Erik was back where it all started...

Back in Covenport, back in the alley where Lisa had been taken from him. The rain fell in a fine layer, like an insubstantial spider web that was shifting in the breeze from the sea. He was cold and dirty. Mud stained his clothes and was smeared over his features, stubbornly resisting the rain that tried to cleanse him. He stood right in front of where they had found her, where her cold, broken body had been stretched out amid the filth of the street like a lotus blossom sprouting from rubbish. It was here that she had been raped, killed, her face marred with the word "WHORE."

He stood there, unmoving, for what seemed like an eternity, the ragged blindfold clutched firmly in his hand. Nobody else passed through the alley. He was alone, apart from the thing in the blindfold, the thing that pushed against the borders of his mind like the waves of a vast ocean.

The rain subsided at last, and the clouds were gently torn apart by the pale moonlight. Erik knew it was time. He willingly opened the gates of his mind as he put on the blindfold.

There was a strange sensation. It felt like snowflakes falling on naked skin after hours of exertion. He felt strangely at peace, calm after the turmoil of the last days... And when he opened his eyes again, now obscured by the blindfold, he saw the world with eyes that were not his, eyes that were not human.

He could still see the street, blurry and insubstantial, as if it was there but not important enough to really be seen—like a memory from a fading dream. Yet, as strange as this new perception was, it seemed as natural to him as if he had never gazed upon the world in any other way. He looked down, and his sense of peace was washed away.

The ground where Lisa's body had been found was still empty, but he could feel her presence as though she were truly lying in front of him, could feel her fear like a cold hand on his throat, could feel her shame, her disappointment... her sadness. Deep inside he knew this sadness came from her last thoughts about him. It was born from an understanding, a knowing that they would never be together again in this world.

A strange sensation of chill peace tried anew to wash away the pain, tried to soak up the rage that was rising again...

It was like an ocean trying to quench the sun.

Erik wouldn't allow it. He welcomed the pain, the sadness. He absorbed it, inhaled it, and kept it close, never wanting to let it go, never wanting to let her go.

And then he picked up the stain of something else. The one. The murderer that had taken her from him! The residue of the deed had mingled with his soul, and like a bloodhound, Erik followed this smell. He quickly became aware that the gray world that had replaced reality seemed to bend to his will in different ways. Newfound power allowed him to easily climb walls in order to pursue his prey even faster. Without consideration, he leaped from roof to roof with the ease of a child jumping over a rivulet of water.

So focused was he on his hunt that he barely noticed how sick the city was. He came across areas tainted by a residue of violent death similar to Lisa's. While he dashed across the rooftops, he saw bright, insubstantial figures down in the streets: bubbling cauldrons of memories, deeds of good and evil. He knew that these things were humans, and he could read from them as a scholar could from a book. So many sins, he thought.

A short while later, Erik had crossed a distance that was both huge and meaningless. In this surreal world, the only things that seemed to matter were the bright lights that humans' spirits were, and the one that was wandering down the street just below him became the most important thing in his world.

Lisa's killer—he had finally found him.

He knew it was a man, but he could not see his features due to the boiling emotions and energies that flared brightly from under his skin. However, he could see the darkness in his spirit, in his very soul. He could feel the deeds of evil that the murderer had committed. He could also feel the good things that the murderer had accomplished in his life, but for Erik they were meaningless. The only thing that mattered was one dark deed lingering in him: the memory of how he had raped and killed Lisa.

The hatred burned within Erik like a furnace, and he wanted the killer to suffer. The thing that was giving Erik his strength cared not about any of the other deeds the murderer had committed; it cared only for ending a life, any life... In this regard Erik and it wanted the same end, but whereas the thing's intent was without malice, Erik's intentions were much darker...

It would not be over quickly.

As if in response to his silent vow, Erik felt his body change. His fingers and nails grew hard and lengthened, turning into bone daggers. He ran them along a wall; they left deep marks in the stone, slicing through it with the ease of a hot knife sunk into butter. He dropped down from the roof and into the alley, grinding the cobblestones as if he were a giant fist, all thoughts of secrecy forgotten. It was a back alley, small and empty apart from him and his prey. It was fitting, since it resembled the place where his Lisa had died.

