Aaron remembered everything: the pain, the torment, the very first touch of the King on his young and fragile mind. He remembered the tortured days of his life leading up to those final moments and he remembered still the pain of his skin being filleted from his body by his wretch of a sister Bethany. But worse then everything was the tiny notion of sanity still swimming deep in the roiling sea of madness spilling over his mind. That small spark Aaron nurtured and fought to keep burning, even if it were nothing more than an ember. It was worse than anything his tormenter could heap upon him because it was like a carrot before the horse. It was the smallest reminder of what he could have been in life while the rest of the malevolence around Aaron spoke viciously to his losses.

The King touched Aaron's mind like all the other siblings on that fateful day so long ago, whispering first of greatness. But it all changed as the King stripped his humanity, warping and twisting a mind already dangerously close to the edge. But as the tattered whims of his mind held stubbornly to that small flicker of sanity the King failed to take from him the King forsook Aaron, left him dangling in the madding winds of insanity with visions of torn and tortured planes of existence and scenes of horrors beyond imagination.

Aaron was left to float like a foul thing through the halls of the damned manor of the Covenants, held like a guard dog on a short leash by the King to ward away the intruders that threatened it. Once brought forth, his revenant form would stalk and kill, the chains tipped with vicious, barbed hooks that hung about him like living things, used as deadly weapons to rend flesh and bone. And all the while there was his companion, his torture for he saw and detested it all, but could do nothing for it.

Then Patrick Galloway came to the manor and everything changed once again. By force, the King guided Aaron to drive off the stranger but to no avail. To that point Galloway had dispatched both those things that were Lizabeth and Ambrose as well as venturing to the heart of Oerinos, the once grand kingdom now broken and flung about the turbulent expanses of another, violent world. There he killed Keisinger, which to Aaron was no great loss. These were no mere feats of luck, but displays of singled-minded determination and skill. Like all things the madness forced Aaron into what the King wished, but always there was the spark and Aaron detested himself for attacking the one man he knew could rid the world of the Covenant curse

Then came Aaron's own final battle. Galloway had located Aaron's corpse's jaw and upon finding his limp body, hanging in a state of slow decay, reanimated Aaron with the reattaching of the jaw. Driven by the King's spells Aaron attacked Galloway with those chains, hobbling and leaping throughout the subterranean room with supernatural strength, but like those before him Galloway was able to use the Scythe of the Celt an upon severing head from body ended Aaron's life for good. But then something happened that perhaps the King could not have foreseen, for the Scythe had an unintentional effect on Aaron it did not on the siblings before him. Where Lizabeth and Ambrose were wiped clean from existence, Aaron remained as a spirit, devoid of the dreadful revenant form. He simply was, left by the Scythe's magic to wander again the halls of the manor with one exception: insanity was no longer the crippling thing it had been. He saw things with clarity and peace and while the mansion descended further into hell, Aaron could pursue his life's passion with purity. Better though, Aaron was free of the King and somewhere Aaron thought he heard it's anguished and angry roar.

Then to Aaron, who had been the most lost of all the siblings, came a secret - a secret even to the King himself did not know, for there was another plucking the strings of fate. Hidden from the face of these dreadful events, guiding the course of things for his own pursuits. It would have remained a secret had Aaron not found an old journal in his father's library, tucked behind older histories. Even in death, Aaron pursued his passion of art and history and while searching through the vast collection of tomes for some mystery or another, found the book. He opened it and read it the words and writing sounding familiar. He read entries all in one sitting (or floating if one was looking for specific truth) for what did Aaron have if not time? "It's taken many sacrifices," one passage read. "but it is all worth it. Hidden and secret I've lead things to my ends. Now all will know what I am and my world will be Hell. Not even the King can stop me now." Aaron read further, read other passages that grew more and more frantic.

