Alessia Dares

TW: death, horror scenes

Four of them sat around the fire with stolen wine in their hands. Alessia’s boyfriend Teo had pinched it from his family vineyard to bribe their friends Marco and Serena. The tree and vine the two had grown in a field of yellow woad flowers had to be moved.

Magic had grown the oak tree but had not helped them uproot it and plant it again in the nearby woods. Sweating and swearing the four of them had shifted the tree and the grapevine on plastic tarps.

Drinking to their victory the four raised their unlabelled bottles and cheered. None of them were old enough to drink without their parents which only made it more fun. The fire in the pit spat sparks into the air as they laughed.

Teo held Alessia’s hand. Marco and Serena were arm in arm. The wine was fruity but from the expressions Alessia knew that they were all drinking it because they shouldn’t. She laughed, tasting the fruity but bitter alcohol. Branches of Teo’s oak tree were black fingers against the night blue sky.

“I dare you to summon the dead,” Alessia said without thinking. The other three stopped giggling and looked at her. She felt a hot flush in her cheeks and heard the wind in the woods.

When they asked her why, she shrugged. Campfire, alcohol, spooky woods. Wasn’t it the done thing? They all laughed again. When Serena laughed her curly blonde hair jumped around and Marco looked at her as if she was perfect. Alessia looked at Teo, he burped. He’d looked at her like that before, but he wasn’t the constant romantic that Marco was.

 “I would need a summoner’s candle and a knife,” said Teo as if it was impossible. He looked nervous. He took a deep swig of his wine and looked away from Alessia.

“I’ve got a candle,” said Serena, digging in her canvas bag. From the mess inside she pulled a worse for wear candle and threw it to Teo.

“I’ve got a knife,” said her boyfriend, Marco. He reached into the pocket of his black school trousers and pulled out a penknife with other attachments. He threw it to Teo, who let it fall in the dirt by his feet.

  “Anyone know an eternal soul who does this kind of thing?” asked Teo, picking the knife up and wiping off the dust.

“I heard of one,” said Marco with a wide grin on his face, “Hadron the Monstrously Massive Smasher. Hell of a name, right?” Marco’s jaw was so square it looked as though his face had been carved on the edge of a cube. Firelight on the grin and the wide eyes made their friend look murderously mad.

“Hadron the Monstrously Massive Smasher?” Teo asked, sighing. Marco nodded. Beneath the shadow of the black cap Teo loved so much Alessia saw apprehension. “Sounds like the name of a superhero made up by a toddler. He looked at his girlfriend, his challenger. “So, what do I do? Will Hadron know?”

“I guess so,” she said. She was starting to feel guilty about the dare. He clearly didn’t want to. “You don’t have to do it. I was joking Teo. Summoning the dead is mad. I heard that most people pass on so quickly there aren’t many mortal souls in the Sea of Souls.”

“I guess we’ll find out,” said Teo, lighting the candle with a spark of magic.

Teo drank the rest of his wine in one long gulp then mashed the candle into the neck of the bottle before Serena could protest. Getting on his knees over the candle he unfolded Marco’s knife and looked at the flash of the silver blade in the orange firelight.

Wind howled in the oak trees around the fire, brushing the flames in a different direction and blowing the smoke into Alessia’s eyes. Feeling the burn and the stink in her lungs she coughed and moved as Teo dragged the blade across his palm. She saw him wince and squeeze the blood into the candle’s flame.

“Hadron the Monstrously Massive Smasher, hear me. Show us the souls of the dead in the Sea of Souls.”

“What?” A head appeared over the fire. The head looked like Alessia’s grandfather but with red skin and a black beard instead of grey. His eyes were orange, his smile was terrifying. There was no body, no neck, just the head. “What are four kids doing summoning me?”

“We want to see what happens to mortal souls after death,” said Teo in mock boldness. He spoke in a burst of a shout. His chest was heaving. He held the bloody knife in his right hand, the wound in his left was still dripping.

“I doubt that,” said the soul as old as time. Alessia had only seen one other immortal soul. Cernunnos the Horned God was nothing like Hadron the Monstrously Massive Smasher. The antlered being had guided her and her classmates in the study of plant magic used to grow the oak tree they sat beneath.

“We do Hadron sir, please, show us.” Teo pressed his palms together and bowed his head to the ethereal being from the realm where thought was everything and all mortals went after death to be meat for sharks like Hadron.

“Traumatise four mortal kids. Fine with me. Do me a favour though. Bunch together so that I can see you all crap yourself at once. I don’t want to miss any of it.” The kids exchanged nervous looks.

Marco stood and gave Serena his hand to help her up. They came round the fire to sit next to Teo. Wiping the blade on his black uniform Teo folded it back down and handed the penknife back to Marco. He blew out the candle in the bottle and pulled it from the makeshift holder. Serena frowned for a moment looking at the mashed bottom of the candle, before shoving it into her pocket and locking her eyes on Hadron.

