The marble floor of Mourning Manor felt as cold as ice as Gillian’s boots struck the surface. The echoes of his footsteps bounced off the high walls of the hall, but to Gillian, the sound felt like hammer blows inside his skull. Ever since he stepped through the threshold, gravity seemed to have doubled, pressing down on his shoulders until he had to stoop slightly to keep his balance. The air around him no longer felt like oxygen, but like a suffocating black dust that stung his nostrils with the heavy scent of rusted metal.
Gillian groaned softly, pressing his temples with palms that were still trembling. He could feel the negative energy from the Estates Theatre crawling beneath his skin like thousands of burning caterpillars. The pulse in his eyes had turned into a sharp pain, as if someone were driving silver needles directly into his optic nerves. Every time he blinked, flashes of pitch-black light exploded behind his eyelids, forcing cold tears to stream down his pale cheeks.
"Sir, you look dreadful," his driver’s voice came from the direction of the still-open door.
Gillian did not look back. He simply raised one hand, signalling for the man to leave immediately and close the door. "Leave me alone. Now," Gillian replied, his voice cracked and hoarse.
The sound of the heavy oak door slamming shut felt ten times louder in Gillian’s ears. He winced, feeling a wave of nausea hit his stomach. This physical pain was not mere exhaustion from carrying out an assassination mission. This was the manifestation of the overflowing Eye of Death curse. The energy he had absorbed from the giant threads at the theatre was too vast, too foul, and now that energy was seeking a way out of his mortal body.
He tried to walk toward the long sofa in the centre of the room, but his legs felt as though they were made of jelly. His body lurched to the left, his shoulder hitting an old bookshelf hard enough that several small flower vases fell and shattered into pieces. Gillian fell to his knees on top of the broken glass, yet he did not even feel the sting of the cuts on his knees. The pain within his soul far dominated everything else.
"Breathe, Gillian. Breathe," he whispered to himself, though his voice sounded more like a whimper of agony.
He clutched his chest, feeling his heart thumping in a chaotic, irregular rhythm. Beneath his black shirt, the black line tattoo on his left wrist began to glow. It did not just feel hot; the skin around the tattoo began to blister as if scorched by an invisible blue fire. Thin smoke smelling of frankincense and dried blood seemed to emanate from his pores, filling the spacious room with a suffocating aura of death.
Gillian looked up, staring at the hall ceiling adorned with faded paintings. His vision shifted forcibly once more. He no longer saw paintings of angels, but rather black tendrils emerging from his fingertips, spreading across the floor and creeping toward the walls as if searching for prey. The negative energy wanted to destroy anything nearby so that Gillian could be freed from the pressure.
"No, not now," Gillian shouted, slamming his fist onto the marble floor. "Get out of my head!"
The sound of hurried footsteps came from the upper floor. Gillian knew those footsteps were familiar, but at this moment, he did not want anyone to see him in such a fragile state. He tried to stand, but his back felt as if it were being broken by a ton of weight. He slumped down again, his face nearly touching the cold marble. Cold sweat drenched his entire body, soaking his expensive shirt until it clung to his skin.
"What happened at the theatre?" a woman's voice rang out from a distance, filled with anxiety and demand.
Gillian closed his eyes, gritting his teeth until his jaw ached. "Don't come any closer! Stay back!"
The pain now moved into his bone marrow. He felt as though his blood had turned into boiling water being forced through every corner of his body. Every inch of his muscle suffered intense cramps simultaneously. He could feel the veins in his neck bulging out, throbbing in time with his accelerating heartbeat. This was the price he had to pay for letting the curse reach a saturation point without adequate protection.
"Gillian, your face is turning blue. You must sit down," the voice now sounded closer, though still hesitant.
"I told you to go! Are you deaf?" Gillian snapped, though he was gasping for air between his words. "This energy will kill you if you touch me!"
Gillian felt a warm liquid escaping his nose. He wiped it with the back of his hand and saw a dark red colour that was almost pitch black. Thick blood. The curse was beginning to damage his internal organs because there was no more room to hold the residual death energy from his victims. He felt like a glass bottle forced to contain a storm; cracks had already begun to appear, and an explosion was only a matter of time.
