The Batman. by hennethgalad

Chapter 1

Read Chapter 1

 

   

  All Númenórians are reckoned to have a drop or two of elvish blood in their veins, some more than others. It is no longer a matter of kinship with royalty, for even women carry the blood, and not all marry well. Some then, have full beards as the Men of old, others are scanty of hair, on head or chin. I myself, unusually, have hair only on my head, having neither beard nor the hair of maturity that grows on the flesh. I am as smooth as the elves, though I myself have never seen them. This was nothing more than a curiosity until my twenty fifth birthday. 
   I should say a little about myself, for what it is worth, for I am a nobody, the son of a sailor and the grandson of a wheelwright. But all were slain in the great war, and we were not permitted to grieve them, for the King was victorious and all must smile and praise him with great praise. But even here in Armenelos, where I was sent to my aunt after the early death of my mother, even here they look at Zigûr standing (truly) behind the throne of his erstwhile captor and they wonder who has won.
   But I, I am a humble cleric, with a minor role in the imperial administration, and there is a great deal to administer. You cannot imagine until you think about it for a while, but every rope, every nail, every loaf of bread is tallied and accounted. The tedium is unimaginable. But my seat is by a high window, and I while away the dull hours dreaming of taking to the air with the wide white gulls, uttering a mocking screech at all the nasty little men who turned the magic of the world into columns of figures and the wealth of the land into hoarded stores surrounded by dustbowl and wasteland. 
   
   Sometimes I find it hard to believe that people like elves really exist, and sometimes I am drunk enough to say such things to the innkeeper, but he is an old friend and would never betray me. And at such times he begs me to go to the mainland, to the Havens, where the elves live yet, and I am reassured, and carry on my dull life, in the city of hate. The killings are so regular now that they pass without comment, and what, after all, could be said, but a screech of horror like the innocent gull.

   They took me on my twenty fifth birthday, a man I was unaware of had been watching us all evening, but when he rose to his feet, his eyes met mine and my throat was stopped with cold dread. Guards converged on me, my friends scattered and within minutes I was bound and naked and kneeling before Ar-Pharazôn, and Zigûr. The beauty of Zigûr needs no description, his likeness is everywhere. He leaned on the back of the golden chair, his elbow bent, his chin on his wrist, watching me with hot and cold eyes. But the King spoke to me
   "You are an elvish spy."
   "Sire, no! Sire, I know nothing of elves, I have never left Númenor, I get sick in boats."
   "You look like an elf."
   "Sire, forgive me, it is a matter of birth, I cannot grow a beard, though I wish that I could." (Never more so...) 
   He looked over his shoulder, Zigûr stood slowly, there was a deliberateness to his every gesture, if movement could be expressed as sound, he was drawling. But he moved to stand before me, his back to the King, and nodded to the Guards, who hauled me to my feet. 
   
  I cannot speak clearly of what came next, his golden eyes gazed into mine and I was lost. His thought seemed to scour through mine like a storm wind blowing open the windows and throwing everything into turmoil. Their words came from far far away. They did not speak to me, but, as I discovered later, about me.
   "You may not sail West. But what of flight?"
   "That’s all very well Zigûr..."
   "This one."
   "Can you really do it? A spy would be incredibly useful, any advance knowledge of the enemy’s positions... But I do not see how it could be done..."
   "You are the King, sire, it is for you to command, as, 'build me a bridge' and for others to find the way. I have found the way, that is all."
   "You mean, you have already done this thing?"
   "No sire. Not yet. But I am certain. This one."
   "How long will it take?"
   "Too long to interest you, sire, for it is not merely a matter of structure, but of function. It will be very challenging. But leave everything to me, trust me, sire, I will do this thing."
   "Very well, take him, you know what you are doing, I am sure of that!"
   They laughed together, and I was carried up endless stairs and thrown onto a bed hung with black and scarlet, with dark gems in spiralling patterns in the dark wood. 

   His first touch was cold, he smeared salve on me, to ease his passage, and instantly I felt the great girth of him forcing into me. I could not protest, I was close to senseless with terror, but his spell worked its dark magic upon my flesh, and my body opened for him, and I became drunk with the effects of his desire, and we found relief together. He slid out of me and lay back with a great sigh. "It’s so long since I had a fresh elf, it almost seems a waste... But there, by the time I am finished with you, I shall be bored of you, so it doesn’t matter. Well, we might as well do it now and get it over with."

