Dragon Hawk
By: Karas Jim
Tags: Fiction, Thriller, Weird Fiction, Spirit Animals, Horror

“Human language probably started to develop around 100,000 years ago”

The last rays of sunlight were licking the frozen landscape as I first beheld the town that would forever haunt my nights.

Μy boots plunged into the thick snow again and again while arctic winds whistled in my ear. My breath came in short, frantic gasps as I exerted myself. My lips were cracked and frail, my mouth thirsty, but wet.

Even now, I evoke that first, eerie glimpse of a small, god-forsaken town in the vast, icy, forgotten plains. How could I forget that sight? My lips are reluctant to utter what my pen dreads to scribble down.

A solid black spire towered over the rest of the sordid, weather-beaten buildings, its pointy end standing proudly against the fury of the elements. The abnormality that chilled my bones like the cold never could, was its utter nakedness. It was not caked with snow, like the other building roofs and the gates. It bore no symbol or marking that I could recognize from afar.

I felt overwhelmed and dizzy for a couple of seconds. I lowered my gaze and caught my breath, resting my body against a lone tree. The gates weren’t far away now.

Having exhausted months in the most hazardous landscapes of Earth, my quest had begun to feel pointless, its fruits nonexistent and rotten. Still, this bleak town looked promising, and with great risk comes great reward. No man alive had managed to accomplish what I attempted, to seek out and discover the beginnings of human language.

I resolved to move on.

As my gloved hand tugged at the trunk of the tree I stood next to, I felt at a deviation on its skin, as if someone had carved at it.

Narrowing my eyes, I removed a faint layer of snow with a quick swipe. I uncovered the figure of a simple, elongated arrow that someone, long ago, had hacked into being at this tree.

The arrow pointed back towards the woods from where I had emerged.

The wood relief appeared blunt and hasty. Its incisiveness indicated both hurry and craftsmanship, and it stunned me in place for several heartbeats, as I pondered its indubitable significance.

By any account, it seemed like a warning.

As I raised my gaze and started for the gates, my heart trembled because I discerned how the numberless flakes of snow and hail convoluted about the peak of the spire in a never-ending spiral. The merciless winds hissed at the irregular structure but could do nothing save coil around it and fade away towards the lower levels of the town.

A Black Maypole of Elemental Fury…

That would make a good title for the journal page of this day’s diary, I resolved, biting back my uneasiness as I struck at the heavy, wooden gates with my fists.

Little did I know that my diary could not hold the torrent that would buffet me.

………………………………………………………………………………………

The tavern-keeper was a stout, bulky giant of a man. I smiled and nodded at him in a friendly manner, but he merely grunted at me.

I set down three silvers on the bar counter. He just turned his back on me in a cold way.

It took him twenty minutes to pour me a mug of beer and chop up some peppers and onions, which he threw in a bowl of boiling water and served with two thin slices of semi-moldy bread and a small chunk of goat cheese.

Meanwhile, I sat contemplating, my mind spiriting itself away to strange realms and outlandish ideas. I found myself questioning both theology and sociology. Brutish men of god-forsaken places such as this tavern-keeper who did not even greet me, hundreds of thousands of years ago, could not have been divinely endowed with language. Neither could they have developed it as a society all on their own, the savages that they undoubtedly had been.

My thoughts expanded to encompass the other locals that I had encountered up to that point. The data that my senses had collected thus far was not promising.

Out in the alleyways of the depraved town, the locals had looked creepy and strange, covered with thick furs, their hair greased and unkempt.

They had avoided me like the plague. Inside the tavern, it looked like the situation would hardly improve.

There were a few companies of degenerate men, with slouched shoulders and bones which protruded due to the cold, and perhaps, malnutrition. Here and there, a few women would sit about, scrawny, miserable creatures, as if begging for leftovers.

Despite the frequent clatter of cups and the clinging of forks against their plates, these people seemed entrapped in an endless, spooky, absolute silence.

It struck me as odd, and by the time I had gulped a few mouthfuls of beer -which was surprisingly well-fermented- and slurped half of my soup, I decided to scribble a note of it in my journal. Perhaps these people spoke very rarely, or viewed dinner time as a period deserving a monastic silence.

I opened my satchel and retrieved my journal, placing it next to my soup.

Suddenly, every other sound inside the tavern ceased.

I had opened a page and scribbled a couple words with my pencil, before I realized.

The tavern-keeper stared at me, transfixed, his mouth forming a wordless expression of shock intertwined with fear.

My initial bewilderment was replaced by an incessant, mental effort to comprehend the situation. It struck me that I had stumbled upon something secret and important. Sweat accumulated on my brow as I realized that every pair of eyes inside the tavern was now fixed upon me.

