I’m not entirely sure if I passed out, but when my eyes open, I’m standing in utter darkness surrounded by what I assume are the screams of lost souls. I reach out into the abyss and my being is greeted by nothingness. A part of me welcomes this abyss with familiarity, as within this void is the odd memory of my death as a human and rebirth as a celandil.
In this recognition I forgo my physical instincts and begin to move as a spirit in the void and eventually find a glowing visage in the darkness. This visage is far off and looks like a star in the sky and as I approach the star grows and grows until it becomes like a miniature sun to my spectral eyes. In closing a distance that is immense but at the same time so very small. A distance that feels like climbing a mountain but if that mountain was crossing a hall into a kitchen on an empty stomach, I find that the solar visage is that of a glowing woman.
“Who are you?” asks the glowing woman acknowledging my presence with a stare that punctures my being.
“Who are you?” I ask in response to her question not trusting the situation that I find myself in, and most of all not trusting her after seeing and experiencing the horrible place that Argentum had introduced me to.
“My name is Aurhea, and for you to not know me means that you are not totalion,” says the glowing woman unfurling two angelic wings made of pure light, “and seeing that you can cast your dream inside the Soul Reservoir means that you cannot be entirely human, nor celandil.”
“I’m not sure what you mean by dream as I only know of souls and essence,” I respond doing what I can to minimize revealing more about myself as I still distrust this yowling void, especially if it has some connection to that gruesomely sanguineous torture chamber of trapped souls and empty vessels.
The starry visage smiles at my clear ignorance of what she just said and beckons to me to follow her. Seeing that I had no real sense of direction or place in this chasm, I’m all but obligated to surrender to her lead. I float alongside Aurhea until we reach her desired destination. I stand staring into the void, and I find myself surprised to see thousands of stars equally spaced in what could be an abyssal sky. I’m overwhelmed by a strange sensation of floating on an immense lake during a new moon surrounded by stars above, below, and around me as I take in my surroundings.
“You can see them?” gasps Aurhea studying me as she gracefully floats around me. Her words confirm my suspicion that the stars in this eternal sky are the souls of the totalion that I saw trapped in those ruby eggs upon the walls of that sanguinous hell.
“I believe I hear them,” I say still hearing the ever-reverberating echoes of the horrid howling of thousands of suffering souls.
I see Aurhea sneer as she says, “You’ll learn to ignore them, as they will all eventually find the peace of oblivion. Those that continue to scream are the stragglers that should have given up years ago. Alas all these souls willingly chose this as they each sought to serve as the building blocks of the heaven of my utopia.”
“I don’t think anyone would willing choose the torment that I heard and felt,” I say remembering the voices crying out their writhing pains that made my skin crawl with their palpable fear and desperation.
“They chose to build the better world that I promised them, but they also demonstrated themselves unworthy of inheriting said world. The faster they silence their cries the faster they can find peace. If they choose to prolong their suffering, they damn themselves to their own condemnation,” responds Aurhea as she appears to recline into an invisible throne in this miniature cosmos, we find ourselves floating in.
I stare at this goddess that appears to be growing to intimidate and dwarf me in this universe of souls, but my will isn’t daunted by this display as I ask, “I assume you are a totalion like the rest of the souls in this…”
“Soul Reservoir is the word you are searching for,” interrupts Aurhea who summons several souls from the sky to form a constellation of a hand fan that she freshens herself with.
“Soul Reservoir,” I repeat feeling a shiver going up my consciousness, “that means what I see now, what I saw contained in those bloody containers, all those empty husks of bodies strapped to the walls…”
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” states Aurhea as she continues to fan herself with what I assume, and hope are some of the few completely silent and inert souls of her people. Aurhea growing bored of her fan flicks it out of her hand and sends several souls careening out into the distance, and all I can do is watch and hope to hear some iota of voice in them to confirm that they hadn’t died a spiritual death.
Remembering the crucified totalion stuck to metal and rock by various tubes and the blood and soul filled containers, I feel myself grow weak. I can’t believe she corrupted such a pure word such as beauty, as I’d never use that word to describe what I’ve borne witness to. I wish I could vacate my currently non-existent stomach, but I can’t even wretch as I lack the physical components to do so. If that is what Aurhea calls beautiful, I hope to never know what heaven is for her.
