The road to hell
Warnings: mentioning of alcohol abuse (of course Damien doesn't drink on duty) and violence
Author's note 1: Sorry if you are waiting for some information on what's going on in Karril's temple, but this chapter is Damien's… Please, Black Dragon's Ghost, don't burst into flames! I try to do my best. This chapter won't be proof read for 20 times at the very least as I usually do, but posted a.s.a.p, so please forgive my mistakes.
Author's note 2: I don't really know how far the Worldsend Mountains are from Jaggonath, but for reasons to be revealed later I took the liberty to place them about a four-hour ride away. I might be a semi-sadistic bitch, but having poor Gerald on horseback for longer than two hours is more than I can stand (and definitely more than he can stand, I'm afraid).
Author's note 3: I honestly don't have any idea how one addresses a monk in English. Is it 'Father' (well, Gabriel is the prior of his cloister) or just 'Brother'? Help would be appreciated. If anybody can provide me with a nickname for a fanatic, crazy mercenary (the nickname showing that the man is a psychopathic killer) I'd go over the top with joy!
Author's note 4: Obviously I borrowed the 'Sun' from the British press ;-)
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo oooo
All religions are founded on the fears of the many and the cleverness of the few (Stendhal).
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooo
Jaggonath, same day
Damien left the 'Neocount of Merentha' in a daze, his mind still reeling with the horrid images of the pagan victims who had somehow managed to survive the latest 'purging' by a hair's breadth and had been admitted to his hospital a few hours ago. Small, innocent children with deep, bleeding gashes had been wailing for their slaughtered mothers and women had grieved for honest, hardworking husbands who had been mercilessly burned to ashes in a frenzy of religious bigotry, and Damien couldn't help but despairing at the undeniable fact that the Church he had once cherished with all his heart was turning rapidly into an obscene nightmare.
The successful crusade against the Forbidden Forest and the Hunter had brought the Church of Unification thousands of new followers, but unfortunately the development hadn't stopped there, the ultra conservative wing gaining more power each day. Horrendous atrocities at the hands of the faithful had been committed for several months now; adepts had been put to the torch, pagan temples plundered and burned and the worshippers driven out of town if there were lucky. More often than not their fate had been much worse.
Decent citizens whose only mistake was to worship pagan gods were fleeing the centres of faith, and open uproar was looming. There were even rumours concerning a third crusade, targeting the second sentient species on their wondrous planet, the rakh, an outrageous plan which, if carried out, would certainly destroy every possibility of peace for centuries, and a shiver was running down Damien's spine when he thought of all those innocent souls suffering in a pointless religious war.
Briefly he wondered what Gerald would make of this terrible aberration of the Church of Unification. If there was one man on the whole vulking planet Damien considered capable of putting an end to this madness it was Gerald Tarrant, the very human being who had been disgraced and damned to hell by his own ungrateful creation, punished for the 'crime' of his adeptitude, a genetic mutation and therefore completely out of his control. There was no limit to people's stupidity, Damien mused.
"Why don't they ever listen?" Gerald had asked him once (WTNF, page 187), a mixture of contempt and resignation clearly audible in his smooth voice. Good question by the most brilliant brain he had ever met. Why, indeed?
Damien was well aware that the reasons for human behaviour were never simple, but it was an undeniable fact that men and women feared what they didn't understand. The man on the street wasn't the one to be blamed for it; he usually believed in the half-truths or outright lies kindly provided by their rulers instead of thinking things over and forming his own opinion on the matter, and if he was 'informed' that the last earthquake, tsunami, plague, famine or whatever incident causing widespread grief was due to some sinister manipulations of the pagan multitudes or a loathed adept they willingly participated in any kind of carnage considered necessary to root out evil. Unfortunately very often the helpless and innocent were at the receiving end of the matter while the truly nasty humans or demons usually got away.
Damien remembered one of the more amicable talks he had had with Gerald on board the Golden Glory during the endless nights at sea, discussing the despicable witch hunts on their mother planet which had claimed hundred thousands of innocent victims who had been tortured until they 'confessed' and burned at the stake for crimes which had only taken place in their torturers' perverted imagination. Damien prayed each day that the Church which had once been his true vocation wouldn't follow that road to hell, but his hopes weren't high.
Straying from that rather disturbing topic their discussion had focussed on superstitious beliefs concerning nocturnal creatures on Earth, and Damien hadn't been able to suppress a grin then, sincerely doubting that some nasty smelling herb called garlic, a cross or some ordinary silver would have caused his undead companion so much as a hiccup. If he would have been able to imagine vulking Gerald Tarrant hiccupping, that is. And although the Hunter had perfected the seemingly impossible feat of shape shifting into an art form a weird flying mammal called bat certainly hadn't been among his favourites, if Damien got the description correctly. The warrior knight smiled faintly, lost in his memories of the mesmerizing silver eyes sparkling sardonically and the amused smirk on Gerald's mouth during their conversation, but his good humour instantly faded into non-existence when he remembered that the classic mob on his threshold had gotten the better of his companion eventually.
