Decay
Decay. Everywhere. The stink of it swirled like a cloying mist, penetrating my clothes, my lungs, my hair. I had never gotten used to and I did not expect to. Anger courses through me. Anger at being back here. Anger at being summoned. But worst of all for the feeling of anticipation that pulses through my body. The taste of bitter copper on my tongue, overwhelming the stench of decay. It had been too long and too short since my last summoning. A love hate relationship I hear you ask. Yes. Almost the perfect definition of such a thing.
The road. Path. Muddy track was unchanged from the last time I had walked it. It always seemed to me that the rain had just stopped and was due to restart any moment soon. I shake my head and walk the last few steps down the path, lean through the dark recess and push the ancient, rotting door open. It squeaks and groans agonisingly as it reluctantly eases back providing a meagre crack through which I squeeze. I hear the first rain drops hitting the rotting leave behind me as I push the door closed behind me.
Disorientated, I stand still in the darkness until a single candle flickers and gutters on a table at the far of the room. I walk up to the table, put both hands down on the table, lean forward, thrusting my head forward.
"What? What do you want? Why call me again? I told you it was over."
A soft wheezing chuckle greets my snarl.
"You find my discomfort funny?"
"You did not have to come." the voice is soft as always, seductive, enticing and completely unnatural. In the silence I can hear the ever present wheeze. It is the one thing that never changes.
Silence.
"See, you have no answer that makes sense to you. I know why you come back. But you have no idea."
The gentle wheezing continues for a while and, as my eyes adapt to the dark the creature that has summoned me again starts to take form. It is never the same. Last time I was here it took the form of a hideous old witch, the time before a mangy dog. This time it is a feathered woman looking like an owl, magnificent in upright stance, cold yellow eyes and horned feathers.
I stand up, the threatening stance making me feel slightly stupid, over dramatic.
"Go on. Do tell. Lets hear your sorry excuse for a theory on my addiction to your company."
He, she, it had said last time I was addicted to its oozing sexuality. It was a game we played, each time I arrived. It would come up with another crazy analysis that seemed to fit perfectly until I was out of its presence and then it was stupid, laughable.
"You are addicted to what I offer."
"And what do you offer? Your company? You have tried that one before. Be more creative."
Soft wheezing laughter. I wait patiently.
"You are addicted to the danger, the death, the pain. I send you to a realm where there is no law. No possible reprisals for your actions you use to feed the black hatred you carry in your soul. You leave death, pain and misery in your wake and no one challenges you for those dead dark crimes you commit."
I reach across the table to grab the creature by the throat and find that it is not where I thought it was. It laughs at my wild grasping.
"Still the same. Unchanged. Uncontrolled. Perfect for my purposes and addicted to what I offer."
Before we go any further let me introduce myself, lest you get the wrong idea.
I am Joel Steyn. An ordinary man. A boring chartered accountant, working for a large multinational firm who support the uber rich. I live a comfortable life, I have a beautiful socialite wife, two perfect children and a future all mapped out for me. I am "Going places!" as my immediate supervisor said of me the other day, not without a dash of envy.
I have an IQ that is over the top and an ambition to match. I could have chosen any job in the world but accounting put me close to money and money is a sort of passion with me.
A perfect life I hear you muttering enviously. Yes. And no. You see I have a secret vice shall we call it? I am addicted to danger, to violence, to destruction. I suppose I could blame it on computer games, my parents, my schooling or society in general, but I am honest enough to admit that deep in my soul there is a bubbling seething pit of darkness that needs to be assuaged. If it doesnâTMt get let out regularly under controlled circumstance it breaks out and goes on the rampage. Dual personality I hear you say? Maybe, but what ever it is the darkness inside me requires to be let out for a controlled walk regularly. While still a teenager, I could get away with the occasional school brawl, a violent fracas on the rugby field or a bit of random chanced upon violence.
