The Scarlet Hourglass
Title: The Scarlet Hourglass
Word Count: 2010
NOTE: January 3, 2013 - edited to change the ending of the section, removing a few hundred words and making it more canon. Edited version appears below.
After three days of blindness, Noah finally learned to see without his eyes.
The creak of wood and the burst of cold air against his bare ribs was the door in the back corner of the hall opening. The slap of boots against the wooden floor helped him measure the space, the distance between his door and his back, which was where the men in the whispering clothing often stopped. They carried with them the smells of the Stalkers, smells that Noah knew well - the musk of aged leather, the tang of metals and gun oil, the clean crispness of the frosted air. Another came less frequently, applying a thick salve to the trenched wounds the whips had left across his back, and he learned to recognize the gauzy brush of her robe, the smooth and comforting caress of her fingertips, the scent of lavender that hung in a cloud around her.
The only one that spoke to him was the man who took exactly forty-seven paces from the door to his side. His voice was harsh and acidic, his breath a cloud of cigarette smoke. He was not a Stalker, Noah realized - he smelled of cheap whiskey and the lighter, fainter scent of coal dust and copper. Zedekiah was his name - he was a man that Noah had been raised to fear, the dark and grumbling beast that lived in the bowels of the keep, punishing enemies of the Gold King. He had never seen this man of nightmares, but the man's voice and presence eventually told Noah all he needed. Zedekiah had a limp that he favored more on the wet, snowing days than others. His voice echoed in a broad chest, and his stomach rumbled constantly. The few times that he came close enough to check the chains that stretched Noah's arms away from his body, his hands were rough and marked with ridges of scar tissue, his arms taut with coiled ropes of muscle. The man was enormous, his presence an intimidating heat of sweat and blood that hovered over Noah's considerably smaller form.
"Lookin' forward to gettin' ya downstairs, lad," he would growl. "Ain't had a hale an' hearty one for years."
When the heat from the torches faded out and the hall grew so cold he couldn't even shiver, he focused on his own aching body instead. Despite the salve the wounds on his back burned and throbbed, and his knees ached from the floor. His wrists were a mass of raw flesh and frenzied nerves, the skin healing onto the metal shackles. The heavy burlap sack over his head chafed against his neck and shoulders, pulled tight with a drawstring so that he couldn't shake it off. He was deliriously thirsty, his craving made worse by the gusts of wind that carried the scent of snow or the bout of freezing rain he heard pounding on the roof high above him, the sound echoing through the cavernous room. And the hunger, it felt as if it had clawed into his bones like an animal nesting in the cave of his ribs, sending slivers of pain through his entire body that made his head spin and bile rise in his throat.
He slept, but only in spurts - the slightest sound woke him, his body tensing as it prepared for the inevitable strike of a hand against his injured back, the prod of a baton into his bruised ribs, or worse, the sear of a cigar into the tender undersides of his arms. The first time he had howled and jerked away so violently the chains had squealed in protest, letting off the scent of scrubbed rust and the crack of wood as whatever they were braced to began to give way. He'd been pinned against the muscular torso of a Stalker for his efforts, an arm around his throat until both his fight and consciousness slipped from him. He'd not made the mistake - or given them the pleasure - of showing his discomfort again.
The smell of cedar logs in the fireplace on the left side of the hall woke him on the fourth day, his head pounding from dehydration and his body weak and trembling from inactivity. He immediately zeroed in on people around him - a pair of Stalkers pacing behind him, Zedekiah to his right grumbling under his breath. And someone new - the smell of incense and honey, the sound of a pitched hum that vibrated painfully in Noah's teeth.
One of the Stalkers came up behind him and the drawstring came loose from around his neck, and in a flourish the bag was pulled away and his sight was given back to him.
