Beginning of a Journey

Beginning of a Journey

                Soff wandered along the overgrown path, whistling softly. It was a lovely day - her preferred kind of lovely day, slightly overcast with the occasional soft drizzle falling. It was quiet and cool, and she felt at peace.

                Standing one hundred and sixty-five centimetres tall, Soff was of average height. Though complimented as pretty, she was plain (and she knew it). Her build was also unremarkable - feminine, of course, and pleasantly fit, but nothing special. She wore a hip length hooded cape over her dress, to protect it from the rain. A pouch slung over her shoulder contained a meal and drink for her lunch.

                It was her day off, and she'd chosen to take a walk along the south-eastern path, and from there along the forest paths. Many were remnants of an earlier era, long overgrown and fallen to disrepair.

                Local legend had it they were paths made for enjoyment alone in the long ago days of the Undead Empire. After it fell, more than three centuries ago, the paths had been abandoned. Men had no need of them, and most rarely had time to spend on pleasure.

                So Soff wandered the old paths alone, enjoying the sights of a forest still renowned for its beauty. A quiet, peaceful walk; and safe. The undead had been quite thorough in their elimination of monsters (apart from their foul selves), and with the undead gone there were few threats in Terryd.

                Her walk led her to a forbidden place, deep in the forest. A blighted place, where the trees, the grass, even the air itself was dead. An ancient graveyard for the forever dead - and when during the war, used to pile the countless corpses of the fallen. Quite a horrible place, all considered.

                But Soff was not worried. The undead were, well, dead. There was nothing to fear in the place, despite its grim nature. In she walked, over the buried pits and through the long abandoned gates. The crypts and graves were each beautiful beyond words. They housed commoners, mostly, and minor nobles; yet so few were the undeads' losses that even those were laid to rest as if great lords.

                A smile lit up Soff's face as she read one of the inscriptions - despite their horrible nature, the undead had been capable of making jokes.

                "Though they came back from the dead,

                They could not help but lose their head!"

                Despite the deathly air, it was a beautiful place. The piles of bones, though macabre, actually added to the atmosphere. A strange place to walk, but still a pleasant one. Then something grabbed her by the ankle.

                Soff tripped and fell, hoping that it was just a branch, a bone, something she'd missed while gawking. But her eyes saw the truth - a grasping hand, clenched tightly around her ankle. Behind it, a corpse - not bones, like those piled all around, no. An ancient undead with flesh and life and glowing gray-green eyes, the reflection of a filthy river.

                Soff screamed, but she knew she was doomed. There was no-one nearby, and her leg already grew cold. The creature was draining life from her rapidly; and soon (but a few long screams later) all went grey. Then she was gone.

                Soff came back, and she knew what that meant immediately. She was undead. Of what kind she had no idea. But she was one of them.

                She opened her eyes, and quickly focused on the creature - man - in front of her.

                "Welcome back," he said. His voice was ragged, as if he spoke with a damaged throat. He looked healthier than he had seemed when he grabbed her ankle; almost well enough to pass for alive. His eyes were still gray-green, but they no longer glowed. The armour he wore was much worse off. Battle damaged, then aged, it was little more than a rag.

                Soff sat up, slowly, and took in her surroundings. The man had dragged her into an alcove (the dust on her clothes attested to that), and he now leant against a grave in front of her. She brushed herself off out of habit and said, "Why did you kill me?"

                The undead smiled. "Prepare yourself for a long-winded explanation. Firstly, my - our - kind is one that drains life from the living. Any living; the death surrounding this place is my doing, through my aura. My touch is far more deadly, of course, but time has allowed me to make this a place of death alone.

                "I needed enough life to repair myself, and I had the opportunity to strike at you with little risk, so I did. As you can perhaps tell, your life was not enough to heal me fully. This is why I took it all. That is why I took enough that you died from it, rather than from lacking enough life to live. And, in turn, that is why you are back. Normally I would not have turned you, but necessity insists. As for why you are still alive: I have enough power to stop you should you try something foolish," he said.

                "I-" stammered Soff. Her emotions were spiralling out of control, into despair. She was undead. Her life was over. She couldn't stay. She realised that she was still feeling, which was good, but - "I'm - what did you turn me in to?"

                "There's no name for what I am, quite deliberately. There were never many; we bear no special use and as I believe you've realised we experience no change in our selves. We are stronger, scarce feel pain, need not eat or sleep, and feed from the life around us. No strange weaknesses, unlike some. The eyes mark us (though they only glow when we use our power), and our skin is closer to a strange corpselike shade than any living human. That is all of import."