With a speed unmatched by any living creature, he closed the distance to the murderer in a heartbeat, batting away the sword his prey had drawn in a feeble attempt to defend himself, crushing it as well as the hand that was holding it. Another clawed strike later, and the jaw of the murderer was ripped off; blood that Erik perceived as life force was gushing from the wound and splattering him. The murderer was collapsing, but Erik wouldn't let him. He grabbed his throat, feeling the hot blood flowing over his hand, while at the same time the coldness in him was soaking up the life force like a sponge. Erik understood that his touch was killing the murderer as surely as any weapon would, but he didn't want to end his life so easily.

No, there would be no easy end for this one.

Erik snatched the broken sword from the ground, slammed the murderer against a wall, and forced his arms upward until they crossed above his head. Then he rammed the broken blade through flesh and bone, pinning the struggling wretch against the wall like an insect.

Erik took a step back, glaring at his victim, who, with his jaw gone, grunted unintelligibly.

Thoughts, feelings, and emotions boiled under the murderer's translucent skin, but with Erik's new perception came insight. He could read him, could understand the ever-shifting vortex of spirit and soul. It whispered to him, and with a mind that was only partially his own, he saw the dark deeds of the murderer, flipping through them as if they were merely pages in a book.

Then he found it.

The deed! It was as if he saw through the eyes of the murderer himself, and that alone was almost enough to drive him insane. He saw through the murderer's eyes as he followed Lisa, approached her, spoke to her... He could not understand what was said; he could only feel. He could feel Lisa's fear, feel the murderer's lust, feel her anger... Then, he could feel the ire of the murderer—strong and boiling. The murderer grabbed her, forced himself on her. She bit him. He drew a dagger. She screamed... Blood... so much blood...

It was too much for Erik.

Like a mad animal, he stabbed and shredded the murderer's body with his claws, butchering him, tearing him to pieces. When he was finished, only the upper half of the torso, still fixed to the wall, was in one piece—and his victim was still alive. The power within him allowed him to do this, to prolong the process of dying. The murderer deserved this little taste of hell.

He suddenly felt empty. The rage was gone; only dolefulness remained. His power was draining, as was the life from the tortured body. It would all be over in a matter of seconds, Erik knew. Wearily he raised hands that had turned human again, lifting the blindfold. Maybe after he looked the killer in the face, he would find peace.

He found living hell instead.

He did not see the features of an ugly thug, but a mutilated face that Erik knew better than his own: Torai's.

A dry gurgle, as if from a man whose lungs had filled with quicksand, escaped Erik's throat as he stared into the face of his best friend. In his tear-filled eyes he could see many things: surprise, horror, sorrow... and shame.

Then the last spark of life left Torai, and his eyes became as still as the cobblestones below him.

Erik screamed.

It was a scream that shattered his mind.

***

The warrior dove aside as another crossbow bolt buried itself in the sand where he had been standing. He was huffing and puffing like a raging bull that had been teased for hours, and in a way he was exactly that. Neither the court herald nor the nobles had taken kindly to his refusal, yet they hadn't been particularly surprised either. Shortly after he declined their offer, the court herald had announced that the lords and ladies might now purchase their "Right of Retribution." After that, it had been relatively quiet for a while as the nobles suddenly focused on something beyond the warrior's view. He had not known what this Right of Retribution was until the first bolt had been fired at him. The projectile missed him by several feet, but he understood well enough what was happening.

They were shooting at him as if he were a fish in a barrel!

They had paid for the right to slay the man who killed the Brass Executioner, and since then he had been on the move, always trying to anticipate where the next bolt would come from—a task that was complicated by the fact that the nobles were not taking turns, but rather were firing when they found it convenient. It was chaos. There were dozens of men and women clumsily aiming large crossbows at him, giggling and jesting while they sent one bolt after another at his dodging form. He noticed that the bolts were marked with different symbols and colors, much like the arrows of hunters in a hunting party, who used the marks to prove who had dealt the killing blow on game. Luckily for him, the nobles that had fired at him so far were lousy shots. Dozens of bolts had missed him; only two had nicked his skin.

It did not matter. He was exhausted, and had managed to avoid the shots more by luck than by skill... Soon someone would be fortunate enough to hit him. As the thought ran through his head, a bolt finally did, burying itself deep into his right calf. He stumbled, fell, and roared a curse that was lost in the cheering of the crowd.

