A Little This For That

The Revenant Zillah arrived just as I anticipated. After so long without the girl that nourishes his soul, he began to soften, weaken, to lose his resolve. It was poetry, following him as he wandered aimlessly for her, for once truly the mindless zombi I wished him to become. Days turned to weeks, then months. By the time I planted the information about the gypsy's whereabouts for him to find, he was ragged, the clothes he usually kept with such care were worn with holes and caked with dirt, his pretty face smudged here and there with soot, his eyes - well, his eye and mine - were hollow and truly dead-looking. A walking corpse. How fitting.

Lime had proven to be more difficult to manipulate than I thought she would be, even after so long in captivity. Zillah himself knew how it worked, the breaking down of the mental fibre of a captive. He used to be so proficient at it. Stockholm Syndrome, they'll call it in the future: warping your victim's perception of reality until they no longer know who they are, they believe anything you tell them, and they will actually assist you in your plans. But she merely withdrew, allowing the pain to wash over her, letting the worst come without ever agreeing to help me destroy the wretched man I was after.

But he came anyway. He agreed on our little bargain - his death instead the girl's continued torture. I was a bit surprised. He could have fought me to save both of them. That was more his style - to take what he wanted with violence and force. Then again, he wouldn't have won - not against myself and the forces I had at my disposal for the task. Disgusting, that he should sacrifice himself so completely for her. Some of those aligned with the Enemy might have stepped in to spare him for that, I imagine.

But no one up above was listening to one such as he.

I placed my hand on his face, my diaphanous henchmen swirled about him and became solid again, their claws ripping into his soul, their howls drowning out his agonized screams.

I had wanted to keep the gypsy for future endeavours, but once a bargain is made with one such as the Revenant Zillah, even I cannot go back on my word. At least I managed to procure the one prize I'd been waiting for - his miserable, twisted little soul.

He'll have his own kind of power over the forces of Hell. It's the privilege you gain when you absorb demonic forces, as he had, without dying a sudden death. It makes him almost one of us.

I know I can control him now though - as long as the gypsy is alive and within my reach, he'll continue to do as I wish. How proud my dear Lamia would be.