1.1.10 : Bonds

 

 

Waking to the overpowering stench of burning human flesh, far worse than ever, sooty smoke fills my lungs. Shaking cobwebs from my head, coughing, I look at the bonfire, finding that Vayne is staring into the flames. For how long has he been like that?

By the light that the fire still sheds, I see that the goblin’s bodies have now been disposed of, chucked onto the bonfire with the last of the villagers he threw in first—all except for one body. Jeraldyne still lay beside my side, faintly smelling of decay.

Staring at her prone form, I shake my head. Halima’s memories seem to conflict with what I just witnessed in this most recent dream. She was a lovely and caring woman. How does everything connect? How can Halima have such a bad opinion of her?

This makes me uncertain of how much more I want to learn about Halima’s life and whoever she was. 

Oddly enough, I’m fairly sure of one thing: she died in the raid just like her mother and everyone else, but I awoke in her body without any injury, proving my theory. How can I be so certain of that? Maybe I’m just an unwelcome squatter in her body and she’s just hiding in the darkness of her mind from all the trauma.

With the life she led and the terrible end everyone else met, I can’t blame her for wanting escape. Truthfully, I want the same. An escape to anywhere else. I’d be happy if I could just go back to Tokyo and forget that I ever had this dream. Maybe wanting more than you’re due can only lead to misery in the end.

“V-Vayne…” I ask anxiously. “Why haven’t you burned her body yet?”

With a blink, Vayne looks back to look over his shoulder at me with a chuckle. “Are you so anxious to see her gone? Hah. I suspect you’d like to put all this behind you just as soon as you’re able.”

He’s not wrong. He didn’t get a ride in my brain like I did in his. Even so, he kind of understands how I feel.

“Yeah.”

“Alright, then” Vayne shrugs and spins. “Let’s get started with her cremation. Out of respect, I waited for you to wake up since you had such a conniption as when you saw this lady’s face here, your eyes went wide and you fainted. I gathered that you were close to her. Was she your mother?”

I blink at his question. Again he’s not quite wrong, but still not right.

“No, we’re not blood-related… but I knew her. She took care of me for a long time.”

“Hmph.” Vayne crosses his arms and looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “A cold one you are, aren’t ya? A woman sacrifices her comforts, wants and needs for your sake, looks after you much of her life for your whole life and shares her humble home and food with you, puts clothes on your back, and you’re so happy to see her burn?” 

I have nothing to say in response to his question. She isn’t really my mother and Halima… but…

With a shake of his head, Vayne leans down and unceremoniously grabs one of Jeraldine’s ankles to haul her over to the bonfire. “You at least want her dress? Something to remember her by?” Vayne hesitates at the point of throwing her in.

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My eyes fill with tears and I tiredly stumble to my feet and run forward. “W-wait!” I swallow thick mucus in my throat, looking again at Jeraldyne’s face with raw feelings painting my face. Whose remorse is this? Halima’s or mine? Am I actually crying over someone’s death that I didn’t personally know? When did I start crying?

“Thought as much. You’re not so cold and tough as you act,” Vayne says, looking at me with an edge of empathy in his gray eyes. “Look at me, girl. You need to make that tough act of yours into the real thing. You can’t just bury all this and forget.” He shakes a finger under my chin. “If you don’t truly leave all this gooey emotional stuff behind, you’ll end up the same as the rest of your fellows. You need to be stronger, no matter what you end up doin’.”

I look at Vayne with stark shock. How can anyone act like him? So unfeeling. And yet he still has compassion for some perceived weakness he sees in me. Damn it! No, he’s just manipulating me!

Jumping to my teeth, I seethe angrily, shouting, “Shut up, Vayne!”

“Truth hurts, doesn’t it, girl?” His eyes widen as he realizes something seemingly dreadful. “Wait a MINUTE!” He roars at me and I flinch. “How the hell do you know my name, HANA?!” He speaks my name as though he’s spitting acid in my face. “I never gave it to you, not once!”

Backing away from Vayne’s sudden suspicion and anger that radiates from his frame, I feel afraid of him for the first time since he saved me. What can I tell him about me that will satisfy him? I fucked up! I called him by his name, not knowing the kind of man he is even though I piggybacked in his brain. Of course, I shouldn’t know his name! Shit!

“What do you know about me, girl? You paid to kill me?” He draws his sword with a hissing noise as it scrapes against its scabbard and he stalks over to me, his eyes blazing hotter than the bonfire outlining his frame. Filled with fear, I take yet another step away.

“No… I’m just… just a girl. A pilgrim like you said… but…”

“You gave me the name Hana, didn’t ya? You an easterner on a mission here, worming your way into my graces to position yourself to poison or put a knife in me? WHO ARE YOU?”

His eyes bore into me as he steps closer to me and my back slams against the far wall. With nowhere else to go, I flinch and tears stream from my eyes. “I am that… but not how you think, Vayne. I am an Easterner, but I…” Looking away, I take a breath. How can I tell him that I’m not from this world or that this might just be a horrible dream that I’m having? He’ll think I’m utterly out of my mind!

There’s a skittering noise of something scrabbling on stone behind Vayne and he spins to meet the source. While the bonfire cheerilly crackles, sending plumes of greasy black smoke to float out the passageway, a dark energy surges around Jeraldine’s body and it starts to expand, turning her skin multiple sickly colors. Fluids go flying as her body mutates right before our eyes.

“SHIT!” Vayne roars. “GET OUT, HANA! RUN AWAY, RIGHT NOW! Get as far away from here as you can!”

With morbid fascination, I watch as Jeraldine’s body bloats up to four, no five times larger than prior, stopping only when it towers over the two of us, still taller if we stood on each other’s shoulders.

“Don’t freeze up! Get your ass moving!” Vayne yells, holding his sword horizontally in front of him in a guarded stance. “She’s turning into an ogre-type. If you had a sword, I’d… no…” Vayne shakes his head. “Shit, just get far away. I’ll catch up when I can.”

Scanning the floor, I spy one of the goblin’s looted swords. Running across the floor on impulse, I scoop it up, making a scraping noise on the stone floor as I raise its point up, coming to a stop. Meanwhile, the head of the ‘ogre-type’ monster that used to be Jeraldyne is becoming less amorphous by the moment as some tearing teeth take form in its maw along with some beady glowing eyes. It roars as its maw finishes developing and rips open its face, sending nasty-looking fluid flying from it.

Vayne slices with his sword and a burst of magick-laden wind explodes from his sword, cutting into the monster’s tough and huge-looking body.

The backlash of the winds buffet me and I stagger as my hair flies behind me like a banner. Holding the sword up before me, I lean forward and drive the tip of the blade into the ground to hold my ground as the blow-blast streams around my body. Vayne looks over his shoulder at me and swings his sword in my direction. A burst of air directly strikes me and I’m knocked up the passageway, empty-handed.

“Fool girl!” Vayne yells moments before I fly out of earshot. I flip head over heels and somehow end up flying clear out past the gravelly slope leading down into the cavern. With a scream, I land heavily into a tree’s branches, coming to a stop in the grass, falling asleep in a rare patch of flowers.