With a jerk he ripped the crossbow bolt from his calf and tried to get on his feet. Then an invisible fist punched him in the chest, and he fell again, landing flat on his back...

He tried to get up, but he couldn't. Dizzily he lifted his head and saw a black shaft protruding from his chest.

"Oh..." he managed to grunt; then everything went dark. 

***

Erik screamed. It was a scream so full of pain that it would make an angel cry and a daemon know pity. He fell to the ground as the memories washed over him, his hands clasped around his knees. He was rocking back and forth as tears of terror streamed down his face. Bran crossed the room, sat down next to Erik, and gently patted him on the back as a father would a hurt child.

An hour passed before Erik finally calmed, an hour in which the memories of thirteen more murders flooded back into his mind. As if to compensate for the pain, Erik confessed everything that had happened. He told Bran how he killed his best friend, who was also the murderer of his beloved. He understood now that the deed had torn him apart and left him broken, and that he had somehow "chosen" to forget. His mind, unable to bear the magnitude of it, had locked the night away. But this defense mechanism could only shield him for so long...

Having forgotten that he had already taken his revenge, his anger would return. Like a bloated corpse rising from the bottom of a swamp, his feelings would resurface from the darkest recesses of his subconscious, bringing with them the pain of loss and hatred. Unwilling to accept the horrible truth, he was cursed to relive the twenty-three days again, becoming more furious day by day, his rage now aimless. A rage that was searching for an exit and for a murderer who had already been punished.

On the twenty-third night, he wouldn't be able to bear it anymore, subconsciously searching for the soothing peace the blindfold brought. He would wander to the place where he had hid it. There he would find peace and pain in equal measure.

He would give himself to the thing in the blindfold, but the power had an agenda of its own. Guided by the rage of a righteous man, they went out and punished the ones that were corrupt. And in a city like Covenport, corrupt men were crawling the streets like maggots on a rotting corpse.

He would take revenge on society, soothing his pain in the form of the Sinripper. He showed everyone how evil and defiled they really were, but the memory of why he did it was always too painful for Erik to embrace. So he would forget again, cursed to be Erik in one life and the Sinripper in another, until tonight. Until the circle was broken.

Bran listened without judgment or comment, and only when Erik had finished and fallen silent for a while did he speak.

"I understand," he said, "and I am sorry that I had to force you to remember. But you have to realize, you are not truly Erik anymore. You are the Sinripper, but that is just a name for something that was old before this world knew life. You have to accept that, and trust me: if you fully embrace what is in the blindfold—welcome it within you—your pain and rage will be a thing of the past. You will have peace."

"Peace," Erik whispered with the longing of a man who was dying of thirst and had been offered water.

He turned his head, meeting Bran's calm gaze. "How?"

Bran looked at the blindfold in the closet and said, "Put it on. I will help set you free. You just have to embrace the peace."

He helped Erik to his feet. He felt as weak as a newborn child. Together they went to the closet. With a shaking hand, Erik grabbed the blindfold, and a rush of pleasant anticipation filled him.

Peace, he thought.

He lifted the blindfold to his eyes and, welcoming the calming sensation of its touch, put it on. Then he turned around fearfully, afraid of what he might see in Bran. To his surprise, it was the most comforting sight he'd had in a long time, because he could see nothing. He could not read him as he could all the others.

There was just Bran, his skin semi-translucent. Where the swirling vortex of memories and energies normally was, there was only darkness. No images of horrid deeds or feelings flooded Erik's mind, and he was not afraid of the inhuman arm that was now clearly visible to him, an arm that moved carefully toward his face.

He felt a clawed finger, cold like a dagger made of ice, move between the skin of his head and the blindfold, but still he did not fear it. The claw put pressure on the fabric, and Erik could hear it rip slowly, somehow knowing that only a few things in the world could have been able to slice through the material.

"Men may call us monsters, but they know so little," Bran said.

With a final ripping sound, the fabric was torn off, and an ocean of ice flooded into Erik's open and welcoming mind.

"Welcome back, brother," Bran whispered.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Author's note:

Life is but a dream and at its end we all wake up...

I hope you enjoyed everything so far, if you have any sort of feedback for me, I'd love to hear it.

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- M.