   What happened next is hard to describe. He untied my hands and stood me in the middle of the great round chamber, and stood before me, gazing into my eyes. 
   "You dream of flight. You wish to fly." I nodded. He gritted his teeth, the beautiful skin hollowed under the sharp cheekbones, and his long dark lashes almost brushed my face. Then suddenly I was gone, he was alone, I had vanished, and a new creature began to form in the space where I had been. Absurd... I think it did not truly happen as I experienced it, it would be bizarre... But then the fact of my existence is bizarre beyond belief. However many pictures may be drawn, and records kept, it will not be believed. 
   But for a moment, a while, an eternity, I was nothing more than the glow in those golden eyes, and in that moment he reshaped my body, as a child with clay.

   It was agony. It was burning pain, excruciating torment. My bones burned with acid, my skin stretched like overwrought dough, my muscles tore in movement, I threw back my head and screamed, and his hands were on my face, pulling my eyes to his, possessing me with his will, as he hollowed my bones and stretched my skin and my fingers grew and grew... 

   I fell into the darkness then, for an unguessable time. It may be that I have never awoken, and that all this is merely a fever dream. Oh I wish it could be so...
   But at last I was shaken awake, curled like an unborn child, thinking at first that I was numb, and that he was taking me again, and that the moans of ecstasy were mine. But when my eyes cleared there was another beardless youth, of far greater beauty than I, bound to the great bed, writhing in his chains, close to the bliss of release. The golden eyes turned to me, as Zigûr hammered into his prisoner, and a small gold knife appeared in his hand. He paused then, and gripped the dark hair of the youth and wrenched his head back, baring his throat, and drove the knife deep into the smooth flesh. The blood welled, and then spurted, the youth gasped, shuddering, then began to soften as the desire, and the life, flowed away. Zigûr gestured to the wound with the point of the knife.
   "You must drink or you will perish in agony. This one is already dead, will you die with him? Will you die in vain?"

   I cannot excuse myself. It is plain that I yet live... But I must record that my taste had changed with my flesh. For it had not been my custom to eat the flesh of animals, and the notion of drinking the living blood, not of an animal, but a man of Númenor... I would have viewed it with loathing. But I was changed. I raised my head and lapped at the dark red warmth, and felt the metallic salt quicken my blood like strong drink, and I fastened my mouth over the wound and drained the blood from the dying youth, until Zigûr pulled me away, and delicately dabbed my lips and then lifted me to my feet. 

   The wings were longer than I am tall, and wrapped across my chest, as one who holds their hands spread across their front. But my fingers... My fingers were so long they wrapped around me, almost meeting behind me. And the skin... The skin between my fingers was thin and leathery and covered me like a cloak. He stood before me, filling the world with his golden eyes, and I could feel the immense power of him, almost lifting me from the ground with his will alone. It was like drowning in brandy. I gasped for air and his resonant voice commanded "Spread your wings"
   I blinked like a fool, reaching in vain for muscles in my back, for, as every child knows, wings grow on the back. But it was not so. I opened my arms as though in a wide embrace, and flinched from the sight of my own body as my wings filled the chamber. The slaves, who had stripped the bed and wrapped the drained corpse in the soiled sheets, looked up from heaving their burden from the room, gaped at me and hurried away. Zigûr ignored them, his eyes fixed on me. "Now, move them, flap them! I must see if I took enough bulk out of the bones. I'm hoping to keep the legs, but if you cannot leave the ground, they must come off."

   I sagged then, I almost crumpled, for I knew now that all the tales of his cruelty were indeed true, and that my legs, my very life, was at his whim. In a frenzy I waved my arms back and forth, but the weight of the leathery skin was too great, and I feared that I would never move, when suddenly he laughed and clapped his hands together like a child with a cake, and I realised that I was looking down on him, and I fell.

  He took me back to bed and spent hours taking me, with excruciating slowness, I came to bliss three times before he tired, and at last, as my eyes were closing with exhaustion he shuddered, and gave a cry of defiant triumph, and slid from inside me and I fell once more, into the true release of sleep.

   But a strange dream came to me. I dreamed that I was building a nest, now that I had wings, but the real birds were there, uncomfortable and upset. They did not speak, but I knew their thoughts; they told me that I was no bird, but a bat, and that nesting was only for birds. And when the birds were gone, a thought, or Thought came to me, saying 'this is not flight, this is not life, this is not you'.

