literature

Chapter One

Deviation Actions

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Literature Text

"So... what's his story? I've never seen someone like him."
"Xander? You won't meet another... well, it's easier to tell you the story than to try and explain..."

It starts off real simple... Man finds a book. A tome so old, it's literally falling apart; buried underneath the Earth since time immemorial. Book is said to contain some of the most powerful spells ever devised. The strongest barriers, the most lethal attacks, regenerative abilities that can pull one back from the threshold. Magic so old that the verbal incantations are lost to history.
Through some bookwork, he finds that the words weren't lost, they never were. None of these spells have ever been spoken aloud, because they can't be; not properly. It would come out as unintelligible gibberish.
He also learns some of the massive history behind the book. The confirmed history is that the book itself started as Sumerian, proven by the type of binding and parchment, but the language and spells inside are second to none. Some of the symbols matched some language, but would always have symbols that resembled others. Sumerian, Cyrillic, Arabic, Ancient Egyptian, Hebrew, Sanskrit, language over language, constantly shifting, back and forth not only through area and people, but time itself. Some symbols more modern and easily translated, some hunted and hounded to find. All in the same slow, fluid handwriting...
He stumbled across a footnote while searching, referring to Witches and the Damned. It's said that certain spells could only be performed by a sacrifice of shed blood, but that those spells can reach further abilities than standard incantations. A symbol flashes in his memory, one that he's seen in the tome, and one seen on an illustration in this book, of a demon carving the symbol into it's palm with a dagger.
Blood magic. The entire book. The reference goes on about séances and sigils, calling forth and sealing demons. Upon further inspection of the section, demonic possession makes its appearance, saying that those controlled by demons have been known to speak and write in languages they couldn't possibly know; ancient to modern languages. Much the way this tome had been written.

"Why did he want the book so badly?"
"Oh, originally, he didn't even know about it. He found it by accident. According to him, he found it in a chasm, while exploring a bit of the woods next to his home."
"How did something like -that- get around here?"
"Well, that's a bit later in the story."
"Hope something like that was worth it."
"Once you know the whole story, you'll see just how much was paid to be in hold of those spells of his. I'm sure he'd trade them back if he could, but not even the Church will listen to his repentance, now."
"Wait, what?"
"...You don't seriously think that kind of magic could be condoned by the likes of the Church, do you?"
"How would they know?"
"Oh, believe me. They have their ways of finding out. Especially employed as such."
"What happened? What did he do?"

The man wasn't alone; he had a wife, whom he'd go to the ends of the Earth for. Weeks after he had discovered the book, she fell ill. He had his suspicions about the book, after all he'd learned about it, that it might be causing her illness. He decided to test his theory and carefully hid the book back where he had found it, even went so far as wrapping it in a blanket and burying it just where it originally lay.
A week later, her health still declined. A local doctor examined her, but without the availability of proper tests or surgery at the time, there was no modern way to save her, and based on her rate of decline, the doctor gave her less than a week to live.
The man, torn between having to lose the love of his life, and the possibility of saving her, versus the strict laws of the Church, couldn't help but go back to that chasm, to find that book.
Only... it wasn't where he had left it. The ground had been disturbed, the blanket discarded, and soft footprints leading away. Someone had taken the book, the only thing that could save his wife's life.
He followed the fresh footprints back up the chasm, and followed them still as they wandered through the woods. It took an hour of haste to find the creator of the footsteps, who had stopped for a rest, beneath a tree, with the pages open, flipping through them as if he were browsing.
He watched from the tall brush as the thief continued, his presence not sensed. He crept a long orbit around the man, behind him, and slowly snuck from the brush, making it to the tree silently. He peered at the book in the same-aged man's hands as he sifted and ran his fingers down the lines, holding his unknown prize.
'That book is her only salvation,' he thought to himself. 'This mugger has no need for it, no need greater than that of my love.'
"Finally!" the man spoke, laying the book down flat and guiding his finger along the words of an arbitrary page, whispering to himself.
With the loud cry of excitement, the man was spurred into action, and threw himself forward onto the thief, grabbing him and rolling him down the hill, tumbling till they broke apart. Jabs and punches ensued between the two, one protecting a treasure, one protecting another's future.
"It's mine! I need it!" the thief shrieked, as his dagger slid from it's hidden sheath, gripped tightly as it was jabbed and swung at him.
The man reflexively dodged the attack, before landing blows of his own, blood starting to spew from the thief's face. The dagger got a tooth-hold on the man's cheek, leaving a deep gash, but it was ignored. The man leapt and grabbed the thief's hand, throwing him down and stealing it away. He kept him pinned as he drew it back, an unnatural rage and will to kill welling up inside of him. He was protecting himself, he was protecting his wife, and doing the world a favor. Thieves are evil, dishonourable, and wouldn't be missed. They had no place in the world, it was his privilege, no his duty, to erase him!
He lost count of how many times he had stabbed the screaming thief, with his own blade. The victim had stopped moving long before the attacks did. He was left panting, as his body's energy had run dry, along with the thief's veins.

