Night Terrors 16 Raconteur

Night Terrors - 16 - Raconteur

I stand in the street and hear in the distance a woman scream, "federalists!" and I hear the wheels of a car spin around the corner onto the street I am walking, through the sunroof stands a boy with a machine gun whom begins firing on the public and laughing, when it passes we continue on our way, because this is how things are here.

I walk passed the signs that say, 'positions available, serfs only', I cannot stop to apply for a position because they only allow the party to work and I refuse, too political for me and I don't have the tithe to pay required before you can work, by choice of creed I won't work at the company store. I continue through the small-minded secularized city into suburbia and see old glory hastily and majestically sprayed over an old billboard with a stencil for only the original thirteen stars, black and white, with the stars on the left it means that a capitalist refugee camp is left and nearby in the forest, they let us live as outcasts, for now.

I make my way to the hospice, with communism running rampantly ineffective, aside other unscrupulous traits, the coal plant officers sell us charcoal we use for filtering water polluted only to be blamed on political enemies of the party, the most hated are called federalists, constitutionalists, capitalists, demonized for individualism. In the party's defense, they're not that bright, they praise individualism but cannot become it in irony and punish it in hypocrisy. Communism by design is corrupt and so the coal plant officers gratefully sell us things we need against party rules, for extra cash, just as most tenured officials do, when they're not under party review. It's dangerous, but better to drink than to drought.

I move to the outdoor kitchen for food but am denied without something to barter, my mission among the drones was successful so I accept this current situation and walk from the sweetly-smelling venison soup to the door of the commissary tent. After speaking with an old friend from Hoosier hills and another newly made friend I walk inside the camp headquarters.

It's best to note, as our numbers grew we were forced to split into smaller bands, the more troops, the larger the den. Large groups can't spend time in open plains without food either, nor is it a good idea to make many zealous attempts to graze in intervals on the fields, tho the underground railroad helps, and large groups are typically gathered and the young indoctrinated, their parents fare worse. Marxists make it a habit to deny holocausts, communism in reality had not been liberal because it does not allow free thought, it was and is overly conservative as it tries to keep clandestine monopoly, and overtly fascist appealing to the beasts within people. Republicans were the liberals and libertarians, yet the latter were ambivalent to forces outside fate such as the liberal mind is, unadventurous independence, this derivative pithiness is me digressing, the golden age is over and the fight has begun, war has grown.

My friend and leader sits watching TV in the tent, solar powered, it plays the state television quarterly debate, pinkos are the party but they allow the socialists as a vassal-like class because they demand that money leeched by the party be spent, illogically but profligate nonetheless, which makes the party seem useful, the favorite ruse it seems of bureaucrats. The communist behind a podium of a red flag argues for research into genetic testing that will allow scientists to divulge if an unborn child is capitalist to expedite abortion procedures, the socialist with a red flag argues for the funding first to do so. Their callow propaganda sounds while my mind imagines them as puppets and the hidden face of Satan.

From the disarmament pacts served through disinformation fascism, guns for all people are outlawed and anyone opposed to the existence of the party are now called citizen and no longer brother or sister, and in doing so run the risk of death for thought crimes. Even if I am mad, trapped inside my mind by paranoia, to seem unsympathetic unnoticed and still pose that the devil is in the details, such a theology could also be punished. We still have our pistols and caches of weapons in scores in troves but the tent is filled with archery weapons and blades to present ourselves as hunters and butchers, and nothing more.

Democracy is a body politic, its blood has been spilt, the wound will heal only with the flow of blood. The chief mentions to me his disgust with the rhetoric of the state and I politely agree with him. There would not be peace without violence, the misanthropic theocracy the party spouts is bile to corrode life, the warlords tearing holes in the ancient peaceful world would call it dishonor, if it describes the evil and idiocy of the party, I'd have to agree with them.  I give him cold hard cash, he'll use it to buy facade and subterfuge for the ever battle, I'm offered ammo and meat then told by him "in God we trust" and I repeat it to him then wipe my hand on the side of my jacket. It is a matter of secrecy that we never salute, our signal in deep cover is brushing ourselves to be clean of particulates, like baseball signals, because it makes us seem fastidious under scrutiny and brings a new meaning to guerrilla warfare.

