Eramane (14 page)

I stumble to the ledge and look toward the ocean rocks, a recently acquired habit. I can see nothing but darkness. Only a short time ago I would have been able to watch as different-colored fish swam around: yellow ones, blue ones, black and orange ones. I could have seen the ocean plants, coral, and the white sand at the bottom—everything. My hazy recollection is disturbed.

“Eramane, it is time.” Adikiah’s voice is unlike I have heard it before. A renewed confidence resonates in his words.

“To harvest?” I let out a dry laugh, which blends with a choking cough. He places an unconscious body before me. Just as I did with the previous two, I turn away from it.

“Eramane, your refusal will cost two lives this time.”

I turn to him and see that he holds a small child in his arms; a young girl—two, maybe three months in age. He looks down to the ocean rocks, and I know what he means to do with the child if I do not harvest. My will is broken. I am not sure if my desire to live or the desire to save the child is the cause for my giving in, but the strength I had to die has vanished.

I move to the limp body, not knowing what to do with the young man when I reach him. Adikiah sees that I struggle with the process and bends down to aid me, laying the small child on the stone.

“Like this,” he says, grasping the man’s head while clutching his throat. Adikiah rips the body away and tosses it behind us. What remains in Adikiah’s grip is a thin, featureless white glow the length of the victim. “Place your palm on his chest,” Adikiah explains. I do as he says; my hand sinks into the mass. It feels warm and malleable, like the filling of a fruit pie fresh from a brick oven. I watch thin lines, the same white glowing color, trace up my arm. As they enter my core, a feeling washes over me; I feel light and numb and exhilarated at once.

I lie flat on the stone floor, letting the energy course through me. It tingles as it surges, but the process does not last long. I sit up and look to Adikiah. He is pleased and relieved. “You look strong again, Eramane.”

“I feel strong again,” I say. “Now return that child to its parents,” I say. Contempt is strong in my voice, and Adikiah knows that I will never forgive him for his manipulation.

Adikiah did as I requested; he took the child away hours ago. I have not left the landing yet; maybe I never will. I crossed a line by accepting the harvest, and I can never go back. If I refuse another offering, Adikiah will only threaten the life of another innocent. What is left is the challenge of accepting my new life and everything that it encompasses. I think about leaving, but where would I go? I do not know where I came from, whether I have a family. Could I find a mountain of my own, safe from kings’ armies? Maybe, but none of this means anything; after learning of Adikiah’s feelings for me, I know that he will follow me wherever I go. I will never be free of him.

Adikiah has chosen a place for us to harvest. We stand on the landing, he in his true form, an obsidian sentinel, and I an unassuming predator. “Vegamon is northwest of here. Our journey will be long, but the harvest will justify the distance,” he says, his chest heaving with the eagerness of our first harvest together. “It benefits us to harvest farther from the mountain; it keeps the humans away from our shores,” he adds. My wings extend without my mind’s command; they act on their own, as if they know I am about to leap from the landing. Adikiah takes to the air first, I only seconds behind.

Soaring through the night, I take advantage of my heightened vision. I can see miles ahead and every insect that buzzes by. I watch animals scurry along the ground below, following their beating hearts until they have gone beyond my vision. I am still in awe of my abilities.

We have traveled for the first half of the night, but now we close in on the village of Vegamon. Snow coats the ground, and mist from the mountains empties from the bellies of the large rocks. The air has cooled drastically, and I watch puffs of my own breath turn into tiny, glittering, frozen droplets. As I play with my breath and the freezing air, I notice that something falls from above us. Adikiah is unaware at first, and I look up to see if anything else is coming down. As I scan the heavens, Adikiah takes part in the investigation.

“Did you see it too?” I ask.

“No,” Adikiah replies. “I can hear it, though,” he finishes. We continue searching the sky, and then I hear the sound of the falling objects. It is similar to the sound of a spear being thrown past one’s ear, cutting the air with ease—a low, whooshing sound. More of the mysterious objects begin to fall, plummeting uncomfortably close to us. Adikiah sees them now, and we can determine that large shards of frozen water are these spears that stab at us from above. One nearly clips my right wing.

“What is going on?” I ask.

“I am not sure,” Adikiah replies. At first the icy daggers are few, but their presence soon increases, and after only a moment, they rain down on us with fierce velocity.

