Verse 10

My Heart (Mind) Just Sitting Around

A few cinders danced through the air past Dasodaha’s face. Black plumes of smoke rose like towers into the brilliant, blue sky. Only a few hours ago, this had been a small town; now, only a few buildings were left standing as smoking husks.

From behind, a shriek, muffled by debris. The distinct cry of pain, he knew it well. It was a nostalgic scene, in a perverse way.

“Daso,” he heard several feet from his right. “Take care of it, I don’t want to hear it anymore.”

Whoever was trapped beneath the house wouldn’t make it more than a few minutes, Daso reasoned, but if he requested it…

He turned to the collapsed house and raised an arm in its direction.

“[TOXICITY]”

—

Gallow wrung the water out of his socks, seated at the water’s edge. He took some zenlike solace in it, promptly ignoring Gideon, who was expositing from a few feet away.

“The reason I’m here has nothing to do with you, Mr. Clarke.”

Gallow’s lips pursed at the mention of his name, and slid on the first sock without saying anything. “I’ll let him enjoy his high horse,” he thought.

“In the last six months, there’s been a rash of incidents in the Southwest.” Gideon paused a second before continuing, trying to find the diplomatic way to explain it. “Five other towns, similar in size and affluence to this one, were razed to the ground.”

Gallow turned his head to look up at the captain. “Razed?”

“They were massacred.”

“What?” Gallow got to his feet.

Gideon continued, his hands close to his saber, as if he were trying to make the explanation more comfortable. “The first town was ten miles Northwest of here…” he trailed off to glance around at the otherworldly Garden. “From Sigrit. The news wasn’t reported until a merchant caravan stopped by and found it almost completely obliterated. No signs of life. Four more have been reported since with the same evidence. Nothing was left but piles of rubble; if there were any survivors, they were taken prisoner, if the perpetrators are even people.”

“How do you…” Gallow processed the information. “How do you know it’s a massacre?”

Gideon allowed a grimace to show in his face. “I haven’t seen anything firsthand, but the local corps was called out, and the coroner said there were signs of a struggle.”

“Such as…?”

Gideon forced the words out. “…Unconventional wounds. Corpses that suggest they were running.”

“Well,” Gallow put his hands on his hips. “I haven’t heard anything about it.”

“I wasn’t asking you,” Gideon retorted, his eyes narrowing. “But if you really are the sheriff of this town, it might be pertinent information. Besides, news doesn’t travel fast around here, anyway. As far as the rail’s concerned, this is another country.”

It was a long-held stereotype that the people of the Southwest lived in the boonies of Andeidra. In the major Eastern cities, the Southwestern drawl was the go-to “hick voice,” and major Southern cities like Fenway were seen as the exception to the rule; even then, its prosperity only stemmed from the railroad engineered and built by Easterners. Gideon’s comment wasn’t a direct jab, but it did reflect the attitude of outsiders to parts of the country so remote, so close to the border.

“Alright,” Gallow began. “So why are you here?”

Gideon returned to his stalwart self. “A reconnaissance assignment. I’ve already stopped at three other towns for information. Nobody has heard anything so far.” He turned his chin up just to get the slightest angle looking down at him. “I assume you haven’t either?”

For a second, Gallow mulled it over, and replied, “Nope. As long as it doesn’t head here, in which case, I just want to know what they look like.”

“The perpetrators?” Gideon scoffed. “We have no idea.”

“Alright, then,” Gallow could feel his rope burning away. “What do you know about them– to identify them?”

“The most we know is that buildings were burned down in the attacks.”

Gallow squinted with one eye. “Fires?”

“Yes, fires,” Gideon replied, a hint of snark. “Is that peculiar?”

“Is it…?” the gears spun in Gallow’s mind. “We had a problem with an arsonist a few weeks ago. He was from out of town; he showed up and tried to light the place up.” A curiosity ran under his words, like he felt something coming to light.

Gideon let out a small “Hm…” and considered for a moment. “What did he look like?”

As Gallow described Fiemme, a flicker sparked in Gideon’s eyes as soon as the details coalesced.

“What did you say his name was?” he wondered, on the edge of his seat.

Gallow was taken aback by his former officer’s excitement. “Fiemme, that’s what he told me.”

A subtle grin snuck its way to Gideon’s mouth as his eyes darkened with determination. “There was one thing– In Jacobson, just a few miles away from here, the locals told me about some strangers who stopped in town for some water. There were four of them, and one of them, apparently the one in charge, told someone with the name Fiemme to get the supplies.”

“Huh…” Gallow now had the same fascination. “And what did they look like?”

“Three white men, one native man,” Gideon recalled.