We'll be moving forward soon, you can always tell when we're pulling up stakes when the clothes are being washed. The cash was part of my duty to the cause, we steal it from the unsuspecting or steal things of even trivial value then wander until we can sell them for money, we use currency for fuel and seeds if ours are lost in battle, they're more valuable than money to us at this point. Its main purpose is for costume and conflict, we never spy anymore, that lead to this hell. The party blamed the free world, we are their lies come to veneration, to the unknown innocent we are the decedents of those seeking redemption and the descendants of vengeance. Even before the war the Islam fought blindly in their own blood, now we're swimming in it.

I take my cut of meat to the nearby fire, the children politely approach in wonder and begin asking questions, I cut a strip and eat it raw, when the children ask I tell them they're too young to eat raw meat and sever the cut in half and give it to their denmother, I eat pieces cooked at the fire's edge with my knife, offering occasional pieces with a young couple as my mind races about the girls in the city that in whiles get information from party officers and elevated aristocratic sympathizers.

Eventually we tell our stories of our common enemy to the children, our plight and exploit explained through the joy of killing communists, which I imagine is the same tale the ancients would tell of hunting bears in deep caves except to add the slavery and sin of the war, but keeping certain to never tell the children why we fight. They must decide to err on the side of good, I can't afford to take another choice from them, they've lost so many already. As the children tire we tell the stories of Napoleon told to us when we were children at the start of the war, memorized in great lengths from books now flipped and thumbed into disuse and disrepair, copied by hand somewhere the mountains.

When the Left is caught in treason they deny it ever happened, if desperate they might attempt to argue their case, but with so many of them now, they so quickly turn to violent radicalism. When the Right is caught in treason they'll admit their error, but provide a patsy, the way an animal might chew-off a limb caught in a trap, slowly losing credibility or mobility, but slow to violence, but when they begin to fight it's hard to make them stop. I believe freedom is in the right, that is us, we are a small band sick of the party's full spectrum lies, teachers nauseous of the reeducation camps that put leaders to death and liars to despotism, doctors that won't ration and cutback care, scientists and soldiers that don't want to repeat a dark tyrannical history.

The fire is low and the night is long, I see darkness lurking in the trees, I hear a whispering gravel voice, a figure of shadow stands near a tree and I pull my pistol with its modified short silencer and aim at the visitor, it is a visit from darkness itself, it leaves like a cloud of darkness that consumes light dissipating into the nothingness.

I sleep and wake with the season putting cold into each dawn, my eyes open to see the Muslims doing their morning prayers in the trees, when done an old friend among them shouts to me religious words in their native language, and I reply 'in God we trust', it is the way of soldiers of our insurrection to give a greeting mentioning God and any one of us could do it in a hundred languages since we were young, it perhaps is why they joined us. They had given up their rabidness, their fear of pork, fear of booze, their contempt of differing faiths, and their polygamy is nonexistent much to many woes of any man from his illicit dreams. They however did not give up their old ways of direct assault, they get into a car with handmade guns so if caught cannot be traced and handmade grenades and head to the nearest concentration of pinkos, they'll act as a corrosion to conformity for life or death, escape and lead them astray for a second wave to slaughter the pencil pushers and rubber stampers, with enough numbers they might even lead the reds into a forest trap and feast or famish.

"Hey!..snap out of it!" a boy shouts at me, "we're going now taker," I've flaked in that last thought, we're moving out in caravan, nomadic we travel, solar and the sweet smell of gasoline. I sit in an old school bus turned into a command unit, I watch a warrior half my age make the compounds that turn plastic into flammable liquids, his tools are in hidden drawers in the walls.

A city approaches the road ebbing beneath the floating horizon, the bus halts and we exit and scout a place to drive into the forest, the bus's solid tires tread softly over the soil and scare a rabbit, three pocket crossbows with the bow against the side of the pistol instead of atop it, point and shoot, one of which is mine, another of such shoots very close to my hand, the rabbit is dead, the two other shooters are boys, I tell them to "bring me my arrow" and one of them takes the rabbit in one hand and pulls the tiny arrow with the other, he holds forward the arrow and reluctantly the rabbit, I take the arrow and gently slap the side of his head and turn away from him. I hear their feet dash through the leaves and their mother calls them, their feet halt as they give a contemplative 'yes' simultaneously. I can no longer hear their conversation over the sound of leaves crushing beneath my feet. We pull the netting over the lowered bus, set the sensors by the road, check the scanner in the vehicle, and roshambo for who takes first shift guard duty. I am first to patrol and afterward first to sleep.

