Salt, Sand, and Blood

by MarQuese Liddle

  Ahead, above, a sallow cadaver hung inverted and half embedded from the wall. “Raise it up,” said the chuckling, dead smuggler as Adnihilo buried a hand in his greasy, knotted beard. He pulled himself up then passed a pair of corpses: a Gautaman woman dressed in a silk and a headless pirate in a jack of riveted gold. In turn, each spoke in incomprehensible tones, and the boiling blood rose with every syllable. Adnihilo didn’t feel it till the flood passed his ankles, but when the pain came, it almost knocked him from the wall. Sweat doused his face. He clutched the pirate’s jack like a beggar’s alms, forced himself onward, tears hidden in thick perspiration—the taste of salt stinging on his tongue.

  “Raise it up! Raise it up!”

  It was Magdalynn next, her lips and the tips of her nose and fingers black with sickness, the rest of her pale and so frail her bones broke under the half-blood’s weight. Yet he did not stop—could not hesitate now he’d come so far. The speck of light had become a blue sky; the well had not been so towering after all. “Raise it up,” he said in place of the girl’s silence.

  “Blood! Blood!” chanted the choir. Adnihilo’s heart was beating steadily as the drums. His feet had finally gone numb, his fingers cramped gripping gaps in the weather worn mortar. Only a bit further. He could hear the lapping of the ocean, felt the cool air rush over his skin as he placed a hand on mouth of the well. Then the brick he held crumbled, and Adnihilo could only watch as it tumbled into the blood below. That’s when he noticed, saw his legs and the damage done. They were nothing but bones and dangling ligaments. Suddenly, it was just one hand bearing his weight while pain raged through his lower extremities. And still the flood was coming.

  With the last of his will, he reached again for the mouth of the well but found flesh instead of brick—an outstretched hand, the hand of a friend, yet cold. It was Adam’s. The Messah’s body had been slung over the edge of the well so that his arm hung down, Adnihilo’s only rope. “Raise it up,” said the dead Messah, and the half-blood grabbed on—to the wrist at first, then the elbow, and after that he grasped a fistful of hair, pulled himself over the edge and in the process dragged the pastor’s son into the boiling blood.

  “I’m sorry,” Adnihilo gasped trying to catch his breath, safe at last outside the mouth of Hell. But this was not the world he saw from inside the well. It was no world at all—nothing but black sky from horizon to horizon, the ground a shallow pool of cool, viscous water. “I’m sorry,” he said again, fading in and out of consciousness. It was the pain, the exhaustion, the crackling of corpses he’d crawled over only to save himself. The shame made him nauseous.

  “They deserved it,” uttered a strange voice in the dark, uncannily familiar. “Don’t be a coward. Look for yourself at what you’ve done. Look,” it said, but Adnihilo didn’t believe he could bear to see. He hugged his knees, lay grieved and motionless on the face of the waters. This world was not what was promised in his depths of suffering. It was nothing, and Adnihilo could not brave another step, another sacrifice spent on being nothing. He’d rather be dead with the rest of them. “So be it,” the voice answered, and at once light flickered in the distance. The horizon ignited, a ring of fire, burning quickly inward over the surface of the water. Good. Adnihilo thought he’d let himself be consumed by the flames, but as the fire drew closer and the pain came again, he realized how mistaken were his childish notions of death. “There is no escape from suffering,” the voice said. “There is only submission…or defiance.”

  The half-blood got up onto his hands and knees, hoisted himself onto the mouth of the well, the last safe place from the sweltering flames. “Yes,” he could hear that the voice was pleased, “now see them for what they are, for what you refuse to be.”

  He looked into the well like one would stare into the sun: squinting at the beginning, forcing himself until his eyes began to adjust to the ache, allowed the image to burn permanent in his vision—a flotsam corpse, grim and gaunt with dark bronze skin, its head a mess of deep brown curls, its eyes the soft rounds of unmottled irises. He saw himself, every aspect bled of the red fire of rage. “And now you see what you’ve sacrificed truly,” spoke the new Adnihilo squatting at the mouth of the well. His body was whole now that he’d consumed the flame, his flesh bright as copper, the rest of him dark as sanguine.

