“I am her child,” replied the purple bird, his eyes glowing dark red.
“Wh-h-h-hat?” I forced from my quivering mouth.
“I am her child. The embryo of her mind. That which lives but does not exist. For long ago, she laid an egg. And I, and I was hatched,” claimed the demented swan. Then he started to laugh again, a laughter of sheer madness.
I couldn’t take the insanity any longer. I ran and ran and ran and ran, but I couldn’t outrun the sound of that crazed laughter. Finally, I reached the valley, and I could run no longer. The purple monstrosity still lodged deep in my head. Deep within my tortured mind he drilled and he dwelled. The angry Purple Swan forever haunting me.
Chapter Thirteen
The Great Valley and The Nightmare Ahead
With my lungs feeling as if they were on fire, I stopped before the valley entrance and breathed deep of the sweet air, gasping for every bit of precious oxygen. My mind remained fixated on the twisted Purple Swan, his demented words, and their horrific meaning. Were those words merely the result of his twisted, fantastical imagination, or had he revealed an insane truth? How could such a thing be the child of The Green Maiden? How could it be that something so ugly had come forth from her being, from her precious mind? A purple monstrosity the child of my beloved? I could not bear the painful thought that this story might be true.
My journey had taken me into the depths of the abyss, and it now stared back at me, taunting me with the final answers I had sought. But the deeper I went, the less pleasing answers I obtained, and the less truth I grasped. But I did have more agonizing questions, so many I was afraid I might lose track of them all.
After I caught my breath, which took several minutes, I attempted to shake off the horrid images of The Purple Swan and move forward. I tried to convince myself I would eventually forget the dreadful vision of the demented bird, but deep down I knew I never would. I told myself anything to make it to the next and perhaps, final stage of my journey. I had to keep moving to gratify my need for answers, yet I felt empty.
I had reached the valley floor, and to my left and right were steep stone slopes about one hundred feet high. The ground on which I walked was about twenty feet wide from one slope to the other, which was plenty of room for walking but not enough for maneuvering in case of a last-minute hostile encounter. The valley floor snaked around the twisting cliffs. The ground was pounded into brown powder in the center with a little grass and vegetation on the sides near the beginning of each slope. It was obvious from the powdery trail that this was a well-traveled path, but by whom? And did I really want to find out?
Just ahead several small rocks, some barely larger than my head, littered the valley floor. They must have rolled from the slopes above long ago. I began to have a strange, unnerving feeling that I was being watched. My view was blocked by the winding valley trail, but I squinted in an effort to detect any presence on the left slope, then on the right. There were no signs of life anywhere, but I exercised caution anyway as I continued.
My ears were filled with a silence that was broken only by the pattering of my feet against the powdery floor of the valley. The silence should have been reassuring, but instead it was tormenting. I trekked onward and turned the corner along another twisting path. Perhaps I was just being paranoid, but I grew more fearful with every stride I took and with every corner I turned. I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone, or something, was watching me.
Before venturing beyond another of the valley’s turns, I decided to stop and rest. But no sooner had I stopped than I felt eyes gaze upon me. I still couldn’t see anything, but I knew someone was staring at my every move. There was no one to my left, no one to my right, no one in front of me. I gasped when I realized someone must be behind me. I was afraid to turn around. I was afraid of who or what I might see.
Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer, so I shut my eyes tight, took a deep breath, and turned to meet my stalker. I jumped at the eerie sight of the six-foot tall monstrosity a few feet in front of me. It was a bloody red human skeleton with dark blue deer antlers attached to its skull. It was dripping a dark crimson liquid from its boney body. This was my stalker and proof I was not paranoid. But I wished I had been so I could avoid this foe. The skeleton man looked vaguely familiar. My mind placed him in a work of art. By whom I did not know, but I had the strange feeling it was from someone close to me.