It was when I was at university that the darkness fully emerged and did its first bit of real illegal damage. A bar brawl turned bad when my opponent followed me out of the bar, yelling insults. The control I had enforced inside slipped and soon I found myself standing over a very badly damaged human, blood on my hands but no witnesses. At least I thought so, until the wheezy chuckle broke through my horrified daze.
"Hmm, nasty. A stretch in the local jail for this one." The soft voice said.
I swung around and found myself facing something from a SciFi modellers wet dreams. Tall, willowy and oozing sexuality, hair that floated down covering a garment that revealed more than it covered.
"Let me introduce myself. You can call me anything you like." Soft wheezy chuckle "But my middle name is Salvation."
"Joel. Joel Steyn."
"Of course you are Joel Steyn. Top of the academic ladder. Going places. A real future. A bit fucked now donâTMt you you think?"
"You said you could help me. Salvation is your name you said. Was that just for show? Like that tarty dress you are wearing?"
"It is going to cost you."
"Everything comes at a price. How much do you want? I donâTMt have much money, but I will be rich soon."
"I donâTMt want money. I want to be able to use your special talent for violence when I need it."
"A hitman? Are you mad?"
"Sort of hitman, but you see where I will use your talents will be far from here where the laws and rules that you are used to wont apply. You had better decide fast. I see trouble coming."
She nodded over my shoulder. An amorous but rather inebriated couple were heading our way. Explaining the bloodied body would be difficult.
"Yes. Yes. Do it."
"This is a binding agreement. If you renege it will not go well for you."
"Yes. Just do it."
She stepped forward, ran a razor sharp nail down my cheek tearing a jagged cut into my cheek. She then sucked the blood and skin off her finger nail. The world seemed to turn silent and slightly blurry. The couple walked, or should I say staggered straight past us and proceeded to get right down to the business of procreation against the door of a fancy Beamer. They were so close I could smell the woman's perfume and the musky scent of sex and hear the man's muted grunting as he ploughed into the woman. When he was finished, he zipped up, she straightened her dress and they staggered back to the pub inches from where I stood. I looked around for my saviour, but she and the injured man were nowhere to be seen.
I did not hear from her for nearly 6 months, then one night she appeared in a dream and said, "Time to pay your debts. Tomorrow morning, take a days leave, stand in the middle of this room and say Indigo, three times. Do not fail me or you will regret it."
I woke up the next morning with the dream in my mind. It seemed a ridiculous thing and the issue was long buried so I determined not to obey the woman's instruction. As I prepared to go to varisty this terrible urge to at least carry out the instruction, stupid as it might seem became completely irresistible. Finally irritated more than anything else, I stepped into the centre of the room and muttered quite sheepishly, "Indigo, Indigo, Indigo".
The room dimmed and then was gone and I found myself standing on that stinking path. Warily I followed the path, entered the door and found a strange wolf like creature standing there waiting.
"Where is the woman?" I asked looking around. The wolf flickered for a moment, the woman appeared and disappeared and the wolf was back.
"We are not limited to one shape here. Get used to it."
"So? How do I pay my debt?"
A shimmering ball shaped cloud appeared from nowhere. Reflected in it was a house.
"Go to this house and evict the people there. Be as brutal as you like."
"Why?"
"Because I say so. Because your darkness needs feeding and because you owe me. Until your debt is paid, I own you. You could not resist my call this morning. You tried but failed. And here you are. Now go do what you are told. Have fun. Go! Go! GO!" The world shimmered.
I found myself outside the house I had seen in the cloud. I was standing staring at it when a head popped out of an upper window.
"We arenâTMt moving. Go back to your devil woman and tell her that. Now fuck off you nasty piece of shit."
The next few minutes are still a blur in my head. I do remember the rise of a terrible rage, climbing the stairs to the top floor of the house, kicking the door open and then all is blank till I stood in the doorway of the house watching the the small family hurry away, carrying the body of the man who had sworn at me. I did not know if he was alive or dead, but I felt cleansed, free of rage. I smiled. I felt good and powerful. Suddenly the world shimmered around me and I found myself standing in my room. It was afternoon and I was covered in dirt and blood.
