In the wake of a storm, there should be peace. A calm when winds have stopped, the sky has cleared, and rain has washed the world clean.
But on the slopes of this hill, there is no peace. Thick fog shrouds the wreckage of a sky ship. Splintered boards scattered along a trail of broken trees lead to the smashed hull with partially-intact cabins at the edge of an open field, while the tattered canopy covers the treetops beside it. In the fog, figures ... move. Shadowy things with too-long limbs, twisted at impossible angles, scarlet dripping from their bodies.
Beside the tilted boards of what had once been the deck, a fox-faced girl with lush fur like smoke wakes to nightmare. Her body aches dully -- head, ribs, left leg, left arm, back -- and her lungs burn with each breath. But that's not the worst of it.
A Gallee is beside her, in the blood-stained robes of a mage. His left arm hangs at his side, twisted backwards at the elbow, half-torn off at the shoulder, shards of bone jutting out of the flesh The right half of his head is caved in, gore and blood dripping down his neck. That's not the worst of it, either.
The worst of it is that he's standing over her, his left eye focused on her. "You live." His voice is flat and sepulchral. "Why? Why did you kill me, Egalantine? I was trying to help you, Egalantine."
At first, the girl only wants to shut herself away from the world, away from the pain, away from the images that haunt her. To go back to sleep, and hope the nightmare is over when she wakes up again. She curls further in to a ball, aching as she forces her body to move. She listens to the beratement with trepidation, trying to tune it out, trying not to look ...
Sleep offers no respite: the same face lurks behind her eyelids. The sounds of the storm echo in her inner ear: the rolling crash of thunder, the shouts of the crew, the cracking of the hull when it struck the tree tops as they tried to bring the skyship down, already hopelessly off course. The screams.
The screams.
The nightmare's not over yet. It never is. "Why, Egalantine?" the dead man asks. His ruined right hand reaches for her like a puppet on strings. "Why did you kill us?"
"I didn't kill you," Lauryn Eglantine whispers in response, unable to tune the man out any further, unable to shake off growing guilt. I didn't. "I didn't," she whimpers, but with more vigor, trying to reassure all and creation of the fact. The uncertainty makes her throat seize as the beginnings of panic wash over her, her clouded mind snapping in to full awareness. She jerks to knees, wobbiling, clutching her head and staring up at the corpse. "NO, it's not my fault. IT'S NOT MY FAULT, Leave me alone! GO AWAY!" she screeches horsely, fear, horror, revulsion hightening her voice to a all-to familiar maddened pitch. Her own screaming voice, the voice she hates, the sound, drives her own, as if she could shout herself away, scream herself in to oblivion as much as the apparition. "GO AWAY!!"
Fresh pain lances through her left leg as she stands, and it almost buckles underneath her.
"Where?" The dead man looms over her. His blood drips onto her shoulder, trickles down her chest. "Where can I go now, Egalantine? You destroyed the airship. You killed us all. There is nowhere left for us to go. We must stay here." From below the deck, she hears another moan. One of the distant shadowy forms roams closer: the ship's captain. Former captain. Dead like the mage, a tree branch driven through one side of his chest -- and like the mage, still moving. He stares at the girl with eyes full of accusation.
"I don't know, I don't KNOW," Lauryn rasps, her voice straining from the shouting, from the pain of standing. She stumbles a step, then begins limping, limping away from the mage and the captain. Away. She just wants to get away, away from it all, the screams, the bloody mess, the guilt ... To where, it doesn't matter. The ship can't have crashed, this isn't real, Mage de Lis said he'd help me -- he'd help me! This can't be real! It can't!//
"I wanted to help you, Egalantine." The dead man's voice follows her even as she limps away. "I wanted to teach you to control your powers. Were you too willful? Did you not wish to learn? Would you rather be surrounded by your own nightmares than let another tell you what to do? Why did you kill me, Egalantine?" The level, uninflected voice pursues her. A couple of sailors rises between her and her escape: one with both legs crushed and dragging himself by his arms, the other with his head twisted halfway behind his back. They don't touch her. They just look at her.