Before I could reach my sword, the red skeleton sprang forward and punched me in the jaw, knocking me backward and onto the hard ground. I tried to get back to my feet but fell in the attempt. Obviously stunned by the merciless blow, I almost expected the skeleton man to yell obscenities as I assumed he busted his hand on my face. But I supposed I had a momentary loss of reality as the boney man could not yell. He was certainly dead and did not care about mortal things such as pain.
Before I could make another try at standing, he jumped on top of me and rammed the tip of his left antler deep into my right shoulder. It went so far in that I felt it poking the skin on the backside, almost piercing completely through. I screamed in agony, then I looked down at the antler sticking into my body, and I began to feel nauseous and faint.
I forcibly placed my left hand on top of the skeleton’s skull and pushed hard. This did nothing to move the antler that was still sticking in my shoulder. I then bent my left leg, and putting my foot on the skeleton’s hipbone, I pushed outward and upward. This took much effort, but slowly I was able to push the skeleton man off of me, which removed the antler from deep within my shoulder. Next, I attempted to scoot backward to distance myself from the creature before I made another try at standing. I had almost made it to my feet when the boney beast performed an unusual and terrifying act.
The crimson skeleton’s rib cage opened outward and then shut. This disclosed a strange, mouth-like behavior as the front rib tips were as sharp as pointy teeth, and the part attached to the spinal column was a menacing jaw. Before I could attempt any further action, the creature jumped back onto me with its ribs opening to bite my torso at the sides. I pulled my left leg in front of the two of us but halted his full approach only a little. The rib cage clamped on my upper body enough to miss a full mouthful of flesh, but it did catch some skin and ripped into me as it closed its ribs tight. I supposed it was hoping to have ripped away half of my upper body. I was delighted with its failure to do so. Looking down at the lacerations it had made, I screamed both out of fear and relief in that the wounds were not far worse.
The man without flesh soon realized his failure and renewed his assault. It leapt back on me and its ribs sprang open to catch my skin and rip it apart. I again pulled my left leg in front of the two of us and halted his full approach. I grabbed the upper part of his left arm above the elbow with my right hand and the lower part of his left arm below the elbow with my left. I steadily held his upper arm and forcibly pushed his lower arm away from me. I pushed as hard as I could, grunting as I did so. Then his lower arm broke away at the elbow. I flung it to the side, expecting a reaction from the monster on top of me. But there was none. Instead, he just kept after me. Pushing him away, I began to lose heart and wanted to give up, but something kept me going. The skeleton attacked relentlessly, pressing harder each time. The skeleton again tried to gore me with its twisted antlers, and only the extension of my left leg separated us.
And then an idea arrived. I reached up and placed my left thumb into its left eye socket and my left index finger into the right socket. I then grabbed the creature’s neck with my right hand and attempted the same method I had used with its arm. I steadied his neck with my tight grasp and forcibly pushed his skull away from me with my left hand. I grunted even harder and louder than before. Then I began to hear cracking. Just a little at first, then more and more the harder I pushed. It was working, but with a price. My arms began to give out. I could feel every fiber of muscle begin to tear as I over-exerted them. I pushed harder and harder, each time the pain in my arms becoming more intense.
Would my weary arms hold much longer? My muscles burned like fire. I knew my arm was about to give way or rip apart, whichever came first. Then it cracked.
My arms fell limp and dropped to my side. My muscles overstretched. My hand gripped tightly to the red skull. It had broken away from the skeleton’s neck. I had snapped the skull off at the base just before my arms had cracked.
The headless skeleton staggered backward, stood motionless for about ten seconds, and then each bone fell away from its attachment, leaving only a pile of crimson calcium. I tossed the skull to the side and laid there beyond exhaustion. My arms were like jelly and burned deep within. I laid there without thought, without concern in a state of mindless peace. I remained so for several hours.
I supposed I could have stayed like that, emptied of all thought forever, or until I died of dehydration. Maybe I would have been more content that way. But then, like a massive freight train, it hit me: three words—“The Green Maiden,” I said aloud, breaking the silence. I drew myself back into reality, or at least what I assumed was reality, and trudged on down the twisting path.
