Human Again

by E. L. Tenenbaum

  I was securing the farthest reaches of the forests. I was driving all action toward what would become the main line of defense when war broke out the following spring. I was keeping Monsephe, and all the roads and towns to follow, safe. Or so I told myself.

  I was certainly not strengthening the beast, feeding it a detrimental diet of violence and barbarity, no matter that its whims became harder and harder to resist.

  In those early months, I reassured myself that such encounters were few and far between. I was only in contact with the farthest of border guard outposts, and mainly to track down rogue creatures. I didn’t harm any of the guards. I barely spoke to them. I doubt they even knew who I was.

  Then came winter, and even troublesome ogres and gargoyles hunkered down to ride out the cold. So I returned to Monsephe with every intention of doing the same, but the beast, born in darkness and nurtured with cold fury, had other plans.

  I was cresting the last rise of the hill before the castle. I was on foot because my horse had twisted its ankle just an hour before, so the going was slow, made to feel even more as I was anxious to get home. I was exhausted, hungry, and at the end of my patience. Plus, I hadn’t properly washed or shaved in days, and it seemed the grime of the road was seeping into my skin and muddying my mood. In short, my anger was at a low simmer, an unideal state for unexpected scenes of any kind.

  As the castle came into view, I noticed some people milling about the front entrance speaking with one of the guards. I would later learn they were a group of villagers who came to the castle from time to time to inquire after the master and offer their services in any way. Until now, we’d missed each other, and fortunately so, because I had little patience for them or their servility.

  To make matters worse, one of the villagers was accompanied by his dog, which he wasn’t stopping from burrowing through plots in my garden. Then, as it caught my scent, the dog abruptly straightened and began barking in my direction.

  Heaven only knows why its premonitory bark so grated on my fraying nerves.

  Quiet, boy.

  I know I thought it. I don’t know if I said it. I couldn’t hear anything. I don’t even know if anyone had a chance to speak because the dog switched to growling the moment it saw me, and the beast did not like it.

  Darkness filled my vision. I saw nothing and everything, all clouded in a fog of abysmal black and icy blue. I was faintly aware of the villagers yelling to each other, of the guard pressing them to get out and fast. I sensed their hasty retreat from the grounds. I knew the dog had stopped barking.

  As I was later told, the villagers only saw a blur of matted hair and hulking form tearing toward them and were convinced the rumored creature of the forest had come to their mysterious lord’s door.

  It is no wonder then about the stories that began to swirl about the soulless, black-hearted beast that stalked the castle walls. It is no wonder that I thought to keep it hidden instead of risking it around others, however misguided that may have proven for my more human side.

  When I regained control of my consciousness, I was in the forest, kneeling beside a fresh mound of dirt beneath a fir tree. Red seeped from the dirt caking my fingers. It coated my arms and left angry exclamations on my sleeves. I shook my head to clear my eyes, sure the beast’s rage still colored my vision.

  But the red didn’t go away.

  I blanched when I noticed the bits of golden fur clinging to it.

  My stomach turned over as I remembered the barking, the door, the blackness. This hadn’t been a group of four threatening ogres, a rebellious steam-spitting gargoyle, but a loyal pet trying to protect his master from the danger it sensed.

  I stumbled back from the tree, unable to look, yet unable to look away from the savagery the curse had unleashed. I raced away and when I returned to the castle I stripped down and burned my clothes, boots, too. I never stepped near that tree again.

  That’s when I truly understood just how terrible the faery’s curse could, and would, be.

  Being closer to the mountains, and farther north, winter came early to Monsephe and usually lasted longer than in the rest of Delphe. With so many months of frost and cold stretching before me, I sought ways to occupy my mind and rid myself of the faery’s infernal curse. Especially now that I had time to think about what she’d made me capable of.

  I spent many hours staring at my sheet music, struggling to clearly hear the melodies that had once brought me so much joy. I visited the dusty library, delved into the minds of philosophers long lost to memory. I tried meditation, I tried herbal concoctions, soothing baths and relaxing exercises picked up from my time at the Academy. But, no matter what measures I took, the beast was always waiting for me just ahead, grinning at my foolish attempts to be rid of it.

  Because it knew, deep down it always knew, that I was afraid of facing life without it. Afraid of how vulnerable I was without it to protect me. And yet, it hurt me so much to keep it.

  No matter how hard I tried to focus on other things, no matter how much I tried to tap back into all the emotions I’d pushed aside and suffocated for years, it wouldn’t let me gain an inch. When focusing on a gentle, reflective piece of music, the beast would interrupt my imagined symphony with a cacophony of sounds, not from instruments, but of screeches, howls, and unending wails. When I tried to find comfort, and strength, in memories of Adlard, his vivacious personality and how he would never hesitate to protect me, the beast would overlay days of sunshine and feelings of warmth with the scent and memory of my brother’s final days of suffering.

