“What do you want?” I ask the eyes in the flame, not
entirely sure how or why I am staying calm. Insanity seems like the correct response
as a face begins to form around the eyes.
No. Not a face. That’s not the way to describe the thing
that I am looking at. It’s too… wrong for that.
It’s a huge gaping maw, and it’s the abyss itself. Death and hatred and
hunger and fear all at once, looking at me out of the flame.
The words do not come fully formed. They’re in an entirely
other language… something that should be unspeakable, but I understand anyway.
The sounds change shape by the time my brain processes them, and change into
something more coherent.
YOU SUMMONED/WEPT/PRAYED
TO ME/US
I think there are words that he is saying that don’t make
sense in our languge. Maybe in our understanding.
Instead, it comes through as
a combination of all of the closest words. I can feel it happening in my brain,
and it feels like trying to see around a paradox.
“What are you?” Maria says to the flame, her eyes still
locked on the thing behind me, and dark tears still running down her face in
the darkness.
BEYOND/ABOVE/BELOW
YOUR COMPREHENSION/ABILITY
“We didn’t summon you.” She says. “We were trying to perform
a séance.”
A SÉANCE/SUMMONING/PRAYER
FOR ONE WHO IS NOT DEAD/BORN?
My heart leaps, as I realise part of what it is saying.
“She’s alive?”
The thing looks at
me, and for a moment, it falters.
NO/YES… IT IS
IMPOSSIBLE TO –
I look at Maria, confidence building within the terror.
“It’s possible that…” she began to say. “A séance for
someone who wasn’t dead…”
YOU
CALLED/PRAYED/BEGGED TO ME/US
“Beg forgiveness,” Maria hisses at me.
“I’m sorry,” I say to the flame. “It was…unintentional. We
were searching for someone.”
YOU FOUND OTHER/ME
“Yes. We’re sorry for…”
YOU CALL US… YOU, THE
KILLER/MURDERER OF ALL
I stiffen, like someone’s flushed ice through my veins. I
feel it wash down from my brain through my body.
“I’m not that.”
THE KILLER/MURDERER OF
ALL
“Why do you call me that?”
THE GOD/ME KILLER
“You don’t know who I am.”
YOU ARE THE
MAN/BOY/PRINCE/KING
I realise that Maria is looking at me rather than at the
thing now, her eyebrows knotted in confusion.
“What’s it talking about, Darren?” She asks, and now I can
see that it is blood on her face.
I look around, looking for the long limbed thing that was
outside of the circle, that put us in darkness.
HE IS NOT TO BE
FEARED/LOVED…. HE IS JUST KEEPING/HOLDING THE CIRCLE/SUMMONING/PRAYER,
MAN/BOY/PRINCE/KING… KEEPING/HOLDING YOU HERE/THERE
“Why do you call him….king?” Maria asks.
HE IS THE MAN/BOY/PRINCE/KING,
THE KILLER OF ALL
“Are you going to kill him?”
NO
“You sound scared of him.”
NO…NOT SCARED….IN AWE
INTERLUDE
I feel you.
From down here. Down in the centre of the earth.
My resting place.
I feel you.
Your call to me.
Your song.
I have so far to climb to reach you.
But your song, it moves me, and even in the heat, I begin to
move. I begin to climb and push and tear my way through to you.
It will be slow, but I will make it.
For you.
My love.
It has been so long.
So long.
But I am coming for you.
Once again, we will be together.
END INTERLUDE
“Please,” I say. “Can you clarify… my wife… is she alive?”
I’m not comfortable with what it has been saying, but the
fact that it has engaged us at all makes me feel less trapped. More like this
could go somewhere.
I don’t know what it wants, but if we’re talking, I’m going
to use it to try and find out more about what has been going on.
I wish I was more scared by how calm I am.
SHE IS THERE/ELSEWHERE
“What does that mean?”
SHE IS OUT OF EVEN
OUR/MY AWARENESS, MAN/BOY/PRINCE/KING
Maria has her eyes closed, while she tries to clear her
head. I can still feel the thing behind me squirming, but it doesn’t seem to be
crossing the circle.
“Can you help us find her?” I ask.
SHE HAS BEEN
TAKEN/KEPT
“Who could have done this? Who could have taken her so
completely away?”
THERE IS ONLY ONE,
MAN/BOY/PRINCE/KING…
“Who?”
THE CHILD/SON OF THE
DEVIL/DEMON