And there you go again, Vryce thought exasperatedly, his lighter mood instantly replaced by the by now utterly familiar pang of pain and guilt. The devastating grief which had almost driven him over the edge when the shock induced numbness had at long last lifted a few days after Gerald's grisly death at the Keep had dulled to a hollow ache over the months, his job as a healer just partly alleviating the terrible emptiness inside him, the gaping abyss left bleeding when something vital had been ripped out of him before it had a chance to bloom.
On top of his misfortune the warrior knight had been forced to lay rather low for the last months, practising under the moniker of 'Gerald Faraday'. Even one and a half years after the actual events people hadn't stopped gossiping about the accursed Hunter's demise, embellishing their tales until they resembled one of the ancient fairy tales still told at the fireside. To Vryce's dismay unsettling rumours had turned up concerning a certain Knight of the Flame who had willingly betrayed his order and his faith to ally with the Lord of the Forest, and in a rare case of unity public opinion agreed on the fact that it was quite a pity the Inquisition hadn't been able to capture the treacherous priest yet. If that widely feared institution, founded roundabout three months after the triumphant return of the victorious crusaders, ever got their hands on the man called Damien Kilcannon Vryce he would doubtlessly be in for an insistent and rather painful interrogation.
Damien's life would have been crushingly lonely if he hadn't found an unexpected friend in old Father Gabriel, the prior of an ancient cloister nestling at the foothills of the Worldsend Mountains. The community was but small, just twelve elderly men living a harsh, austere life on prayer, the few vegetables which they could wrest from the barren ground and the odd charitable donation, and the monks barely survived from day to day, living hand-to-mouth, while the pious souls determined to serve the Church of Unification were drawn to the much more fashionable white and golden armour of the Knights of the Flame.
In spite of the arduous ride on horseback Father Gabriel visited the hospital each Friday, combining the collection of alms which would see the monks through the following week with the more philantrophical occupation of praying with the sick believers or just sitting at the bedside of any desperate soul in need of some consolation. Naturally the old monk had talked to the healer in charge as well on each occasion, and he and Damien had instantly been drawn to each other, but the warrior knight had forced himself to stay on the alert despite his sympathy for the easy-going, white-haired old monk.
A vicious article in the 'Sun', one of the worst examples of the infamous yellow press found on the whole continent and usually dripping with gore and smut, had contained a rather correct description of himself, and although his hair was much longer now, swept back into a ponytail as greying as his short beard, and his former bulk had been wasted away by lack of appetite letting his guard down and trusting the wrong person could very well be the last mistake he ever made in his life. Being the centre of attention in a propaganda trial after having been tortured half to death or just disappearing from the scene, done away with by a paid assassin, wasn't on his agenda for the near future.
Maybe Damien should have taken into account that the road to hell was paved with good intentions, and he still vividly remembered the day when the bubble had finally burst approximately three months after the regrettable incidents at Karril's temple. What was supposed to be a fulfilling vocation had turned into a veritable nightmare that day when a broken axle had caused a heavy haulage carriage to keel over, burying a group of four primary school pupils under its bulk, and despite their best efforts they had just managed to save two of the unfortunate children. For the umpteenth time since working as a healer Damien had cursed his helplessness and the loss of the fae which had allowed him to even heal a failing heart without so much as shedding a single drop of blood, but as usual the worst had been dealing with the bereaved parents. The warrior knight knew perfectly well what it was like to loose a loved one to the grim reaper, and barely able to retain his own composure he had been insanely grateful of Father Gabriel's support and calming presence.
When his shift had ended Damien had collapsed on the bunk usually reserved for the healer on standby, wanting nothing more than to rush home, if a decrepit single room without any decoration or personal belongings other than his clothes and his weapons could be called a home at all, and knock back the first drink of the day, but too winded and devastated for the time being to get up. Up to that point he hadn't quite managed quitting, and he had noticed that his hands had started shaking, if from pure exhaustion after eight hours of taxing and utterly depressing work or from sheer lack of alcohol he hadn't dared to contemplate.
With a sigh the warrior knight had flung an arm over his face and had dozed off for a few minutes, but had come around instantly at the gentle touch of a hand on his shoulder. "Damien?"
Vryce had blinked his eyes open, still dazed from his short nap. "Just a moment, Father", he had yawned, "I'm with you in a minute." Then realization had set in, and he had stared at the old monk in wide-eyed horror. Shit!
