Darkness was such a comforting experience. It neither assaults the senses with an overwhelming intensity, nor did reveal any unpleasantness one may happen upon in the world. There was no time in darkness. No worries in darkness. No exhaustion in darkness. Only ever a relaxing numbness in darkness.
It could have been cold, yet it was difficult to tell when that all there was to feel. There was also no one else to bother you in the calm void, their existence unproven with no way of sensing them. If there is no one except yourself, could you truly ever be alone?
Apple certainly was not.
He had his memories and the people that dwelled within them. A scene of himself as a child dining on a handful of fresh rosehips, whilst sheltered under a sunlit tree flashed by in his mind. The time his father discovered he was dwimmer-blessed and the proud face he displayed at the news. His brief apprenticeship at the Crystal Castle and meeting the renown Duke that ruled the structure. His first love, an accomplished prostitute who took his first time in his adolescence. Sadly, not all of the memories that filed by were pleasant - however.
His elder brothers beating him under his favourite tree. His father discovering that Apple’s younger sister was also dwimmer-blessed and possessed a talent for it that eclipsed his own. The heckling from his masters and fellow apprentices at that quartz palace. The realisation that the prostitute who took his virginity was only kind and sweet to him was because he simply paid her to be.
It would seem that in life it was impossible to have the good without the bad and vice versa. All Apple could do was either embrace the bad and use its experiences to help him grow, or hide it deep away from his senese, less he ever thinks about it again.
**********
“Apple, apple! Wake up!”
Apple flickered his eyelids slowly. His consciousness lagged as it attempted to return to the physical world and with it, the great pains his body had endured. Cuts and bruises infected and inhabited his flesh. A deep gauge in his side from a spear stung as the humid air touched it. A bulbous lump of puncture marks plagued his shoulder. A scattering of arrows was nestled inside the meat of his back. A slick hand of dried blood and decapitated finger. Nausea from blood loss and a rapidly growing fever from the ill humours that crept through his open wounds.
“Apple! Can you hear Mula?” A frightened sounding voice from beside asked.
Apple licked his cracked lips with his dry tongue and forcefully coughed the last dregs of his saliva from his throat into his mouth. “Water...” He managed to croak.
A moment later he felt a warm liquid trickle down his gullet, invigorating him ever so slightly.
Once the waterfall stopped and his mouth had become moister, he was able to regain himself. “Hey, Mula.” He gasped. “Any goblins shown up since I took a nap?”
Apple was unsure what kind of expression the girl was making. He tried to turn his head and look at her but it simply hurt just too much to do so. “No,” she whispered. “No gobbies since we kill the ones in this room.” She replied. Her false bravery evident in the hiccups that slipped through her words.
Apple sighed with relief. He was certain more goblins would have shown up at some point but he was at least glad Mula did not have face any of them on her own. Well, as of right now she still would have to, for Apple was nothing but a breathing corpse at this moment. “You’ve done well, Mula.” He praised her. “You’ve done so much for me, but sadly I still need your help.”
Apple heard her gulp. “Kay. What you need?”
“I need you to grab one of the torches from the wall.” He requested of her. Then followed by the all too familiar “Kay,” and the sound of footsteps dissipating in the distance.
Growing footsteps now, accompanied by the warmth and light of fire, indicated her return.
“Good job, Mula. Now, what I’m about to ask of you isn’t going to be easy.”
“Kay, what Mula do to help?”
“I need you cut my coat into pieces so my wounds are visible, don’t worry the coats useless now anyway. Then I need you to place that torch on all the big wounds.”
“But wouldn’t that hurt?” She squeaked.
“Oh, it’s going to be the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced. But it beats bleeding to death.” He told her with complete honesty.
“Mula don’t want to hurt Apple.” She stuttered.
“Don’t think about it as hurting me. You’re saving me. You’ll be my hero.”
“What’s a hero?”
An unexpected question, Apple mused. “Erm, a hero is someone who does good things and helps people. Everyone loves a hero, myself included.”
