Chapter 5
Chapter five
Iwalked from the bathroom, placing the crystal into my pocket as I did.
“Sorry,” a light-haired soulless grumbled as he stumbled down the hall, his once white shirt speckled with grime and dirt, hung limply around him.
His eyes were glazed over, and his reddened face made him look intoxicated, but it was actually a sign that he was close to death.
I steadied his shoulders as he wobbled down the hallway, leading him to the couch.
“I really hated you at first,” the soulless man said as he slumped down into the couch, his head cocked at a weird angle.
“As do they all, I assure you,” I said, sliding my hands into my pockets as I watched his eyes open and close slowly.
“But—I think I know the truth.”
“What is that?” I was confused by his wording. I looked about the room, noting that no one was yet awake. It must have been early in the morning.
“My soul—it was corrupted.”
“That it was,” I agreed.
“And—it was not ever going to become uncorrupted, I take it?”
I shook my head, no. Terrans understood that once a soul became corrupt, there was no way to restore it; it was gone, lost, piece-by-piece, giving more power to the corruptor.
“So?” I asked, leaning over him closely and looking into his eyes. They were almost completely black–the whites, too—which was a sign that death was near.
“So, thank you—I do not wish to have my soul in the grasp of the corruptor, but in the heavens—you have given me another chance.”
I was humbled by his words. Although a few of the soulless who I had created had delivered similar confessions, not all of them did.
“You are welcome. May you rest well in the hands of the Creator.” I watched for a few minutes as his eyes grew wide, the whites completely black as his chest rose and fell slowly.
It was five minutes or three hundred seconds, until his lungs gave out, and he ceased to exist on that plane.
I leaned over him further and closed his eyes, wondering how many more soulless people would die that day and how many more graves I would have to dig.
“Another?” I looked up as another soulless, this one with dark brown hair, walked into the room, sitting in the side chair, near the glass windows framing my favorite view of the forest.
“It seems so,” I said, sitting beside the dead soulless.
When I decided to save the corrupted souls of those Terrans on earth, I didn't understand the toll it would take on me.
I figured that I was soulless, myself, and as such, I could handle such a difficult task.
I had been right; it had not taken much of a toll on me before I reclaimed my soul from Shadrict.
Since recovering my soul, it became more challenging than I ever could have imagined.
I wanted to escape it even though I knew that I was doing important work for the Ancients and for the Creator himself.
I reflected on Hava, after that soulless’ death.
I often thought of her. She’d come and sing songs to me when I was in the dungeons.
At first, I was in too much pain to focus on the words, but over time, I realized that I had unintentionally memorized them.
They became embedded within me. She barely spoke any words to me.
The guard beside my dungeon would probably have told Tarick, or my father, if she had.
I knew her name was Hava because the guard called her that.
I could barely make out her face because she always wore a dark brown cloak and hood, but I knew that I would remember her melody and her blue eyes for the rest of my existence.
She was the only one on all of Terra who had ever shown me any kindness.
The song floated to my memory, then, as I sat and looked at the dead soulless beside me. The lyrics came.
Tell me the tale of the faraway lands
The place where the Ancients first roamed.
A people of strength and heart, they were,
and they came, and they fought the bold.
Tell me the tale of the princesses there who wished for the right to sing.
Tell me again of the peasant queen who lived in want of so many things.
Tell me of those souls so strong as they battled to defend their throne.
Sing me a song of the faraway lands, the faraway lands of old.
The Ancients had come,
and then they have gone—
the price for a melody sung.
Tell me a tale of the prince who knew that a heart could be pure, alone.
Restore the souls to those who were lost to more than to flesh and bone.
Tell me of the tale of them all, once again–of the mighty, mighty men,
clutching swords and shields in their hands as they vie to defend the throne.
Tell me the tale of the ancient lands, the ancient lands of old–
The story of the knights who fought until the battlefield turned red.
Tell me of the ones who remained standing still and bold
for the righteous cause, even in the midst of their dead.
The Ancients had come,
and then they were gone—
the price for a melody sung.
Tell me the tale of the ancient lands, the ancient lands of old.
Of the first Terrans blessed with the ancient gifts to bring
hope to the lands; still, the first to fall into darkness’ curse, as told,
when all the light was dimmed, and the souls ceased to sing–
Those souls ceased their singing.
And dead was the song of them.
Tell me the tale of that faraway place
And of those faraway lands of old.
Tell me the tale of the warriors bold traits,
reminding me of those who are older than old.
The Ancients had come,
and then they were gone—
the price for a melody sung.
“That will be my fate soon,” the soulless said, holding a tissue to his nose—he must have started the bleeding phase; it was a matter of weeks then until he would be gone as well.
“It will be.”
“Are you afraid?” he asked, his eyes dark but still so much white left that I knew that, at least, most of his mind was still there.
“Afraid of a life in the heavens?”
“Is it a life? Or is it just that I will cease to exist?”
“The Ancients say that—” I began.
“Like I care about them,” he interrupted. “They abandoned us.”
“You think so?”
“I know it.”
“I am sorry for you then.” I stood up, not needing to deal with the ever-shifting moodiness of an angry soulless.
“You made me this way! This is your doing.” He stood and walked over to me, grabbing my shoulder. I quickly turned around and pinned him to the wall, my arm at his neck.
“I did not corrupt your soul; you did that yourself while you were here on Earth. You should be thanking me for making sure that your soul doesn't end up in the hands of the corruptor—the soul eater. He has many names, and all of them describe what he does with melodies, with souls like yours.”
“Maybe, I wasn't fully corrupted.”
“When I found you, you were robbing a woman at gunpoint and had murdered two others.” I shoved him back against the wall. I watched him slide down the wall as I fixed my suit coat.
“I was fine,” he mumbled.
“Maybe you did deserve to be taken by the corruptor, but I would not change what I did.
With each and every single soul that he takes, he gets stronger.
I know just what kind of people he has working for him, and I will not be a part of adding to his forces.
No—I make soulless in order to make certain that he doesn't gain any more power.”
The melody inside of me was buzzing wildly, and I felt it encircle me as if attempting to calm me down. I stood frozen, my chest rising and falling, as the soulless picked himself up off the ground and walked up the stairs.
“Another two are downstairs.”
I turned to see Aiden, walking into the kitchen and pouring himself a bowl of cereal. “Two more? How many more are left—that one there has moved on,” I added, pointing to the couch.
“There are a total of eleven left, but at this rate, we will all be in the ground within the month.”
“It is only ever a matter of time. I have not discovered any more corrupted souls in quite a while—since that last group of twenty. That is where, I believe, I found you. It was the largest group I had ever discovered.”
“Are you searching for more?” Aiden asked, leaning his elbows upon the counter as he shoveled the cereal into his mouth.
“No. I have a melody to figure out right now. I think I have found most if not all of the corrupted Terrans.”
“And you are sure—” Aiden asked, standing up straighter as I walked past him to go into my bedroom. “You are sure that there is no way to restore a soul?”
“No,” I said, but Hava’s lingering song in my mind: Restore the souls who were lost, Restore them all again, took my attention.
I wondered what that meant. My father had yelled at Tarick to restore, and the thought lingered.
Was it possible to restore a soul once it was corrupted?
I didn’t know for sure, and in a matter of weeks, Aiden would join his soulless brothers and sisters in the ground.
It didn't matter what I thought was or was not a possibility because the reality of it was—no.
No one could come back from being a soulless—even though, I was a walking example of that very thing.