"Oh, Noah," the man on the dais some twenty feet away sighed, his voice like the crisp song of a starling. "You've no idea how it disappoints me to see you here." Blinking against the light, trying to force his eyes to focus, Noah could just pick out the thin figure as he stepped from the platform with a large cylinder balanced in his hands. "Two years ago I believed you had the most promise of all the slaves, and now?" He dropped to one knee in front of Noah and smiled a sick, cold smile. "Look at you."
He was like a man carved from glass, brittle eyes and smooth complexion, in a tunic of pale blue-silver and black cotton slacks that clung to his thin hips. The object he held, which he rested gently on his knee for Noah to see, was an hourglass encased in dark wood, the sand inside dyed a deep red. The reservoir on the top was running low, only a bare handful of sand remaining.
"We haven't much time," he said, and ticked a fingernail against the glass, "so I'll make this quick." Reaching out, he cupped one cold palm against the side of Noah's face. "You are a beautiful thing, child. The King favored you so."
Noah said nothing, just held the man's icy eyes with his own.
"The slaves whisper of you at night, tell tales of you over their meals. Immortality is a thing granted to a paltry few, but it seems you've found it." He chuckled at this - even Zedekiah snorted a laugh. "It's a shame your story will end like this." He peered thoughtfully at the hourglass, and Noah felt a chill begin to seep through him as the sand trickled down. "What have you done with the key, Noah?"
Again, Noah said nothing. The man's face contorted, his fingers digging into Noah's cheek.
"Do not make me repeat myself, child," he warned. His eyes came up again, blazing with anger and a dire threat, and Noah simply smiled.
"Is that what he wants?" he asked, his voice grating against throat. "His precious key?"
"The key is a relic, it is property of the king, it -"
"I gave it to the Watcher."
Zedekiah sucked in a startled gasp, and the man recoiled as if Noah had uttered a filthy curse. Eyes widening, he pulled his hand from Noah's face and shook his head as if denial could erase the truth he'd just heard.
"You..." Anger flooded his face and he slapped Noah, his claw-like fingernails raking deep into the younger man's cheek and sending a spray of blood pattering to the floor. "You wretch!" he bellowed. "You insolent, pathetic - I will have your soul for this!"
A faint smile touched Noah's lips and he lifted his head defiantly, blood streaming down his neck and chest.
"Then take it," he challenged quietly.
They stared at each other for a long moment, Noah smiling his gentle smile and the man shaking with rage.
"You've no idea what I am capable of," the man hissed. "I am a Magistrate of Time, a Keeper of the Hours. I can strip your spirit from your body, I can sentence you to an eternity of sleepless agony, I can -"
"You are an arrogant grandstander," Noah interrupted, and gestured with his chin to the bare skim of sand remaining in the top portion of the hourglass. The pattering of each grain into the base felt like pelting hail in his veins, an ice that swept through his heart and pulsed ribbons of frost through his entire body. "And you're running low on time."
"Zaman, don't be lettin' the boy bait ya," Zedekiah warned. "Ya don't -"
"There is no baiting," the man spat. Zaman - Noah knew this name, as well, another moniker whispered in tales from his childhood, the Sorcerer King of Atrades. To think, he could meet two of his nightmares in the flesh in one day. A small part of him thought it entirely appropriate.
The hourglass thumped onto the floor, hard enough to rattle the glass and send a shockwave of pain along Noah's spine. He grit his teeth, his smile fading to a wince of pain just momentarily, fingers spasming at the chains holding his shackles. Leaning over the glass, Zaman clasped Noah's face in his hands and leered at him.
"The things I have in store for you," he whispered, his voice seeming to suck all other sound from the room. "You were a slave in life, and you'll be one in death, boy, I swear it." Though he couldn't see it, Noah could feel the last of the sand spiraling down the glass - a wave of panic swept over him as his chest tightened, his heart kickstarting a desperate tempo against his ribs as he found himself unable to draw breath, his weakened body straining against forces stronger than nature. "I will undo everything you have fought for," Zaman continued, his lips at Noah's ear, voice piercing through the roar of his blood. "Your so-called legacy will lie in ruins. The slaves will know that their Scarlet King is dead, and you will amount to nothing."
