Stirring Embers: An urban fantasy action adventure (The Light and the Void Book 1)

by Willem Killian

  When the humans acknowledged the push, thinking that one of their brethren had pushed them, they were immediately on the offensive. There were no apologies. They would look challengingly at each other. Death stares abounded, daggers flying.

  There didn't seem to be any decency left. No compassion. No humanity.

  The only passion within them seemed to lean towards violence and self-preservation.

  There seemed to be a fiery animosity burning just below the surface of many of them. They just needed a spark. Or a push.

  Most though, had dull auras that ignited when they were pushed. Few of them had a bright life essence that signaled kindness, dignity and respect for others. Even fewer had a shimmer that he was looking for. At first, Urøk thought it would be easy to find candidates as the Harbinger. In a city of millions, his chances of finding people with a Glow should have been easy, but instead, they were all dullards. Boring, inconsequential cattle, roaming about on an endless, aimless cycle.

  Despite having lost their zest for life, most of them however, still retained something of their primal instincts. Urøk might be invisible to them, but he was still bound by the laws of physics. He hadn't suddenly become a wraith or a creature from the spiritual or ethereal plane. People still sensed him, even on the crowded walkways.

  He would stand still and the flow of humanity would bend around him, as if he were a boulder protruding in a stream. No one would bump into him. They passed within inches of him, most often with a frown, not knowing why they had sidestepped. They bumped into each other because of him, but that wasn't the effect he was looking for. Urøk even stretched his arms wide, extending his claws, hoping that some dolt would slit his own throat or lose his sight. But no one did. Some even ducked to walk underneath his arms, little heads unable to process what had happened, but not questioning it either.

  The most perplexing thing was that none of them even gave their strange behavior a second thought. It happened, it was strange, but it was over within a second or two and they continued with their lives as if he wasn't there. They seemed to accept the strange phenomenon and merely moved on, most forgetting that it happened instantly.

  This incensed Urøk. He was not a creature that could be ignored.

  A young man on a bicycle caught Urøk's eye as the daredevil bobbed and weaved his way through the busy city streets. He was in the prime of his life and the look on his face said that he knew what he was doing, and that he would continue to do so for as long as he pleased, despite, or perhaps even because of the angry honks, curses, and gestures he received from irritated drivers. Urøk stepped to the curb and timed his push perfectly. It was nothing more than a nudge, but it was enough to send the courier careening into the back of a sedan. The rider and bicycle did a flip in the air. The rider was catapulted further than his metal steed and landed with a crash on the vehicle's roof.

  One of the passers-by laughed at the spectacle. Another clapped hands. A few heads bobbed in approval.

  “Serves you right, you jackass!” one shouted.

  No one stopped to help. They stopped to view the spectacle, but as soon as the courier slid off the roof and stood on shaking legs, people started to move off. Some hung around, hoping there would be a confrontation with the driver. They also moved off when they saw the driver was a portly, middle-aged woman who immediately began to apologize to no one in particular. She looked at the shaken but mostly uninjured bike messenger, looked at the damage to her car, and proceeded to shake her head. It didn't look as if she was about to start screaming, so people moved on, the show evidently over.

  Urøk took heart from this. People did stop to stare. They took notice of another's misery and misfortune. Some had even been entertained.

  Perhaps the city was not such a dull place after all.

  CHAPTER 9

  Eleanor was petrified. She stood frozen to the spot, unable to move. She didn't think it possible, but here she was, in broad daylight, surrounded by hundreds of people, afraid for her life.

  Or was she afraid for her sanity?

  This was unlike any Glitch she had ever experienced.

  What she was seeing couldn't be real. This thing couldn't possibly be there. It couldn't exist. People would run screaming from it. Even from a block away, Eleanor had seen the thing sticking head and shoulders above everyone else.