                Soff stared at her hand. He hadn't lied; her skin was... Dead. She'd be outed as a monster as soon as anyone caught sight of her. "So what are you going to do, now that you've killed me?" asked Soff.

                "Flee somewhere beyond the reach of humans. If a young woman can freely wander, this land cannot be safe for the likes of me. I was never one for power, though I fought as we fell. I am making many assumptions about what has happened since, of course, but I know that these lands, this world, will have a place I can hide. It has only been three hundred years, after all."

                Soff barely listened as he spoke. She was too busy with her own thoughts; staring at her hand. Tears - she could still cry - formed in her eyes. She placed her hands over her face and sobbed. She shifted herself jerkily, leaning back against the statue of some great undead, and began to cry in earnest.

                The undead watched her silently. He hadn't cried for hundreds of years - since before he had been released into this world. He had seen, and done, far worse than kill one person out of necessity. Yet he felt for her. All the tragedies were sad; and he (like few others) had always minimised his part in them. The fact that humans would be no better should the situation be reversed was what had born him through. His thoughts: we are all human, really. All terrible.

                I cannot leave while I owe her answers, he thought. So I will wait out her tears.

                Soff cried for eleven and a bit minutes, then wiped her eyes and glared. "I'll tell you nothing of the history you missed," she said, spitefully.

                "Very well," replied the undead. "Do you have further questions for me?"

                "What are you going to do with me?"

                "Nothing. I have no reason to harm you further. I sorely doubt you will find welcome in these lands anymore, however, so you may accompany me if you wish."

                Soff ground her teeth in anger. "This is how you seek to bind me to you? Offer me a way to continue this 'existence'?" Disgust coloured her last word.

                "It can be seen that way, true. But I offer more than continued life: I have much to teach, and I suspect quite far to walk. In exchange for your company I shall tell you of the world that was, the intricacies of our kind, and if you are able to learn it I shall teach you the sorcery I wield."

                Soff wanted to spit in his face - kill me and expect company? - but the offer was all she had. The alternative was a second death, likely after torture. 'You can't trust the dead', they said. Perhaps their ki- the monsters they were could barely feel pain, but there were ways. "I don't have a choice, you bastard."

                "There's always a choice, though sometimes it's a shit one. I'm sure you have family you could hide with, and you might know other routes to escape that I cannot know of. Perhaps you could ask your family to end your life painlessly? Do you fear death so much as life like this?" He paused. "Flippancy aside, I would enjoy some company on the road."

                "Those aren't choices. And you know my answer." The undead stared at her, blinking every fourth second, exactly. It made Soff realise that she hadn't blinked her eyes in minutes. She closed them, and said, "I will come with you."

                "Very good. I wish to begin my journey immediately; but you should say goodbye to your family. I doubt it will be forever, unless you kill them. I will meet you on the great eastern road, which I am sure has been co-opted to suit your human needs."

                Father... Soff thought. She had to say goodbye, yet thoughts of it filled her with dread. "How would I catch up with you? And aren't you worried about me betraying you, or being captured?"

                The undead stood straight, then grabbed a pole of long-dead wood that lay beside him. Using it, he took a hobbling step forwards. One of his legs was very, very badly broken. "As you can see, I am not quite healthy. You will catch up with me without trouble. Depending on how close your home is, you may well find me before I reach the road. Secondly, I do not fear those who will sally forth to attack me - unless my luck is cursed, they will not have the power to slay me, and I will drain them. With their life, I will be healed, and able to flee this land at a far faster rate - more so, if they ride to catch me. I should think fast enough to avoid any other hunters." He smiled.

                "Fine. Start your flight. If I'm lucky I'll meet you on the road."

                The creature smiled. Anger was better than sorry, at least in company. Certainly far more amusing. He hobbled a couple of steps, starting his way out the alcove, then paused. "One last thing; what is your name?"

                Soff spent a moment considering her response. "Soff," she said. "And yours?"

                "Taoten. I'll see you later, Soff." Taoten made his way out of the alcove, leaving Soff sitting there. She didn't move until he was out of sight.

                Soff clenched a fist in anger, then stood up. After a few deep breaths, tears welled in her eyes again. Time to go say goodbye, she thought. Then she began her walk home, for the last time.