Collected
Chapter 8
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It was not looking like Gordius Town was getting out of this situation better than Virala Town did.
Soldier corpses had lined up to their deaths beyond the gate, some with their faces burned and with shrapnel poking through their bodies. Others gored and pummeled. Then there was the general town itself. Gordius Town had these elegant, well-paved streets with a rustic charm to it — except it was being ruined by the Fervent Indulgent trashing the place. Homes broken into, furniture thrown out, decorative bushes set ablaze, and cultists running amok with killer smiles on their faces. Hounds running about as well, seeking targets to hunt down and chew on.
From the Collector’s eyes, Kamali thought she saw a body mutilated with what looked like runic carvings, sliced into his face and half-uncovered chest, and tried not to gag. The Collector himself was slinking through the streets as if he belonged there, and had for decades on end. A mantle of shadowy energy had cloaked him as an extra layer of camouflage, the Collector holding onto the light of a tannish spirit in his hand and using the Rule it provided him.
In a wayward alley, a group of the Fervent Indulgent had tied up a terrified family of four, the cultists staring at them with warped glee. The Collector grunted in distaste, before twisting each one’s neck, killing them in succession. The last had just enough time to look over in confusion before his head was snapped too. The Collector took a quick intake of their forms, Kamali swearing she could feel a trickle of something entering his throat, before spitting out.
To the family, it would’ve looked like the air itself had twisted upon them, seeking vengeance — a mercy made all the stranger when their ropes were ripped apart, courtesy of their unseen benefactor. The Collector dismissed the sword he’d summoned from his spirits’ powers, quick to leave the foursome. “You do have a heart, huh?” Kamali said from her spot on the rock island of the Collector’s prison, having watched it all with wonder.
“It still beats, yes,” the Collector wryly said, “despite my unusual form.”
“Maybe you could’ve escorted them out though?”
“Maybe I should go and take Beastmaster’s head while I’m at it?” The Collector stopped to pull out Freya’s soul, casting Haste on the bewildered family, before continuing to move on. “There. That might help them escape this ruined town. My own presence, I’m afraid, would not be as welcome of a boon.”
Duh. It would be ridiculous to think anyone wouldn’t freak out at the Collector, even if he was assisting them. Something he could work on changing, perhaps?
Bah, fool likes his poor reputation. Now, if he really wanted to—
“Charon.” The Collector made an irritated clicking noise. “I’m not in the mood for you to start something again.”
I wouldn’t dream of it, came Charon’s voice, as charming as can be. But you do have such a spotty track record and so little interest in cleaning out the stains—
“Charon.”
—setting yourself straight and all that good stuff. Really, behind all these hollow attempts at making us complacent is a criminal who knows he’s better off dead—
“Be silent for several hours.”
The command muted Charon’s voice from the network of spirits, but Kamali had the impression he was all smiles right now. Smiles of the slimy sort — his words had provoked tensions and unease amongst his fellow spirits, some taking offense at him and others silent, if not in hesitant agreement. Strange as it was, Kamali leaned slightly toward the first group.
The Collector returned the tannish soul into his form, taking off his shadow mantle — apparently it sapped at his stamina, keeping it going for too long. “Reeks of the dead,” he dryly said as he came upon a narrow street, deserted save for a couple corpses, cannibalized with several bite marks each. “A place like this would weigh heavily with their laments, would it not?”
The Shaman within Kamali stirred. If she tried, she could feel around the Collector, her senses picking up on something imperceptible. An otherworldly pressure. She felt it, and felt them.
When a soul departed the realm, it departed for good, leaving to whatever destined place it belonged to. A place no man nor woman in this world could hope to glimpse, a mystery they could only know the full truth of through their own deaths. That said, there was still something left behind, a trace of the former individual. Something that Channelers, Necromancers, and the like often called upon. Shamans too.
Eseelis Village had a terrible pressure surrounding it, when it had burned down. Probably still was there, Kamali figured. She’d been keen ever since on not opening herself to the feeling, but Virala Town surely had a weight on it too, just as Gordius Town did. But where Eseelis Village had been burdened by the sorrows of the dead, Gordius’s agony was mixed with a sense of loathing. Fury.
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“They’re angry.”
“No surprise, what with the Fervent Indulgent’s savage ways. But I’d wonder if Lord Terrence’s inaction has fed their rage as well. Elystra City could’ve sent out its elite troops to combat their advance, after all.” The Collector knelt beside one slumped man, and Kamali’s eyes widened as his chest rose with labored effort. “But he’s held back.”
The man gave no reaction to the voice, too weak to even bother opening his eyes. On the verge of death, clearly, with his chest fighting a lonely battle to stall it. The Collector sighed.
“Some will do anything to live, despite the price. Isn’t that so, new friend?” He reached for the man’s soul, consuming it all.