  The only way to escape its hellish battering of my mind was to try and lose myself in physically taxing activities, but there again, the beast was one step ahead of me. I would practice drills over and over in an attempt to bring back some order, to regain some control of my body, at least. Even then, the hope was that such physical exertions would eventually quiet my mind. Except, here too, the beast commandeered my intentions. It would flood my mind with images of red and blood and fury, driving me to batter my training dummy to pieces, to hack at trees and brush when that was not enough. I tried escaping to the forest, but it found me even there, sighting a bird or other small animal and demanding me to maim, catching scent of anything in bloom and ordering me to raze. Whole sections were ravaged where I passed through.

  And worse than all that were the days, the moments, when I didn’t feel the beast coming. When I was convinced I’d strengthened myself just enough for the next battle, only for it to ambush me without cause and prove just how weak I really was against it.

  My life was deceptive then, and some parts of that still linger. There were mornings I awoke feeling like nothing ever happened, my mind clear and certain, the beast nothing but a forgotten shadow in the recesses of my heart. Then there were days I woke with the darkness wedged so tightly into my blood it spilled into my lungs so I could hardly draw breath enough to get out of bed.

  In all, the physical toil it took on me didn’t chip away my humanity the same way as the mental wars it waged, which could be why it’s so hard for many to understand just what I went through. Some days it drove me mad, others it teased me with a false sense of peace, overall, it brought me to the edge of breaking, then watched gleefully as I dangled from the precipice.

  It continued to control more and more of me, turning me more animal than man, heightening my senses until I could identify a person by scent. Sometimes I climbed to the rafters barefoot, sometimes I stood outside in only shirtsleeves, daring the winter cold to penetrate the ice of my soul. But these acts of defiance only strengthened it even more. With time and without intervention, I surely would have become the fanged and hairy beast the tales purport me to be.

  With each failed attempt, I was tormented by the possibilities of what could, and would, be. If Father died before I was redeemed. If Father named Amellia heir, condemning me to a life of failure even if I did return a redeemed man. If I never returned and no one noticed or cared.

  “L
et him live as the general he was supposed to be,” they would say. “Let the crown be worn by someone better liked and more deserving.”

  Whenever fear and rage for my uncertain future overcame me, I would step out onto the highest turret of my castle and roar into the quiet night, knowing full well how clearly the sound carried to the closet villages. My servants soon returned from trips for supplies with stories of a beast trapped in the forgotten castle, of the fear that kept villagers from leaving their homes at night.

  As winter grew colder, I nursed my anger and abandonment, my rage and loneliness, my companions forevermore had Kiara not appeared at my door that fateful day, bringing forgotten sunlight back into my shrouded life.

  I realize now how the faery’s curse did no more than reveal to all what was already there. For by then, I truly was a man in name only, more a monster as cruel as any that could be imagined. With her curse, the faery made certain that I would never escape my actions, that I would never be free of the darkness until I’d faced it in battle and conquered it completely.

  But even she must have known that no man can change so absolutely. Because even after the curse was broken, there was no way to get rid of the darkness dyeing my former life. A darkness still casting its shadows on my battered soul.

  The Merchant

  After that winter, I hardly went out anymore. I was too ashamed of the beast’s increased hold over me and too much in its thrall to care if I never saw another human again. Even as it salivated over the thought of spilling more ogre and gargoyle blood, the fading remnants of my self dug in and forced it back indoors. Thanks to the faery, it could not be trusted around others.

  Following my last visit to the border outposts, and despite all that had been done, war broke out in the spring just before I turned nineteen.

  I had almost forgotten about the outside world and impending war, mired as I was in my own personal one, but early morning mere weeks after my uncelebrated birthday, a delayed message from Panthrea quickly brought it back to my attention.

  Dawn had yet to break when Jaxel, one of the few guards in exile with me, tiptoed into my room to tell me someone was asking for me. Already awake, I quickly pulled on my boots and stepped into the frosty first glimmer of day.

  “Sir Garamond?” I recognized him immediately, even in the dim light.

  “Your Highness,” he acknowledged with a bow.

  “What brings you here?” I questioned, hoping, praying, he came with a commission, or a reprieve and invitation to return home. Anything other than being snubbed and ignored in this remote corner of the kingdom. “Come inside.”

  “Haven’t the time, Highness,” he replied. “Have to rejoin the men.”

  “The men?”

  “At the border. I’m only here on delivery,” he explained, handing over an enveloped sealed with my father’s official stamp.

  “What’s this?” I inquired.

  “For you,” he said, as if no further explanation was needed. “I’m returning from a quick mission to Panthrea, and this was only a slight detour on the way.”

  “Of course,” I replied, still struggling to piece the picture together. “Heaven keep you safe.”

  “And you, Highness,” he returned.

  He was on his way well before sunrise.

  I opened the note the moment I was back inside.

  Laurendale queen health failing.

  Ogre-gargoyle treaty. War inevitable.

  Troops sent.

  I crumbled the note and tossed it into the fire, finally understanding Sir Garamond’s references. Whatever troops were referenced in the note had surely arrived before the note reached me and weren’t waiting around for me to lead them. So if the note wasn’t a summons to war, if the troops weren’t mine to command, then why send it to me at all? Hadn’t Father promised me a chance to redeem myself through the destiny of my name? Hadn’t I undergone elite training for this very purpose? Why had Sir Garamond been sent with a note instead of a commission or reprieve and invitation to return home? Why was I being left out?