Dreaming I see a city of museums and monasteries, I walk thru gates over large square stones, thru large doors, I see a famous painter on a ladder creating one of the famous paintings, the afternoon is also evening, the surreal light is transparent but bright and dark, in the shadows a woman cat burglar comes to remove the paintings from the abode, her form wrapped in black cloth, like the ninjas from books in the archive, to do so she swings a rope with a triple hook on it used for climbing to a rung of the ladder, then pulls the artist down to their death. The burglar begins to take the paintings, and the dizziness of disillusionment makes me a picture, while watching her take the pictures, while watching through her eyes, while feeling the world be taken like a picture from a wall as the ground shakes and melts, I fear and startle myself awake from nightmare.

I walk toward the guard on patrol and am silently ambushed by another stealthy sentinel and tell them my dream and new found revelation, they patronize me for the entire telling of the dream and ask me "are you asking us or telling us?" to which I presume is my zealousness and retell them my interpretation, "when we are living we are fighting, to sleep among leeches is to die, when we cannot make our funding nor can we attack, we spy, and if left for too long, sabotage a luxury, a noble's new wardrobe, a king's apple cart, something that would never be a major target, but those are our major targets... look, if we disturb the river we channel the river, ...if we take the luxury from the lives of career aristocrat wives, they'll soon be angered at their husbands, which forces the commies to shuffle their strengths, come hunt us as they would never dare, in the confusion we stage spies and saboteurs throughout their base, the final trigger is to hit a supply shipment, a freighter or a train, then collapse a stronghold in a single night."

The guard reaches into his coat leaving me believing that he is about to shoot me, the same thought to the second patrolman, but it is a bottle of booze. With his hand on my shoulder he pulls a flask, he hands it to me then briefly squeezes me saying, "that is a fine idea, drink, in the morning we tell the chief then call the mountain." a bitter drink called moonshine, I can hear the shadows whispering again.

Rules of a Dream

There are cultists who believe democracy and capitalism are not a good idea, that government is a first class of people, hierarchy a second class, and republicans a third, I pose to you supposed people that you're members of a dwindling genetic pool, inbreeds of your own design. Most of them don't understand the American dream, even tho most of the time they're living it, and despite complacency they want a hardened set of rules despite the throngs of conservatives blue in the face. Here we go.


First we must pay our respect to clergy, in regards to a nationalist equality, this would be everyone imaginable, we are all equal until factional. In the traditional sense of clergy, I am not an atheist I am a nihilist, thus atheists do not exist, I know most people can see them and so can I, it's more of a separation of church and state, it would be atrocious to see a clandestine surreptitious order of tax fiends parading causes of equality only to force ontological therapy and constant change without exception for common law. In history they have been called Orders, gatherings and councils, chaos in the dark ages, unto desperate feudalism, then totalitarianism, and if lucky a return to democracy and capitalism.


Second we have our liberal births to reckon our conception, in the land of the free everyone is of noble birth, but none are born nobles. We are kings among men and queens of consciousness. We are all nobles, but we are not born that way, we share an unspoken hope and a proud and adamant respect of freedom, of all the talk of what we may become that inspires feeble minds into envy we will disown you when you sin. We will warn you, show you what poor choices brings and where it belongs, and if there is doubt it is forgotten with the success. Food tastes better hungry but there is no excuse for starvation, a true leader provides prosperity and not poisoned hope to create civil war as the incompetent cave people of yesteryears. So many are desperate for attention or gluttons for punishment that it seems so odd that they forget how they are so easily forgotten.


Third are the commoners, don't worry I didn't forget to beseech your hearts, they are the voice of the people in angry riots, the heavy hand of destruction, and the lovers and teachers. People are the life-force of existence, barring that they can keep evolving I think even my extraterrestrial friends will let you live a little longer. Society is what creates itself, it becomes the elites of any word to describe a thing. It is people becoming the wealthy only to be hated, yet without them the anger would not be known nor the poorness unacceptable, the poetic justice belonging to irony on that one. They are the leaders of thieves and the hunters in the darkness, they listen, learn, and speak, and god blessed when they can do all three we'll be in a better place.

