His shaking whispers splashed around me, “I am strong, I can handle this.”

Deep in the belly of the Earth, we walked in darkness.  Yellow flames danced from our torches like ancient dancers.  Red embers jumped and glowed in brief arcs.  Angry eyes blinking into the darkness as they fell.  The wet stone hissed in discomfort.  Muffled silence offered a thick muted rocky scream all around us.  He never took his gaze off of the ground, for if he had, he would see the dried river of bones and screaming skulls lodged into the rock above our heads.  My companion turned to me, his face fitted firm with fear, “Do you suppose the devil is near?”

“I have been with you the whole time,” I whispered as I drank the fire from his torch, and ripped his soul from his warm bones.  A cloud of white smoke clawed at the walls… swirled, grew dark, and was drown in the forgotten void.  I filled my stomach with his flesh and placed his bones into ceiling with the others.  By then, I had already forgotten his name.

. . .

© 2018 Zachary W. Gilbert