“And which one was the leader?”

“One of the whites, the locals said he dressed strangely.”

Gallow’s brow raised. “Strangely?”

“Yes,” Gideon’s strong memory served him well. “He wore an eyepatch with a rose, a grey jacket, and his hair was blond, but they said it looked blackened at the ends.”

It felt like the air had been sucked out of the Garden. Gallow’s heart dropped a beat.

—

At the call of his Vocation, a serpent leapt from his mouth, gliding off his tongue and hitting the ground with a head start. Its scales, black and green streaks, slithered through the dirt at blistering speeds, sliding into the collapse of rubble.

Daso could not see through the serpent’s eyes, but he could feel its intent, like an extra limb. Within a few moments, the shrieking reached a fever pitch, and then tapered off into a rapid silence.

Warren’s shoulders relaxed, and an easy sigh left his lungs.

A horde of flies scrambled out of the pile and swarmed through the air back to Daso, where they landed on his skin, melting back into him and leaving white splotches that gradually darkened back to his natural skin tone.

Warren wiped his brow, it was almost late afternoon, and the sun was bearing down on them like no other. Flicking his sweat away, he gazed back at Daso.

A young native man, he never lost his stony expression. His fit form was covered in a self made leather tunic, ripped down from the neckline from years of wear, and painted with dark stains of animal blood. Black hair fell around his collarbone, tangled and unmanageable if not for three leather bands that formed bangs and a ponytail respectively. A single white feather, tipped crimson, was tied into the left band.

Daso’s eyes reflected gold in the sunlight, and those who met him out in the desert would say that his glare was magnetic, shameful. That is, if they came away still breathing.

The wind sent Warren’s coat into a flutter; it never seemed to dirty or tear. His right eye was gone, and a lush rose grew out of the socket in its place. Upon Daso’s first meeting with him, in the wilderness of the Southwest, they had been drawn to each other’s peculiar stares. Now that he understood the rose’s true power, the mystique had dried up, but his respect for him had only grown. Daso repeated to himself that the only thing worth fearing was the unknown.

“Everything is simple, as I see it,” he often said. “I don’t need to think about anything weaker than me. If something is stronger than me, I just need to understand it, and then there is nothing to fear.”

“So what does it become, then?” Warren had asked when first hearing this.

“My enemy.”

Warren had laughed. “Then am I your enemy?”

“You must be.”

This exchange was what made their companionship as solid as stone. Being Dasodaha’s enemy was not a threat outright, it was simply how he fit everything in the world together.

“Enemies and insignificances.

One’s enemies in life will far outnumber one’s friends. You cannot fight them all, but that does not mean you’ve lost.

Enemies and insignificances…”

“Take a moment,” Warren admired the scene. “Listen to the fire.”

When Daso overlooked the husks of carbon and ash where people once were, he felt two forces pushing in opposite directions; he felt like a different person, slipping into a new body and warming up its nerve endings. It was numb.

A silence hung between them for a moment, and once Warren was satisfied, he pulled it down. “Where’s Malvado?”

“Hm?” Daso snapped back to the present. “I think he took off a few minutes ago around the pass, behind that rock formation over there. He said he was getting water.” He motioned to a tall set of boulders many feet away, through the burning wreckage.

A small smirk curled at one end of Warren’s mouth. It wasn’t a sinister expression, but a knowing smile, like finding humor in a friend who can’t help his own nature. Truly, Malvado and Daso couldn’t have been more the polar opposite of each other. Malvado often tried to show off his “ruthlessness” (his words), but when it came to the true brutality of their mission he always seemed to be absent. Warren did not attempt to change his nature, at the age of twenty-seven it was an ingrained part of his person. However, he did recognize his ability as a useful tool and often assigned him to information collecting tasks.

A knowing smile curled at the end of Warren’s mouth, the type of humor that comes from knowing one’s friend too well.

“Hey, hey! Did you finish it off without me?”

Malvado waltzed out from behind the rocks with a big grin. Warren’s own smirk softened to hide his amusement. “As we often do.”

“Ah,” Malvado didn’t know the right response, and his face would have burned with embarrassment had it not already been burning in the intense heat which bore down from above, bounced upward, and radiated from the carnage. At the back of his mind, he was dogged by the insecurity that the two of them were playing with him, and looked down on him. He never confronted those feelings, though, as he would never be able to realize or articulate them.

“How far away is Sigrit?” Daso wrangled attention back to business, prompting Malvado to pull a map from his pocket and unfurl its pulp paper.

“About two days’ time from here.” 

Malvado paused and both he and Daso looked to Warren, who had taken on an abrupt, pensive expression, as he was oft to do.

