Monstrous Flesh by Zoe Cannon

Author:Zoe Cannon [Cannon, Zoe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Zoe Cannon
Published: 2023-12-23T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

They tied Jennek between two trees. His arms and legs were splayed out, stretched to their limits. There was no slack in the ropes, not even enough to let him relax his posture, let alone sit down.

The rope wasn’t actually rope, because who would waste valuable pack space carrying that kind of thing into the swamp when they could carry food rations instead? His fellow soldiers had sliced off bits of the thick vines to bind him, and the vines were stronger than any rope could ever be. They also doubled as a kind of torture implement. Looking at them from afar, Jennek hadn’t realized the vines were covered with spiky hairs. Now those hairs dug into his flesh like needles.

Tiny rivulets of blood dripped from his wrists and ankles. The vines drew fresh stings from his flesh every time he shifted minutely and inadvertently dug the spines deeper. The flesh had swollen around them, and it itched as well as burned, like each of the spines was a tiny insect stinging him over and over. He didn’t know which was worse—the pain, or the itch he couldn’t scratch.

And the blood attracted actual insects. Not just the swamp flies, which he couldn’t swat away, but smaller bugs that moved in a swarm and drowned themselves in his blood before they realized it was too rich a feast for them. And ants, crawling up his legs in an endless march, making him twitch with the desire to shake them off or swatch them out of existence.

The ants, he suspected, were drawn more to his sweat than blood. They didn’t just crawl over his wrists and ankles. They went everywhere—and he meant everywhere. His fellow soldiers had stripped him of his armor, and then the clothes underneath. There was nothing to protect him from the bites and stings of the insects. Or from the thick swamp air, which somehow felt even hotter on his bare skin than it had inside the armor.

There was nothing to disguise the empty machine that was his body.

The brief feeling of emotion, of life, was gone. Even the fear had left him. All that remained was a hollow emptiness, unbearable now that he had experienced the alternative. He hoped that they would get around to killing him soon, just so he wouldn’t have to feel his hollow heart beating for too much longer.

He knew he should feel something. Anger at the witch who had done this to him—because this was her doing, he was sure of that. Or fear that he was about to die now that he had finally tasted life. Or even the desire to feel whatever had come over him in battle again.

But he felt nothing. He had forgotten how. He stared his own death in the face, and could only bring himself to wonder with idle curiosity how long it would take to reach him.

He had always suspected he would die in this place, after all. Just not like this.

His fellow soldiers didn’t talk to him.

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