Through Breath and Sight - Chapter 4
#4 of Through Breath and Sight
Another chapter. Shorter than usual, but I'd like you to think I was doing SOMETHING all those months.
Lying motionless upon my back, drained and battered, stumbling in and out of consciousness, I find myself numb to everything but the dull aches pinching my joints and throbbing in my head, the vague impression of a spongy and uneven surface beneath my spine, and the stinging, discomfiting sensation of a pair of bony fingers being prodded sharply through the fur of my neck, scraping the flesh of my throat.
Paralyzed by weariness, I lie motionless as the fingers slide their way down my chest, dig into my armpits, move over my stomach, delicately caress my groin, and slither down between my thighs, all the while jabbing at my flesh, and here and there tugging at tufts of my fur.
Several long minutes later, after the fingers have ceased their prodding and withdrawn, and the weariness and pain have ever so slightly subsided, I am able to stiffly force myself onto my side; and as the fog clears from my eyes, I slowly discern the outline of a narrow room, the dark walls unadorned and oddly imposing.
And seated beside me, a gangling figure, tall and motionless.
I blink stiffly, once, twice. My vision clears ever so slightly more, and I discern the dark skin, the slender frame, the piercing eyes...
The figure seated beside me is a lizard, of shape similar, near as I can discern, to that of the peasant girl; shrunken, angular form, long spindly muzzle, coarsely scaled, dark olive skin that glistens slightly even in the dim light, and narrow, bright yellow eyes fixed upon me...
The figure rises up; I hear the hammering of rapid footsteps, the high, sharp clattering of shutters being flung ajar, and a piercing ray of sunlight spreads across the room. My weary eyes burn, and a sharp ache shoots up into my brain.
'Hope you'll forgive me, boy.' The voice is thin and flat, and seems to ring out across a vast distance. 'I really do need to check if you've brought the pestilence in here with you.'
Another rapid succession of hammering footsteps; the sharp pain in my head intensifies. Something clatters loudly onto the floor just beside me.
'Lift up your head, yes?'
A frigid, spindly-fingered hand slides beneath my neck, and roughly tugs my head upward and sideways. Something long and thin is pushed into my mouth - with a texture of rough wood that scratches my tongue - and jammed down into my gullet. I gag, retch, and as the thing is withdrawn from my throat, I arch forward, the bitter, searing sensation rising in my throat, and vomit heavily. My muzzle burns, my eyes stream, and as I collapse back upon the bed, I feel globules of vomit seeping into the fur of my chin.
Several more minutes pass, silent but for the relentless ringing that has erupted in my ears. My eyes dry; the burning in my gullet subsides; and, eventually, blinking heavily, I am able to persuade myself to raise my head and glance across the room before me. The walls and floor are of a dark and grimy wood, and all completely unadorned but for a patch of rug just before the doorway, so darkened with filth that it almost blends into the floor.
And in the far corner, the lizard is seated upon a crooked stool. A broad wooden bucket is perched upon his lap, and he is bent over it, poking keenly at the contents with a lengthy wooden stick. He wears a dark, lengthy gown, ragged with neglect, and a tall, conical yellow hat atop his head. Much like the peasant girl, he has a severely shrunken, emaciated look about him; but unlike her, his bright yellow eyes bear a distinctive look of level-headed alertness.
Lifting his eyes to me, he smiles warmly, and tilts the bucket toward me; at the bottom, still bubbling slightly, is my vomit.
'No blood!' he says cheerily, putting the bucket aside. 'You seem to be alright for now. You'll need regular checks, of course.'
He folds his spindly, scaly hands upon his lap, still smiling. I stare back dumbly, still slightly dizzy with weariness.
'So...' he says. 'So...I see you're one of those...eh...' He tails off. Silently, I strain my arm about my torso and finger the whip marks on my back; the blood has mostly dried, but the stout and lengthy scars and patches of bald flesh feel more bloated and tender than ever.
'Well...I've little room to judge.' he says, his voice still alight with cheeriness. 'Besides, I dare say it helps loosen the humors a fair bit. That would probably help keep it away. That and the, uh, fresh air, assuming there's any left out there. I've not been out in weeks, but Agatha mentioned that some imbeciles dug a ditch just off the road nearby and tried to burn a whole lot of corpses in it.' He tuts sharply. 'I don't suppose anyone around there walked away from that. I had to lock the poor girl in the pantry with a big damn pot of herbs for a few days just to make sure she hadn't brought it back with her.'
He pauses, smiles. I stare back.
'Anyway...' he continues, '...Agatha tells me some lads...eh...gave her some trouble last night.' He glances downward and begins absently picking at something on the back of his scaly, bony hand. 'I'll probably have to lock her up again - can never tell - but maybe this'll get her out of her habit of wandering all hours of the night, the airheaded little thing.'