Six months later my darkness was starting to affect me again. I was looking for fights and then one night I had a a dream. Darkness and a voice chanting "Indigo. Indigo. Indigo"
I have paid I thought to myself the next morning but the darkness was there urging me to go and soon I was in the middle of the room chanting "Indigo." and once again I stood on the path.
I returned that evening, cleansed and more confident, more assertive. Each trip seemed to feed my ambitions, my ruthlessness my will to succeed. My life grew to meet my ambition.
Promotion, a beautiful wife, a big house in a very good neighbourhood, two children. Life was good and getting better.
That is how I find myself facing the creature.
"This one is really just for you. Lots of lovely ladies to abuse, dangerous men and beasts and a cherry on the top. A wizard. Or at least that is what he calls himself. No good useless charlatan. Mind you destroy him before he starts talking. Very seductive is our Crazy Craig. Off you go!"
And as usual I find myself in a part of this world I have never been before. I look around, see a path to one side so lacking any real direction, I follow it. It curves and turns, up a hill down the other. Through a muddy river where I nearly topple inelegantly into smelly slimy mud. My sense of humour was severely strained to begin with and it now getting epically close to breaking point. I push my way through a thorny bush and find myself in a clearing. No house, no keep, nothing. Except for a little wizened man sitting on a rock tending a kettle that steams languidly in the still air.
"Finally arrived did you? Bit of a round about route this time. No easy into the slaughter path. Georgie boy is getting sloppy. He never made that sort of mistake before. He did tell you about me I trust. I mean that would be very, very rude of him not too. After all we have been opponents for ever so long and I know he hates me and would like to see me gone so he can rampage through this peaceful countryside without and opposition. I am Craig by the way. Want some tea? You must be very cold and damp after that nasty river crossing you had. I had a lot of fun putting that all together for you when I knew you were coming. You do have a growing reputation around here. The Fearsome Sword bearer. The Defenestrator. I thought that one up you know. Literacy and vocabulary have always been my strong points. Sit, sit. Have a cup of tea. Ready brewed for you."
I draw my sword and walk towards him. He flickers and is gone. I find myself staring into a mirror. The mirror reflects a room I remember from my childhood, where I used to hide while my father beat my mother. Where he would come afterwards and either comfort me or beat me. I see the door open and involuntarily I cringe away from him. He raises his hand and I dive way from the blow. He catches me by the hair and holds me facing the mirror.
"Look" says a voice. "Look."
Now it is my sons room, my wife and son cower away from me. I raise the belt in my hand to strike, the blind fury taking me. The mirror shatters and I am left facing Craig, my hands shaking, my face unaccountably streaked with tears.
"You come here to stop your violence on your family. You visit it on strangers instead."
Again a mirror. Now a parade of people I have killed, maimed or just made homeless, each one turns and points at me. The mirror flickers and is gone.
"Only you can fix this. No one else. I am sending you back. George will think you have succeeded. Fix your soul and when you are healed I will know. Craig will call you again. Do not resist him, but when you stand before him say the words "Scarlet, Scarlet, Scarlet!" It will allow you to break his hold over you and you will be able to walk away."
"What about home? George? He will just recruit another."
"That is up to you." He flickers and is gone and I find myself back at home, mud stained and confused.
I shower and change and then go down stairs.
My wife is there looking apprehensive.
"I want you to go to your Mothers house for a while."
"Why?" Reasonable question.
"Please," I say. "Just do it."
"How long for."
"Until I say so."
She doesnâTMt argue, she gathers herself and our sons and they head out of the door.
I am a stubborn, goal driven man. When I decide to do something, I put all my heart and soul into the project. I tear into the images that Craig showed me. Some I had buried, others I had explained away. The worst were the ones I had just ignored. The horrors of my childhood and the horrors I had inflicted on my own family and others echoed in my head.
