The Vorrh

high platform where their bodies are dissected – butchered, really – into small, devourable pieces. The surgeon-priest then leaves the platform so that a flock of vultures may descend onto the meat table. They then eat every scrap and depart, taking the body of the holy man into the clouds. In this procedure, the hands require the most work. All else is child’s play in comparison. To get them shredded enough for the birds to eat takes great effort, heavy, sharp tools and time.’ He paused for a breath. ‘Yes sir, the hand is a ferocious weapon when sent forth, without doubt.’
    All four of them fell silent, with not an ounce of communication floating between them. They all looked in different directions, into different worlds, and waited for theirs to begin again.
    * * *

    Ishmael was thirsty. He had finished his supply of water the day before, and was following a track that seemed straighter than the others, but was, in truth, identical to the rest. He had walked so many since turning his back on the city and pointing himself into the depth of the forest. He had resolved to never take a forking path that curved to the right or the left, and instead sought only straight paths, knowing that even they could be deceptive and capable of making him walk in circles.
    This was a truth he had learned in one of his lessons with the Kin; something about navigation and sense of direction. What at the time of its telling seemed difficult and abstract now hovered over his will like a halo, or a beacon in the night. ‘Humans always walk in circles’ – this is what Seth had said, adding that human beings were faulty in their alignment; they were off-balance, permanently tilted from birth. Even placing one foot in front of another and staring straight ahead was not a remedy.
    But he was now sure that he was not human. Maybe some part of him had been gleaned from there, but not his whole. He was unique, and his dealings with the woman had proven that. He would not be sullied by their fears, or crippled by their imperfection. All their ailments and stupidity meant nothing to him, and here, in the midst of the Vorrh, they all seemed petty and trivial. None of the hurt and shame had lasted past his fifth hour among the trees. He was unbridled, and the yoke of his previous emotions lay in discarded ruins at the entrance of his new life.
    He had slept in patches throughout the days and the nights, always facing towards the inner direction of the forest. He had spent nights in sandy hollows, or in a trampled nest of undergrowth. Once, he had tried sleeping in a tree, but found that it attracted attention from the things that dwelt there.
    He and the Vorrh were beginning to converse, and he was finding a pleasure in its growing strangeness. He knew he would have to hunt and forage it soon. The loaf of bread, water and wine he had hastily brought was gone, and his body was starting to complain, the pangs of hunger and thirst and his aching feet confirming his corporeality. Perhaps, as he got deeper, these too would burn off and he would change, evolve into a different being. He would have tasted and spoken the possible names of such an original entity if his tongue were not encrusted to the wall of his mouth, and his throat blocked with sand and emptiness.
    As he tramped forwards, he noticed a stone blocking the slender path ahead of him. He approached it, and the rock focused its smooth contours from a supposed stone to an earthenware bowl, containing pure, fresh water. He marvelled at the miracle, seemingly conjured by his thirst, and sniffed at its cool freshness. In only a few seconds, he had swallowed every drop, drinking it with relish. His thirst quenched, he took a closer look at the mysterious bowl. Its shell was that of unfired nut, packed rigid with mud and still showing evidence of the finger-marks of its maker. The prints were tiny; the hands of a child, he thought absently, his brain still soaking up the fluid and its function. He put the bowl in the sack that he carried over his shoulder and resumed his journey through the trees.
    The animals in the forest seemed tamer than those he had passed on his way out of the city, indifferent to him, as if they carried none of the natural fear that most creatures have of the earth’s most bloodthirsty predator. Or perhaps it was his differences that affected them; perhaps only Double Eyes carried that taint? He had seen a snake lift its head at the side of the track, its