Sign In
Create Account
Think I'll share, for the curious.
The first of them was a little story I drummed up by the name of Daemon. As you may have guessed, it's main subject is demons(although unfortunately I never really got far enough to go in depth). The structure is peculiar, but I found it appropriate at the time. Without further ado;
D A E M O N
B O O K I
A R C I
P R E L U D E
l
l
l
l
Deep cold breaths tantalized the air.
A silvery tongue clicked, parting the
abominable lips and revealing an unruly
number of teeth. Only a lone amber
eye blinked. Only a dark gaze protruded
from that mass of swirling clouds. The
silvery tongue tasted the air again and
a greedy smile formed in sinister
agreement.
The mass emitted a noise. It was
not just a babble, but a form of speech.
The noises were in a pattern and
intelligently arranged. Something that
could be called a language. It was a
language different than what the
human ear has been accommodated to
and is most readily explained as a convulsion
of latin, spoken like thunder. Every syllable
would penetrate the heart and mind of
a mortal and drive it ill to insanity.
“You look tasty enough to eat.”
The swirling mass took, what seemed like
a step, forward its dark entrails oozing
all over the grassy mounds of rotting dirt.
“Stand back!”
The mass thrashed, explosions of
darkness erupting from its surface. The
coldness of the air seized it, causing the
figure to instantly remain still. The silence
that followed gutted slowly into the mood,
fresh blood now slipped onto the ground
from the brazen lips that housed the silvery
tongue. It lapped up the life liquid almost
pleasingly, the pain losing out to the
insatiable thirst of that hungry glare.
“Idiotic beast. You were not spared,
simply underestimated.”
Spared would be no one. The rule
of the land was null. Only terror
and size governed the madness that
remained so inconclusively
asleep. The beaten shadow
clouds remained a sight’s away
from the aggrieved figure. The frail figure
that had so easily repelled the morbid
spirit absorbed the melancholy of the
world around it. Its grievance was
so tangible it weighed down the air. So
tactile it was that it frightened the
ravenous hunger that had awaited it
so eagerly. So it walked past the plains
undisturbed. Only the muddy ground
made resistance to its pained existence.
The sloppy plains met up with what
seemed like a sea of hills, evenly distanced
and scarcely barren. Every hill was a mossy,
wet green. The air felt damp. It felt cold.
It felt distancing. The figure looked at
it with a plain expression. The lost eyes
did not change their nonchalant tone. No
smile made its way there. The pale body
stood in reminiscence taking in the scene,
making its final declaration. There could
be no turning back from now because…
It was here on these
desolate hills that the stench of death
remained the strongest. It was here where
everything had begun. It was here where
it all would end. It was here that
a legacy had awoken.
D A E M O N
B O O K I
A R C I
F A L L
l
l
l
l
He viewed the world as miserable
cesspool of corruption and despair.
Who were they to judge him for the
way he acted? What was the
world to him? It meant nothing
to the silent observer, he who
watched with disgust.
Love? A word for the frail
and faint. An emotion
on the fast lane to death. Pathetic.
Happiness? Does such a thing
exist? There is no perfect happiness.
Only the enjoyment of another’s
failings. Happiness is a farce.
Why are humans so pathetic?
Who are they?
To judge me?
Faint footsteps governed over the
silence of the stone path. This
particular path, washed away by
the rains of ages, was traveled most
frequently by daylight. The occurrence
of a traveler amongst its entrails at
the dead of night was all but common
and rarer was the passenger it
carried.
A man with a heart made of
stone. It weighed so heavily upon
his body that the further his footsteps
took him, the more his eyes saw, the
deeper the stone sank, the further his
soul plunged into nothingness.
His elegant appearance, yet rough
features were testimony to his twisted
personality. He was morbid yes, but in
the most cynical of ways. Sane to himself
and above all skeptical of everything.
His pale green eyes watched
the world around him with great contempt.
The softness of the earth, he observed,
corrupted by the soles of human arrogance.
The air, once natural, was now tainted with smog.
Only the rain that fell seemed to
soothe his inexplicable hatred. It was gentle,
independent, and most of all free.