Were these people illiterate? Had I seen any sign, any poster, any word, written anywhere in the town? Did my writing skills really captivate their feeble minds so? Could these people have not developed any writing skills whatsoever?

I coughed, harshly, and stood up, facing the tavern-keeper, whose eyes were bulging.

“What’s wrong?” I spoke, quickly and decisively.

The crowd inside the tavern howled.

It was a sound of anguish and lamentation, and it clawed at the wooden walls like a sharp knife scraping against a cold bench.

The tavern-keeper grew ashen with fear, and opened his mouth, revealing a reddish tongue that lolled about, as he failed to utter anything in response.

They can’t speak either! My god, what are they?

A thunderstorm of frantic footsteps, maniacal grunts and harrowing yelps fused together into a cacophony that assaulted me from all fronts.

I did not understand this aggression. I could not make heads or tails of my situation.

All I could see was a mob of atavistic humans flailing about, their tongues jutting helplessly out of their mouths as they circled around me.

Shocked, I surmised that my quest would meet a short, brutal end. The answers I chased down all my life would remain unanswered by this unholy town and its denizens that definitely did not have any link with the origins of human language whatsoever. I had gone too far. I had overextended.

I felt a sharp twinge of pain on the back of my head, then everything went black.

………………………………………………………………………………………

It all comes to me, even now. It feels like a dream, but one that is ever so tangible and within reach of my hands. My tongue contorts in the same manner as it did that very night.

When I opened my eyes, they were carrying me, those masses of wicked, disheveled peasants that could neither speak nor write.

The black spire’s gate was a gaping crack into unending gloom. I stared at this six-feet high tear which led to unfathomable darkness, still dizzy from what those mongrels had wrought upon me, as they hoisted me in a semi-standing position, my cold, weary legs and feet scraping against the ice and dirt.

Suddenly, the eerie silence was interrupted by a mental stab at my thoughts. The language used was neither my own nor, I reckon, any known tongue. However, bizarrely enough, I could understand every single word. The speaker was, indubitably, an old, hardened male, willful and, strangely, seductive.

Come to me… The animal… It cursed you… Mine…

My decadent captors struck me again on the back of my head as they ushered me into the black spire.

………………………………………………………………………………………

Opening my eyes, I knew I was gagged and bound tight with hard rope on a wooden chair.

The chair was positioned in the middle of a soundlessly abysmal room that spiraled upwards towards the heavens. There was very little light, but the gloom felt inviting, not destructive.

Directly in front of me, thirty feet away, a golden throne glimmered, splitting the darkness in half.

Instead of struggling against my bonds, I frantically tried to discern what sort of figure sat on the throne. The mental assault resumed, as if to ease my efforts.

Far-away land… Foreigner… You are cursed… It is mine… Mine!

I understood at that moment, that the speaker was sitting on the throne, as clearly as a mouse realizes that a cat is its predator.

Just then, the enthroned figure clapped his hands loudly.

A couple of side doors burst open with a clang, and several of the degenerated people that this town boasted of swarmed into the room.

They wore long, black hoods and robes which obscured their features almost completely, but could not hide their shambling, weird gaits and distastefully slim and elongated bodies.

There were about two dozen of them, and they all froze to a standstill, forming a straight line right in front of me, their backs turned.

The enthroned figure clapped once more, and the ground in front of them trembled.

I felt my blood run cold and my eyes attempted to discern what was taking place, but to no avail, since the accursed acolytes blocked my line of sight.

Cogwheels clanged, chains and ropes extended from underground making dull sounds, and the entire process was completed with an echoing thud. Dust filled the room, but only for a little while.

But the speaker now let his voice ring through the room.

“Man must not carve icons and symbols! Punish! Feast on his flesh and let his spirit be joined with mine!”

I cringed and mumbled incoherently under my gag, thinking that this silent, man-eating crowd would turn on me.

Instead, they all lunged at what now appeared to be an ancient, enormous table, which held another human figure strapped on it. Apparently, it had been raised from an underground chamber only moments ago.

I need not describe what took place in the following minutes. I half wished my ears and nose were gagged as well as my mouth. My eyes watered from the humidity that rose in the atmosphere, coupled with the sheer stench of human skin and flesh being ripped apart, blood flowing everywhere in the chamber. The victim did not howl, and I believe he or she was already half-dead or semi-conscious when this primordial, forbidden feast began.

“Animal cursed man into its own image! Devour the carrier of the curse! Let his spirit meet mine!” The speaker howled, while I struggled to make sense of the proceedings.

As the horde indulged in relentless, religious and raw savagery, my eyes gaped with awe, seeing a translucent shape coming out of the body that writhed on the bloody table, and hovering about.

Dumbstruck, I beheld a transparent, teal sparrow, the size of a cat, which emerged from the body of the person that was being devoured.

Scrawny, evil sparrow… Come to me… Sate my thirst….

