Chapter 8C: Plague of a Dying Star

I paused to consider the implications of his words. I had not thought about it at the time, but it was strange that Kalairo and I possessed the same power. Bellaina and Kalairo both had unique talents which did not resemble the other or even the powers from fables and legends. if everyone had a unique power, how was it that he and I just happened to both create dummies of ourselves? I did not have enough data to extrapolate the probability, but it was safe to assume that this was unlikely at best and anomalistic at worst. Either way, it was a secret worth keeping to myself. However, I closed my eyes as we walked and focused upon that power in my mind, exactly as he had said.

In that moment, I felt like I transcended my physical body on the snowy streets of Bones City. I awakened in some ethereal space deep inside my head. It resembled a hallway that spanned from dreams to a reality; it was a corridor which traversed life and death. In this space in my head, I could sense two presences locked behind closed doors. Starlight illuminated the door that led to Kalairo’s power, but darkness devoured the door beside it. Given that I had only ever killed two people, I quickly concluded that this second door belonged to Aziel. But since I had not killed him with black fire, I never stole his quintessence for myself. As I stared at Kalairo’s door with a grimace, I saw the number eighty-four appear in the wood.

“What exactly does that number convey?” I asked when I escaped the hallway.

Donovan answered though he still looked unsure, “You have to understand that all this is obscure. I don’t have quintessence myself, and I refuse Bellaina every time she’s offered to pay me in that way. I can explain it as far as I understand, but the truth is only entirely understood by the underworld’s patrons and the queen herself. I believe you’ve already seen that we deal in human lives. They’re burned on an Array of Black Fire to create quintessence, but the sad truth is that a human life doesn’t actually amount to much. Just four quintessence points, no more and no less. So if you just kill an ordinary person on an Array, then that number in your head would equal four. That means, for most powers at least, that you get to use them just four times. And as far as I understand it, that is the ultimate currency for the underworld.

“Even the city leaders themselves obsess over this fuel, but this quintessence doesn’t come without cost. I’m willing to bet that the number in your head is a bit bigger than four, because Kalairo killed many of his own captives over the years. If he had thirty quintessence points when you killed him, then you would seize the four from his soul and the thirty he had with him. This is actually one of the reasons why I refuse to take any quintessence for myself. It would simply make me a bigger target for someone else.”

“What is the other reason you choose to stay away?” asked Aeliana with a stare of dismay.

Donovan asked as he gazed at the city wall, “Have you noticed some people are unbelievably tall? Like our queen of the dark and her closest guards, or even the minister and some city leaders. Their height is a sign that they sacrificed their human heart for power. As far as I understand, anyone with quintessence can surrender to its influence, and then it corrupts them inside and out. Their bodies grow in size and durability; they become monsters unmatched by ordinary men. But in exchange for their strength, they must sacrifice their heart. They sacrifice their mind itself and become a slave to the quintessence, constantly seeking more no matter how many people they must kill to sate their lust. And in the end it’s never enough, just like the hopeless souls in this city who find themselves addicted to chemicals that let them dream. In both cases, they destroy themselves and everything around them just to service their addiction.”

I took a moment to consider the implications of his words. When I had first exited the walls and wandered the windswept plains, I saw a monster in the distance who did not see me. And when I made my way to the woods where I spoke to Alyssa’s ghost, I first encountered a towering woman who could swirl the sands with just her hands. I had simply concluded at the time that those were the monsters of which we warned; they were the reason we had a wall in the first place. But now by a coil in the thread of fate, I found myself a single step away from becoming the monster which wandered the badlands. The only real difference is that they had surrendered their souls to the fuel for their power. And perhaps a cynic or a skeptic would have realized it far sooner than me, but I realized in that moment that the city leaders had never built the walls to protect from predators. It was instead to secure a fuel source for the monsters inside the wall without the risk of outside interference.

Aeliana then said with unmistakable fear, “I truly believed I would be safe from them here. Out in the plains, they go by a name – those monsters of which we are so afraid. One is an Astrodeus, two are called Astrodei. They frighten us far more than the killers and cannibals. It’s sad to see that this same danger has also infected the city.”

Donovan nodded in concurrence and confessed, “This city is a purgatory pretending to be blessed. I denounced it when I first learned the truth, back when I was young and idealistic. But when I fell in love, my Anna became my only priority. All this world could die in dreary darkness as long as I had her hand to hold to watch the world erode. So when I realized what really mattered to me, I let my old ideals die. Hell, I became a cog in the machine that propagates the darkness. And when I first learned that these monsters are slaves to the addiction they call the quintessence curse, I at first thought Bellaina was nothing more than a high-powered addict seeking her next hit. I later learned that she could service her addiction whenever she wants; she instead uses the curse as a business model. She uses it to hold power over the other monsters in the city walls.”

I then said to placate my curiosity, “But you know the darkness that dwells in this city. Why would you contribute to it?”

“It’s all a desperate gambit to protect my family. The best way to defend Anna from the darkness is to give them a reason to keep us alive,” answered the man who only wanted his family to survive.

“I should have expected an answer like that; being needed breeds peace and impedes combat. They will keep you alive if you are useful, and they won’t ever find reason to burn through your soul. But Aeliana and I have a decision to make, now that our future in this city has become opaque. I think I will go see Bellaina later tonight, but first I must hide Aeliana from sight,” I explained as we walked beneath the starlight.

Donovan agreed to my terms, and then we went our separate ways. I turned at the nearest intersection, and I walked hand-in-hand with Aeliana toward the west. Occasional pedestrians passed us in the streets, but they kept their distance as if we were obvious carriers of the growing plague. I’m sure it seems antisocial to admit this, but I honestly adore the way in which the plague has changed our city. Where in the past people would walk uncomfortably close with no concept of personal space, they now cleared a path. Where in the past we would walk by the wayside just to avoid people in the street, they now evaded us. Aeliana and I could walk together through a crowded market and see strangers scatter and scramble aside for us. It was like people had adopted the self-imposed isolation with which I lived my life. Some families even went as far as to exile themselves inside their homes. But as much as we enjoyed this social collapse, the reality was unmistakable. Unless I could hide Aeliana forever, someone would eventually realize that she came from outside the city.

I said as we crossed upon a quiet street by the sea, “Perhaps we should set sail from the city. I want you to see how lava lights up the sky; I wish you could see how that light shines in your eye. In the end if we stay they will pull us apart. They’ll make me relive the death of my heart. But if we can steal a boat from the factory bay, then we can sail from here to the islands today. Every inch of this world is ours – both the land and the sea. Let’s run away to an island and finally live free.”