The Other of One: Book Two

by Brian G. Burke

  Doing all but pinching The Head to see if he was real, William yelled over the powering winds, “We thought you’d left, Crosco! And Ifcus! I-I thought he wasn’t able to run!”

  Into William’s ear, Crosco smiled with a twinkle in his eye, “He couldn’t! But you’ve made quite the impression, boy! It may have taken me long enough to see it—you know me—but you truly are quite the hero, putting up with everything the way you have. You may even come to learn this yourself someday! Imagine that!” he grinned, making the lad think. “Now, less yammering! I need you to keep your head down, for we need more speed!”

  William couldn’t have been happier to see his friend again. Then there was the old sack, tied to the rear of the saddle.

  Blood-stained and obscurely shaped, it bumped about like mad during that ride. At one point, a horn poked out of it. Then it became so clear.

  It turns out that dreams or visions don’t always signify what they show, in spite of the obvious. Redmun was right. What this prophecy actually meant was that, aye, William had seen death, yet not his own. What he saw was the heavenly ruin of Valstarius. The reasoning behind this was simple, if not a mite embarrassing.

  William’s wish that eve, by the lake, was so vague that his magic truffle, instead, wound up showing him some arbitrary event from his future. Unfortunately (depending on how you look at it, of course), it happened to portray something of a sinister and atrocious nature, which shared just as much ambiguity as William’s question did, to begin with. Not what one would call an amusing err. Even so, all humiliations aside, it was over now. One less thing for him to fret about.

  Imagine young William’s relief when he figured it out. It felt like every bad feeling he’d ever had was just popped like some blighted bubble, to be washed away by a friendly summer’s wind. All that worrying, for what? Nothing. True, he still had Drevol to contend with, and that would always remain a concern. But after stressing over this one particular thing for so long, to have it lifted off him like that, primed him with enough reassurance that he may yet make it out of this journey after all. For no centaur was coming for him now. All thanks to that amazing Dullahan. A valuable bond, indeed.

  With the odds leaning more in their favour, they ploughed on. At the same time, their friends were egging them on from above. The excitement had them on the edge of their seats. Or roots, as it were.

  Taming such power, and such grace, the way that he did, Ifcus looked like a completely new steed, were it not for his tell-tale peg leg giving him away. He was over the moon to see his friends again, too. However, not a second could he spare to acknowledge them, with everything that was going on. Thérn needed saving, and that was all he could think about. The focus on his face was unbending, with him having some distance yet to close before catching up to it. But it wasn’t going to take long, what with a little chocolate miracle shooting forth not metres ahead of him.

  The truffle cut through the air at a whirring pace. Crosco cracked his reigns to urge his trusty charger on. Ramping it up another notch, Ifcus so gained his place behind the truffle. Next thing he knew, he was on it. It was zipping alongside his cheek like a stone whizzing without fade.

  “Ifcus, my faithful friend!” The Head ordered. “Now’s your chance. Take it!”

  Already two steps ahead of his master, Ifcus champed down on that wonderful truffle with voracious zest. He deserved it, moreover, after he’d been denied it outside the tower of Thérn that time. His eyes practically rolled in ecstasy as that creamy goodness swished around in his mouth with a smattering of hazelnut to go with it. The taste was absolutely divine.

  Just then a huge, explosive boom rattled the walls, and Ifcus took off like wildfire. It was so sudden and so fast that, for any bystanders, it literally yanked the expressions off their faces, replacing it with out-and-out disbelief. Leaving behind a kindling trail, his hooves blazed beneath the might of his sprint, generating such momentum that even rocks were getting uprooted as he passed them by. Our Ifcus’ speed was remarkable. Absolutely unheard of. Nothing on Lythiann had ever run that fast before. Ever. No beast of any breed, nor being of any race. By Jove, did this make him feel strong. All the time he was thinking about Temprá, and how he’d failed her that day. But he wasn’t about to let that happen this day. That, he was sure of.

