part of me started to find the idea… appealing. The hunger, the desire, was some sort of beast with its own free will. It plucked at my brain and tickled my arms in anticipation for something that I wish wasn’t so easy to picture in my head.
“S-stop calling him Greg. It’s disrespectful. We don’t know his name.” Despite urging the two women to hold more respect for the dead man, I found my own legs pushing me up from the campfire, unwillingly drifting towards the man. How could I admonish the two about disrespecting the dead when I was just about to commit one of the great acts of disrespect towards the dead. I could act all I wanted that I was still some sort of refined scholar, but the truth is that I’m some inhuman beast being drawn by their nature to feast upon flesh.
‘Now you’re getting it, human… sate yourself. Sate us both.’
A voice. A thought of mine? Perhaps a subconscious desire made real in my haze? The distinctly feminine tone of the voice told me otherwise. I did not sound like that. Though it wouldn’t be the worst thing.
‘We h u n g e r. We must eat.’
There it is again. I was in some sort of trance, my mind focused on the strange voice that echoed and reverberated through my mind, while my body listlessly wandered towards Greg, no, the clergyman. There was a thick haze of hunger clouding my thoughts, making it almost hurt to try to piece together the origin of the other voice in my head. My curious nature fought against the fog in my mind, a throbbing headache forming as a result of the conflict. There was no more time to consider, however, and I felt my knees hit the hard stone, a moldy tapestry lay before me.
It was time. I didn’t want to, but I did. Fear gripped my core as I lifted the tapestry and crawled over to the body. My hands, no, my arms. They had the same familiar shadows wrapped around them. I could see shadowy claws forming at the tips of my fingers as I dragged the body out from under the desiccated fabric. I was entranced in my meal, but behind me I still managed to hear the readying of Cecelia’s sword.
Did she wish to stop me?
I twisted around and let out what sounded like some sort of bestial hiss. It felt natural, like a defense mechanism built into me from the day I was born, though I know it wasn’t. When I saw Cecelia take no action but to watch me eat with her sword at the ready, I continued my almost ritualistic feast on the corpse. Minutes passed. I acted with the ease that would imply I had done this a thousand times. A grim implication, to be sure. Yet for my virgin meal, I felt practiced. I shivered at the thought, or did I shiver in bliss at the flavor? I couldn’t tell, a thought that I knew should upset me more than it currently did. What was wrong with me? Why was I so okay with this?
I don’t know exactly how long it took to get my fill, but I didn’t dare recall the experience to try to guess how long I took. I was currently standing in front of the corpse, Greg, whatever… with Cecelia and Phern staring directly into my soul.
“Gosh you were hungry”
What do I even say to that. Phern, despite looking as visibly disturbed as Cecelia during the entire ordeal, was still trying to lighten the mood. Perhaps some sort of coping strategy? Bad habit? I’d have to ask when I wasn’t covered in blood and digesting a holy man.
“Are you okay?” There it was again. Cecelia speaks in a tone that could almost come across as caring. I wanted to make a joke about how she’d better be careful or I might think she cares, but I knew it wasn’t the time.
“Does it look like it? I just ate a man! Twice! If you count the time I don’t remember! I feel like I’m losing it!”
“You uh… looked like you enjoyed it?”
“That’s what I’m concerned about! It’s why you should be afraid of me, not staring at me like I'm a pathetic jester who failed his routine!”
Phern looked down and shuffled her feet around, looking up with what I gleaned to be apprehension. “Sorry Bandito, but we’ve seen worse. Maybe not a buuuuuunch worse, because that whole thing you did with the intestine was nasty, but we’re not new to this.”
I couldn’t tell what was worse. That I had just had a dead man for dinner, or that the two women watching are nonplussed about the whole display.
“You changed. I don’t know how much you noticed given your… hunger.” Cecelia spoke softly, like she was worried if she worded it any harsher she would wound me severely. I was fine, I didn’t need her to baby me.
“Oh, right. What did I look like?”