“The Green Maiden,” I said aloud again as if to convince myself to continue my quest. I hoped she was worth it.
I shuffled on down the valley floor, sometimes not even bending my knees, barely moving forward enough to avoid going backward, guided by the snaking valley path. My mind shifted between emptiness and fading thoughts of her. Like driftwood I had become, in both body and mind. The valley was so silent I could hear my own brain cells whispering to one another. What were they saying? That I was crazy for continuing? That I was mad to proceed into further horror? Then my brain cells began to gurgle. I stopped.
“Shut up!” I screamed.
“I’m not going back! I’m continuing to the very end!” I yelled at them.
They gurgled still.
The bubbling continued as if to mock me, to humor me. Then, in a rare and brief moment of sanity, I realized the gurgling was not my brain cells at all. I realized it was coming from just around the corner, around the bend of the valley floor. My view blocked by the steep cliffs, I listened intensely and noticed the sound was more of a slurping than a gurgling. Or maybe it was neither. Whatever it was, I knew I would carry on. I shuffled forward, hardly making any progress. Meanwhile, the sound grew more obscene and abhorrent. The sounds were squishy, sloppy, slimy sounds reminiscent of thick mucus being expelled from within something huge. And then I heard a sudden thud as if something heavy had crashed violently to the ground. I froze. After a brief moment, I shuffled around the bend, closer to the origin of the dreadful sloshing sound. And then I saw it, like a translucent nightmare, a horrid, ghastly image of torment and dreadful horror. The deep abyss itself had come alive and stood indelicately before me gurgling and spitting and sloshing and slurping about. So abhorrent it was that I was almost compelled to gouge my eyes out for having seen the horrendous monstrosity.
Springing up from the valley floor was a fifteen foot tall, live replica of The Green Maiden’s head, the neck attached to the ground like an appalling tree trunk, and her green hair swayed like wicked vines. An expression of confounded agony was about her. Her face and lips twitched and squirmed as if she were suffering a nervous spasm. Her eyelids fluttered while her muscles jerked up, down, and sideways as she grimaced. Just as I thought the heartbreaking scene could not have been more disturbing, a river of dark yellow mucus began to dribble from her lips and onto the valley floor, sloshing and gurgling as it did so. Her rosy cheeks began to swell as if she were going to spit. The repulsive gurgling and swishing grew more intense. Then her mouth opened and spewed an ocean of sickly yellow slime onto the ground.
Once the gunk had been fully expelled, her mouth remained open but silent. I peered into the wide mouth of my beloved’s replica, but there was only blackness accompanied by an absolute and chilling silence. Then a piercing scream erupted, followed by tiny black particles flying madly out of her mouth. The particles stuck to me like tar. A few even entered my mouth and went down my throat, scraping along my insides, slicing and dicing on the way. I was being pelted to death by the darkness from her lips. I could feel the sweet air leaving me. Then, as I was about to draw my dying breath, the onslaught stopped. The gurgling and swishing resumed, and a shower of the thick yellow liquid washed the tar-like particles from me. And I thought, not a moment too soon. My breath came back and I welcomed it despite my current sticky situation.
I brushed off the remaining specks and flung them to the ground. The black particles and the yellow slime mixed on the valley floor and began to bubble and gurgle. Then they rose to form the shape of a man—the yoke man. The slimy man oozed forward with its arms out and its hands ready to choke or slime the life out of me. I was far too shocked to move and too dumbfounded to think of a defense. Then the dark yellow hand grabbed my jaw and forced it open while the other hand oozed forward and pushed its way into my mouth. I choked on the creature’s thick mucus-like skin. The moment was accompanied by the sound of wild laughter coming from the head replica of The Green Maiden. It was such cruel laughter, especially to die by.