To Damien's astonishment Father Gabriel had just winked at him mischievously, his wise, blue eyes amazingly clear and bright in the wrinkled face, and had invited him to a drink. Tolerating a boozing, cheerful crowd probably warming up some tales about the Hunter's demise plainly out of the question for the former priest the two men had made themselves comfortable in Damien's room, equipped with a few bottles of ale and some sandwiches.
Still horrified at his lapse of control and the possible consequences Damien had frantically tried to think of a way to talk himself out of this mess at first, maybe just profess to have misheard in his drowsy state, but feeling the old monk's gaze locked on him without a whiff of repugnance he had started telling his weird story, his voice low and choked with emotion and his hands shaking like leaves in the wind, but leaving out nothing but his true feelings for Gerald and the meeting with the youth at Black Ridge Pass. Risking his own life was one thing, but he simply hadn't been willing to endanger the man who might have been Gerald Tarrant in another life, another time.
It had hurt to relive everything again, and some tears had been running down his cheeks, but once he had started Damien hadn't been able to still his tongue anymore than he would have managed to stop breathing and had poured his very heart into his tale. He had wanted Gabriel to understand, to understand that there had been more to Gerald than his Hunter persona, his frail human soul who could still be salvaged though it had been mutilated by a thousand years of torture and murder while trapped in a devilish compact which had been sealed with the blood of his own family and the ransoming of his humanity, cutting him off from any possibility to show even a shred of mercy. No soul, not even an indomitable, proud and stubborn soul as Gerald Tarrant's had undoubtedly been, could have come out of that unscathed, but after Mount Shaitan there had been at least the possibility of redemption.
When Vryce had finally stopped silence had descended on them, dragging on until the warrior knight had started fidgeting uncomfortably on his seat. Whatever sympathy Gabriel might feel for him the former priest had allied with evil incarnate, defying his church and the patriarch, and men had been excommunicated and incarcerated over the last few months for a lot less grievous offences. Damien had expected appalled revulsion, wrath and accusations, but he hadn't been in the least prepared for the one sentence which had shaken him to his core. "You still love him, don't you?"
Damien had blinked, utterly taken aback by the unexpected question. So much for pulling the wool over Gabriel's eyes, he had thought with an inward sigh. Do I have 'Damien Kilcannon Vryce loves vulking Gerald Tarrant' written all over my face? His eyesight blurring again and almost choking on his grief the warrior knight had but managed one single word. "Yes."
Pulling himself together Damien had raised his head to face Father Gabriel, waiting for the judgement to fall, but to his surprise the monk's eyes had been kind and understanding, though very sad, and when he had spoken his voice had been low and gentle. "Please don't fear me, Damien. Although I won't pretend that I approve of each and everyone of your deeds I will neither condemn you nor betray you to the authorities. 'The quality of the One God is mercy' the Prophet wrote a thousand years ago", the old monk had continued with a faint smile. "May the Lord forgive Gerald Tarrant for his crimes and cradle him gently in his arms, and may you find peace and happiness again. If you don't mind I would like to visit the cathedral now and pray for both of you. Will you join me?"
To his own astonishment Damien who had given churches a wide berth since Gerald's death had indeed accompanied the prior to Jaggonath's famous cathedral, and settling down in one of the pews and inhaling the air heavy with not incense, a smell so familiar that his heart had ached with longing, a strange feeling of peace had come over the warrior knight. After all it wasn't the Lord's fault when humankind went rampart and murdered and tortured in His holy name, and burying his head into his hands Damien had whispered a prayer for his friend's immortal soul.
In the wake of this catharsis life had become a bit easier, and with Father Gabriel's help Damien had been able to kick his annoying drinking habits and settle down slowly but surely into his new life. He had visited the prior once or twice when he had two days off and had even contemplated joining the friars, but Gabriel had talked him out of it. "Believe me, my friend", the old man had chuckled, "you aren't destined for the monastic life. I can't see where the wind will blow you, but hiding from the world behind convent walls is not your cup of tea."
Presumably Father Gabriel had been correct in this assumption, as usual, and if he hadn't known better Damien would have been tempted to assume that the old man had the Sight. But that wasn't the only riddle which his new friend was posing him. To Vryce's amazement Gabriel had taken it in his stride without so much as a blink that the Hunter and their venerated prophet had been two sides of the same coin, an appalling fact which had certainly caused the late patriarch more than a slight stomach ache. Not even the revelation that the Lord of the Forest had been identical with the first Neocount of Merentha and therefore related to his slayer, Andrys Tarrant, had resulted in more than a raised eyebrow, and sometimes the warrior knight wondered if the old monk didn't harbour his own secrets.
oooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Stepping into the street the icy wind dragged Damien out of his reminiscences, and he hurriedly closed the buttons of his winter coat. The snow on the far away tops of the Worldsend Mountains had visibly spread downwards, and winter was approaching with rapid strides. Bowing his head to avoid the gusts of wind Vryce very nearly bumped into a well known Iezu who had apparently been waiting for him at the hospital's staff entrance.