“Like a big ol’ shadow monster! With claws!” Phern raised her arms above her head and proceeded to grossly imitate eating something with claws. A performance which I cannot say was very tactful given my mental state.
“You looked monstrous, and almost feminine?”
Huh? I replayed Cecelia’s words in my head in order to confirm just what she had said, and despite my disbelief, she had in fact called me feminine. Why was my shadow form feminine? What did that even mean? Why did it almost excite me?
‘A gross approximation of me.’
I froze. The voice rattled in my thoughts once more. Now that I wasn’t in the depths of voracious hunger, I could begin to consider just how horrifying the prospect of a voice in my head was. Was it my hunger speaking? Surely not, I just ate, so the desires would theoretically refrain from invading my consciousness from my subconsciousness.
‘You overthink a lot, don’t you, my little morsel.’
Shit. She can hear my thoughts. A disgusting invasion of privacy, but one that would matter little if this voice was a part of my subconscious. Wait, she? Why would my subconscious supply a feminine voice to contact me?
‘Gods, do you ever stop your incessant speculation? It’s like a chorus of anxieties every time someone so much as speaks to you.’
I’m curious, bite me. I believe it makes plenty of sense that a scholar would excel in careful examination of their environments and circumstances. Ugh, I am seriously arguing with my own thoughts?
‘I can assure you I am not born of your thoughts, human. Even being subjected to your thoughts is enough punishment, do not insult me further.’
“Our little airhead is at it again, it seems.” Cecelia huffed the words out before moving down to my dinner-the body and sliding it back behind the altar and presumably underneath the aged tapestry. Phern was currently occupying herself by waving her hand in a blur in front of my face. Mildly infuriating, but I suppose I had been distracted enough to warrant it.
“Somethin’ on your mind, bandit?” It was as if the woman never tired. She just kept waving her hand like she was caught in a repetition spell. If I could find a way to harness the energy she had, it could fuel all of Varenthell Academy for decades. She was like a little miniature anomaly of constant energy, a smile so bright I’d put money down that it could serve as a light source.
“Oh uh, nothing.”
“You got a little spacey when I mentioned the feminine appearance. Care to explain?” Cecelia paced back up to me, using the fabric around her waist to attempt to wipe off the blood that found its way onto gauntlets while moving the body.
I felt like I could relate to that very same blood on her gauntlets. I couldn’t know for sure, but for how hot my cheeks burned, I could only assume they were beet red. Why? Fantastic question. Sure, I had been distracted, but it was more to do with the voice in my mind than the comments she made. Yeah, that was definitely it. I suppose I could just tell them-
‘DO NOT. They know what we are, they would only seek to kill you if they knew about me.’
I shuddered at the intense cacophony ringing in my head. Her words had a commanding tone to them, so much so that any thought of revealing my new internal nuisance was quashed. Whether she had actual power over me, or was just an intimidating presence was up for debate, but I wasn’t keen on testing those boundaries just yet.
I looked back to Cecelia to see her hawk-like gaze piercing my soul like she had every intention of burning through me with just her eyes. Shit, I’m probably hesitating far too much, I can’t have her thinking anything is up.
“Sorry, it’s just weird is all. Any guy would be just as uncomfortable looking feminine, right?”
“Sure.”
“Glad it’s settled then!” It clearly wasn’t based on her expression, but that wouldn’t stop me from moving the subject matter away from the current sensitive one. “C-Can I ask why you killed me? Earlier, I mean. It was just… very sudden.”
Cecelia unlatched her contraption from her belt, and for a moment I feared I had overstepped some boundaries and I prepared for a swift end. Thankfully, instead of the blade I had seen up to this point, the device whirled, metal shifting and sliding around shockingly smoothly to fit into a circular shield. Handy.
“Your back. The mark of the Deathless rests on the upper back of every single one. Given the depraved subterfuge Deathless engage in, the tattoo is sometimes the only certainty you can rely on.”
‘Depraved? This human talks about us in such filthy words’
Us?
‘Perhaps you’re right. I care not to be associated with a human like you.’
