Dealthagar/No Release No End
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No Release, No End
Part 1
Sularis sat in the furthest corner of the room from the door, huddled on the floor against the cold stone.
"Mine...mine...mine...she is mine...mine..mine...no...not mine..."
Extending his talons he tore at his face, cutting sinew and muscles, scoring the bone.
"There's human in there. Please let me out. Let out the human. Free me from my prison. Let me go. please. She can't be mine. Not mine. No no no no...."
The bleeding stopped and the wounds healed. His curse of eternal life, his everlasting torment, his punishment for his crimes...it would not let him end. No end. There would be no end to his suffering. Stealing a scalpel from his master's desk he began to carve at his chest.
"If she won't love me, I don't need it? Right? What's the point. It's a useless organ, full of suffering and useless weakness. Nothing I need. Nothing a slave needs, right?"
The blade cut cleanly and hit talons tore the flesh away. Twisting and pulling, the cartilege gave way, bones cracked, and the beating goal of his self inflicted eviceration flopped rythmically in the gaping hole he had torn open. Grasping it in his talons, he squeezed. Gritting his teeth he clenched until the organ burst, spilling his life's blood freely to the floor.
"She loves me, she loves him, she loves me, she has him, he has her, I have...I have..."
The words died in his throat as his wounds began to knit and heal again. A calm came over him and he laid down, resting his face on the cold slick stone.
"Nothing. Nothing nothing nothing nothing. I have nothing. i am nothing. Nothing nothing nothing nothing..."
Closing his eyes he rolled his face back and forth.
"Not a gargoyle. Not a man. Not a being. Not a monster. What is Sularis? What am I? Why? What? Why? How? Why?"
He stabbed the scalpel into his eyes, trying to end the tears, trying to shut out the reality of the pain. Trying to hide his weakness and his sorrow.
"Nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing."
He stood, roaring at the heavens, screaming in rage, pain, sadness and fear. Fear, most of all. Fear of it never ending. Fear of the pain never subsiding. Fear of the hurt in his heart never going awy. Fear he would never be whole. Never be...anything again.
A broken doll.
A discarded toy.
A forgotten lover.
A slave.
A monster
He was something. He was all these things. Yet he was nothing. Nothing without her. And he would never know her again. She was lost to him forever.
Forgiveness. Pity. Salvation. Redemption.
Love.
He fell to his knees and pounded on the stone in rage unti the bones broke and split the flesh. until his hands and arms were little more than a bloody shattered pulp. He lay on the floor, hugging his knees to his chest, weeping at the burning sensation as his arms mended themselves. There would be no release from his hell. There would be no end to his pain. Rocking slowly, he wept silently.
"I am, now more than ever...Sularis, the Damned."
Part 2
Dealthagar paced back and forth, listening to the mad ranting, cries and outpouring of dispair by his servant. Sularis was his slave, but it was by his choice, a means of paying for the crimes of Dealthagar's dark rebirth. Time...time had changed them both.
His rage swelled and thrashed as he thought about Sularis' crimes during his slumber. Crimes provoked by the madness of Oblivion. His shade had fallen under the sway of Oblivion and from everything his spy told him, he had become the complete monster that Dealthagar feared becoming. He became the monster that had driven Dealthagar from the Order in the first place.
His shade. A study in madness. A design on depravity and horror. A study on dependance of the flesh and complete forsaking of the soul.
His shade was a reflection; an absolute polar opposite.
The shade had twisted Sularis, broken his spirit wholly. Twisted his flesh and infected him with the worst that the horrors of Oblivion had to offer.
As a being who had given up his own destiny to serve penance for his crimes, was he truly responsible for his actions?
Dealthagar paced back and forth at a frenzied pace, his mind racing, his mantra on his lips and his precepts in his heart. Sitting lotus in the center of the Codex, Dealthagar meditated on his tortured servant. Sularis may have been damned....but was he unrecoverable? Was he irredeemable?
The Oracle of Control allowed a smile to cross his face, as his own teachings slapped him in the face.
"With Technomancy, Anything is Possible"
Part 3
Sularis lay quietly in the bed, the concotion taking hold and placing him a a dreamless, unwaking sleep. Dealthagar flexed his left hand and the forefinger shifted, revealing a thin glowing orichalum scalpel. "Hrm. First order of business is to get the infection out."
Dealthagar adjusted the input on his optics to allow him to trace the threads of magic that were woven into his servant's being. His shade has done a hell of number on him. He had twisted the flesh on many levels, mingling it with actual gargish flesh, grafting and blending the two together in such a way that there was no end of one and beginning of another. it wasn't that the gargish form was unappealing, but it was as if it was the flesh he had been born with. The ease of the blending suggested some of his more outrageous theories on Gargoyle and Human compatabilities weren't very far off.
