Bereft: Demise

10 | Of a Hundred Stone-Eyed Ravens

I was unsuccessful in my search for Darius, though it was to be expected. I didn't dare wander, so the best I could manage was to poke my head into the various halls and rooms adjoining the main foyer and stairwell. I didn't find the Sin of Pride, but I did stumble upon several lounges, an aquarium, and a solarium with views of the muggy landscape.

I would have enjoyed sitting there for a while—if not for the collection of a hundred stone ravens perched in the rafters, all of them staring at me with blank, lifeless eyes.

As the morning waned and gave way to the afternoon and the afternoon found its rest in the hours of twilight, I admitted defeat and retreated to the Sin's rooms upstairs. I pushed the armchair to the window and found a book in English to preoccupy myself with as I sat down.

What was Darius researching now? More on this mythical weapon? Was I wrong to be skeptical of its existence? A month ago, I had thought Darius and his ilk were nothing more than haunting phantasms conjured by ink upon paper—by books and words. I had been convinced witches and vampires and mages were figments of the imagination, convenient ways for those in the Dark Ages to explain disease, phenomena, or political corruption. But they were real.

I sat with my legs folded to my chest, the book balanced upon my knee. If such things as demons and angels and fairies could exist, was it possible for Darius's weapon to be true too? Was I being naïve in my dismissal of it? 

I wasn't sure. I believed there was a definite line between what is improbable and what is impossible. Was the weapon's existence improbable? Absolutely. But was it impossible?

The sun was invisible behind the walls of iron fog, but its descent toward the western horizon was marked by the steady decline of light upon the moors. Crows cawed in the dark while bullfrogs croaked in the shallow pools. I heard them splashing through the water as the black birds flew by the open window, their wings beating against the misty air.

I bent my head over my chosen text and tried to lose myself in the poetry contained within. It was surprising to discover a collection of Keats poems in Darius's library, but I assumed he read such things to learn the advanced mechanics of language. Even so, it was an odd contradiction in his laconic character.

"'Was it a vision, or a waking dream?" I murmured aloud, thumbing the soft, worn edges of the pages. "'Fled is that music:—do I wake or sleep?'" The end of the ode resounded with me in a significant way. I shivered. "Sometimes I'm not sure either, Keats."

The stubby candles on the mantle guttered and extinguished with plaintive wisps of smoke. Irritated, I groaned as I lowered my bare feet and went to rise—when I felt a presence looming behind the chair. Fear spiraled through my veins as my body went rigid with adrenaline. The presence neared, arcing above the chair as its heat battled with the chill of the night billowing through the open window.

What was that?

"I'd appreciate," Darius snapped as he took the book from my pale hand. "If you didn't get your grubby fingertips on this. It's a first edition."

"You scared the hell out of me!" I yelled, rounding on the demon standing at the armchair's flank. His face was lost to the encompassing shadows, though the sparse rays of fresh moonlight illuminated the edge of his jaw and the side of his nose. The Sin's hands landed atop the armchair, his long fingers ghostly against the faded upholstery, the book's spine bent beneath the pressure of his inexorable grip.

"If you're waiting for an apology, it's not forthcoming."

I started, realizing I had been staring at Darius for some time as my heart slowed to its typical speed. "Where did you go today?" I demanded, choosing to ignore the frigidity proceeding the Sin's presence, though it was a clear indicator of his uncooperative mood. "You left me alone in this...place!"