In The Presence

The Presence Submission for IronAge Media

Evelyn stands, head bowed, as she recites the litany scrawled on the paper. The guttering of the flames of the candles makes it difficult at times, brushing back loose strands of brown hair to keep her vision clear as she keeps her head lowered per the paper’s instructions. The stone table the candles sit on stands silently as she reads the words in the strange tongue. This isn’t her first summons, but she has gone through a lot of effort and resources to get here.

Even now, though, it seems as if it isn’t working. The other summons had appeared more quickly, beasts and men of various shape bound in the circle at the foot of the table and ready to do business. This was something older than those wraiths and nightmares. A last longshot chance at victory in the face of utter defeat. Old and powerful, but just as forgotten.

Though the words do not falter, she curses in her mind as it seems as if the ritual is faulty. Stolen from the dying thoughts of a madman, it had always been a possibility, but her father had been right so many times before. Her coat felt heavy in the unlit basement, her skin beginning to sweat slightly in the heat of the room as her nerves began to fray slightly at the thought of her last resort failing.

And then, as the words begin to scratch at her drying throat, the walls begin to melt away, falling into the distance like a shadow. Mist begins to creep up from the edges of where the walls should stand, an iridescent and almost shimmering mist that flickers and sparks near the candle flames, the light casting cinnabar shadows across the waves of the thickening fog.

Then, a vertical slice through the air above and before her. Eyes down, the words burning on her tongue now in the increasingly stagnant and thick air. As the split opens, like the eye of a sleeper, virescent light begins to shine through, the greens and blues of it swirling with the oranges and reds of the candles in the mist. A shadow casts before the light, and Evelyn dares a glance upward to see.

The figure is draped in white linens from its drooping shoulders all the way to the floor in piles, its features as indiscernible as the direction its head faces, crowned with a latticework of bronze artilleries pulsing and shimmering sickly to the rhythm of the motions of the mist. Her eyes swing back to the paper, almost stuttering the words but catching herself quickly as something old and feral claws at the back of her mind to run. She steels her nerves, and her voice, adjusting her long coat on her shoulders before finishing the chant and placing the paper, face down, on the table before her and closes her eyes.

She holds them closed for the length of a long breath, releasing it as she opens her eyes to look into the void-face of the figure, voice strong but threatening to falter, “I know your name, specter, and call you entreat you to accept my audience.”

The presence, the bronze arteries pulsing slowly, seems to regard her through the light; an unpleasant and almost invasive feeling.

I know your name, flesh, and accept your audience.

Licking the dryness of her lips, putting her fingers on the table to feel something solid in the strange alien mist, “My enemies are getting closer. Your children have failed me. By the old blood and the old songs, I entreat you to succeed where they have failed.”

The mist shudders, the candles threatening to go out as she can see the pulse in the bronze crown matching her own, the viridescent eye seeming to fray at the edges.

Your enemies are flesh. I have no children. By the old blood and the old songs, I permit you to offer your bargain.

Her blood boils, cheeks flushing and fingers curling across the table into fists, swallowing down spit before she speaks through gritted teeth, “My offers have been made and kept. I have given of my blood. I have given of my kin. I have given of my soul. I demand you honor the oaths of your kind.”

The mist dims, the eye growing brighter, the shape of the presence almost seeming to turn.

You have given blood to the gluttonous. Kin to the lustful. Soul to the jealous. You invoke old oaths you have no claim to. You are flesh and have no right to demand. I am spirit and have no need for honor. I permit you one last time to offer your bargain.

Evelyn almost screams, grinding her teeth before she takes a long calming breath, brushing her hair back behind her ear again and swallowing back down her bilious rage. She adjusts the coat on her shoulders, feeling the weight of the gun holstered under her arm, and the brings her hands back down on the table, drumming them on the paper once, twice, thrice.

When she speaks, it is calm and collected though laced with rage and contempt, “There is nothing of me left to offer, and nothing of my family that I am willing to part with. My bargain is your freedom. To unbind you, unchain you, on the condition that my enemies shall meet the fate they deserve.”

The air stills, the pulsing of the crown seems to stop, and from somewhere in the mists she is regarded with a dark and terrible scrutiny, You would let me loose upon your world, of your own free will, to see your justice done.

It isn’t a question; it is a judgement.

It hangs in the air for longer than she expected, her skin cold and clammy as she weighs the chances of this gamble paying off. She wouldn’t be here if she weren’t desperate, but she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to rebind the creature once its work was done. The other risks had been calculated, but they had failed, she ruminates; maybe its time to take a chance on the unknown.

Evelyn nods her head, biting her lip nervously, “Yes, though you will have to show me how to do it properly.”