Adikiah dives for the protection of the trees, knowing that I will follow. As we pass through the forest, shards of wood fly out at us. The frozen spears are ripping small trees in half, sending large wooden splinters in all directions. “We are under attack!” Adikiah yells back to me. “We must get back out into the open!” he exclaims. As we swoop through the forest and near our exit, one of the frozen shards pierces my shoulder, knocking me out of the air and to the ground with a forceful impact.

“No!” Adikiah bellows. He turns and twists, trying to dodge the attack. He is slashed several times by both wooden and ice shards before he reaches me. “It will be all right, Eramane! I will get you out of here—just hold on!”

Again I am pierced, this time through my left wing, and it is just as painful as the shoulder hit. I see worry in Adikiah’s expression; does he doubt our escape? My strength dwindles, and I do not know how much more of this assault I can handle.

As more frozen stakes plummet toward us, I see desperation on Adikiah’s face to get us out of there. He reaches for me, but before his fingers touch my skin, a shard of wood from a tree pierces through my leg and into the ground, pinning me there. Adikiah cries out in frustration.

The ground begins to tremble and crack, and Adikiah turns from me to investigate the quake. Dust from the earth clouds our vision and blinds us for a moment. Through the haze I see giant claws tearing away at the ground, and something begins to pull itself up from the dirt. When the dust settles, we see what has crawled out of the earth.

It is an enormous creature, slightly larger than Adikiah. Black fur covers the beast. Long claws and fangs make up its weapons. The beast looks like a giant feline with knobby, hornlike bones protruding between its ears, like the newly growing horns of a bull calf. There are many of these structures on top of its head, which allows the beast to ram its victims with great force. The eyes of this monster are wide sockets of green with a vertical black center, and its fangs drop out of its mouth, hanging below its bottom jaw.

Soon this beast will attack, and I will witness the extent of Adikiah’s might. The ice crystals, still falling all around us, pierce me again. This time one goes through my hand, and I shriek in agony. Torment grows inside Adikiah as he witnesses this brutal assault. I am growing weak, but I have the strength to remove the shard from my hand. Gripping the wooden dagger, I give a quick yank, and the stake is removed, but not without sharp pain and a loud scream. I look to Adikiah; the behemoth feline has his full attention.

The stocky creature jumps at Adikiah and takes a crouching position in front of him. Adikiah picks up two large wooden shards from the ground. He stands guarded, trying to anticipate the creature’s actions. The feline beast lunges at Adikiah and wraps its paws around him, sending them both to the ground, the beast on top. It covers Adikiah almost completely, and I cannot imagine that Adikiah has not be crushed under its weight. I helplessly look on as nothing else happens. The creature is motionless, and I fear that Adikiah is dead. This should fill me with joy; if Adikiah dies, I can die too. But I find that this fact does not bring happiness to me. Instead I feel a faint prickle of dread; if Adikiah dies, then I die—and I no longer wish for death! Just as I reach the point of real fright, I see small movements from the feline beast, as if it is trying to stand. After a few moments, I see that it is Adikiah pushing the creature off of him. Adikiah lets out a forceful grunt as he shoves the dead beast onto its side. Two stakes pierce its chest.

“This is going to hurt,” Adikiah says. He grasps the ice shard that has me pinned to the ground. I take a deep breath, and he pulls it from my leg. An agonized scream surges out of me. Adikiah tosses the shard aside and lifts me into his arms. Again we are flesh to flesh, and I can feel what he feels: remorse.

“I will take you home, my love,” he promises. I feel as though I will not make it there; I am completely numb … no pain, no fear, nothing. He sweeps me into the air, and we fly above the trees.

“Adikiah, I’m dying,” I say softly. My lust to live has faded, and I am ready to die.

“You do not think those things, Eramane! You are mine!” Adikiah commands as we soar above the earth. “You do not worry about death! It cannot harm us! Do you understand me?” He descends and we slam to the ground harshly, but with control. “You will not die, Eramane,” Adikiah declares as he places me on the ground. We are near a village, and I can hear people celebrating something, a wedding maybe, a funeral possibly. I do not know. “I will return soon. You must harvest,” he says, kissing my dry lips. He leaves and I am alone in the darkness.