Carmine

The flames of the campfire simmered and crackled against the silent night. We made it through the forest, and found the man Valor feared.

Dagon, the name that introduced this tall gray haired muscular man to us with his hair ending between his shoulders, and eyes changing colors like San Rosa. Janilla called it The Eyes of Dalia. It gave them the ability to see the unseen, or put simply, to visualize objects in different variations of sight, whether darkness, heat, ultrasound, amongst other ways.

The many scars on his face and arms indicated his past life ripened with many escapades I feared getting involved in.

Dagon sat on a round brittle log with worms swirling out of the dry earth it rested on. “Yes, come drink, eat, be merry.”

Valor sat on a whitish gray rock neighboring the tall dark brown tree I leaned my head on. Sandream and Five sat on the ground with ants prowling the earth for scraps of the cooked meat they ate, while Janilla wrapped in a tight wool blanket sat on a high mountain of clothing, reading her book to my absent ears.

My arms relaxed and my eyes twitched open as the fatigue suffocated me. The moonless night annoyed me with it's beckoning dark claws from the trees hiding their assassinating tendencies.

We arrived a short time ago. Tiredness swept through us and consumed our limbs to the awaiting slumber.

I had not eaten much, and it was for the best. My stomach could not handle this life anymore.

Janilla put me to sleep with her renditions of strange beasts with wings for arms and bodies that molted into acid that consumed anything. Obsolete shells such as the Gamma Base T-two and the Exga seventy eight, so much knowledge existed in this world, yet there came so little comfort from it.

I blinked.

It was morning. When had I fallen asleep?

Two long thick creamy whitish sheets covered me in the same spot next to the tree.

A dull pain ran through the moving of my arms as if chained to the earth. Exodine saved my life from pain, but only in short bursts.

I stood up and blinked trying to organize my thoughts. Stretching was also in order, because this back pain nagged me. It took me several seconds before I walked around some trees towards the center building.

“Had a good nap?" Valor asked.

"No." I sighed, and turned to the deepening frown on his face. The trees around us stood at a good distance, leaving a bed of dying leaves and narrow branches.

"What's wrong?"

My eyes rolled before a smirk twitched out of my despondent appearance. "Nothing."

He approached, the closeness of his face, the sweet aroma of earth tickled my nose, offsetting the overarching power of his height. "You said no, that's not, nothing."

My eyes flicked up thereby hitting the bottom of his stubble-lined chin. I crossed my arms, clutching the shoulders from the cold morning chill, yet in his aura, warmth raised within my heart, but never exited. "You cannot do anything to ease my pain."

"Try me." Valor shifted on his feet, protruding his discontent through the deep ridges of his clenched jaw when he bent before me.

Air exhaled through my nose as I averted my eyes. "You ever feel like you don't want to exist?"

His head tilted to the side. "Carmine, don't think like that."

My shoulders shuddered in annoyance, and my eyes sliced through his facade. "Kind of too late for that don't you think?" I turned away from him, but my shoulder got gripped, seizing me to the spot.

"Listen, you're special, I believe that."

My eyes closed as I pushed down the building rage. The wind picked up, so the rustling leaves fought to stay with their mothers birthed from the earth.

"I don't want to be special." I flicked my hand with a snap of my opening eyes. "Why do I have to carry all this weight? It feels like when I had to learn how to curtsy, how to eat at tables, which clothes to wear at what functions, speaking properly, all of these, just to keep up the appearance of stability. I could never show a crack in the image of my nation, in myself, because, my life ain't my own."

"I—I have never been royalty. Even when I was in command, I let the men do as they pleased, never cared much for the intricacies of it."

I pried his fingers off my shoulder, and turned to him. "You were fulfilling your role. So am I. Yodan, Canus, those peasants, every step I take, everywhere I go—I feel like—"

"It's not your fault."

"My presence destroys the people around me. My fate splits the world in half, and prompts me to destroy the other. How can I live when my existence brings despair?"

He sighed. "It doesn't bring despair to me."

My face shrugged. "It will at some point."

He grinned and gestured with his clasped hands towards me. "Then I will gladly take that despair with you."

I cut my eyes away. "You don't mean that."

"What did I tell you about doubting me? When I say I will be there for you, I will be that light, no matter how dark the night."

My tongue licked my lips twitching to chuckle. "Don't wax poetry with me."

He stepped back, and pointed at my face. "You smiled though."

I twirled away from him into the rising gale of fragmented brown leaves, while hiding my smile.

