The street felt dead.
A hollow silence clung to the rickety bungalows and crumbling flats like rotting mold. Streetlights flickered weakly against the dusk. Shadows slithered, yawning across the cracked pavement. Even the wind forgot to breathe.
At the center of the empty road stood a tall figure draped in a long, flowing black robe, its back turned to the world. On the robe, there was an ominous symbol embroidered upon its back; a serpent's head. Its emerald eyes gleamed as if alive in the dying light. The man's hair was as white as bones , cascading down his shoulders like a spectral waterfall.
He seemed immersed in front of a large, floating canvas. His hands moved with slow, deliberate strokes across it, the bristles of his brush whispering against the surface. What he painted was unclear….shapes shifted, its forms indistinct, like a chaotic dance of shadows and incomplete figures.
His movements were calculated. It left behind a trail of colors that seemed to blend and swirl together in a maddening dance.
The canvas seemed to absorb the fading light around the street, eerily pulling color away from the world.
The strange painter's shoulders shook with an amused chuckle as he sighed. "If you must skulk in the dark, Benedict, do try to control your breathing," he said, his voice low and husky. The sudden sound slithered through the silence like a sharp sword on flesh.
A figure emerged slowly from the shadows, his dark hair slicked back, his eyes gleaming with a mixture of intelligence and wariness. Benedict Grim, dressed in the finery of an aristocrat, bowed slightly to the painter. "Evening Lord," he said, his Victorian accent clipped and precise. A silk napkin held tightly to his nose.
Benedict could feel the aura surrounding the painter. It was an aura that made his skin crawl and his stomach churn. 'So this is what it's like to be in the presence of a 98 percent Inner,' he thought with unease.
The painter did not turn. His brush continued its work, his strokes growing faster, firmer, more defined.
"Are the preparations ready?"
Benedict's nose twitched as he inhaled sharply. " Of course Lord. The others are in place."
The stench became stronger. "A rather ghastly choice of meeting place, Lord, if I may say so."
"There's a stench about this place," he said carefully. "Hardly fitting for gentlemen such as ourselves."
"Your sensibilities are delicate," the painter remarked, adding another bold crimson stroke to the canvas. "You should learn to be more tolerant."
Benedict shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his serpent- encrusted ring glinting as he compulsively straightened his cuffs.
" Although there's a little hitch. The cub. It is beginning to grow," Benedict added, his voice low.
Benedict's jaw tightened. He stepped closer, lowering his voice further. " The others are worried. Particularly, the Councilor. They demand assurance. Nothing must interfere with the Purge. The Convergence is at hand, if anything should …"
"It is too weak," the Painter interrupted, as he calmly dipped his brush into a jar of black paint. "Too young in fact. It knows not what it is. It merely lies to itself."
He turned his head slightly, though his face remained hidden beneath the curtain of hair. "In fact," the corner of his mouth twitched,"it is about time I paid the cub a visit."
"And... if I may inquire," Benedict ventured cautiously as the painter returned his attention to the canvas, "what is it you're painting so... intently?"
A beat of silence.
The Painter moved a step, folding his arms slowly as he stepped aside, revealing the canvas in full view.
Benedict leaned forward and paled immediately.
"It's just a rough draft, I know it's unlike the original," the painter murmured softly as he drunk in the view himself.
The painting was of the very street, quite similar to the one they stood on. Every crack in the pavement, perfectly copied on the canvas. Every sagging window,replicated on the canvas by the brush. But then,there were the people…..bodies which lay strewn across the ground. Corpses, some bloated, some twisted in frozen screams. Dried blood caking the ground like paint.
The more Benedict stared, the more the rot seemed to seep from the canvas into his nose, his throat.
Benedict, against his better judgment, stepped gingerly around the canvas. His feet felt heavier with each step.
He staggered back.
The real street mirrored the painting. Bodies littered the ground in grotesque poses. Blood thickened on the walls. The smell. He gagged into his gloved hand and lurched back toward the Painter. He nearly stumbled on his own feet.
"The gods help us!" he rasped,his eyes wide.
T
he Painter turned his head slightly, his crimson eyes staring into space.
"The gods?
" he mused, almost to himself.
"I thought I killed them."