Aurhea chuckles at my discomfort and says, “The Soul Reservoir is a tad grotesque in its design and visible qualities, but its purpose is beautiful.”
“What purpose would make anything like that infernal place beautiful, or even morally justified to be created?” I ask my spiritual lip curling into a sneer.
“I’m transforming refuse into diamonds. I’m taking human derived bodies and transforming them into something glorious, like we are glorious. Humans are so limited, slaves to the world and environment, whereas Celandil are gods that can force reality to heel with a word. The bodies of the reservoir are atoning with their denied divinity, having the barriers of flesh and essence eroded away to allow for the transforming bodies to accept celandilic souls and become gods like we are gods,” explains Aurhea summoning a new constellation of souls that looks like a fancy glass that is filled with so many souls that they blend into a glowing liquid that Aurhea sips without a care for what she is consuming.
Watching Aurhea literally imbibe the broken and now forever quite souls of her people, has me doubt that the souls of her people will be the souls that’ll be returned to the bodies that are being prepared to become celandilic in state. What souls is she going to implant in those empty bodies? This question has me blurt out the question, “Aren’t you going to return the souls of your people back to their bodies after they are made celandilic?”
Aurhea smiles again and with a final sip of her drink she casts the glass aside and it shatters into stars that dash into the abyss like several comets painting a night sky. Aurhea claps her hands, and she separates into several Aurheas that surround me in a sphere. Her voice comes at me from all directions as the thousands of Aurhea clones respond in unholy unison, “My people? I once toyed with the idea to prepare the totalion who willfully submitted their souls and bodies to the reservoir for reimplantation, but would you trust the greedy hearts of children with the power of a god? No! A child with godly power would merely squander their gifts and destroy! I’ve entertained and listened to the dreams of these totalion for a thousand years, and their dreams for my gifts will only enrich the disparity that breeds misery, despite my aspirations to destroy that disparity inherent in the world and in those that I will call my children. These people’s desires only confirmed and enriched my fears; thus, granting them the wonderous privilege as materials for paradise.”
“It sounds like you won’t even give them a chance to prove you wrong,” I say my voice filled with my incredulousness as I’m trying to force myself to understand Aurhea’s point of view.
All the Aurheas recline in the void upon invisible thrones and with a smirk they all respond, “disparity is the root of all evil. If newly formed gods are disparate then evil will proceed into my perfected world. Even amongst the souls of the ancient celandil there were vast differences, and in those differences, they found strife. Ancient celandil with power spiritual and political threw their competitors into a manipulated and faux war meant to destroy all opposition to the omnipotent control of their gnarled fingers. In addition, these supposed spiritual protectors of man in their vast distinction to humanity, decided to put humanity under their heels which the celandil perceived as the safest place for humanity to reside.”
Every Aurhea rises up from their invisible thrones and spreads out their arms in a grandiose gesture as they all continue their personal soliloquy, “I assume you’ve never seen the destructive meetings of two gods in combat, nor the hundreds of lives a god can snuff with a glance, and because of this lack of seeing the horrors of the past, you will never truly understand the threat that disparate gods could bring upon a fragile physical world with their reintroduction. My people even with my guidance are fated to one day repeat the sins of their forefathers, because their souls derive from those that in their disparity chose the peace of destruction. Therefore, why trust a people doomed to a fatal fate by their very souls.”
“What hypocrisy! You are destroying your people for the sake of their difference from yourself! Aren’t you committing the greater evil by falling to this supposed disparity that you profess is the greatest of all evils!” I say refusing to understand Aurhea’s reasoning. I watch as all the Aurheas recombine into a single entity and she reduces herself in size and once again floats around me observing me, studying me, scrutinizing my very being.
“There is some truth to your logic… however, if a great evil can end a superior evil forever which in turn creates a better world free from the chains that superior evil cast upon the world of the past, then that great evil becomes a necessary good,” says Aurhea summoning a soul to her hand that she smushes between her thumb and forefinger, “If my goal is to destroy the root of all evil, and those I destroy are filled with said evil, then am I truly destroying anything that has any claim on survival? Evil earns its destruction, and the world as it is now is filled with evil… and in turn the totalion who were born of this world are tainted with this world’s corruption; thus, they are also in need of purification.”
