Chapter 15 - Roden’s Eyes
July
It was not a nightmare, that much I know. And that my back hurts like hell from having spent too much time—hours?—on a hard, cold surface.
Is it still nighttime?
No, wait… Shit!
I’m blindfolded. My fingers throb painfully, to the point I fear my skin will soon burst open because something is constricting my blood from flowing as it should. At least, whoever’s dumped me here didn’t think I could cause much trouble with just my voice, and they left my mouth uncovered.
“Hello? Anybody there? Where am I? Galen?!” I didn’t know I could reach such a high pitch of desperation.
Let’s focus, let’s take a metaphorical step back. Dinner—Galen and I were having dinner, and I got… Drunk? I don’t remember having more than one or two glasses.
“Oh, shit, did I throw up on Galen’s expensive shoes…” My voice rolls out of my mouth and lingers somewhere in front of me before fading away.
My brain’s a ball of fog where memories stretch like hot cheese, pulled between my need for reassurance that I’m not about to die alone, in some stranger’s basement, and the uncomfortable feeling that I’m right where I should be.
“What the fuck is going on?” I shout, but yelling into an (empty?) room doesn’t improve my current situation, as nobody replies.
Fine. Let’s try a more direct approach.
“You…kidnapped the wrong person.” Oh, please, don’t say I’m the right person.
Still no answer. I sway my legs left and right to test the space surrounding me and to see if my kidnapper decides to make themselves known by stopping my pathetic attempt to break free.
But all I can hear is a low, constant humming of electricity and crackling sounds, suppressing indistinct voices, words that don’t make sense, like a TV screen with a bad signal.
Exhausted and achy, I lean back until my head finds a wall. Shit—if I were at least able to free my hands.
I touch my fingers to the hard surface behind me, scouting for a rough patch, a nail, or anything I could use to cut whatever is around my wrists, but it all feels like a solid, perfectly smooth piece of stone.
Back to square one, then.
“Hey, is this your big plan? To keep me in a room and watch me slowly rot away? That’s some disgusting kink you have.
” I expel all the air in my lungs. Well, if this wasn’t the plan before, I may have just fucked up grandly by proving I’m not the smartest bargaining chip but a very deafening, disposable one.
I drop my head, focusing on the steady sound of my breath, and bend my right knee in an attempt to get up, using the wall for support—but my legs are heavy as trunks and pull me back down.
Reset.
Why am I here? “If I could only use this wall to pull me up…”
Reset.
Galen always says that when in doubt, I just need to breathe and let go.
Breathe…let go…Nope!
Someone’s watching me. It’s like an invisible finger tracing a line along my forehead and down the side of my face, making the little hairs on my neck stand up.
I shake my head and wiggle my fingers, eager to find a clearer perspective of what’s happening to me. A flashback of Galen and me sitting at the restaurant fires in my head, along with a single word—squads.
I know what I have to do.
I have to provoke whoever is enjoying my display of confusion. “Do you like watching your victims while they go crazy, eh? Nice touch, very villanesque of you. I see, I see—you like to remain secretive… ”
Squads.
“Hang on, am I here because I mentioned to Galen about the recycling squ— ”
What was I about to say? It was just one word, but it got stuck between my throat and lips, and I can no longer remember it.
Galen’s face floats behind my eyes. He’s not with me; had he been here, he would have said something already. If only a joke to cheer me up, no matter the danger of our position.
I drop my chin, my head heavy with the need to speak words I no longer seem to know. Frustration finally gets the upper hand. “Please,” I whisper on the verge of tears. I don’t believe that showing your weak side makes you stronger, but I haven’t felt this vulnerable in a very long time.
I jolt awake to the sound of—no, it’s not a voice, but a noise I can only describe as the gears of some machinery, rotating and marrying their dents and hollows in a perpetual movement.
I turn my head left and right to follow the screeching notes bouncing off the walls, chasing each other, stretching to a distance that makes me picture my prison very empty and very wide.
Until the noise subsides to a low hum and stops, making space for the sound of steps slowly approaching me.
“How’s your head?” A stream of energy speaks to me, flowing directly into my core, and wipes all the confusion from my mind by reigniting inside my head the past few hours of my life like a slap in the face.
All my words come back to me in a rush. “I feel like a giant hammer has beaten me. Thanks for your concern. What’s next? A tea party before you send ransom letters to…whoever you think may care enough about me? I hope you don’t expect me to ask how your day is going.”
I’m not really sure what my value is, but if they’ve kept me alive until now, I’m entitled to ask questions, loads of them.
But for some reason, they’re all bottled up and struggle to come out one at a time.
When one surfaces, another one immediately follows.
They chase each other in a race to reach my tongue first, but end up colliding and popping like soap bubbles.
I tilt my head, searching for the disembodied steps, but whoever is in the room with me has stopped walking. Perhaps to enjoy the miserable show I put on for them.
I take a big breath, ready to blow out my defence once more, but the invisible walker starts moving again, each step accompanied by a clicking sound.
I snap my head back up, but something seals my mind and lips. I must listen…
No. No. I need to ask questions.