  At first it seemed like an oddity. Maybe someone dressed up for a theme party. But as the thing made its way toward her, Eleanor realized that it looked and moved too realistically for a mere costume. Not even a big budget Hollywood movie would be able to produce something so lifelike.

  Not wanting to be anywhere near the thing, Eleanor crossed the street in a hurry.

  It looked like something from a horror movie. And it was definitely an it, despite its humanoid appearance. The head was all wrong. Its jaws were unnaturally big and extended, making it look top-heavy. It had the jaws and snout of something akin to a Komodo dragon or alligator. Even its arms seemed too long when it stretched them out and the claws could clearly be seen from across the street.

  And the eyes. Oh my gods! The eyes! Eleanor shuddered.

  Standing across a busy street from the thing, with a double lane of traffic and hundreds of pedestrians between them, she still managed to see its eyes. At first, she only noticed four, and those were bad enough. They were a bright amber, the color of a dog's eyes at night when ambient light fell on them at just the right angle. They reminded her of the Shadow ICK from her nightmare the night before. An icy shudder spread through her from head to toe. It felt like her heart had been replaced by a leaden block of ice. Had her dream been a premonition of this thing? The David ICK shadow creature had very little in common with the thing across the street. Except for the eyes. They were the same color.

  This thing's orange eyes seemed to constantly glow, even in the daylight, and that, more than the claws, its imposing size, its hyena-like crocodile jaw, or its scale-like armor, scared the shit out of her. Especially, when offered a sidelong glance at the thing, she noticed that it had six eyes. Two eyes were where you would expect them from most mammals, especially one whose body form resembled that of a human. The normal eyes (if anything about this thing could be described as normal), were perhaps a little closer set together on the face. Then there were two at the temples and two in a direct horizontal line with the other four, in the area where the ears should have been. It seemed like the thing didn't have ears.

  Was that relevant? Did it matter? Her mind screamed at her and she had to look away.

  Eleanor tried her best to seem inconspicuous. The park was on her side of the street, which meant there were no storefront windows for her to feign interest in. She needed an excuse to linger and study the thing, get her mind in gear, somehow overcome this debilitating fear that had a stranglehold on her.

  Her reporter instincts of old had kicked in. She was curious. She had to know what was going on.

  A food vendor a few yards away, near one of the park entrances offered a solution. Her stakeout position would offer her a good view of the thing as it stood almost directly across the road from her.

  There were two people in front of her, making it easy for Eleanor to still glance around without causing unwarranted suspicion.

  Am I nuts, she wondered, for the briefest of moments. Is this thing really there? Why is no one else reacting to it. Why aren't people running for their lives?

  Am I the only one that can see it? How is that possible? Has my mind finally snapped?

  That idea scared her. She shook her head and took a step forward as the first person in line had been served. She looked down at the person standing in front of her, concentrating on their feet, her mind subconsciously trying to ground itself. Luckily, the short line went perpendicular with the sidewalk so that a line would form near the park boundary, not across people's walking path. This offered Eleanor the chance to steal a glance across the street, without turning her head much. The thing was still in her peripheral vis
ion and now it was standing still, as if in thought.

  Eleanor took the time to concentrate on the people walking past the thing, rather than looking at it.

  Why wasn’t anyone running away screaming?

  Concentrating on the people, she realized that they somehow sensed the thing, even if they couldn't see it. People of all shapes and sizes, ages and different ethnic backgrounds seemed to walk around the thing. No one bumped into it and everyone seemed to angle their bodies away from the huge space that it occupied on the sidewalk.

  At just over seven feet, it towered over most of the people around it, but because its body seemed to be made of one chiseled muscle, the thing seemed almost squat for its size. Its shoulders were certainly as wide as two men. If its size and strangeness wasn't enough, it also had an oily black skin that seemed to reflect light. Eleanor couldn't be a hundred percent sure, but from across the street, it seemed like a haze surrounded the thing. Almost as if its body created a heat mirage.

  “Miss.”