“So, you are planning the destruction of the totalion, glirdon, dracaquan, teratolion, and humanity all for what? An empty world that will be freed of willful evil?” I ask, shocked by the fatalism of Aurhea’s supposed better world. Fresh memories of the Gehennan genocide claw at my mind and fill me with pains of twisting conflict as I view someone willing to make a decision millions of times more destructive than what I failed to stop. Aurhea is not only willing to make this ultimate decision on behalf of the unknowing masses, but her body language is relaxed and excited for the world she wishes to create upon the graves of all those that currently breathe upon Nuren.
“I won’t destroy them, but they’ll destroy themselves,” says Aurhea her lips curling into a half smile, “they’ve been poised with daggers at each other’s throats for years, and all it will take is for the few disparately desperate and ignorantly powerful to be slightly nudged for the ready blades to fall and fertilize this world with a new beginning.”
“Why are you so focused upon the word disparity. It has appeared again and again as you speak of people! Have you forgotten what people are? Have you forgotten the smiles of family, the tender words of a friend, the push of a rival…” I say not wanting to believe in how Aurhea reiterated what Argentum said about how the world is poised to destroy itself… not wanting to believe in her words, despite witnessing their truth.
Aurhea seeing my defeated appearance teleports her radiant body behind me to place her hands upon my shoulders, “why defend the people that you apparently already know of their foul fated potential? The essence of your being reeks of the internal conflict of one that walks the borders of truth. Many in this dissonance of the soul will fall back into the comfort of wonderful delusions, whilst those that take the plunge will discover a world ready to rid themselves of the tumor of difference. As I said before disparity is the root of all evil.”
“Why?” I say, my voice escaping my mouth like a whisper as I feel the clawing hands of those I have already damned to early graves rip into my broken mind and unsteady nerves.
Aurhea chuckles and with a wave of her hand the astral souls of her people form constellations of warring celandil, humans, teratolion, glirdon, dracaquan, and totalion, “Disparity and evil go hand in hand. Those in the world of politics, religion, and any form of social engineering use it to define me and you, us and them, those that have and those that have-not, right and wrong, good and evil, sin and moral duty, light and darkness, the deserving and the damned, every duality of this world. What makes these disparities so easily defined is that the physical senses do most of the work to manipulate the cravings of the mind and heart for the simplicity these dualities bring in abundance.”
“Humans and all the other human derived races have the same origin, same needs, and can even interbreed; meaning, they aren’t yet separate species but are like different breeds of hounds. However, even though all of the races of man share a similar origin the disparity in appearance of humanity and the other human derived races made it easy for Angtos to declare most of the other human derived races as demons without humanity so much as questioning Angtos’ claim. Even within humanity the small differences in genetic expression and even ideology they possess within themselves can have a similar manifestation of violent hatred and demonization that is the exact same as their perception and treatment of the other human derived races, but ironically amongst themselves. Even in the educated, hearts, minds, and senses can cheat and create new violently disparate realities.”
I wish to interrupt Aurhea to defend the world I was called upon to defend by my master, but Aurhea is right. The humans of the valley of Unadeam declared the teratolion demons and did horrible things to their people all because they believed they saw them as infernal, cursed, and lesser beings. I betrayed my pacifistic morals as with them I couldn’t undo the wrongs perpetuated by Gehenna and the High Matriarch, and because of my direct action most of the village’s men literally fell with me, my mother, Gehenna and the High Matriarch down the pit of Martog’s Maw.
Even after the deaths of Gehenna and the High Matriarch the village of Unadeam split in twain as many chose to follow the ghosts of Gehenna and the High Matriarch to eventually join them in death by provoking the ire of the restored princess of the Teratolion and those that they once called brother and sister. Even family and blood will turn on each other and create delineations of identity, Unadeamy and Gehennan, if only given a reason… even my mother, the daughter of the High Matriarch, was cast out for the minimal heresy of marrying someone her people perceived as an outsider, an outsider the Unadeamy labeled a lich.
