The voice was familiar to Rikard. In fact, it was the only voice he could ever remember hearing, although he had to have known others in his life, hadn’t he? But though he recognized the voice, he could not put a name or a face to it. Perhaps the voice had neither name nor face. Perhaps what he was hearing was the voice of God Himself. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was the Voice, and the Voice was Pain and Blood and Darkness eternal, forever and ever, without mercy, amen.
“I wonder if you are still capable of controlling your body… or perhaps I should say what is left of your body.”
Rikard couldn’t see God’s face—if indeed God had one—but he could hear the grin in His voice.
“Why don’t you try moving a little? Not too much, though. I undid the leather straps that bound you to the table some time ago, right after I removed your last limb. But we wouldn’t want you rolling off and falling onto the floor, now would we? After all, you might hurt yourself.” God let out a girlish giggle.
Rikard didn’t want to try to move. He was in so much pain… All he wanted to do was lie on the table—the warm, wet, sticky table—and listen to the voice and stare at the darkness inside his own skull. But the voice was God, and it would be disrespectful to disobey Him.
Rikard concentrated for several moments, building up his strength. And then, with a Herculean effort, he did as his God commanded. He moved.
“Excellent! You managed to purse your lips and turn your head an inch or so toward me. Bravo!”
Pride swelled within Rikard upon hearing his God’s praise. He wanted to ask God to give him another task to perform so that he might please Him again, but he could not, for he no longer possessed a tongue.
“Do you want to know a secret, Rikard?” God’s voice came then as a whisper in Rikard’s left ear. “No matter what other amusements I indulge in, I always take care not to damage the ears. Functioning ears can continue to cause pain long after the rest of a man’s nerves have gone dead. All I have to do is shout!”
Rikard grimaced—demonstrating that he could still work at least a few facial muscles. It felt like God had driven a white-hot spike into his ear.
“But the best part is that hearing allows one to exercise the imagination. For instance—”
Rikard heard the whisk-whisk of steel sliding against a sharpening stone.
“What does this sound make you think of?”
An image flashed through Rikard’s mind then: the sharp point of a dagger coming toward his eyes. He remembered struggling against the restraints (this was before God had removed them) as the blade introduced him to a night darker than any he’d ever known before.
“Now that you no longer have any eyes to get in the way, let us see just how far the dagger will penetrate, eh? I like to keep on going until the tip of the blade scrapes against the back of the skull. Try to hold still now. Without the restraints, there’s a good chance you’ll thrash around a bit.”
Anything for his God. Rikard tried to smile to show how willing he was, but the best he could manage was a lopsided grimace. The cold metal tip of the dagger touched the ragged-edged hollow ruin where his right eye had been.
“Looks like your eye has regrown a bit, but you don’t have much vitae left in your body to fuel any significant healing. That’s all right, a little push and a twist or two—there! All gone. Now let’s see how much of the dagger’s length you can take.”
Rikard felt the blade slide slowly into his eye socket and keep going. He tried to scream, but not only didn’t he have a tongue any longer, it appeared he had no vocal cords either. The dagger kept sliding in, deeper and deeper, until bright flashes of light exploded against the darkness in his mind. He knew the metal had somehow pierced the very core of him.
“Milord István!” Another voice, one Rikard did not recognize.
“What is it?” God snarled. “I told you never to interrupt me when I’m playing.”
“Begging your pardon, milord, but his highness wishes to see you.” The voice grew eager. “The rumor around camp is that we’re going to march against the Tartar’s tribe at last!”
This last sentence stirred some fragments of memory in Rikard but he was finding it so hard to think….
István (that must be God’s name, Rikard decided) sighed. “I suppose his highness wants to see me this very instant?”
The owner of the other voice sounded amused. “Naturally.”
“And just when it was getting good, too.” Once again the voice came from next to Rikard’s ear. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to leave you, my friend. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and I will think back upon our hours together with much fondness in the centuries to come.”
The blade slid out of his socket then, and Rikard wasn’t sure what was going to happen next, but then he heard a soft movement of air, and he realized that God was bringing the dagger back down swift and hard—and then Rikard found himself falling, falling, falling toward an endless sea of blood.
Chapter Seventeen
Why do you come before me again?
“To speak for the Cainite called Qarakh.”
And why does he not speak for himself?
“He knows nothing of the Grove of Shadows. And even if he did, he would not come here on his own.”
He is too proud?
“He is a prideful man, yes, but he is also a sensible one.