Water trickled
down from his fingers and descended within the
cracks and pores of the stone path. Because of the
slope he now stood on, they descended at a quicker
pace, almost as if hurrying to their fate. They were
all fated to end up in a hole.
Just like bloody humanity.
The luscious green of the meadows swayed with the
night breeze, giving small thought to the hardened
traveler.
Behind him lay a great city, formed throughout
the ages, carved out the stone it called its foundation.
It was always moving, always changing, always adapting.
An age of great mechanical monsters now called this
world their own. Beasts that emitted the foul stench of
human repugnance were housed in immense structures
where men, women and children scurried about
scraping up the misery they called a living.
All in vain.
Blasts of smog filled the air above the buildings
and the traveler returned to his walk unbeknownst
to the world he resided in. Faint cries in the distance
told of raptures and theft, murder and rape, deception
and lies, evil and sin.
He listened in disgust to the sounds emitted from
the forest. They sounded like animals, but he was
certain they were human. That heavy breathing, that
heavy panting was that of a woman’s. It accelerated
and steepened at unpredictable intervals. Something in
the emotion behind it, the passion the heaving expressed,
the intensity it perspired, something in all of that clarified to
the man on the path the event that occurred with the dark forest.
Humans are stupid creatures.
The panting continued mercilessly, almost as if
crying out to him. There was nothing that voice could offer
him. Every carnal desire he disdained. The adrenaline of gambling,
the vices of money, the pleasure of corruption, the company of
women; they were all below him.
He walked away. The stone path was gradually swallowed up
by vines and rogue grass. Only a few signs of the ages remained
carved deeply into the waning ground. His feet jogged up and down,
causing dents imperceptible to the human eye.
The further away he walked, the louder the plea became. The faster
his steps took him, the more pronounced the noise became.
The voice cried out.
“Come.”
His eyes stared straight into the black and
he answered.
“No.”
"Why do you resist me?"Her voice was sweetened like honey.
”I do not resist you.”
I simply despise what you are.
She layered her voice with a desiring tone. A voice
a harlot would be proud to call her own.
”A disgusting human.”
The cold laugh disrupted his train of thoughts
and before a single live cell in his body could
respond, cold steel pressed on his neck, a trickle
of crimson red decorating the edge.
With every word her voice became angrier and the
blade pressed harder. “You’re a difficult man to seduce.”
His teeth shut tightly on the air, contracting as though
the coldness of the steel was freezing him.
His mind had become an empty slate, so purely focused
on the stranger behind him.
“It’s strange,” she said, “Men usually give themselves over
to me before I kill them.”
The traveler grinned, almost devilishly.
“I can’t possibly imagine why.”
D A E M O N
B O O K I
D E C I S I O N S
I
I
I
I
The sharp, cold steel of the blade
whispered an infinity of curses,
tortures and the madness that would ensue
after her will had been done.
An old proverb of the age once said:
”A simple motion of a hand becomes
the giver and taker of life. A blade draws
blood when told to. Humans draw blood
when their is something to gain.”
She pulled the blade.
What did she have to gain from the misfortune
of another?
What motive could she have?
Who knew?
The air became an unpleasant ripple of
delirium. Humid and dense, like it had been
poisoned with madness.
The woman gave no appreciation to the
sudden change. It was almost as though
she was used to the insane feeling. Like that
force had become a nuisance rather than
a danger.
A presence loomed over the dead corpse.
She did not bat an eye.
"You bled him to death.”
Below the new voice
a devilish smile etched into a stony countenance
faced the sky. Blankets of crimson elixir flowed from
an incision on the neck of the frail human skin. It
almost feigned the life it never had in its pained existence.
The face once pale now held a waning rosy complexion. Only
his eyes were darkened and filed with grim hatred
for all the misery to ever cross them.
The air seemed to tense up with each
millimeter that spilled.
“Who do you think we are Maya? Common thieves?”
“Hold your tongue Verenai. You speak with no authority.”
The honey that had coated her sweet words dripped off
with every syllable. Maya looked at the man with a hatred
that dated a millennia ago.