  The beast, in particular, did not approve.

  It took several rounds of furious pacing and wrestling with the beast to finally beat back my anger enough to form coherent thought.

  If no one else had the wisdom to call me to arms, then I would simply have to call myself.

  So I promptly ordered Jaxel to ready my horse, intending to ride back to the outposts, do a reconnaissance of the situation, then present myself at the frontlines.

  Jaxel had my horse ready and was holding the reigns when I came to the stables fully prepared for war. It took just under three days of steady riding to reach the first border post, but I intended on reaching it in two. However, as soon as I neared, my horse whinnied and stepped back. Jaxel, strong as he was, had a hard time staying it. I reached to take the reins from him, and again the horse voiced its disapproval, even raising up on its hind legs and threatening to trample us underfoot.

  “Horses is all skittish this morning,” Jaxel commented, struggling against the animal’s protestations. “Maybe thinking on the wolves howling close last night.”

  It took me a moment to nod in agreement. Sure, there had been wolves last night, and almost every night since they called the forest home, but we both knew very well that wasn’t the cause of the horse’s fears. If anything it increased mine, as even the horse offered proof of how deep the beast had sunk its claws in during the quiet winter months.

  Unsure of what else to do, and feeling long fingers of darkness creeping over me in losing a heretofore untainted pleasure coupled with the blatant slight from home, I threw off my gloves and took off into the woods before I could harm Jaxel or the horse. I ran blindly, at breakneck pace, wishing to severely hurt myself in the process so the sorry mess of my life would be over.

  It took almost a week, but I eventually made it to the border post, arriving only to find out that fighting had indeed commenced farther along the border. The Delphen troops commanded by Sir Garamond were going forward without me, and just like that both my future and my destiny blinked out of existence. Despite the state I was in, I had enough dignity left to know there was no way I was going to present myself now, especially disheveled as I was and without a horse.

  I released most of my anger in the days it took to run back to Monsephe.

  I didn’t ride much after that.

  I hardly visited the outposts either.

  I tried to shut out the war and the wider world even as the beast burned, burned, burned to get closer to so much bloodshed.

  So a cold and lonely spring and summer passed. For the first year and a half of my exile, I lived with only a small cadre of servants and guards who had the misfortune of being sent to me, the almost silent echo of their movements as they carefully went about their work the only reminder that life still existed outside the dark torments of my mind. Each week, my anger gnawed at my heart bit by bit, magnifying my suffering so every hour felt like a day, every day a year, and every month an eternity with no end in sight. My limited interactions with the few others who were company to my misery were my only link to the world outside, and to humanity.

  Among my limited staff, I only ever learned to trust four of them, somewhat.

  One, Jaxel, my valet, my guard, my faithful servant. He’d been assigned to me when I was a young child and was one of the only servants at whom I could rage freely without fear of resorting to harm. Plus, he was loyal beyond reproach. And, as he’d been with me at the Academy, had watched and prayed for the man I was becoming, he was one of few people I’d heed when things were bad enough to force him to step in. Overall, he wasn’t much for conversation; he only spoke when spoken to and in the least amount of words possible, which suited me very well.

  Jaxel was also one of very few men who could ever rival me in size. I was still taller, stronger, and larger than him, but he was large enough to not be physically intimidated by me, especially as a man. If the beast frightened him, he never showed
it.

  Two, Ms. Potsdam, a woman without a husband who had a child without a father, making her an ideal candidate for banishment with me. She cooked and laundered and ran the small staff of servants responsible for maintaining the castle and the grounds, effectively keeping charge and making sure that all was in its proper place.

  Three, her son Alvie, a defiantly gregarious boy of five, who helped his mother however he could. More than once I heard her warning him to mind himself around me, but I didn’t usually mind him. He could speak for hours, whether or not anyone was listening, and I often took comfort in the familiar noise and mischief of an inquisitive, growing young boy, the very kind of boy Adlard had been before he died and upended my life. Being a mother to Alvie often extended to mothering us all, and Ms. Potsdam would even scold or fuss over me in the brief pauses of stillness when the beast was quiet.

  Four, Kellan, both servant and guardsman, who had very few choices of occupation. Jaxel was there because he’d sworn a blood oath to his monarch, so he went wherever he was told. Kellan was simply honored and grateful to be chosen by royalty and too simpleminded to know otherwise. The man was a halfwit, unable to take offense or insult from my torrents of verbal abuse, but he could follow orders well enough and had an admirably fierce, unwavering loyalty to me. His naiveté gifted him a sunny disposition that remained unbroken before the beast’s onslaughts. Even after I tamed the beast and the castle came back to life and the few servants were given the choice to stay or go, he remained. In the later years, sometime around when my ever after lost some of its happiness, he was one of the two men I could trust to protect Kiara no matter what.