Not a morsel. Not a sliver. All. If Kamali tried, she thought she could taste it, bottled with the spice of anger unrequited, of the sourness of a dead man’s woes. She felt the solemnness shared amongst the others, heard the Broken’s chants—
New!
Another, another!
Rebirth!
Your misery. Ours.
Misery, eternity.
A soul, snatched from death, fell from the Collector’s throat and into his prison. A few spirits moved, Dahlia notably ahead of the rest as she moved to intercept the newcomer. Kamali turned and rubbed her eyes as she found Jarsh, the Broken ocean blue spirit, wandering the violet sea in the same direction as the welcoming party. His posture hadn’t changed a smidge, his head drooped as ever, arms hung behind him. His gaze shifted to her for the slightest of seconds, before continuing his march onward.
“Help him settle in. I cannot spend time myself, regrettably.” The Collector’s lips curled into a frown. “Hmph. Flea-ridden cur.”
Too many conflicted thoughts were running through Kamali’s mind, from horror to strong aversion, with a smidge of reluctant acceptance of the Collector’s soul theft. But the moment he cursed, she dropped her feelings to focus on his condition. One of his other spirits spoke in concern, and the Collector replied instantly.
“Beastmaster. Doing his usual, tormentor that he is.”
Criminal!
Violator!
Viler kin!
“Do not compare us,” snapped the Collector, quieting the Broken.
Clearly his soul sense was what let him feel the Fervent Indulgent’s leader. Kamali could not feel it herself, not with her skillset, but she tried to see through the Collector’s senses. It proved fruitless at first, but she pushed herself, letting her merge as much as she could with his body. The Collector gave out an odd, strangled noise, and Kamali for a moment picked up on whatever Rule he was using, sleuthing out an area where a notably strong soul with a sense of wrongness to it rode upon twin souls of even greater wrongness. And with them, a tearful, youthful being of innocence—
“Stop that,” growled the Collector, and Kamali felt the sensation brand her as it slipped out of reach. But too late. She’d seen.
“He has a child.”
Pure one to twist.
Corruptor!
Innocence into guiltless.
“Beastmaster makes monsters.” Kamali considered the humanoid fiends she’d seen, the many comments people had made about their master, and paled. “He’ll—”
“Turn her into one of his beasts, as he’s done to countless others.” The Collector began walking off. “It happens.”
“It’s a child.”
“Many of his victims have been.”
“Her soul—”
“Will be trapped in a beast that uses her as nothing but fuel. Her spirit, doomed to spectate its evils.”
Kamali shook herself, beyond horrified at the thought of it. Beyond disgust. “And you’re leaving her?”
A scream rang out, fighting amongst a sea of screams that fell on ears rendered deaf by their noise. The Collector moved a little faster, for he seemed to be an exception. “Did I not warn that the Beastmaster is above my capabilities?”
“You could—”
“No. I cannot.”
“She’s—”
“Innocent. Destined for heaven, I’m sure.” The Collector chanced upon two hounds chewing on a corpse like a toy, and with uncanny strength, grabbed one’s leg and smashed the yipping beast into the other, over and over again. As if it would absolve him of wrongdoing. “I save more lives by thinning his ranks.”
Do you?
The Collector growled, slamming the dogs one last time, their skulls bashed in and their breaths stilled. “Charon,” he said, and Kamali recoiled at the anger in his voice. How was Charon talking? He was just silenced a moment ago!
Drop in the bucket, that’s all you’re doing. But fine, I get it. Beastmaster’s too scary for you—
“Several days!” barked Collector, and Charon’s voice was sealed away again. “You make me wish I had the nerve to suck you dry, but you’d be far more aggravating with a Broken’s chatty mouth. Keep this up, however, and—”
He gasped, as sensory input from other spirits chimed in, unhappy at his refusal to do something. Phrases like It’s a child! and Do something about it! flooded in, peppered with off-key statements from the Broken. Kamali furrowed his gaze as she felt the violet sea and mists shifting, the Collector straining from the noise.
“Stop!” he commanded, groaning in relief as their chaos subsided. “Yes, I know you’re emotionally hurt by this! But what can I do? I’m a soul thief looking after himself, not some suicidal savior—”
He paused, then backed up as a mess of paws slammed down a distance before him, dislodging road tiles. The two heads of Dupemaw sniffed at Collector, one growling at him, before Beastmaster soothed the head with a gentle rub of its cheek. Collector and his collected spirits stared onward at the unwelcome guest, an arm tightly holding a girl no older than ten years of age. The child’s face, stricken with tears, blood, and snot, grew graver at the sight of the Collector.
Kamali’s soul cracked at the sight. “I knew you’d show yourself around, Collector!” Beastmaster said, giving a tip of his feathered hat and a wink of his glowing brown eyes. The girl didn’t bother struggling against him, even as he stroked her hair. “I take it you’ve been having a wonderful time?”