  Her head swung towards the food vendor, as if she had been caught in the act of doing something solicitous. She closed her eyes, frustrated with herself for her reaction and forced a smile. She hoped the thing across the street hadn't noticed her reaction.

  “Sorry,” she stepped forward, filling the vacant spot next to the cart.

  It seemed like the only thing on the menu was a dog in a bun. There were different types though, ranging from the traditional Vienna, to what looked like bockwurst, pork cheese grillers, and other wieners she couldn't identify, accompanied by an assortment of condiments.

  “What's the chef's specialty?” she asked, forcing herself to concentrate on the man in front of her and not with what might be happening across the street.

  “Traditional bockwurst with sauerkraut and German mustard,” he answered without a hint of an accent. He sounded like someone from the Bronx, rather than Berlin. “I call it the bockdog.”

  He was a local, which made Eleanor wonder how traditional the fare would be. She relented anyway. If he had offered her porcupine pie with vanilla soup, she would have accepted it. All she needed was an excuse to hang around and watch the thing across the road.

  “Sounds good,” she nodded and dug around in her purse for her wallet.

  While the vendor was busy preparing her impromptu lunch, she glanced at the price list on the side of the cart and got out the necessary notes. Eleanor made sure to include a tip. The transaction done, she moved with food in hand to the side and leaned against a pillar next to an entryway to the park. She was hoping it would look like she was waiting for someone.

  With the perfect vantage point, she took up her vigil and stared surreptitiously at the thing across the road as she took a bite of the German delicacy. She was just in time to watch it push a cyclist into the back of a car. Bike and messenger went flying and the cyclist ended up on the roof of an old Mercedes sedan.

  Eleanor was about to run across the road to assist, her maternal instinct and good nature prompting her into action. She was almost to her side of the sidewalk when she stopped. The thing seemed to be looking at her, peering over the roof of the car and the man lying on top of it. Then the cyclist rolled off on his side of the sidewalk and wobbled on unsteady legs. The driver of the car, a lady in her mid-fifties, exited the stationary vehicle and was glancing between the cyclist and the damage to her car.

  The cyclist seemed shaken, but okay, so Eleanor backed off, trying her best not to look directly at the thing. It took a lot of willpower to turn away and walk to her previous position. She hated not being able to see it. Her back felt exposed and a cold sweat trickled down her neck and spine. She expected cold claws to encircle her neck at any second.

  The few feet to her vantage point seemed to take an eternity. She made sure to turn and look at the scene of the accident, and not at anything else.

  From the corner of her eye, she could still see it. It was still on its side of the street, thank God. Eleanor's gaze inadvertently drifted towards it, as if being pulled by an unknown force. She couldn't resist and didn't even realize what she was doing until she was looking directly at the thing.

  It was looking straight at her. And then its lips curled upwards in what could only have been a grin. Eleanor's blood turned cold. Not because a smile was such an unnatural and completely alien thing on that countenance of horror, but because it was clearly looking at her. It angled its head and then three of its eyes winked.

  Is she looking at me? Urøk wasn't one hundred percent sure. He was so caught up in the courier and his fall that he hadn't really noticed her. She was definitely looking his direction, but did she see him?

  As a test, Urøk grinned, cocked his head to one side and winked at her, making sure she would see most of his eyes.

  Did she flinch? He couldn't quite be sure as she turned her attention to the food in her hand. She took a bite of whatever she was eating and turned her head away from him. She even looked at her watch and looked up and down the street as if waiting for someone.

  Urøk was intrigued. Here was the first sign of a human with a Gift. She definitely had a glow about her, which marked her as someone special. But the glow never indicated what the Gift was. It could be anything from telekinesis to superhuman strength. The glow about her didn't necessarily mean that she could see him.

  There was only one way to be certain.

  He would have to do something drastic. Something worthy of the human's attention.

