Human Again

by E. L. Tenenbaum

  Yarrow pursed his lips and studied me closely, perhaps trying to gauge the sincerity of my appeal coupled with his desire to stay out of another magical’s business. He flicked a glance over at Daimyon, who shrugged.

  “It’s one night,” he repeated. “He knows he’s the only one who can cure himself.”

  Yarrow considered the point before finally nodding agreement. He faded out of sight then reappeared a few moments later with a small vial glowing a soft violet.

  “As per your request,” he said as he handed it to me. “Remember, it will not silence the darkness completely, it will only keep it contained from sundown to sunrise. Do you understand?”

  I grasped the delicate vial in my monstrous hand, afraid I would crush it if I dared clutch it too tightly. I nodded vigorously. “Absolutely,” I replied. “I absolutely understand.”

  “Drink it about an hour before you need it,” Yarrow instructed.

  “Thank you, thank you so much,” I said effusively. “What payment can I give?”

  If Yarrow had asked me for the castle, I would have given it to him on the spot, I was so relieved to be holding that little vial in my hand. Only too late did I think that Yarrow wasn’t the type of person to whom a man should make generalized offers. He didn’t need a castle and he wouldn’t want any monies I could offer as payment.

  To my eternal good fortune, Yarrow asked for nothing, merely inclined his head toward Daimyon and said, “Consider it a token of my gratitude for taking care of a friend.”

  I nodded, that was all right by me. I would’ve given Daimyon my very chambers if need be. Let him move in and never leave if that’s what it would take to stay in Yarrow’s good graces.

  “Thank you,” I said again, already turning toward the door, the guarantee that all would be well safe in my grip.

  Yarrow stayed with Daimyon a few moments longer, the two of them engaged in a brief almost silent conversation during which I was certain more than I could hear was said. Then in a ripple of purple magic, Yarrow faded away and Daimyon left to do whatever it was he did when he wasn’t helping Kiara or saving her from the likes of me.

  That actually turned out to be one of the oddest twists of that little incident, because from that day forward, Kiara was no longer afraid of the Huntsman. I can’t say she went out of her way to befriend him, but she no longer forced a wide space between them whenever they crossed paths. She relaxed a little more around him, even suppressing her shriek whenever his bat suddenly swooped down from overhead.

  I’m still not entirely sure how to regard that change in their relationship, but one thing is certain: I don’t like thinking on how their friendship began because he had to save her.

  From me.

  Cages

  Within a few short weeks of the rose garden incident, winter finished thawing. The runoff of melted snow trickling steadily from the mountains signaled it was nearly time for Daimyon to depart and the long-awaited party to arrive.

  Under Kiara’s direction, the castle had been turned inside out, not a room, not a level was spared, from the deepest cellar to the most unused attic space. As our staff was too small for such a grand place to begin with, no one was excused; not me for my title, nor Alvie for his age, nor Kellan for his limited focus. Kiara herself flitted about the rooms with an apron tied around her waist and a dishrag flung over one shoulder, her buzzing excitement making the work that much easier to bear.

  She had all of the china and silverware brought into the main dining room for inspection and cleaning, positioning each of us along the table to form an easy flow of work. She was rather efficient at making sure things were done satisfactorily, and the rest of us moved quickly, the plates and cutlery passing in such smooth procession from one person to the next they near danced across the tabletop.

  Odd as it may be to admit, those days working together were some of the best at the castle by far. Alvie made most of the noise, telling stories about little discoveries and asking a bevy of questions about whatever struck his fancy. We all listened and answered, which helped pass the time more enjoyably. Ms. Potsdam was fond of singing a particular strain of ballads, her voice pleasant, the songs common and simple. Though the first time I did more than hum, the whole room fell silent.

  I looked up, already feeling a flush creeping up my neck, but I fortunately noticed their expressions before the anger took hold. The surprised stares were tinged with small glints of hope, and perhaps some relief, too. Daimyon clearly suppressed a smile, Kiara happily beamed at me.

  “What?” I asked gruffly.

  Kellan was the only one unafraid to answer. “I never knew His Highness to sing.”

  “I have a voice, don’t I?” I demanded.

  “Yes, Highness, of course,” Kellan replied with a wide, innocent smile, “We just none of us knew it was ever so pleasant to hear.”

  I blinked at him. There were so many ways to interpret what he’d said, though I knew his true intent wasn’t insult. Still, it gives a man pause to think that his own servants have never known him in a mood good enough to spontaneously sing out loud, or even hum to himself. What kind of man only gives voice to the harsh demands of a tortured soul filled with viciousness, vengeance, and violence? Had I really fallen so far, that even music sounded foreign in my voice?

  Daimyon had the good sense to end the little exchange, and thereby save me from either further embarrassment or losing myself to rage, by picking the song back up again. His voice was weathered and rough, too old for his age, but still clear and on key. For a short time, he sang alone, soldiering on until one voice and then another joined him. Soon we were all singing together again, and it was as if our harmony cast a spell very different than the one that had brought us there to begin with. Even if it only lasted the rest of the afternoon.

