22 Vienice Aramon

Warning: Graphic scene ahead

_Vienice Aramon_

    He was going to be punished for this, he thought. They were never going to let him go now- not after this. Not after he had killed more people- he was going to be tortured forever. None of it was going to end.

    He felt a panic swirl in his gut at these thoughts. He wanted to throw up- but not because he had... ingested them. Oddly enough it was the dread and panic that had his stomach churning. In his head, he knew what he had done was sick. He knew you were not to... eat... people. The biting was okay for self defence, but he had gone beyond that. A beast with a hunger had arose out of him and it had taken control.

    He wondered if this is what happened back in Vangerbore. So why could he remember now? He wanted to forget again. He wanted the memory to leave him- wanted to forget the things he had done to those men. They deserved to die for being sick people but they had not deserved to be eaten by a monster.

    That is what he was. A monster. He was sick and deranged for what he had done. He believed the words thrown at him his entire life now. He was an abomination. He was of the devil. Perhaps he was the devil himself incarnate. None of this made sense without that face.

    None of this seemed real.

He had killed those men in such a horrid way... and after he had... fed... he had found that his wounds were partially healed. He could walk, though still with pain, and his fingers were more movable now, and slightly healed. However, his most shocking realization was the clarity that had followed the deaths of these men. His head no longer throbbed and blinded his vision, he could breath without pain, and speaking was much easier- though his voice was still quiet. He was not sure that was a physical thing however. Perhaps it was of the mind.

    The robe man had seemed pleased with what Vienice had done to these men. He had appeared dazzled by the show. Vienice had figured the man had never actually left when the guards told him to. Had the man been connected somehow to his outburst? It didn't seem likely. This was probably what had happened back in Vangerbore and the robed man had not been there before.

He thought back to what the man had said before. He had mentioned taking Vienice after he was to be burned- but now the boy wasn't so sure he would ever see that fate. Surely they would keep him here forever now that he proved that he was a monster. The robed man was the only one who saw what had happened though... would he tell?

    Vienice sat back onto his bum and stared at the bodies before him, staining the dirty floor with their blood. It smelled like death in here, but Vienice could not find it in him to be disgusted by any of it. He looked down at his bloody and beaten hands, frowning to himself. Not all of the blood on his hands was his anymore. His hand moved closer to his lips, coming to rest aching fingers there.

    He knew it was wrong but he felt compelled to open his mouth and taste it. It was when he felt this way that he realized he was shaking. His eyes shifted to the door as it opened slowly and the robed man stepped into the room, scanning the scene before himself until his eyes came to rest on Vienice.

    "Have I interrupted?" He asked in a casual manner, as if there were not three brutally murdered men littering the room.

    Vienice's hand fell from his lips and he shook his head slowly, unsure of what words to say.

    The man's eyes scanned the room once more before it seemed as though they were lighting up. "This is," He paused looking for the word. "Quite brilliant," He finished with a satisfied smile.

    "Brilliant?" Vienice repeated in a quiet voice.     "Why? What would you call it? Slaughter?"

Vienice gave the man an odd look. "Yes..."

    The man made a face and waved him off. "We need only to clean up the mess. You are worried about what is to happen now, are you not?"

    Vienice hesitated before he spoke. "Aye,"

    "You worry too much. I will have this cleared up, and you will see your fire- I promise you that."

    Vienice looked down at the dirty floor of his cell. He was not sure of the robed man's words but if he were to be burned at the stake, he was not excited for the pain. What did burning alive feel like? He did not want to know. Nor did he wish to know how much it differed from the torture he had endured.

    When he looked back up, he had questions. "How long have I been here?"

"When will I..."

    "When will you be burnt?" Vienice nodded. "I do not know- ideally today or tomorrow but the crown is a stone just as these fine men here had said. It could be after the whole three months or it could be next week. It is merely up to how well I convince the king."

    "Oh," Vienice said as he looked down at his hands once more, but he had to quickly look away from them.

    "The blood," The man spoke up again. "It calls to you, does it not?"

    "Calls?"

    "You want to see it- to feel it- to eat it, do you not?"

