THE VIOLENT ENTICE
Wise Sayings of Solomon
"Scoundrels concoct evil, and their speech is like a scorching fire. A perverse person spreads strife, and a whisperer separates close friends. The violent entice their neighbors, and lead them in a way that is not good. One who winks the eyes plans perverse things; one who compresses the lips brings evil to pass. Gray hair is a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life. One who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and one whose temper is controlled than one who captures a city. The lot is cast into the lap, but the decision is the Lord's alone."
—Proverbs 16:27-33
—
JUNE 5TH 2012
NAZAS, DURANGO
Disgusting.
The ripping of limbs did little to soothe or distract the irascible mind of the person who stood uphill from the mess before them. The sight was pitiful. They inhaled steadily and allowed their mind to settle somewhat, words twisting and repeating and playing in their head. A manta repeated thousands upon thousands of times. One that would be repeated thousands more. With one hand in their pocket, they rolled their finger around something small, hard, and sharp, letting the feeling of it occupy their focus for a moment.
Down the hill in front of them, hissing turned to growling which turned to shrieking. They opened their eyes and let their gaze settle on the pair of lovers before them.
Purple smoke did not hide the screaming pair's expressions from the one who watched them. The pair should've been more cooperative, knowing what fate lay ahead of them. Especially if they continued to howl like beasts untethered.
The watcher was pleased when the largest man, the most loyal of their group, whipped a hand across the face of the man who would not stop shouting.
The obscenities falling from his mouth were silenced as his head jerked upward at an unnatural angle. The watcher realized, with mild disappointment, that the injury wasn't too serious. Nothing worse than what had already been done to him. The man could do little to fight back, his arms had been tossed away where they would be burnt later after a proper conversation was had.
Unfortunately, the pair were unwilling participants of this very important discussion.
"Please, PLEASE—stop, no!"
"You dare speak now," the loyal man reeled on the woman, finally laying hands on her shrieking face. Her chin was jerked upward and turned forward so that she was facing the one who watched from afar. "You ignore us, resist us, and now your words find you?"
The small object continued to roll between the watcher's fingers. They thought she ought to be grateful to them. Her limbs were all still attached. Only a few fingers were gone, some bones had been hammered into her own injuries in a few places, and a portion of torso that truly wasn't necessary to the survival of their kind was missing, too.
Her injuries were a mercy that she didn't deserve.
Vile.
"Gino," was the only word that emerged from her now. A desperate, broken call. "Gino," the woman sobbed openly, and it was not the name of the man at her side. His neck was slow to mend itself. Only the gravity pulling it down towards his body was responsible for what would be his inevitable return to consciousness.
And if he screamed at them again, it would be his last.
They knew who he was. Timothy from Caborca. A irritable halfwit in over his head. These lands had been occupied for well over a century by the watcher and their forces. Only a fool who wanted to meet God would try their luck and attempt to uproot the watcher's rightful claim to the land.
Land both given and earned.
Awful.
The stench of death was as familiar and comforting as it was a sign of progress. Of success. Of moving toward what had been rightfully theirs for the taking all of this time.
One could only plan for so many years before testing out the limits of their abilities. The watcher had perfected their process. The obedient man with his hand still firmly grasping the woman's jaw was only proof of that.
The person who watched the scene below them didn't need to speak. They didn't need to provide instruction for what was to come next. Every body on this field that was still standing was theirs, and every single one had proven themselves worthy of their spot in this group.
It was a shame that Timothy would have to die. His cooperation or willingness to join, to pledge allegiance, to confess his crimes, would have saved his life.
Sadly, he would have to be sent straight to Hell.
Wretched.
For so long they had bided their time. Careful. Always so careful. They'd moved slowly throughout the years. Building and disassembling their assembly with care. Until they hadn't had to dispose of the ones that didn't serve their purpose anymore. Until they'd begun to bring other people into the mix to do that work for them.
Loyalty had been hard to come by at first. But power was something they'd always possessed.
When the screeching of limbs and heads being removed punctuated the hissing and crying that had been filling the field, the person who stood, watching, rolling the object around in their pocket, finally let out a sigh.
"Very well," they spoke, watching as their followers gathered the bodies to drag across the barren land and toward the pile that had already been assembled just out of sight, up and then down another hill. As they worked in agreeable silence, the watcher closed their eyes again, sighing once more.
The object in their pocket was sharp on one side. With a small amount of pressure, the tip of their finger opened. A clenched fist brought their venom toward their palm and with a quick squeeze their hand—mangled, scarred, and strong—was wet with it.
Memories attached to the pain trickled in through their thoughts. For a moment they smiled and pictured once more the two bodies that were being carried away. Their faces were not hard to morph with the imagination, their features not quite similar but close enough that there was no effort to this daydream.
The watcher imagined blond hair torn and burnt, skull exposed and silvery venom slick across the head. An opened neck, perhaps proving that scarred skin all looked the same when peeled back, ripped from the purple, cemented system that held their kind together. His teeth would be kept and put to use. His last mark on the world he'd abandoned would never come. He would become nothing more than a discarded instrument, broken down for parts—maybe put back together once, or twice, just so they could hear him scream and beg and cry—that would be used to carve into every other victim these lands claimed.
The same teeth that had once marked the watcher's forces, would mark others, too.
Imagining the woman was easier, and brought a fiercer fire to their chest, the satisfaction of what would be done to her eliciting a full smile from their quiet, closed off face. Yes, the dark-haired witch would get what was coming to her. They imagined what she might look like, as torn and mangled as her companion had always been. Limbs fused together. Eyes gouged over and over again until regeneration ceased. They had never quite figured out how many times their bodies could do such a thing.
The experiments were only kind when mercy was deserved. Some people did not deserve mercy.
Time repeated like a spinning wheel. The unwise came to meet their ends on the watcher's land, trespassed upon. Interlopers sick with courage pretended that they stood a chance. They were never sorry. Instead they screamed and fought and died like imbeciles, shrieking out promises of violence that would always be broken.
It was never the cries the watcher wanted to hear. It was not these fools who they wanted dead. But little by little, they knew their time would come. They'd been waiting patiently. Something had to eventually give, and it would not be them.
When they finally had the Major and his tiny witch before them, his head on a spike, her limbs snapped like bird bones, their parts splayed out for the taking, then this land might begin to know peace.
Only then, would anything the watcher fought for feel worth it.