  Kiara’s impulse to clean and ready the castle covered every room, except my own. Thus, I really shouldn’t have been surprised when she eventually stumbled across the dungeon.

  Nearly every castle I know of seems to have at least one or two dark and mangy cells somewhere in its structure, aside from the palace at Panthrea, which boasts an entirely separate prison structure. In most, the dungeons are hardly used, especially during peacetime, but that doesn’t stop anyone from still including them in each design, though many have since been closed off, stocked with storage, or even turned into wine cellars.

  I had tried to lead her past the innocuous-looking door stuck into a back passageway, but its sudden appearance piqued her interest. She tried the door, and, finding it locked, looked at me expectantly.

  Despite my best efforts to convince her otherwise, she insisted I locate the correct key on the large ring I had taken to carrying with me.

  Kiara’s eyes widened when she saw the gaping blackness ahead of her, knowing full well, as I had since I’d discovered that door as a child, that we hadn’t stumbled upon a mere broom closet.

  Any slim chance of convincing her to stay above ground was lost in the spark of adventure merrily glittering in her eyes.

  I lit a torch from the wall sconce beside me and led the way, keeping a tight grip on Kiara’s hand so I wouldn’t lose her. Though this area had been locked up a good while, darkness left alone too long could not be trusted.

  The way down didn’t take long, but it was steep and deep enough to drown out a man’s cries. The path was also a confusion of switchbacks designed to slow a fleeing prisoner and create an overall annoyance for everyone else. That alone was reason enough for me to never come down here. Not unless there was a wild beast I needed to lock away forever.

  The rats were scratching as they had all those years ago, and the quiet that grew thicker as we descended pressed down on us as stale air seeped into our lungs. However cold I’d imagined the empty castle to be, these stones were even colder, enough to send an icy chill down the back with a fleeting touch.

  The torch nibbled at the darkness as we went forward. Here and there I lit other intermittent torches on the walls to
fight its insistent desire to swallow us up. Even Kiara’s warm, constant glow seemed susceptible to whatever was lurking in the walls enclosing us. As we wound our way down, I imagined it was very much like what the inside of my heart and soul would look like were someone to cut me open.

  After a few more turns, the passage released us into a wide room that felt even larger considering where we’d just been. To our immediate right was a small room from which the jail keeper could watch the prisoners. To our left, the cold stone gave shape to two cells, with thick metal bars the only reprieve from the unforgiving rock. One could not see inside the other, though sound certainly traveled, which was undoubtedly the intent.

  The beast took one look at it all and began pacing restlessly.

  At first, Kiara and I just stood there, staring at these human cages and wondering at the lives they’d seen. There wasn’t much to see within them, no molding straw or rotted remains, and the thick streaks of rust creeping along the bars of each door spoke volumes to how little this dungeon had been used. Still, even if we couldn’t envision the men that had, or could have, been housed here, the sight of the cells was chilling to the core, enough that I began inching back toward the too-narrow passageway. I’d rather be in close quarters than stay in this room of captivity. Yarrow’s words about caging a beast echoed against the empty walls, and I shuddered inwardly.

  “It’s not right to lock a man up.” The words slipped out of me.

  “What would you have done with men who break the law?” Kiara asked, more out of curiosity than outright challenge.

  “Immediate consequence, immediate punishment, whatever it may be,” I replied, warming to the idea as I said it. “If a man steals, force him to pay the money back, with extra for good measure. If a man breaks something, let him fix it; if he loses something, let him replace it. If he has no money, let him hire himself out until his debt is repaid.”

  Kiara listened intently as I spoke. “It would require some changes, and a few more specifics, but that seems a pretty sound approach to governance. Though you may need to consider other repercussions for crimes of violence or death.”

  I simply nodded. I would have liked to prolong the conversation now that I’d started and Kiara had responded so well to it, acknowledging I might have some sense to run a kingdom, something no one had done before, but not down there. I had to get away from those cages as soon as I could.

  Having overcome her initial trepidation, however, Kiara pushed forward, curiosity urging her toward the closest cell door, which she had barely to touch for it to creak open. She entered the cell and just stood there, hands on hips as she wordlessly assessed the entirety of the little space. I edged in after her, the beast pawing at my heart in protest, the rest of me irrationally anxious for the fate of my bright, warming sun if she stood in a cage too long. Even though I could see her clearly from where I was and knew full well that we were the only two down there, I simply didn’t trust the darkness.

  I inched in enough to stand beside her in the cell, looking at her warily and wholly unsure as to what she would do next. I was pretty certain it didn’t involve sending someone down here for a thorough cleaning. Finally, after what felt like far too long a time had ticked away on the anxiety-riddled clock of my brain, she looked at me with a wry smile.

  “I suppose,” she said carefully, “considering your decision to hold me prisoner, I should be grateful you didn’t lock me down here.”

  I sputtered.

  I certainly hadn’t been expecting that. Was she teasing? The flickering light of the torch cast part of her eyes in unreadable shadow.

  “I wouldn’t,” I finally managed to force out.

  Kiara reached out to me and touched a warm hand to my arm. “I know,” she said with a smile, though she couldn’t entirely hide the sadness that crept into it.

