Fallen Eagle-Chapter 16: Monsters Aren't Real

“It’s been three days.”
The quill in Demetrios’s hand hovered over the parchment, a tiny, indecisive bird. He wasn’t looking at the rough sketch he was meant to be refining - a grid of tilled plots to be carved into the fort’s packed-earth courtyard - but through it, his gaze lost somewhere in the middle distance. The captain was, as always, embarking on a new ambitious project. To use the vegetable seeds he’d purchased from the relief convoy for a vegetable garden.
The logic was sound, although the idea was novel. The vegetable yield, though potentially small, would give an invaluable degree of self-sufficiency that the fort previously lacked. It would take a long time to bear fruit, but the captain seemed sure it would be essential. Demetrios held back his worries that the sheer, back-breaking labor of it would tire the men and delay the wall’s reconstruction.
He sighed, the sound loud in the quiet study. It wasn’t the work that gnawed at him. It was Christo’s absence. He’d come to care for all the men in the garrison in his own way. And Christos was their unlikely poster boy, someone who had transformed from a thorn in the garrison’s side to one of its most dutiful recruits. He woke early, never complained, and gave his utmost in the various drills. Now he was three days gone.
“I know.”
Theodorus’s voice was a low murmur from across the room. He sat before his own small desk, a half-finished letter to a recalcitrant minor lord - one of the last holdouts to their coalition - lying before him. He hadn’t touched it in half an hour.
“I expected him back the day after he left,” Theodorus continued, his voice flat, betraying nothing. But Demetrios saw the way his fingers were wrapped tight around his quill, the knuckles white. “Yesterday at the latest.”
He set the quill down with a sharp, definitive click. The letter - and the petty lord it was addressed to - were left, entirely forgotten. “Assemble Leonidas’s Pentarchos.”
The name Theodorus had given to the five-man squads was a flourish of classical pretension to a now bygone era of Byzantine fortunes, but the men seemed to carry themselves straighter thanks to it. “All of them, my lord?” Demetrios asked, his own anxiety sharpening. Leonidas had been given command of the strongest, most aggressive, and most rebellious recruits, who just happened to be the garrison’s most capable fighters, a group Christos himself was a part of. To summon all four meant the captain wasn’t expecting to simply ask questions.
“Yes.” Theodorus rose, his face a grim mask. “We will go ourselves. We bring Stratiotes Christos home.”
Christos’s world was a smear of light at the edges of a universe made of pain. It came in waves, radiating from a hot, singular point behind his right eye that flared and pulsed, sending tendrils of agony down his neck, through his limbs, to the very tips of his fingers. He was floating. Not in water, but in something softer, cooler. A cloud. It muffled the world, cradling him. A woman’s voice, gentle and distant, was pleading with him to wake, but it was so comfortable here, so quiet. Heaven. He was close to heaven.
A great hand reached for him from the mists, its knuckles gnarled and knotted like the roots of an ancient oak. He reached back, his fingers stretching to meet it, but as they touched, the wood warped and twisted, hardening into the familiar shaft of his father’s shepherding staff. It backhanded him, the impact a splintering crack that filled his mouth with the taste of blood and shattered teeth. He tried to dodge, but the wood always found its mark. Hide. He had to hide.
His mother was there in an instant, a ghost in the fog, pulling him behind the scratchy wool of her skirt. His parents yelled at each other, the sound a warped, familiar lullaby he’d gone to sleep to his entire life. She never backed down, his feisty lovebird, his father would call her… until the day he broke her wings. The memory sharpened, the comforting cloud burning away like mist in a harsh sun. He was in his cot, the shouting a physical barrage against his senses. His father, a drunken stupor, late yet again. His mother was, predictably, furious. The shouting match was an endless barrage on Christos’s senses. The cloud…he just wanted to return to his peaceful dreams amongst the clouds…
The scene turned demonic. They became apparitions, their insults shaping them. His mother’s form grew thin and sharp, all jagged edges and righteous anger. His father’s shadow swelled first, swallowing the faint candlelight, before his body bloated with it, turning a dark, monstrous red, spittle flying from his lips like embers. It was a casual shove that hit her, not a full-force blow, almost an afterthought. She stumbled sideways, her balance lost for a single, fatal moment. The corner of the heavy oak table - the one they used to eat at together, a lifetime ago - met her temple.
