The Devourer

by C H Chelser

  A crucial difference to his involvement as well as hers

  He reached through the doorway to help her cross, now without qualms or resentment. The door disappeared the instant she stood beside him. Only the cord extending from her back marred her otherwise aptly chosen appearance.

  Without a physical body to restrain her colours, their appeal to his true nature exceeded what he had come to expect. Deviated in other ways, too. Where her hand touched his, the sensation wasn’t dissimilar to the presence of that pesky guide. He had anticipated that her contact would burn him, but instead he found it to be agreeable. As if their frequencies were not as incompatible as her brilliance suggested. Despite his soaring hunger, he felt inexplicable reluctance to release her, however fleeting their touch. Her fascination, however, was of another kind.

  ‘Your hand. It is so cold.’

  He retrieved his hand at once, reluctance overcome by reality.

  ‘Forgive me, monsieur. I meant no insult. It was merely my surprise that I should feel cold when I have no body to be sensitive to temperature.’

  ‘Temperature?’ he echoed in disbelief. ‘A physical concept that holds no sway here. What you sense is a difference in frequency.’

  ‘Light is warmth and darkness is cold?’

  He glared at her. ‘Invalid notions, both.’ So was touch, he reminded himself, yet it was a light touch on his forearm that drew his attention. The woman smiled to hide her nervousness. It caused a patch of soft blue among the greens and yellows.

  ‘I’m afraid my time is limited.’ She indicated the cord at her back. ‘Is there anywhere in particular that you wish to investigate?’

  He didn’t respond, only shifted. She followed.

  His long-standing habit brought them to the darker end of the fog, where the outlines of the city were only just visible in the advancing shadows, but the scent of human energy still drifted down from the threshold. Here, the streets were teeming with life of another kind. His kind. Here, he was met with apprehension, but not with outright abhorrence.

  The woman seemed less confident.

  ‘My God, what are those?’ she exclaimed, drawing closer to him.

  In the near distance wandered two hunched figures. They staggered on aimlessly, emitting a sharp screeching howl that cut through to the core. Or it would have done but for the protective qualities of his coat, which prevented the horrific noise from bothering him.

  ‘Wailers,’ he answered deadpan. ‘Pathetic souls that are incapable of anything but cry and lament.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Undetermined. It is conceivable that they no longer know themselves. They do not communicate with others, not even with their own kind.’

  ‘But these seem to be travelling together.’

  ‘Misery does so love company.’ His sarcastic smirk dissolved into a scowl. ‘How can this be news to you? You were here before, and wailers are not uncommon.’

  She forced a wry smile. ‘On both occasions I was looking for you and had neither time nor inclination to meet the local residents.’ Her energy pinked as she looked away. ‘Not to mention that my descent was not quite as coordinated as I would have liked.’

  Proceeding through the fog, they passed three men loading the outline of a cart in front of a hazy building. Two of the men were of the same vague quality as the cart and horse, while the third was more distinct. Nevertheless the other two ignored him.

  ‘Curious,’ the woman remarked, slowing to watch the scene. ‘He must be invisible to those men, yet he seems unaware.’

  ‘It happens. It is not unusual that after a quick and unexpected death, a soul continues to believe it still inhabits a physical presence.’ He moved on, uninterested.

  ‘When will he realise that he is dead?’

  ‘Impossible to say. To some, the transition is hard to fathom. Those persist in their conviction of tangibility for a considerable length of time.’ He shot her a disapproving glance when she fell behind. ‘Spare it no attention. It does not see you, and we have more important matters to attend.’

  ‘But surely—?’ Her thought broke off when she registered the fat, lizard-like creature slithering towards them.

  He sent the fat thing a low-key warning, but it braved his signal to sniff at the woman’s aura. Annoyed, he flicked the tip of his cane, causing it to flinch. When the creature hesitated, a more direct prod hurried it along.

  ‘Parasites,’ he replied at her unspoken repulsion. ‘A nuisance rather than a danger. They feed on the energy of others. Humans, preferably, as humans tend to be oblivious hosts.’

  She watched the reptilian tail disappear into the shadows, never meeting his gaze even as a great many thoughts spilled from her mind, merging into a single understanding.

  ‘That is what you did to Eric, and to those men who attacked me in the alley.’

  His silence was a sour one. Leeching like a parasite sustained him like mouldy bread sustained a beggar on her side of the city. His hunger desired a king’s meal, but even what it longed for most would never suffice.

  Another parasite appeared, ahead of several more. The woman’s aura turned a sickly yellow when she noticed, so he asserted his presence, drawing a boundary. It deterred them, but only briefly. She was too interesting. He cast a full shield around them both to keep the critters at bay, but they whined and clawed at his barrier, the promise of instant gratification outweighing their fear of him.

  ‘Oh, heavens above! What do they want?’

  ‘You.’

  Was she truly that ignorant? He growled, exasperated, but altered his shield so it reflected what was within, effectively making it a full-length, encircling mirror.

  The woman gaped, astounded. He let her, although to him the reflection of her energy, now unable to disperse and thus bouncing infinitely inside his shield, was pure torture. Only his own darkness being reflected and enhanced in the same way kept him in control.