  For the first time since she came to the castle, I wondered if perhaps she didn’t like being here as much as I hoped. Sure, this wasn’t her home, but she had seemed to make it her own so completely, enough so I couldn’t imagine life here without her.

  I figured we weren’t exactly standing in the right place for furthering that conversation, especially as I didn’t want the room we were standing in to influence her mood. Better to ask under a warm sun while snacking on freshly picked berries.

  I was about to tug her hand and tell her it was high time we were leaving when another thought, sharp and fierce as a bolt of lightning, struck me. My grip tightened around Kiara’s hand enough to bring her eyes up questioningly to mine. Seeing my expression, lines of worry appeared on her forehead, her eyes darted all over my face, trying to discern the noticeable change in my mood.

  “Promise me,” I said, my voice suddenly hoarse, “promise that if it ever comes to it, if ever I don’t come back to myself, you’ll lock me in here and throw away the key. Then you must leave, get far away from here, and never look back. Go to Daimyon if you must. Wherever he is, he’ll protect you from me.”

  “Azahr!” Kiara exclaimed. “How can you say such a thing?”

  “Please, Kiara,” I begged. “You must. For by then there will be nothing left worth saving, and it would be safer for everyone to leave me alone.”

  And no one would be around to hear my final moments of torment, when the beast so consumes the man there is no recourse but death.

  Kiara’s eyes flashed and I felt her grip upon me tighten, speaking her determination.

  “Azahr,” she began.

  “It won’t be enough,” I cut her off, shaking the hand she held for emphasis. “Even if Daimyon were to teach you all his tricks, even if I were to flood all the channels of redirection, it will never be enough.”

  It could have been the dim lighting, but I was sure her eyes were glinting. Not from fire or terror, not from her unassailable stubbornness, but from something much deeper and closer to the heart.

  There was no mistaking then the ferocity of the look she gave me, her face fully facing mine so I would not, could not, miss or misunderstand any part of what she said next. “I do not intend,” she enunciated carefully, “for you to ever come to that. You are a man, created in the image of the Divine. What gives you life, the soul you still so stubbornly cling to, glimmers even now. I will not give up on you, Azahr. And you must promise that you will not give up on yourself.”

  Considering where we were, considering the power of her words, I could do nothing but agree, even as I thought that the sparkle she saw was nothing more than the reflection of her sun’s rays sparking against my crystal ice. Not genuine treasure, but fool’s gold.

  “I promise,” I whispered, and only then did she relax her grip on me, though she didn’t withdraw her hand.

  Finally, we turned away from the dungeon and headed back the way we’d come, extinguishing the few wall torches as we went.

  I’d like to say that I left the darkness behind me that day, left it caged in one of those cells, or even struggling for breath in that narrow maze of a passageway. But, as it was with my curse, the darkness stayed with me, as tough, as terrible, as terrifying as it had always been. In many ways, it almost grew larger having been down there, having been brought to drink from a deep well symbolizing human despair.

  I was more determined than ever that the party would be everything Kiara wanted it to be. I thought then it would be my only chance to give her as much before it was too late for me.

  Still, the fierceness of Kiara’s words in that forsaken dungeon remained with me long after we emerged from the passageway back into the warmth of the castle. I couldn’t stop thinking about her determination to help me, about her adamancy in my ability to be saved.

  I could dismiss these thoughts as misguided naïveté, knowing full well that though Kiara had glimpsed the beast, she’d only ever seen the tip of the iceberg. The abyss inside me was so much greater than she imagined.

  However, even with all that, I couldn’t help but put my faith in what she’d said, in wanting to one day feel the warmth o
f the fire she carried so effortlessly within her. I dared to kindle a tiny hope that if she truly believed in me, she might just succeed in saving me. Then eventually, when I was human again, perhaps she could find room in her heart for a man like me. And then, finally then, whatever I was would be enough.

  A door had been nudged open in my life, casting a faint, delicate sliver of light on my ragged soul. The remaining fragments of my human side pounced on it, lapping it up with all the hunger of a starved man finally allowed a few crumbs of bread. That light, small as it was, was a beacon for me.

  I knew, without doubt, that Kiara was trying to open that door as much as she could on her own. If I wanted more of that light, if I wanted it to illuminate every corner and every shadow, if I wanted to turn away from the reflection so I wouldn’t lose whatever good I still held, it was up to me to break it down completely.

  Daimyon was supposed to leave about two weeks before the party, but I suspect Kiara persuaded him to stay a few days more, out of kindness, or insurance, or to help finish preparations, I still don’t know.

  I do know that days before he left, we were working to the music of Kiara’s harp, when it suddenly stopped. I went to investigate, but paused when I heard voices drifting quietly from the music room. There was an urgency to their tone that kept me from announcing myself, but it didn’t stop me from flattening against the wall to listen just outside the door.

  “—with me.”

  Daimyon. Was he trying to take Kiara away?

  “Risk my life to join a man on the run?” Kiara questioned.

  “I’ll bring you home,” he explained. “It’s too risky staying here.”

  “Azahr would never hurt me,” Kiara insisted. “Besides, I can’t leave now.”

  “What are you staying for?”