The chill in Noah's bones flared into molten spears that ripped through every nerve, every cell of his being, bursting vessels and rupturing organs. It was a monumental struggle just to open his eyes, his vision already blackening as his optic nerves liquified and his eyes hemorrhaged streams of blood down his face, across Zaman's bone-thin fingers.
Blinking owlishly, he forced a sick smile through the sheen of blood painting his lips.
"We'll see," he choked, and shuddered weakly before he collapsed, lifeless, against the chains that held him.
Silence fell in the hall for several long moments before Zedekiah exhaled loudly and crossed himself several times, stepping back until he was pressed firmly against the wall.
"Lords and Ladies, Zaman," he cursed, shaking his head. "Shouldn'na done that, swear Above, shouldn'na done that. T'was a damning smile, you saw it clear as I did, canna be anythin' good come of -"
"It was nothing of the sort, you buffoon!" Zaman snapped, rising to his feet in a fluid motion and shaking Noah's blood from his hands. "You put far too much stock in fairytales and folklore, it was nothing more than -"
The shattering of glass at his feet made him jump back out of reflex, and elicited cries of shock and dismay from the Stalkers who scrambled away from Noah's body and toward the wall. Zedekiah pressed his bulk even more firmly to the stone, whimpering prayers as fragmented shards of the hourglass exploded into the air, the wooden housing skittering across the floor.
None of them spoke for nearly a minute, their eyes fixed on the pool of red sand sprinkled across the smears of Noah's blood, until finally Zaman drew a shuddering breath and straightened, tugging at the hem of his tunic.
"You shall not speak of this," he ordered, his voice heavy with implied threat. "I will not have the slaves make a martyr of him." He spun on his heels, crossing his arms over his chest to hide the shake in his hands. "Clean up this mess," he ordered. "Burn the body."
Word Count: 2010
NOTE: January 3, 2013 - edited to change the ending of the section, removing a few hundred words and making it more canon. Edited version appears below.
After three days of blindness, Noah finally learned to see without his eyes.
The creak of wood and the burst of cold air against his bare ribs was the door in the back corner of the hall opening. The slap of boots against the wooden floor helped him measure the space, the distance between his door and his back, which was where the men in the whispering clothing often stopped. They carried with them the smells of the Stalkers, smells that Noah knew well - the musk of aged leather, the tang of metals and gun oil, the clean crispness of the frosted air. Another came less frequently, applying a thick salve to the trenched wounds the whips had left across his back, and he learned to recognize the gauzy brush of her robe, the smooth and comforting caress of her fingertips, the scent of lavender that hung in a cloud around her.
The only one that spoke to him was the man who took exactly forty-seven paces from the door to his side. His voice was harsh and acidic, his breath a cloud of cigarette smoke. He was not a Stalker, Noah realized - he smelled of cheap whiskey and the lighter, fainter scent of coal dust and copper. Zedekiah was his name - he was a man that Noah had been raised to fear, the dark and grumbling beast that lived in the bowels of the keep, punishing enemies of the Gold King. He had never seen this man of nightmares, but the man's voice and presence eventually told Noah all he needed. Zedekiah had a limp that he favored more on the wet, snowing days than others. His voice echoed in a broad chest, and his stomach rumbled constantly. The few times that he came close enough to check the chains that stretched Noah's arms away from his body, his hands were rough and marked with ridges of scar tissue, his arms taut with coiled ropes of muscle. The man was enormous, his presence an intimidating heat of sweat and blood that hovered over Noah's considerably smaller form.
"Lookin' forward to gettin' ya downstairs, lad," he would growl. "Ain't had a hale an' hearty one for years."
