II

A zephyr of life filled Rooh’s lungs as he regained consciousness. His eyes awoke to a sky parched with the absence of the sun. It was torn asunder with one crack of light that seemed almost divine. The rays lit up his dark eyes that morphed into amber. Grey clouds enveloped the day which was strangely reminiscent of the shroud he was feeling in his mind. It smelled of smoke and decay. The fatigue exaggerated the way he lifted his body up, bandages slipping off him like a second skin revealing a massive scar over his heart. He gazed at the horizon and his eyes glassed over with tears at the familiar sight of seething destruction. Fire and smoke painted the horizon like the spray of carotid blood against a tranquil canvas.  

The Valley of Armistice. A memento and token of a time lost and filled with past sentiment. Broken and warped. 

“20 years.” 

A voice that pierced through the air felt like a crippling blow to Rooh’s back. He turned around like a weakly animated corpse to the figure draped in deep blue garb faded with time and wear. Rooh had trouble fathoming the words that came out of his mouth. He could not summon the timbre of his voice to respond. 

The mysterious man spoke with a calm lucidity, “I have been your caretaker for 20 years. I am known as Saleh. You were entrusted to me by my father,” Saleh’s eyes softened as his clothing flapped around in a theatric gust of wind. “A father of whom has also...been affected by the tides of time. Yet, you remain. Unchanged. Unaged. And I dare say, undying...with that mortal wound in the essence of what makes you a man.”  

The clandestine figure paused abruptly in baffled contemplation. He questioned in pure and soft wonder, “How can this be?” The question rang true. Rooh wiped his eyes and smeared his tears against sunken cheekbones. His lips cracked open and he could not yet bring forth a sound. It was on his second try that he croaked, “...I am Shashin.” 

Saleh’s eyes widened momentarily as he took a step back at that ominous word. In disbelief he muttered, “This cannot be. I believed that they were folk tales. Humans ensorcelled by something not from this realm. Turned into...something not from this realm,” He paused and scratched at his silver-streaked beard. “Yet it makes sense. You are standing in a tomb meant for you.” 

Rooh gazed down at his feet at the stone with inscriptions of an ancient language. It was littered with flowers both wilted and full of vivacity. Ensorcelled by something not from this realm. A vision was procured from recalling these words as if like an incantation. He saw everything on and around his feet being swallowed by a black tide covered with bioluminescent moss that swallowed his corporeal and ethereal form. An ungodly voice undulated in him. 

He shook himself out of the vision and squeezed his temples with his fingers, sighing. Rooh gazed at the man in front of him. There were more pressing matters at hand. He had trouble making eye contact as he said, “You know...I saw you in my dreams. From time to time. When I was,” He motioned with his hand a wave while looking down at the tomb. “Down under.” Saleh paused to take in his words. Rooh turned back around slowly to face the violent vision of what his world became. His lips twitched as he choked back the stream of consciousness that was his brain. He managed to ask, “You are a mystic? I felt your uncanny energy.”  

Saleh slowly strode to the edge of the cliff that they were on. He was sucked into the violent sight of the horizon as his eyes glassed over. He nodded and said, “If it is answers you seek...answers you may receive. I do not imagine this world is the one you once knew. Somehow, I do not believe it is of no coincidence that the same day you were brought here to me was the day the tides of war changed this world forever. Nectere is benighted now by a king who understands nothing. Not even the war he rages on.” Rooh glanced to his side at Saleh without moving his body as if frozen like a statue. He locked his sight onto the mystic’s silhouette as he stated, “Malrose. Son of King Malcent. Yes...we were acquainted.” Saleh glanced back at the man and muttered, “Perhaps I can learn more from you than me.”  

Rooh said nothing. He felt a brush against his shoulder, twirling up against his neck with a soft hand resting against his pulse. Familiarity overwhelmed him as an image of amethyst-speckled dark eyes burned into his vision. The sound of a faint thud echoed across the cliffside that they were on as he buckled over and fell to one knee. The mystic gave Rooh his shoulder as support, dragging him back to a nearby and solitary temple. “You are still weak. You need rest and food,” he said. Rooh felt his head spin as the aural sparks of the windchimes that draped the outer vestiges of the now dilapidated temple melted into his consciousness. The brightly painted wood and gold ornaments blurred as he stayed silent and let himself get dragged by his newfound guide. Hopelessness was not new to him, but he tasted it in that moment like a new foreign cuisine that stained his understanding of what was. 

I am haunted by her.  

The sentence echoed out to him and replaced the windchimes that occupied his soundscape. I am haunted by loss. The amethyst eyes seemed to gaze at him from the dark that occupied the corners of the walls he was being dragged through. He slipped in and out of consciousness as he felt the fixations of many faces, both young and old. The temple was littered with people of all cultures. Rooh was able to completely dissolve back into his dreams as soon as his bearded face made contact with the delicateness of a real bed.  