Quite suddenly, a fit of dizzy weariness overcomes me. I collapse back upon my pillow, my eyelids fluttering spasmodically, the room beginning to steadily spin about me.
From beside me, I hear the groaning of decrepit floorboards, and the dull scraping of a chair being pushed aside. 'Well...if you ever wake up, do come downstairs.' says a muffled, steadily fading voice.
Slowly, stiffly, my agonised joints and aching spine violently protesting, I manage to force myself up and into a seated position. Roughly kneading my knuckles against my stinging eyes for nearly a minute, I glance up. I cannot hope to guess precisely how long I have spent here, listlessly groaning and tossing and slipping in and out of half-consciousness; but the light has grown cool and dim, and the awkward corners of this poky, angular little room are enveloped in shadow.
Minutes pass in silence as I stare at the door before me, watching the encroaching shadows swallow up the grooves and pockmarks that pattern the battered wood. Finally, the fierce twinging in my legs slightly subsiding, I push myself to my feet and stumble forward. The door, a warped and decrepit old thing that barely fits into its frame, swings open at my touch upon a steep flight of wooden stairs, little more than a narrow and curving shaft, the filth-flecked walls leaning aggressively inward.
The effort of descending - the stairs curve sharply about twice, and barely offer room for even my scrawny girth - wears upon my stiff and weary body; and upon reaching the bottom, another minute passes before I am able to catch my breath and aright my reeling consciousness enough to look around me.
The room before me bears what is, by now, a closely familiar air of lifeless emptiness. The floor is dried mud and trampled strands of hay; the walls colourless and webbed with long, dark cracks, unadorned but for a cupboard hanging crookedly at one end of the room, and a wooden crucifix, black with damp and shrivelled by decay, at the other. A few battered, mismatched stools are scattered intermittently about; a rigid wooden chair stands before a cold stone hearth, over which hangs a charred cooking pot. A shapeless heap of straw covered with a rough sackcloth blanket is heaped in one corner; a shallow, rust-coated iron chamber pot is tucked discreetly in another. Above my head, the grey twilit sky stares icily down through broad holes in the thatch, bathing the room in a murky, colourless half-light.
And across the room, against the far wall, a figure is curled up upon a low wooden bench, hugging its knees to its chest, its face turned to the wall, a threadbare, colourless gown hanging off its bony frame.
I stand in silence for several minutes, watching the motionless figure. And slowly, silently, wearily, it turns its head toward me; and through the dimness, I discern something familiar about the hollow cheeks and dark, shrunken eyes, the tangled, ash-coloured fur, the flat muzzle and curved feline mouth.
A violent thud echoes through the room. The young cat, apparently too weary for surprise, turns her expressionless gaze toward the far wall; I follow it.
The lizard stands in a darkened doorway. He wears a lengthy apron splattered and smeared with broad dark blotches, some of them damp and slowly dribbling. A rich, pungent scent of decay wafts in from the room behind him. Meeting my gaze, he smiles warmly, then glances over at the cat.
'Make him something to eat, Agatha.' he says with cheery firmness. 'Something moist - I think we both know what an overactive spleen looks like, eh?'
And for nearly a full minute, the cat stares at him, silent, motionless, her face revealing nothing, before finally pulling herself to her feet and beginning a slow, straggling hobble toward the crooked cupboard on the wall.
The lizard turns his eyes back to me, still smiling. He jerks his head carelessly toward the cat. 'Found this one wandering about the woods when I arrived here. The most enthusiastic spleen I've come across, I should say. Don't bother trying to get anything out of her...I've not got much more than a name.'
I glance briefly over at the cat, who is briskly sorting through the contents of the cupboard, eyes fixed upon the wall. The lizard takes a step forward. 'So...d'you have a name, boy?'
I stare back mutely.
'A name, boy.' he repeats. 'You have a name?' He prods a spindly finger into his chest. 'I'm Joachim. See, boy? Joachim. You?'
I stare back. The lizard frowns contemplatively, gnawing distractedly at the tip of his little finger. 'Are you simple, perhaps, boy?' His tone is steady, inquisitive, not remotely unkind. 'Perhaps your phlegm production's off-balance as well.' He gives a disapproving grunt. 'I'd think it would fill you out a bit more, though. You should improve your liquid intake.'
He eyes me in silence for a brief moment; then his warm smile returns, and he nods toward the darkened room behind him. 'Well...come and take a gander at this.' he says jauntily, stepping back through the doorway.
A moment passes. I glanced back over at the cat, still sorting almost frantically through the cupboard, her shoulders hunched. Then, with a long, deep exhalation, I find myself slowly following after the lizard.