“I see that you already know the truth in my words,” says Aurhea as she tightens her grasp upon my shoulders, “I know you are the victim of disparity’s claws, as you’ve seen the sins it births steal from you. I can give them back, you know. I can undo all your pain.”
“Give who back?” I say, shocked at this sudden proposal which feels like it came out of nowhere.
Aurhea swirls her hand next to my ear and then her finger plunges into the temple of my skull which then her finger feels like it splits into many smaller appendages that dig into my brain. Though my perceived body is spiritual, the sensation is gruesomely physical as the extreme discomfort and surprisingly hollow pain overwhelms my senses.
The prying movements stop, and suddenly the starry souls in the darkness swirl and recombine until I’m looking at four constellations that approximate the appearance of my parents, Geracht, and Uzuri. I attempt to look at Aurhea but her finger digging into my mind keeps my head in place which forces me to continue to stare at the constellations. In my helpless state and sorrowful confusion at what I’m seeing my mouth makes the beginnings of a word, but Aurhea speaks for me, “You wish to know how I knew that these people were stolen from you? You also wish to know how I plan on giving them back. Simply put, like you, I can breathe in the truth of this world. Your dream speaks to me with your voice, which meant that your soul must be close by, so I followed the whispers of truth within your dream and found your essence. I listened to your soul and essence and learned the names of your loved ones, and then forced myself upon your dream to obtain a more intimate image of your longing.”
“That still…” I begin to say as she still hasn’t answered one of the two questions that she ripped from my mind.
However, in trying to ask the second question again, Aurhea interrupts me by forcing me to speak the answer, “I plan on giving you four of my bodies that I’ll implant with the truth of your soul, essence, and dream. Then I’ll morph the bodies to embody the appearance and memories of your lost loved ones. In treating the bodies like living reservoirs without a will to reject your soul shard, your soul will act as a material of creating souls linked to your memories and in a sense returning your loved ones from beyond the grave, and from beyond their abandonment of you.”
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Realizing what Aurhea is proposing, my body attempts to recoil from Aurhea, but she holds me firmly in place. Aurhea with a swish of her hand that is not currently in my brain then conjures more constellations of hundreds of men, women, and children, these constellations this time drawing from my memories of the Gehennan and my mouth moves again like I’m Aurhea’s puppet, “How about I undo your greatest mistake, and give you more bodies, as they are a drop in the pail in comparison to the thousands I possess. I will restore every Gehennan but make them peaceable and receptive to a message of coexistence. In fact, I can change their thoughts to convert to the modified Unadeamy religion that Esther preaches to ensure that no ideological differences exist creating the seeds of what created the original genocide.”
I try to fight against Aurhea’s hand in my brain, but she does not relent as she secures her second hand upon my shoulder which though her grasp has a gentleness it also possesses a powerful firmness that prevents me from removing myself from her control. She then whispers in my ear, “Why are you resistant to my generous offers. Reality is what the celandil make it, so why make something so rigid that we can make so pliable.”
“Because I’ll know that I sacrificed another person’s life for my happiness. I’ll know that I destroyed another person’s life for an illusion,” I struggle to whisper as the fingers in my mind begin to writhe again.
“Memory, can be manipulated. Truth in the hands of the powerful can become anything they desire. A heinously bloody event can become a glorious triumph! For instance, a genocide becoming a necessity for peace,” says Aurhea, and with a twist of her finger I see a Teratolion army descend into the valley of Unadeam disemboweling women and children with sharpened claws as tens of men are overwhelmed in their doomed defense of their new beginning.
“A Gehennan minority seeking vengeance for the blood you spilt, sought revenge. However, you were perceived dead, so their only recourse was to obtain vengeance through the secondary leader of what they saw as a sacrilegious coup, and thus, killed your best friend,” I say as my mouth is manipulated to move by Aurhea’s control, “however, despite a terroristic minority making a fatal decision, the majority received the final judgement. I believe, the broken heart and sorrowful words of a distraught adoptive mother, and the confused yet distrustful thoughts of a traitorous new chieftain were what swayed the mind of a restored yet horribly abused princess to decide to end her vile father’s legacy, while simultaneously perpetuating it despite her disguised lover’s pleas for mercy. In the end, blood and claw became the means for instantaneous peace, due to fear and grief triumphing over speculative hope.”