“You said the man had a single blond streak in his hair?”

Malvado shrunk back ever so slightly; there was a strange intensity coming from Warren. “Yeah, but the name he gave me was Gallow, nothing about an Ajax Colt or-”

“Clarke,” Warren corrected him.

Daso noted the speed of his reply, it had a defensive tone that betrayed the investment he had in this person. “Unlike him…”

“Very well,” Warren fell back into his calm, chilled voice. “We’ll continue eastward.”

Without warning, a deep growl rumbled from behind Warren. All three of them spun to the noise, unmistakably animal and obviously aggressive.

—

“They said it-” Gallow stuttered. “It was what-?”

Gideon peered at him with a cocked view. “Blond, with some kind of burnt ends, black.”

Waves of emotion washed through Gallow’s body. Which emotions, he could not tell, but some swirling amalgamation of joy, fear, dread, and adrenaline. He seemed lost in another world, looking at Gideon, but staring through him, at something unknown.

“Sorry,” he shook his head. “I just need to think about something. I’m gonna head back, you should too, there’s an inn in town.”

Gideon’s eyes darted all over the Garden. “Oh, and how do you want me to get back?”

“Easy,” a grin finally breached Gallow’s face. “Follow me.”

It was all Gideon could do to hide his indignation. “Follow you? You can’t just explain it to me?”

“Naw,” Gallow replied. “You don’t need to know.”

“What about her?” Gideon pointed to his guide, who had been leaning against a tree, relishing in the shade so scarce in the desert.

“I’ll stay,” she called, arms crossed. She raised her gaze to the two of them before stepping through the lush grass towards Gallow. “I know how to make it back.” She extended her hand to him. “Gallow?”

He took in her offer before taking it, shaking her hand.

“Yeah.”

“Sonsee-array, nice to see you.”

Their hands parted. “Then it’s nice to see you, too.”

With that, he motioned to Gideon, and they left the Garden together.

—

Malvado’s stomach leapt into his throat, and he almost fell over in fright. Before their eyes was a pack of three hulking coyotes, their teeth bared, backs arched and ready to pounce on them with ravaging claws.

Daso stepped in front of the other two. “I’ve killed these before,” he muttered. “I’ll handle it.” They were immediately identifiable as southern coyotes. The light splotches on his skin had cleared and healed. “I can use Toxicity again,” he remarked with a razor sharp voice, digging his foot into the ground to assert himself.

“Stop.”

“Stop?” Daso’s eyes flicked back to Warren, who put a hand to his shoulder and moved past him to confront the animals. “There’s no fear in his steps,” Daso observed. “Even my own heart is racing, but he… Is he hiding it? Or… is he just that kind of man?”

Warren’s rose shimmered with gentle light. “These are nothing but illusions.” A flash of red, and before either of them could see what happened, the coyotes had vanished from sight.

“What?!” Daso stuck his head forward, as if there was something he was missing. Their fur had been so real, their growls just like the real thing. Malvado too, floundered about, looking around with wild energy. Even after traveling with warren for some time, they were still astounded at his abilities, the enigma he presented.

In the midst of the falling ash, Warren raised his arms, letting his wrists slack. As if he were feeling around for something, he turned without warning to a collapsed house, still smoldering.

A tattered, dirty tarp had fallen, draping over three splintered wood planks which jutted up at odd angles. Warren approached, and took the tarp in his hand, ripping it away with a tear.

Beneath it, cowering like a wounded animal, was a young boy, no older than twelve, clutching a dagger. He was clothed simply in a stained white shirt and blue jeans; when the tarp was removed and washed him in sunlight, his eyes widened, and the muscles of his scrawny form locked up, jittering with fear every few seconds.

Warren peered down at him with a judge’s cast. “You created that illusion, didn’t you?” he asked.

The boy gave no response, but tightened his eyes as tears began to well up in them.

“And if we got to close, you would run out and stab me, is that correct?” Warren spoke with a tone of voice so kind, like a mother reasoning with her child. It made the boy’s anger erupt.

He leapt off the ground, knife first, and made a lunge at Warren, who effortlessly stepped out of the way. The boy skipped forward, having thrown all of his weight into the stab, then regained it only to refocus his attack with animal rage.

Warren had stood near perfectly still, waiting to see what he would do next; that self-assured attitude radiated off of him, and only elicited more grunts of fury from the boy.

The calm, afternoon sun reflected in the blade, and as if reciting a dance, Warren evaded every single strike aimed his way. With each missed blow, the boy’s heart pounded with adrenaline, and an enormous stress built on his body, only able to be relieved by drawing blood. This continued for a minute; desperation sucked his being into the abyss, and he reached a fever pitch.

