Nephew's eyes opened and he immediately sprung to his feet and looked towards the voice. The Priest was slower but got up as an armoured figure came crashing towards them. The figure tackled Brandon to the ground again while drawing a sword they turn around and gave a wild swing in a one hundred eighty degree arc. Nephew lay wounded the breath forced out of his body by the figure’s impact it’s shoulder crushed his sternum as they had hit the ground.

Gasping in the air by the time he felt able, he noticed the Priest was dead. So too was the Robber. He had chains around his wrists. Both lay still blood pouring out of fresh wounds. The armoured figure had cut the Beast across the belly and its roar of pain stunned the figure and Brandon. The Beast took the time to flee.

“Are you alright, Nephew?” asked the armoured figure.

“I’m alive, Aunt.” He grunts looking up at the armoured figure.

“How do you feel?”

“I feel nothing.”

“Not possible, Nephew.”

“I’m not an all-knowing, powerful warrior-scholar, what is it I feel then?”

“Fear and anger dwell in you. Until you face them, listen to them they will dominate you.”

He tried to close off his feelings about the recent deaths and bid his suffering. She pressed him to open up and the trauma of the event for him.

“Will you help me?”

“Yes, if it is what you want, then you have my support.”

“It will kill us,” he replied his voice breaking but sure.

“To death, our lives have already happened. Not now but then, it makes no difference to death. It is just me, you and others who perceive us as alive. Let us spend these few moments we have well.”

“Say that to …”

“You don’t speak to death, there is no time to.”

“So, you just die then, that’s it.”

“No, you face it, like the wise face pain or the … with love. As you are now and everything that you were and now will not be. Giving attention and being indifferent.”

“Your ramblings make no sense.”

“Wisdom often does, it is not normal after all.”

“How do you be indifferent, I’m scared?”

“You do it first, by caring for what you can control, like yourself. Though the first act is often to care for others, those you love. Dwelling in their presence. Then you learn to care for yourself as they care for you. Then it is easier but never easy to let go of worries.”

“Easy to say.”

“Perhaps so, but they die with courage. Uncertain of what will be, often alone and ingloriously. Heroism like death doesn’t have a face. To face the pain of dying and the uncertain, certainty of death. That is brave. If you can benefit another then you are a hero in my eyes …”

“Life is hard I know” she adds.

“It is just all dark.”

“Fear is the only darkness.”

“It is painful to live, and others suffer so much. What is the point of it all?”

“If you thought that is all life was, we would not be speaking.” She replies.

Their foreheads touch as her hands clasped either side of his face.

“You will die, no one can change that fate. I promise you, it will not be today. Many will go before you. You are scared and curious, I know. There is no rush, there is much life left for you. Do not discard your life because of knowledge about pain. I will protect you, Brandon. It is going to be okay.”

Rags nods.

“Let’s go on.” He said.

“After the creature?”

“Into darkness and if I am right… fire.”

They walk in the darkness. There are many twists and turns but Nephew walked without hesitation. He let himself be pulled and in turn pushed into the pain and followed his whims.

“How do you know the way?” she asks.

“Everyone knows the way to death. It is more difficult to keep someone ignorant than to not hear its call.”

“Death is not alive. It can hardly make calls.”

“You know what I mean, you have to listen.”

“Death does not exist. Matter merely reforms; the extension of all remaining. The difference is sensual. Death becoming is a perception.”

“It is no less real than to I or you. Nor does it deny the call I hear to struggle and live or the stench of corpses.”

“No, I suppose not. Perhaps, spend time listening to music than death. Life is so short to spend all your attention on the future.”

“Listening is like dice, to progress you have to try and take the risk. But fortune determines the outcome. You get sixes great, ones terrible and life continues beyond your control. And what do you learn? You only see some of the dice and part is always concealed. To listen is to know and to fail to know. To listen to nature is to listen to everything, and people are rarely wise and kind enough that you roll sixes often In my case, I roll hear death.”

