The Awakening Part 1. Chapter 4

Rasha felt like he was wandering into death’s embrace, the increasingly dank air pressing heavily on his lungs. Faced with uncertain darkness, the stories monks shared about the monastery’s subterranean depths flooded his mind and came to life in his imagination. The  monks traded stories and legends like currency at the monastery, and the taboo tales about the monastery’s subterranean corridors were the most valuable. In exchange for a week’s worth of transcribing, one brother told him the spiral sanctum concealed the pathway to the afterlife and that the reaper of souls swept any away who walked the path while still living.

A more seasoned brother had accepted Rasha’s black ivory broach for a moonlight tour of the monastery that ended down by the entrance to the depths, where the man told him that the first brothers of the Order of Nostros had carved out the pathway in order to escape from Aldir II, the last ruler to worship the soil’s original twin-headed god, Balishek and Auros – the great serpent who tricked the sun as it sped across the sky into fleeing into its expectant mouth. That brother never would say whether the priests had ever needed to use the tunnel. And it now dawned on Rasha that he would finally know one way or the other. But then a deeper irony followed. Where he now walked was no different than the monastery, and his brothers were probably dead or dying at the hands of a bloodthirsty mob.

Rasha let out a whimper and a moan as he thought of the carnage just feet above him – the  Path of Light burning with the crimson blood of his brothers, the Hall of Reverence desecrated with anguished screams and joyous reveling, and the Immortal Flame setting the whole monastery ablaze until all turns to cindered ash.

“And thus, is history’s scribe the hand of the victor and its ink the blood of the under trodden.”

-          The Teachings of Nostros

 “Who am I to live?” Rasha cried out to death itself as tears poured from his eyes, collapsing with thunderous crashes into the passageway underfoot. Rasha started to claw at his eyes, he didn’t want to see any more of this cruel world. He pawed at his ears, so he would be deaf to the screams of his murdered brothers. He scratched at his heart, so it would trouble him no longer with insatiable grief. And when he had, at last, fallen to his knees, Rasha noticed his tears were somehow like fallen stars illuminating the overwhelming desert night. It was a small thing. A small hope. But it was enough for Rasha to cling to, to propel him forward. I am no one to live, he thought, but life was both his blessing and curse, a debt he owed to the source and his brothers, and to himself. And thus was the phrase – “The journey home is lit by the fallen rain of human grief,” made clear for Rasha. And so Rasha let himself cry freely and walked in the faint glow of fallen tears.

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The distant cracking and crashing of stone roused Rasha from his grief. “It’s finished,” a voice whispered from the darkness. I’m finished, Rasha thought answering the voice of death. Rasha broke into gallop, trying to escape the stalking firelight. Rasha’s eyes had started to adjust, and he could make out the faint outline of walls as he raced around corners as once faint voices grew louder and distant gallops grew closer and more ravenous. “Come out brother, they’ve gone away!” one voice triumphantly called. “The holy brother convinced them to spare us,” another voice called. The holy brother? Did these men know anything about the monastery, Rasha thought as he laughed at their ignorance while trying to catch his breath. Even as his lungs burned, Rasha tried to quicken his pace. “Why do you run from us brother?” one voice called out meekly. “This is all just a big misunderstanding. We’ll clear it right up if you’ll just let us speak as brothers.” Rasha didn’t respond. He didn’t move. He couldn’t risk exposing his position, but more than that he felt his resolve waning and allowed himself to ask whether he would rather die at their hands or those of the phantoms waiting concealed in the impenetrable shadows.

Rasha forced his feet forward in tiny ginger steps. They couldn’t know how close they were, he shuddered. In spite of his careful gait, Rasha’s foot struck a pebble sending it skipping across the uneven stoon floor and crashing into the wall. Impossibly loud echoes reverberated like the clap of thunder. He’d been resisting salvation every time it had extended him a welcoming hand. He’d walked to the front of the monastery and knelt beside his brothers waiting for the coming slaughter. He’d resisted Father Zoshima when he begged for him to leave so that at least some remnant of their order would survive and return. He had looked into the heart of salvation those two times and accepted it reluctantly.

