Episode 27

1

After a long, long time....

Jonathan opened his eyes. His face was on the sand. His face was wet and at first he thought it was the waves lapping as they passed, rising and falling, as they always would.

But no. It wasn't that.

He was too far from the water.

That wet substance sticking to his face was his own blood.

He put his hands on the sand, a ground as unstable as himself, and pushed himself up. He struggled to stand. There was something he had to do. He was confused, but at least he could still remember that.

Jonathan set off at last, staggering over the sand, but he didn't get very far.

Not because of him. Not because his body had betrayed him.

He stayed on his feet. Though he wasn't sure how, after seeing that.

After seeing Elizabeth lying on the sand, looking up at the sky, except her eyes were dark and empty. Dead, like her.

He couldn't fool himself. He couldn't because he was beginning to remember what had happened right in front of his eyes, with nothing he could do. But also because she was on her back. Perhaps on her side, or face down, Jonathan would have been able to approach her with his heart in a fist, saying that she was surely alive.

But like this...

She was too visible. Her chest was cut open by the knife. The blood, which had already dried. The entrails that glimpsed through the wound.

Above all her face.

She hadn't gone pale yet. But there was no air passing between her lips.

She was dead.

She had been killed and he hadn't been able to do anything. Jonathan clenched his fists.

"Where are you? Come out of wherever you are, you son of a bitch! "But deep down, he knew it was pointless. He'd crushed him, so why would Adam hide?

No, it didn't make sense that he'd left him here after he'd won to begin with.

According to him, he wanted him as a partner, didn't he?

He should be on a ship, on his way to the palace...

"If he's left, "Jonathan began to talk aloud, to himself. Maybe it would help him think, "How? I wrecked his ship. I also killed all his crew, so he could have left alone in his boat, but the boat is still in the harbor.

He could see it from here.

No doubt about it. Even though his vision was stained with tears.

"And what the hell does it matter? I've lost and she's dead. What the fuck does it matter? I don't care if the son of a bitch learned to walk on water. Who the hell cares!"

Oh, shit.

Jonathan got dizzy and fell to his knees.

He narrowly avoided falling on Elizabeth. On her dead body.

"I'm sorry. I..."

They weren't friends, let alone anything more than that. Acquaintances, that was the most they could be called. So why did he feel like his heart had been ripped out again?

Why couldn't he stop crying?

"Shit. It wasn't supposed to end like this."

Jonathan took the corpse in his arms, rising to his feet again. All along the coast, the dead rose with him, but not only those who had fought on his side, also Adam's soldiers, whom he had abandoned.

And when Jonathan set out, back to the mansion, the dead walked with him.

He vaguely had the feeling that there was something strange. But he couldn't care less. Unsteady as he was, he made it all the way to the mansion. Opening the doors, pushing them open with the full weight of his body.

He staggered at that moment.

And so he knocked a candlestick off a small table, at the same time. He didn't catch it. Nor did he try to. Incidentally.

He grabbed the edge of the bedside table, just to have a handhold.

"What am I doing? What have I been doing all this time?

He walked down the hallway, rounded the corner and into the living room. All the way he couldn't help but think that he was now the only person living in this town. Everything else was dead, dark. Empty.

He made a move to leave Elizabeth's body on the table, for the moment at least. But he realized there wasn't enough room.

For some reason, something so trivial filled him with rage, and he threw everything off the table.

The candles, the silverware, the plates and the tablecloth.

Not even the plates exploding on the floor woke him up.

He placed Elizabeth there.

"What now?"

Bury her, as he had buried the assassin whose name he still didn't know? No. No, no way. She deserved something more. They may not have been more than acquaintances, but she deserved more.

"It's not up to me. Maybe at the office..." Elizabeth had left so recently, but talking to himself was already becoming a habit. Would it help him not to succumb to madness, or would it be pushing him into its arms?

In any case, as he had said, he went to the office.

