Coil of Worlds

When Skye first heard the voice, he thought the Kurites were tricking him, trying to make him fear for his sanity so he would tell them everything he knew. Namely, the Pyranni troops’ future movements. To make the voice stop, he would have gladly told them he knew nothing. It was unceasing in its ability to annoy him, yet the voice had never been this loud and obnoxious.

He now believed he was the only one that heard the disembodied spirit. The spirit continued its song. Oh! He is a big fair man, big fair man, big fair man… Oh! Big blue eyes, big blue eyes, big blue eyes… Oh!

The voice trailed off. After a few moments of silence, he sent a swift prayer of thanks to the Goddess. The voice found everything hilarious, and he was often a source for her many ditties.

He remembered the first day he’d spent in his cell, the first time he’d heard the voice. The voice had gone into a rendition about his private parts—verses even a tavern wench wouldn’t dare sing.

Since then, the spirit visited him at least two or three times a day, every day. Its songs and one-sided conversations never followed a single topic, changing tangents faster than he could blink. He’d tried to follow one of the nonsensical conversations one day when boredom hit. It was like trying to catch a hare with his bare hands. Although, yesterday he had barely caught himself from laughing outright at the spirit’s rather blunt observation of a human couple walking by at the time. The words made him chuckle even now.

Nothing like calling the man a thorn in a bee’s buttocks. As the couple walked by, he thought the woman, with a face that looked as if it could sting, must represent the bee. The man, who moved like a puppet from one of Dane’s family theatre productions, must be the thorn. The voice’s volume had increased the closer they walked to his stretch of tunnel, all without either of them showing they heard.

Turning away from his thoughts, Skye noticed the voice was still silent. Then he remembered the paka. Searching the area around his cell, he found her sitting close to the wall. Her coat was as black as midnight and difficult to see. The paka had never come alone before. Two days ago, he learned the creature was female; a fairly timid and small female compared to the others he’d seen. She had the gentlest eyes to grace a person or animal. He saw the eerie, unnerving intelligence there as well, though he scoffed at the idea.

Frowning as he scratched his itchy beard, Skye tried to think of a time when someone had spoken to the cat—paka, commanding her to move or leave. For once, she was easy to spot with her golden eyes glinting with flames from the fire. Unlike the other black pakas, she didn’t make him uncomfortable with her presence. She never did anything except come and sit on her haunches on the other side of his prison and watch him or the passing Kurites. Its stare was not of hunger or death but held curiosity and camaraderie instead.

Tonight Skye could almost feel her sadness and wistfulness. Shaking his head at his sentimental musings, he berated himself for fancies of personifying an animal. Perhaps it was a sign the lack of sunlight was affecting him.

He thought it odd when the voice paralleled the cat, huffing a long, drawn-out sigh. Something about the animal’s behavior troubled him, but it was soon buried as the sound of utter hopelessness and loneliness went to his soul. Shaking his head again in frustration, he closed off his heart and mind to the voice. Skye refused to show compassion to a spirit that no one heard except for him. It was sheer foolishness.

The voice’s next words made it difficult though. The maniacal laughter and the high-pitched voice was gone, replaced with a voice so beautiful he almost shivered for its purity. But as beautiful as the voice was, it couldn’t hide its despair.

I know how you feel, Pyranni. I truly do. I would not force a prison such as yours on anyone after the life I have been forced to live. The voice paused in its thoughts with a trail of tears that could be heard despite the lack of words. I know not how long I can live like this, so alone. Only if someone could speak with me, converse with me, laugh with me, I would feel as if I was in the hands of the Goddess.

The next words, spoken in a hoarse whisper, were a testament to her struggle. Truly in Her hands, as the Goddess alone hears my voice, this I wish.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he watched the paka rest her head down on her feet with her face turned away from him.

The spirit’s voice hit him next with such strength, he almost wept from its sorrow. With some effort, Skye kept his silence. He was afraid of the spirit’s power if she knew he could hear her.

The lilting voice was beautiful, singing a sweet lullaby mothers would sing to their children. The story, as he listened, was one of power and magic, but, most of all, he realized the voice sang of love. Love originally gained was lost in the end. The end was simply the beginning of another love in another time.

As she came to the end of the lullaby, he moved closer to the fire and stared into its depth. Skye could not conceive of a love beyond the brotherly affection he held for his battlemates. Even as a child, his parents never showed their affection beyond a smile or a pat on the shoulders.

To him, love was a fanciful dream for young girls waiting for their arranged marriage. Not for someone like him. The spirit sang of love as if it existed. Rolling his head, he gazed thoughtfully at the cat who slept curled on the other side of the barrier. He wished he knew why she visited him every day.

He whispered, “Sleep well.”

Sometime later Skye woke with a wince. The ghostly voice had begun its tirade of the few people traveling down the corridor in front of his cell. He couldn’t help but grimace at a particularly bad note. He sat up and put his head in his hands. The voice continued its screeching monologue. Raising his head from the useless cocoon of his hands, he sought out the paka from the night before. Though the animal was closer to the tunnel wall on the right side of his prison doorway, it had stayed the night.