“Listening is to do nothing, it is the erasure of I and you. There are no boundaries of touch that reach skin deep, no history of touches. Where sight befuddles with complexity and detail to hear is to locate the presence of trace their relations from the ear to the stars. Where touch speaks to relations of force, to listen is to unbind from the will of authority and hear those who cannot speak. Where smell speaks to pride and shame listening does beyond. To listen to notes the movement of passions and the indifference of matter to the speaker of wishes.”

“Death is indifferent to my wishes. On that, we agree.”

“Stop.” He declares.

“A fire?”

Ahead is a glimpse of light, and the grunting sounds of a beast.

“We can turn back.” She whispers.

“Logic dictates action. If we do nothing the immortals die. We die anyway but they live older than mountains. How can we justify the cost of our paltry lives in comparison to them?”

“Life requires no justification. It is not the prisoner of reason and knowledge. It formed before the speech and writings and it will have reformed in easily in the song of nature long after language has ended.” She insists.

“They are my teachers, I owe them and I am eternally grateful for their support. How can I live with the shame of running in their darkest hour?”

“You learn with time and humility. A head bowed like the dust.”

“No.”

“So be it.”

They stepped into the dome carved room. A single brazier stood in the centre surrounded by piles of treasure made up of art, gold, transparent orbs as well as jewels and other materials. A flame was lit at the brazier without a visible source. Crackling and showing the massive creature of tooth and claw.

“You are too late.” The voice emanated from the creature.

“What do you mean?” asked the Aunt.

“The Faerie tried their spell. They will be toasting to their success.”

“Don’t do this.” Pleads Nephew with teardrops pouring.

“In their hubris, they have grown complacent. They once had the envy and ambition to become like the Gods. They succeed in their imitation. Now their feeble efforts have gifted me their undoing.”

“Please.”

“What is going on?” asks Aunt confused.

“The boy knows.”

“No!” screamed Nephew as the Beast swallowed the flame.

In a bite, the immortals died. The passing witnessed by none; their salvation in the hands of a boy had failed.

“Now for my next feast.”

“Not today.” Shouts back Nephew.

The Beast bounded over and the Aunt stepped in front of the boy and the creature blew an icy breath.

Her body grew pale and her limbs stiff, the cold gnawed and she bent both knees and placed them on the ground her shins parallel in a mediative pose her hands claps palms facing upwards at her belly.

“Death and light are illusions of sight. Before knowledge and courage, there is life and darkness. The dark is ever-present weight binding all beings and life reforms with the very act of destruction. There is but the Weight and the Song. And the Song shall not go Unsung!” she spoke her voice cracking and fading until silence, ending with a booming call.

The Beast consumed the fading ash of the proud guardian.

The boy scooped up an orb as the Beast feasted.

The boy turned around and there it was; the Beast raised a claw and slashed.

The beast spoke “You bear my mark. I will come for you soon. When I am ready.”

“No, no!”

“But today. Flee!” roared the beast and it lunged at him.

With the strike of the claw, the orb was cut, a chunk flying off. He scrambled out of the way and to the exit and the orb lit up with the luminance of a star.

He ran with the glowing light of the orb shining the cavern walls of black rock and dripping water. He kept running till his breath stopped but he felt the breath of the beast and bolted. He sprinted till his legs felt weak but he felt the claw of the killer; he ducked and crawled away. He snuck till he felt the tongue of the terror; he wailed and blinded it with the light and fled to dawn.

The brilliance of the rising sun dimmed the orb and the transparent crystal shattered.

“How?” He croaked and the gentle spring breeze answered with a brush against his cheek.

“Alone.” He whispered and was answered with the songs of the birds.

“In the face of death and deceit, and of the suffering on the earth, how do I enjoy the life I am compelled to live?” Said the last living body to emerge from the darkness and he was answered with silence.