SHORT STORY: His Siren - Part 3
Thank you for all the kind comments and messages after the last post. <3 Now, back to your (not) regularly-scheduled content! As promised, here is part 3 of ‘His Siren’, the story of how Immeral and Sienna met and went to rob a grave.
If you want to read the first two parts, you can do so here: Part 1 Part 2
His Siren
Part 3
The next night came, the moon rising higher and higher in the sky as Immeral waited for the fairy–Sienna–with increasing irritation. She was late again.
She'd explained little more about the job after they'd left the bar—instead issuing vague instructions for them to meet in the small graveyard a few hours south of Heartfair.
This place is falling apart, he noted with disdain. All around him were crumbling gravestones—their names faded away, forgotten. The ground was overgrown with cacti and dark green shrubs which seemed to sway toward Immeral whenever he got too close. The small hut, where he assumed a groundskeeper must've once lived, was decrepit and collapsing in on itself.
Looming over the entire cemetery was a giant cinder tree; its blood-red bark and jagged leaves streaked an inky black. The trunk had burst through—and was growing out of—an intricately carved sandstone crypt. Rubble was piled from where the tree seemed to have cracked the roof open.
He had a feeling this was the place Sienna wanted to rob.
Immeral caught sight of the stone entrance, hidden by another green bush, and carefully picked his way over to it. He felt the shrub prick at him as he pushed it aside and glanced at his arm to see black blood dotting the skin. He looked at the door decorated with reliefs and fading paint and let out a sigh. Some of these carvings are for Aiovan nobility.
He reached out, lightly traced his fingers over the symbol for new beginnings, and then froze. The unmistakable presence of death magic was overwhelming—a caeles of Death had been there recently.
That knowledge gave him pause, and his fingers ceased tracing the carving. I'd rather not fight one of Nillioth's people. But if one of them finds me, that's a fight I'd win. He refused to acknowledge the brash cockiness of that statement.
He reached his other hand out, gave the stone door a hearty shove, and chuckled when it didn't move. "Of course," he muttered.
He ran his fingers along the stone again, feeling the grooves and bumps that must've once been a beautiful relief. Instead, it was now just a slab of forgotten rock, broken pieces scattered amongst neglected graves. It'd be depressing if he held any love for mortals and their short, meaningless lives. It's not like my life is much better—or meaningful.
"I didn't think you'd actually show up," he heard Sienna's voice call out to him from across the graveyard.
He pulled his hands away from the stone and glowered at her. "You are late."
She gave a noncommittal shrug but offered nothing else. "I see you found the crypt." She flew to a stop beside him, avoiding the blood-thirsty bush, and continued to speak, "This crypt holds a necklace that my client would like retrieved. We need to get in, grab it, and get out."
"Sounds simple enough. Why do you need me?" Suspicion again crept into Immeral's mind.
Sienna flashed him a mischievous grin over her shoulder but didn't answer his question as she moved in front of him to stand directly in front of the door.
One of her delicate hands reached out, clutching a black rock swirling with ocean-blue magic. Magic surged forward from her hand and filled the crevices and carvings Immeral had traced moments prior. The light flooded the graveyard, accentuating the shadows and clashing with Sienna's purple wings.
The skin-crawling scream of stone scraping against stone met his ears, and the slab slid to the side to reveal stone stairs descending steeply into a pitch-black void.
The smell of decay from inside hit Immeral like a physical blow. In front of him, he heard Sienna coughing.
"Let's go," she said—a watery, warbling note to her voice. She didn't wait for Immeral to respond before she began to float down the steps, the stone's light guiding her way.
Immeral followed her into the crypt even as his unease grew. There's nothing a mortal could do that would hurt me. Just the suggestion is laughable. Somehow, that thought didn't lessen his nerves.
Sienna didn't appear to share the same apprehension as she continued unflinching down the stairs.
"Most mortals would be concerned with the state of their soul after robbing a crypt favoured by Death," Immeral pointed out.
Sienna just chuckled, throwing him an indecipherable look over her shoulder. "You scared? Feel free to turn around."
He gritted his teeth to bite back a scathing retort but followed her deeper into the crypt. They finally reached the bottom of the stairs, the floor turning from stone to sandy dirt. The air was worse, somehow even more stale and stinging with decay—a feat Immeral hadn't thought possible.
The damp, claustrophobic walls of the stairs quickly gave way to a massive cavern where the magical light Sienna carried barely reached the sides. Across the room from where they'd entered was what Immeral assumed to be the cinder tree's base.
Sienna held up the stone further away from her body, and with a muttered spell, the ocean-blue light became brighter, flooding through the cavern.
The cinder tree's gnarled, twisting roots—the shade of fresh blood—sprawled and snaked through the dirt floor, walls, and ceiling as though they were already cocooned, entombed, within the crypt. Tendrils of wood, veined black, dripped spots of liquid Immeral couldn't identify.
