Shards of darkness (watty awards 2012)

The darkness between the stars

Though the sun had long since dipped below the horizon, the air inside the grand tent was fuggy with the heat of many hosts.  It was summer. So, the heat was hardly a surprise but it was uncomfortable all the same. Athough Kaa possessed the senses of any who lived, the heat and humidity did not bother him the same way it did to the humans and beasts around. No. He could simply block out all discomforts of the land and feel as if he was deep in winter’s heart if he so wished. But he did not. For to do so would create a barrier of ignorance to all dangers. If he gave in to the bliss of mental security, he would become locked in the fictional world of lies. If he died, he wouldn’t notice, he would just become all the more enveloped in the blanket of a white mist from where he would be lost to obscurity. It didn’t do to dwell on such thoughts of the past that could all too easily get tangled in with the present. Last time that occurred, 5 years came to pass before his self war had subsided. He had given in to himself. Mental suicide. After…

No. Too long had past for him to care to remember those dark days. Of course, to those around him, those years where only a few heart beats for he had blocked the world in a sense of scale less time in which to dwell. Long enough for them to notice, too short for it to have made a difference in their tiny little lives. In those years he had, however slowly, come to terms with the consequences of his departure from the physical land of the living. All would be lost. He had killed many, there was no denying that, and if he remained on this planet many would follow. But if he gave in, more would perish. Innocents. So, he made himself a bargain. When all in the world was good and not a thought of evil resigned within the minds of those on Vansannon, he would give himself up and his life would end. So, he tried to come to terms with what he really was. He did not know. A man, he guessed he had been long ago, but he had many forms and a man was no more likely his origin than any other. He was not, even now, sure what gender he truly was. It was him who had created his identity for he felt secure, as with out it, he worried he would forget his ties to this world, forget that he was earth bound, and drift up to where even the birds don’t dream.

It was his imagined family that had caused him to go in to a mental comer that fateful day. They had died. Or rather they had ceased to exist for they had never truly existed. Yet he remembered. Back, back to his supposed youth. He had a different name then but that too was muddled. Thiorah he thought. It didn’t matter, that time was past. But still he remembered…

Scattered memories... His mother, Gwendolyn, stroking his wild black hair, whispering in his ear that she loved him. He remembered clearly his father drunken rages, but he couldn’t even remember his name. So, like all his other fragmented thoughts, what he did not know, he invented. Fictions merged with memories, their edges blurred ‘till he could no longer tell them apart. He remembered loving his mother dearly and could even recall her tuneful voice, singing to him softly as she rocked him in his cot. He thought of his hatred to his father. Even the Horror could never fuel him so as did his own kin. That man was a coward, a slave to the drink. Even though centuries had past since that dark time, every blink of an eye brought back shadows of hate.

An animal. That is all he is. Father. Not even deserving of a race, a name, a breed. Violent, savage, twisted with mead. That was the path all their money travelled down and when the gold wore thin and the streams of booze ran dry, the beatings began. Not to his worst enemy would he beguile those beatings. Never on himself did the metal brand, yet it was not through love that he was spared the pain. No. An unknown force stayed every attempted blow. He would have bared the pain and be grateful one thousand times, as all his fathers pent up fury was unleashed on his mother. And through it all, she never once cried out, begged, she would not give him the satisfaction. Instead, she meekly stood and was beaten and lay when she fell. After such an attack, she would have to remain in her room for days for fear that some kindly soul would inquire into her savage injuries. Or at least that was what his father feared. In truth, there would be no one who would help her. No one would go near her for fear that her ailments could be caught like the plague. If she did venture out of the confines of the house, They would shame her. Seeing her wounds, the first thoughts that entered the minds of all that were to behold her state was, what was her crime that was so terrible she could be this broken? Whispers would spread. She was a prostitute. She had birthed out of wedlock with another man. She was a witch. All lies. All believed by the simple minds of the occupants of the small coastal village in which they lived their sorry existence. Dwelling in houses however clean stank of filthy evil. They should have been burnt down long long ago. Thiorah felt nought but contempt for such people. He longed to watch the plunge of an elegant rapier prick open their rotten hides. Slicing open their fragile bodies and watching the gushing blood cleansing the streets of their lives, leaving their twitching cadavers empty of all of their former owners hate. You couldn’t hate a corpse. He longed not to hate, but that night he was devoid of any other emotion. The night he killed his ghosts.