Merciless

Circle 8: Fraud

In this trench, the souls of deceivers who gave false or corrupted advice to others for personal benefit are punished. They are constantly ablaze, appearing as nothing so much as living, speaking tongues of flame.
Several stone ridges form natural bridges across the pits, so many in fact the author is too fucking lazy to write them all out.

I ran but I didn't expect to get far, even when I did, I knew it was pointless in the narrow halls.
Mercy's legs grew long, artificial, sculptured for hunt, but not like this, not used in a way to toy and torment how he did.
But of course he couldn't resist, so he let me run along, even when we both knew it was just a game of how long it would take him to catch me.
When he decided he was done dangling me by a string.
So I played along, running, running because I knew that voice would be near again, and my memories trapped on the tune.

Would he steal them from me then, if I was out of his sight? Or could he snap his fingers, and whoever he was thinking of, their memories, gone, like smoke blending in with atmosphere— or did he have to see me? See all of me, and everything inside, and know just what to take out.

"MIS—" A voice, weak, desperate like my own breath. But I didn't hear the cut off. My mind was one of many things, so much to control I didn't consider he could take my hearing as well.

WHAT? I screamed but felt only my mouth move, no sound, how if I never said anything at all I would never know.

And eventually I did find a room and eventually I did find the product of that voice. All from memory, where I heard it come from before, but I wasn't sure if he led me here or not. A scrappy room with oak walls like melting chocolate, same size as the one I've been skinned in, but with furniture, old and frail as if it's been pulled out of a house fire, and with it all a silver nightstand to accompany no bed, no couch. Just a stand, drumming against the floor, vibrations I couldn't hear.

I opened it, and figured I didn't need permission from anyone anymore on what to touch, where to be, not when I was running for no purpose, not even for my life.
I was inside the drawer, but immediately wanted to shut it. Lock it, hold it in with chains. It was a head, ripped from a body but still moving, still talking, mouthing— Oh Gods, mouthing.
Mistress. "Mistress?"

I wiped at my eyes, reminding even that this body could not tear up.
What the fuck.
What the absolute fuck. It was a boy, a small thing, and where was the body? His voice? Hitting my ears, but going nowhere.

I felt something vibrate from behind me, something that must've been loud if only I had my hearing. But it was not Mercy when I turned, it was the same girl that skinned me. Bony ribs, grown thighs. Eyes brown like almonds, but hair black like our sky at night, how there is no moon to give life, give light. Black and whole, like my own.
I remember her skinning me with the scissors, the unbearable pain of exposing every part of me, peeling me back until I was a body of blood and muscle and nothing else, nothing to keep in. I cringed, the memory of loose flesh laying on a ground so cold it stuck.

It mouthed something, something I couldn't hear, the face he was wearing, the girls round cheeks spreading, feline, perfect.

What? I said, I hope.

The reaper, the woman it was wearing, frowned. Rolled her eyes, but I knew what it looked like to use emotions for show. She waved her arms, pointing to me, then back to the front of her.
I don't understand. Then, Mercy. Porcelain skin, healing back into glamour, a contortion forcing itself back into human skin. Beautiful. So beautiful, and with nothing human about it, creeping through the doorway.