  †††

  “Raise it up!” chanted the demons’ procession as each plucked a golden chalice from the black of the surrounding deep. “Blood!” each called, filling his cup with the abyssal water as he rounded the isle, Ba’al at the lead. “Hail the Xanthos King!” they cried, passing under his high seat and reversing their direction. They rounded again, coiling ever more inward to where Lilum lay writhing on the ground. Adam stood beside her, watching the pangs of infernal childbirth, resisting the urge to look Asmodeus in the face, wondering is anything the Charred Angel said was true—and if it was, what it meant for souls to be conjoined, to be embedded. How much of them would be left to serve the original purpose of Light Bringer, Dark Seeker, and mysterious Deep Sea?

  “Now,” the King started, and the procession halted in a perfect circle, the priestess at the center, crying in pain. They held their chalices high. “Light,” the King said, and the contents of the cups burst into white flames. “Be reborn, Heritor of Fire, in that truest light that births the dark. Bring us vengeance against our maker. Bring us ashes and cinders of Heaven and Earth. Let there remain nothing apart from Pandemonium. For this purpose, be reborn.”

  Astaroth poured his burning chalice, and Lilum’s body burst into flames. Then Naberius followed, then Focalor and Murmur, Andras, and Kimaris, Aamon and Beelzebub. Last was the bishop of Cathedral Nox.

  “Be reborn…Armilus!” the King dubbed their champion, and the lords became a chorus, chanting, “Armilus! Armilus!”

  A shadow formed inside the white flame, stepped forth, proud and changed down to his core. This was not Adnihilo, Adam told himself; nevertheless, he found his breathing quickened, his palms slick, and his heart pained. The Messah’s only solace was that the armour the demons dressed Adnihilo in covered his face. It would be easier to pretend this was not his friend, easier to accept the unwinding of fate.

  The white flame burned out. To Adam’s surprise, Lilum remained, sodden and shivering, but otherwise unscathed—and likewise, unnoticed. Adnihilo paid her no attention, nor did the demons or the bishop. Only the King commented, “Armilus, we pass to you the torch which burns the world. Like Lucifer and Dagon and Veles before you, be blessed with the gifts of enlightenment. Your breath shall be Hellfire, a substance of mine own creation. With its power you shall purge the world of its corrupted order. The woman shall be yours that you be not tempted as was your father. And last, we gift you the tool by which to cull souls of human blood. Draw the weapon at your hip.”

  Armilus obeyed and held his sabre high.

  “Breath deep into your entrails. Deeper…yes. Now squeeze your lower belly. Exhale your very essence.”

  It happened within the seconds expended to teach the lesson: a cloud of black fire erupted from the Heritor’s face cage, cloaked the sabre, hilt and blade, and stressed the steel till it wailed like an animal. When the flames dissipated, the weapon had changed.

  Armilus flourished the bronze sickle-sword, tested its reach, its balance, how the old bone hilt filled his grip, and how its crescent curve culminated in the weight of it fang tip. The thing looked alive and hungry as the man brandishing it—the man whose attention turned toward Adam. The Messah bit his tongue to keep from calling Adnihilo’s name, drew his sword instead, held the rusted blade between himself and Armilus. Everything had gone as the Charred Angel claimed. Then this is truly the end.

  “Heritor,” spoke the Xanthos King, “You feel it, do you not? The depletion of your soul. This is the cost of bringing true light. Now you must regain your strength, for this purpose we have prepared a sacrifice. So go now, and be satiated. There is much work yet ahead.”

  “Blood! Blood!” th
e demon lords chanted, begging with their chalices that Armilus take the Messah’s head.

  “I’ve found my purpose,” the Heritor said. “Have you found yours?”

  Adam lowered the point of his sword, thrust it into the sand. “Yes, I have,” he answered, his heart racing in his chest, his knees shaking as he approached his destiny—and Armilus his own. The blade came fast. A flash of bronze, of pale light, then the thousand eyes of the Blind Leviathan.