The girl stumbles to a halt as the sailors approach. She stares back, face twisting in to a grimace, body shaking from fear and strain. "I didn't kill you," she repeats. "I'm not too willful! I never wanted this! I never wanted any of this! I don't want power! I just want to be normal, NORMAL! I j-just want to read my books and, and ... " She staggers backward, then jerks again when she sees the captain and mage behind her still. Turning another way, she tries to limp around the dead men, to find a way out.
More dead men surround her, to the left and the right, behind and before. But there's a gap not quite closed between two of them, and they don't stop her when she limps sideways through it. Instead, they follow her. Their accusation is like a lead weight on her. "You ... should be ... dead, too," the captain rasps, voice breathy and bubbling from the branch that pierces his lungs. "Dead like us. Why should you live when we die?"
Around her, the other crewmen echo him in murmuring voices. Dead. Die. Dead like us. Die. Die. Die.
With a clear way, Lauryn can only keep going. She heads for the trees, for the inviting fog. How she wishes she were like the fog, misty, unknowable, untouchable, concealed ... unfeeling. "G-go to hell," she screams at the ghosts who follow her.
"Not without you," the captain tells her. Not without you not without you not without you ... the chorus of the dead answers. Through the fog cloaking the trees ahead, Lauryn can see more shapes stirring, half-heard ghostly voices calling out words she can't quite understand. Suddenly, the fog looks much less inviting.
"I'd go," the girl whispers to herself, unwilling to admit the truth: that she agrees. Not to the ghosts that haunt her, but only partially out of shame. No, she fears they'll grant her wish more. What could hell be -- what could be worse than this? "I probably belong in hell." The idea that she belongs anywhere is vaguely comforting to Lauryn, even if it's among demons. She'd be a demon, if just to feel peace somewhere. Anywhere. And it seems, she has a choice now: the afterlife behind her, or the unknown of the fog. Certain terror, or unknown fears in the dark ... She walks on, in to the fog.
The dead follow her, flanking to either side and in ranks behind her. Egalantine's smoky fur blends with the fog, making her look more like a ghost than the hideously realistic apparitions with her. The fog thickens and darkens: it smells of ash and rotting flesh. The trees turn black and twisted, spiked limbs reaching to a leaden sky.
Lauryn just tries to keep going, even if she isn't sure why, or where. The thought of lying down and submitting to the forces of the world calls to her like the dead, but she keeps on, without really knowing why. Maybe if she keeps going she'll finally wake up, like the others, the real people, the non-monsters. She considers calling out, maybe someone will hear her, someone ... But she's too afraid. She doesn't know who -- or what -- may answer. At least the fog is cool against her wounds, uncarring. It just is. How she envies it.
Even as she thinks that the fog is cool, it turns warmer. Each breath of it is like acid in her lungs, searing. Her ribcage feels tight, like bands of steel are wrapped around it and constricting her every time she inhales. Her leg hurts more if she puts weight on it. The world is an empty ruin around her, smelling of death, tasting of death. Worse than death: pain. "I wanted to help you, Egalantine," Mage de Lis whispers at her back. "Why didn't you let me help you? Now you have destroyed us all."
There's no one here to cry out to, nothing but her and her ghosts -- wait. Footsteps, and a clicking noise, like men moving in chitin armor. A voice calls out to one side of her, in a language she doesn't understand.
"Just .. leave me ... alone," the girl rasps as she staggers one last step. He body protests, screams, and she oblidges. Sinking to her knees, she colapses on to the charred earth. It's here she hears the sounds -- armor? Did she kill someone with armor, too? But the voice ... She struggles, unable to decide if she wants to call out to them -- or scream at them to leave her alone.
The dead turn to face the newcomers. The sounds of movement stop save for a few clinks; she can catch a hushed, uneven breathing. Out of the corner of her eye she can see a score of figures in curious dress. They wear something that might be armor, but it's like no chitin or metal armor she's seen before. Most of the figures are vulpine in shape, but a few humans are among them. The same voice that spoke earlier calls out again. She still can't understand the language, but the tone is strong and imperative.