"What did the thief want with the book? He knew what it was?" the listener asked.
"At this point, it's impossible to tell just exactly what he knew, or what his motives were. Whatever they were, obviously it wasn't as strong a need as his, because he is here, and the theif isn't." the storyteller explained.

Only now, as he look at what was left of the slightly younger man, torn to pieces, could he see what he was doing. The dagger was dropped beside the body, as he look at his hands, stained with blood.
Rightly so, he told himself. Somehow he didn't feel the regret he might once had felt, but this worked in his favour. Unfettered by the weight of the fresh murder, he took the book and quickly rinsed the blood from his hands. Nothing detectable had gotten on his clothes, so as he came back to the town with the book in hand, none could tell that any wrong had occurred.
And yet a wrong was present, just as he came in his bedroom door.
In her last moments, his wife begged and pleaded for forgiveness for her sins to the bishop and entourage, who had come to give her the last rites.
She died the moment the bishop forgave her.
The entourage of clergymen left the room as he was left with his fallen love, with no more comfort than a second's hand on the shoulder.
After all had left, the book fell from under his arm, and opened with some unnatural flipping of the pages, to a spell he had previously overlooked. The exact spell he needed, to bring her back. He had to work quickly to set it up, because resurrecting someone is quite a time-sensitive trick.

"He didn't..."
"Just listen..."

He wrote the symbols out in a circle around her deathbed, having to slice every fingertip to spill enough to write the spell and structure.
His bloodied hands and razor had one purpose left, a slash of the left wrist, a sacrifice of blood to save his beloved.
With just enough blood left to stay awake, he bowed his heavy body and prayed to whomever may listen, praying in the book's tongue to save his wife.
He couldn't stay awake any longer. Had the spell failed? Was this all a hoax? Was it all for nothing? His body collapsed under it's own weight.
Time passed, he couldn't tell how long, but enough to slowly regain consciousness. He saw a pair of feet resting off the floor, flowing up into the leg of his wife, who was now sitting up, having just woken up as if from a sleep. He forced his heavy eyelids open to see her, and felt a smile grace as she stood, and rushed to him.

"My god... he actually resurrected her. That's... that's extraordinary."
"Unheard of."
"Except for the most obvious case, yes... God, that scene must have been quite one to come back to... Bloody circle and runes, and a near suicide, after knowing you were going to die..."
"Hard to imagine, isn't it? I'm sure it was for both of them."
"What happened next?"
"Well..."

It took a few days for him to recover from the whole ordeal, the loss of blood was enough to nearly kill him, not to mention the shock of using a magic that hadn't previously existed to do the best thing possible he could with it. His wife seemed completely returned to him, even more youthful and energetic and happy than long before she was sick. The spell had worked it's way, and he couldn't be happier. At this time, it was very well worth the pain and blood spilt. But that time was quite short in it's life.
Facts began popping up with this wonderful little miracle. The clergymen knew she had died. The town doctor had pronounced her, after examining her. The Bishop of the Church had personally forgiven her, and her death certificate was written and signed. In all aspects, she was dead, except to the poor soul who had brought her back. No one could know of this, absolutely no one. No one could know she was alive, no one she knew, no one she loved, nobody. If one knew, all knew.
And in that time, people didn't come and go as easily as now. No one simply was mistaken for dead. They were stone dead. If anyone found out she was alive, after the Church pronouncing her dead, they'd both be branded as heretics. Possibly killed.