    Vienice was baffled by how easily the man said such a thing. "No, of course not. That would be of the devil-"

"There is no devil!" The man raised his voice, but his eyes widened for half a second as he realized his broken temper and easily calmed himself. Next he spoke, he was calm once more. "The devil is a silly little tale spun off of a misunderstood god. A god who is no such thing." He explained briefly, coming to rest cold eyes on Vienice now. "You lie to me as well. I do not appreciate that."

    "I lie?" Vienice repeated.

    "You wanted to eat these men."

    "No-"

    "Yes. That is why they are missing their throats."

    Vienice paled impossibly whiter. "I could not control myself-"

    The man swiftly interrupted him for a second time. "Aye you could not but you liked it. You did. You had been dying on the inside- suffering, for over a month, dying to rid them of the burdens of their sick lives."

    Vienice was quiet as the stranger continued. "The beast inside you had been a starved and beaten dog. And what do starved and beaten dogs do, boy?"

    Vienice said nothing and the man narrowed his eyes. "They lash out." He finished. "But you are no dog- and the beast and you are one in the same. One thing is certain. You are not human and likely never have been."

"What?"

    "That same god who is called by the devil's name. That god who is not the devil, he has no name. He is an old god- an ancient one; long forgotten and left behind. But he never died. He lives on, nameless, faceless, and angry." The man hissed, as if angry for the god himself. "The Elder god, the one true god. You are his creation. You are his blessing. You are not Vienice Aramon. You are the creature that inhabits his skin and takes his face, but you have never and will never be him. What you are is a walking corpse." The man told him now, fighting not to curl his lip.

    Vienice swallowed, his breathing labored, a panic returning to him. Was he shaking again? Had he ever stopped shaking in the first place? He was no longer sure of anything. "How do you know?"

    "Because I speak for the elder one." He said simply, running his hands down the front of his robe in attempts to calm himself down. "Ahh," realization dawned over the man. "You do not know my name, do you?" He said with a smile now. Vienice was silent, finding the man's swinging temperament much like his mother's. "I am Wymon Canicus. I am an all around educated man who goes by many titles. Shaman, a magician, medicine practitioner, and priest are just a few of the things I am addressed by, but you can call me the Archdruid."

_____

    Vienice had figured it had been nearly a day since the Archdruid Wymon had left. He had spent the day completely silent, his eyes closed in a sort of meditation. The same meditation he had learnt during his time being tortured. His eyes opened at the thought of those monstrous men and scanned the floor where they once had lain.

Not long after the Archdruid had left, several robed individuals had come and cleared the room of the bodies without a word to Vienice. The boy could walk now, but he did not leave the room, not even when they left it unlocked as they moved the bodies out. He could not say exactly why it was that he did not leave, nor did he know where these robed people had taken the bodies. How would he explain the missing guards to the king?

    He was as full of questions as he was dread.

    Had he never lived? Was that why death escaped him? He was already dead? The thought was a strange one- he could not bring himself to understand. What made him more confused was Wymon's words about who he was. If he was not Vienice Aramon, then who was he? No, he was Vienice Aramon. He decided it right then, that a dead baby had no need of the name. It was his name now, it had always been. As was the body.

    A few words from a temperamental robed man would not send him into an identity crisis. He would not allow it.

    Soon, his day turned into what he was sure had been a week, and he grew restless. The suffering of torture kept him busy, but nothing at all made him feel like a caged animal. He was not sure what to do with himself- and he found himself pacing the room on sore ankles. Ankles he had never expected to use again.

    Wymon had been right about him not being human. It made sense to him- one of the few things that did. However, this did not mean he was pleased. Now more than ever he wished that he was dead. Dead in the way that your eyes closed and never opened again. Dead in the way you did not blink and think and speak.

    Vienice was disgusted with himself for many reasons, and his self hatred had only grown during his week of solitary confinement. It seemed to him now more than ever, that he resented himself more than he could his own mother- which was quite the feat. That woman had been unstable and a horrid person. He had heard rumors of his eldest sister being killed at her hand- and he had never believed it but with most things seeming unreal but being true... he was starting to believe it.