  Urøk was near a street corner and he took notice of how the traffic lights worked. People crowded on the sidewalk until a green light showed them it was safe to cross. An idea formed. He would have to hurry, though. The human might leave after she had finished her meal. Or perhaps she was waiting for someone and that person would show up.

  She was the first person with a glow, which made her a likely candidate to be the Harbinger. He didn't want to lose her. The decision was made to follow her regardless of whether she could see him or not.

  It would be nice, though, if she could see him. She would be the first warm-blooded creature in this world to acknowledge his existence. That was a special bond. A special connection.

  If she could see him and she wasn't the Harbinger, then he was going to enjoy eating her eyes.

  He had a surefire way to find out.

  He didn't have long to wait.

  Eleanor kept up her vigil for as long as she could, eating the brockdog as slowly as humanly possible. The thing had moved only a few yards down the street to the traffic light on the corner, and was standing next to the yellow pole.

  It seemed to be waiting for something. Biding its time.

  The signal was red for the pedestrians when it struck. It was so unexpected that Eleanor didn't know how to react to the cold-bloodedness of it.

  The thing was standing passively, even leaning against the pole, when without warning, it pushed someone. It happened so quickly that there wasn't even a squeal of brakes before the body hit the front of the dump truck. There was no scream, just a thud. And then the brakes. And then other people, not the victim, screaming.

  The thing had just killed someone and it was staring defiantly at Eleanor.

  The viciousness and swift brutality of it hit Eleanor in the stomach. A life had been snuffed out as effortlessly as if the thing had squashed an insignificant bug. Eleanor hadn't even had time to see if it had been a man or woman, or heaven's forbid, a child.

  It didn't matter. She turned her head and vomited up the bockwurst, sauerkraut, and German mustard. It all came out in a sour mess. Some of the mustard spattered in little droplets onto her white sneakers. It made her think of blood somehow and her mind conjured up violent, bloody images of what the victim across the street looked like. The reaction of the bystanders indicated that the poor soul had ended up beneath the back of the truck.

  Just thinking about it made Eleanor void the last of the contents in her stomach.

  It wasn't the thought of blood and gore t
hat made Eleanor sick. Rather, she felt intense sadness and loss. This had been a person, a human being with hopes and dreams, a family, friends, work colleagues. And just like that, gone. The thing had snuffed a life without consequence, or remorse, and for what purpose?

  Eleanor straightened her back defiantly and wiped the last tendrils of vomit from her mouth with the napkins she had received from the street vendor. Anger replaced her sadness and disgust.

  Without giving the thing the satisfaction of looking at the scene of the tragedy again, Eleanor turned her back on what had now become a sad spectacle.

  She stormed off into the park, hoping to never see the thing again.

  What had happened to the messenger and then the poor dump truck victim had been real enough. But she wasn't about to add monsters to her repertoire of twisted nightmares. She was going to forget ever seeing the thing. There were no such things as monsters. They didn't exist. Her mind had simply been overactive. It could have been the stale donuts or the terrible coffee from the police break room. Perhaps some criminal had infiltrated the precinct and added hallucinogens to the coffee pot. Imagine a bunch of cops all hyped up on acid? Someone would get a laugh out of that. It was all part of a stupid prank, and she had been an unwitting victim to it.

  There are no monsters, her mind kept insisting as she made her way through the park and to the train station.

  There are no malevolent invisible creatures out there, tormenting human kind. If there were, why would she be the only one to see them? She was hallucinating for some reason. There could be no other explanation.

  Either that or her mind had finally decided to crack. She had seen and experienced some pretty awful things in her time. The trauma of it could finally have caught up with her. Maybe it was a form of PTSD? Perhaps she had always thought of the evil out there as a physical entity and now her mind had conjured this dark demon to torment her.

  Maybe she had only seen the thing after she saw the pedestrian hit by the truck? Perhaps it was her mind's defense mechanism? But she had seen the thing before the incident. That line of thinking didn't make sense.