Mercenary Nation

It is most important to remember, let the blood run. We are a free republic, a nation of heroes surrounded by evil and filled with the consternation of enemies. I can think of countless heroes that would gratefully put an axe into the face of a communist and fuck the wound in front of infant schoolchildren, man or woman reciprocally. Communist nations are the convention of animals, a bureaucracy adopts a system of entitlement, it makes a protected class of radicals and degenerates who enslave the workers, first the militarized officials enslave the innocent until redistribution processes are unsustainable, at which point dictatorship arises and assumes power over industry and outlawing free commerce. When the cost of corruption overshadows the costs of production industrial entities are nationalized and maliciously burdensome hostage the public under a slavery system under penalty of death. A divisive caste system thus begins where citizen militants hold feudal reign over civilians, the suffering free are rewarded with only their serfdom. 

The poison of tyranny spawns from what is called the "frailty of man" to which the slave class itself devolves into additional hierarchical systems, akin to insects and not unlike dogs. Communists are the dogs of the state, their goal is silence and subservience, and they will kill any dissent that is not of their automaton declension. It is why their inherently flawed system and arrogant minds do not allow the brevity of freedom and commerce, liberty and reason. Despots are insulted by success that is not taken in the name of victory, it is seen even in the free world as the poison of socialism and liberalism that poisons the very thought of creation. In the free world we are mercenaries, when we do not serve we have democracy, when we are of service we slay evil in the respect of honor. All good things have liberty, all liberties are good. 

A life has freedom and lives by the code of honor, wielding power does not prove intelligence and does not gain respect, the man who has a slave harem is a coward, the woman who lives many lives has none. There is no freedom in duty, be it service to the gods or manna or even compliance to evil because there can be no choice in pessimism. Would the communists love freedom they would grant it, would they care about injustice they would not abuse democracy for the whims of imbeciles, nor would they abuse a single life. We remember our enemies until hero or villain cannot sleep. The seven deadly sins are best to be avoided, and in doing so a great empire of enlightenment will take innate providence.

The hypocrite is not communist, but the communist is a proven hypocrite. They speak of freedom by ways of isolation and purge innovation where justice will suffice, vengeance thrives withing their cold hearts. The cults begin programming the minds of children, the corrupt begin justifying intolerance and entitlement without worth, the criminals will always blame the victim. The determination of relativism creates a narrow view in childish minds of stubborn deaf hatred, which is called fascism. Would they not beckon to a name their doings would still be illegal to their own law, information is forbidden to retain power within the ranks of malicious reigns and rulers, and creates a power vacuum of intolerance and ineptitude until bribery comes in the form of shared corruption. Gautama, Jesus, Confucius, Socrates, Boudica, King Arthur, Napoleon, each spoke of greatness in their time achieved by liberty being the responsibility of honor, not the emotions of each communist 'revolution' that is renowned as violent insurrection. We all make mistakes, but communism is ridiculous because it is cowardice. Get a holy book, any holy book, before it's too late, before they burn them all. 

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy."
~~ Winston Churchill 

Merlin 2:29 "The Hourglass"

Merlin 2:29 “The Hourglass”

Trading gold and repartee, both of stroppy encounters, Merlin and his kith make respite at an inn called ‘The Hourglass’, the first surprise is for the barkeep when Merlin gracefully puts Arawn’s melted crown on the counter and slides it in an attempt at inconspicuousness, the second is of the travelers as half of a roasted ham with a flay of braised sweet apples is brought to them. A knave takes their plates and such and a maiden escorts Nickolas and Ana to a room above the restaurant, Merlin watches the bartender toss the bone to a shepherd dog that is only one or two cousins from being a full-fledged wolf, keen eyes below attentive ears. As the maiden offers to show him his own room he declines and begins to drink.

By dusk the room is filled with lively spirits and a boy with a tiny harp aside the fireplace, hearty fest in brethren jest to best the starry night, at which point Merlin approaches a thorough bacchanals as the trysting Nickolas and Ana descend the stairs to see him telling tales nearby Troy with a group of women, just in time to hear their begging answer, he to tell them, his white skin comes from windburn in the clouds, an entertaining of admiration.