Once there, he sat down behind the desk she had occupied and started rummaging through the drawers. Maybe it was silly, but he hoped to find a clue, at least, as to how she wanted to be buried.

A hole in the ground wasn't the only way.

Perhaps cremation, although the very word brought back bad memories and he wasn't sure if he could do it.

Maybe sinking the corpse in the sea. Many cultures did it. Many others considered it an aberration, even though, like a "normal" burial, it's simply giving back to nature.

Jonathan wasn't interested in anyone's opinion, however.

Except Elizabeth's.

He needed to know. It didn't feel right to just bury her and, to be honest, he didn't want to accept this. He supposed a part of him was just trying to postpone the inevitable. Whichever way he did it.

Jonathan found official documents.

And more and more official documents. Nothing that interested him. Nothing that had anything to do with him.

Nor with him.

Nor with her.

It was a very impersonal workspace.

"Her room, perhaps?"

He'd never been there, but as soon as she'd died, would the first thing he'd do be to sneak in? He had no bad intentions, obviously, but he would feel like an intruder. Like some kind of weirdo.

He put a hand to his head.

God, how it hurts.

"And what do I expect to find? A letter with instructions about her ideal funeral?" He squirmed in that chair, laughing at himself.

Alone.

All alone in the world.

"She didn't expect to die. She could talk about it as a suicide mission, but she believed... she had to believe she could do this. She wasn't ready to die."

Who was?

One of Jonathan's hands had ended up in front of her face, fingers spread wide, but he wasn't peeking through them. He could barely see beyond those fingers. His surroundings felt like the stage of a play.

It's all fake.

Staged. Loose and depthless, like pieces of cardboard.

"What do I do now?"

Now there was no one to answer.

Only silence.

2

Jonathan didn't like to drink.

He drank socially, to have fun and share experiences with his crew, to be one of them, they would feel as if he was looking down on them otherwise.

But he didn't like the way drunks looked.

The things they did or said under the influence of alcohol. Deep down, Jonathan did despise those who gave up the reins of their mind to alcohol.

However, things were changing.

He emptied one of Elizabeth's bookshelves. Bottle of wine after bottle of wine. The world was shattered, like broken glass, but the number of times he saw everything couldn't compare to the bottles he had emptied.

He could barely stand, in fact.

He was staggering from side to side, as if in a poor attempt to dance. Repulsive. Everything was repulsive. Though perhaps it had nothing to do with his urge to vomit.

I'm the most repulsive of all.

Jonathan took the last swig from the last bottle and then put it back on the table. He'd been standing for a while, so his vision was coming into focus. So not too much.

He'd overdone it. And quite a bit.

He didn't feel on top of the world, not even temporarily.

He felt even shittier than before he'd started drinking. That's right, nothing had changed. Elizabeth's corpse was still on the table and he still had no idea what to do.

He hadn't found anything to give him even a hint of what he would have wanted, even in his room. Elizabeth had not thought

He hadn't found anything to give him even a hint of what she might have wanted, not even in her room. Elizabeth hadn't thought she would die.

For one thing, she suspected she was the kind of person who didn't give a shit what happened after she was dead.

Because she'd still be dead.

As for him, he didn't want to bury her.

He didn't want to burn her either. It might be a habit, but every time he thought of bonfires and dead bodies, he saw the flames where his family had burned in his mind's eye. Now he could only think of that act as a repulsive ritual.

Send her to the bottom of the sea? Not that either.

Elizabeth hadn't been prepared to die. And the same went the other way around. He hadn't been prepared for her to die.

He hadn't even been able to say goodbye.

Or apologize.

He'd begged for her life, but that didn't seem enough for him. Jonathan covered his face with his hands, closed his eyes.

Thus the silence drifted by... For what, a few seconds?

A few seconds until he snapped and knocked the bottle over with one arm, causing it to explode into a thousand pieces.

"I don't have to if I don't want to. Say goodbye to her," Jonathan realized as he spoke.

