Jack Weber
It was far from a fair trial. Before the diocese of God justice is but a false driver. My fate was carved long before I stood before the judges, so much so I wholly lacked anxiety; there was far from doubt whether I’d meet a damned fate, though I rather expected death. This, they refused to grant me.
Fegefeuer’s aisles were but a tuft of brush thrust in the center of Earth’s seas, no beach nor connection to main land, for it was a land of just myself till the life of man was to fall and he to meet his end; banishing me to the lifeless land with none but the company of my mind. Bright green trees and thin grass died and grew with the seasons, this was the only change to witness on the perpetual island. The only eyes to look over me were the stars and the ever watchful sun above, its hateful rays chewed at my skin and singed my flesh, though the following twilight cooled me and glittered with promise. The waves of sea crashed against my land, as a turnkey thrusts a taunting stick into the rat plagued cell of the damned, its incessant thundering thudded against my skull. Though God turned his neglectful eyes from me, his agents glowered at my wretchedness upon my verdant land bound by sea.
Days trudged past until I counted the years, soon these were replaced by notches upon a tree for the decades that spun around my head. These too were lost when a mocking stroke of lightning splintered its body to ash, removing my single mark upon the land.
The nights following I stared into the hopeful sky, its twinkling reminders of those far more ancient than myself who are a spectacle for all lesser beings to see. How I had hoped for a sign of my days left in exile, but was met with no word. The days burned on, these I toiled through writhing agony to meet my friends at the end.
One night they spoke. Glittering shapes of grand beings and beasts, their timeworn knowledge spoke to me in the twilight. These first encounters enlightened my dehydrated soul far beyond what I had ever felt, my desperate love clung to them as if they were a drug to me. The ocean of violet skies above were a breath of fresh air to my sun choked eyes, desperation clung to my thoughts as I wished for them through the day. When the sun—the assuming fiend—crested above the ocean, I dreamed of the glittering counsel of the night and pledged myself to them as the sun declared me his wretch.
“Oh fiend of day!” I called upon him on an uncounted dawn. “Cower beyond the horizon, for your torture on my condemned, helpless soul is pathetic! Toil with gods of your magnitude, save us wretched to battle with our own rats and demons!” This brought no response from the merciless god above. The days trudged on.
Nights met me with an anxious joy for I couldn’t sit still at the thought of our conversations. Sleep rarely touched me as their words consumed my mind. The dirt of the small forest became my tablet in which I would transcribe their infinite wisdom and these I studied vigorously against the commanding fiend’s wishes.
Quickly I found the difference between my enemy and my aids. The fiend fed off the land, while the ancient scholars studied it. I wished for nothing more than to be of the rank of my idols and to be quitted of the prison clasped about me by the hands of God. To ask of such a request unnerved me, for such a request could mark me as nothing but a lesser burden to them. One night my wishes overcame my modesty and I spoke among the council of stars. Though I was met not with just denial, rather they answered my plea with a quest.
“My beloved stars, council of night, hear my plea. I wish to flee this prison, my soul wishes to be as great as you above me!” I called to the silent night. “God sends false agents to guard me as he stands above his slaves, I am but a toy to him and I mustn’t die this way; as a nameless dog. Make me as one of you, for mortals to look upon in their reflective nights, an eternity I shall last over each.” Though I heard no words, I understood their wish.
They required blood.
This I harvested from my own veins, dripped upon my tablet of wisdom. A sharp stone about the edges of the island sliced my wrists with ease. As I wrung the life from my veins, the sun crept above the dawn to behold my blasphemy, but my confidence hindered little. That day I stood taller for I feared no evil.
Rather than stare to the sun, I looked to the aisle, for I’d paid little attention to the seasons or the land. Its trees held onto a few blackened leaves, most having piled upon the brown grass below. These sentinels wore dead, white bark and what had canopied the land in shade was left exposed by felled trees. Had a frost covered the colorless grass, I’d have supposed it to be winter, though a long lifeless air breathed about. Only then had I realized the lifelessness of the land, I’d lost the memory of what the few creatures looked like. The only memory of them now was their mud-caked skulls sunken into the petrified land.
That night swept cold about me, the anticipation of their response chilled my bones as my blood warmed only them now.
“The warmth has drained from my body and serves only you, great ones! May I enter your covenant of greats, may I gain your eternal destiny?” I eagerly waited. The air of the night was not that of satisfaction, rather an expecting disappointment.
They required my body.
That night I hesitated, sat in an uncertain toil through the silent night. For this council and my dream I wrung the life from my veins, now I was to give myself to them. Such wise beings wouldn’t swindle so much out of a lost soul, it was not their trust I questioned. I couldn’t understand my hesitation, though I understood my masters grew impatient as the stars crossed the sky. There I sat, sharpened stone in my sliced hand, preparing. The hours slipped past me as I looked up to see the faint glow of the fiend rise above the sea. Here I made my commitment.
Cold stone dung through my thighs, dragging across bone and sawed through the other side of skin until I dragged my stunted form across the mud, my legs left behind. I cried a prayer.
“My great gods! I’ve done as you’ve asked. I have suffered torment, loss and toil, though all unregrettably to your ask. May I now be one of your great, timeless council?” My voice caught in my lamenting cries to the heavens.
Thundering clouds of gray rolled across the sky, blinding the stars from my aisle. This thick, night fog blocked even the rising sun. Anxiety filled my breast and a helpless worry filled my cries. Thick, chilling drops of rain trickled from the black clouds. These quickly turned to an unrelenting storm of pelting bullets of ice. I sat patiently, awaiting my redemption to crawl through the clouds, whether they be a trial sent from the stars or a tormentor from God’s hand.
I marked my arm with the stone with each freezing day that passed. These were soon replaced with marks of each shivering year, and soon by the decades. The stars had left me and my lacking body weakened. Countless ages passed, I spent these staring into the hailing void above, awaiting my false council. My body was no more than a skeletal stump and my mind no more than a rotted stone.
Perhaps it was mercy or a gateway to a worse torment, but the light faded from my mind. God had graced me with death. The vision of the dark sky faded as my eyelids drooped. In these final moments I cursed God, I cursed the stars and I cursed myself. Although it was not only hate that filled my mind as the beautiful flood above drowned my helpless corpse, the sun crept from behind aged clouds, for it was a fine day to die.