In an hour passing the drinking has put the youthful village kin to leave for a younger clique to bide ways of smoking and joking unwarranted by adults, leaving room for others to patronize and in such do, the heavy laborers having worked until dusk and returned to their spouses and cleaned before gleaning a relaxing meal at the inn. Some are duly serving double duty as farmers and militia and thus choose to drink with comrades at day’s end, without food that isn’t buttered bread, and drinking heavily with the generosity of the innkeeper delivered as added libations for them because of the golden payment on the morn. Through the evening they tell jokes about exaggerated follies of enemies and their own deprecated misadventures, of which a closing line like oceanic tide doth come from Merlin.

Merlin: “…and he says, ‘you’re in rags, put this leather buckle beneath your tunic!’”

The warmth of ambiance, with the sound of the strings and uproarious laughter in revelry to Merlin’s joke Nickolas begins to topple, differently he cannot die but can be killed and much drinking of wine has done so to make his feet lighter than his head. As he tilts backwards toward the floor the newly gathered group bemoans his tumbling as a celebration of prediction, an anticipation they are hoping will end humorously. Alas to happiness it cannot, Nickolas swings wildly for balance and wallops a lummox with a stein on his skull and Merlin becomes the first man in profession to render another man unconscious with a joke.

A group of infuriated soldiers awaken within drunken farmers and Nickolas is struck across the face to the ground, foxed he stands regardless of threat and starts a fullout brawl, the look of a surliness and the swift of a tyrant the odd and uneven match is the first Merlin and Ana have seen their friend miss strikes and blocks to take smashes and cheap tricks. Young master Troy escorts two girls from the anarchy each by a hand toward the door, his hands behind his back as if shackled and escorted by twins, a local from their town seems angered at this more than at Nickolas and throws a fist. Troy catches the punch, though he is not stronger than his opponent his skin is tougher, he can feel the strike but the pain is more useful than distraction, as the attacker stammers Nickolas assists Troy by kicking the boxer’s knee and elbowing his head with a spin at the waist, with a smile to allow the frisky three to pass.

Merlin and Ana toss a table to its side near the fireplace and sit at its ledge to watch the tussle, keeping fools from catching the entire place afire as three men hold Nickolas for others.

Ana: “He sure is something else.”
Merlin: “His dedication and your spirit, make a torch of blessed union.”
Ana: “Should we help?”
Merlin: “I didn’t say I liked him that much. A favor says he makes it.”
Ana: “You’re on.”

By now the varied brawlers have found Nickolas to be their shared underlying problem, three soldiers hold him and another approaches and more stand watching. Nickolas pauses stoic as a vengeful spirit, his breathing becomes tired but in a wild show, on his left the soldier’s weakness is an unguarded thumb that pulls a twisted arm, on his right the soldier’s weakness is reaching for Nickolas whose elbow cracks across face in return, for the soldier behind him and before him, he kicks forward and stunts him then reaches behind and puts a headlock then drops to the ground to bridge the jaw to the force of the floor. Others approach to subdue Nickolas but he squires them until they tire, laughing or groaning afore the stools at the countertop, he sits aground with them in relief and pride for only a moment before taking their coin and taunting those who resist, each amount taken he moves to the innkeeper, who shocked accepts the tithe and checks the pulse of a man asleep on the table then pushes him to the floor.

Nickolas walks behind the bar and takes a bottle then stands in the doorway and drinks, his lover stands humbly and looks to the paintings not knocked from the walls then joins him, walking over bodies in a frolic, and leaving with him arm in arm. They’ll stay in the stables on a bed of fresh linens and scrims used for horse blankets. In the alley hot and heavy Troy kisses and speaks patois to the two girls who could be twins, Merlin interrupts them very much close to their equanimity scaring one of them to scream.

Rhosyn: “Ah!”
Troy: “What on earth Merlin?”
Aisling: “My god in heaven, leave us dog!”
Troy: “We’re wayward, what?”
Merlin: “You’ll find us sometime tomorrow heading north, whence still daylight.”

The alley becomes the site of rapt lechery as Merlin seems swallowed by shadows, he shan’t tell a soul that he would be sleeping in a tree, using the power of the world nature to rest atop the highest leaves.

At dawn the boughs wave with Merlin sleeping in their crest as Ana and Nick find him, at which point Nickolas decides to climb the tree to see the truth in how perfect it seems, yet Ana does not feel the same and watches. He shouts to Merlin three times, lastly on the inability to ascend to peak. A lofty stone wakes him and he falls to the floor, catching a brief sight of Nick before summoning wind to land safely tho without proper time to avoid an unwanted plummeting. On his feet he looks to see if the moment is tainted with danger.

