Sueño: A Goddess guide to interrogate a drunkard ~ Present

As per what now seemed to be Ases’s family tradition, he kicked open the door of the log cabin, this time breaking the door out of its hinges.

The man did not even respond to him this time, he just kept drinking his booze without even raising his head to look at them. He was full on wasted.

“You should have at least thrown the alcohol away when you first came. How are we going to get anything out of him if he’s drunk?” asked Mors, disappointed and looking at the drunk man with disgust.

“I didn’t really think much of it at the moment. Besides, maybe alcohol will loosen his tongue”

“And will make him tell us a pile of bullcrap, most probably. Let me do the questions, this requires a careful hand.”

When Mors entered the log cabin, the walls started creaking. The logs had started rotting. Even in his stupor the man seemed to recognize the sound of the wood creaking and finally raised his head. What a surprise it must have been to wake up and suddenly find yourself in front of the Goddess of Death. The shock alone almost threw him back into sobriety.

“Oh great princess of Rhodes. Please, I beg you for your mercy!” screamed the man, almost throwing himself into his knees, but falling out of his seat instead.

Princess?

Certainly Ases suspected such by her crown and her attire, but she had been extremely evasive when talking about her human past. How the hell did this man know her?

“You dare speak to me, you blasphemous heretic? Do you think appealing to me will save you from the crimes you have committed?” She asked, raising his tone of voice.

The cabin creaked more when she screamed the word crimes. Not only that, the man’s hair had started becoming white. Ases initially thought it was her eroding emanation that was doing it, but it may as well have been purely out of fear.

“No, please, have mercy, oh God”

“And you still dare to plead, you truly are eager to see the depths of the Tartarus.” She responded again, leaning down on the shrunken figure of the begging man.

This time, the man had the good conscience of staying silent.

“Now, you finally understand your place. You may know that my servant is quite merciful to tolerate your atrocious manners, but I do not have such lenience for pests like you. Now tell me, and only answer with the truth if you don’t wanna worsen your punishment even more. What did you people do in that basement?” She asked, her voice becoming more stern when asking the question.

“No… please… have mercy.”

“I didn’t ask you for excuses nor pleadings, I’m asking for your sins.”

“I didn’t know, I swear. I only did what I was told.”

Mors didn’t say anything this time. She only leaned in even further. The man seemed to shrink even further, sobbing, before he finally opened up.

“I… I just took the people from the inn. There’s a basement there, we take the horses out of the carriages so they can’t escape, and then kidnap them while they sleep.”

“Why did you do so?” She asked, not abandoning her stern tone.

“But God, they were mongrels, those people would only dirty our village, we did it for our protection.”

“You were killing any people from outside who arrived. And what’s worse, when the beasts attacked and refugees came in droves, you kept doing it until the corpses piled so much you could not hide any more of them.” She screamed.

Everytime Mors raised her voice, the entire room creaked. It felt as if it was a couple of screams away from collapsing on top of their heads.

“Please, have mercy!”

“But that’s still not the worst part, is it? Speak, or I’ll cut your tongue and ask the answers I need from your corpse.”

“No, have mercy! I didn’t take part in the rituals! When they started doing them, I abandoned the cleaning groups, I didn’t want to take part in any heretic magic.”

“But you did call me princess, didn’t you? You took part of the heretic mass”

“But I didn’t take part in the rituals! Everything is the fault of the beasts! When that priest appeared with his speeches, everyone started believing in them! They even allowed the beasts into our village. I could not stand it! That’s why I ran out here. I’m speaking the truth, please!”

His speech was becoming more and more incoherent with every sentence, he looked as if he had aged an additional decade completely out of fear. He was starting to babble, soon they would get nothing else out of him.

“And tell me one last thing, if you want to have the slightest sliver of mercy I’m willing to give someone as undeserving of it as you. Where did they take the remainers? I know you didn’t use all the people in your rituals.”

“Medio! The priest told us to move them to Medio! We would hide them in the cargo and make a driver take them just outside Medio. I don’t know anything else, please, mercy!”

Finally, the only words that came out of his mouth were begging. They would not be able to get anything else out of him.

“As my single mercy, I’ll let you go this time. But don’t think that I’ll let your crimes go unpunished. A messenger of mine will come for you and make you pay before the water has taken it all.”

The man was left trembling on the ground, in the middle of a dilapidated cabin that seemed as if it was about to collapse any second now. Ases just watched the entire interrogation from the door, in awe, at the display his Goddess was making. In a way, it made him feel vindicated for his ever present fear of her.

When she came out, she took him by the shoulder, and walked away before saying any other word. Eventually, they stopped, when the cabin was finally out of view.

“See, it wasn’t that hard. You probably could have done that yourself. I especially feel proud about the last part. I don’t need to send anyone for him, but he’ll be in fear every second of life he has left.”

“Excuse me? No, I definitely could not. Besides, I did try to intimidate him and I did not get anything out of him.”

“First, you brought that upon yourself, I offered to teach you the ropes, but you refused in the first place. I can’t even imagine what kind of foolishness you call intimidation. Although to be honest, all you need is a bit of creativity and to twist the myths however you need to. I told that buffoon I would send him to Tartarus and he believed it all. That thing does not even exist!”

“Wait, it doesn’t?”

“I swear to God Ases, the world is going to end and you will die never having understood anything of it. Well, now you got your information too, so you can go on your way.”

“Do you think they were kidnapped by the villagers?”

He had chills when he listened to the entire conversation. He had no idea of anything that was going on in the town when he arrived, and he felt incredibly foolish for leaving Herm and Raz in there.

Although, even then, he still had the hope they had managed to escape before disaster struck.

“I don’t know, but I may guess that even if they were not, Medio would be your rendezvous point, wouldn’t it? No matter what happened, they are alive, so in all probability they are going to arrive there. So, go, do your thing. I have my own problems to deal with.”

The Goddess tried to dismiss him, but Ases was not going to let her.

“Did you know what was going on in here? the rituals, the killings, and you did nothing?”

“Ases. I’m not omnipresent, If I tried to stop every heretic ritual around I wouldn’t have time to do my actual job as a Goddess. What I did here was merely a favor for you, one that you would not need if you had told me about your plans to see the other Gods in the first place, or about where you were going to hide your family. This is all something you brought upon yourself.”

When the Goddess said her final words, she started glowing, then dimmed down. The divinity around her body seemed to dissipate, but soon her body became dim too.

“I’m being pulled away. Someone is invoking me… This is!”

Mors tried to assert herself, but she could do nothing to stop the force that was pulling her away.

“Ases, come to Medio! This is more grave than I thought, you have to come here now!”

Without being able to say anything else, Mors disappeared into thin air. Ases was left hanging, having to swallow the response he wanted to give to the Goddess. The worst part was that even though he did not think he was guilty of what happened… Once again, a small part of him thought she was right.

No matter what the result was, he now had a goal in mind. With no idea of the dangers he may find in there, he started running up the mountain, trying to reach the city of Medio.