   When I awoke, he was on me again, gloating over me, his living sculpture, his winged elf, his spy. He let the King watch while he took me, (to intimidate him, I suspect, for no mortal could stay proud for so long. I doubt even elves could, but they keep their own counsel on such matters). And at last Zigûr had me spread my wings and beat them until I hovered above them where they stood, and Ar-Pharazôn clasped Zigur in his arms and said "By the mighty deeps Zigûr! I could almost let you have a go at me I'm so impressed!" He laughed then and pulled me down by the ankle, as I carefully folded my wings (they must sit just so). The King walked around me, Zigûr stood back with his arms folded and his face shut. The King stood behind me and laughed "I like the way you've left his arse bare, I just don’t... How about a girl one, for me?" Zigûr moved to stand beside him and put a hand on my arse and toyed with me while he spoke to the King.
   "I apologise, sire, but this has exhausted me, it will be a long time before I am able to repeat the act. But one spy, one such as this... Surely that will be enough?"
   "By the void! Yes! Sorry, Zigûr, I'm thinking as a man rather than a King. But you, always thinking of strategy and tactics! My wisest councillor, and my dearest friend. Thankyou for this great gift! As ever, anything of mine that you desire is yours for the naming. Indeed, is there aught that you need for the... for this?"
   "Yes sire, there is. It will not be strong enough to make the voyage for some months. And every week, we shall need another such as you gave us yesterday."
   "Months, eh? Well, I suppose he must train as any other soldier. Very well. Yes, of course, select what you need, help yourself, you know that I would give you anything."
   As the King uttered the word 'anything', Zigûr plunged three fingers inside me, and I understood a little of the thought of Zigûr. For the tone of Ar-Pharazôn's voice was that of frustrated desire, and though he was a man for women, yet his craving for the touch of Zigûr was like a wasting sickness, eating out his spirit. The scale of his madness smote me like a blow, and the hand of Zigûr lifted my remade body from the ground and slid me onto him, and the King stood awkwardly by as Zigûr bit into my throat. Then he raised his head and spoke softly to the King "There is one thing, sire."
   "Name it."
   "A drop or two of your blood, that would quicken his growth, it would take a month off the time of training."
   Ar-Pharazôn, Lord of Númenor and emperor of the islands and the mainland kingdoms, blushed like a village girl and swallowed "I... My blood?" he held out his arm and drew back the gold cloth. The gold knife appeared and Zigûr brought the King's arm up to my mouth, the blood welling forth. And as he took me, I drank, until the King swooned, and fell into the arms of his Guards, who bore him away to the healers. But Zigûr paid them no heed, gloating over my tranformed flesh, invigorated and sparking with life.

  The weeks turned into months. He took me out to the countryside, and in a flowered mead I spread my wings and learned the paths of the air, raised by his joyful laughter to new and greater effort, until the land fell away beneath me, and the sea was blue and gray all around the island of Númenor. And there, in a placid lake of air, the eagles rested, the great eagles, the messengers of Manwë, so the tales tell.
   And once more I misdoubted myself, for here was my dream. I thought that they would scorn my bloodthirsty ways, but their thoughts were sharp in my mind, sharper than their great beaks and their fell talons: I must away, across the forbidden sea, to Elvenhome and beyond, to seek out the Valar themselves, and to cast myself on their mercy.

   But Zigûr was calling, his tone precluded debate, I must obey. My wings, now at home in the air, tilted and folded and I plummeted down, then spread them with a snap and soared laughing around his head, but he leaped impossibly high, gripped my ankle and pulled me, winded, crashing to the ground and set his foot upon my chest "You will not speak to the eagles. You will speak to no one, neither mortal man nor beast of the air. You will listen only to me, you will hear only me, and you...will...obey."
   Then he took me again, on the open grass, like the beast that I had become, and for the first time, I shed tears, though he did not heed them, being concerned only with the hole he spent his time in. 

   But at last the day came. By then, like Ar-Pharazôn, a part of my spirit was consumed with desire for the beauty of Zigûr the cruel, and trembled at the thought of being apart from him even for a day. And the way was long, it would be several days before ever I saw Elvenhome, much less espied the positions of the Valar. But a secret part of me, that could not be permitted even to hope, longed for freedom as the infant longs for the arms of its mother. 

  I am leaving tonight. They think that I shall return, perforce, in a week, for the lifeblood of another of my countrymen, that I will choose to endure this existence even at such a price. But no. For though I have been a party to this vilest of crimes, yet still I would choose to cast myself upon that forbidden shore, and beg for mercy. For how could such as I live among men, even should any be found who would offer me their blood freely. How could I take it? 

   And here in my heart, hidden even from him, there lives yet the hope, the wish, the dream, that there among the Valar one exists with mercy and power enough to render me whole, to cast off this disguise and make me a man.