“Everyone ready?” asked Hadron, his eyes glittered with glee. In his golden teeth Alessia saw herself and her friends, eager and fearful. Serena clung to Marco. She settled into Teo’s embrace and he gripped her. They all nodded.

Screaming stopped their hearts. Alessia felt Teo’s fingers dig into her arm like claws as the forest disappeared around them. She’d imagined getting to ask a ghost questions about their life. Instead, she was transported to the ethereal realm with her boyfriend locked around her. The forest faded to black around them.

Screaming filled the air as their minds adjusted to a realm without light. Smoke solidified as her head made the best sense it could of a place she should never have gone. Wisps of flitting smoke became hideous beasts ripping at a man as he flailed helplessly at them.

Not made of colour but memory, the man shrank with every bite taken from him by the predators that waited for all mortal souls to come to them. As the man flailed some of the monsters pulled back to a circle around him, he pleaded for mercy. He repented for things he could no longer remember.

The immortal souls didn’t care. They weren’t listening. They waited. When his energy diminished, they attacked again. Claws of thought ripped cherished memories away. He shrank again, smaller weaker. Losing himself, losing hope, he wept and screamed for help.

Alessia reached out from Teo’s arms to the man who could not deserve the torture of that destruction. She was crying. Teo held her tight but he was crying as well.

“No. No you can’t have that. Not my daughter please. She’s,” another bite cut off the pleading father as he swiped desperately. Something about him grew for a moment. Thinking of the daughter gave him strength to fight a little longer.

Alessia saw the man. He was old. Eighty perhaps, maybe more. She saw his age in the memories that bled from him to be devoured by the immortal souls he fought. He fought with all the rage of a younger man as his soul was stolen from him piece by piece.

Seeing the monsters, she could see memories in them, thoughts that were stolen. She could see the flesh that was their own, their beliefs, their hatred of mortals. On and on it went, back all the way to the dawn of time itself. The creature she watched turned from the attack as if it was aware of her for the first time. Cruelty smiled as it turned and did the equivalent of sniffing the air.

Her face in the smoke, beaten and bloody. Her mother’s face. Her father’s face. Teo’s face. All dead. All grinning. Imperial soldiers marched through the night, wiping out everyone with waves of bullets like the stories her parents told her. The screaming grew louder as the jaws of the nightmare opened wide before her. Her screaming. The screams of everyone she loved. It was laughing at her.

“Your soul will be mine,” it promised her. “Your soul and those of all you care about will be the meat on my tongue. You are nothing but meals to me.”

Death’s hound looked away from Alessia as Teo’s nails began to cut the flesh of her hand. She tasted blood, realising she’d bitten her cheek. The warmth of urine on her trousers cooled in the wind of a forest she could not see. Sweat in her armpits. Tears on her cheeks.

“No please. I can’t,” said the man. He was exhausted. His soul had shrunk to a fraction of itself. Alessia wondered if he even knew who he was anymore. Could he remember the daughter he’d fought not to forget? What would be left of them when the beasts had their fill?

The man was getting younger it seemed. He surrendered memories to the teeth of the immortal souls who could never have enough. He wasn’t old anymore. He was a young man, too young to have a daughter. So small.

As the beasts circled and left a gap between them and the four children, he seemed to see them. He reached out. Not a man anymore, a boy, gnawed down to his youth. He was as young as them.

“Please help me. I don’t know what’s happening. Don’t just watch. Help me!” he screamed desperately. She saw him, handsome with a broad face and loving brown eyes. He reached out his hand to them. Alessia tried to reach out. He was too far away. The glass of a universe stood between them as they watched him ripped apart.

He wasn’t a teen anymore. Just a little boy, frightened. He didn’t know what he looked like. He didn’t know his name. With another nash of teeth, another swipe of claws that were mocking hatred and hunger, he was gone. Tongues that weren’t tongues licked lips that Alessia had imagined because there was no image to do the horror of their forms justice.

Memories of the dead man merged with their minds. They grew. It was nothing to them. He had been a meal. He was a toy they had played with. He was gone. She’d done nothing. Guilt sprouted in her as she relived the end of a man’s soul.

Eyes in the darkness saw them. Alessia felt the demons from the ethereal realm turn to look at her. The whole pack advanced. They were hulking grins of vicious teeth, barbed arms that ended with cruel claws. They saw her and they hungered to rip her apart.

Alessia tried to rip herself from Teo’s grip to run away but he was holding her too tight. His face was pale as a sheet. His eyes were popping out. Shimmering streaks from tears lined both cheeks. In that place where thoughts could be seen and heard she saw his fear.

