His Experiment

Chapter 8

The smell was not exactly hard to identify, but the location was. He picked up on the scent of burning plastic immediately, mixed with gasoline. It did not stand out in a place like this; it was a smell that told people they were in the wrong place, made their nose crinkle in an attempt to block it out. Zachariah did not have that luxury. He was here for that smell and he had become accustomed to it; it, and all the other scents that surrounded it. Most were unpleasant, strong aromas that could almost choke you. Many were strong enough to taste.

Zachariah knew the taste of burnt plastic. He also knew the taste of ginger and garlic boiled with blood, in addition to the sickly-sweet flavor of bone marrow mixed with tree sap. He had never once actually ingested any of these items, but he certainly knew the taste.

He circled above the camp again, letting the smells direct him. He could pick up on the burnt plastic and followed that, hovering over the left leg of the ground division. Thousands of little fires lit up the ground beneath him as he searched for the right one. The flickered in the night; he watched a cloaked individual walk through a set of flames, sprinkling pepper as they did so. Eyes swinging from camp to camp, he finally zeroed in on the flame burning plastic. Unlike most fires, only one individual sat perched before this one; as Zachariah flew closer, he could see this man running his hands through the flame, as if he was swatting flies.

He landed silently behind the man, ten feet away, as agreed. Silent or not, however, the man straightened his back. "I didn't foresee you coming again so soon." His voice was soft and quiet, carried on by some unforeseen force that had always unnerved Zachariah; it was unnatural.

"Things change quickly," Zachariah replied, circling around his ten-foot barrier to stand opposite the man, across the fire. Tzorak did not raise his eyes from the flames, still gently caressing them. He knew why Zachariah had returned, and it was not because anything had changed at all. His fate had only just started.

"Your past lie is coming to an end," Tzorak rasped. Zachariah watched silently, hiding his confusion; he had stopped asking for explanations years ago. The man did not raise his eyes still as he continued, "Your plan to kill me will have little success."

"I've killed warlocks stronger than you. You will be no challenge." Zachariah growled out. Tzorak stopped his gentle stroking of the fire and instead held his right hand into the flame, palm buried in the fire.

"I have no doubt in your abilities to kill me. I do, however, doubt your friend. Kai will be just as successful gaining your answer from my dead body as you have been from my living being." Zachariah tried to breathe through his anger, but all that he found was the burning plastic smell, and that enraged him more.

"I just need a name," he seethed, the light of the fire highlighting the sharp panels on his face. He was a terror to look upon and his voice demanded obedience, yet Tzorak still did not move his attention from the flames.

"I need to understand your intentions." Zachariah was sent back to a previous memory, one ten years old, when he stood in the same spot having much the same conversation.

"I'm not going to kill them," he had raged, trying to force the old man to see.

"I know you will cause them no harm; you need them. What I need to know," Tzorak paused as he finally looked up from the flame, deep violet eyes holding Zachariah in place as nothing ever had. "is what you'll do with the information they have." Zachariah stared at the face, or skeleton, of the man he had been arguing with for fifty years. There was little man left; his hands that he held over the fire we're strong and brown, but no flesh remained on Tzoraks' face. Violet eyes pulsed from the sockets, and Zachariah had his first encounter with the rotting face of a man he had once killed.