"Time is working against me, and perhaps I have failed to hide all my avenues. I think the King knows my mind now and I must act quickly." That was the madding part of reading the journal. Thoughts were cut short, interrupted by ravings Aaron well recognized, but when they were meant to, the words were plain and open to all. Another passage: )"Bethany is becoming more of a thorn and now it appears Aaron has gone missing. One problem and one solution I suppose. I must work faster and perhaps see to my troublesome sister." Something was pushing the author, hurrying toward the finality of this one great plan. With each passage Aaron read, the words became more and more frantic and yes, even a bit fearful. "Damn all, who is this Keisinger I keep hearing about. He is muddling about the manor in places he should not be and I am stuck in this dreadful hell on earth." Then a few pages later. "It appears my wounds of Keisinger have healed themselves and this is a part of a pair of good tidings for me. Keisinger has left the manor, where to I do not know, but Bethany is dead and I feel no great loss at this. My way is now clear!" Aaron read further and then: the secret. Finally revealed like a plot point in a book. A long passage at the end speaking of despair, but with a small hope as well.

"My plan it seems has backfired. I could not foresee Galloway succeeding, but he has. My siblings are all dead, their demons dispatched one at a time: Lizabeth, Ambrose, Aaron, Bethany and yes even Keisinger. Now all that is left is the King and then myself? But wait there is still time. Galloway, believing me dead at the hands of Ambrose, now leaves for the Standing Stones and will meet the King. My old friend , Patrick is clueless at what I really am, just like my siblings before me, for I am the true servant of the King and soon even the King himself will worship me. I should think Patrick's expression at me should be quite comical." Aaron let the book fall through his incorporeal fingers, striking the ground with a thud. That last entry solidified his growing tension and revealed the author to him. But how could they all not know this? How could this one person have worked in the shadows without either the siblings or the King knowing? But worse than that, Jeremiah, his brother and the only one who seemingly escaped the King's curse, had plans for the throne of the King and his intentions, raving as they were, were clear. The world would burn before him and Galloway, despite his noble efforts to help an old friend would help pave that road. His mind made up and determined to warn Galloway, Aaron quickly made off through the manor, cutting through walls and rooms on a crow's path, exiting outside and making for the standing stones. It was a dark and moonless night, the clouds obscuring a crescent moon that peaked out through small breaks. The wind was chilly from the north and promised more rain but Aaron cared nothing for it. He continued floating forward, over the mansion's front courtyard and toward the front gate when something happened. He could go no further and with that came the realization of his own private curse; a hell set personally aside for an insolent soul. He was confined to the mansion, forced behind the prison walls of his family's home. He cried to the growing wind and from across the ocean he heard an answer. He could see the isle of the Standing Stones through the shallow mist, but only that. He could not tell what was happening there, but then he was met with a roar carried on the wings of the breeze.

It was all for not. The King was awake and though he could not know what had happened to his brother or Galloway, Aaron's last thought was this: "We are all doomed, are actions cursed." In the back of his mind something clawed. A familiar feeling Aaron recognized and he raged against it. "No!" he wailed as the visions came again and he recognized it all more fully. "Noooooo!" It all changed, the vision. The same vision that had plagued his racked thoughts forever it seemed. He was back in the mansion, his private studio wrapped up in the wings of the manse, staring at a vacant, unfinished painting of a torn landscape. Eternal Autumn, Oeirnos, some other plain of existence - who knows? It mattered very little, because Aaron realized what was happening and his thoughts became lost in a torrential flood of chaotic, tortured visions. It always ended like this, knowing none of it had come to pass yet. The King showed Aaron what could be. Showed him hope. Aaron knew though it was impossible. The King showed Aaron a great many things, among those his own death at the hands of his sister and his final demise at the hands of Galloway, unavoidable it seemed. Aaron would die again and this the King kept showing him through the frivolous visions of perhaps finding freedom. Something tugged at his spirit then, pulling on him and tearing him away from his blank stares. He was whisked through the manor, sucked through the ground. His vision snapped and then refocused with a terrible hate. His body, hunk like a slab of meat from those old supports in the ceiling. Before stood Galloway, backing away slowly, snapping the blade of a dreadful weapon open. The harvest had come and Aaron shrieked. Yes, Aaron remembered everything.

Fan fiction, © Deathscythe 2007