Unable to quite grasp what has happened, Lauryn props herself up with her stronger arm. Though it quivers, the limb manages to allow her a view of the situation -- a scene that she can only stare at. The newcomers are strange to her, and she takes them for soldiers, though they are unlike any soldier she has seen or read about. She can only decide they must have also come to haunt her: twisted guardians, mocking her want for help and safety. She screams at them too, telling them to leave her alone, and that she didn't kill them either.
The vulpine and human soldiers don't look dead, or like ghosts. Most of them are wearing helmets, though, and some have sinister masks that cover their features: horns and carved, twisted grins lacquered in gleaming reds and blacks. Perhaps they are the demons of hell, sent to welcome her host.
But the ones who go unmasked don't look demonic. Most of them are taken aback by the apparitions around her. Half hold slightly curved swords before them, shifting their grip as they await their leader's command. The other half hold strung bows and arrows, not yet raised to fire.
Their commander -- one of the masked ones -- barks another unintelligible command. He doesn't sound afraid. The wind howls, mournful, and the fog thickens around them, the trees bending to reach them. The skyship captain answers the man -- and Lauryn can't understand him, either. But the demon-soldier apparently does: he gives another order, and the bowman raise their weapons into firing position.
It suddenly occur to Lauryn that these men, as impossible as it might be, may be real. That they talk to each other in an improbable language strikes her as telling in some way, but she hasn't much time to think on it, because she decides flatten herself to the sundered earth. Maybe the demons heard my prayer, and have come for me, she considers, shivering at the thought. Or maybe they have come to kill me. She isn't sure which would be worse, but at least can decide she doesn't want to test their arrows so quickly.
The dead men around her lurch torwards the demon-soldiers. Another command from the fox-demon: bowstrings twang and arrows thunk to the ground around her. The arrows don't impede the dead, however. Lauryn has a strange moment of double vision, seeing an arrow both pass through the captain's body, and stick in it. She can see the arrow on the ground at the far side of him, but it's also inside him. He ignores it, advancing on the strangers with his crew. Mage de Lis raises his hands and chants the words of a spell.
To Lauryn, this is a rare sight. The double vision the arrow produces is also telling, and she knows it means something. for she has seen it a scant few times before. With Made de Lis, and ... elsewhere, in a place she doesn't want to remember. The place she tries to ignore dances on the edge of memory, trying to get in, trying to reach her, even as she struggles with what the arrow may mean. It's no use; can't grasp the memory, can't focus enough through the myrid pains. So instead, she reaches out, pushing her hand through the dirt to try and grasp the arrow that pierced the captain ...
The arrow is of smooth dark wood with feathered fletching at one end. It feels ... very real.
More arrows rain down, farther forward now as they're aimed at the advancing dead rather than where Lauryn lies cowering. The demon-soldiers fall back in the face of the sailors who are undetered by the arrows sticking out of them. But Lauryn notices that there are as many arrows in the ground as were fired -- and as many as are stuck in the apparitions. The demon leader barks a command, and his men stop retreating. They hold their ground, then engage with sword when the apparitions close ranks.
Lauryn runs her hand along the dark wood, feeling the feathers, touching the tip so that it pricks her finger and makes her bleed. She yelps, caught off guard by the ver real sensation, staring at the blood with shock. "It is real," she breathes, even as a little voice in her head questions wether she may not simply have accended to a new level of madness, instead. Still, she clings to the hope that -- demon or no -- something real has come. Clutching the arrow like a comforting old doll, she curls up around it.
The melee between the soldiers and the dead crew is horrific. The dead mean scream and flail at the soldiers, pulling arrows from their flesh to stab at the soldiers. De Lis finishes his spell, and a ball of fire launches from his hands to engulf the leader. The soldiers fall back while the leader cries out --
-- but when he steps from the fire unharmed, his men take heart. They hack at the apparitions with sword and fend off attacks with square curved shields. At first, the soldier's attacks seem to have no effect beyond making the dead more grisly and horrific, making each severed limb attack separate from the body. Gradually, however, the apparitions seem to weaken, somehow. They become translucent, and insubstantial. The fog thins. The trees become less spindly, and foliage returns to them.