The memory turned sharp and clear. He could remember it as if it were yesterday. The sound was small, a dry pop, like a twig snapping under a boot. Her body went limp, a puppet with its strings cut, and crumpled to the floor.
The monster his father had become seemed to shrink, the red draining from his face, leaving a waxy, terrified pallor. It was the only time Christos had ever seen him scared. He rushed to the body, shaking it, yelling her name, trying to will life back into her as the blood began to pool, soaking into the reed-strewn floor. There was so much of it. It was an ocean. The reeds writhed, turning from dry yellow to crimson seaweed. The floor dissolved, and the blood rose, a warm, silent tide that lapped at the legs of the table, turning it into a lonely island. His father stood ankle-deep in it, his cries turning to whimpers.
Then, the monster’s head turned. Its eyes, burning coals in the gloom, found Christos’s small frame in the doorway. He was supposed to be asleep. He should have stayed asleep. The monster rose from his mother’s body, the blood ocean swirling around its legs, and took a menacing step towards him.
“It’s time to remember your lessons, boy.” The voice was a garbled, inhuman growl, a sound dredged from the bottom of a well of pure hate.
He ran. Branches like skeletal fingers clawed at his skin, thorns tore at his tunic, but he didn't slow. The woods were a tangled nightmare, and behind him, he could feel the heavy, thudding footfalls of the monster. It was catching up. He was sure of it.
“Here.”
The voice was a sunbeam cutting through the gloom. He skidded to a halt, panting, and saw her. Golden locks framed a face with two emerald eyes that blinked at him, curious and bright, as if asking what could possibly be so frightening in the world.
“Agape!” The name was a prayer on his lips. Fear evaporated, and a wild, foolish smile stretched his face as he stumbled toward her.
“What are you doing, silly?” Her own smile was the warm sun, melting the last of the forest’s chill. “If you want to run, we can play hide-and-seek.” She laughed, a sound like silver bells, and then she was gone, a flash of golden hair disappearing between the dark trunks of the oaks.
“Wait, Agape! It’s not safe!” Christos yelled, his voice sounding childish and feeble even to his own ears. Her laughter answered, a shimmering echo that came from every direction and nowhere all at once. He chased it, heart hammering, catching glimpses of her - a hand, a sleeve, the hem of her dress - but never enough.
“He could be here at any moment!” he pleaded with the trees. “Please, Agape, come back! The monster!”
“Who, silly?” Her voice warped, the bell-like tone turning discordant and garbled, as if spoken from the bottom of a well. The air grew colder, and the light began to fail, the sky bruising to a sick, coppery red. He had to reach her. He scrambled up a final ridge, his lungs burning. There! The clearing!
Christos burst through the treeline and froze. The clearing was empty, its only inhabitants a sea of dandelions. Where Agape should have been, the earth was sunken and dead, filled with a pool of viscous, bubbling blackness that seemed to drink the dying light from the air.
“Monsters aren’t real,” came a whisper from directly behind his ear. The voice was a hot, wet gust of air, carrying a pungent stench of stale alcohol and bile that turned his stomach. Christos was paralyzed, his feet rooted to the spot. “You should know that, dummy.”
He didn’t want to turn. Some primal instinct screamed at him to stay frozen, to not look, but an unseen force compelled him, twisting his head around with agonizing slowness.