  Until a curious dissonance drew his attention.

  He focused. So far when beholding her, the various colours had assaulted and overwhelmed his senses. But the longer they stayed in this cocoon, the more the accumulating reflections of her energy refracted the colours. Seeing each hue separately for the first time, he noticed that they were off.

  More than that, they were flawed.

  At first he believed it to be the effect of his own corrupted energy trapped and reflected along with hers, but pulling up a discrete shield between himself and her did not diminish the dark ribbons laced through her energy. Dark, cold streaks with the same consistency as his coat.

  The consistency of the deep darkness.

  The woman must be aware of this. All who were tainted with that twisted frequency felt it, even if they didn’t recognise what it was.

  ‘Is this—is this what you see when you look at me?’ she asked in awe.

  He nodded once. ‘It is also why the other is drawn to you.’

  Come to think of it, the fine black streaks might well make her more approachable to their kind, hence even more desirable. That would explain much, including his own writhing instinct to leap at her throat.

  ‘Your craving is as strong as his,’ her thoughts reflected in perfect symmetry to his own.

  He snarled and flexed his shield, rendering it transparent while jettisoning the energy build-up. The more patient parasites chirped and grunted as they drank their fill from this brief abundance.

  ‘Why?’ the woman asked, mulling over their momentary concurrence. ‘Not me specifically, but why at all?’

  ‘You know what I am. It is my nature.’

  ‘Yes, but why feed off others?’

  ‘Do you not eat?’ he spat.

  ‘That is not the same. I eat because my body will starve if I do not. You have no body.’

  He impatiently tapped his cane. ‘All entities need sustenance to perpetuate their existence. It is that simple. However, your purpose here is to aid a hunt, not to discuss dietary habits.’

 
‘Are you so certain that diet is unimportant to the matter at hand, monsieur? This demon feeds on souls. Souls!’

  ‘Of course it does! It is a rampant devourer.’

  ‘So are you,’ she countered, ‘but you are satisfied to leave a man his soul and drink only his energy.’

  This time he bared his teeth. They elongated. ‘Not “satisfied”. Never “satisfied”!’

  The woman withdrew without moving away. Fear stained her aura. He imagined sipping a fraction of that energy to make his point, but even a fraction could compromise his self-control. Instead he recomposed himself, straightened his appearance and led her on to where the shadows grew stronger.

  The fogged city and its inhabitants faded. A hand grasped his arm. Too perplexed, he forgot to break contact.

  ‘Forgive me for taking liberties,’ the woman whispered, ‘but I cannot see the ground.’

  He arched a brow. ‘There is no ground.’

  Judging by a frantic splash of bright orange, this confirmation of her perception failed to be reassuring. Yet she showed no sign of struggling despite their descent. They approached and passed the level of his haven. The cord at her back began to pulsate, but otherwise her energy stood out like a beacon in the surrounding darkness. Unlike that of the boy and the guide, her colourful light didn’t diminish at these depths. Only the dark lines in between grew stronger as they dived, just as his energy did.

  In all, she proved to be a shining example of adaptability – and the perfect lure for his quarry.

  The void of the deep darkness stretched in every possible direction of time and space. He sent out a silent call, a mental net as wide as he could cast, in search of traces of the one they were looking for. The void was never as empty as it seemed, and his call triggered several soul markers; subliminal signals akin to leaves that, when moved by a breeze, stirred in acknowledgement of it. A handful of entities lurked nearby, hiding in the darkness.

  The woman clasped his arm tighter. ‘I sense ghosts, but I cannot make out their intentions.’

  ‘Do not bother. Like wailers, they keep to themselves.’

  ‘What are they?’

  He contemplated how to convey this in words she would comprehend. He settled for the least inappropriate term: ‘Hermits. They never go beyond the deep darkness and seek no interaction.’ Which was why it intrigued him that they displayed such an explicit interest in the woman.

  ‘Do these hermits feed, too?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She gibbered. ‘Well? What do they feed on?’

  Her impatience caused the emission of a bluish green wave, which in its passing revealed a gigantic insectoid limb before dissipating. The woman all but jumped on him in fright. He backed away at once, before her energy could engulf him and obliterate the limits of his already over-taxed self-restraint. She jabbed an angry dark blue, blade-like spike at him for abandoning her, but she failed to penetrate the primary shield of his coat. Still, one nail, a talon comparable to his own, hooked into his sleeve.

  ‘Monsieur, in these parts I am dependent on you,’ she hissed. ‘I would greatly appreciate it if you were more forthcoming in this regard.’

  While coherent, her thoughts were shrill with panic. Like the parasites that cowered whenever a guide or a sentinel came too close, she sought refuge behind his shield. Uncertain how else to respond, he enforced the secondary barrier to shield her from the depth’s creatures. Her hues lightened again, although she did not retract the talon.

  ‘These entities consume the energy trails left by others,’ he explained at her silent prompting. ‘Yours draws their attention, or they would not come this close.’ An unexpected advantage that he would be foolish not to deploy to his benefit.