“In the end peace is still peace, no matter how it is achieved, and whatever actions to get to said peace become moral as the future provides the balm of forgetfulness and justification,” says Aurhea who with her free hand gestures toward all the souls that surround us as the proof of her words, “nearly everything is a steppingstone, as long as it fulfills a greater purpose.”
“That can’t be true,” I whisper, and in front of me the constellations of souls once again morph to show me Gehenna and all of his loyal guard that I damned to Martog’s Maw.
“This is where I say that you are the hypocrite. The currency of better futures is the blood of the impotent, and you yourself have used lives as steppingstones toward the future you desired,” chuckles Aurhea as she has me watch the constellations of Gehenna and his men fall into the abyss to shatter upon a non-existent ground like their physical bodies shattered against cold hard stone.
“I did everything in my power to make sure no blood was spilled. I trained, I bargained, I…” I whimper as the constellations reform in front of my eyes to show me my mother and father’s deaths, which paralyzes my tongue. I see my father skewered with spears and held aloft, and I see my mother cast aside, already dead from her split wound bleeding out as she is cast into Martog’s Maw by her defiler.
“And when your bloodless revolution failed, when your family fell around you, when your friends were threatened, you chose the violence inherent in disparity. You protected your own and the blood you spilt became the means of purchasing a future for your chosen! Even if you were to have succeeded in your peaceful coup, divisions would have destroyed the original Unadeamy and despite your cries to spare those that clung to a different future thirsty for payment, the Gehennan would have been slain anyway paying the toll for your future. I firmly promise you this Skath and reiterate, that even if your face wasn’t that of Aeramen, Blood and Claw would have secured the same future you endure now that you yourself had placed a sanguinous deposit to achieve,” says Aurhea cooly into my ear, my name being revealed from her mouth causing my being to quake, “now you see why I say disparity is the root to all evil, and why I seek to rid this world of it. I wish to pay one last bloody price for a benevolent future free of future debts to pay.”
“How?” I ask desperate to turn my head from the repeating deaths of all those that I have killed but am obligated to watch as my eyes are held in place by the fingers in my brain preventing my eyes from moving.
“One body, one mind, one soul,” responds Aurhea pleased to hear my question, “I’ll create thousands of living reservoirs like your Cranbeatha by providing each body with an equal piece of my soul. My mind will connect to every living reservoir as my soul will connect all of my offspring in glorious unity. Finally, every physical body of my children will possess a similitude of my being as I’ll take the celandilic bodies given to me and through apotheosis create the inheritors of my future. True equality through destruction of spiritual, mental, and physical disparity! My future will be born of a womb of godliness and will possess the powers to one day outgrow the garden I go to enrich with the blood and detritus of a dying world all to one day claim the stars with our might!”
Aurhea reaches out into the artificial cosmos with her free hand, her gesture filled with a deep longing. She then turns to me again and with a tender hand strokes my cheek, “Now, I just have to quell the last cries of rebellion, to ensure my future. I know my father contends to thwart my glorious future, and he intends for you to be the tool of my downfall. Personally, I feel insulted that he has come to rely on such a pathetic and dull tool, but even a pebble can be dangerous if placed in a sling.”
Aurhea takes a deep breath and contemplates her next words as she summons another drink made of souls to sip on with the hand that isn’t currently stuck in my spectral skull. I hear her hum to herself as she thinks and she whispers more to herself than me, “it’s clear that giving him physical bodies isn’t the answer.”
I then see a crooked grin appear on her face from my peripheral vision and she says, “I’ll be honest, you’d only have about five, well if I’m being generous ten years to enjoy life with the replicas of your friends and family. However, you’ve made it apparent that you detest this idea. How about I give you eternity instead?”