  Gripping on for precious life, Crosco and William dipped beneath the wind’s roaring stream. No doubting it, it was a struggle to stay on. It was a good sort of struggle, nonetheless, being a labour of budding victory. Seeing them racing towards him made Goidoy ever more frightened. He knew it wouldn’t be long before William would try to reclaim what was rightfully his, while payback was surely to follow.

  In a bidding to stop this from happening, he thus ordered some idle roots to stamp them out, but Ifcus was too nimble for that. Rather than squashing our heroes to road kill, those vines either ended up missing them entirely, or else Ifcus jumped through them, displaying such confidence that you would say he was hardly even trying. Better yet, this caused those stalks to become entangled, putting them right out of commission, hence leaving Goidoy’s scheme an utter shambles.

  Goidoy, fearfully aware of this, risked another tactic. Any chances of him gaining the upper hand at this point, though, were slim. In his desperation, he called upon his brethren with these unnatural, guttural sounds. Disgusting noises to the ear. His kin knew it as a call for aid, so they answered, despite their reluctance. They scrambled to all fours and hurtled after the Dullahan, strings of drool slavering behind them in their haste. Speed, however, was not on their side. They were too far back, and the sword was almost within William’s reach.

  Riding up fast through the merging blurs of Ifcus’ alacrity, his fingertips were practically tipping the pommel when, with a sudden jolt, the peg leg tore a splint and Ifcus’ galloping faltered, sending them back some few meters. It didn’t matter though, as the horse was determined not to let his dear friend down. So, in lifting his head from the stumble, he rose to the occasion and raced on, heedless of his injury; but it was only a matter of time before his leg would shatter altogether.

  “We can’t do much more here, lad,” The Head so regrettably announced. “Ifcus will run till it kills him, yes, but that leg just won’t hold! You’re going to have to reach. It is now or never!”

  Recovering what distance they’d lost, Ifcus was feeling the strain again, and William’s arm pained him as he reached for Thérn. It was but a hair away, teasing him. It was so very, very close. Whinnying, with one last surge of energy, Ifcus blasted forth just enough for William to grab a clean hold of the hilt. Goidoy didn’t know what to do or where to run.

  Ifcus skidded to a halt, with dust clouding up about them, and William sprang from his back with a tremendous flip. A flashing tongue of electricity shot out of nowhere, surging over him to a fade, when he landed down, kicking Goidoy into the midst of those great, wagging roots. It was such a boot to the face that Goidoy forgot where he was. There he was, shaking his head and trying to see straight, but he couldn’t.

  He tried to stand up but was suddenly kicked down again. Kicked in the stomach by the boy. Again, he kicked him. Then again, and again, and another, until every one of Goidoy’s ribs felt as if they were being held in place by just tendons and skin. Blood leaked from his mouth. He was truly beaten. William grabbed him by his head of hair, twisted his neck back, and commenced in punching him over and over in the snout, till Goidoy’s nose was half spread across his face, and William’s knuckles glowing red. Only for someone had yelled, “William! No more!” from above, he might have kept going till he’d killed him. Instead, he let the Goblin go, and stepped aside. Goidoy, the fool, he really thought he’d been spared.

  Broken and defeated, he then discerned but two things. First, the sound of cowardly Goblins, yelping into retreat after they’d seen him bested. Second, some form of greenish flash, traced by a slack thud. It sounded like many lengths of heavy rope had just flopped to the ground. He wasn’t long deducing th
at there were no such ropes to hand…only vines. The stalks had been cut, and their captives, freed. This put an icy chill through his fur like nothing else. Never had he felt so alone. Then he heard the footsteps, coming for him. One set only. Everyone else just stood by. What’s more, he knew without doubt to whom they belonged.

  First his claws were bound in wiry root. Goidoy was then seized by the neck and hoisted up to meet his end, face-to-face.

  Through eyes as bare and unfeeling as death itself, the Elf peered long and deep into those of his sister’s killer, and calmly whispered with such perpetual hatred, “She never hurt anyone. A gentle creature. So harmless. Always smiling. An infectious thing that, even to this day, remains as potent even through memory. Memories, however, will eventually trail off, and die; unlike what her life would’ve done, had you only finished your spoils earlier that day, all those years ago. Perhaps you would have let her be, yet you did not. Instead you ended it all for her; what could have been a beautiful existence. For what? Sport? A mouthful? You took her smile and erased it from the world, like cloud over sun. You took her love and amputated it from my heart, leaving in its stead a seed of hate. A seed which you yourself had sowed. And it has been growing stronger since, upon every resting sunset.”