I can’t tell if I should be happy about that or not.
Cecelia nodded to Phern, who moved up to take the shield from her hands. After which, she held the gleaming shield directly in front of me. Gods was that device magnificent. I opened my mouth to ask how many different forms it could take, but before any words could crawl out of my lips, I saw it. The tattoo. Cecelia was using the reflection of the shield and her own shoulder plate to allow me to glance at my own back. So many emotions filled my heart at the sight. It was… beautiful, elegant, and vile at the same time. A black circle surrounded what looked to be the letter D, only the curved part of the D was marked with countless perpendicular lines, like it was a spiny creature. A closed eye sat in the center of the D, with the beginnings of a tear collected on the left side of the eye. It felt wrong to look at, yet I never wanted to stop. It was a discordant harmony that I wanted to exile from my mind and worship until my death.
Thankfully, the swirling pit of emotions forming were disrupted by Cecelia placing her shoulder plate back where it belonged, and Phern de-activating her shield to be returned to Cecelia.
“You know what this means, CiCi?”
“What?”
“I win the bet!! You said nothing interesting would be in here but we found ourselves our very own Deathless!”
The bet? I remembered they spoke of such when I had stumbled out of the church at first.
Cecelia let out a sigh, but didn’t argue as she pulled out a small pouch from the pack on her back and tossed it to the eccentric girl. “More than a Deathless, Phern. I think we might have just found enough trouble to last us a lifetime.” As if she could read my confusion for what she just said, she continued speaking. “You said a ritual did this to you, correct?” I nodded. “Congrats, bandit. You just became the first Deathless to be ‘made’ and not ‘born’.”
“Why does that translate to trouble for you two?”
“Oh come on, silly! You’re standing in front of the two most loved and prolific Life Hunters Kistram has ever seen! The two of us have killed more Deathless than anyone else!” Phern cheered, as if she was announcing herself and Cecelia for an audience in a theatre.
“I wouldn’t say loved”, Cecilia grumbled.
‘Filthy Filthy F i l t h y Hunters.’ The voice in my head growled with such a deep hatred I could feel it scoring my arms and legs with a shiver.
Should I be relieved or concerned that the only two people I know in my new life as a Deathless happen to be supposedly famous Life Hunters?
‘KILL THEM.’
No! I’m not just going to-
‘K I L L T H E M K I L L T H E M K I L L T H E M K I L L T H E M K I L L T H E M’
The pressure in my skull was far too much for me to handle. I could barely tell I was still conscious when Cecelia ran over to me, catching me just as I collapsed to the ground. All I could do was grip my head in a fetal position. It was pure agony, like the creature in my head was trying to shatter my skull and sliver out the cracks.
Mercifully the feeling passed after what felt like minutes, but was most likely only one. There was an odd taste in my mouth that I couldn’t quite place. Had I started bleeding? No, it wasn’t just a taste, there is something in my mouth. I spit it out as fast I possibly could only to see a wad of… moss? Looking up, I saw the stretched smile of Phern. Even without me being a scholar, I could tell that she was certainly responsible. “What did you put in my mouth?!”
“It was for a spell! Gosh, you’re calm now, so maybe a thank you next time?”
“Spell?” No spell, and I mean absolutely no spell required moss as a kind of component. Even if it did, it certainly shouldn’t be placed in the target's mouth. She had to be lying about her spellcasting ability, but regardless, the strange act did seem to pull me out of my intense pain.
“Since the cat’s out of the bag, we should really get moving in the morning. I want to believe your ritual is not a part of this, but I would be foolish to think so.” Cecelia calmly moved back to her pack, unfastening what looked to be a sleeping roll on the back.
“This? What are you talking about?”
“A girl’s allowed to keep some secrets. You’ll find out later. All you need to know right now is that some very powerful people are most likely on the way to this church for you. We don’t want that.”
“Wonderfully vague as always Cecelia.”