There was a long pause, followed by the eventual sound of cutting. He began to feel the warm air as it touched his bare skin, oh how it stung. Now that his torso was completely bare, he waited.
“Mula, what are waiting for? Hurry up.”
“But, but – “
“No buts.” He ordered. “I know what I’m asking is hard, definitely something a child shouldn’t have to do, but you signed up for this. I need you Mula. Please be my hero and save me.” He begged
“O-kay. Mula will be your hero.” She nodded.
Apple smiled, he was proud of her. “Wait!” He suddenly cried.
“What?” She yelped.
“Put one of those strips of leather you cut of in my gob, preferably a less bloody one.”
“Kay.” Apple felt an invisible forced jam a piece of leather in his mouth. Now all that was left to do was wait.
After what felt like a lifetime, he was finally kissed by the flame.
Mula hovered the torch over the wound in Apple’s side as close as possible without touching kissing it with the wood of the torch. Immediately he screamed. It was agony. Simple primal agony, the time he was forced to place his hands near a fire to melt the copper of his catalyst could not even compare to what he experienced now.
His veins bulged and his body spasmed wildly, his only positive emotion was the joy he felt in remembering to ask Mula to put leather in his mouth, if she had not, he would have bit through his tongue long ago. Although, even with the leather to aid him, he could stil feel his teeth grind together through the tough material.
Apple eventually no longer felt the fire upon his skin and almost wept with relief, until he remembered it was far from over.
Over and over the flames cauterised his exposed flesh, causing him to sweat profusely and pass out from shock over and over again during the whole inopportune medical procedure. On several occasions he had to frantically rearrange the leather in his mouth with tongue, due to biting clean through it three times.
His shoulder, his thigh, the stump here his finger once wiggled, and several places on his torso had once again become sealed thanks to the power of fire. Albeit instead of pleasing skin, form of ugly charred scabs that beckoned infection now laid across his body. Apple was not too worried about the foul humours that would soon assault him though, his dwimmer-fuelled body would destroy most of the humours without him having to do anything. At this moment in time Apple had a much more worrisome concern. The five arrows lodged in his back still remained. He feared this moment the most, for how could a child pull out the missiles and not damage his insides in the process. Apple hoped greatly that the arrows did not possess a stone or metal head and instead just a sleek piece of sharpened twig.
Apple could feel the intensity of Mula’s thoughts as her gaze bore down on his back. They had no tools nor experience to aid them. Just yank and burn; yank and burn.
“Don’t keep me waiting, Mula. We both know what you must do to me. Better now than later.” He told her calmly, as he rested sideways upon the floor. The warmth of his scorched wounds almost relaxing, like a warm summer day.
“I can’t.” She objected.
“Please Mula, please. You’ve already healed most of my wounds, just a few more to go.”
“But-but, what if Mula pulls one out wrong and it gets stuck?” She tried to reason.
“Well that’s a risk I’m willing to take. More of those ugly bastards will be here soon. I won’t be able to fight them with these arrows paralysing the muscles in my back.”
Then there was silence. Not a single sound did Apple hear, except for his own laboured breaths. It appeared that Mula lacked a rebuttal, yet was still unwilling to free the arrows from inside him. Apple was loathed to nag a child until they agreed to cause him immense pain and risk his life. However, Apple had always been a little on the selfish side.
“Mula...” He said ever so softly. “Remember, Mula, I’m magic. Us magicians are a bit tougher than the average man, we also heal faster. The only reason I’m still alive right now is because of my magic, and the very same magic that flows through my body will keep me alive while you pull the arrows from my back.”
“Really?” She whispered, her child mind feeding upon the wonderous concept of magic – clinging to it hopefully.
“Yes, really. So please, Mula. Do it; I beg you.”