Whatever the thing I was looking at was, It was neither evil nor scrawny, hence the speaker’s comments baffled me. What followed, would leave me drawing mad lines of thought, long discarded and forgotten by humanity.

The figure on the throne descended and approached the table from the other side, as his zealots gulped and chewed and swallowed in a frenzy.

The sparrow that initially attempted to fly skywards was frozen on mid-air and violently pulled by an invisible force towards an old, lean man of immeasurable winters, who was endowed with a long beard and dressed in regal garments. A silver crown nested on his head and his eyes glimmered yellow. They were the two sole things that I could clearly discern about him.

Slowly, cherishing the moment, the old king raised a hand and stretched his skeletal fingers, which grew transparent and silvery amid the semi-darkness.

He grabbed the spiritual sparrow and crushed it into countless, tiny particles of spiritual matter. He then opened his mouth and the particles were drawn, inexorably and inexplicably, inside him.

By that moment, I had formed a certain conclusion in my mind, about all this.

In books forgotten and forbidden, filled with apocryphal lore, it is written that, countless thousands of years ago, man was bestowed with the gift of language by animals. It is not specified how the process took place, but each person supposedly formed links with a particular animal, which not only taught him how to socialize and use language, but also formed parts of his or her personality.

Here I was, confronted with a sight that would drive any scientist, sociologist and theologian insane. That lore was considered to be mad ramblings and myths, but I had the sole privilege of standing -more like, sitting-directly in front of the facts.

Unless all this was not real. But why shouldn’t it be? I was trapped in an accursed temple surrounded by cannibals, was I not?

Only, what those primordial antiquarians had jotted down and referred to as animals, were, as my four senses and the gruesome proceedings showed me, in fact spiritual animals tied with the human soul, probably appearing only when their vessel was in dire straits.

Then, who was this old man, this king? He had just absorbed and devoured the essence of a spiritual animal. Was this a religious cult? Who were these people? Why could he speak and the rest could not? Evidently, that was why they worshiped him. Had he devoured their spiritual animals too? Why were they alive and their victim was killed?

You!

The mental assault suddenly singled me out, jolting me away from my scientific bewilderment and back into the horror of the now.

The horrible acolytes had now completed the feast and distanced themselves from the despicable human remains that lay on the table, besmirching it and covering it with a festering stench of human innards.

I am a god. I eat sparrows and others… You are cursed… I must eat your curse… You are too strong… We won’t eat your body… Your spirit cursed you… I will release you…

Every little hint united in my mind, fusing into a terrible conclusion. This king that could speak directly to minds and devour spiritual animals believed, or wanted to make me believe, that language was a curse that they had long since afflicted man with. This second, incredible finding of immeasurable anthropological significance affected me deeply.

In spite of my horror, I decided to test out if he could hear my thoughts, as I heard his. I wanted to try and communicate with him.

No curse! Let me go! You can talk, like me! Let me talk!

The old man winced and appeared unpleasantly surprised. Undoubtedly, all the people that could converse with him had passed through that table and had been consumed, bodily and spiritually.

No… Only one god… Come to me…

I decided to insist and not pay heed to this primordial, monotheistic proclamation.

Talking does not make you a god! Language is not a curse!

The old man narrowed his eyes in suspicion. It dawned on me that I was touching on some very ancient, sensitive chords.

You dare defy me… Silence, filth… I offer release… It is mine….

I felt a mental grip coiling around my soul, gripping my very being.

Abruptly, I also felt a powerful fire, a bright flame, suddenly lighting up my very core.

I must not stumble now and deliver precisely what happened.

My bonds were inexplicably burnt to ashes, and I stood up, removing my gag, feeling my insides burn and boil. I feared that the old man was responsible, but I could move freely again, and I intended to take advantage of this unexpected situation. Surprisingly, my muscles were vigilant and not sore at all.

“He has taken everything from you!!” I shouted off the top of my lungs, hearing my voice reverberate within the silent, deadly halls. The acolytes panicked at the sound of my voice, which was magnified by the second, and stood dazed and bloody, clasping their ears.

I bolted for an open side-door, ran through the gloom, teeth clenched, and emerged from the black spire, alive, but deeply traumatized.

I did not stop to contemplate, but dashed at the town gates, looking to get out of this place of dread in one piece. What I discovered on that day could not be jeopardized. It could not be laid to waste.

You run… You escape… How dare you?

The old king was still connected with my mind, which translated his every monstrous gibberish so accurately that it drove me mad. The time for words and language had ended, I resolved as I reached the town exit.

Unfortunately, the town gates were hermetically shut. I banged against them with my fists, shouting at the top of my lungs. My adrenaline surge diminished, letting horror burst forth once more.