There was so much to think about. Not all of them were positive thoughts.

My sandals crunched into a bark when I came to a stop. Dagon sat on a drum-like seat of hide over a wooden log, and he stared at me with a sickness-inducing smile with his full teeth.

Trying to stand strong, I held off the shivering fright of this man. It slipped into a tight grin as he stood up. “Come Carmine.”

I followed, while shaking off the tension. He moved hunched over as if pain besieged him. A pain that prevented him from walking straight or should I say walking with any semblance of humanity.

We came into a large room in one of the outer rim buildings. The heat clutched me, begging my sweat to the fore of my crawling skin.

I stayed at the front of the room, and of a long beautifully adorned table resting in the middle, for on it laid black figurine size sculptures of many shapes, and designs depicting faces, body forms, and body positions.

They all had smiling faces, since none were sad. The gloss of the sculpture's rounded edges deflected an ambiance that fascinated me.

Something creeped me out with the way he moved, looking at me with those penetrating eyes, and there was that smile. He moved around the other side of the table, hands behind his back, and stared at me with expectation.

No fear emanated from the slim coat of sweat, though my feet threatened to buckle.

“Nice sculptures,” I said.

“They help pass the time.”

“You are alone.”

“Yes.”

“Is it not maddening to be alone, like this?”

He chuckled with a closed mouth. He rolled his bottom jaw and then smirked. “Life is only as mad as you allow it. As bad as you make it. It is really how much good you make out of it that determines how good it is. So don’t make it bad or mad, to begin with.”

“As—” My voice broke as he reached perpendicular to the center of the table. I swallowed. “You know about me.”

“Valor told me enough.”

“Can you help me, with the rings, this glove, the—anything at all?”

He slowly made his way to the back of the room. I followed. He replied, “I don’t get involved in other people’s matters. Worst the matters of Gods.”

Sadness gripped me. Hands clutched tight in dismay, I pushed down my irritation with this continuous cycle of negative answers. How much time should I get the same answer? My mother commanded terror in many people.

Well, if I was an Eathen she would have been worshiped by me since birth. So what about Ashuor? I had been neglecting to ask Ashuor for anything knowing the truth, but why not ask?

Would he help if I had? Should I believe my mother about Ashuor?

“Though,” Dagon said. “Seeing Erot bite the dust will be a fine sight to see.” He rubbed the underside of his chin and grinned.

I sighed. “I do not even know how I will even pull this off. I mean look at me. I cannot fight. I have no army. The few people I have can barely help me.”

Dagon’s eyes turned to me. “I cannot see your potential like others, but if that prediction was made. If you are a singularity, you will do it, well, you could do it if the conditions are right.”

I looked at my hands. “If it is my fate should I not be some invincible force? Should I not be winning like I was born to? Why care about me, when I am nothing to fear?"

Dagon walked around without looking at me, the gesture of his hands like a slow theater. "The reason why they care about the singularity so much, it's because they are the one true manifestation of God."

My lips twitched in hesitation. "Me, God?"

"Yes, as advanced a civilization as we are, we are all fragile beings at heart. We want emotional connections, we seek to discover the secrets of the unknown, we are not ruled by common sense, but by desire."

Dagon stopped then tilted his head at me, causing me to step back.

"You are the only thing on this planet that is truly unexplained, there's no reason behind you, no form or logic to explain your existence. A singularity, the thing that can change the world through their actions," he continued.

I looked down at my open palm. The scar, fresh as ever, it never disappeared, no matter how much time passed. The idea of me having so much power, yet hopelessness reigned in my shaking bones. A laughable notion presented itself in my mind thinking about it.

"That is why my mother wants me, I am the thing that she always wanted herself, the power of a God, but if I am a God what part do I have?" I asked.

Dagon chucked and laid his head on one of the taller statues. "Sometimes it's just your presence alone. Think about it, even though Erot and the rest of them are mere mortals we still hold them up as Gods. Deep down that is what we seek, something to follow, chase, and to die for."

My fist closed with discomfort building in between my clenched fingers. "I don't think I'm worthy enough for people to even follow me."

His face went behind the statue. "You may not think yourself worthy, but the universe has chosen you as such. I do not know you, but I believe you are special and you will do great things. Just like Queen Riana. Through my will, this world will be made in my image was what she said back then."

"The Ascus queen?"

"Yes, your country is fortunate to have two singularities in such a short time frame. I was there when she destroyed Elam herself."

