Through Ages of Weary Fulfillment: Ch. 25

Voices Rising

Notes:

Okay...I'm home now, so maybe THIS TIME my posting will get back to the daily, normal posts. Of course, I'm leaving for college on the 12th, so then it might be wonky again. I'm going to try and get the rest of this posted before that day, so we leave off at the end of the story and not on a cliffhanger. It shouldn't be too hard. I only have around two chapters left to write.

Back to Artham, now^^

*****

Concussions had been a close friend of Artham’s over the years, so he knew how to handle them, how to give in to them, and when to tell them to shut up, because it really just didn’t matter anymore. He also knew the signs of waking up after the delight events that led to obtaining them in the first place, and he was experiencing those signs at that very moment.

The first thing Artham noticed was the army pounding mercilessly in his skull, and he couldn’t help but groan. Armies were so stubborn. They never stopped marching. It was unlikely this one would either, especially when considering—his fingers moved toward the back of his head and made contact with something that was sticky and sent a jolt of pain through his mind—it wasn’t actually a real army. It was one made out of what seemed to be a blinding headache which was, of course, the result of something hard bludgeoning his head. 

It occurred to him that testing the “blinding” theory might actually be a good idea, considering that not having the use of precise vision might make his mission—rescuing his daughter—rather tricky.

His eyes snapped shut automatically when he opened them which he supposed was a good sign, since it meant he could see, his eyes and mind were just sensitive to it. But that was to be expected. On trying again, perhaps a bit more carefully, he saw that though the world around him was slightly blurred and also swimming in sunlight, it was visible, and he could focus…somewhat well. 

Nothing would be accomplished if he just laid there—“there” being wherever the Fangs that had attacked him and/or Creepy Crab Amrah had thrown him—so Artham resolved to stand up, or sit at the very least, and get a bearing of his surroundings.

Something that looked rather like a pole shifted into his vision, and he sat up slightly, reaching for it. As it was, the pole was closer than his mind perceived, and his knuckles ended up knocking against what was certainly very strong and a bit rusty metal.

The contact made his blood run cold. Unless he was imagining it as a result of the concussion—in the past, though of all his senses had been impaired after similar blows to the head, touch was the one that always stuck with him—the pole was not just any pole, but one of many, one of many bars holding a prisoner—him—inside of yet another cage.

No, no, NO! his mind screamed of its own accord, forcing him to stand, making his head hit the top of the metal cage. He whimpered and dropped to the bottom of the cage on contact, holding his now-even-more-pounding head and begging himself to stop sounding like the cowardly buffoon, Peet the Sockman. Those were the noises he made, and he knew them all too well.

“Ahh, so the crazed cloven has been resurrected, has he not?” Amrah's grating voice appeared out of nowhere, and Artham couldn't help but flinch at the sound. 

Raising his throbbing head against his better judgment, Artham found himself staring straight at her through the bars of his hanging cage, and visually, it was not unlike it had been all those months before. In fact, he couldn’t help but blink in surprise at the sight of her. Janner had briefly made note of her crab-like state, and he had expected that. He definitely was not looking at a crab now, not in the least. She looked normal, albeit rather angry. She had always seemed sinister beneath the sugar-coated surface, but now she was furious.

He wanted to ask what had happened to her and why she didn't look like a monster any more than she had the last time they had made contact, but there were other priorities, namely one.

“Where is my daughter?” he demanded, ignoring her questions and his questions and any other questions floating around the room.

Amrah smiled in a sickening way, though the churning of his stomach might have been a result of the concussion more than anything. “Why Artham,” she crooned, reaching out and brushing her hand against one of the bars in a very creepy manner. “I’m surprised you haven’t figured it out by now.”

“Figured what out?” he hissed through gritted teeth, more done with her than he ever had been. How had he stood listening to her drone for hours on end when she had trapped him there, dangling in a cage?

“Well, Artham,” she began, twirling a strand of her hair in a disturbingly girlish way. “You broke the rules. I said ‘only you.’ I never said you could have help.”

Clenching his fists now, Artham stood up suddenly, blinking away the rainbow splash of colors flooding his vision for a moment. “What are you talking about?” he asked, grabbing hold of the cage bars. He couldn’t risk denying the matter; what if she hurt his daughter because of it?

Now one of Amrah’s white, slender hands came through the bars, getting close to him, close to his face, and Artham stumbled backward, falling to the cage floor.

His head didn’t appreciate the sudden change. As the world swam, Amrah’s honeyed laughter peeled through the entire cave, bouncing off the walls endlessly. It was all Artham could do to keep from clamping his hands over his ears. 