He felt the flesh of his back contort backwards. The dried blood that coated the wooden shaft became moist again from the spasms of the moving arrow. Apple felt Mula spin, shimmy, and tug at the arrow until it eventually came out with a pop. He felt nothing drag his flesh along with it as it was pulled out of him, foretelling that it was mostly likely just wood in its entirety. Next came the fire, an all too familiar warmth that Apple refused to acknowledge was touching him. He could not allow himself to succumb to the pain and cry out, for Mula’s sake.
“Great job, Mula. Just four more to go.” He wheezed through gritted bloody teeth.
The second removal was very much like the last, torture that threatened to silence his consciousness, yet thankfully was still just sharpened wood. With despair evident in Mula’s actions, the third arrow was armed with a head of a different material.
It could have been rock or metal that protruded from the stick, not that Apple pondered what it was too much. The sensation of it leaving his body and dragging a chunk of himself along with it distracted his thoughts quite well. This time, he was unable to hold in his anguish. A sudden roar, quickly followed by a forced cough to attempt to bury his screams came after.
“Are you okay?” He barely heard Mula ask.
Apple gathered himself as fast as possible. “Me?” He mimicked causally. “I’m fine... Just, just carry on...”
The sting of fire was his answer. Only two more to go.
Fate must have landed a drop of pity upon Apple as the fourth arrow was just wood. The drop must have evaporated just before Mula yanked free the fifth.
Again, scraps of his valuable flesh, blood and muscle were scooped out of him as if the goblin had shot him with a particularly jagged arrow-tip. It was the last one and Apple was too tired to fight his primal urges, so he screamed a horse scream. A thunderous cry that bulged the veins in his neck and aged his throat by several years in an instant. Not even the chewed leather in his mouth was able to muffle the magnitude of his trauma.
When the final touch of fire left the hole in his back, Apple’s body collapsed. Not a single bit of tension lurked within his frame anymore. If one stood far enough away, unable to see the details of Apple’s body, they would probably think he looked quite peaceful.
“Apple! Apple! Apple!” He heard Mula cry in his ear.
He failed to stir. All desire had left him and now he wished nothing more than to remain completely still – forever. Although, much to his annoyance, he could not do that right now, no matter how much he wanted to. The brave little girl beside him needed a least one more slice of praise for her efforts before he rested.
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“I’m alive Mula.” He mumbled. His words barely audible as his lips were pressed against the damp ground. “Ya did great... Gonna rest now. Wake me when goblins show up. ..”
***********
What Apple told Mula was a lie in a sense, he was not asleep, although he was at least as rested as a person could be before they were truly titled as unconscious.
Using the tiny trickle of consciousness left in the physical world, he willed the last of his dwimmer within him to heal himself. He knew no spells nor held vast knowledge about the human body to assist him, nevertheless it was better than nothing.
He induced a fever upon himself, burning his dwimmer fiercely so it burned the ill humours that have crept inside him. He also used the warmth to relax his muscles; aiding in their recovery. A whisper of water was sent to his blood and told to procreate. His last reverses of the raw mystical energy he was blessed with was spread throughout his body and ordered to cure him in any way possible. A crude method to say the least, yet it was the best he could do. The major downside of what Apple was doing, however, was that he burned more dwimmer than he could produce, meaning that he would only have a smere plash left when the goblins would arrive.
***********
It was not the cries of Mula that eventually stirred Apple, it was merely himself. Just as how one would awake from their slumber for a reason unknown at time, Apple too awoke from neither the aid of the outside world, nor from the completion of his rest.
Apple spat dry phlegm from his mouth and pressed his palms upon the ground to rise himself. His body still ached horribly and he shook while he stood, yet stand he still did. Something that only very recently was impossible for the magician.
It was dark in the room. The torches that were scattered around it had all been snuffed out by time. His body trembled from the cold, as his upper body was now completely exposed to the elements.
“Mula? Where are you, Mula?” He cried out into the darkness, while he also searched for his catalyst.