More screaming. Sounds of fighting, demons versus the dead. Lauryn tries to curl up more, hope beyond hope they keep at each other and forget she's even here. She can't even imagine the outcome -- can the dead truly die? Can demons? But as long as they keep at each other, they're not after her. Maybe they'll go away, she thinks. And then, surprisingly, they do. As the noise diminishes, the girl isn't sure if she should be hopeful or just count the seconds before a blade finds her. The only comfort is that the world sounds more at ease, quieter, and for that at least, she's glad.
It's calm now. At last. She can hear the ragged breathing of the demon soldiers, and the soft, pained noises a couple of them are making after having been injured. Unlike the dead, who had showed no signs of pain, or feelings beyond anger and a desire for vengence on the living. She hears footsteps nearby, and the leader's voice again, barking a command. To her? He sounds very close, though she's curled up with her eyes closed.
The girl breathes a sigh of relief. The nightmare has abated, at least partially. While she fully expects it to return -- does it ever really leave her? -- the tide has ebbed, for now. In her relief, she allows herself a second to relax -- which causes her to yelp when the demon-leader presumably yells at her. Her eyes flick open, and she squints as she pushes herself up to sitting. Still clinging to the arrow, despite it digging in to her skin, she stares at the man. "A-are you ... a demon?"
The demon takes off his face -- or rather, lifts his mask so it rests on top of his helmet instead of over his face. Beneath the mask is a normal-looking fox's face, russet-furred with a white throat. He frowns down at her, and says something else she can't understand.
Lauryn begins to cringe when the man removes his mask, only to pause when she sees such a normal-looking vulpine face. She never imagined foxes could be demons. Her experince with the vulpines was limited, but even so, the worst thing she can remember is that certain creatures seemed fond of them, and that her step-brother thought tormenting them was "fine amusement." "I didn't help him, I didn't! He hounded your kind all on his own, with his friends! I swear, I never wanted him to!" She holds a hand out, pleading, the blood from the arrow wound still fresh on her hands.
The vulpine soldier cleans his sword and sheathes it, still frowning down at her. He shakes his head at her words, then crouches a little and offers her his hand, as if to help her to her feet. He barks a command over his shoulder, and two other soldiers come to his side. They move slowly, hesitant.
Hesitantly, Lauryn reaches for the hand. It speaks of her exhaustion and loneliness that she accepts at all. Now, here in this strange place, with the dead that hound her silent, any help is welcome -- be it demon or otherwise. She's too tired and too desperate to resist a offered comfort. "T-thank you," she mumbles, then pushes her hair out of her face with her free hand. The gesture leaves a streak of blood across her face.
The vulpine pulls her to her feet, taking in her condition with a practical eye. He gives an order to the two men, and they move to flank her. The one on the left grimaces with distates as he puts an arm around her back and her arm over his shoulders to support her as she walks. The leader moves back to his men, leaving the two soldiers to help Lauryn move.
A bit more of the reality sinks in for Lauryn as she studies there cautious, vulpine men who help her. They don't look demonic, save for their armor. They carry the expression of most people who have known her for a little while, who have been present during one of her 'episodes,' but who havn't fled. In short, they seem normal -- almost too normal. She wonders, briefly, if she's instead reached the afterlife, and that these are soldiers of the dead. Testingly, she uses her better arm to tug at a soldier's fur.
The fox growls something, and shrugs to pull his arm free from the tugging. The fur feels real: a little coarser than her own, but russet strands remain caught between her fingertips. They get back to the main group, where their injured are being bandaged. Lauryn feels woozy and her breathing is labored; the leader looks her over again before giving another command. From their supplies, they assemble a litter and put her on it.
