1817: Untitled, Chapter 9

[Back to the start.]

---

They were flying.

Dora knew that she was in a bad situation, and worried about Magnus, but she couldn’t help enjoying the exhilarating experience. The golden figure — whom she had by now met several times before, but was quickly coming to dislike intensely — had snatched her up before she had realised what was going on, and was now carrying her under his arm like a cheap flatscreen TV scored in the January sales; a gift to be taken home as quickly as possible; a prize.

She was insulted by the implications of the way she was being carried, but also knew that were it not for her being carried like this, she might not be able to experience the euphoria of physics-defying flight she was enjoying right now. She felt pulled in two different directions at once; she hated the golden figure for the way he had behaved, but she loved him for the things he was letting her discover.

She had lost track of how long they had been flying or even how far they had travelled; the ground beneath them had flashed by in a blur, and she hadn’t been able to make out where they had headed. Abruptly, the flight came to a stop, however; the golden figure slowed and stopped above what appeared to be a country church, then gently lowered himself and his prize to the ground. When his feet touched the ground, he released Dora from beneath his arm, allowing her to stand on her own two feet. She staggered unsteadily; it felt strange both to be on terra firma again, and also to no longer be travelling as fast as they had been.

“Whoa there,” said the golden figure. “Take a minute to get your balance back.”

Dora frowned. She couldn’t understand this bizarre character; as she’d been snatched up, she’d felt like she was being kidnapped, but now he was concerned about her wellbeing? He wasn’t restraining her or holding her against her will? What was the deal with him?

Of course, he might as well have been restraining her or holding her against her will, since she had absolutely no idea where they had flown to. She didn’t recognise the church, and it appeared to be somewhere in the countryside well outside the city. It was a peaceful, relaxing environment; there wasn’t a trace of the perpetual background traffic noise that was everywhere in the city, and instead the only sounds that could be heard were the rustling of the leaves in the gentle breeze and the occasional hooting of an owl somewhere in the distance.

“Come in,” the figure said, approaching the church door and gesturing for her to follow. She hesitated a moment, then followed.

Inside, it was clear that the church wasn’t in active use, but it hadn’t yet crossed the line into “ruined” territory. It was still fully intact, just abandoned. Rows of pews were covered in a thick layer of dust, sad old candles sitting atop the detachable candlesticks every other row; faded hassocks adorned the backrests of each row. Images of sacred figures gazed down from the stained-glass windows, and the crucified form of Jesus gazed down from his cross that formed the centrepiece of the rood screen dividing the nave from the chancel. It would have been an attractive, quaint little village church had it been in more active use; now, though, it seemed slightly eerie.

“Let there be light!” bellowed the golden figure with exaggerated theatricalism. Instantly, every candle in the church — many of which clearly had not been lit for years — flared to life, filling the church with flickering orange light. It was a spectacular sight, and the golden figure clearly enjoyed every moment of it. Dora couldn’t help but be impressed despite her intense dislike of her companion.

“Sorry,” he said slyly, turning to her and shrugging. She couldn’t see his face, but she could imagine what expression it would have been pulling if she could. It wouldn’t be an expression of genuine remorse. “I just can’t resist doing that every time. Even when there’s no-one else here.”

“Okay,” she said absently, walking up the aisle. Her bare feet made little sound as she felt the cold tiles beneath them; she knew that if she had come here wearing her favourite shoes, however, that the clopping of the heels would have reverberated for several seconds inside the old building. She paused before the rood screen and gazed up at the crucifix for a moment, contemplating the son of God’s sad-looking face as he willingly submitted himself to his “punishment” and supposedly died for the world’s sins.

Dora had never really believed in religion, but then if anyone had told her that one night she would be swept away to the middle of nowhere by a radiant golden figure who could fly, she wouldn’t have believed them either. She found herself wondering what else was out there that she had taken for granted as not being true — or what strange and wonderful things there might be in the world that she had never even thought of once.

The church was silent for a moment. Then Dora turned from the screen and faced her companion.

“Why am I here?” she asked mildly. Her earlier exhilaration was giving way to irritability, but she did her best not to let that show; she could see from her companion’s encounter with Magnus that he was not someone to be trifled with, despite his apparently flippant attitude.

“You’re going to help me,” he said. He was confident in his statement, even though he hadn’t discussed it with her. This annoyed her further; she was her own person, and she didn’t exactly relish the thought of taking orders from this… was “person” even the right word?

“What makes you think I want to?” she said. Her facade of calm was quickly fading. “And what am I supposed to be helping you with?”

