The brotherhood of wolves

Chapter 12

          THE DEATH OF A KING

Murad's amazement knew no bounds, the shapeshifting creature in front of him was none other than ...
his Grand Vizier Imamzade Halil Pasha, who supposedly perished in the Christmas ambushment with half a year ago.
With tearful eyes the Vizier unfolds him the tale of the night ambush, how he was kept alive, confined in a underground tunnel, only to be turned recently into a similar creature like the one who ambush them.
Chained to the wall, he had been held captive for so many moons, a dumb boy bring him food and water once in a while, no other human soul visiting him in his captivity.
His transformation was slow and painful not recording anything from it or before, the recent attack over Sultan triggering his memory who surfaced making realising about his identity.
At the behest of his creator bounded to his will, he was overcome to consign to oblivion Valide Sultan without hesitation .

Finishing to say what he had to, realising the weight of his deed, he knelt before the sultan with his head bowed in submission waiting for his punishments.
" Grand Sultan i'm at your mercy, put an end to my sufferings and kill me!! I can't forgive myself knowing what i have done to the one dear to me! If you do not stop me i will kill again and again.
My life, it's an endless pain and misery, i don't want to live like a mindless animal at the mercy of his master bounded to obey his commands." he ended his plea in tears.
"Not tonight Halil Pașa, not tonight, I have a good use for you !" Sultan answered briefly, stroking his head consoling like you would a dog , he having something else in store for the Vizier. He needed to find out who was the culprit who triggered all of the recent events, the master mind behind all of this, who proved to be a foe worth reckoning with.

And the night came again,
enveloping the world in its mysterious darkness, the sky was lit by the same big moon that casted ghostly shadows around.
In the cemetery, Vladimir buried deep in the ground up to his neck, he awaited for his end which was slow to come.

He wished he could be able to look at the starry sky for the last time but darkness had fallen over his empty sockets, his eyes gouged out with a red-hot iron rod.
Human nature it's full of surprises, when you have everything at your feet you don't care, only when you lose all you realise the value of things, the same rule applying for him as well now .
"If only death will come once! " he thought.
The cold earth numbed the pain from his broken body only his soul was still ached.
He felt all sorts of regrets. He regretted leaving this world far too soon unprepared to part with his family.
Regrets that he had not finished doing everything he had set out to do..
Anyway nothing mattered now, he thought to himself philosophical. Death was just around the corner, waiting for the right moment to act, in life there is a predestined time for everything, as clichéd as it may sound things won’t change no matter how much you wish,you live and die, nothing else matters.

His mouth was dry with thirst, he was making superhuman efforts to inhale the torrid night air that even at night fall hadn't cooled down, each breath was a new torture.
Would  give anything right now for a mouthful of water he thought moistening his cracked lips with his tongue.
The metallic taste of blood which dripped into his mouth disgusted him but it quenched his terrible thirst softening his sore throat .

"Cursed be Murad and all his wretched family!" He whispered as if afraid he would be heard.
"To be cursed forever and ever, to live always in the shadow of death neither dead nor alive, to wish death to take him but death to avoid him, to suffer as he was suffering now"

Night bugs were a nuisance driving him crazy, swarming around his head attracted by the taste of blood like a swarm of bats feeding on him.
Oh, how he would have liked to look at the blue sky one more time, he thought again with deep longing..

A light breeze was blowing his tangled locks stained with the blood  which flowed down his chin from the  large open wound on his wide forehead  pooling around his neck, reddened the ground around him.
His empty eye sockets flailed around in vain only his hearing and smell remained intact, his once handsome face now horribly disfigured looked contorted in pain.
Crickets sang carelessly around him.
At least he wasn't alone he thought bitterly, he had them as company in the loneliness that surrounded him. He did not even have the strength to whine, he wanted to leave at once but death was delayed.