A New “Old” Story

I wrote this about 2 years ago (most of my new stuff is out in cyberspace trying to get published).  I was told it had some nice writing in it but didn’t quite work as a story.  Looking back at it I think I agree but, I was put on a word limit so I guess it was a successful exercise.  Let me know what you think.

The Harrows

By

Matthew Piskun

 

There is no color yet it is blinding.  There is no noise but the silent cries of the dead is deafening.  I don’t exist and it is maddening.  I am not in heaven, its promised kiss eludes me and I am not in hell for I don’t feel its icy sting.  Then I am summoned.

            ‘Welcome back to the land of the living.’ is his greeting.  It’s the same every time, that officious little prick.  He calls himself Lazarus but I know it’s not his real name.  I’ll learn it soon enough.  Then he will suffer.

            I don’t know how long I have been dead.  Lazarus has command over my soul and has imprisoned me.  ‘I have need of your abilities again.’  He speaks behind a pane of black glass, his voice distorted and mechanical.  The glass is painted with symbols, triangles and goat heads, swirls and stars.  I cannot approach.  I have tried but it lights my soul on fire.  The pain is excruciating, it is like nothing I could have imagined when my body was flesh.  God, I will make him suffer one day.

            He wakes me from my purgatory, gives me orders that I must obey, only to be imprisoned again.  ‘There is a new threat.  Kill him.’  The command is cold and simple.  The target appears to me in my mind and I am off.

            The night is crystal clear.  The moon and the stars bathe me.  I can feel their luminescence surging through me, light-waves bending in endless cycles of bright and brighter.  I burn and my soul cries out for salvation but there is never an answer.

            I approach the house of my prey.  The front door is painted with simple talismans of half-moons and pentagrams.  Red paint, coarse and with dried smears, give the impression that these scriptures were written in blood.  My arrival is expected.     

            I pass through the door, the talismans don’t even sting, and I make my way upstairs.  The air shrieks as I travel trough it, then dies as thunderclaps.

            “Whose there?”

My prey’s flesh ripens with sweat and gooseflesh.  I can see, no taste his fear.  I absorb its acid, rancor and I am not surprised that I have learned to like it.

            “Stay back!”

            I laugh.  It booms like tortured screams and pierces the prey’s soul like icy shivs.  I can smell urine running down his leg.  I can feel the beat of his heart.  His eyes grow wide.  He holds up the Jatuka Ramatep and I laugh harder now, at his pathetic charm, and the room trembles.

            “Please, tell Nahema I’m sorry!!”

Nahema!  At last I have a name.  This must be who my captor is!  The prey is shaking now, on his knees praying, begging and crying.  Although he doesn’t know it, he has given me valuable information.  I decide to end his life painlessly.  I place my hands on his head.  My touch rots his flesh; it curls and gives off the sweet odor of decay.  Before he has a chance to scream, in one quick motion I twist of his head.  His soul passes me by, a whisper in a hurricane. 

            I begin to dissipate as I get summoned back to my prison.  It won’t be long before I am free Nahema, then you will know true pain.

 

           

 

           

 

 

  

Advertisement