I was gagging on the foul creature’s hand and arm, and I could taste the putrid sludge dribbling down my throat. My eyes rolled back into my head, and I could feel consciousness losing its grip on me and the blackness take hold. I was about to die. That wild, savage laughter would be the last sound I would ever hear. Then, like an alarm, a light flickered in my head. It was a tiny flame at first, but it grew quickly into an inferno. Anger had finally awakened me. It was an anger that said I had come too far, accomplished too much, to die like this. I snapped back into consciousness determined to complete my quest.
I grabbed the creature’s arm and pulled it from my mouth—slowly at first, then more and more confidently.
“I’m not afraid of you anymore!” I screamed at the dark yellow yoke man.
“I’m not afraid of you anymore!” Then I turned to The Green Maiden’s giant head.
“I’m not afraid of you anymore!” I continued screaming as I withdrew the monster’s hand from me.
The creature looked surprised and stumbled backward. I seized the opportunity and freed my black sword from its sheath. I spun around in a full circle and outstretched the blade, striking the yoke man at the torso and splitting him apart. The dark yellow yoke flung into the air and landed on my face. What was left of the creature burst like an overfilled balloon and splattered the valley floor. A final few gurgles soon faded into silence.
I turned to gawk at the giant head of The Green Maiden. Her eyes stretched wide as if in absolute shock. Her mouth opened as if to say something, but nothing came out. After a time, a few words did emerge. “Find me at The Spitting Post.” The familiar words were spoken in a guttural voice so deep it could not have been human.
Then the head shut its eyes and dropped forward as if I had pulled its plug or flipped its off switch. I dropped my sword onto the ground and shuffled forward toward the end of the valley just ahead. The high cliff walls began to taper. Ahead was a stream, and I hoped I could make it there, but my legs were growing increasingly heavy. I was far beyond exhausted and running on fumes. Then I felt myself crumble to the ground. I passed out with the yellow goo still firmly attached.
Chapter Fourteen
Tiny Reflections in a Dream
I opened my heavy eyes to a thick gray haze that surrounded me. I was all too aware that I was dreaming. My body was in a deep, deep sleep, and my mind was exploring my subconscious once again. What would it reveal this time?
The fog was dense and engulfed my current surroundings, making visibility less than zero. I was standing in the obscure mist in a semi-comatose condition, my weary body fast asleep but my mind frantically searching for much-needed answers. I walked gently through the haze, my eyes unable to make out any definite shape. I was trapped in never-ending monotony.
Finally, tiny shimmers of light pierced the gray haze. The glittering illumination broke the fog
into tiny shards. The thick grayness dissipated to reveal a poorly lit room with odd ends and strange furniture. Above my head a huge red crystal chandelier with four crimson skulls hung from the black ceiling. The gray walls were widely chipped, unveiling a sad, decayed look. The room had the appearance of twisted decor from a disturbed individual. It was a mental ward masterpiece.
I made my way toward the black door at the other end of the long room. A horrible chill crept across my skin and caressed me. The window to my left was open, and its white drapes fluttered in the cool breeze. I placed my hand on the doorknob and gave it a slow turn. It creaked open reluctantly. Or maybe it was I who was reluctant.
I entered an immense room that almost seemed to swallow me whole in its enormity. The walls were adorned with abstract and macabre paintings, some too disturbing to discuss. Toward the back of this great room was a winding staircase. At the top, on the second floor, was a purple glass swan sitting impatiently on an obsidian pedestal. The expression on the deranged bird was one of mockery. I laughed to myself as I wondered what the place would have looked like with a more cheery interior decor. Even though I seemed to be alone, a voice echoed from the other end of the great room, commanding me to immediate action.
“Don’t just stand there. Do something—something useful; something helpful. Just do something, anything,” ordered the voice in a stern and commanding tone.
I spun around to view my foreman. He was a tall, thin man with purple skin and matted black hair. He was carrying a case and seemed impatient.
“Wh-wh-wh-what do I do?” I asked.
“Wh-wh-wh-what do I do?” mocked the purple man, and then he smirked. “Start setting up. Anything. Just do something.”
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