No response. Apple began to worry and looked for his staff with a growing desperation. It did not take long to find it luckily, for it was right next to where he had rested, just hidden behind the veil of blackness and groggy eyes.
As soon as his hand clasped the familiar wooden shaft, he invoked a light spell.
Once everything was visible again through an orange tint, he searched for Mula.
It only took a second to recognise her silhouette sat about twenty feet in front of him, facing away. Apple forgot the existence of caution and limped with haste towards her. He almost tripped over the corpse of a goblin as he approached.
He paused for a moment and noticed that four goblin bodies surrounded the unmoving girl. Apple scanned the room and saw all the goblins he had fought earlier; these remains were new to Apple.
He darted towards her with increased panic, the threat of reopening his injuries did not even tickle his mind.
She was breathing. Her hunched frame rocked back and forth softly while she slept sat up. Placed upon her lap was the short sword of the former goblin leader, drenched in thick brown ichor.
Apple inspected her gently, not wishing to disturb her. Apart from the occasional scratch and being covered in goblin blood, she seemed fine. Apple was impressed. He had acquired a deadly little thing on his journey, she would most certainly make a fine warrior when she had all grown up. Apple thought that he should increase his physical training, or she would quickly surpass him in only a few years, perhaps even less.
He would not just get stronger for his own pride though. Shame clung to him the more and more whilst he gazed at the sleeping child. He had relied far too much on her. Apple was most likely twice her age and he had been treating her like a fellow companion. She was supposed to be his shadow, his helper, not his equal. He had no doubt in his mind that she would become far stronger than him in the future, but right now she was not. She needed some pampering while she was still young, he doubted she had been given any her entire life and he did not want that trend to continue. Apple decided that after this, they would be going on a much more “child friendly” adventure.
For now, however, he still had a mission to do. They needed to hunt down the remaining goblins and look for any hostages and hopefully acquire some loot along the way.
He nudged her awake. “Hey there, sleepy-head.” He smiled.
Apple saw a flash of primal instinct on Mula’s face, quickly followed by recognition, “Apple!” She beamed. “You’re alive.” She leapt to her feet and hugged him tightly, startling him. He eventually wrapped his arms awkwardly around her as well, ignoring the pain it brought. He unused to displays of affection and was extra careful not to whack her with his heavy catalyst by accident.
“All thanks to you, kid.” He replied, composing himself.
“Sorry for not waking you. Only four gobbies showed up. Mula knew she could take them on own.” She apologised with a boast.
“I know, Mula, I know. We’ll talk later...” Apple looked towards the exit. “I’m bloody sick of this cave. Let’s just finish our job here and head back to that hairy fellow’s house - whose name suddenly escapes me.” He groaned.
“Kay.” She nodded.
The two released their embrace, Apple stretched his damaged body while Mula picked up her new bronze sword. Apple kept his mouth shut, he actually had planned to claim that sword for himself, but could not bear to ask Mula to part with it. He hoped he would find something just as good as they scoured the rest of the cave.
**********
The pair retraced their steps and ventured into every single tunnel they came across. So far, they had come across nothing but dead ends and the occasional few goblins. They never saw more than five at once, even while tired and greatly injured, the creatures were easily slaughtered. The mayhem the pair had caused must have dispersed the remainder of the cowardly creatures into every nook and cranny of their home.
Apple was mostly upset that he had failed to find any item more advanced than a stone axe and even those were quite rare. He was sure one of his father’s men had mentioned that goblins liked to steal things, perhaps they kept it all in one designated treasure room. Although, the more Apple thought about it, the more he realised that since the only people the goblins stole from were lowly surfs, they mostly likely did not possess anything worthwhile. The two had also yet come across another human being, if there were any prisoners, they were probably kept in the same room or nearby for they too were a type of treasure.
After several more fruitless tunnels, they finally happened upon another open area. While of very similar design to the leader’s lair, it was much smaller and lacking decorative fire of his domain. It was so small in fact that Apple could see the other side from the entrance, and the shape of another cavern along hiding along its body.