“[TREACHERY]!!”

A glint of light through the air, faster than the eye could see, and the scene around them was bathed in flame. Warren doubled back, the heat scorching his skin. Four figures, silhouetted by the fire, dashed out at him.

“The boy!”

Four blades stabbed and swung with murderous intent. Warren instinctively bent out of the way, narrowly missing every single one.

“It’s not right,” he realized. His natural inclinations had told him to dodge in the direction of one of the attackers, and he had corrected his course at the last moment to avoid the dagger. In the blink of an eye, he saw through the trick.

“[SALAMANDER]!”

Daso heard the command and stepped back. “No mercy, then?”

The scarlet spark of Warren’s rose shattered the illusion in a heartbeat. The flame was gone, the silhouetted copies had evaporated, and the only heat now was what rained down from the afternoon sun.

The boy felt a hand on his shoulder. He drew a breath and did not let it go, to hang on to that last sweet life in his lungs.

“Very clever,” Warren spoke with the same soft, parental voice. “Your ability is very robust, to make me feel the fire like that. Those coyotes before, they weren’t nearly as convincing… You seemed angry just now, do you think it’s stronger when you’re angry?”

Not a sound escaped the boy’s lips.

“Hm…” Warren sounded amused. “You know what gave it away? My senses wanted to lead me into one of your doubles, but my eye would never betray me like that. This is no ordinary eye,” he leaned down to whisper into the boy’s ear. “This is the eye that sees God, and he will never lead me astray. I am on the righteous path.”

At this, the boy’s legs buckled, and his knees hit the ground. He couldn’t cry, only his arms trembled, propping his body up.

The world was silent, even the flickering flames of destroyed houses, and Warren cast a relaxed gaze over him, observing his unique suffering. Far away, a crow cawed, and a larger shadow appeared overhead. Two massive wings flapped many feet above the boy.

“[SALAMANDER]!”

A short, painful shriek, and something hit the ground. The boy lifted his head, and finally saw clearly again; his eyes widened. It was a vulture, motionless. Its wings were charred, and a hole the size of a bowling ball was blown through its side. The message was made clear in the most brutal way.

“The bird will not feed today.”

“Now,” Warren began. “What is your name?”

All of the anger in the boy’s heart was gone, and he finally let go of the last breath of his life.

“Bleech.”

“Bleech?”

The child, defeated and dirty, sat up on his knees and turned to face the man who had killed everyone he knew. Warren’s face looked down on him, half-swallowed by shadow, and his blond, black-tipped locks blew like leaves in a gentle breeze.

Something wasn’t right; the sensation that he was staring at a mass-murderer never even entered Bleech’s mind. It was entirely different, almost peaceful.

“He looks like… the Saviour…”

In reality, the Saviour’s face was never depicted in art. The great steward of the human race was a universal figure, Their face obscured by a veil, always wrapped in robes. In fact, despite being referred to as “He,” the popular theory among modern theologians explained that this was due to the language of the Holy Texts not having a gender neutral pronoun. The enigma of the Saviour’s identity meant that it could be anyone.

“Anyone…”

That hollow, dead-cold hole in Bleech’s chest was being filled, moment by moment, with a feeling of awe, like his heart was passing through clouds.

“Bleech is a beautiful name,” Warren continued. “Very stark as well. Is it Hemmenan?”

The words quivered a bit as the left Bleech’s throat. “Y-yes it is.” Everything was soft, but the peace was fragile.

“It’s good to meet you, Bleech.” Warren’s lips widened into a smile, and he knelt down, extending his hand. Bleech, with steady, shaking movements, reached out his own hand and took the offer. For the circumstances, a vulgar civility. “You have an ability, much like I do. Do you know what it’s called?”

“It’s- it’s… Treachery…” Bleech stumbled.

Warren let his hands hang over his knees. “Yes, it’s a power called a Vocation. My Daso possesses one, as do I.”

Malvado glanced at Daso. “And me…” he mumbled.

“As does he,” Warren added. “I wasn’t lying when I told you that this eye sees God.” He pointed to his rose. “Our souls are wanderers, living lives to discover the Truth so that in the next we might be with Him. Those with Vocation are called to find that place. You and I…” he paused, boring his sight into the boy. “Can find God.”

His monologue was capped by an honest smile, and he stood up with a start, looking down at Bleech from the same holy vantage point. There was almost no doubt about it, his knowledge was divinely inspired.

“My Vocation is calling me to wipe away the evil in this world, would you follow me?”

Warren’s offer hung in the air for a moment, until Bleech found the courage to speak up.

“Of course.”