When the heat from the torches faded out and the hall grew so cold he couldn't even shiver, he focused on his own aching body instead. Despite the salve the wounds on his back burned and throbbed, and his knees ached from the floor. His wrists were a mass of raw flesh and frenzied nerves, the skin healing onto the metal shackles. The heavy burlap sack over his head chafed against his neck and shoulders, pulled tight with a drawstring so that he couldn't shake it off. He was deliriously thirsty, his craving made worse by the gusts of wind that carried the scent of snow or the bout of freezing rain he heard pounding on the roof high above him, the sound echoing through the cavernous room. And the hunger, it felt as if it had clawed into his bones like an animal nesting in the cave of his ribs, sending slivers of pain through his entire body that made his head spin and bile rise in his throat.
He slept, but only in spurts - the slightest sound woke him, his body tensing as it prepared for the inevitable strike of a hand against his injured back, the prod of a baton into his bruised ribs, or worse, the sear of a cigar into the tender undersides of his arms. The first time he had howled and jerked away so violently the chains had squealed in protest, letting off the scent of scrubbed rust and the crack of wood as whatever they were braced to began to give way. He'd been pinned against the muscular torso of a Stalker for his efforts, an arm around his throat until both his fight and consciousness slipped from him. He'd not made the mistake - or given them the pleasure - of showing his discomfort again.
The smell of cedar logs in the fireplace on the left side of the hall woke him on the fourth day, his head pounding from dehydration and his body weak and trembling from inactivity. He immediately zeroed in on people around him - a pair of Stalkers pacing behind him, Zedekiah to his right grumbling under his breath. And someone new - the smell of incense and honey, the sound of a pitched hum that vibrated painfully in Noah's teeth.
One of the Stalkers came up behind him and the drawstring came loose from around his neck, and in a flourish the bag was pulled away and his sight was given back to him.
"Oh, Noah," the man on the dais some twenty feet away sighed, his voice like the crisp song of a starling. "You've no idea how it disappoints me to see you here." Blinking against the light, trying to force his eyes to focus, Noah could just pick out the thin figure as he stepped from the platform with a large cylinder balanced in his hands. "Two years ago I believed you had the most promise of all the slaves, and now?" He dropped to one knee in front of Noah and smiled a sick, cold smile. "Look at you."
He was like a man carved from glass, brittle eyes and smooth complexion, in a tunic of pale blue-silver and black cotton slacks that clung to his thin hips. The object he held, which he rested gently on his knee for Noah to see, was an hourglass encased in dark wood, the sand inside dyed a deep red. The reservoir on the top was running low, only a bare handful of sand remaining.
"We haven't much time," he said, and ticked a fingernail against the glass, "so I'll make this quick." Reaching out, he cupped one cold palm against the side of Noah's face. "You are a beautiful thing, child. The King favored you so."
Noah said nothing, just held the man's icy eyes with his own.
"The slaves whisper of you at night, tell tales of you over their meals. Immortality is a thing granted to a paltry few, but it seems you've found it." He chuckled at this - even Zedekiah snorted a laugh. "It's a shame your story will end like this." He peered thoughtfully at the hourglass, and Noah felt a chill begin to seep through him as the sand trickled down. "What have you done with the key, Noah?"
Again, Noah said nothing. The man's face contorted, his fingers digging into Noah's cheek.
"Do not make me repeat myself, child," he warned. His eyes came up again, blazing with anger and a dire threat, and Noah simply smiled.
"Is that what he wants?" he asked, his voice grating against throat. "His precious key?"
"The key is a relic, it is property of the king, it -"
"I gave it to the Watcher."
Zedekiah sucked in a startled gasp, and the man recoiled as if Noah had uttered a filthy curse. Eyes widening, he pulled his hand from Noah's face and shook his head as if denial could erase the truth he'd just heard.
"You..." Anger flooded his face and he slapped Noah, his claw-like fingernails raking deep into the younger man's cheek and sending a spray of blood pattering to the floor. "You wretch!" he bellowed. "You insolent, pathetic - I will have your soul for this!"