"Karril! How are you?"
Remembering his amorous adventures with the God of Pleasure Damien still cringed with embarrassment, but when he had a closer look at the Iezu's strained face there was no mistaking that Karril evidently was occupied with more urgent problems. In fact he looked pretty much like a frightened mother hen, stepping nervously from one foot to another. "Damien, it's Gerald", Tarrant's old friend blurted out. "He's going to roast me alive for telling you, but I fear he needs your help."
For a moment Vryce closed his eyes, desperately trying to process the mind-blowing revelation which had just been sprung upon him by means of a few random words. So the 'youth' on Black Ridge Pass hadn't played a cruel joke on him but had told the truth in his roundabout way, and the God of Pleasure presumably had been in on the bloody secret all along, deliberately brushing off Damien's frantic attempts at wheedling some information out of the damned bastard.
Bristling the warrior knight fought down the overpowering temptation to wring the Iezu's neck by a small margin, his anger somehow kept in check by an unveiled tenor of urgency in Karril's voice which made Damien's skin crawl. He still vividly remembered a small cave at the slopes of Mount Shaitan and the Iezu waking him up with nearly the same words when Gerald was about to die of heart failure. Gazing at the the God of Pleasure Damien realized that Karril shared his memories, and that he was desperately worried about their friend. Tarrant was certainly prone to drawing calamities like moths to the flame, and Vryce's heart crawled up his throat with dread. Into what kind of mess that vulking son of a bitch had gotten himself now? "Where is he? What's wrong with him?"
Horrifying scenarios rushed through Damien's brain ranging from killer diseases to compacts with whatever dark forces foolish enough to meddle with the former Hunter, failed attempts at shape shifting or suicidal sorcery beyond the powers of his imagination. Karril's scared face had done a more than adequate job in convincing him that Gerald wasn't just suffering from a bad cough and a sneeze.
"He's at my temple, Damien, and he is… well, sick, in a way..." Karril trailed off helplessly, looking plainly mortified.
"Sick?" Vryce repeated hoarsely. "What is it? His heart again? Will you tell me what's going on now, Karril, or do want me to shake the answers out of you?"
The Iezu winced, and the warrior knight got the impression that the God of Pleasure would have preferred vanishing into thin air instead of spilling the beans if the situation hadn't required an urgent intervention on his part. "I really think you'd rather see for yourself, Damien. If Gerald hadn't made himself abundantly clear that I wasn't supposed to interfere I would have sought you out months ago. I've tried to aid him as best as I could, priest, but now I'm at my wits end."
'Months ago'? That piece of information wasn't quite destined to lighten the burden on Damien's heart, and he raked his hair in despair. Damn the Iezu in general and especially Karril with his ridiculous clinging to his vulking 'non-interference-policy'. He had been interfering for ages now, thank God; otherwise the Hunter would have been burned to cinders in the rising dawn on Mount Shaitan, just to mention one occasion.
"Damien, please believe me", Karril's pleading voice cut through the fog of worry clouding Vryce's mind, "I tried so hard to talk Gerald out of it, and when I realized that it was a waste of breath I practically begged him to tell you the truth at the very least, to ask for your compliance. I thought you deserved that much. But it was like talking to a bloody brick wall. You know him."
Yes, Damien knew Gerald Tarrant, or whatever his name was right now. Linked with the adept's soul for life he knew him more intimately than he had ever known another human being before, and that was quite enough to scare the living daylights out of him right now, but try as he might he couldn't make head or tail of Karril's hide and seek game, not to mention understanding what his 'compliance' might have to do with Gerald's mysterious sickness.
In the meantime Karril had quickened the pace considerably an had started tugging him along the street by his sleeve, and sensing the Iezu's misery and fear Damien had just thought better of lagging behind and wasting valuable time with fruitless discussions when the very air seemed to explode. A huge detonation shook the ground below their feet, and numerous glass panes exploded into a veritable shower of razor-sharp shards.
Damien Kilcannon Vryce had never seen an Iezu blanch before and hadn't thought it possible a minute ago, but Karril seemed close to keeling over on the spot with dread. Alarmed the former priest gripped his shoulder and shook him not too gently to get him out of his daze. "What's going on, damn it?"
Karril's eyes were wide and full of panic. "The Knights of the Flame, priest. They're storming my temple! Oh dear Mother..." The next instant he was gone, leaving behind a dumbstruck Damien Vryce.