He peered closer at the origin point of the tree's trunk and caught sight of an altar just in front that was made entirely of roots as well. Death magic filled with killing intent radiated from it. He opened his mouth to warn Sienna when she moved forward, shifting their light source and illuminating something that made her gasp in horror. A second later, he saw it too and swore, stepping up beside her.
Bones.
Bones—likely of the person entombed here—were tangled up in the roots above the altar. It was as if, while the body decomposed, the tree had grown and torn the skeleton apart. Mouldering bones hung down at the front of the cavern. Immeral caught sight of the skull, high above the rest, twisted up, with a faintly pulsating red glow coming from one of the eye sockets. If I didn't know better, I'd think it was staring at me. The thought sent a shiver down his spine.
"I'd always known…" Sienna muttered. He turned to see her staring at the skeleton, a combination of horror and fascination having overtaken her delicate features.
"Known what?" Immeral asked.
She jolted at the sound of his voice. There was a second of hesitation before she answered, "What the Aiovans do with their dead nobles. I knew they planted the sacred Cinder tree in the body and then entombed it, but seeing the result after all these years is another thing."
She shook her head as if to clear it. "It doesn't matter, we need to grab the necklace and get out."
"If that is all, I still do not understand what you need me for." Even as Immeral said the words, apprehension rose within his gut. Something was wrong. A caeles of Death had been here recently; something at the altar was possibly cursed, and he swore the skull's eyelight was following him.
Sienna moved forward and Immeral kept pace with her. He looked down at the altar and the assortment of items neatly laid out amongst the roots. Pots that must've once held oils—long since dried up, bundles of half-burned incense, a glowing silver sword whose handle was encrusted with deep green gems. It was a statement of the wealth this man must have possessed during his lifetime.
At the very center was a shining gold necklace—a thick ruby mounted in its center. Immeral vaguely recognized it as an actarile—a sacred symbol of marriage and commitment in Aiova. From what he understood, they were generally passed down from mother to first-born son to be given to the individual said son planned to marry. They were seldom buried with their wearer or the gifter.
It was also the item radiating magic.
Sienna paused momentarily before tugging a cloth from her pocket and using it to pick up the necklace—never once touching it with her bare hands. She wrapped it in the same fabric and stowed it away in a canvas pouch at her side.
"Done!" she announced, sending him a slight smile.
They'd barely taken a step to leave when an eerie groan sounded—originating from what Immeral had assumed was just a pile of rubble. The pitch was low, crooning, and made the black blood within his veins run cold.
"That," Sienna said, gesturing with a faintly trembling hand at the pile, "Is what you're here for."
"And just what is that?" Whatever it was, it didn't come from this plane—Immeral was sure of that.
Sienna didn't respond, instead moving so she was behind him. Fighting I can do, he thought and pulled the large, spiked club from his belt.
It felt natural in his hand, perfectly balanced for swinging one-handed. He summoned his own sea-green magic in his other palm and braced himself for whatever was coming.
He barely had time to form the light into a small bolt before a twisted mass of limbs came screaming at him from the pile. It moved faster than he'd expected, flailing limbs hitting the ground in a tangle that catapulted it across the floor in a rush of rotting flesh.
Immeral swung the club out—connecting with a sickening crunch right before the creature slammed into him—and knocked it sideways.
He let the magic bolt fly immediately after and felt a fleeting thrill of satisfaction as the beast released a horrific screech that twisted and distorted the air around him until his lungs burned with every breath.
Misshapen claws—wicked sharp and dripping red—tipped the end of every limb. They dug for purchase in the damp dirt, and then the creature launched itself at Immeral again.
He swung, the heavy impact jarring his arm, but the amalgamation of limbs collapsed at his side. The air was still burning and he watched in horror as the mass began to split apart.
Skeletal arms and legs, tipped with talons, scrabbled at the ground to pull themselves away. As they succeeded, they took other body parts with them—rotting heads, flayed torsos, and all different manner of organs and limbs Immeral couldn't identify. Then, they began to expand, somehow growing new limbs right before his eyes.
He heard Sienna let out a noise that she bit back quickly. He chanced a look at her and saw her holding her spiked club in one hand, the other sparking magic. Their eyes met momentarily before Immeral glanced back at the creatures. He'd seen panic in her eyes that he was sure mirrored his own. He'd never seen anything like this—even the uibixa that prowled Saebetia for lost souls didn't look or move like this.
I can't fight them properly with her nearby, he conceded to himself and then yelled at Sienna, "Get out of here!"
For a fleeting moment, she was silent, and Immeral took another burning breath. Then she was flying away, her purple wings carrying her up and over the creatures. They struck out at her, horrible screeching reverberating in the cavern, but the fairy dodged out of the way and made it through the door unscathed—taking the glowing blue stone with her.
Immeral refocused on the monsters in the near-darkness and felt his shoulders droop a fraction. Now that he wasn't worried about hitting the mortal, he could finish this.
His magic began to spread over his body, warming him from within and lighting the room with a sickly green glow. I haven't truly let loose in a while.
The prospect thrilled him.
