The Messengers

In retrospect, that damned day should have never been. It started well enough, but it adequately deteriorated from there on, into a gloom such that hell hath never seen. I knew what the Messengers were sent to do; what craven deed They were being forced to carry out. The wake left by Their deed still never wholly registered in my mind. I was far from cognizant of the repercussions that day would have on my family’s life, or my life for that matter. If you leave with nothing else: don’t shoot the Messengers.

As it was winter, and the sun was non-resplendent in the aere; warmth far from abounded. Yet the ominously deviant clouds made no intimation of the coming cold. The firmament suggested no chill. Yet it was cold that day, as it would be for many days to come. I woke to this inherent dreariness, and I could not fathom the day to come. War, revolution, terror: the tone was set for the years to come. For the time being, however, I tried to distance myself from this stark truth, from this raven reality, from this deathly pallor, which had overcome me. This pall filled me with despair, which was equaled only by my fierce hatred of the Messengers.

As the week’s respite dawned, I left my haven, my domicile to find solace where I had found solace many times before. The wood held this ephemeral solace, for me at least. To me the silence was like a still lake in the morn, unfettered by the shackles of conventional cacophony. No one, save the Messengers dared to pursue any further than the edge of the wood, for it was said to be inhabited by demons, revenants - manifestations of pure evil. I had found no such apparitions, all save those created by the darkness. This darkness overcame and enveloped my person as I proceeded into the dense growth, haunted by the images of my slaughtered predecessors, incognizant of Their presence.

As I proceeded up that dirt way, the ruts made by the wagons were the only constant. Tracks made by the travelers - innocent, puerile; I ruminated upon these tracks, the superficial brands of history, as to what they were thinking at this time many years ago. I imagined the fiery steed’s hoof beats melodic, rhythmic; striking a spark kindling a fire, a light in the darkness. That fire of hope burned no more, nor did that steed now travel this road. Only the Messengers had the audacity to traverse that road, that dark thoroughfare leading to an impending end.

As I crossed the threshold of the forest, a chill swept over my soul, as if ice in stead of the normal sanguine fluid now flowed through my veins. I gasped as if my breath desired to flee from my lungs if only to conceal itself. Darkness crept from behind the trees, like a viscous salve, and engulfed me in a cloak of obscurity. I wore this cloak of fog while the impetus of my journey urged me onward. Silence, utter stillness, a dearth of sound is all that surrounded me as I progressed. The silence was deafening, analogous to that silence, sonorously following a lightning’s strike – a calm after the storm. The wood was devoid of life, as if it had already been touched by Death, touched by the Messengers.

As it was, they always said that the spirits of the wood were those slaughtered many years before, many years even before the Messengers. The stories, no doubt sensationalized through the ages, still were haunting testimony to the antediluvian code of brutality. However, the re-manifestation of this archaic code could be no more palpable than in the Messengers’. As I walked in the forest towards my destination, I heard the silence, saw the unseen, smelled the fear, and felt a darkness envelope not only my person, but my soul. O would that there be a terminus to this portentous fear. Would that the Messengers let me be.

The spirits of the damned howled their silent speech. Nary did I hear a noise – save the silence, yet I felt motion. In the darkness I could feel the hoary occuli of the lost, staring at my nearly imperceptible visage. The silent darkness imparted to me a sense of safety as if spoken to me in silent tongues. One, I thought, should feel safe in this solitude. Yet this silence afforded to me no such solace. I feared that which I was running from was still yet following. Closer still, They approached. The presence of the Messengers, all but seen.

Madness. Silent yet stentorian – silence, deathly, deathly silence. Through this silence, I yet heard voices. The heathens to their leader, for I was the last standing, beseeched of me apt requital. I envisioned their deathly pallor as well as if they were present. Yet they were present; in every movement of my cursed existence, they were present. Infidels – what threat was our God to Theirs? Pagans – in definition incongruous from credence. Their gods held no credence, which I could see. A scourge on humanity – that is what They were. A scourge sent to plague mankind for the sake of ecclesiastical conformity. The Messengers, an assiduous assemblage of those in debt to their gods, for one reason or another, endeavored to purge the world of that sect of non-believers. The high priests did not believe us to be more than an aggravation. The Messengers saw diversely.

As I reached for the center of the wood, the sequestration seemed only to amplify. The reticence, too, became almost unbearable – to such a point that I desired to utter a word of reassurance to myself, if only to hear myself speak and know that I was still present in that hellish forest. I had no way of telling how far I had come, or how far my destination was from my current position. I could not even enter upon fathoming where my destination was. Where would I be safeguarded from the Messengers? Could I ever be safe? Was this effort futile? The solitude was beginning to infringe upon my mental fortitude. The noise in my head was unbearable, but I couldn’t release my demons. For if I uttered, even a word, I feared that the sound could be used as a beacon, giving my position to the Messengers. I felt as if at this moment there was nothing save the ground on which I progressed and the blinding darkness; yet silently I knew They were close. The wood was not normally this tacit, for it sensed the approaching dogmas. I feared, nay I knew that I was in the presence of the Messengers.

Suddenly a noise, like a cracked whip, resonated throughout the forest. I ran like a fox, pursued heavily by ravenous, unrelenting hounds. As I ran, a wooden shaft surged forth and embedded itself into a tree from whence it had originated many years before. The timber shook as if it had been struck by a woodsman’s axe. Like the woodsman for his felled tree, the messenger was fast approaching. Hoof beats, aggregate, steady, rhythmic, gradually increasing until the silence was no more. Another sagitary missile left its master’s clutches, seeking the vital fluid of life. This arrow struck a nearby adamantine face, creating a spark that kindled a fire of hope. As the missiles gained precision, the fire of hope dwindled – extinguished by dogma. The whip cracked again, and the reverberations of the bowstring were audible for a lifetime. Shortly thereafter silence reverberated through the wood just as the ligament of the bow had many lifetimes ago. Again, I heard silence, nothing more – nothing less. I saw the pallor of their craven faces, yet the countenances of the Messengers nary did I lay my hapless eyes upon.

Distant from my present state, I heard a piercing shriek. It was as if an innocent bird had been shot from the sky; ripped from its freedom; fettered by death. As the majestic bird lay dying, I could not help but feel sympathy for the fledgling’s fall from grace. A hunter, knowing not the repercussions of his forthcoming actions, slaughtered this creature. Strangely connected, I could feel the avis – his pain – his loss – his death. The macabre nature of human kind at this time mortified me. A searing heat overcame my person, and pain filled my soul for the last time; for I saw Him. There He stood – hunter over his trophy; the Predator over his prey; the Messenger over his adversary. He was silent, and I could again speak not to be heard, my mouth incapable of opening, I uttered not a word.