  Silencing upon a thought, he then uttered, “Yet, alas, I know that she would not want me living my life this way. Full of anger. Full of revenge. She had a heart so true that she would probably have begged me to spare your worthless life, if she was here now.”

  Praying to whatever God that the Elf would act upon this, Goidoy then regarded him purely with his beaten face, when Stell’s eyes blackened as he spoke, “But, she isn’t here. Is she? Not now. And who have we to blame for that? I tell you now, Kaylen did not deserve her fate. And with the Lord and all his loving saints as my witness, believe me when I say that you deserve everything you did to her.”

  What happened next, few could stomach. Most eyes present at the time could not watch. Not only because of the sheer brutality, but also because they never would’ve believed the Elf capable of such dreadful deeds. Not he. Not he who was so timid and gentle. Should you dare it, I shall tell you of this event now, but it wasn’t very nice.

  Brandishing his dagger, Stell hovered it in front of the Goblin’s face, in a way of twisted indecisiveness. ‘Where to start?’ type of thing. He seemed so at ease while doing so, that it was disturbing to watch. A smouldering fuse. Trembling with fear, Goidoy’s whimpering began. He could tell what was coming. For he remembered Stell, and Kaylen, too. He shivered all the harder for it; no longer the Goblin King that every living thing once feared. Because even the most dangerous of beasts can understand what it is to feel terror, while they might not wish to admit it. It could easily be said that the last thing Goidoy expected to feel when he awoke that morning was a knife point scraping his flesh. And, thus, it was…and how strange and petrifying a thing it must’ve been, to have never before experienced the chilling sensation of true dread, only to have it suddenly stampede through his every waking nerve hours later, making his heart thrust to the degree of pain.

  Guilty of inhumanity towards so many lives as he was, they somehow found pity for this creature as he stood abandoned in the company of such hatred. But he could not go unpunished, or else he would’ve gone about his old antics again once freed. Harassing kind people, and feasting on more precious loved ones. If not today, then someday. That’s why Goidoy had to be punished, even if what Stell had in mind was far beyond the reasoning of a simple flogging. What he wanted was for him to suffer. And suffer he did.

  Wren feared the worst, so she turned away. For all the good it did. The ears can paint pictures far more disturbing than what the eyes can see.

  After the initial silence, she heard the sudden shuffling of feet, mixed with a struggle. The Goblin’s wail was so frightening that she had to shield her ears from it, though it did no good. She heard everything. The fear in the Goblin’s voice was so real, the panic, like his face was being squeezed in a bone-breaking grip, muffling his words through the folds of squashed cheeks. Then he started to kick. Wetness hit the ground in a sudden splash. The Goblin would flail, then stop, then flail again, then stop. Another splash, followed by a soft trickling. His screams, almost human, pleaded for the pain to stop, but it never did.

  Then Wren said, squirming, “Stell…” trying to get the Elf to show some level of mercy.

  He had no intention.

  The beast howled again, this time shriller. He screeched for help, but none came. That’s when she heard the most violent screams of all. Screams so piercing and horrific that they made the others seem like laughter. Ice crept under her skin.

  Wren, who was too repelled to properly look, peeked back to see the Elf standing over the beast, holding his wilted body upright and Stell’s arm jerking in quick carving motions. She thought rose petals were covering the ground, but they weren’t rose petals. Stell’s leather glistened black. The screams had stopped but were replaced by the sodden echoes of steel carving through meat. By the Elf’s reckoning, it was only fair that Goidoy sample his own savagery after what he did to his sister. Kaylen suffered it once, now Goidoy must suffer the very same.