I am inescapable… I have devoured spirits since men were young. Language is a curse… I have given them a calling… Man must always be a savage…Man is not animal…

The old man’s mental energy was approaching. I could feel him creeping up towards me, treading through the snowy path of the town.

I resigned my efforts and pivoted, to face my fate.

“You are not a god! Let me out of this town!”

The old man wore a long, red robe, and was naked. His body was a collage of wounds, gashes, pieces of hair and putrid yellow skin. His face, however, sparkled with intelligence, as his yellow eyes fixed upon mine. I had never seen a human so hideously deformed and so bewitchingly captivating. Truly, that would have been the body of someone who had survived since antediluvian times.

Displaying unnatural speed, he leaped on me, covering the last twenty feet which separated us.

His fingers were emaciated, slimy, and supernaturally powerful, as he forced me to the ground, clutching at my throat as if he sought to choke me out of existence.

Again, though, it was as if this heinous contact between us awakened some fire from deep inside of me. I suddenly had the wild thought, I had a spiritual animal inside me too. I found an explanation for the fire, while I wondered what manner of animal it might be.

Come to your god… Your curse must be ended…I hunger…

Like drawing a sticker from a rough surface, I felt his energy pull my spirit clean from my body, and suddenly, I was struck by the realization that I could no longer talk.

I attempted to utter a word in protest or shout out a cry, but my voice was gone. My brain was working furiously to reject what was taking place, but the facts were undeniable and did not lie. Whatever my spiritual animal was, it was the one that furnished me with the ability to command language.

The yellow eyes of the mad king twinkled as he raised his gaze to meet my spiritual animal. I rolled my eyes backwards to behold it as well.

A hawk-like creature, the size of a small truck, uttered a shrill cry from its strong beak, as it extended its wings, lush in feathers of multiple colors. It was mostly red and blue, with long, plump feathers. Its talons were sharp, its gaze authoritative and unforgiving.

I could see the initial pride in the demented king’s face alter to disbelief and bewilderment. Somehow, things had not gone as he planned.

What is this… Never seen before… Big hawk?

The fire inside me erupted once more, and I suddenly felt like I could battle his powerful grip on my throat. I twitched about wildly but he held me down like a fly while he still pondered the situation. I had overestimated my strength. He was still the closest thing to an immortal that walked on this Earth.

Come to me… Feed me… Come!

As the despicable spiritual necromancer extended an arm towards my spiritual animal, a surge of energy flowed through me, and my speech was restored. I had zero control over the words that shot out of my mouth like bullets, and yet, I could feel my absolute endorsement of them.

“I am Dragon Hawk!”

I felt everything, synchronized with my own heartbeats. My inner fire flowed to the dragon hawk, and it opened its beak wide, firing a continuous jet of flame at the old king, burning him to cinders.

As it turned out, the link between man and spiritual animal was not limited to the faculties of language. At that incredible moment, under those unbelievable circumstances, I had unlocked a far greater power.

As I rose to my feet, stared upon by all the degenerate townsfolk, who were stunned and speechless, I turned and looked at the dragon hawk that was I, with newfound pride and scientific awe. Nothing would ever be the same.

Signed, Dragon D. Hawk.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

The head doctor paced about the room, still holding on to the journal, still taking in what he had considered to be a work of literature or the musings of a deranged young adult. The implications inside this journal though, were astonishing, powerful and could not be overlooked.

“And you say you found this outside Dr. Draha’s cell?” He asked the nurse.

The nurse, a strong male, around 25 years old, nodded and eagerly added how the good Dr. Draha had mumbled incoherent nonsense and stood in a transfixed posture, facing to his right, without even twitching, for the past fifteen hours.

It had been two days since the mental asylum experienced its first ever incident of a doctor displaying unusual behavior. Dr. Draha had started twittering and chirping and singing outlandish melodies, while producing sharp, guttural sounds when he grew hungry. Swiftly, the facility had moved to isolate him and monitor his status, but everyone was perplexed as to what had befallen him, until this journal mysteriously appeared in the slit between his cell door and the corridor.

“Fetch me Dr. Sanders, I need a second opinion on this.”

The nurse nodded furiously and bolted towards the other side of the corridor.

Lost deep in his thoughts, the head doctor tried to recall whether his colleague, Dr. Draha, had ever undergone any sort of expedition such as the impossible one described on these hastily written pages of that journal.

The nurse had returned to the room together with Dr. Sanders and the head doctor was still pacing about and trying to remember Dr. Draha’s past, when a hellish explosion shook the building, and an alien, nightmarish cry pierced through all the floors and the air between them.

The fire alarm sounded and the floor was immediately showered with water, which ruined the journal that had slipped and fallen from the head doctor’s hands, into the wet floor.

On the floor below, a window was broken and both the two doctors and the nurse unmistakably heard the flapping of wings that hastened to the free skies.