The monster stood there, its form a hulking distortion of his father’s, a possessive, triumphant smile twisting its lips. Cradled in its massive arms like a broken doll was Agape. Her simple dress was coated in the same black sludge that filled the pool, and it leaked from the corners of her eyes and mouth in thick, oily tears. Her head lolled to the side on a neck that was bent at an impossible angle.
As he watched, her emerald eyes, now filmed over with the black ooze, found his. Her mouth opened, and a sound came out, a wet, gurgling half-groan, half-scream, as the words fought their way through the filth choking her.
“I… need… you.”
A half-scream died in Christos’s throat as his eyes snapped open. Or, one of them did. The world on his right was a dark, swollen pit of nothing. Above him, a ceiling of old, nearly rotten thatch was pocked with damp patches, a testament to a dozen leaky repairs. He was in a cot, a coarse wool blanket drawn up to his chin. Where was he? Who had dragged him here? And, most importantly, how was he not dead?
He took stock of his body, or tried to. His arms refused his command, two leaden anchors that sent jolts of fire up to his shoulders when he strained. His ribs screamed with every shallow breath. His father had threshed him like a bundle of wheat, yet he hadn't finished the job. That wasn't like him. The old man never left a nail half-hammered.
The groan of a door opening echoed in the small room. It came from the right, from the darkness. He tried to will his head to turn, a fresh wave of agony crashing through him. Had Vassilis come back to finish it? The footsteps weren't his father's heavy, rumbling trudge, but a soft, deliberate shuffle.
A slender hand entered his field of vision, reaching for his forehead. Christos tried to flinch away, a pathetic, twitching motion. A damp cloth he hadn't realized was there was lifted, replaced by another, blessedly cool one. They were caring for him?
“Who… are you?” His voice was a stranger’s, a dry, rasping thing.
“Can’t even remember your old friends?” The voice was the one that had haunted his dreams for months, the only part of this blasted village he hadn’t wanted to forget.
“A-gape,” He forced the name out, straining to see her. The movement sent a flash of white-hot light through his skull. Her hand was on his shoulder in an instant, firm and steady.
“You’ll hurt yourself like that, you dollop. Sit still.” He heard her move, her footsteps circling the cot until she appeared on his left. “There. Now you can see me.”
Light brown hair, the color of dusty earth, cascaded around an angular face. Her eyes, a murky green, were deep-set and weary, her skin pale. She was thinner than he remembered. But her smile… it was the same mischievous, catlike upturn that made small dimples appear in her cheeks.
“Hello there,” He forced out with as much nonchalance as he could manage, the sight of her giving him a sudden surge of strength.
“You’re a right mess, you know that? Something’s definitely broken, I’d say.”
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“Several somethings,
I’d say
,” Christos gasped out the joke, stressing the manneirism. He’d missed her verbal tics.
“I don’t mean your body, you trounce, though that’s plenty broken.” She blew a sharp puff of air from her lips, sending a stray lock of hair dancing. “I meant your head. It’s not right. What were you thinking, waltzing up to your father’s home like that?”
Christos didn’t answer. He hadn’t realized he was smiling until it died at the mention of Vassilis.
“You could have died,” she said, worried. Or at least what passed for worry for her - a single quirked eyebrow and a displeased frown.
“Why didn’t I?”
Her smile became brittle. “Beats me.”
“I heard a voice… before I went under.” Christos’s gaze was intense. “Was it you? Did you stop him?”
Agape’s expression shuttered, her eyes a deathly stare that said not to ask questions. “Get some rest. You need it.” She rose and headed for the door, vanishing into his blind side again.
“Wait,” he hated how weak and desperate his voice sounded. “Agape… stay. For a little longer.” He hadn’t realized how starved he was of her until he’d seen her again.
He heard her pause in the doorway. “Why?” Her voice was cold, stripped of all warmth. “You didn’t stay, did you?”
The words hit him harder than any of his father’s fists. He had nothing to say. He hadn’t forgiven himself for running, not after seeing how the old man had ended up in his absence; so why should she?
