The Boy and the Animal

Part I | Twenty-Seven

"Son," Father called for Dark. The child looked up from the dolls he made dance for his baby sister and glanced over at the man. "Come here."

Dark swallowed. It was never good when Father called us, and, looking up at the man as he stood in the doorway of the little house, clothes disheveled and eyes heavy with a darkness scarce contained in humans, the little boy was terrified.

Father was what we called the "sober drunkard." Sometimes he was kind, held us and sang to us just as much as our mother- albeit gruffer and with little attention to tone- but there were other times when he became a completely different person. Like a drunk wasting at an inn, Father would become aggressive.

Jumpy at every little sound, he would slur his words, and what little we could understand was muses of nonsense. The man became vulgar, darkened, almost as if something else entirely had taken over him. And not once did he drink a drop of ale.

It wasn't often that he called on us, but when he did in this state it was never something good. I had been stood on a chair with a noose around my neck while he screamed in my face for three hours when I was six years old. My sister had been suspended over the edge of the city gate when she was only a few weeks old.

Dark, however, up until that moment as Father's heavy black boots clacked against the hollow floors like tolling bells in the distance, had never been called.

"C'mere," his deep, rough voice said again. "C'mere, son. I want... Damn witches festering in the ground... I want to see you."

Dark stood up from the floor, but he dared not to move; though, even if he wanted to, his legs would not move- his eyes, caught by the black aura the flickered between his dimension and another. No, this man had never called him like this before, but he knew, from watching his siblings, that he was in danger.

Sara began to cry as if knowing what this shadowing figure was planning to do with her big brother. The sound of her cry made Father's brow twitch, and he snapped her a cold look. The babe quieted, nibbling on her thumb. Dark was on his own.

When Father reached him, he stopped, tips of his shoes touching Dark's toes. The boy dared not to look up at him, but he could feel every pass of the man's limbs. When Father breathed, he felt it, and when Father grasped his large hand around his shirt he felt it coming. And then, the man lifted him up from the ground so that they were face to face.

"He's coming. He's coming for me. And your brother. And you. And your sister. He'll take us all," Father hissed. He shook the boy, who yelped and clenched his teeth against the tears streaming down his face. "He wants me to find him, the boy in the woods. Find him, find him. Stop crying!"

Dark cried harder, letting out a terrified sob. Enraged with his disobedience, Father growled and grabbed his sword from the sheath fashioned to his side. The blade found its teeth on the child's neck, threatening to sink them in and drain him dry. Dark's little heart had never pounded so hard, sweat and tears dripping from him as his mind went blank with terror.

"Father!" I yelled out. Father seemed to snap out of his trance, and, realizing what he was doing to the child in his hand, he began to shake. "Put him down, Father."

He set Dark down onto his feet, but he remained stunned by his actions with his sword clutched in his hand. I stepped towards him slowly, placing my body between Dark and the man trembling before him. He looked on me with drained eyes, eyes that sagged with guilt, exhaustion, and pain.

"I'm sorry, Cyrus," he muttered, backing away from me. "I'm so sorry, son. It's him. He's taking over me. I can't take it anymore, I can't, I need release- I have to make the voice stop."

I opened my mouth to speak, when my father suddenly pointed the sword toward himself and plunged it into his heart. I froze, the flesh on my face where his blood splattered burning hotter than any fire I had ever touched. His body hit the floor in a heavy thunk, and with the shift in the draft, I slapped my hands over my siblings' eyes, throwing them out of the room.

It wasn't that this surprised me; it was always a matter of when- not if. I just hadn't expected it so soon and not in front of the little ones. With them gone, I hurried back into the room where my father's body lied and stood over him. A strange feeling came over me; here the man that made us miserable was dead, here my father that did his best to make us all happy was dead. And I could neither cheer nor cry.

His lifeless, hollow eyes stared into my own as he began to drown in his own blood, but there wasn't nothing. The more I stood there in awe, the more a feeling overcame me, like my body being invaded. It cane gradually- and then it tore into me all at once. I fell back and grabbed my head, crying out as silently as I could to keep quiet from my siblings. My vision blurred.

And that was the first time I heard his voice.

Dark froze. As the boat settled into the water and caught its steady, gentle flow, his hands hesitated on the water. He had to push the boat to the other side, but he couldn't. He couldn't move at all, and his eyes were as petrified as his hands. His teeth clenched.

On the other side of the river, where Golmore Woods began, Dark could see my apparition. He stared at me, half expecting my form to melt into that of some strangely shaped tree or just the shadow of an animal skulking by, but he knew deep down that it was neither. His eyes welled up with tears, and all I could do was smile.

I saw him mouth my name in his shock. It formed over his lips, twisted them in a unfamiliar fashion that he hadn't accustomed himself to even after 18 years of knowing me. The name made his tears fall, and he swallowed them down.

Cyrus.

"Dark, are we okay?" Jesiter interrupted him, hands covering his eyes. Dark glanced at him before turning back to me, only to find that I was gone. He stilled, heart steadying, and relaxed with a small sigh.

"Yeah," Dark replied, turning back to the boy to ruffle his hair. "We're gonna be okay.

The rest of the ride to the other side of the river was quiet, save for Jesiter's nervous humming. When they reached it, however, Dark rose from the boat and stepped onto the bank to help the boy off. Jesiter was all too happy to follow him, and, once they were safe on the earth, he wrapped his arms around the man's waist. The man smirked and pet his head.

"See? We're fi-"

Shing.

Dark's heart stopped. Behind him, he could feel the sweltering pressure of someone behind him, and, at the back of his neck, there was the piercing sting of a blade. He dared not shudder less the blade sunk into him, but the chills and goosebumps spread across his flesh like the pass of death across a window. The white fear seemed to pass into the boy, who froze just as still.

"Thank you for taking it out for a little exercise, but it's time to go inside now. And you have to go," a malicious voice seething in darkest black hissed in his ear. Dark didn't have to see him.

He knew it was Titus Ale.