The Empty Mirror
Chapter 32: Poison
As I swallow the saliva, I feel its wetness crawling down my throat, a warm liquid that flows with an uncomfortable parsimony. Occasionally, a subtle, barely perceptible taste intertwines with my own, reminding me of his presence. It is an intimate but strange sensation, as if I am sharing part of my being with another, if only for a fleeting moment. I throw the debris to the ground like someone who throws dead skin. The plant or creature, barely visible, rises to my knees, an organism that resembles a spectre but acts as a liquid source to avoid perishing of thirst, absorbing its tears, nourishing itself with its saliva.
When the fever takes hold of my being, I experience an inner burning sensation, as if I am consumed by a fire that springs from the innermost recesses of my being. Every pore of my skin is drenched in sweat, which emerges in ceaseless cascades, clinging my clothes to my body like a second dermis.
My mind is shrouded in a veil of delirium, as if sailing through an ocean of confused and fragmented thoughts. Words blur in my mind, losing their meaning and becoming a cacophony of empty, disconnected sounds. My thoughts drift and fade, as if floating in a dense mist that refuses to dissipate.
The world around me becomes veiled and distorted, as if I were looking through a fogged glass. Shades intermingle and fade into each other, forging a palette of murky, gloomy hues. The sounds come to me like distant echoes, distorted by the fever that thunders in my ears like an unbridled torrent.
Delusions wrap me like a leaden cloak, dragging me into a state of confusion and disorientation. I can't discern between reality and illusion, and every moment seems to slip through my fingers like fine sand. I feel trapped in an endless maze of chaotic thoughts and tumultuous emotions, struggling to find a path to clarity and lucidity.
Every time I brush my tongue against my teeth, I taste the metallic tang of blood in my mouth, reminding me of the insidious presence of an ailment. My gums feel swollen and sensitive to the slightest touch, as if they are on the verge of rupturing with every movement.
As I brush my teeth, my fingers are stained a glowing red, as if I am tracing a macabre painting in my mouth. Blood gushes from my gums like a thick, dark spring, intermingling with the drool in an unsettling way. The metallic taste sharpens with each rinse, leaving a bitter, lingering aftertaste on my palate.
The sensation of discomfort spreads throughout my oral cavity, leaving me with the impression that every bite is a painful outrage to my bleeding gums. The latent pain seems to resonate in each of my teeth, incessantly reminding me of the presence of some insidious ailment. Irritation and bruises seem to surface on my hands, on my neck, as if marked by some shadowy and mysterious force. I watch in horror as the purple and bluish marks spread like ink stains across my body, with no apparent cause or memory of any trauma that might justify them.
Each ecchymosis is a silent witness to the fragility of my being, as if I am being singled out by an invisible and merciless hand. The bruises are painfully sensitive to touch, as if they are burning beneath the surface of my skin, relentlessly reminding me of their presence with every movement and touch.
In the confinement of a constant observance I find myself, each new contusion, in anticipation of a greater evil, sows in my being a pang of dread and anxiety, a questioning that gnaws at my being as to what else lurks in my dermis under the sombre sway of a mysterious ailment.
The cardinals, haughty emblems of ignominy and suspicion, stand like labarums of an affront, as if they were heralds of the oppression of an enigmatic and implacable force. I wonder if I will one day manage to break through the barriers of this nightmare that consumes me, or if my fate is inexorably sealed by the calamity that seems to be voraciously preying on my existence.
I have come to the fatal opinion that I have been poisoned, though I do not know the exact origin of this pernicious substance. I sense that Hanging Gardens are poison in themselves: the plants, the creatures, everything in them. My lungs, clogged with spores, I knew it when I spat out a clot of blood, fearing that some monstrosity was breeding in my guts, some grotesque and nauseating insect. The foetuses I ingested and the saliva I swallowed could be the carriers of the poison. They were no ordinary beings; they were, rather, chemicals incarnate.
This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.
Following the concept of poison as a chemical mixture that, in certain doses, can take life or disrupt health by interfering with vital processes, I have been poisoned. The most terrible thing of all is that the poison spreads rapidly through my organism, deteriorating it from within with these harmful substances. I cannot do without food and drink, even though I am aware that these substances cause purple and blackish stains on my skin. I am sentenced to swallow poison.
Wriggling in my torment, I persisted in my pilgrimage through the gardens in search of help. The barely hinted bruises marked my neck with a faded purple tinge. I was thankful that my soul had not yet left my body, though at the edge of hades I believed me. Perhaps, if they could find a tonic to nullify the poison, it might snatch me away from my dismal fate, but I was utterly ignorant of the path to such a remedy. Aware that this was no time to give in to my appetite, for if I did, "Hunger on trial" would devour me in one bite.