Ana: “I had considered burning the tree...”
Merlin: “We’re going north.”
Nickolas climbs out of the tree.
Nick: “How’d you do that?”
Ana: “Whither were you found?”
Merlin: “I didn’t want the lawmen bothering me until I could rest…” dusting himself, “I saw a map that showed meadow to the north, to join Troy.”

Hours later Merlin and the lovers walk a narrowing road that eventually vanishes into the grasslands, passing thru the demesne and meadow Troy on a phoenix flies over their heads but the sight of a fellow sky climber deeply frightens Alerion causing it to cut hard discourse from wings seen in the distance, the abrupt turn jolts Troy in his saddle. Two Valkyrie fly in the distance, the phoenix flies in retreat far and fast and soon the angels fly toward a split horizon, from them an object falls loftily to the ground. One of the winged seraphs circles but ignores showing ambivalence and lets it fall, the three walk to the thing that fell so quietly moments ago.

Of inspection it is a doll with porcelain face shattered among the tattered fabric, after delay Merlin shoves the doll with his foot and when nothing happens he looks at the horizon for signs of route poisoning or a deity tariff to find none.

Nickolas: “The small world gets smaller.”
Ana: “If we turn back we’ll be at the tree line for days waiting for Troy.”
Merlin: “If we wait here, we’ll eventually hunger.”

Within a silent pause Ana stands akimbo and Nickolas bows while gesturing for Merlin to lead the way, which he does with emotive anxiety among the chicory, trillium, and yarrow pasture.

Kin approach the edge of consciousness to a point where the Valkyrie either landed or passed the world’s edge, which leads them to a kirk, the belfries broken the walls stand tall roof, decay still holds its pall, and a maladroit surreal remnant of an ornate temple somehow in abandon. Moisture in the autumn turning to spring working with moss, the stained glass still holding pat the rusting iron frames lost in sensor open and for the moonlight more than day the way left beckoning to birds, nonetheless a church in the shallow of nowhere.

The two Valkyrie carry a child under a spell to an alter where an archangel with a reddish hue prepares the blood of a snake, an eagle, and the child walking without spoken command to hold its cut hand over a large saucer beside an hourglass, blood runs from fingertips as if the ends were cut and when complete the celestial touches the girl on her head and she faints aside the alter. At the sacrifice of bloods an hourglass rests as the sylph speaks tendentious incantation in ceremony of circumstance to define revelry of desired achievement, cassock hostages in their monastery are forced to watch.

Archangel: “…and the son came to the baleful host prayerful, thence became the weapons open erst, the guards now durst all …and when God’s angels could keep their tongues and tithes he brought the breath of life to man, …soon we walked their cities turning rust into aureate metals and without thanks they loved their treasure.”

The rosy angel walks near the captive monks who hang their heads and shiver in fear of blood, blasphemy, and belligerence.

Archangel: “…but man is wretched and began to take the gold from the denizen …the shepherds of the lord shouted how embarrassed they were that they ever embarrassed them all, the greed of salvation was far worse than survival …for their indifference we turned their coins to ash and their stores to rot.”

The weak waifs and strays take council and send their prayers unto their gods heedlessly, one rushes toward the archangel but a move by a Valkyrie puts a sword through him, the archangel takes a swipe of blood with his finger and tastes it. The murder weapon holds the victim standing lifted by blade from falling and with an acknowledgement, the sabre is withdrawn as the body falls without a scream in paroxysm as another monk begs for reprieve only to be slain himself, another angel breaths a cold breath and the remaining fearful fall into eternal slumber.

Another monk with promises of servitude of forbearance clutching missal and catachrestic pride as Merlin begins reprisal to the reproached, only in time to see the innocent backhanded with such strength he is thrown into the shadows and pews through the rays of light.

In the white chapel kirk they enter and there stands an angel in grey thinly woofed wool with black wings, beside him other with hair that shines like chaff of wheat shine beneath the sun, shields across their backs and armor aegis front.

Archangel: “Away I say! Else thou shalt no more hereafter.”

Merlin slowly paces backward in apprehension. Nickolas the closest to siege abandons Ana whereas she confronts monks near the abbey who’ve sworn fealty to the Valkyrie despite the bloodshed.