He crawled toward the stairs, trying to reach his private ritual room on the top floor. Every movement felt like dragging a weight of iron over a bed of thorns. His vision grew increasingly blurred, leaving only grey and black shadows dancing wildly. He could feel the presence of dark entities attracted to the overflowing energy from his body; they whispered in his ear, demanding that he surrender and let his body be destroyed.
"Not yet," Gillian growled with his remaining strength. "I am not finished."
He gripped the finely carved banister, his nails leaving deep scratches in the wood. The heat in his wrist became unbearable, spreading up toward his elbow and shoulder. Gillian could see the blood vessels in his arm blackening, as if thick ink had been injected directly into his veins. This was spiritual poison, the residue of the giant death threads he had seen at the Estates Theatre.
"Why is the reaction so violent this time?" another voice called out from the second-floor balcony.
"That building was a trap," Gillian answered with difficulty, his voice sounding like the grinding of stones. "A delayed mass death. I absorbed all of it."
Gillian tried to steady his breath again, but his lungs felt as if they were being pricked by thousands of ice needles. Every breath brought a pain that made his vision turn white. He slumped down onto the first step, leaning his head against the railing. The world seemed to spin at high speed around him. The ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner of the room sounded like the deafening boom of a cannon.
"How much longer can you hold it in?" the voice from above asked again, now with a colder, more realistic tone.
"I don't know," Gillian whispered. "It feels as if there is a fire burning my soul from the inside."
He stared at his own hands, which now looked foreign. His fingers were stiff and purplish. The scent of death emanating from his body grew more potent, filling the manor hall with a faint stench, like withered roses and rotting flesh. Gillian knew he was at the threshold. If he did not do something soon, this curse would tear his flesh apart and release that dark energy back into the city of Prague, creating a catastrophe far greater than anything he had ever imagined.
"You must go to the ritual room immediately," the instruction from above sounded firm. "The syndicate's shaman will not be pleased to see you like this."
"I know that," Gillian countered as he forced himself to stand again. "Open the door. I cannot turn the key with hands like these."
Gillian dragged his feet up the stairs one by one. Each time his foot landed, a stinging pain shot up to his waist. He felt as if his skin were being slowly sliced by a blunt knife. Sweat mixed with bloodstains dripped from his forehead, falling onto the marble and leaving dark spots that dried unnaturally fast. He was an executioner, yet at this moment, he was the one being executed by his own fate.
"Don't look at me like that," Gillian said as he reached the second floor and saw the figure standing there.
"I only see a man dying of his own greed for power," the figure replied in a toneless voice.
"This isn't greed. This is a curse I did not choose," Gillian defended himself, though his voice was almost lost to the wind blowing in from an open window.
The physical pain reached its peak just as Gillian stood before the door of his ritual room. A burst of static energy shot from his body, killing all the lights in the corridor in an instant. In total darkness, Gillian's eyes instead glowed with a faint, eerie silver light. He could see the flow of black energy coming from his chest, forming a hungry little vortex around his body.
"Open the door!" Gillian shouted again, now with a note of desperation he couldn't hide.
The large door in front of him opened with a soft creak. Gillian fell headlong into the room, which was lit only by dozens of black candles burning with blue flames. There, the scent of incense and ancient herbal potions tried to fight the smell of death he carried. He crawled to the centre of a circle of symbols painted in animal blood on the wooden floor. That was his place to dampen some of the storm raging inside him.
"Only temporary," the voice from behind the door was heard before the door closed again. "You know this is only temporary, Gillian."
"I know," Gillian sighed as he buried his face in the cold floor. "Only until I get the third."
Gillian curled up in the middle of that room, letting the pain shatter the remnants of his sanity that night. He knew that tomorrow morning, he would have to face the leaders of The Velvet Syndicate with a steady face, but tonight, he was just a man crawling on the floor, pleading for death not to claim him sooner before he could complete his final covenant. The ritual room sank into a haunting silence, leaving only the sound of Gillian's heavy breathing and the burnt smell of his skin, which was turning increasingly black from the curse.
Aksara