As they marched through that opening, the smell that already hounded them worsened.
Apple had grown fairly accustomed to the foul scents that dwelled within this cave. He believed he probably most likely did not smell much better either. Yet, the scents that wafted their way towards him made him feel like he had entered this place for the first time all over again.
The all too familiar smell of excrement, urine, muck, and aged entrails desecrated his nose and clogged his throat. Smells he could not even identify choked his eyelids and burned the flesh of his irises. The aromas grew stronger and stronger as he pressed forward.
Then Apple saw the source of the smells.
In that very same instant, he took hold of Mula and threw her back into the tunnel from whence they came.
“Don’t come in here!” He roared at her, while she laid breathless upon the ground in shock. “Don’t you dare come in here, or I’ll abandon you, forever!” He spat, completely uncaring of her feelings at this very moment.
Apple turned back towards the room of smells and prayed Mula would obey him, even if it meant hating him forever.
He found his goblins, he found his desired treasure, and he found his hostages.
He could not believe how foolish he was. The signs were all there. The warnings from that woman about Mula joining him in goblin slaying. The lack of girls around the hamlet. The very nature of all living creatures, so well-known to everyone, yet Apple had ignored them all for he had yet to truly mature.
The circle may have forced him to grow in many ways, it had also forced him hide from the desires of the living. He had spent over a year hiding from life itself and had got pretty good at it too. Alas solitude leads only to imagination. Wondrous dreams of epic adventures, vast treasure, beautiful damsels in distress, and most importantly hope. Splendid fantasies to rival any children’s book. Sweet, sweet delusions that filled the unknown gaps of reality.
All this time the only thing Apple had truly taken seriously was the Circle. Wild animals, bandits, even hordes of goblins, all fantastic chapters in his story.
Not too long ago he was sprawled on a cave floor bleeding to death, yet even then Apple was never truly worried. What a moving part in a novel it would make. He even thought about the manly scars he would acquire from it.
This was the first time Apple truly saw the world. Something no teeth, spears, arrows, or even powerful magics had managed to accomplish. Right now, absolutely nothing was trying to harm him, they were far too occupied to do so. He never felt so hopelessly ignored.
Women. All around the room were women. Young women, old women. Small women, large women.
For every two women there was one goblin present in the room. All either laid atop a woman, or glued ecstatically behind them.
Naked defiled bodies laid limp across the cold ground, whilst foul creatures barely taller than infants thrashed around inside them gleefully. Only the occasional gasp indicted life in the goblin’s treasure.
For the first time in Apple’s magical life, fire was first and only choice of battle. He lacked skill and affinity to use the elements affectively, yet right now his mind even once considered an alternative. It was the manifestation of destruction itself and that was what Apple desperately desired in this moment.
He charged and took hold of the skull of a goblin, a vile creature that hand not even noticed his presence as it lost itself in ecstasy. Embers dribbled from Apples fingers and feasted upon the goblin’s bulbous cranium. Its horse screams fuelled Apple’s rage as he crushed its calcium shield in his grip and boiled its pathetic excuse for a brain. Only when its skull completely became a puddle and its brain was sliced into pieces by Apple’s grip, its ooze dripping through the gaps in between his fingers, did Apple finally let go.
Not even bothering to wipe any of the gunk of his scarred hand, he pounced upon another of the monsters, howling all the while.
Apple roared so loud his own ears shook from the pitch; He did not care. He needed them to hear him; to see him; to smell him; to notice him as their greatest enemy. It was vital to Apple that they attacked him immediately, he could not allow even one more second of their defilement to occur – he refused to.
He screeched in satisfaction as the monsters finally came at him.
Lacking a weapon, one leapt at Apple with gaping maw and readied claws. Apple jammed his arm willingly inside its revolting mouth and cooked its insides. He yanked his arm free without grace, dragging as much of the creature's insides along with it.