Resting on the litter, Lauryn examines her two possessions: a lock of fox hair from the man who carried her, and the arrow that passed through the captain. Trophies of reality won, marks that she has escaped her nightmare for a little while -- or at least found a more pleasant one to dwell in. She turns them over until her arm grows sore, then she rests them against her chest. She feels drowsy now, spent. The whole experience took so much out of her, and without the adrenaline born of fear, she's quickly losing her grasp on conciousness.
The alien voices, with their crisp commands and unfamiliar intonations, are not comforting. But they aren't nightmarish, either, and there's something oddly reassuring in their strangeness. It's as if they too unusual not to be real. The litter isn't comfortable either; the motion of the two soldiers carrying her jars her now and again as they walk, and her body hurts even more than when she first regained consciousness. But it's better than when she was trying to walk on her own, and eventually she falls into a doze.
When she opens her eyes again, she's in a room shrouded by shadows that are pierced only by the uncertain light of the Hunter's Knife. Outside the door, something's breathing.
Heavy, panting breaths, ragged, hungry. It pauses by the door, and moans.
Lauryn knows this thing. There's only one way to escape it: by being quiet and motionless. If she moves, if she cries out, if she tries to run, it will be upon her in an instant. If she's absolutely still, it might move on. Find some other, more interesting prey.
And so Lauryn doesn't move. Statue still, she holds the darkness like a blanket, hoping it will conceal her, trying to hide beyond it. Though her body is still, her mind races. What if it finds her? What if she has to move -- a sneeze, a cough? If she can just be still long enough, it'll go away ...
Of course, when you can't move, the need to move is all the greater. Her whole body hurts, and she finds that she desperately wants to shift position, to see if she can find a way to lie that doesn't put quite so much pressure on her leg; one that would the ache in her back and along her ribs. She feels stiff as well, and she wants to stretch. There are bandages wrapped tightly around her ribs, left arm, head, and leg.
Slowly, ever so slowly and with great care, Lauryn edges over. She untangles her hand, and reaches to brace herself. If she's careful, if she's quiet, she can move and get more comfortable. Maybe. If she's careful ...
The moan turns into a predatory snarl. The door swings open -- or is it sliding open? Where is she? The door flickers, from a white that almost glows even in the low light to the dark wood of the Asylum. Footsteps pad on -- stone? Wood? Talons click. Click. A quasi-cheerful voice calls out from the distance, "Time for your medicine!" The monster in her room doesn't seem to hear that voice; it never does. Its long neck swings from side to side, sniffing at the air. Ears swivel, listening.
The girl freeze half way to laying down, in an even more uncomfortable position than she was before. Her wide eyes fix on the creature, unable to look away. If I'm quiet, it will go away. If I'm quiet, it will go away, she repeats, mantra-like, in her head.
Then there are more voices. The new ones are neither monstrous nor familiar. They speak in a language she doesn't know, with clipped, querulous tones. The monster in her room turns from her to the new sounds. The cheerful voice is saying, "Having a bit of an episode, are we? Now now, you know what happens if we don't take our medicine ... "
Why doesn't she see it? Be quiet, it will hear you -- run away, Lauryn pleads in her head. Her eyes squeeze shut, as if being unable to see the monster might make it unable to see her. Her body aches, but she can't move. If she moves, it will find her, and then it will be all over.
A female figure appears in the open doorway, dressed in strange clothing and speaking the strange language. She holds a kind of lamp in one hand, and she gasps as the light from it falls on the monster. It's a scaly, demented thing the size of a Rhian. It bares ridged teeth and pounces towards her as she falls back, screaming.
Despite the sounds of horror, Lauryn remains frozen. She tried to warn the woman, she really tried, but to move is to be seen. There's nothing she could do! Another voice, a guilty voice deep inside, tells her she let the woman be caught. If it finds her, it won't find you. Let her go, let her go and die, and you will be safe. The honest truth hurts as much of her wounds -- she would let the monster find someone else, if it kept it from her.
Frozen as she is, Lauryn can't see what's happening, but the sounds are bad enough: screams and whimpering cries from the woman, frantic thumping noises, slurping and clicking and other sounds from the monster. It seems to go on forever. The artificial cheer of the other female voice carries over it: "You'll be better in just a moment!" Lauryn knows the pain that accompanies those words from personal experience, even if she's not the victim of it right now.