I decided to seek sustenance, spotting in the nearby gardens one of those creatures known as "Cursed". However, it was not a single presence, but at least three such organisms. Although, for the moment, they seemed harmless, except for the insect gestation that infected them and the spores that spread one of the ailments that afflicted me. I had only the option of veiling my lips with the purple cloak to prevent any more spores from finding asylum in my lungs. With cautious steps and holding the silk to my lips, I drew the dagger from my attire and resolutely began to stab the creature's insides again and again until it was slain.
With bowed head, I pulled out one of those bags full of livid flesh and, with the knife's edge, opened its belly, distancing myself from the procession of the other specimens. As I bit into the pale flesh, each mouthful flooded me with fear, making me feel like a submissive canine, while the other Cursed remained undaunted behind me. I wondered if the masters of poisons were cursing me at this moment for blaming my afflictions on poison, when it might not be poison itself. But they are as unfamiliar with the situation as I am, and the ailment that spreads, though they are as yet unaware, will be an omen that will make sense later, much later.
At the epicentre of my spot, a pond or pool appeared like a jotun forgotten by the passing of time and lack of clemency. Its face, veiled by a layer of greenish, sticky algae, barely allowed a glimpse of its abyss. The aura, dense and charged, seemed to be the only witness to the mute agony unleashed in this forsaken corner. The liquid, if it deserved such an appellation, gave off a foul, pungent stench, a nauseating amalgam of decay and stagnant dampness that enveloped the surroundings in a suffocating embrace. Each inhalation was an invitation to disgust, a sensory experience that left a bitter aftertaste on the palate and an uneasiness in the belly.
On the banks of the pond, a carpet of black, sticky mud unfolded, where insect carcasses and decaying animal remains intertwined in a dismal feast for maggots and grubs. The water itself, with a hue that defied description, seemed to exhale a tangible darkness, suffused with the shadows of those who dared to come too close and never returned.
With trembling steps, I watched in horror as a creature of unknown appearance emerged from the abyss, at a most inopportune moment for me. In that instant, I loathed it vehemently.
From the depths emerged amid groans of anguish a kind of dry cough, sickly as the last sighs of a dying man, a creature of colossal proportions. The mere glimpse of its torso was enough to draw all eyes to the firmament, the size of a residence if it were to rise fully to the surface.
Its bulging head stood like a grotesque manifestation of vast orifices. The mere contemplation of this congregation of openings awakens a visceral revulsion in my being, as if my skin were invaded by a horde of execrable entities. Every time my eyes fall on that macabre pattern of holes, I feel my epidermis bristle and an icy shiver runs down my spine. It's as if something inside me stirs, a discomfort that sinks its roots deep inside me.
Unable to look away, a strange morbid fascination compels me to take a closer look. A being devoid of eyes and mouth, just an uneven surface covered with orifices and fleshy cavities. Each bulbous protuberance looks like an amalgam of cysts in perpetual fermentation, exhaling a sour and nauseating aroma that seeps into my nostrils and oppresses my throat like a noxious substance.
From the holes and cavities ooze a black, viscous substance, like bitumen or a kind of coagulated blood, as if they were the tears of a being sentenced to an existence of eternal decay. The skin, the scales, if such an abomination can be so called, is an embodiment of repulsion itself, like plaques of corruption rooted in a being forgotten even by existence itself. Each scale is a testament to decay, twisted and warped, as if moulded by the very hooves of despair, thick and slippery.
The texture of this being is an outrage to the senses, an amalgam of roughness and softness that seems to pulsate with a life of its own. Wrapped in a viscous, sticky mucus, these scales cling to everything they touch, an existence nourished by the gloom that surrounds them. The hue of these scales is a parade of horrors, a palette ranging from anaemic green to the deepest black, a sickly deformity that writhes and feeds on the rot beneath the waters. Each movement seems to be accompanied by a dull, repulsive creaking, as if the flesh itself were lucid and resisting its own decomposition.
The pale, sickly hue of the flesh exudes the essence of affection and corruption. Every inch of this amorphous mass seems saturated with an evil energy, a dark force that awakens primal instincts of revulsion and terror. Contemplating this abomination is like facing the abyss itself, an experience that threatens to devour sanity and hope in an ocean of despair. This monument to degradation and decay is a grim reminder of the horrors that lurk in the darkest corners of our mind and character.
Each segment of the abdomen is festooned with sharp, curved spines, like dancing blades in a tragic spectacle of sadism and torture. The skin and cuticle in cartilaginous tissues are covered with repulsive bumps and swollen pustules, on the verge of bursting into an explosion of pus and nauseating fluids. The veins that criss-cross the abdomen are like rivers of poison, a twisted network of dark lines that intertwine in a labyrinth of death and desolation. In the centre of the belly, a loathsome orifice opens into the depths of the being, a grotesque mouth that seems to whisper promises of pain and suffering.