I feel Aurhea’s hand and fingers connected to my brain twist and for a brief moment a bright light blinds me. When my eyes adjust, I’m in my parent’s cabin again, except the cabin isn’t in a state of disrepair. I see my father in his wide brimmed leather hat whittling a wooden figurine while he uses soulcraft to tend to the garden and prepare dinner. I watch as vegetables from the garden float through the open door and put themselves on a cutting board to be diced up into pieces by a hovering knife to then be deposited into a cauldron of stew at the center of the cabin. Oddly, despite this peaceful scene I know it will soon be interrupted as if by memory or instinct I know that my mother is about to crash through the front door.
The cabin rattles with sound and vibrations as a foot bursts through the door and there she is, my mother. She’s a behemoth of a woman, and upon her shoulders is a deer freshly hunted, cleaned, and ready to be eaten. Everything I’m seeing feels so real. I reach out knowing that this has to be an illusion, but my hand instead of passing through a perceived nostalgic hallucination surprisingly grabs hold of the very real and tangible fabric of my mother’s tunic.
“Skath, it’s been a while,” says my mother who places a tender hand on my shoulder, “haven’t seen you since your wedding. Then again, that’s probably for the best, as your father and I would have probably gotten in the way of you two making us some grandchildren.”
“Wait what?” I say confused at what my mother is insinuating, as I’m not married. I’ve made some heart destroying choices all for the promise of preserving thousands of lives, so I am utterly aware of my status as a bachelor. Though in my acknowledgement of this reality in my mind, the reality that I held as real fades as my memories alter themselves to comply with this new world. Every moment I’m in this dreamy world my pains disappear, and joyous thoughts and feelings replace the horrors of yesterday.
“Look boy, I know we are your parents, but sometimes it’s good to take a break from rutting like the boars and check in every now and again. It’s been close to eight months, a whole half a year, since you visited last,” says my father with a devious chuckle. He then puts down his carving and tools to tilt back his hat to see me better, “but, then again…”
Suddenly the door to my childhood room opens and I see Uzuri wearing the traditional garb of the women of Unadeam, a white dress with a geometric pattern cut out over the abdomen to reveal the navel. In Uzuri’s case the geometric pattern is that of a sun, which signifies a lineage connecting her to the high matriarchs of the Unadeamy. My surprise to see Uzuri only grows when I notice that her stomach looks similar to that of Lamia’s.
“But, then again, it looks like you’ve had a good reason not to visit for a while,” says my father with a guffaw, “looks like you two have been busy.”
My mother runs up to Uzuri and kneels down to put her hands on her stomach, “You look like you are far along. Why didn’t you visit sooner?”
“Well, honestly,” mumbles Uzuri somewhat bashful of the attention she is getting, “We both wanted to tell you about the good news as soon as we knew, but after the wedding Skath and I were whisked away on diplomatic meetings with the other teratolion kingdoms. When we learned that I was with child we were somewhere in the middle of Nursil. Skath desperately wanted to tell you the good news, but we both agreed that a letter wouldn’t be the right way to tell you… so… surprise?!”
“Reminds me of Skath’s father and me,” chuckles my mother placing an ear up to Uzuri’s stomach, “I got pregnant almost immediately after Turas and I tied the band. How has it been? have you been sick? Any weird cravings?”
Uzuri smiles and places one of her clawed fingers to her chin as she tilts her head in contemplation and says, “I honestly have unending cravings for honey cakes and pickled mushrooms. Sometimes I eat them together and it tastes really good. I got Skath to eat a honey cake topped with pickled mushrooms once, but he didn’t see the appeal.”
“I get honey cakes, I had that craving too,” says my mother actually entertaining the idea of pickled mushrooms somehow adding to the flavor of a honey cake in a positive way, “however, with Skath my main craving was mostly meat. I liked it cooked so the outside had a nice crust but the inside was basically raw.”
“You’ve always craved meat cooked that way,” says my father who in the commotion had returned to his whittling.