Another came at him and he simply caved in its skull with his staff. Unsatisfied with that kill, Apple grabbed another of the fiends by its gluttonous maw, lifting it off the ground to eye level, welding its own lips shut with the red aura of his palm. His free hand he took hold of its delicate wrist and forced it to tear open its throat with the pointed nails it had threatened him with. Still not feeling slightly satisfied, he threw the creature carelessly to the ground and searched for more prey. Most were crowding around him now, weary of his might, yipping pitifully at him. He took no notice of them, however, for at the back of the room were two goblins still partaking in their prisoner’s flesh; Apple blacked out.
**********
When he awoke once more, he found himself standing in the centre of the treasure room. His body stiff from the weight of the blood and innards that clung to it. In his left hand was his beloved staff, in his right was a goblin’s arm he did not remember claiming.
All around the room were the beaten and smoky remains of goblins, almost none of them still possessed all of their limbs, some even lacking a head.
This was not the first time Apple had lost himself to rage, yet it the first time he failed to feel a single shred of remorse. Every single fibre of his being told him these creatures had to cease existing, his actions made as much as sense to his being as eating and sleeping.
Now that the goblins were all dead, next came the hardest part, tending to the women.
“Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead...” He mumbled with a monotonous tone. “Alive!” Apple finally breathed
Apple would take it no more and wept waterless tears. Never in his life had he seen such horror. Such one-sided vileness. Only one woman still drew breath and just barely at that. Some looked as if they had perished weeks ago, bloated skin, contorted veins, and black lips. The goblins did not even try to rid their prizes of grubs that feasted upon them. Two of them looked as young as Mula. Apple heaved over and over again but there was no food to be found in his stomach.
Apple slumped down beside the only alive prisoner and washed her body with warm water with his last few drops of dwimmer. He would not allow anyone in the hamlet to see what covered her.
Apple tried to find something to warm her with but came up empty. With complete silence, he picked up her limp body and placed her frail body over his good shoulder.
He wanted to burn the rest of the bodies, to allow them even the slightest respect of passing, yet he no longer possessed even a single slither of dwimmer left within him. With no other options, he finally left the room, never giving the goblin’s meagre treasure a second glace. His desire to leave trumped everything else.
Back in the tunnel he found Mula waiting for him. He could not bring himself to meet her gaze after what he did to her. “Let’s go. I’ve found the prisoner,” was all he could bring himself to say.
Apple could feel Mula stare at the girl on his slung across his shoulder intensely. After a few seconds of nothingness, she simply nodded and walked ahead of him.
The two marched back through the cave in complete silence. The frail body on his shoulder growing heavier and heavier by the second. Luckily, they never saw a single living goblin on their way out.
It was night when they finally left the goblin cave. They had been in that accused lair for quite a while it would seem.
Mula immediately noticed the lanky hunter: Nick, propped beside the cave entrance. Sprinkled around him were over a dozen lifeless goblin corpses.
Apple did not need to inspect the Nick’s body to know he was dead, the blood, stiffness, and several tree branches protruding from his front told him enough.
“That explains why we never saw him again... What a shame, he seemed like a good man.” Apple sighed.
Mula grunted in supposed agreement and crouched down next to the man. Apple saw her pick up a large blade from at his feet. When she returned to his side, he recognised the foot-long razor metal as a scramasax, a single bladed iron dagger that he himself used to own, until he lost it in the side of a stampeding boar a while back. Apple thought about asking for the short sword now that she had something more suited to her but decided it was not a good time.
Resisting the temptation to loot the man himself, Apple ignored the wobbling of his legs and foggy breaths, and headed back towards the hamlet.
He gazed longingly at the night sky, trying to distract himself from the fresh memories of the day’s events. Yet he could not, for the full moon’s beauty frustrated him. People of magic ability and liquid affinity typically loved the complete exposer of the moon. Its majestic curvature and silver glow. He was no normally exception either, but not tonight. Tonight, he wanted nothing shining down on him – he wanted nothing at all.