He watched the paka track a scarecrow of a man striding down the corridor, a cloak wrapped around his body, and a stack of papers clutched in his two hands. As the man came within touching distance of the paka, he somehow tripped over the long flap of his cloak and stumbled into the animal. Skye watched the paka scamper sideways, trying to escape the scrawny man’s flailing arms. Through sheer force of will, the Kurite caught himself before gravity made him stumble in the same direction as the paka. In a tumble of arms and cloak, the man fell onto the paka, almost making the animal collapse under his weight.

The animal made not a sound throughout the accident. No growl. No yowl.

The Kurite, on the other hand, screeched loud enough in outrage people should have come running. When the sound of feet didn’t come, Skye realized it was still too early for most people. He turned his attention back to the drama unfolding before him. He watched the tall, thin-boned man come to his feet, still clutching the papers in his right hand.

He sneered, “God-cursed Paka! Get out of my way, you despicable creature. Worthless beast. If I had my say, the Pakas would have disowned you on sight years ago. Why your useless hide is allowed to live, I’ll never understand. You are a blight to this city. Even the Goddess has forsaken you.”

Still muttering under his breath, he straightened the wrinkles in his clothes caused by his spectacular fall. The paka moved a few feet away, her tail twitching in irritation, her body rigid with indignation.

Glaring at her, he said in a louder voice, “Why am I wasting my breath? Dumber than an ult, you are. Why the Pakas continue to give handouts to you, I’ll never know.” He threw up his hands in disgust, seeming to wash his hands of her. With a final sneer, he stalked away muttering to himself with the papers clinched in his hand.

The vehement female voice caught him by surprise. Confounded man. I abhor that man. Never a day goes by he does not go out of his way to set me in my place. The paka’s tail twitched back and forth. He acts as if I’ve been placed here by the Goddess as a curse to mankind.

With a silent hiss from the paka in the direction the man went, the voice continued, Rather, the Goddess wanted to curse me and placed him here to keep me miserable.

Skye’s mouth hung open in utter shock. With an audible snap, he closed his mouth and scrubbed his face with his right hand in the hope he’d wake up from the new turn of events.

It suddenly made sense. Though, surely it was impossible. The voice never spoke unless the animal was nearby. By the God and Goddess, he was an ignorant fool. The paka could speak. Reeling from the revelation, he shook his head in denial, staring at her with eyes wide in consternation.

The spirit was the paka.

The voice had always been the paka.

With her ears laid back, eyes at half mast, and body crouched in agitation, the paka glared after the man. Abruptly, the cat dropped her head in a pose that spoke of exhaustion and defeat in volumes.

I know not why I even become upset anymore, it is not as if anyone hears me. For the others, I truly am a nuisance. She glanced in his direction as if remembering his presence. Although you hear not what I say, I apologize most fervently for his behavior in front of you. It was uncalled for. He is truly a despicable man.

With those words, she gave him a slight bow, not unlike the courtiers in the court from his home, and left his line of sight. Despite his shock, Skye wanted to laugh at the absurdity of a formal apology coming from an animal.

Questions whirled amok in his mind. How was this possible? Why did no one in Pyran think the pakas could speak? How were they able to talk? And if all pakas could speak, why did that man not think the female could? Though it was unfathomable to him, the animal was quite intelligent. The words she chose, when not acting deranged, revealed her as highly cultured, intelligent.

Why could he hear the animal? He was not a heathen. He worshiped the true God and Goddess. He didn’t know how to practice magic. Skye jumped to his feet and paced with the restless energy that overtook him whenever he worked through a puzzle.

With fingers scratching the skin beneath his beard, he began with one piece of the puzzle he knew for certain. He was not the most avid worshiper in Pyran. But like all Pyrannis, he held both the God and Goddess in the highest esteem. His training was the product of his belief in the God and Goddess. After all, they were the reasons why the war with the Kurites had begun, to bring them the true religion. The ones who lived, the little ones—the Kurite children—would learn to revere the true Gods. Skye stopped in mid-stride and tossed his hair over his shoulders, cursing the loss of his leather tie.

The animal and the man had mentioned the Goddess several times in passing. While in the tunnels, his captors had also made references to the God and Goddess. What was the truth behind their faith? The Kurites could not worship the true Goddess since She rejected anything of magic.

So, it wasn’t possible the Kurites worshiped the same two Gods. No. If the paka could speak, then he was sure it was caused by magic used for evil. Perhaps the Kurites worshiped two of the old gods, ones that were now shrouded in myth in Pyran.

He crossed his arms as a slight shiver coursed through his body. He had never been certain magic existed until he heard the paka speaking. The very idea of magic made his skin crawl. A speaking animal was enough to make him rethink the idea he was going mad.

He ruminated about that for a moment. Surely Skye would recognize the beginnings of the curse. Surely there would be hints of the encroaching insanity.

Shaking his head, he forced himself back to the original plan. Learn as much as possible about the enemy. And when he had a chance, escape. But first, he’d develop a plan to learn as much about his enemy as he could from the paka.