    He did not sleep once, during his week alone. Nor had he eaten, but that was not an issue. He did not feel hungry. When his cell door was unlocked and swung open, There were four guards there, accompanying the Archdruid.

    "The rock seems to have grown ears," Wymon stated with a wicked grin.

Vienice said nothing as the men lead him out of the room. He had thought to ask about what Wymon said about the three guard's disappearances but kept his mouth shut. He focused now, at the new horror at hand.

    He was not sure why the king thought to burn him at the stake, it was obvious to Vienice now that he could not die. But when the men marched him out the doors into the blinding light of day and his eyes landed on the stake mounted into the ground a far distance in front of him, he felt an all new fear.

    Fire was different, he realized. Fire broke things down to ash and coals. You could chop wood and it was still wood, but once you burned it, it would never be wood again. Even if Vienice survived this, would he be the same? He felt his heart flutter in his chest, walking stiff legged up to the beam.

    HIs breathing was heavy, fearful eyes found the Archdruid's calm ones. "Wymon," He said now, eyes glancing at the bystanders who were about to witness this. "Wymon I'm not going to be the same," He said seriously. "This is going to be worse than death- I can feel it," He said quickly as the guards shoved him along.

    The Archdruid stopped walking and stood at the front line of witnesses. "Perhaps you will be different; perhaps not. But one thing is sure, you will live." He said coolly.

    "Wymon please! You do not understand!" He pleaded, his voice attempting to yell, but it did not get much louder than it had when he spoke.

Wymon merely shrugged him off as he was pushed up to the stake, his bare back biting into the splinter prone wood. Despite his instincts and fear pleading him to flee, he did no such thing. He did not struggle as they chained him to the wood, the dread that filled his stomach had the back of his throat spasming, threatening to throw up anything that was left in his stomach right then and there. But he held it back, attempting to keep some dignity for himself.

    He took deep breaths as the men stepped away from him, and he closed his eyes tightly, trying to keep himself from looking at the people watching him like some theatrical show. No doubt a few of them were the people that had witnessed his beheading.

    When nothing happened, he opened his eyes, looking around. They landed on the king and his guards in the distance, watching from a high seat so he could see above the crowd. His face was stoic, and uncaring, and in this moment, Vienice would have liked nothing more than to hit him over the head.

    He would have liked to hit plenty of people over their heads, but perhaps that was just his angry panic speaking for him.

His eyes caught sight of a guard walking through the separated path of people, a torch in his hand. He approached with a deathly slow speed, making this entire thing ache. He wanted it over and done with or not done at all. His eyes glanced at the king in the distance as he stood, and spoke loud for everyone to hear.

    However, he could hear nothing but the buzzing in his ears. He could not hear the wind, the birds, nor the murmur of the people watching. It was a terrifying feeling that came over him, as the only noise echoing through him was the buzzing and his own thoughts. He was not going to be the same.

    When it seemed as though the king was done talking, everyone turned to Vienice and he felt his stomach do flips into his chest. It felt like slow motion when the guard lowered the torch into the wood and grass that was littered around his stake. Another guard lowered a torch to the other side of him, speeding up the process in which the fire spread.

It was agonizingly slow. The fire seemed so close yet so far away as it slowly inched towards him, but soon he could feel it heat. And sooner he felt it start to sting his skin until what was left of the scraps you could scarcely call pants caught aflame. It quite obviously burned, and it burned quite badly. At first he kept his voice to whimpers of pain, but as the fire spread upwards, his screams came, sobs too. They were not as satisfying loud as they once could have been.

    The three dead guards had taken his voice from him, he was left with the pitying attempts of screams and wails that fell short of harrowing. Or perhaps the scene was worse than harrowing because of that fact- but he had no way of knowing. The flames licked and bit at him, burning and taking from him. It was a horrendous feeling.

    Vienice was shaking and pulling from his constraints but they had not used ropes for a reason. The chains were hot and they helped burn him all the more.

    There was a certain point when he could scream no more, and everything faded away from him. Yet again, he found the world of nothingness that comforted him from his woes.