More memories come with the guilt, blurring with reality. "Having a bit of an episode, are we? Now now, you know what happens if we don't take our medicine," the voice repeats in her mind. How she hated that voice, hated the medicine that would render her barely concious, sending the world in to confusion. When the monster came, sometimes she'd wish it would eat the cheery woman with her medicine. But sometimes, it seemed like the monster is the woman with the medicine, and then what could she hope for? If I don't move, it won't find me, she begins again.
There's a scream from the other room, too. Then other people rouse in adjoining beds in Lauryn's room, and they cry out. Lauryn's surprised to realize she's not alone as one of the other people in the room go to try to help the poor person wrestling with the monster. More reinforcements come: demon-soldiers stomp into the room and do battle with the monster.
The newcomers causes Lauryn to look. The memories offer little in the way of company, save for monsters and the cheery woman with her medicine. This is different. The gathering evokes simultanious feelings of relief and more guilt: relief she is not alone, relief the monster kind find other prey; guilt she's too afraid to help, guilt that a part of her doesn't want to.
Afterwards, they carry out the monster's victim on a litter. Eyes turn to look at Lauryn, full of suspicion. Some kind of hushed argument begins; as it grows in volume, the demon-soldiers are ushersd out by their leader.
Finding herself watched, Lauryn closes her eyes again, hoping they too will go away. If she's still, maybe the eyes will vanish, the demon-ma will go away, and she'll be alone again. If I'm quiet, they'll go away, she starts anew.
The mantra works this time, too. They go away, and she's left in peace again.
Silence. She's alone again, alone with her thoughts and with the darkness. Only unobserved, far away, alone can she be safe. When she's not alone, there are the eyes. That look, the accusing look that makes her feel guilty and wretched. The eyes and their suspicious faces, always different, but always the same face. She hates them almost as much as she hates the monsters, fellow souls who carry nightmares in their eyes to go with monsters. She breathes a sigh, and begins to relax.
For a little while. She falls back asleep, but awakes briefly as she's loaded onto a litter. She drifts off again amdist the murmuring of strange voices. When she wakes again, she's lying on a mat in a room walled by what looks like thin white paper. It's brightly lit by sunlight, and she's alone except for a soldier. One of the demon soldiers, kneeling on a mat before a small flat table, and painting on white paper.
Seeing nothing outwardly horrible about the room stirs suspicion in Lauryn. She watches through barely opened eyes, not trusting reality to be so kind. Even the sun no longer seems cheery to her. Its bright light and promise is a mockery she does not appreciate; she knows full well the truth. Still, nothing jumps out at her immediately, so she hazards opening her eyes a little more, and slowly rising.
Nothing horrible happens. The demon soldier does stop painting, though. He lays his brush to one side, tip resting on an ink-stained stone, and turns to regard Lauryn. He says two brief words, something like "a-saym loh-rayn."
Lauryn's ears shoot up at the words, and she blinks. She could swear that she almost understood what the man said, "loh-rayn" sounds an awful lot like her name. But, she doesn't remember telling anyone her name. Maybe demons just know. For a moment, she struggles with suspicion, and decides to reply. "H-hello, demon."
The demon flicks his own ears to the side. He says a few more sentences Lauryn can't understand.
Lauryn never really thought about what languages demons -- or the dead -- would speak, but she finds herself unsurprised that she doesn't know it. As much as she liked to read, she never ventured in to understanding other languages -- and she doubts if 'demon' would even ahve been an option, anyway. Trying to find some common ground, she scoots a little closer, and tries to see what the demon-man was drawing.
It looks less like a painting on close inspection, and more like writing: fine, careful brush strokes of tiny characters that march in columns down the page. The demon-fox doesn't seem to mind her looking at it. When she doesn't say anything in response to his words, he returns to his painting.
The drawing means about as much as the man's words -- that is, very little. At a loss for how to communicate, Lauryn eventually returns to just sitting and staring at the man, like a black, ghostly statue.