“Just your help from…well, I suppose the dragons,” Amrah said briskly, a touch of anger in her voice. At least it was better than raucous laughter. “One of them got you here early, I presume? You haven’t had time to find my note and arrive, even if the winds were in your favor.”

“Fine,” Artham admitted, glaring at her more steadily now that his senses were working as he wanted them to. “You’re right. Perhaps I did receive a bit of help. But I’m the only one here to save her. No one else is coming. I’ve forbidden the family to, and they won’t risk her life.”

A little half-laugh came from Amrah this time, the annoyingly endearing sort. “Oh, bless your heart, Artham Wingfeather,” she said belittlingly. “I suppose you’re righteous then, aren’t you? Free from every wrongdoing? Perfect? Blameless? Because you followed my rules, only bending them a little?”

“Of course I’m not,” Artham replied slowly, wondering what trick she was using now. “No one is perfect, least of all me. I’ve made mistakes, I admit that. But this was not one of them! I will not put my daughter’s life on the line again, and you had better know that now!”

Amrah clucked her tongue a bit. “Well, now, Artham, I’m impressed. This is a much improved version of you compared to the last one I saw. Only in spirit, of course, not in body. The other was far more beautiful, my most beautiful creation.”

Wincing as he heard those words, spoken just the same way they had been months before, when they were in a rather similar situation. “I was never your creation,” he whispered, his head down, more to keep himself from falling prey to her trap than anything else.“What did you say?” she asked, her voice suddenly high, painful again. Her eyes snapped and glittered angrily. 

Taking a breath, Artham raised his head, praying it was the right decision. “I was never your creation,” he said again, calmly, looking her directly in the eyes. “Even when I fully sang I was twisted, twisted into something a bit beautiful, perhaps, but still twisted, never whole. I am whole now, but I am not your creation, nor I am my own. I am His. His and no other’s.”

Amrah flinched the moment he mentioned Him, the Maker. He did not even need to say His Name for the realization to dawn on her that He was the subject, that in a way she stood in His presence as they spoke.

She was silent for a bit; her hands fell to her sides, and she stared at the ground, her mouth moving a bit as her body trembled. Artham prayed with all his heart that whatever she was thinking, it would somehow lead to his daughter’s freedom if not his own.

Those hopes were shattered the moment Amrah raised her head, her eyes narrow, an awfully snake-like appearance taking over her being. “Were you His when you left her to die on the floor of a cell, when you let the Fangs take her, when you let the Fangs take your wife?” she hissed, cruel and deadly.

Artham closed his eyes and let out a shuddery breath. “I lost sight of Him then,” he whispered, feeling a tear roll down his cheek. “I was scared and hopeless and I made dreadful mistakes that—”

“That you’ve never forgiven yourself for,” Amrah added, an angry cackle in her voice.

His hands twisted together, apart, together, apart, together, apart now, and his legs trembled. “Not all the way,” he murmured almost inaudibly, familiar shame flooding through him.

Amrah took a step closer, her eyes wider, hungrier, angrier. “And you were a foolish coward to leave her. You know why you did it? I’ll tell you why. It’s because you didn’t love her, that’s why. Cowardly Artham Wingfeather never even loved his only daughter, didn’t love her enough to save her.”

“YES I DID!” Artham roared, leaping toward the edge of the cage and clutching the bars, shaking them, his voice breaking as his tears flowed more freely.

Staring at him steadily, almost pityingly, Amrah reached her hand in again and brushed his tear-covered cheek with her deathly cold fingers. “No, you didn’t, Artham,” she said sadly. “You know how I know?”

He shook his head, whimpering, crumpling to the floor of his cell, covering his head in his arms because he couldn’t stand hearing her and all the true lies she told.

“I know because…because you didn’t save her. You didn’t even protest when they took her away. I’m the one who kept her from being another experiment, you know. You should thank me. I did what you couldn’t. I stood up where you crumpled to the ground. I had strength when you had only your cowardice. You don’t love her, Artham, and you never did. You’re only here now to keep your guilt complex quiet, and trust me, from what I know about you, that won’t satisfy it for long, even if you succeed. It will clamor and scream and stab you your entire life because it is you, you are a coward, and that is simply how your life was meant to be.”

The sound of her shoes hitting the rocks grew louder and louder in Artham’s mind as she walked away, until they clamored along as loud as the voices scorning him, mocking him, taunting him in ways they never had before.

*****

Notes:

poor Artham 😭😭😭 he does not deserve this at all 😣😣😣

However, the fact that he calls Amrah "Creepy Crab Amrah" or "Creepy Crab Lady" is meant to provide a bit of comedic relief 😂

p.s. if this gets approved in time, I'll post another chapter today as well^^