“Ooo, our little bandit is getting sassy.” She smirked, unrolling her sleeping mat onto the hard stone. I was accustomed to the comforts of academy dorms, so the prospect of sleeping on this stone floor tonight rather than the cushioned beds made me miss my old life. Even saying old life brought with it an array of sadness. Was it really gone? No, I’m sure there’s a way out of this. I can make my way back north to Varenthell and resume my studies in peace, surely. I would just need to adjust to a strictly carnivorous lifestyle and everything would be fine!
“Just keep an eye out for any groups being led by blindfolded individuals and we’ll be fine. Get some rest, bandit, we’ll leave in the morning.”
I shot a look at Phern, who just stared at me plainly. Unsettling. Her expression flipped to that of a cocked smile, like it was a response to my own tired expression.
“Sorry, I just need some air. Today has been a lot.”
“Want me to come with? We can dissociate about the pestlebees that have been turbulent to my shinskins!”
None of that made sense to me. Either she was talking about strictly southern animals, or she had decided to come up with her own imaginary animals. I wouldn’t put it past her.
“N-no that’s not necessary. Really.” I tried to deflect as best as I could while walking towards the doorway of the church. The stones itself looked like they could collapse at any moment, making every passage underneath feel like a gamble. It was best not to wander too far, I thought, stopping 20 paces from the church. The building (if you could call it that) was on top of a small hill, giving me a good view of the surrounding environment.
For the first time since the ritual, I felt like I could breathe. The past day had felt like a non-stop blur of new revelations and tragedy. I felt liberated under the resonating silence in the open air. The sun had gone down long ago, and yet I felt myself able to see far clearer than I had any right to. I was fully capable at absorbing the steady decline of the hill that rolled directly into a forest. Looking back towards the church, I could see that the structure was built in a kind of crevice eroded into the side of a mountain. I could see why this area felt like it was hidden away from the world, a lone sanctuary that could flourish away from the prying eyes of society. I suppose it makes sense to have a church built in such a beautiful location. Its seclusion certainly explains the deteriorating state of the lifeless walls.
‘It is for Baehevar. That is why the humans left it to rot.’
Oh. She’s back.
‘You should speak more highly of me.’
“Sure.” I had no intention of treating this intruder like anything other than what she was. A threat.
‘You could start by not announcing your plans to me, human.’
Shit. Forgot you can hear that. What was she talking about anyway? Baehevar? Wasn’t he a warmongering fiend?
‘Of course you humans would label him as such. He didn’t use to be such a touchy subject. This church stands as evidence of that.’
I had read plenty of history books in the academy, so I felt comfortable preparing to defend myself from any of this voice’s lies. Baehevar was infamous for attempting to slaughter humans en masse in his pursuit of control.
‘Do not speak of him as such. You couldn’t possibly hope to understand the truth from human history. History for humankind is the sweeping waves of an ocean, washing away any attempts to build or develop in the sand. They love to strip and desecrate whatever paints them in poor lighting.’
Sure. Next you’ll tell me to befriend demons, I take it?
‘Oh how I anticipate your answer to that question once you have been subjected to human judgement. Then we will see if you remain on your, as humans say, tall horse.’
I rolled my eyes. It was natural, I suppose, for the Deathless in my head to attempt to manipulate me. I was still mostly human after all, I had no reason to fear other humans. Right?
‘Lilith’
What?
‘That is my name. You keep referring to me as “the Deathless”. It is improper. It would be as if I referred to you exclusively as “human.”’
You do.
‘...not true. I once called you little morsel’, Lilith spoke indignantly, like she couldn’t possibly be wrong in any form.
I’ve got a petulant beast in my head.
‘I live in a cowardly meat sack that would rather think than act.’
Touché.
My mental argument with Lilith was disrupted as the calm and orderly quiet of the outside was altered. In the distance, leaving the forest and heading directly for the church, was a group of people. The group just so happened to be led by two individuals with flowing black robes accented with golden trims, wearing blindfolds over their eyes.
‘Hah! Your inauspicious luck proves endlessly entertaining, human.’
Real cute, Lilith.