“Miss Crimson.” The voice belongs to a man who has been speaking for years. Centuries. It’s controlled, with no inflexion whatsoever, and is so soothing I could listen to it all day long.
“Have we met before? I don’t remember your voice... And judging by how you treat your guests, I don’t think you’re the type of person I’d like to deal with. Ever.” I blurt out my words because I fear I only have a few seconds of autonomy.
I’m panting, like I’ve run for miles and just stopped. “Where’s my friend? What did you do to him?” Please don’t say Galen’s been next to me all this time, but he’s no longer moving or able to talk. Please don’t even say his name…
The stranger stops and chuckles with amusement. He sounds very close, as if we are at eye level. I can smell amber and musk cologne when he purrs, “Galen is fine.”
My heart sinks. He is fine—and he is now part of this terrible picture.
I’m not here by accident; this man knows our names. My brain begins to sketch a question, but the words I need to voice haven’t yet been invented.
The wall behind me pulls some of my hair when I press my head against it, trying to move away from the stranger.
“Who are you?” I bite my lips until I taste blood, until my voice breaks.
Tears wet the fabric tied around my eyes, and my lids sting, but the discomfort is nothing compared to what I experience when the man unties the cloth and reveals his face, which appears hazy behind my veil of tears—but too fucking familiar.
I blink the blur away, and my jaw drops when I recognise those chips of grey ice.
Roden’s eyes.
“Sir, I…Why didn’t I recognise your voice? How—” I stare at him, bewildered, when a sudden rattling, static sound explodes from the wall behind him.
I jerk my head to one side, looking over his shoulder. “What are all these screens for?” I blink fast to clear my view, finally recognising the source of the humming noise I heard when I regained my senses.
“Those, my child, are my windows to Horigos,” Roden replies, standing up and turning his back to me.
I know there is something I mean to ask him, an urgent question, something I probably did ask a moment ago and forgot the answer for some odd reason.
He’s tall, and not even this vast room, empty save for a shiny white piano and the screens, can diminish his stature. This man can tower over any person and take up space, making himself bigger if needed. This man both scares me and makes me feel safe.
Perhaps this is why, instead of trying to get up and leave, I remain with my back against the wall, waiting for him to speak again.
Are you crazy? Get up; this is not right. Remember the—
I must have hit my head. I hate this sense of forgotten thoughts.
“Aren’t they majestic?” Roden opens his arm as if embracing the screens that cover the walls, from floor to a never-ending ceiling.
“This is where I decide which Horigean truly needs me. Every screen is a cry for help, my dear,” he explains, cocking his head left and right.
One of the lower screens is projecting the video of a man, wearing faded newspapers as if they were a three-piece suit, pushing a shopping trolley filled to the brim with rubbish. While on the screen to the left, a girl runs by a river, as thin as the birch trees she passes by.
The scene rolls down and off the screen, only to reappear five positions below. The girl is no longer running, but drifting on the water, her hair floating like golden seaweed.
“What’s just happened?” I can hardly tear my attention off the girl and focus on Roden.
He stands still momentarily, then eventually looks at me from over his shoulder, elegantly spinning his walking stick like an old-fashioned dancer—a friendly smile on his face as if amused by my interest in the fate of a stranger.
“The lower they go, the more desperate they are. And—ready to make a deal.” Simple as that.
He puts both hands on the pommel of his cane and taps the point of his shiny white shoe to the rhythm of music I can’t hear.
Behind him, the river scene has slid to the very bottom of the wall.
My eyes widen as the top of the girl’s screen begins to turn black like a curtain slowly falling on a stage.
“What if they don’t want to make a deal?” I mutter.
Roden’s eyes narrow on me, but he doesn’t move an inch.
I’ve seen his face many times, but it still shocks me how young he looks, despite his actual age, which is a detail - I imagine - he only shares with a chosen few, like Popplewish.
His face is one tone away from a wax mask, but not as fake—full lips and dark eyebrows, nearly as black as his hair. Everything about him is intense, powerful, and colourful, as though more life flows into him, extra blood in his veins, and more air than usual fills his lungs.
I wait for his answer, but something whispers in the back of my mind, disturbing my meeting with the Creator…We’re on the floor. Why am I on the floor—
Roden hits the marble with his cane twice, and I blink as if someone has shone a bright light in my eyes.
“What if they like their life as it is?” I vomit the question as if I’ve been punched in my guts.
The corners of Roden’s mouth lift in a wicked smile. “We show them what a waste of a good soul their choice would be.”
“But that’s their soul—”
His cane bites the floor again, but this time, a shooting pain behind my eyes silences me.
One second passes and the pain is gone.
“What was I saying?” I mumble. My tongue is like a fat piece of meat that doesn’t belong to me.
Still smiling at me, Roden pulls a small remote control from the pocket of his perfectly ironed dark blue trousers and switches off all the screens.
I follow his every move in a daze, feeling like I’m not really here and he’s just a projection.
Until he stands inches away from me, kneeling to meet my eyes. “Full of questions, are we? And I do like curiosity. In the right measure.” The lower he gets, the more his voice changes, turning every word into shards of ice that scratch my mind.
And yet, his hand is warm and soft against my cheek when he says, “How about I show you the truth?”