He heard her scoff, a small, bitter sound. “Get some rest, little man. A lot has changed since you left this wretched place.”
“What has?” Christos croaked.
She didn't answer. The soft shuffle of her footsteps faded down a hallway, and the quiet of the room settled back in, heavier than before. Christos was once again alone with his thoughts, his pain, and his nightmares.
“It’s quiet,” Leonidas stated, his voice a low rumble that disturbed the profound stillness. “Too quiet.”
They had reined in their horses at the edge of Kerasia, and the silence that greeted them was not peaceful; it was a heavy, suffocating blanket. No dogs barked. No children’s laughter echoed from the spaces between the turf-roofed hovels. The windows were like vacant eyes, and the thin ribbons of smoke that should have been rising from the chimneys were absent. The village was a ghost. Except for a dark column of smoke that rose high up into the sky, a dark omen piercing through the pale blue horizon.
The air grew thick with the recruits’ fear. One boy’s hand trembled where it rested on his new shield; another’s gaze darted from shadow to shadow, seeing phantoms in every corner. Something was wrong here. Theodorus could feel it like a change in the pressure of the air. Inaction would let the fear his men felt fester, and he needed more information. He looked to Leonidas.
“Sergeant,” he said, his voice cutting cleanly through the tension. Leonidas turned to him, his own eyes sweeping the perimeter, alert and missing nothing. “Circle the village, wide and cautious. I want to know if these people have vanished or if they’re hiding. Watch for a Tatar ambush.”
The Sergeant whistled for the two smallest men in his pentarchos to follow him. Theodorus remained with the other two, gazing upon the village from their hidden vantage point. His mind, a historian’s machine, processed the data. This wasn’t a nomadic strategy. A stationary ambush in a village gave up their greatest strengths - mobility and shock. And what he saw lacked their signature chaos; there were no smashed doors, no signs of looting. This felt like something else.
Leonidas and the men melted into the woods like spirits. A tense silence descended upon those remaining. The wait was an agony, every rustle of leaves a potential threat. Theodorus remained perfectly still in his saddle, a mask of calm authority betraying none of the anxiety he felt, but his hand never strayed from the hilt of his sword.
After an eternity that was likely less than a quarter of an hour, the men returned. They emerged from the trees not with the brisk efficiency of their departure, but like men wading through deep water. Their faces were pale, their movements haggard. Even Leonidas, usually a pillar of stoicism, looked shaken, his jaw set so tight a muscle feathered in his cheek.
“Leonidas. ,” Theodorus barked, his own temper frayed by the suspense.
The sergeant met his gaze, and for a moment, Theodorus saw a flicker of something haunted in the veteran’s eyes. “The village isn’t deserted, Captain,” he said, his voice strained. “It’s… ” He swallowed hard. “You need to see it for yourself.”
They rode into the village, the clatter of their horses’ hooves a sacrilege in the dead quiet. As they entered the central square, they saw it. A grotesque monument of stacked timber and charred logs had been erected in the center. The two recruits who had scouted with Leonidas visibly recoiled at the sight of it. As they drew closer, the acrid stench of burned meat and scorched hair hit them.
“B-by the Saints…” Georgios, the awkward recruit who had befriended the sullen Christos, blubbered, his face turning a sickly shade of green. “I-Is that…?”
It wasn’t an edifice. It was a pyre. And staked atop it, a black, skeletal effigy against the clear sky, were the charred remains of a giant.
The last two days had been a masterclass in agony. Patience was a vest Christos had never worn comfortably and had been worn thin over the last two days. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t sit without aid. Relieving himself was a long, painful odyssey. There was only one silver lining in this entire shit-show.
“Hold still, damn you,” Agape snapped, the spoon hovering near his lips. “You can’t eat if you’re flapping your gums, you twat.”
He’d managed to guilt her into feeding him the broth herself, a task that made her stiff and flustered. Something Christos secretly delighted in.