A faint smile touched Noah's lips and he lifted his head defiantly, blood streaming down his neck and chest.
"Then take it," he challenged quietly.
They stared at each other for a long moment, Noah smiling his gentle smile and the man shaking with rage.
"You've no idea what I am capable of," the man hissed. "I am a Magistrate of Time, a Keeper of the Hours. I can strip your spirit from your body, I can sentence you to an eternity of sleepless agony, I can -"
"You are an arrogant grandstander," Noah interrupted, and gestured with his chin to the bare skim of sand remaining in the top portion of the hourglass. The pattering of each grain into the base felt like pelting hail in his veins, an ice that swept through his heart and pulsed ribbons of frost through his entire body. "And you're running low on time."
"Zaman, don't be lettin' the boy bait ya," Zedekiah warned. "Ya don't -"
"There is no baiting," the man spat. Zaman - Noah knew this name, as well, another moniker whispered in tales from his childhood, the Sorcerer King of Atrades. To think, he could meet two of his nightmares in the flesh in one day. A small part of him thought it entirely appropriate.
The hourglass thumped onto the floor, hard enough to rattle the glass and send a shockwave of pain along Noah's spine. He grit his teeth, his smile fading to a wince of pain just momentarily, fingers spasming at the chains holding his shackles. Leaning over the glass, Zaman clasped Noah's face in his hands and leered at him.
"The things I have in store for you," he whispered, his voice seeming to suck all other sound from the room. "You were a slave in life, and you'll be one in death, boy, I swear it." Though he couldn't see it, Noah could feel the last of the sand spiraling down the glass - a wave of panic swept over him as his chest tightened, his heart kickstarting a desperate tempo against his ribs as he found himself unable to draw breath, his weakened body straining against forces stronger than nature. "I will undo everything you have fought for," Zaman continued, his lips at Noah's ear, voice piercing through the roar of his blood. "Your so-called legacy will lie in ruins. The slaves will know that their Scarlet King is dead, and you will amount to nothing."
The chill in Noah's bones flared into molten spears that ripped through every nerve, every cell of his being, bursting vessels and rupturing organs. It was a monumental struggle just to open his eyes, his vision already blackening as his optic nerves liquified and his eyes hemorrhaged streams of blood down his face, across Zaman's bone-thin fingers.
Blinking owlishly, he forced a sick smile through the sheen of blood painting his lips.
"We'll see," he choked, and shuddered weakly before he collapsed, lifeless, against the chains that held him.
Silence fell in the hall for several long moments before Zedekiah exhaled loudly and crossed himself several times, stepping back until he was pressed firmly against the wall.
"Lords and Ladies, Zaman," he cursed, shaking his head. "Shouldn'na done that, swear Above, shouldn'na done that. T'was a damning smile, you saw it clear as I did, canna be anythin' good come of -"
"It was nothing of the sort, you buffoon!" Zaman snapped, rising to his feet in a fluid motion and shaking Noah's blood from his hands. "You put far too much stock in fairytales and folklore, it was nothing more than -"
The shattering of glass at his feet made him jump back out of reflex, and elicited cries of shock and dismay from the Stalkers who scrambled away from Noah's body and toward the wall. Zedekiah pressed his bulk even more firmly to the stone, whimpering prayers as fragmented shards of the hourglass exploded into the air, the wooden housing skittering across the floor.
None of them spoke for nearly a minute, their eyes fixed on the pool of red sand sprinkled across the smears of Noah's blood, until finally Zaman drew a shuddering breath and straightened, tugging at the hem of his tunic.
"You shall not speak of this," he ordered, his voice heavy with implied threat. "I will not have the slaves make a martyr of him." He spun on his heels, crossing his arms over his chest to hide the shake in his hands. "Clean up this mess," he ordered. "Burn the body."