“Anger me and I will destroy you
before they find me here."
For an icy moment her shape flickered into
a slender, taller figure. It was hard to grasp
at the moment, but her skin was sleek, like a
glossy, thin transparent membrane covered
tightly knit scales.
Maya closed her eyes and released the
mounting pressure.
Her skin faded from a light blue to the peachy
color she once had.
Verenai smiled amusedly. “The effects are
wearing off.” A pause. “The flashback was longer than
usual.” He looked at his hand, as if not
sure what its use was. “At any rate, we must find
more before the moon turns dark.”
His companion searched the corpse at her feet.
”Ironic, no?” He continued looking at the night
sky. “That our greatest strength is
our greatest weakness.”
She sneered. “Bloody fool. I’ll have your head.
Be resourceful and assist me in my search.”
He laughed a cold, inhumane laugh.
Maya snarled, “Indecisive as ever I see.”
“No, not indecisive. Just multi-opinioned.”
He scanned the body. “Quit searching. You
know as well as I that its beyond reach now.”
She almost screeched, her only warning a color
change in her fingers. “How are we supposed to come
across another?” She beat the body, pulses of blood
spilling with each strike.
“Patience is the key.”
“Damn the key fool. To he-“
She was cut off and in an instant was
knocked over. Verenai stood over her.
“Do not mention that prison. You know
how the pull will affect us.”
Hell. A word that riles the very core of human emotion,
logic and theology controls the very reason of Verenai’s
unprecedented action.
Maya wiped her mouth and spat on the ground.
Ferocity glowed in her eyes. “I don’t need a
reminder from you.”
The emphasis on the “you” was demeaning, but
Verenai decided not to push his luck.
“Did you hear that?”
Maya too desperate in her search did not
hear him.
In the distance a bell chimed. The purest
tone ever to come to fruition.
With every strike the hairs on Verenai’s
neck flared. His dark eyes widened
under his midnight hood.
”They’re advancing. Make haste Maya!”
“Damn this!”
Anger brewed, convulsed and escalated.
She grasped the limp body and flung it sky way.
It rotated on an invisible axis, almost defying
gravity. The ground caught the body with an
audible thud as if mocking the fruitless effort
of the uncontrollable murderess.
“There’s nothing on it let’s go.”
The bell chimed again. The tone more
pronounced, clear and concise. The purity
of it intensified with proximity.
Verenai held his abdominal region.
He felt uneasy. Reduced to a miserable
thief. There will be an end to this.
“Veranai, quick! I’ve got it.”
Her hands held something obscured by
her fingers.
One look at Maya and the uneasiness he felt
became a tingling sensation.
He mouthed almost to himself,
”Freedom.”
D A E M O N
B O O K I
A W A K E N I N G
I
I
I
I
Sharp, numbing pain. It’s the feeling one gets
after waking from an unpleasant sleep. Perhaps
caused by pure exhaustion or a trick of the mind.
Whatever the reason, when one stirs from death,
pain is… well…
Pain is welcome in comparison.
He awoke with a sudden start, a sudden start to an
unprecedented beginning. The beginning of death.
A paradox? Perhaps. He decided not to muse on
theology, a subject that was far beyond his
interests. His vision was foggy, or maybe he
was just simply blind? He blinked a couple of times,
the sharp pain in his head subsiding as his brain
focused on recovering his vision.
“A rock?”
The ground below him was solid and rugged in texture, completely
uncomfortable on his nether regions. Was he
sitting on a rock?
“Well if it is a rock, it’s a bloody huge one.”
He could not see it, but he felt he was on a slope. It may have
been a descent on a huge boulder, but how to tell? He rubbed
his eyes with one hand, while the other hand guided him down the slope.
It became increasingly difficult to descend. Even though the rock was
sturdy, it was more brittle as he went closer to the base.
As if it was a cruel trick of nature, the air became cooler
the farther along he got. At first it was a mild breeze, one he
welcomed (his throat had been burning even though
he felt no wound there), but it soon became more intense.
It felt as though the very essence of his body, all the warmth,
all the happiness, every little hope was left behind with each step.