And there it was. The threads. Purposeful or not, the threads of entropy had taken root, like a weed in a rose garden, or a parasite in a healthy host. It didn't matter if the shade had purposly planted them, or the simple act of servitude under the shade's corruptive influence had allowed them to take root, they were now strung through him, finely woven into the fiber of his very being, anchored in the flesh, trapping the soul.
As the mystic blade severed a strand, two others would become visable. Some as deep and thick as the moral code of a paladin, some no more than a thread of a harmless white lie. He had hoped it wouldn't be this bad...but he had planned for it.
Dealthagar peeled back the flesh covering the breastbone. The imprint of his hand from Sularis' original binding still sat burned into the bone. He traced the tiny seal. He had only been a child of six when Sularis bent knee in eternal servitude for his crime. The tiny fingers... had he truly ever been that young? It seemed so long ago. So many lifetimes ago.
He flexed his hand, the the blad began to spin, forming an auger. He quickly set to making a set of eight indentations around the breastbone, and placed an etched and prepared arcane gem into each spot. Waving his hand, the flesh moulded back over the open wound, healing and sealing. The gems would need to set in place for a week or two. He has set them to act as leeches, drawing in the latent mystical energies of the body, aloowing the free and cleansed Ba and Ka to re-enter the flesh, but keeping the corruption sealed into the stones.
With the spiritual changes happening, the physical ones would need to be addressed. The red flesh was fearsome, angry. It conveyed a dread or a horror that Sularis no longer needed. Taking a jar of alchemical paste he began to rub his servant down. A calm cool color...something soothing.
Something that would allow him to awaken the being Sularis had been when he first came into service.
Part 4
Sularis woke, sitting up groggily. Looking around at the wooden walls and heavy smell of moss and pollen, he was certain it was not the place he had fallen asleep. The bed was a heavy wood, with a thick green woolen blanket and several layers of heavy linens. A female gargoyle poked her head into the room. "An zu ú? Sent ú quó?"
He rubbed his forehead as he processed the gargish tounge. "Yes, I'm fine. Where are we?"
She nodded. "Klep ámowislem postim í." She gave a small smile then dissapeared through the doorway.
A few moments later, he could hear Dealthagar in the hallway, his voice coming closer. "Ilem gratmúr ú. Gratmúr. Gratmúr." The Oracle came through the door, gave a gracious wave to the young gargoyle, and closed the door behind him. "You're awake. You look better."
Sularis looked down at the bandages that half covered his arms, his eyes lingering on his talons. "I look like a gargoyle."
Dealthagar nodded. "You do. And in time, when you have had enough time to fully heal, we can alter you back to your human state. But for now, the form suits you."
Sularis frowned. "It suits you."
"My shade is to be commended on his work. Even the other gargoyles believe you are one of them, although they don't understand why you have a tail." Dealthagar sat at the foot of the bed. "You're not complaining of your lot, are you?"
"Of course not." Sularis lowered his eyes as if reciting a mantra. "We are bound by our own word, for our own crimes. We serve to pay our eternal debt to you."
"Excellent." Dealthagar patted Sularis' leg as he rose. "When strong enough to get out of that bed, I have a new role for you. A more direct penance for your crimes."
"My lord?"
Dealthagar smiled. "Nothing so dire, as you think." He opened the armoire near the door. "Your time as a simple laborer is over. It is time to take up your blade once again."
Hanging in the armoire was a suit of ornately detailed platemail, etched delicately with the mantras and teachings of the path of singularity. A gargish blade and shield hung on the back of each of the doors. "I'm not worthy to wear the standards of a paladin, my lord."
"And I wouldn't want you to." Dealthagar laughed. "To serve the Britanian virtue code is just as rigid, unyielding and unfufilling as following the Anti-virtues. You will be an Agralem-únorus, and my personal guard."
Sularis nodeed, taking in the meaning of the words. "Such as it was in the beginning, so it returns."
"The Celestial circle."
Struggling, Sularis rose from the bed. Taking the sword from the cabinet, he dropped to a knee before the Oracle, and offered the hilt. "For now, and for always, I am your devoted servant."
'~FIN~'
Gargish Translation:
"An zu ú? Sent ú quó?" - Are you awake? How do you feel?
"Klep ámowislem postim í." - I will get the Oracle
"Ilem gratmúr ú. Gratmúr. Gratmúr." - We thank you greatly. Much Thanks. Much Thanks.
Agralem-únorus - Gargish equivilant of a Paladin, based on the Path of Singularity
Original Post Dates: Tue Aug 31, 2010 - Sun Sep 05, 2010