I weathered the pain and the remembrance. I weathered the guilt and self recrimination. I beat the hell out of the gym punch bag. I ran miles and talked to a shrink for hours. Slowly the tangled mess that was my mind started to unravel in the best possible way all though at first it felt like the worst possible way. For a while my work suffered. I would break into a new part of my psyche and the horror and anger and grief would overwhelm me and I would seek oblivion in whiskey, then rock up to work with a monster hangover. But it did get better. Slowly, very slowly until I knew I was winning and I went to visit my wife and children. I took my wife out for coffee. Told her about what I had been doing since I asked her to leave. Told her it was my fault and that I was fixing it. It was possibly the most difficult conversation I had ever had in my life. I asked for forgiveness and she said she would think about it.
It was almost 8 months before the next call came. I had begun to suspect that my anger was the trigger for the timing of the calls and the long period of no calls seemed to bear this theory out. What triggered it was possibly the news from my wife that she was divorcing me. I had hoped to rescue my marriage and repair the damage I had done, but that avenue was being denied me. I was angry, sad, guilty, in a raging turmoil when the call came. The call was weak and seemed not to have any coercive force. I considered ignoring it, but my memories of the wrongs I had done haunted me and I realised I needed to make some form of amends. The thought I might repair some of the damage I had caused there was the tipping point. I stepped into the middle of the room and reluctantly said the words.
"Indigo, Indigo. Indigo"
If anything I was more disorientated than I had ever been. The path seemed to be faded and to twist and turn beneath my feet. I staggered a number of times as I walked toward the rotting cottage where the guttering candle weakly flickered and danced in the darkness. I pushed the door open and walked into the room. The change in the room was confusing. It smelt of decay. It seemed almost ephemeral flickering in and out of existence disorienting me.
"So you tried to break free?" The wheezy voice echoed around me. "DidnâTMt work did it. I taste your rage, your anger, your hate. I give it chance to live and you like that."
"What do you want?"
"The usual. A few random killings, a bit of torture. I do need to know if you are still up to it. You have been away so long and you feel weakened."
"So, give me my weapons and my direction. Let me get about your business."
"That's my boy. Enthusiasm. Maybe a bit on the cool side, but still."
I felt the weight of my weapons about me, the power they gave me and now that I could feel it, the damage they did to my soul.
I looked around stepped back into the centre of the room before the creature could send me off.
"Crimson! Crimson! Crimson!" I screamed the last over the hows of rage from Craig. The creature came rushing toward me a violent whirlwind of hate and death and spite.
"Go! GO! GOOOOO!" it screamed but its screams bounced off the shield that the incantation had built around me.
The creature slammed into an invisible wall two paces away from me and it bounced back. Before it could recover I had drawn my sword and had the point poised at its throat, but for all my anger, my fury, my frustration, I could not kill the creature. It tried to crawl away from me, but I stomped on its foot.
"Stay! And hear me. You ugly misbegotten being. Your time is over."
I didn't know where the words were coming from but they came. Then the language changed to something else, a singsong chant comprised of words I did not understand. The creature screamed and writhed and slowly collapsed onto the ground.
"George."
I jumped as Craigs voice echoed around the room.
"George. Your time is up and it is one of your puppets who brought you down. As you knew it had to be. No one else could touch you. Your power comes from the death of a puppet doesnâTMt it George. You were going to kill him and snack on his life force, but I got to him first. And you know what? He has destroyed you even more thoroughly by not being able to kill you. His compassion will destroy you. Say goodbye now and donâTMt forget to say thank you.."
To my utter surprise, the creature squirming under my foot, my sword at its throat look at me and said thank you. The wizened old wizard smiled briefly and then looked at me directly.
"Go now. Your debt is repaid in full."
Before I could argue I found myself back in my bedroom less than an hour since I had uttered the fateful words for the last time.
It is now three months since that last encounter in the other place. My life is completely changed. I gave the house to my now ex wife. I deeded all my investments over to her, bought a battered 4x4 and headed out into the country not knowing where I was going or how I would support myself. One day I may return, but maybe not.
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