Idream-walked, and it wasn’t the type I liked. I invaded someone’s body.
At first, I didn’t know whose. But after thinking about the questions I had before bed—and feeling the extra appendage in our pants—I had a hunch.
We stared down at a sobbing female kneeling on blinding white floors. Threadbare cloth swallowed her malnourished form, vibrating with her cries. Her eyes pleaded with us as blood trickled from the cut along her neck.
I confirmed my hunch when black shadows reached out and absorbed her blood.
Ronen and I delved into her mind, watching her memory unfold like a high-speed movie, revealing every beautiful and tragic moment. We saw her as a cheerful child, watched her grow up and raise a family,saw their prosperity. Then their home was destroyed, their belongings taken, and their family left destitute, trying to make ends meet. The last image we witnessed was of her stealing from a local market.
We popped out of her head, black shadows seeping from her nose and dissipating.
“She stole a couple loaves of bread and some meat,” we said, turning our head and glancing at a male beside us. He sat in a golden chair with luminous white wings jutting from his white robes, his long hair just as devoid of color. Disdain twisted his lips as he sneered at the female at the bottom of the dais.
He stood and glided to the edge of the stairs, stopping right in front of her. Unfolding his hands from his robed sleeves, he reached out and hovered a finger a few inches beneath her chin.
“Such a sinful creature,” he said.
The female lowered her head and almost brushed the male’s hand. He jerked back like she was diseased.
“Kill her.”
Ronen flinched like an invisible blow had struck us. The next thing I knew, we were mentally battling a cold, all-consuming force that eclipsed every emotion he had. He fisted his hands, trying to hold onto his boiling rage, to fight against the force.
“She only stole food for her family, Etan. She isn’t evil. She’s starving!”
He tried to resist, pushing back against the force that urged his shadows to obey, but then Etan luscelered and grabbed his wrist. Pain seared into our skin.
I knew that pain. I knew that movement. Etan was carving a rune into Ronen’s inkless wrist.
“I didn’t ask for your opinion.”
The invisible force he struggled against cooled his rage and silenced his desperation. His fists relaxed, and an empty, cold feeling took over. There was no more emotion, no thought, no trace of the beautiful light that had filled his mind.
A light I hadn’t even noticed until Etan carved it away.
Who Ronen was—who he truly embodied—shrunk to a pliant shell.
Etan pointed at the female. “Send her to Hell.”
A fierce command shot into our mind, and black shadows launched out.
I wanted to screamDon’t do it, but I was just a spectator.
I tried to close my eyes, to shield myself from the horror to come, but I had no control.
So I watched.
Ronen’s shadows slipped into her nose, eyes, and ears. She screamed, then seized. Blood dripped from every orifice, sliding down her face in a gory mess.
Heavenly Hell, that poor female. She had a family. She had been innocent.
And Ronen—my chest tightened for what Etan forced him to do.
“Wrath to the sinners,” Etan said, shooting a searing blue flame at the female’s corpse, reducing her to nothing. “Come. There are more to execute.”
We followed the angel, and my heart raged in time with Ronen’s as he killed ten more lives that day. Every time, we tried to resist Etan’s commands. But the Hell Rune wouldn’t let us.
So, we watched their bodies burst. Rot. Burn. Over and over.