“You leave me alone in this godforsaken shack all day, woman,” he retorted, his voice still a painful rasp. “If I don’t talk to someone, I’ll go mad.”
She was the only person who came. He was in the miller’s old maintenance shed, he’d figured that much out, but there had been no sign of her parents. It was as if he’d been squirreled away. Hidden.
“You’re already mad,” she said. “A mad fool who should keep his mouth shut.”
“If I shut my mouth, how can you feed me?” Christos bit back, a wide grin plastered on his lips. Their antics reminded him of the past.
“I just won’t feed you, then.” She shoved the spoon past his teeth as he opened his mouth to reply. “You’ll die a slow, miserable death, and I won’t have to be your wet nurse for another fuckin’ minute.”
Her words were barbs, but she hadn’t missed a single feeding. She kept a wall between them, her movements brisk and impersonal, but he chipped away at it relentlessly, trying to coax the old Agape out from behind the stone.
“So why are you feeding me?” he asked, his tone shifting. “Why go through all this trouble?”
Her movements stilled. Her murky green eyes, which had been fixed on the bowl, lifted to his, and for a moment, the hardness in them softened into a deep, familiar sadness.
“To make myself feel better,” She said, looking away. The mood turned heavy in an instant.
Christos’s own teasing vanished. “Did you mean it?” He asked, his voice barely a whisper. She went still again. “What you said that night.”
The memory was a phantom limb, an ache of a time that felt centuries away. The dandelion field under a full moon, the sweet, earthy smell of crushed stems, their bodies steaming a cloud so visible he was sure they’d be caught. It was the night he'd mustered up the courage to tell her how he felt. It was the last night he spent in this blasted village before he ran away.
She looked at him now, truly looked, and he saw her weighing the cost of the truth, deciding if the boy who had shattered her trust deserved to hear it.
“I did,” she said, her voice so soft it was almost the same whisper she’d used that night “But not anymore,”. She held his gaze as she delivered the killing blow. “In the end, that night didn’t mean anything at all.”
The finality of it hurt more than any insult she could have thrown, or any of his father’s strikes.
“Agape, I didn’t intend to run forever,” Christos said, his voice softly pleading, trying to convince himself as much as her. “I was going to come back stronger. Strong enough to beat the pissing shit out of the old man and-”
“And did you?” Agape cut him off, her voice freezing cold. “Because from where I was standing, all I saw was the same little boy getting the pissing shit beaten out of him by his father. Nothing had changed.”
She voiced the secret, terrible fear that had been his shadow since he’d fled. He hadn’t become stronger. It was all a lie he’d told himself. The air left his lungs, and he felt his body slump into the cot, a weight of failure settling over him that was heavier than any injury.
Agape rose, placing the half-empty bowl on the stool beside him with a sharp click. “You can feed yourself, if you’re so much stronger now.” She said, her voice dripping with a disdain that flayed him raw.
She turned and retreated into the doorway, leaving him alone once more in the gloom.
“You have to leave. Today.”
Agape’s voice was a whisper that cut through the haze of Christos’s apathy. He had spent the last day lost in a fog of self-doubt, but her words were a splash of icy water. She’d returned with the morning broth, setting it down with a clatter, but her anxious energy filled the small shack.
“Why? What’s happening?” He asked, pushing himself up on his elbows, every muscle screaming in protest.
“Today was the last day I could get for you,” she said, not meeting his eye as she began gathering his few belongings.
“Get for me? From Vassilis?” Christos swung his legs over the side of the cot, a spike of pain shooting up his spine. The word was absurd. His father didn’t negotiate. And what did Agape have to do with the 3-day allowance he was given?
“Get a move on, you idiot,” She snapped, trying to push him toward the door. Her shove was laughably weak against his stocky frame, but he rose all the same, the urgency in her touch more compelling than the force.
“I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell is going on,” Christos said, planting his feet. His towering frame filled the small space, but she didn’t flinch.