As he looked at the symbol on his hand.

1

At last, Leonard arrived at his destination, steering the boat on his own. He and his wind skills. He had to stop many times along the way, yes, but what ship could fail to stop on such a long voyage, even a fully manned one?

If anything he had gone faster because he hadn't had to wait for others. Just paying attention to his own needs.

And here it was.

Elesbury, the town in the middle of nowhere that Jonathan had plunged into darkness. He was to be the only inhabitant, now.

He and the monsters he had brought with him. Surely he hadn't seen them all, had other aces up his sleeve. Which Leonard didn't care about. Even the worst rumors. About that he could make people rise from the dead, like him. Only badly. Simple tools under his will.

It wasn't like he'd come to this place expecting to survive, anyway.

If he valued his life that much, he'd be a long way from here.

Leonard walked down to the harbor and into the dead city of Elesbury, where shadows reigned.

He walked fast, without a care in the world. He was already screwed anyway. He thought it would take a long time to find him, even considered the possibility that he was no longer in Elesbury.

But he came upon him as he turned a corner, out of the blue.

He was there, in the middle of the square, standing like a shadow. His eyes, sunken and dark, his hair dirty and sticking to his forehead. He looked completely different from the man he'd known for so many years.

It almost made him overlook that he wasn't alone, consuming his attention.

The shadows were littered with the dead.

"Jonathan?"

There was no response. Not the slightest reaction, as if the words hadn't reached his ears. Leonard took a step forward, suppressing the shiver that was about to run down his back.

"Jonathan? Can you hear me?"

He jerked to a halt. For he had finally lifted his head, reacted.

Leonard had never seen him in such a pitiful state. Not even right after finding out what had happened to his family had he been this bad. Defeated, depressed. But not like this.

"What are you doing here?" Jonathan asked.

Leonard swallowed hard.

"I'm here to make peace with myself. But not with you. I'm not selfish enough to ask you to try and it's impossible, anyway. Do what you want with me."

He held out his arms to his sides.

Inviting him to do just that.

He stood still as Jonathan began to stagger toward him. He couldn't walk straight. Despite his almost ghostly appearance, with sunken eyes, hair, his skin wasn't pale. Quite the contrary. Very red. Was he drunk?

The dead moved with him.

But as if they were tied to him with invisible ropes and were being dragged along. An involuntary movement, in other words.

Jonathan reached for his sword. As expected.

"Looking back, I'm hardly able to understand how things ended up like this," said Leonard, slowly and after a while. Without taking his eyes off his brother. His brother. He should have been true to what mattered. But it was too late now, for everything. "I really don't understand, but I won't deny that I made my own decisions. And it's only my fault. I'm sorry, brother. I hope we see each other again in the afterlife."

Jonathan suddenly smiled.

It was like seeing the ghost of the person he had once been.

Then it pierced his chest. It wasn't an instant death. Jonathan could have done it, but he didn't put the sword through his heart. Maybe he didn't want him to die so quickly. Maybe he wanted to see him suffer.

How could he not.

He understood.

"You don't have to worry," Jaonthan leaned close to whisper in his ear. "Or wait for the afterlife. I can put everything back in its place, brother."

Leonard put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing. Not to resist. Unconsciously, he sought support from the person in front of him as he began to lose his balance. Nothing more or less than that.

Over Jonathan's shoulder, he took particular notice of one of the dead.

For she was not a nobody.

It was Elizabeth, the governor of Elesbury. The previous one, that is. Now it wasn't even a place where humans could live anymore.

"What... What should I do?" The dead woman spoke. A lifeless voice, hollow and hard to understand, as if she had a mouth full of grave dirt. But she spoke.

The others still made not the slightest sound and he had thought they were reanimated corpses, nothing more, not like Jonathan. Or the Count.

He was beginning to understand.

Also what was going to happen to him.

"She's still in there?"

Leonard shivered from head to toe.