“And lo I am among all men – most alone. I do not slacken my haste unto the umbrous morrow. For it comes, relentless as the sun and evanescent as the moon. I meet the darkness with furious tears and come through reborn to my own rising light.

-          The Prayer of the Kunah I  before fighting Ish Khala

But now its guiding hand was drifting out of reach. There would be no more passive survival, Rasha realized. And so, he kicked his legs outward and sprinted with what might and fervor remained in his limbs. He was a furious racket that seemed to make the darkness come alive as he fought to outrun the torchlight. I’m taking two steps for every one of theirs, Rasha boasted to himself. Just keep running, they’ll grow tired of this soon enough. He vanished into a room that seemed to swallow him along with every particle of ambient light. One moment he was running on hard stone and the next he was buoyed solely by unforgiving vapor sending him tumbling into the abyss.

For an instant, Rasha feared he had fallen into Malkos’ great and terrible maw and waited for that great being of darkness to consume his heart, his mind, and then his very soul.

There would be no return to Iiliios, Rasha feared.

But just as he was about to abandon himself, Rasha felt the merciful pain of hard earth’s embrace. He winced for a moment before succumbing to a different terror – those shouting voices and clanging footsteps would soon be upon him, and he had nowhere else to retreat.

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Dancing firelight ominously stirred the darkness, illuminating two figures who cast tall shadows in their wake. The taller of the two wore a handsome face, obscured by a ghoulish smile, while the shorter of the two could barely conceal his bloodlust behind his fiery opaline eyes. The men walked like desert serpents, with a loud rattling, which Rasha realized came from prayer necklaces stolen from the lifeless bodies of his fallen brothers. My brothers are a trophy to these men, he thought with disgust. Their ashes are flakes of gold they ornament themselves with. And our creed is a perverse joke. A horrible thought filled his mind – what would they say about us to justify what they did? What monsters will they make us out to be?

“What brings you down here?” the shorter man hissed, interrupting Rasha’s ruminations. “Your brothers were so welcoming.”

“Completely obliging, to a fault” the taller one answered as he gleefully played with intricately carved beaded necklaces adorning his thick neck. “He must be shy,” he added. “But you needn’t be. We make no illusion of our import.”

Rasha scooted backward along the ground to escape the light.

“See now that’s just impolite,” the taller man chided.

“Impolite?” the shorter one questioned, “we haven’t even introduced ourselves, of course he’s standoffish.” “Come back into the light so we can make a proper introduction. We’re all civilized people here.”

Would they believe me if I told them I was a false monk, Rasha wondered. Would they care?

“Ezra,” the taller one pleaded, “let’s just leave the man.” “He’s a desert deer mired in the sand. We did our job.”

“He’s no deer, he’s a locust,” the shorter man chided impatiently. “He fed on our crops and swarmed our people. You don’t let even a single locust escape, even to the barren desert. That’s where they go to die and be reborn of the sand.”

Rasha waited as the two men exchanged silent glances and the taller one shoves Ezra forward, dangling him over the edge of the pit. “What are you doing Jasher?” Ezra pleaded, clinging desperately to Jasher’s arms. “If you would squash the locust, do it yourself” Jasher demanded as grabbed onto Ezra’s tunic. Jasher walked a squirming Ezra to the edge of the pit and casually tossed his torch down. “You’ll need this more than I will down there,” Jasher grinned sinisterly. Ezra flailed his arms, vainly trying to escape Jasher’s grasp while the larger man slowly lowered him into the pit.

Rasha struggled to his feet, scrambling back into the darkness with his eyes affixed on Ezra and the torch he carried. He was running out of darkness and felt his heartbeat quickening as firelit panic overwhelmed him. Rasha crashed into hard ground – there was nowhere left to turn. Ezra silently approached, holding his flame to Rasha’s face. “You seem different from your fellow brothers,” Ezra sneered. Ezra raised his off hand to Rasha’s face and pressed his fingers into cheeks before touching his forehead and nose, offering a bastardized blessing. Rasha bristled and squirmed under the man’s touch, his brain searching for a way out of this corner he’d stupidly wandered into.