  Claiming his say, Goidoy’s torturer sneered, “See what I’ve had to become to avenge her memory? See what you’ve turned me into? I understand now, after all this time I was wrong. I will not see Kaylen again. Not after this. Because there is no place by God’s side for the likes of either of us, dog. Rest assured. Hell is where we shall perish. But, by your unholy blood may Kaylen, and the souls of your victims alike, rest in the knowledge that you will be burning there long before me!”

  He dropped Goidoy’s ragged corpse like a pile of wet hide, and stood staring at it. Wren could see now what he’d done.

  The creature’s gullet had been carved from one side to the next, and Stell had fed his long, red tongue through the bloody slit so that it flopped across his chest like a fresh cut tenderloin. A heinous punishment befitted a heinous crime.

  A morbid turn to behold, even with Goidoy’s wrongdoings. Then again, revenge can possess even the meekest of minds. All it takes is an instant to turn them inside out—into complete monsters—flipping their worlds upside-down while reaping whatever it needs to. Be it blood, dignity, power, or worship; revenge will never fail to succeed should it be set loose, leaving its helpless host alone thereafter to forever pay the price. Heartache. Emptiness. Shame. Damnation. Revenge is a cold, sleeping wraith who hails from an unending line of ill feelings, none of such are bred from, or can result in, nobility. Only virtue can give us the gift of reward. Sadly, Stell was benighted by his hatred that day, and it led him—that same infant who was made suffer that carnage all those decades ago—by the hand, down a gruesome path towards scars so deep that they will never heal. Nevertheless, he always knew there would be a price. Ask yourself, could you blame him?

  William was the only one who could stomach the torture without expression. Not out of some sick bloodlust. It’s just, he understood why someone would take it so far. He’d often dreamt about doing such things to the Pooka, after everything he’d put him through. If he could actually take it to such brutal extremes or not was another thing. Then there was Stell. The fair one, who they’d always believed so thoughtful and just. To see him going through with it was most upsetting, for all of them, William as well. He must’ve had some anger in him. But, if any good could come of it, it was that Goidoy was finally through. Finally put out of his misery. And no longer did any one Goblin stand. Somewhere out there, in the darkest of hollows, or in tunnels old, they’d all turned to rot, the second his life’s blood reddened the earth.

  Spent after his gruesome frenzy, Stell turned a blind eye to their judgment, and went gruffly back about his everyday business, enveloped by dead silence. Proud, he was not. But vengeance was what he desired. He felt he deserved it. Therefore, he took it. And he wasn’t about to allow some petty sense of guilt tell him otherwise. That cold wrait
h, it seemed, had fallen back into its slumber after it had claimed what it had so long coveted, leaving its indelible mark in its place.

  Stell wiped the sweat from his mouth with the back of his garnet-wetted hand, put his dagger away and stepped over the corpse. He may as well have been skinning a hare, for the scant emotion that he showed.

  He plainly said, “Fresh meat there if you wish it,” and set off down to the secret pool to wash up.

  The Dullahan was probably the most shaken by Stell’s sudden turn of behaviour. He remembered him to be so cheerful and so kind. Yet in learning of his sister’s murder from Icrick, as well as the severity of it, he came to understand just why he went to those lengths. After that, the idea of eating him didn’t seem so unbecoming. He admitted so too, having not properly dined in so long.

  Redmun carved him a strip from Goidoy’s left shoulder, then said, “Give me a few minutes to get my head right and I shall cook it for you. Goblin meat needs a good roasting. We’ve already eaten, and you shall need your strength should you plan on sticking with us this time, horseman. For now, all of you, we will try to forget what went on here, and lend Master Crimpleton our support. No doubt this is a difficult time for him, and friendship is what he needs, not judgment. So let us head down to the pool where can do what we came here to do. Respectfully, yet quickly, as time ever battles us.”

  When they descended into that magical lagoon, William decided to hang back for a moment. He donned a strange half-smile of sorts as he deliberated over that beaten pulp. The type of smile someone would adopt when ‘at peace’ with something. That doesn’t necessarily make it a good thing, either, and now was no exception.

  Hooves came trotting up to his side, and there was Ifcus, eyes arced as he peeped in at him.

  The affection of his funny glance cheered William up somewhat, when The Head asked, “Everything well with you, lad? You seem away with the faeries.”