Merlin is slightly hesitant trying to glean surveillance of the situation once noticing the child slumped against the stone alter, but his eyes do not move fast enough to hide his curiosity from the archangel.

Merlin: “Manifest Destiny?”
Archangel: “Provident malarkey, murder him.”
Merlin: “Blast!”

Counting his moments Merlin lunges for the sacristan altar, beside the snake in a vase and the flayed eagle behind the bowl of blood to attack, but the large angel turns the hourglass and eschews a sanctuary to this fate. An hourglass in a strong wooden framework is nearly reached as the archangel grasps for him, the timepiece is taken, turned, and time begins to slow before the Valkyrie ceremony is complete, the two are complicit within a time storm. Four Valkyrie draw their swords to aid their leader but are abruptly interrupted by Nickolas dropping quite literally from the rafters liberally applying a blade through the ornamental helmet of one, the winged warrior is mortally wounded as another skewers Nickolas and tosses him aside with a throw that hoists then slides him from enemy blade. Immortally resurrected he takes an antique candelabrum, with its branches kicked clean it serves as a spear to pierce another in the leg and a scream inward.

Merlin and the angel captain speedily fight wherein he in his unbalanced, in the time between falling grains of sand lies eternity. Advantage puts a lance into the wing of one outside the temporal inclusion, determined to slay Nickolas they pull their shields from their wings, where two curved metal brackets dost hang a shield on an arm, their shields rest the same manner over the sinew where their wings meet their backs, pulling the shields over their heads and placing them to their arms. The déclassé Valkyrie with a sliced wing is the same who stabbed the monk and does not claim his shield herein only swings the blood from his blade to the floor and marches to Nickolas with a look of anger.

Without cordon shield the damask wings of the two celestial soldiers have room to stretch and serve as shields if necessary, Nick is often skewered at his arms by the Valkyrie, ripping limb to battle further, lashings a heart piercing, severed the bones tearing, rend the arm in rolling to avoid glaives, an angel leg cut, a second angel another leg sliced and swift moves to take both wings from the already wounded battler, a scream demarche. He pauses in hiding and falls into the cataclysms of blood loss then open his eyes with healing wounds.

Merlin and the archangel taunt each other in a hiatus from combat austerity. They cannot be heard but move quicker in swaying tide, voices without sound and movements unbound, slow in wait and stealth in gait, apercus like words underwater. Ana sneaks behind the archangel, his teeth are sharp as he speaks to Merlin with a caustic hex of sound wave superior, she places her wrists together and blasts fire at the Valkyrie risen in milieu, superfluous in faster speed it notices her and dodges hinter deft Merlin is sure to chase after it crashing into the pews both, he lands on the winged deity and attempts to hack with a sword taken from the ground, clashing to gauntlet and blown aback by the powerful wings. Infuriated the archangel flutters the ground tempestuously then stands, formidably slightly larger than other Nephilim.

The spring rains bring a darkened sky as heat rises in the temple, the candles everywhere are beginning to melt and the air is furnace blight less with depth from the glowing hourglass. With sword in hand one of Nickolas’s opponents tries to lunge saber into spoil, missing again an angled jab to stab his brow with the blade, open and unready Nickolas twists the extended arm behind the Valkyrie while ducking beneath the wing, to take a knife and pin the winged man’s hand to his back with his elbow bending the wrong direction and pealing a howl of anguish.

Nickolas jumps clear from spearing and causes an angel to thrust the wingless one in the heart, the survivors fighting him pause in disbelief as he takes advantage. Merlin battles the leader who at times blocks strikes and spells with a wing otherwise battling with them closely, Merlin is not the best of swordsmen. Slowly Nickolas attacks the battle storm, he kills his foes one with precision the other with Ana burning wings and he cross cutting with two blades to decapitate the second. The sand in the hourglass runs out of the top chamber and together Merlin Ana and Nick fight the mighty archangel but cannot win, the wings blast winds and act as shields, the aura for many of Merlin’s easier and readied spells turns to steam and conjurations of larger power can be sluggish and for cause and case be dour.