“Look at me,” Ezra demanded. “Look at me and see the lives of thy thousand brothers dripping from my face.” Rasha obeyed. A blood-stained smile greeted Rasha, who began to whimper and tremble as uncontrollable grief overtook him.

“Don’t lose yourself to the future you see on my face. I’m not done with you yet,” Ezra chuckled menacingly.

“It is a unique blessing to fear death. For our death is twinkling light that courses back to that great source. If you fear the return, it is because you cleave too much to worldly indulgence.” Rasha repeated Father Zoshima’s words to himself to steel himself as he looked past Ezra’s blood -spattered face into his eyes. He didn’t fear the man – he pitied him. He pitied a man who had completely lost himself to bloodlust. He pitied a man who had allowed himself to fall prey such an obvious deception.

“I don’t fear death,” Rasha answered resolutely. “I fear grief and all of her children, loneliness, despair, doubt, and silence.” Ezra was almost taken aback by his plainness; his eyes retreated briefly to introspection before he reared his head back and spat in Rasha’s eye.

“You may see us as locusts, a contemptible annoyance, no longer suited to share your world. But our eyes behold the same splendor as the sun rises over the sea. Our ears hear the whistling winds tickle the laughing chimes on the city walls. We suffered the same hunger when the rains refused to fall three years ago.” Rasha whispered fervently. “You may not be able to see how we contribute to your new world, but my brothers did not deserve to be trampled underfoot and slaughtered like vermin.”

“We had cheers ringing at our backs as we left to rid the land of your brothers.” Ezra sneered as he studied Rasha’s face, remarking on the man’s unflinching resolve. He despised the locust’s confidence. “And we shall ne’er hear a cry when you the last of your brothers is gone. What does that say of deserve?” Ezra shouted in Rasha’s ear.

Rasha felt Ezra’s hatred pour into him like poison. Ezra cast his torch to the ground and savagely grabbed Rasha by his shoulders and threw him to the ground. Rasha braced himself as he violently crashed into the earth and slid, coming to a stop directly in front of the blazing torch, its heat singing his brown eyebrows. A sharp kick to Rasha’s nose sent him sputtering backward, away from the lit flame. A few involuntary grunts left Rasha’s mouth as he struggled to breathe as blood filled his mouth and nostrils. “Well, we bleed the same. We’ve got that in common,” Ezra mumbled sadistically. The man kneeled down and pressed Rasha’s head into the dirt, “Tell me this, do we also eat the same?”    

Rasha choked on the dirt as Ezra flipped the man onto his back and shoved another fist full of dirt into his mouth. Rasha squirmed to get out from under Ezra, but the man had pinned his shoulders with his knees, bringing the full force of his disdain for the monk down on him. Confusion flashed across Ezra’s face before harkening the flicker of discovery, which faded to self-satisfied grin. “Jasher,” Ezra called back toward the opening of the chamber. “You’ll never guess but our monk has a little secret.”  

Without a response to cheer him on, Ezra’s face faded from glee to impatience. “Listen here, Jasher,” Ezra tried again.

“Jasher.”

“Jasher.”

A loud thud reverberated across the darkness. And darkness swallows up the sound as silence overwhelms the two men.

“Death has visited us,” Rasha muttered. Panic and confusion briefly render Ezra speechless as he shoves Rasha’s skull into the dirt as he climbs to his feet and retrieves the torch as he goes to examine the clamor.

From across the room, Rasha watches as Ezra examines something in the distance. Ezra reaches down to prod it with his hands. Then he frantically shakes the body and starts pleading. Finally, Ezra kicks the body, trying to stir it to life. Rasha felt a cold shiver as he realized that death had visited the three men in the depths. A cold shiver like Death’s icy breath sent a shiver down the monk’s spine. He slowly walked toward the warm glow encircling Ezra and his fallen comrade.

“Death himself stalks these corridors,” Rasha muttered quietly. “What did you say, monk?” Ezra said between panicked tears. “Death does not suffer the living  to walk on its path. We’re both dead.” “Speak plainly,” Ezra demanded. “We need to flee,” Rasha implored.