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NOTE: These stories are
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Vorare/Ra'ab
A Vorare story
By
Ivan Ewert
Start at the beginning of the Vorare series

Gordon stood, bleeding.

His Ally was now in constant motion, more violent than ever before. The edges of his skin beat against the wind like prayer-flags in high mountains, scattering drops of blood across the frozen ground, across the screaming face and form of George, pinned by solid blood to that self-same ground, into the wicked dance of the bonfire, where it transformed into the hissing whisper of a thousand lost souls.

Agam stood, frowning.

"You led a host to me, little nameless spirit. You led to me a host - not even to a mortal, but a host, a creature of void and hunger. A thing without a soul to call its own, pulled by whim and fate and never a will."

The Ally remained silent as a scolded child. Gordon remained in place, as transfixed as George by the hunger to know more about the thing which had shared his skin for so very long, which had taken him from the peace of death and set him upon this abominable road of murder, sorcery and devastation.

"You gave away my name, little spirit. Because of you, I have been brought to dealing with these creatures for little joy and far less profit. Because of you I have walked this Earth for months, I have dealt with filth and dirt and effrontery, little nameless one."

His voice grew louder and more arrogant - the face and tone of the casual, modern man of business slipping from him as he approached Gordon. "What has occurred in my domain while my attention was here? What will I return to? I do not know, nor do you, and that, little nameless spirit, will not stand until you have named your Master and your path here."

The skin rippled along Gordon's forearm, beginning to tear the inner flesh of his elbow - and Gordon felt it, felt the pain of ripping skin, of muscle and tendon separating, and with a gasp which was visible in the chill March air, he went to one knee. Agam stepped closer, the firelight deepening the shadows of his long, thin face.

"You do not attend, little nameless spirit, and so your Master I will name."

"No," cried the Ally, its voice a pleading shriek. "No, Lord, no - I will answer as I am bound."

"Then tell me of your name."

The shriek came to a whisper. "I beg you, Lord, before my host ?"

"He will know your name ere he uses mine again!" Agam reached forward and took Gordon's wrist, jerking the arm and body forward as he plunged one hand deep into the wound.

Gordon's scream echoed through the night. The feeling was indescribable, an electric flame running along the bones of his arm, illuminating them with pain and power alike - a human lightning rod which coursed with hellish energy.

"I will know your name," said Agam. "Speak, spirit, or I draw you forth nameless and cast you into the wilderness your master reveres."

"Sheherim," whispered the Ally, broken now and all but inaudible. "Sheherim am I named."

"Sheherim," repeated Agam, "Good." He withdrew his hand, leaving only a finger hooked beneath the torn skin of Gordon's arm. Gordon writhed as a fish on a hook.

Speak his name, he thought, speak his name again and he will answer, it's a fairy tale, it's a movie, an urban legend, it's naming him in threes ? speak his name and he'll end this all one way or another, death or power, life and power, command, command for once, control over life and all ?

"Agam!"

Agam's head snapped to where George lay, where George had screamed the name.

"No!"

"Agam!" His chest rose and fell around the bloody spear, dry as his body had lost all blood, ribs cracking with the effort of every breath he drew.

Agam stepped forward, transforming in that moment to a shape wild and fierce, bestial and yet too terribly human. His claws seized for George's mouth, seeking to tear his tongue by the roots, seeking to stop the repetition of that name ?

"Agam!"

The world froze.

The fire no longer licked along the outbuildings of the Farm. The breezes which had caressed those flames ceased to blow. Only the terrible, triumphant baying of the hellhounds loosed by Agam still sounded in the air until Agam, his face and form and features returned to their mortal guise, stood and straightened his jacket.

"What would you of me, George?" The voice was pleasant once more, but below it - oh, below it lurked a furnace of hatred stoked by the promise of eternal pain.

George laughed, shaking and coughing, and pointed to Gordon.

"Kill him."

Agam turned, and a trace of a smile slithered onto his lips. "It is done, O my once-master. And now," he turned to George once more, the smile gone. "Die."

George's eyes grew wide, and were frozen. He did not move.

Agam turned his attention back to Gordon. "You," he said, "are very lucky for a man who's already dead."

The world snapped back into motion around the two of them. The pain had left Gordon now with the removal of Agam's claws, and the Ally - Sheherim, Gordon reminded himself, the name sounding both alien and terribly familiar - quiescent beneath his skin.

"You are also lucky to see that simply naming me a third a time will do you no favors." He stepped forward again, clasping his hands before him. "So I think we can take as read for now that we're both in fine, fine places."

"Do you speak to me ? sir?" Gordon could not bring himself to call Agam Lord, as Sheherim had, but he felt that caution was the word of the day.

"I do. You have a name now that will do you far more good than mine, Gordon. Your master is now your pet - under your skin and under your thumb. Ask for what you wish, and to the best of his meager and meaningless abilities, Sheherim will perform." The name rolled deliciously in Agam's mouth as he savored this victory.

"And what of us," Gordon asked. "Are we completed here?"

He found, with some surprise, that he felt the chill air in his lungs. He felt something other than pain, or resigned and muted terror. He was cold.

He was cold.

"Oh, no," said Agam pleasantly. "You and I will be bound for some time, Gordon. I have saved your existence more times this night than you can possibly imagine, and your actions - though not your will - have caused me a great deal of trouble. No, should I have need for you and your little pet, you will know it. Be assured of that."

"Then what's one more request?" Gordon said, and Sheherim moaned aloud into the darkness.

"That depends," said Agam. "Ask anyway."

"Would you please give me the name of Sheherim's master?"

Agam's smile was delighted, and he laughed aloud. "You will be a wonderful, wonderful fool, won't you? Why do you want this name?"

"If I have been doing Sheherim's will, I've been doing the will of his master as well. I'm not blind and I can see that what you want and what Sheherim wants are two different things, which means you shouldn't have much love for his master. And while I don't want to command anything of Sheherim until I understand the rules of how this works a damn sight better, if I already owe you then what's one more debt to be repaid? "

"You are clever," said Agam, and if it was meant as a compliment this time there was no earthly way to tell.

"He is the master of goats, he who hungers after sin, the strong mountain of the wild places." The winds shifted direction, coming now from the woods where Gordon and Sheherim had hidden. "He is the source of all desolate places, the navel of the hidden world, the edge against which the dust of man has hurled itself from the dawn of their days. He is the enemy of comfort and respite, and no, I will not speak his name.

"But you will learn it, Gordon." Agam turned to regard the burning buildings. "You're alive for the first time. You burn again."

Gordon looked at his arm, and saw that light - the light which Sheherim had revealed to him so long ago, the light of hunger and desire.

The incandescent light of the too-human soul.

"You want to know how to control your little pet? Then take the titles I have given you, Gordon, and as you study you will uncover his master's name and source and all he is."

"Thank you, sir." Gordon stood. "With your permission, I'll go now."

"Go," said Agam. "Go and learn and prosper, Gordon. Be ready when I call." He turned his back and walked away from the fire, toward the dying calls of the hellhounds, and into the darkness, and was gone from sight.

Gordon turned, breathing in the cold air. "Sheherim," he said, thinking of George's fate.

"O my master."

"Obey only me from this day on."

"O master," said Sheherim, "thy will be done."

Story and image by Ivan Ewert, Copyright 2008