Teo’s family hung from the rafters of the family barn. Dead eyes stared down at him as he ran from one to the other and tried to get them down. She felt their limp weight in his arms, felt them swing. She saw their dead, milky eyes looking down at him.

“Teo. It’s not real. The demons are taunting you Teo. It’s a lie. Look away.” He couldn’t his arms bound her like chains as he stared into his worst nightmare and the ethereal souls laughed with the scream of everyone he loved. He’d wet himself as well. She couldn’t blame him. She’d turned away from the nightmare. He couldn’t. Teo was sinking into his worst fears.

Alessia felt his wrist. His pulse was weak. Had his heart stopped from fear itself.

“Teo. Snap out of it,” she shouted.

The nightmare blew away. The realm of the ethereal beings was gone. Hadron’s head hung over the fire. He was smiling but the face he’d taken from her grandfather also looked concerned.

“I did warn you,” said the demon, “you’re not meant to see that until it’s your turn.”

“Our turn?” Alessia asked, her voice was shrill. “That’s going to happen to us?”

“It’s like that for every mortal soul. Better not to fight it really. It just lasts longer.”

The wet where Alessia had peed herself was going cold. Teo was still staring off into the distance with his mouth wide open. Marco and Serena had merged into each other, shaking uncontrollably. The fire crackled. The trees swayed in a gentle breeze. Stars shone in the sky.

Alessia was shaking. She was certain that she’d be having a violent seizure there and then if she hadn’t taken her medication at breakfast. Her heart was aching from the pace of its own beat. Her wine bottle was on its side on the ground. The soil had drunk the purple alcohol away.

“Enjoy the rest of your night kids,” said Hadron before he vanished, leaving them alone. She missed him instantly. Not that another demon was much good but knowing he was one of them that didn’t seem to want to hurt her felt like some form of protection against the malice of the monsters he’d shown them.

Whether it was the wine or the painful knowledge that when she died her soul would be ripped apart by immortal souls, Alessia felt sick. Shaking free of Teo’s grip she stumbled away from the fire and vomited up purple bile.

The other three hadn’t moved. Only Serena’s curly blonde hair showed where she began, and Marco ended. They looked as if they cowered from inevitable death. Alessia wondered what they had seen. Had the ravaged bodies of their families been cut into their minds?

Alessia waved her hand in front of Teo’s face. She clicked her fingers. He was lost. All of the colour had drained from his face. He’d seen his two sisters and both parents hanged. He’d felt it, smelled it, heard the rafters creak as they swung in his arms.

“They’re not dead Teo. It wasn’t real. Snap out of it. Go home and see them. They’ll all be there waiting for you.” He turned and looked at her. He seemed smaller, younger. He was a year younger than her, like Marco and Serena but in that moment, he looked like a little boy. He reminded her of a toddler who’d had an accident toilet training. They all did.

Nick jumped to his feet and ran off through the tree, stumbling as he went. She heard him crashing through branches as he ran. Wiping tears on her sleeve she looked at their friends in a death grip together.

“Marco. Serena. Get up. We’re all scared. Go home.” She pulled at them. When they finally emerged from each other’s armpits they looked as bad as Teo.

Alessia Found an arm and pulled Marco up. He looked drowsy. His lip was bleeding. The stink of fear in his sweat was revolting. She was no bed of roses herself.

“Home. Yeah. We should go home. Come on Serena. I’ll walk you back.” Marco pulled Serena to her feet.

The couple stumbled off into the night. Alone with a fire to put out she searched for something to put it out. Two half-drunk bottles of wine did nothing to put the flames out. She kicked soil into the fire until the light was gone.

Cold and afraid, Alessia walked home. Her hometown, Cagliostro, had never been frightening before. She’d never had the death of her family beamed into her brain before either. She knew it was a lie. She had also felt it as vivid as if it was still happening.

Cagliostro’s painted houses were every colour under the sun. Survivors of successive genocides committed against magi had flocked to their own worlds of Cauldren and Faia. Cagliostro was the biggest town in the region of Paroldo, populated by descendants of Italian magi.

Alessia couldn’t help imagining soldiers of the Human Empire marching through Cagliostro with their guns and slaughtering her people. She pictured her father rushing out to face them as all the Militia el Magi would have to. He would use up all of his magic and bullets until the endless soldiers of the hateful empire marched right over him as if he was nothing, the way they did with everything else.

The lights were on in the kitchen. She turned the handle to the door. She heard the click of her mother’s heels on the tiles. The door flew open. Adelina looked furious; eyebrows arched in a frown. Alessia threw herself at her mother and told her, sobbing, that she loved her. All of the angry tension left Adelina’s muscles in a moment as she hugged her daughter. She smelled of perfume and love. Adelina told Alessia to shower, because she didn’t.