I stand aside witnessing a heavenly vision conjured by my heart. Though my mind is now somewhat in congruence with all that is in front of me, the specters of what I somehow can still tell is the real past haunt me. I look at Uzuri and I feel like my mind and heart have been caught having an affair. The ghost of a conflicted perspective eats at me as I in this moment love Uzuri with all my heart, love the child that we made together, but in looking at her the shade of the princess that chose the slaughter of the Gehennan reside in this Uzuri’s shadow. I love her. I’m sure I love her? Why can’t I just love her fully like I once did, like I should now? I feel a twisting feeling in my head and suddenly the conflict within disappears, as I embrace the familial warmth that surrounds me and my dear Uzuri. The ghostly Gehennan I once perceived are swallowed in the darkness of Uzuri’s shadow and peace overwhelms my being. I cannot speak because of the happiness I feel watching my parents and wife celebrating a bright and better future. I take in the joys of new life and the growth of the dearest thing I hold in my heart, as the clawing sensations of my conscience retreat to the farthest reaches of my subconscious.
I see Uzuri brighten up after my parents’ comments and she says, “Geracht told me that Lamia also had a craving for meat, especially now that she’s close to greeting her baby. Though, she’s kind of like me in that she likes combining flavors as she wants meat covered in mashed berries.”
My mother seems to have been greeted with an epiphany and looks at my father, who lets out a sigh and shakes his head. I watch as from the open window a few berries fly into the cabin and land into a mortar and pestle to be mashed into a berry paste.
“Wait did you say Geracht?” I ask incredulously, as Uzuri’s words partially didn’t make sense to me. Geracht is dead. Geracht is dead? Isn’t he? The longer I am within this world the longer my thoughts begin to fill in with details that were missing but feel like they’ve always been present in my mind. What I held as memories and truths about reality become lies deriving from realms of nightmares that disappear once the conscious mind grasps the waking world.
“My brother, what about him?” asks Uzuri looking at me with concern, “do you know something I don’t? He’s okay, isn’t he? I know that he’s been involved in the Unadeamy and Gehennan peace accords, and that there have been threats on his life, but the people responsible for those threats have been apprehended. There isn’t another after my brother’s life is there?”
I vaguely recall holding Geracht in my arms, his eyes already glazed over and lifeless, a spear wound dripping the last drops of ichor from his chest. However, this image, the guilt of not being able to save him, not being able to heal him as I cannot resurrect the dead, the shame of knowing his death should have been mine! All these feelings dissipate like mists upon a morning lake.
“Nothing, I… my mind and tongue got twisted for a second there,” I say rubbing my head, “I guess it’s the jumbled anxious thoughts of a soon to be father.”
Wait, that’s not right. Those words escaped from my mouth like they were truth, but they aren’t truth. However, all of my senses in this moment say that my words are truth. How is it I feel so conflicted, yet in this conflict there is a soothing balm that is replacing the rebellion in the deepest reaches of my mind.
“What of the Gehennan and Unadeamy peace accords? I know that Geracht was subject to stressful moments during the debates and negotiations, but I’ve heard that the reunification of the two factions is to go smoothly?” asks Uzuri to my mother who is still glued to Uzuri’s stomach in a maternally protective way.
“Politics are boring, let’s get back to baby talk,” says my mother finally getting up from the ground and guiding my wife to the kitchen table where they both take a seat and continue to talk about pregnant life, and I stare at this tender scene of family and indulge in the relaxing feeling of peace this scene brings me. For the first time in months, I feel truly happy, like the persistent guilt and shame that became consistent companions were delusional daydreams that I convinced myself were real. My heart screams for this reality to be real despite the disappearing confusion present in the recesses of my mind.
Please be real… Please be real… Don’t make me return to the darkness…
The scene of tranquility and rapturous joy freezes before me. My beautiful wife and joyful mother become stuck in expressing a thought that appears will never be said. My father’s knife upon a chunk of wood sits halted in its creation of a curl of wood hanging precariously yet eternally upon the material of its origination. The stew that was boiling now has bubbles that appear like they will never burst.
“You know Skath, if you just give up on Argentum’s schemes you can fully focus on being a family man,” says my father from his chair his expression not faltering from what it was before time froze.
“The only thing good about Argentum is the honey cakes he can conjure,” says my mother still looking at Uzuri.
“Don’t you want to be with me forever?” says Uzuri her head turning to me jaggedly in order to beggingly look at me with pleading eyes.