Because he was in agony.

But mostly because of the fear that gripped his heart. Jonathan had not come back well, he had lost something important on the other side. And nothing and no one would end well. Of that, at least, he could be sure.

"We will be together again. Brother," Jonathan said. He sounded on the verge of tears.

Then he withdrew the sword from his chest violently, with a single

Then he withdrew the sword from his chest violently, with a single jerk, and Leonard knew no more. He was gone.

Except for the spark that would be left burning inside his corpse, where it would remain as one of Jonathan's dead. His immortal soul trapped in the prison of his own decaying body. Far from the light. Far from life.

Far from everything, forever.

2

It was just a passing, impulsive thought, and perhaps it should have been no more than that. But Jonathan made a decision quickly. He could blame it on the alcohol, argue that he was drunk off his mind.

And yes, he was. But even then he knew that wasn't entirely true. That it didn't justify shit.

The mark on his hand burned, and his ability kicked in.

Passing from him to Elizabeth. To the piece of meat that had been Elizabeth, and immediately that opened its eyes on the table. But it didn't change anything, deep down. She wasn't dead anymore, but that wasn't life.

It was further from life than even his condition.

The dead were controlled by him. Dolls without will. He knew that. He knew that this changed nothing, that he would get nothing back, but....

The island.

The island where it had all started, where both he and Adam had been cursed. If he could keep her corpse and bring it to the island, maybe he could bring her back to life for real.

Making her like him in the process, yes.

But anything was better than death, because it was the same as nothingness.

And because Jonathan simply refused to let her die. It was a stupid idea, a crazy one. Perhaps his passing thought should never have been more than that. But, deep in his heart, he knew he had to at least try or he would go mad. Guilt consumed him.

Even though he hadn't thought twice about slaughtering Elizabeth's guards.

She'd helped him while the guards had only been in his way. It was that simple. Jonathan placed his hands on the table, clasping them together, squeezing them tightly as if to hide his trembling. As if it made sense to hide anything, when he was alone.

He was a selfish bastard. Plain and simple.

But he couldn't face the guilt. He already felt too guilty about too many things. He was full to bursting, he couldn't even take one more spoonful.

Or he would explode.

Everything would explode.

All his thoughts stopped when Elizabeth's corpse turned her head in his direction.

He had thought he saw recognition in her eyes, you see. That was what had taken his breath away. She doesn't recognize me, he thought. I only see what I want to see. As usual.

That's why I've ended up this way.

But then she moved her mouth.

Producing only the faintest sounds. Nothing intelligible. Still, it was amazing because so far his soldiers hadn't even groaned after losing body parts. They couldn't.

And she was making the attempt, perhaps that was the most important thing. He hadn't ordered her to do anything. Just like he hadn't ordered her to look at him.

"You're there. You're there, aren't you?" More than a question, it sounded like a plea.

Jonathan didn't get an answer, of course.

She wasn't capable of it yet, if she would ever be capable of it. But he felt closer to her anyway than he had ever been while she was still alive. Because now, plain and simple, he needed her for more than just killing someone. He truly needed her.

Jonathan couldn't stop the tears from welling up in his eyes.

3

It took him a while to realize that during his fight with Adam, Arise had leveled up. Not all class skills possessed different categories, so he hadn't expected it, let alone that he would be able to do something like this.

Part of him feared it had been a matter of luck.

So he was very nervous after withdrawing the sword. Waiting for it to work on Leonard, too.

Slowly, he sat up. The important thing was that he had done it, after all. Now he just needed to check one more thing.

"Who are you?" Jonathan asked. Perhaps the most important question a human being could have.

"I don't... I don't know," Leonard, his brother, replied. But maybe that was for the best.

"And who am I?"

"Jonathan."

His lips traced a smile.

"Good."

Now it was all over. Things would never go back to the way they were, maybe, but at least they would be together forever. Not even death could separate them.

He would never lose anything or anyone else again.