Eternal Nevermore

A Story by Scott

It’s not at all as they described it would be. It wasn’t the world envisioned by so many diluted writers in those books and scrolls. The air was alive and gently rolling over the land, providing a soothing breeze. It wasn’t still and dead as they said it would be. The sun shined as brightly as it had every morning. There were no dark, ominous clouds hung overhead, blotting out the light to make life for the unfortunate even more heavy, like it had been written so many times before. There was, however, a dreary mist that crawled low, just barely above the ground, but it was like that every morning so I assume they got that wrong as well.

They had even described the conditions of the night before incorrectly. No storm signaling the events that were to unfold or warn us of inevitable terror hung overhead. No rain fell from the heavens to pelt us with cold and wetness as we stood shoulder to shoulder. There were no flashes of lighting that allowed us glimpses of our fate as it slowly marched towards us. There were no roars of thunder that struck fear into our hearts as the door to endless night was opened in front of us. I suppose, if you romanticized over such things like those writers, then you would say that rain is a suitable replacement for a seemingly never ending bombardment of arrows, striking down scores of men in the blink of an eye. The thunder was the sound of the enemy’s drums and the pounding of their feet as they came to slaughter us and our families. The lightning may have described the massive balls of flames from enemy siege engines hurdled over the city walls and into the homes and businesses of the locals, killing those who had taken shelter within.

At this point, the writers would write that the men native to the city, who had bravely banded together to fight the imposing army, fought valiantly but were not successful. There was no bravery in that battle. Every second men were dropping their weapons and fleeing from their positions back to their homes. I was one of the fools who stayed, who wanted to fight. I leapt into the fray, swinging my sword like a savage. Looking back now, I laugh at my foolishness. To think, a simple merchant’s son could kill a trained soldier. No, I never stood a chance. None of us did. Matters like these were to be left to soldiers whose job it was to defend the city, but they were hiding in the castle, along with our “beloved” lord. All the help we had received were broken swords and spears thrown from atop the castle walls. We took those weapons and prepared to fight.

It happened only seconds after I had started fighting a soldier in crimson armor who wielded a long spear with a wavy tip. He didn’t even try as he plunged the weapon through my chest, my only armor a thin, tan shirt. Such a grievous wound, even if a doctor or some kind of healer had been right beside me, they could do nothing to save me. The soldier pulled his weapon from my chest and moved on as my body hit the paved road like a sack of rocks. I died that night, died for a hopeless cause. After that, I’m not quite sure what happened. All I remember was waking up, standing over my bleeding, dead body. And that’s how I ended up here, a spirit of a merchant’s son, doomed to look over my own dead body as it lay several yards from my family’s ruined shop. I assume it was destroyed during the enemy’s bombardment, along with the castle and its inhabitants.

Many times I’ve tried to approach to family’s store, to see if my family had been trapped inside, but I couldn’t go more than a few yards from my body. However, I was able to get close enough to see a thick, red liquid seeping from under a stone. For the first few days I mourned, yelling out in rage at the soldiers that passed in front of my body, throwing punches and kicks that only passed through their physical body without any harm. It did seem to startle them a bit, but nothing else. But after days of constant screaming at deaf ears, and swinging with no contact, my body and mind grew tired and I retired to sitting on a corner of what used to be the butcher shop. I had grown up with the owners’ son, my best friend Dem. We had both decided to fight when the soldiers fled back to the castle. We stood side by side when the fight began, but I can’t seem to remember what happened to him after the first volley of arrows. How foolish were we? He was probably lying dead somewhere near where we had been standing.

It took all three of those rage filled days for the fear to sink into me. That fear was my fate. I was fated to stay by my own dead body for all eternity. To spend forever as a spirit that can’t pass on to whatever lay beyond physical human life. To spend the rest of time alone in the destroyed remains of a once beautiful city state. Or not.