At the very foot of the descent, his hands submerged and emerged just
as quickly into and out of a chilly stream. He was not aware it was there,
of course, for his vision had yet to improve. It was rather shocking, or
so it felt, to come in contact with another form of matter. He dipped his
hand again, this time scooping up the substance and bringing it
closer to his face. It only took him a moment to let the liquid splatter
onto the ground. His hand had become numb, and the feeling was already
spreading on to the rest of his arm. He let out a silent gasp,
as the feeling came back the instant all of the liquid came out
of contact with his skin.
“Definitely not some place I want to fall in.” His brain was
desperately searching for an answer that would solve
his problem. Opening his mouth to release a scream, his voice
faltered. He felt so many urges to yell, but he was afraid
to.
“What’s wrong… why am I so afraid?”
He crept along the border of the freezing river, retreating
whenever he would feel the liquid lap up onto the shore. For
what felt like a day, he crawled and crawled in this same fashion.
His vision never improved, and the freezing cold always getting
colder.
Something in the history of humanity has always related success
to failure. For something to succeed, something else must
fail in comparison. It applies, as so, to each and every individual.
To win, something must lose. To find oneself…
“I must give up.”
All of his muscles loosened up as he collapsed onto the rocky
ground. Not from exhaustion, but of frustration. He was bonded
to this boulder, cold and alone. Alone? He hadn’t even given much thought to it. Wherever he was…
“I’m completely alone.”
He stared(or he tried to anyway, it’s hard to say when
you’re blind) skyward and his nails dug into the ground.
It was dangerously brittle now, but who would pay heed to
something so insignificantly important?
“Insignificantly important? I’m making no sense.”
It is a simple task to make no sense. Consequently
though, it is difficult to adapt to nonsense. A difficulty not
explicable with words and only understandable through experience.
And it is through experience that one learns to overcome
difficulty.
“Who in the world has gone through this though? I can’t
see a dam thing.”
He pounded the ground, fist clenched and sweating.
The force of the impact resonated dangerously
within the rock itself, and only when a snap echoed
did he notice the cracks that had begun to form.
“What the hell? Is this thing shifting?”
The foundation was weak, barely supporting the rest of the
rocky structure. It gave way to the pounding easily and
without warning(ironically) cast itself into the freezing river
with its blind passenger. Gliding upon that bitter brook
upon a fragment of an unstable boulder, in the sub zero
temperature he succumbed to the pleas of his weak spirit.
“I think… I think I’ll sleep,” he whispered to the air,
defeat the source of his tone.
His hands settled onto the shifting vessel and his eyelids
closed, mimicking the action that always preceded sleep.
The current seemed calm, in fact, the surface of the water
felt unmoving, but the speed of the rock never increased
and never decreased. It was as though something else was
moving the rock. It was pure nonsense of course. Nothing could
survive under the surface. Nothing.
His thoughts were interrupted by a thud. It seemed the rock
had collided with something, something unmoving but malleable.
“Mud?”
He grasped the substance. It was mud like, but he could not be certain.
The mud seemed to spread farther in, at least that’s what his hands could feel.
Searching for some refuge from the rough vessel, he stood up and stepped onto
the sloshy ground.
“This feels a bit disgusting, but I suppose it’s better than pain. If I could
see where I was, maybe this damn- What was that?”
He turned around instinctively. A loud moan struck his core, and
adrenaline pumped throughout his body.
“Should I…?”
He took a tentative step toward the origin of the moan, and found that his
foot had come in contact with another slope, this one muddy.
“Found you.”
“Huh?”[/font
“I wouldn’t take another step if I were you.”
“Who’s there? Are you the one moaning?”
It was a stupid question really. This new voice was
closer, but how does one address confusion within confusion?
A queer laugh. “Hardly.”
“Then who are you?”
“I am…”
There was a silent pause, as though the newcomer
was contemplating the need to reveal his identity.
The moment expanded to a second, three seconds, ten
seconds.. forty seconds… The silence was eerie and
uncomfortable.
“I am…” That queer laugh again, “…the collector.”
Back to top
