Talarius grimly watched the scene. Dimly making out the barely visible gyrations performed by the agonized figures, hidden by the flames and smoke of their own living funeral pyres, moaning and pleading for release upon their stakes. Talarius blinked as a particularly pungent curl of black smoke licked at his eyes. He wanted to close his eyes. Wanted to shut out the grisly scene from hell. He forced himself to watch. Watch his own work.
The sight of each blazing bier, containing some former villager, some man, woman or child, bringing back painful memories. Memories he’d rather forget. Memories he would never forget. He hated this. Tiernon knew he hated this. Situations like this were what made him question his vocation. Situations like this, that in the end, always reaffirmed it.
If only this was the plague he was dealing with. The plague might be more frightening in the minds of many, but at least the plague killed its victims. Bubonic plague cast a long dark shadow over many lands, bringing death to thousands. Death, clean and simple. Death with the chance of reward or punishment. Death, something final. Not this. Not the unending hunger that these poor souls were damned to. Not the lifelong agony and unholy thirst that would drive men and women to perform actions otherwise unthinkable, in order to survive.
For that’s what it eventually came down to. Survival. Survival at any cost. Survival and temporary surcease of the agony. Any cost, even that of cannibalism, even that of one’s immortal soul. Talarius allowed himself to close his eyes for a moment, remembering. Melissance... he forced his eyes open, forced the memories back.
No cost was worth that. Better to die. Die, burnt at the stake than to be forced to eat the living flesh of others in order to survive. Better to die than to risk passing on the disease. Die early, before the weight of sin dragged what little was left of one’s soul down to the depths of the Abyss for all eternity. Hopefully, by dying now, even unshriven, these poor souls might, just barely, escape damnation in the sight of their respective gods. Talarius prayed to Tiernon it might be so. Prayed as he had every night for twelve incredibly long years.
Many of the figures had ceased their moaning. Succumbing at last to the cleansing flame. Succumbing to the flame even as they’d succumbed to the foul creatures that had done this to them. Talarius gritted his teeth. If only, if only Sir Etrian hadn’t failed. Failed in his test of faith. If only he hadn’t succumbed to the lure of damnable immortality. If only he hadn’t given in. If he hadn’t failed in this test, then the foul bloodsucking creature of the night would have been stopped sooner. Perhaps stopped before any more victims had fallen to their half-finished attacks.
Half-finished, if the vampire didn’t completely kill its victim, or lead it into damnation, this was what was left. Victims half dead, knowing their state, hating every moment of it. Hating the all-consuming agony in their bodies that drove them to seek the living flesh of others to try and ease their own half-dead state. Trying to bring a little more life into their drained bodies. It never worked. Not for long. Oh, they could appease the hunger for short whiles, have a few moments of respite, but the hunger would return, they would be forced to prowl again.
To rend, to tear the very living flesh of friends, family, strangers, any living being they could find. All to digest a little bit of that person’s vitality to prop up their own beleaguered state. Not just blood, like a vampire. Their systems weren’t refined enough for that. No, ghouls needed the flesh and needed it in greater quantities. Talarius had seen that early on in his life. No, he would not dwell in the past. She was gone. Gone as these poor wretches.
Talarius was sure it was the acrid smoke causing his eyes to water. He couldn’t let himself pity these few remaining writhing individuals. Their fate was unkind, but so much better than if they’d been allowed to continue in their hellish state. Etrian, Talarius cursed the man. He knew it was wrong of him to pass judgment on other people. Etrian however, had given up that claim. Given it up when he’d renounced all he stood for as a Knight of Tiernon when he’d sold his soul to that blood sucking fiend.
Talarius cursed Etrian now as he’d been unable to when he drove the stake through the former knight’s heart. Then he’d only been doing his job. No curses, no remorse at the loss of a friend. Only a job. Only knowing that his fellow knight would never experience Tiernon’s reward, but would at least be spared too great a weight of sin in whatever afterlife there might be for the truly damned. With vampires, there probably wasn’t even damnation. From the effects of their passing, Talarius had to suspect that they simply ceased. Whatever life force they had simply dispersing into nature.