The solemnity of enmity proliferates to a contingent status, Nickolas walks around dead angels tired and brutishly stoic with a blade in one hand and a fist in tother amidst blood on his limbs, with the sand went the day thus from the timepiece silence befalls the night. He runs to team against the archangel in bitter lavish hatred but alas shortfallen, no fear for the setting sun, in better footing the Valkyrie lifts his head and dives out of way with a wing wrapped afore him and one arrear, an overborn tumult brings a brunt collision with Nickolas and the forward wing manifestly spinning him. Yet limber with a spinning jump from his foot he twists midair and cuts the ash angel on the right arm made vulnerable by dependence to wind balance.

Wooden doors that will not in due time be viable against the rain shatter as new angels of the haute sky kick and hack through them, Merlin turns in amazement with dearest dread, in moments a light emanates from the new arrivals, a wave of energy takes tide to encroach and entreat as all are put to sleep thus falling from where they stand.

Merlin wakes on the ground next to a small puddle of blood to acquiesce let and watched by a sylph as others work to put a struggling archangel into gyves.

Archangel: “You dare to take me! Not of my flood, my spies daren’t thee, his son and your brother; they are made in error, error! Who fell should be felled Michael!”

Michael: “Don’t mind him…”

Dead hagiographers lay about the monastery, stacks of sewn books with melted candles on their burnt pages spared in cooler air by the latter day and evil thence way, the temperature of morrow languid and eerie. Wounded and being escorted the still whence angel speaks turned in anguish and tears looking to Merlin.

Archangel: “Flee harbingers of the nine, this is Merlin, our child of peace …who is here to slay us all!

As the vile transgressor is reluctantly taken into the sky by winged guards the others make sure to put to death the wounded and the traitors, then accostable wait for Merlin to speak.

Merlin: “He knew my name?”
Michael: “He can know what you are, as can be.”
Merlin: “Thus do thou.”
Michael: “We will speak anew. You may keep the hourglass.”

Michael turns and walks toward the hole created in the door well within limit, requite by implacable undemonstrativeness and eyes trapped within memory, with exeunt angels Merlin becomes ostracized by sophistry and enamored with the hourglass, sound becomes purged and broken as he slowly paces forth.

Ana and Nick bond embraced and twixt enlaced to peruse for scars of body and soul and notice to the floor a gathering of loose feathers from dead angels, golden traced and soft effaced brittle by the bond of touch. They call to Merlin with excitement but he has renounced cordiality and places his hands on the majestic device.

As he lifts the energy glows and swallows echoes, the light with caliber of energy prior which put to sleep admix of smoke and water is drawn into Merlin by the spirit of magic and the twilight of gods as the walls tremor. When the essence is consumed there is quiet until he drops the time keeping fixture, the glass breaks and sand spills leaving the others to watch in aversion for mutiny in the air, he turns to them with his eyes aglow and tattoos on his skin glowing a whitish blue warm beneath his skin and slowly fading.

Merlin: “We’ll take the horses on the other side of that wall.”

His companions look to the wall unto he stares and back to him, a look of confusion placates as Troy comes rushing into the anxiety, Nickolas draws his arm to throw a blade but is stopped by Merlin.

Merlin: “You were mentioning feathers?”
Troy: “Merlin?”
Merlin: “Late, unbecoming.”
Troy: “A man with wings chased me, far off, told me to help you.”
Ana: “Fetch linen to carry these.”

The sacramental girl hides behind the altar in the ruins, the signs of death via beleaguering conflict naught but with a bracelet bearing the name ‘Lilith’ etched, a stone rolls from beneath her lifting foot and without pulse she is unseen dismissed as aftermath. Nickolas and Troy return to gathering the large feathers turning gold and brittle as Ana in plenary becomes counsel. 

Merlin: “We will leave before the scavengers of such high beasts arrive on us. Gather what you can and follow without.”

Three steeds in a yard readied with saddle and supplies are not timid or skittish and humbly allow new riders, the bags are stocked with durable food and youthful each horse seems watered and rested.

Inside the girl scurries, a bloodshot stare that quickly turns to paranoia as she raises her shoulders then shifts from hiding to standing on the floor, the combined bloods of sacrifices emanate a negative sound as she drinks it, her eyes fill will a white cloudy swirl of blood as she begins to struggle with convulsions, but she remains standing until her eyes pool with whiteness. Satiated she pushes the tables accoutrements to the floor without physical action, the power shrouds her memories taken beyond remorse abandon, she turns and leaves the temple opposite of travelers four, and by the time she reaches the doorway she is grown taller and aged by scarcely few nubile years, her gown now a prairie dress, walking into the sunset.