He dreamt of The Valley of Armistice. Lush green with commerce bustling. Buildings and spires of all kinds were erected as a testament to progression and faith in one another. A crossroads of unity and peace. Countless cultures and peoples coexisting after an eternity of conflict. A place that he could put his faith in. And for Rooh, that required moving against forces rooted in place within his nature. Moving mountains would be easier than completely submitting himself and trusting in something with all his being. The idea of a utopia seemed impossible. Far away from the thumbs of corrupt sovereignty and ancient reins grasping with the ineptitudes of greed and wanton power.  Especially a place where he could manifest his love with a woman of the arcane. A dream whose name was Nika. 

He dreamt of the entanglement of dreams. His own with Nika. The bonfire of dreams that was a population. All the pain, the lessons, the mysteries of lives he had never even met before. All concentrated within Armistice. Pain he wanted to mitigate and to transform into something beautiful. Lessons from clashing of souls he wanted to indulge in so he could feel closer to the universe. Mysteries that could whet his appetite for the unknown and provide comfort to his disdain for human nature evoked by a start to his life that he never once wanted. 

He dreamt of an almost inevitable downfall. He begged so desperately for his ego to be crushed by the kindness of mankind. But the calloused rage within always resurfaced at the awakening of injustices. Two fonts of magma. His neck became pillars of fire. Seething.  

Again, the flash of her eyes. Amethyst turned to ruby as blood ran through the edges of her eyelids. Rooh saw the rivers of Armistice turn sanguine. Shriveled men, engorged on lust and power, on their thrones of decay and rape. A sky of smoke and hated incarnated that suffocated any semblance of light. What power did he have against any of it? What did it all mean when he tried to throw away all his past ineptitudes and faults? Moral failures? Did it mean nothing against the overwhelming dark tide of the world? 

Was there ever any hope for the hopeless? 

The men on their thrones just laugh. A laugh that turns into a shriek amongst the air. A laugh that awakens a second heart within him. An obsidian one that threatens to overtake the one that beats virtuously. He grits his teeth so hard that they shatter. She is not here to help. Not fully. A phantasm that reminds him of his failures. A simulacrum of love that he wished to last forever. Nika’s visage appears before him as she reaches out, fading into blackness once again just before the point of embrace. 

Panting, Rooh woke up to a drenched bed. For a short while it felt like his soul had escaped from his body. His fingers were clutching the sheets as if they were united from the beginning of when they were made. He lifted his hand in front of him as it shook violently. Blurry vision made it difficult to see the lines and callouses that adorned his palm.  

Too much gall. It was dangerous to the point it made the hair on his body salute with goosebumps. He closed his eyes and sucked in air, breathing meticulously to calm himself down. An onset of tears was fought back as he regained his composure. Ghostly pale hands slid down his neck and wrapped around him. Nika pulled him back into herself. Rooh shut his eyes in defeat and let himself envelop in the feeling. A familiar voice pulled him back as his eyes fluttered back open.  

“Bad dream?” 

Saleh stood in front of him, blocking the flickering torchlight and appearing as a shadowy figure. He gently knelt next to the bed and said with a genuine smile, “You, my friend, have demons.” Rooh blinked at the bluntness of the statement then exhaled through his nose in amusement. He sank back into the bed and muttered, “No shit.” 

Saleh clicked his tongue and lectured, “Shit. This is a place of worship and spiritual refinement,” He stroked his beard and nodded. “However, I cannot fault you for being in the position you are in. You have slept for two days. And if you must know, you kept calling out the name Nika. Is that of any relevance to you?” 

Rooh bit his lip in reluctance. Eventually he revealed, “Nika was my partner. She was a... sorceress. I’m not sure if you know this but when you, you know,” Saleh raised his eyebrows in curiosity at Rooh’s reluctance to speak further. “You...consummate. It is a forbidden union. A sorceress’s soul is tinged with magic and gets intermingled with someone who isn’t, well, magic. She never completely leaves even when she’s not in this realm anymore.” His cheeks were rosy as he mentioned this, not fully understanding himself why he was revealing this to a man he hardly even knew. 

It took a while for him to fully digest Rooh’s words. He responded, “So you are...haunted. My condolences. So much burdening you at once. I have always figured sorcery is of depths that no one fully understands. Not even the School of the Arcane itself. I will do some research and think of a way I can help.” Rooh scrunched his eyebrows in confusion. Did he really want to forget her caress? And was it even fully possible to be absolved of this phantasm? Before he could respond, Saleh interjected his thoughts and said, “But. I am curious. For one thing. You said you were acquainted with the late king. How so?” 

Rooh looked back at him slowly with a stoic gaze. 

“Regicide.” 

Saleh waved a ring adorned hand above his head like he was fending off evil spirits after absorbing the truly dreadful word that subtly echoed in the room. His heart sank and yet even then his curiosity piqued. There was no helping him as he exclaimed, “You are the Revenant of the Desert!” Rooh tilted his head the side in confusion. He uttered, “The what?”  

The mystic sucked his teeth in contemplation. He explained, “They called the one who murdered the king the Revenant of the Desert. You were stabbed through the heart. It is a mystery to me how you are even here right now. There is no function of a mortal man that did what you did. No doubt it is the power of the Shashin.” Rooh pursed his lips and nodded. He vaguely recalled. Killing always has consequences. Especially the killing of a king.  

The events of that day were mired in a fog that made his stomach churn.