“I don’t think you’re in a position to demand anything from me,” Agape spat, her eyes blazing with a fire that stirred something deep inside him. It was too much, this was too fast. Something was amiss. He’d had a long time to think in the quiet darkness, and he’d started figuring out that the pieces of this story didn’t fit. His rescue, his recovery, Agape’s presence, and Vassili’s acceptance of all three. It was all too unlikely.
“Then I’ll wait here until the old man comes to explain it himself,” He said, crossing his arms.
A small, frustrated scream tore from her throat as she tried to pull him, a completely ineffectual gesture. “We don’t have time for this! He’ll come for you, and this time he won’t stop at just a beating, you fool!” Her panic was real now, sharp and desperate, her eyes darting toward the door as if expecting it to splinter inward at any moment.
Christos didn’t move an inch. He knew that, for all the barbs, Agape wouldn’t let him die. That night in the woods wasn’t meaningless. He’d wager everything on that.
“Go back to playing soldier, Christos. You’ll only get hurt,” She tried, her voice thick with a desperate attempt at her usual scorn, but her eyes were pleading. Whatever this was, it was serious. And a cold dread began to settle in his gut - it was worse than he imagined.
“Tell me what you’re hiding.” His tone was cold iron, an echo of the captain’s authority that brooked no disobedience. “What are you keeping from me? What did you bargain with Vassilis?” He was shouting by the end, his eyes wide as the horrible pieces began to connect in his mind. "How did you stop him from killing me?!"
A sob broke from Agape, and she turned to run. He caught her by the shoulder, his grip unyielding. “No! You’re not running from this!” He needed to know. He pulled her back, shoving her away from the door. She cried out, stumbling to the ground. The force of it tore the worn collar of her tunic, exposing the pale skin of her shoulder and the top of her chest.
And the bruises. A sickening constellation of old, faded yellow and new, violent purple.
Christos’s mind froze at the sight. The world tilted, a wave of nausea rising in his throat. A memory surfaced, dredged up from the depths of the tragedies he’d locked deep away: his mother, her back to him in the dim candlelight, rubbing a salve onto her own bruised skin. She’d turned to see him awake, hastily covered herself, and spoke with the saddest, most forced smile he’d ever seen.
“Go back to sleep, little dove. It’s past your bedtime.”
“No…” Christos breathed, the word a hollow thing.
I-it’s impossible.
The blood drained from his face, his mouth falling open as his hands began to tremble, not with rage, but with a dawning, absolute horror. “In his cabin… the woman’s voice… it was you.”
Agape lay whimpering on the floor, sobbing uncontrollably. “D-Don’t do it, Christos. ” Her beautiful green eyes seemed to shine like the emeralds he’d dreamed of for an instant. It was one of the most beautifully tragic sights Christos had ever seen, but the rampaging thoughts screaming in his head drowned it out.
“H-He’ll kill you. You can’t beat him. D-don’t go,” she begged him, half whispering, half crying.
He looked down at his own hands, coarse and calloused, so much like his father’s. Then he looked at her, the girl he loved, broken on the floor because of him. He had hurt her. And he’d do it again right now. Because there was no way in hell he wouldn’t absolutely murder the fucking bastard.
The Agape in his dream was wrong. Monsters were real. And monsters had to be eradicated.
The rage that filled him was not a hot, blinding fury. It was a cold, vicious, and cruel thing.
You don’t show your worth by shouting the loudest. You do it by proving them all wrong.
He turned and walked toward the door, not stomping, not shouting. Each step was the deliberate, heavy tread of a man marching to an execution. His face was no longer contorted in anger, but was a calm, chilling mask of resolve. He was going to prove them all wrong. He was going to annihilate that fucking piece of shit. Or die trying.
From the floor, a final, broken plea escaped Agape’s lips as she watched him disappear.
“Don’t go, Christos… I need you.”