  Coda

  Hark! And hear thy prophet Kashim out in the dark of Tsaazaar on the night of the Beast. This lease, God, has got me feeling like a damned fool, standing off with demons while companions abscond the sand bowl. But sure, Luthor’s sword swings heavy enough. I lug the steel on my shoulder, stare out looking tough when the mutt lopes around to the south of the dune—sound of claws cut the ground, claws larger than you. It’s the desert deserter murderer with fur that churns like turning your guts to viscous pitch, more viscous than Iisah bitches, fangs that light you up. Devil-engine levels of quickness. No witnesses after it hits, till the Mad Dog puts it down, now.

  Marauder Kyoken, remember the name. Kashim, infamous for innocence slain. Rhyme lyric mysticist, theurgist mysterious, wanted from Gautama to Nuw Gard’s Wild Isle.

  Notorious for work laborious, some say I’m possessed; a sabre-strapped maniac who never could rest. A lunatic, perhaps, but the best of the best while I’m laughing at the moon, shouting, “Shaking in your boots? Scared how Luthor did to Veles, I’m going to do to you?”

  “True,” from the darkness, the Black Beast admits, slips within vision, the demon lord Seth seeming six feet of human, black skinned and hound-headed, packing a sceptre that’s deaded more men than I care to count. Now, he’s concentrated, aiming straight for the brain. Domination, just like Jezebel did Cain. So I’m waiting there, patient, cause slavery’s not placed upon a man who hasn’t yet already given his consent.

  That’s life, nothing but salt and strife, fighting on a knife’s edge half-blind in the moonlight asking, “why?” And there’s never an answer; so take a chance, or take a dive. Either way, Life looses the arrow of time.

  Flying forward, I drop the steel off my shoulder, overcome the inertia, nearly knock myself over shifting rhythm; I dig myself in with my toes, swing the winged sword low, from hip to collar bone. Seth slips into the shadows, howls sick as brothel-moans, cause his tricks aren’t cutting it. He switches tactics—explodes! Lo, and behold, above and below, the Beast’s teeth close. On the upswing, I flow like windmills, my heel wheels—hits a blow to the nose, and the demon goes reeling. I get this feeling I’m chosen to spit lyrics that glow like steel flashes, a stroke thrown faster than bolt lighting arcing wide as I gloat like I really did smote Seth’s neck from his shoulders. But the demon darts right so I connect on the side, cut him off with a slice, watch the lopped paw drop like your jaw from the rhymes.

  Ho! It’s time I finish this, heft the great sword, impressive with one hand, be damned if I’m not ending this in style. Standing over him, I smile like a pygmy in denial, bring the blade behind my head and let it swing like something wild, saying, “Die.”

  I’ll be damned.

  It seems the tables have turned. Scratch the record—these fangs are really testing my nerves from wrist to shoulder. I’m hurting, though I suppose I deserve it. Traitor’s bones are forever cold beneath the sand and ocean. But I’m not ghosting it yet—from a dog bite? Like Hell. Draw my sabre half way, toss it up, grab the blade like a spear and take aim. Eye’s the prize in life; you’re only good as your last phrase.

  Snicker-Snack! What was that? Vorpal sharp turns the pain in my arm. Sounds of fangs tear apart—Can it be? Nothing! of this world can ever damage me within. Suck it up, the spirit that your fearing deep within. A sin? Might be the state of mind that I’ve been in invites the rhyme to open eyes to a vision that transcends.

  Blinding demons while bleeding out onto the sand, it occurs: the triple burners. Inspire purposes grand and emergent, searching for words that serve perfect, the fans that expand the ambition in my gut. Only then can I expire, when they’re giving it up, when their feet can’t stop jumping, when their hands erupt like the fire I’m blustering in the face of the damned.

  “Hear me!” I scream as the demon flees into the night. “I am thy prophet Kashim, the Blind Leviathan’s seer, he to whom the moon hast committed her mysteries. Ye with eyes on the inside, open them to see as I bring out the sun once again. It’s not over! Hear me!”