My eyebrows furrowed. "Destroyed Elam? No, she was defeated—"

His head poked out from behind the statue with a smile. "Is that what the history books told you?"

I stiffened in fright as he continued, "She never lost, in reality, she did achieve her goal, Elam was put to waste at the hands of her army unfortunately for her—"

"She died."

He came out on the other side of the table, and I saw only a side view of his head blocked by another sculpture.

"Yes, she died a natural death, her body decided that was enough for her. Soldiers there said she died with a smile to see Elam burn. Most of her army died of starvation on their way back to Ascus. They ran out of supplies and the harsh climates of Elam's dead land gave them empty promises. That woman always said it was her will that drove her and it was her will that kept her alive."

Will…

"Like the will to live?"

He smirked and turned away from me. "Something like that."

I looked down at the ground, and tried to wrap my mind around this. My own experiences up until now pushed me to a confrontation with Erot.

“If I was fated to kill her, that meant there must be a reason?” I asked.

Dagon smiled wide and menacing. “Of course Carmine. That is how time works. Any decisions we make lead to other decisions. Every choice is yours and so is your future as you determine how you react to it.”

He leaned off the figure and turned. The contours out of the statue’s face glimmered in the morning light. “In this case, you, Carmine must have had a good reason to kill Erot that it seems no matter what, you have to do it.

“Something driving you more than anything else in the world, singularities are not normal people. Normal people are fickle, while singularities move mountains, give arms to get to their goal.

“Their drive towards that goal is so powerful almost nothing, but death can stop it. It could be a million, billion paths, but almost all lead to Erot’s death.”

Something drove me, but what? Why would I feel an intense drive to kill Erot? What had she done to me? My eyes widened.

My own mother…

Erot made my life a living misery up until now. I never hated her though, for I wished this would stop, while my past muddied itself.

Canus, my father, could it be?

I shook my head. “My chances are one, one percent?”

“One percent is enough.” Then his face nodded with a frown. “Show me the rings, maybe I can increase your chances if but by a little.”

I took out the rings, and a gleam reflected off them.

Dagon took them in his cupped hands. “Oooooh, sigma crested rings, these are etched in the new style. My skills pale before the challenge of these.”

I lifted my glove and pointed at it. “What about this?”

Dagon laughed. “I have not seen that in a long time.”

“Elams stopped using stuff like this?”

Dagon waved his hand. “Yeeees, but for you, this can be useful. This should be easy to encode.” He leaned forward with his head close to it as if appraising it. Dagon smiled with devilish flair. “For a price.”

I frowned. He laughed and leaned back. Dagon waved his hand and one of the rings appeared between two fingers. “I will tell you what, I will show you how to encode it yourself for three of the rings.”

Three, no, that was too much. “Those belonged to Corona, the prestigious sage of the Erot coven, you will only get one of them.”

Dagon rocked his head as if he was thinking. He shrugged. “Okay. Follow me.”

I slid back the metal cuff, and he looked within. Four strings rested there. Dagon put on a strangely white glove with metal strips that gleamed in the sunlight. He made a gesture like he tried to touch the air with the fingers of it. Dagon smirked as if satisfied.

He snapped the first one on the left giving us the murderous roar. Dagon said, “Been a while since I heard an Asasa Lion.” I noted that name for later. The second one was glass cracking, the third was a woman screaming, the middle one was the warhorn, the fifth was birds chirping, six was a twig breaking, seven was a man screaming.

“Which one do you need the least?” he asked.

I would say every one of them except the murderous roar, but I will start with one. “Twig breaking.”

Dagon held the string with two fingers and pressed down on the top end with a finger of the white gloved hand. “Speak.”

“Speak what?”

He released the string, and snapped it.

“Speak what?" My voice echoed back at me.

I shuddered back in shock. That was my voice. He snapped it harder and it got louder.

He took off the white glove and handed it to me. “You saw how it was done right?”

I nodded. “Yes, but how does it just read the sound so easily?”

“Do not worry yourself with those gritty details. Encoding is easy for starters, but difficult to master. You should have no problem as long as you press with the finger of the white glove on the top end, not the bottom. Look.”

That was when I saw the top side of the metal string was thicker. It had a different shade and texture to it as well.

The glove was given to me with the rest of the rings. "Thanks, I appreciate it," I replied.

Dagon turned away from me, while hopping the ring he took in his hand. "It's a good exchange. I will scribe the glyph for Five in the evening."

I balled the rings, and glove tight in my determined hand, ready for the test ahead. "Yes."