As Hera grew up, time ran its course on the continent that is home to the Kingdom of Antomea. The warm season saw the number of small animals emerging from their mothers" wombs. Behind their parents, new fledglings appeared with their short, clumsy wings, and although they sometimes fell, they eventually took flight. The budding buds gave way to flowers that had already withered. Thus, as it should be, the perpetual cycle of the seasons resumed its perpetual waltz.However, there is a place in this world where that year this natural cycle, so well established, was broken. In that warm season, although small mammals were born, no sooner had they emerged from their wombs than their horrified mothers fled from them. In the sky, none of the few travelers who ventured on these too-quiet paths could observe feathered parents helping their young to discover the pleasures of flight. As for the flora: from the buds came new varieties of flowers, which, like a challenge to nature, refused to wither.
At the border of the Kingdom devastated by, according to witnesses to whom the various authorities could only give a relative credit, Demons of such a size that not even an Ogre could reach their bellies, three delegations from three Kingdoms decided to cooperate in their efforts to discover the reason for all these worrying changes.
That was three years ago. Several squads, led by experienced and talented scouts, were chosen and so they entered the strange, odourless purple mist. Prudently, using what they had learned and respecting the teachings they had received from their instructors, they went deep into the territory that everyone dreamed of conquering and soon, outside, their superiors lost sight of them.
These brave soldiers never reappeared before their eyes. Afterwards, over the months and then over the three years, many more (inspectors) were sent on reconnaissance. Since there were not many volunteers, the Kingdoms of Kant, Antomea and D"Ift.i.t decided to offer bounties to the brave who dared to step out of line and raise their hands. As the bounty was no longer sufficient to motivate these soldiers who had become reluctant to make a name for themselves, the Kings ordered that the volunteers be designated from now on.
However, due to disappearances in the fog that was named (the sea of sighs), the number of designated volunteers became less and less numerous, and these soldiers being essential, during an agitated council of ministers, the Kingdom of Antomea made a decision that did not meet with unanimity among the army officers.
Throwing out the soldiers was neither prudent nor humanly correct, and considering the expense of each trip by a squad that, moreover, never returned, it was noted in the official gazette that from now on, the dirty work would be entrusted to the guild of adventurers.
Disposable lives to do the dirty work, wasn"t that the best compromise? They also felt that disa.s.sociation from the temporarily allied Kingdoms had come, so, faced with a King who was not very concerned about the politics of his own Kingdom, no longer finding this three year old subject very exciting and who was now completely disinterested in the issue, when the increasingly powerful ministers left the council, without resorting to useless words that might have earned them the whip, their scheming lips expressing their deepest thoughts, they all shook hands vigorously.
…
The young man hardly moves the fingers of his right hand. Starving for days, he is still dizzy after the many blows he received not so long ago, but as his strength gradually returns, he is again vaguely able to distinguish what is happening around him.
As his fingers scratch a dusty floor, he understands that he is still in that same damp cellar in which rats take advantage of the darkness to come and tear pieces of flesh from his purulent wounds. How long has it been since their torturers brought them to this place? It must have been at least two weeks. No, three weeks seems more realistic. However, it is also possible that he and his comrades have been imprisoned here for months.
In this place which is anything but unknown to him. In this cellar, where men he trusted so much take great pleasure in beating him up, almost come when they indulge in the worst humiliations and worst horrors that a human being can do to his fellow human beings...
... Yet It"s toward himself he"s most angry.
For his foolishness that led his friends into this infamous trap. For his weakness, which led him to let them fight two against three dozen brutes devoid of any feelings, but above all, for obeying his torturers when they force him to look at what they are doing to the woman who has always encouraged him in this path which he has taken for purely financial purposes.
Two weeks, three weeks, months? He no longer knows, and is it really that important? Enclosed between these cold stone walls, where the smell of blood, the smell of virile men and the stench of rotting bodies mixes, the exhausted young man has lost track of the pa.s.sing of time.
He is certainly a coward, but he will never invite death to come and visit him before his body drops him. Leaning on his very thin arms, pushing away the electric current that runs through his body, originating from his freshly cut and already necrotic little finger, the young man manages to sit down.
Too accustomed to the darkness, his eyes, witnesses of his life which flees him every minute a little more, take a little time to adapt to the few candlesticks whose quivering candles shedding tears of wax pa.s.sively illuminate the torture chamber.
After blinking repeatedly, at his feet, he can discern his weapon. That day, traitors didn"t even take it from him. No, they certainly did not consider him as a potential threat, or wishing to humiliate him, they threw it there, close to him, and then, they just broke his arrows in two. Like him, his precious bow has since remained lying on the ground, and like him, it will be there until these men decide to get rid of it for good.
He can no longer stand the daily noise of the long table in the middle of the room. The young man whose tears are beginning to dry up, feels that one by one, they are still managing to come down along his cheeks. If he listens, he knows that he will end up going mad, so, in order to deny a reality that has become too unbearable, he covers his ears.
His hands press so hard on his skull that he might one day break it, but... He can no longer hear the furniture creaking to the rhythm of his friend"s cries and pleas. These high-pitched, plaintive screams, mixed with the low, b.e.s.t.i.a.l laughter of several hungry men.
Below this well-made table, where a magician"s garment has been carelessly thrown away, the sound of the belts that are unbuckled incessantly at this time of day makes him nauseous, and although he refuses to hear, the now-excited candle by the incessant coming and going of human skin monsters taking turns in the room, and the rapid movements of the brutes who take turns pa.s.sing either in front of or behind the table, remind him of the torment of the one he betrayed out of pride.
He, who unlike all his fellow workers does not come from the lower cla.s.ses, once decided out of sheer pride to disown his family to prove to everyone that he did not need the t.i.tle of family n.o.bility to be able to succeed where his elder brother had failed.
He, who always out of pure pride and knowing himself to be mediocre in his profession, taking advantage of the fact that they were close to the family castle, this time renounced his own choices and decided that for once he would impress his friends by showing his social origins superior to theirs.
He, the man who had never been more than a coward without real motivation or illusions, led his friends on the path that led them to h.e.l.l.
The coward, in order not to look at his reality, turns his face towards a great man whose breath is so short that the spirit of G.o.d might abandon him at any moment.
His heart is hurts, but somehow, too accustomed to this infernal sight that goes crescendo in violence, the young man swallows the blood from the many blows that have caused multiple wounds inside his mouth.
As if lulled by the table that continues to creak, again he lies down on the ground and he ignores the silent laments of the young woman whose throat must have been obstructed. His still valid hand under his head as a pillow, he closes his eyes containing no trace of hope and while waiting for the next torture session, the only proof that he is still alive, his heart full with guilt, he falls asleep with the fear that he"ll never see the candles crying again.