“Because it’s the right thing to do,” he said. “And we’ve already been through this.”

It was true: they had. Dora hadn’t given the full story to Magnus when they had compared stories shortly after their respective strange experiences had begun. While their experiences had been, for the most part, fairly similar, despite the opposition of the light and dark perspectives, there was one key way in which they had differed: what their apparent objectives were. Magnus had mentioned that his own strange companion figure had said something about the balance between the light and dark being thrown out; what Dora had not shared, meanwhile, was the fact that the golden figure standing before her right now had taken a somewhat different view of the situation: he had informed her that she was going to play a key role in wiping out and destroying the darkness completely and utterly.

“Think about it,” her companion continued. “Consider your shadowy friend we saw earlier — Marcus, was it?”

“Magnus,” she corrected him, though she had a feeling the error was deliberate rather than based on poor memory.

“Your friend is consumed by Darkness,” he continued, ignoring her comment. “Wouldn’t you like to help him? Wouldn’t you like to stop his pain? Haven’t you thought to yourself time after time that you want to save him?”

She said nothing. She couldn’t deny any of the things that her companion was saying, but she knew that his interpretation of them differed very much from her own, particularly if the sad case of Stacey Barman was anything to go by. She had little doubt in her mind that her companion genuinely did see his murder of Stacey Barman — for Magnus’ story had convinced her beyond question that the golden figure was responsible for the girl’s death — as “saving” her; as releasing her from pain.

That, in itself, was frightening, but what frightened her more was the dawning realisation that assumptions and associations she rarely had cause to consciously think about were being proven wrong every moment: she had always made the unconscious mental connection between the concept of “Light” and the concept of “Good”, but it was rapidly becoming clear to her that this most certainly was not the case, at least not if her companion was anything to go by. Similarly, despite Magnus’ embrace of — or at least being taken in by — the Darkness, did not make him an agent of “Evil”.

She knew him too well to think of him as evil. She knew him too well to believe that he could ever commit an evil act, even with his new powers: if he was truly evil, he would have wanted to exact revenge on the one who broke his heart, but instead, despite how deep into the darkness of despair that woman had sent him, he remained contemplative and accepted his own role in the way things had gone; he had taken responsibility for the things he had done as much as he had blamed her for the way in which she had handled things. She admired that, and wasn’t sure she could do the same thing, and yet she was the one who found herself infused with light and radiance?

“Well?” said her companion.

“I do,” she said defiantly. “But I’m going to do it my way.”

He laughed at her. Then he stopped abruptly.

“Oh, you’re serious,” he said gravely. “How adorable. I’m not sure you quite understand the situation. So let me put it in terms you might be able to comprehend.”

He walked slowly up the aisle towards her, his golden radiance seeming to grow as he did so. Although the sight was quite beautiful, she also found it spine-chilling. She didn’t know what was going to happen next, but it wasn’t long before she found out.

“Kneel,” he said, pointing to her. She complied immediately.

“Grovel,” he said, his finger still pointing at her in an accusatory manner. She complied again, touching her head to the floor in a gesture of complete supplication.

“I don’t think you understand,” he said again. “You cannot just use the Light as you see fit. Everything we do is for the greater good. And you need to learn that. You need to learn to put aside selfish concerns and think of the greater good. You need to learn. Stand.”

She stood.

His arm still outstretched, her companion opened his hand, palm outwards towards her, and she felt herself lifting off the ground, her bare feet no longer touching the cold, chipped tiles of the old church’s floor. She was flying, floating, completely out of control of her own body. She floated until she felt something digging into her back, and realised that she had been pushed up against the rood screen; the sharp thing in her back was, presumably, the crucifix she had contemplated earlier. Now she was the one in the submissive position, but she didn’t feel like her sacrifice, unwilling as it was, was going to achieve anything.

Nor, it seemed, did her companion. He clenched his fist and pulled back his elbow. As if yanked by invisible chains, she was pulled to the ground, her whole body slamming to the ground with great force.

Such was the shock of the sudden movement that it took several seconds for the pain to register. Then, suddenly, it was everywhere in her body; she couldn’t move; she felt like all her bones had been broken. The agony was so much that she felt like she would pass out — then, as quickly as it had come, the pain was gone again, and she found herself being helped to her feet.

Surprised that she could stand and tears still falling from the corner of her eyes from the agony of just a moment ago, she looked at her assailant, who just nodded.

No, she thought. Light was not Good at all.