  So, with due diligence, he permitted some of the woman’s energy to bleed through his shield’s perimeter. This enticed a response from the hermits, the initial extent of which was ‘give me more’. He did, but only in exchange for information. Those who consumed trails also knew the identity and patterns of movement that belonged to a specific trail.

  Not all answers he received were honest, but he rewarded each one nonetheless. In his experience, even the lies had their merits when it came to gathering intelligence. Both the truths and half-truths confirmed what he had hoped for: the other’s passage through these realms had not gone undetected. Given time and persistence, he would find it.

  And he would. No other outcome was to be permitted.

  The woman refrained from participating in these exchanges. What her light revealed of the denizens as he conversed with them disquieted her. In her increasing anxiety, she clung to him with both hands and by now all her fingers had shaped into talons. He felt the sting as they attempted to invade his personal shield, but he gave no quarter. She resorted to begging instead.

  ‘Monsieur, this—this is highly uncomfortable. I want to leave.’

  ‘Not yet.’

  He opened the secondary shield to reward a serpentine shape which had neither head nor tail. The creature had recognised the woman’s colours from quite a distance and now came for its share. However, the recognition was mutual and when she caught wind of it, a fresh flare of bright orange accompanied what might have been an audible shriek.

  ‘Monsieur, please!’

  He paid her no heed. The snake-like creature provided exceptionally useful information. Indeed his quarry had been roaming these levels, ravenous but unwilling to attack an entity so close to its own strength.

  The serpent nudged his shield none too subtly, intent on making him release more colourful strands. He refused. It butted at the barrier again, but then disappeared. As it retreated, the next marker already identified itself in the distance.

  ‘Another one?’ the woman muttered. ‘How much… more will you give them?’

  ‘As much as you can spare. These mice know where the rat is hiding, and we are close to flushing it out.’

  ‘Must we… go deeper?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She drew closer, clutching at him like a starving parasite at its host.

  ‘M—m’sieur?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I do not think I can... go on. My back…’

  He took note of the cord extending from her. While only pulsating earlier, it now throbbed like an inflamed sore. Used to being in constant pain himself, he had disregarded her agony while she bore it in silence, just like his own. Nevertheless, this development was alarming.

  Extremely ill-timed, too.

  He growled. Was he to give up now, when for the first time since setting out on this infernal hunt, he had made something resembling progress? He was loath to even consider it. If he could convince more creatures in these depths to function as informants, he would be able to cut off the other next time it led him on a chase. A vital advantage!

  Oh, yes. An advantage, but won only by the grace of the woman’s colours. If she came to harm, he would lose his sight of the other, lose the hunt – and with it his own right to exist.

  So be it.

  Their ascent was so fast as to be instant. He didn’t slow their shift until the fog surrounded them. When the city took shape around them, he stopped where the quay along the river emerged from the grey banks.

  During their shift, the woman had collapsed in his hold. Now they had reached what she believed to be solid ground, she sagged further still. A habitual means of displaying her exhaustion, he supposed, given the fact that without her body, gravity was at best optional. As it did not seem to hurt her, he let her indulge in these theatrics, provided she kept them a private affair.

  But despite his efforts to dislodge her grip, her elongated nails had forced their way into his coat. As she sank, she thus pulled him down with her – and in the process dragged out half-formulated answers to the incomplete questions spilling from her confused mind. Highly undesirable!

  For their mutual protection he increased the shield of his coat. The darkness of her despair was solid, but his intense hatred trumped that. Her na
ils broke and she fell at his feet.

  He stood stock still, hands resting on the knob of his cane. The woman curled up around him, against him, but he remained unmoved. A statue in the fog. His acknowledgement of the world – or of her – was limited to maintaining the second shield around them both to ward off unwanted attention. Beyond that, he only felt the acid of outrage burn inside him.

  Damn it all! Good progress, gone to waste. All on account of her frailties. If not for the fact that he had need of her still, he would have been tempted to abandon her in earnest.

  At least, leave her to stew in her own sentiments for some time. Without straying further than was prudent under the circumstances.

  His fingers increased their grip on his cane, all but digging into it.

  ‘More than a meal, is she?’

  His focus snapped to the sudden intrusion like a sharpshooter locking onto its target. Across a space with the semblance of a street he detected the signature of the ancient boy. It leaned against a vertical surface, possibly a lamp-post it had willed into shape. He glared at it. The woman was of more use than the boy had ever been, but he bit back a comment to that extent. He would not be baited, especially not by one to whom he had taught the trick.

  ‘I am done with you,’ he growled. ‘Be gone.’

  The boy hesitated for the briefest of moments, but then obeyed and vanished. Or had it merely obliged him? A more likely explanation.

  From the very start, the boy’s interest had been to stop the killings, and by extension to be rid of the devourer responsible. That the boy had requested his help to eliminate the other did not guarantee his exemption from a similar fate. Certainly, he was in control of himself now, and had been for a long time. But that could change. As such, he recognised that he, too, was a liability to existence. He could not preclude that, in time, the boy – and what other forces it had enlisted – would meet him with the same devastating hostility that he held for his kin.