The scene of peace crumbles around me and fades from my view. The horrible feelings of anxiety, guilt, and shame return in full force upon my mind, like a river crashing into the stones of a rapid. I reach out toward my family. I desperately reach out to my wife and unborn child. I call out to them pleading for them to save me… I claw out in futility to try and climb back to all I ever desired. I struggle but continue to fall away from the home that my heart has pondered upon and had for once just been granted a taste of its dearest dream. I once more stretch forth my hand, painfully straining to attempt to touch Uzuri’s hand. In my forced return to my reality, I briefly feel Uzuri’s hand and the comforting softness it provides my heart only to have the abyss of the soul reservoir steal the light and warmth of my deepest yearnings.
Non-existent tears attempt to form and leave my eyes incapable of producing them, as I continue to desperately reach toward the memory of that paradise made from the denials of my heart. My mouth as if on its own screams out, “bring them back, please, bring them back!”
“Unfortunately, I can only give you a glimpse of heaven when interacting with your dream,” tempts Aurhea who rips her finger from my head and allows me to fall to my knees in the eternal darkness of the soul reservoir, “however, if you willingly deliver your soul to the reservoir, I’ll gladly give you the eternity you crave.”
I look up at Aurhea, like she is a goddess of salvation, but the shock of having my family returned and stolen from me again and the promise to have them returned once more welcomes a sorrowful realization. Everything that Aurhea has offered is a counterfeit, a replacement, a salve for the pain of reality. In the end nothing she offers will be real. I’ll claim an illusory heaven at the cost of a world.
As if realizing that her grasp over me was waning, Aurhea leans down and whispers, “reality is what is perceived, and if your perception is altered to such a degree you cannot determine reality from the reality I give you, who is to tell that one reality is more real than the other. Food for thought. I am offering you a new reality, all for abandoning the hopeless remorse of a man who has lost grasp of the greatest of dreams. In giving up, you will claim an eternal euphoria, and when I say eternal, I mean that literally. Every time you supposedly die in the realities I give you, I’ll give you a new reality to enjoy, again and again until you are satisfied. Now isn’t that more than fair, for the mere action of doing nothing but submitting yourself to me?”
Haven’t I done enough. Hasn’t what I done caused more pain than created joy. These thoughts pierce my being as I entertain the thought of completely giving up and submitting to Aurhea to claim all I lost and more. But then again, what I’ll claim is a mirage, an extremely convincing mirage, but still a mirage. I look at my spectral hand and I find it shaking as just moments ago my very memories faded and were swiftly being replaced by new ones making the mirage feel more real than what I’m experiencing right now. I truly believed that I had a pregnant wife that I loved deeply, that my parents weren’t dead, that the Gehennan never were destroyed, and that Geracht was never murdered. If it felt that real, then how was it not real… I guess sometimes even feelings and experiences can be lies even if they scream with realness.
I need to get out of here. I need to clear my head and get away from Aurhea, as the longer I’m here in this void the more sway she has over me. I look up to Aurhea and she is beaming seeing me in my now pathetic state as she says, “I’ll gladly give you some time to think over my offer. The soul reservoir is always waiting and will receive you gladly when you decide to claim my blessings. Until then sometimes the easiest way to reclaim your projected dream is to just open your eyes. Just a tip from someone who has hundreds of years more experience in the ways of soulcraft and listening to the whispers of essence than you do.”
I look upon a now beaming Aurhea, as she reaches out a comforting hand to help me to my feet and as if remembering something she continues, “also, tell my father that my sparing of the Huto ends now, as he has betrayed me.”
Confused by her last statement, I begrudgingly and desperately attempt to employ Aurhea’s teachings in order to try and escape her and this vacuous prison. I take a few deep breaths, focus upon my physical body, and I open my eyes. The spells that scar my flesh throb, but the world of darkness and wailing souls disappears as my physical eyes open. I see that I’m back in my parent’s dilapidated cabin, and a small part of my heart dies seeing it. The paradise I was presented and the reality I endure make my eyes water and what I was denied as a spirit, the physical body permits as tears freely flow.