"They'd kill them?"
"In that time, and even now, the Church didn't like people competing with the Holy Order of things, especially when it makes The Resurrection look more possible than one-time miracle. If someone could claim the same powers as God Himself, say, then the Church would lose it's power over the people. And that wasn't something they'd be willing to let happen."
"Wait, you keep saying 'in that time' as if it had happened centuries ago, how long ago did this happen exactly?" the listener asked.
"Two-hundred and forty-seven years, three months, and this makes the seventh day." the silent brooder spoke, from and back to dead silence.
"Two hundred... you're lying." the listener claimed.
"He's not." the storyteller responded.
"How can he possibly still be alive, if he's that old?" the listener questioned.
"If you'd let me finish the story, you'll know." he said.

So they ran. They picked up their things and were going to leave in one swift night. But fate, as it seems, was more cruel than generous, because just as they were leaving, his radiant wife was caught face-to-face with the bishop that had watched her die. The bishop didn't believe his eyes, seeing this woman who was dead, standing in front of him like nothing had happened.
All it took was one word from the commanding bishop, and the two were incarcerated by the superstitious mob, grabbed and taken away, locked in the hanging cages of the town's square, separately.
The bishop, knowing that she had died while he watched, announced to the murderous crowd that devilry was afoot, and that -she-, not he, was the cause. He accused the woman of witchcraft, and of ensnaring an innocent soul to protect her and lie for her.
He pleaded to the bishop, and divulged everything that had occurred, everything down to it's minute details. The book, the spells, the murder, the happening; everything. He pleaded that he be punished for his actions, instead of her. The bishop only used this to sway the crowd in his favour again, saying that the witch was pulling his strings, making him say that to save herself.
He also said that he had knowledge of some of the arcane rights, noting that if the witch is killed, then the man will die a suicide after a lifetime of grieving, weighed down by the witch's spell, so neither of them could be saved. He said that the only way to cure the man of this fate, was to make him watch as the witch is burned, so that her spell will burn with her.

"No..." The listener clung onto every word.
"... They burned her alive, in their usual witch-hunting fashion. And they made him watch from the stockade, facing the blaze, listening to her screams." the storyteller hung his head.
"... Afterwards, the man remained incarcerated, thrown into a cell and left to weep until he could recover. Every day the bishop who was responsible came to talk to him, but with each day, he grew more and more detached from the world."
"I can imagine." the listener shook his head.
"No... you can't..."

He sat still for three days, sitting in the corner shadow of the cell, never speaking a word, never eating anything, never moving. Thoughts pouring over thoughts, and a distinct feeling growing inside. Hate and darkness kept growing inside of him, cringing every time he heard the cell door open and that pale old man come to give him some kind of useless verbal solace. He kept saying God didn't intend for her to rise again, and that it wasn't really his wife, just a demon in her skin. He kept saying how they had released her from a hellish fate, and that one day she may have done terrible things. And that they had released him, from a lifetime of grieving, and saved his soul from hell.
At first he had grieved. He had cried and fitted; his soul was shattered, as any sane man's would be. But slowly, in the depths of his mind and that corner shadow, he found himself again. He took those pieces of his soul and re-forged them back together, but went even farther than that. By pounding those thoughts of revenge, hate, and the pain he felt, he had tempered it to an edge.
He had found a new place to call his own. There were no more tears, there was no more pain here, no more suffering, but only a black furnace, where hate was the only kindling.
Hunger came back to him as he crawled into this niche, but as he look at the plate, kindly offered to him by the attending Sister, he felt indifferent. His stomach was hungry, but not for what he saw. So he waited.
He waited for the next day the bishop might visit him.
EDIT: Changed the year count from 800 to 200, to keep chronology relative. Also changed a spelling mistake.

My newest idea to come off the back burner (probably because it was on fire) and slapped onto a digital page. I've had a few ideas floating around lately, random scenes, and finally glued a few together.

And I still don't have a name for it. Expect the next one to be named Chapter Two. :p I'll throw a link into this area once I've gotten it posted.

I'm quite happy with how this one is turning out, I have quite a bit of expectations for this one, seeing as how the other ideas I have for it have to happen later in the story.

Still working it out, though.

Enjoy!
© 2010 - 2024 AnarchicWolf
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PushEmFlames's avatar
Once again, an incredible story, AnarchicWolf! It has a Skyrim theme, which I love.