I gaze out across the lifeless city, my face shrouded in the welcoming darkness of the deep night. Few souls stirred now, the streets were empty of any life save my own. The city is grim and dark, seeming to perfectly reflect my currently mood. I had not known or heard of this city until I came here, until I decided to stop running. I knew I wouldn't be able to rest long. The people are quiet and lead private lives, much to my fortune. It meant I had more time to stay here, but I know I would have to leave eventually.

As the dark corners of my mind begin to creep into my conscious, I hear a small rustle in a bush beside me, bringing my focus back into the real world. I do not jump, but only stare intently as a rat scrambles from the bush to the other side of the road. It does not see me as I blend into the surrounding night.

I had known it was there before it revealed itself, just as I knew where every pathetic man and woman in this city was. They are much like this vermin, so ignorant, and so very fragile. I reach out with my mind; seeing and feeling the rat for what it was. I grasp onto it, pulling it apart and twisting it. I could change it, twist its being impossibly and change it with no restraints. I could end its life with ease. Cut it off and drain its life as easily as I could draw a breath.

As far back as I can remember, I could see what men and women were truly like. No masks could hide their true faces; no lies could deceive me as to their true motives. For years I wondered why. Why could I see and feel them like no others; change them like no others could. I know now, but I do not accept. I don't believe I ever shall.

The rat screeches in agony, flailing wildly. I realise that I'm slowly draining the life from it, but I only avert my gaze and continue to let my mind wonder.

You're letting this happen?

I question myself, but I am already lost in the dark recesses of my thoughts. I know I had made a mistake allowing my focus to slip, but a part of me wanted to remember; remember all I had done. The gates holding back my life's misery burst open, and the worst moments of my past came flooding back to haunt me. In my mind, the rat's screeching becomes the screams and weeping of all the innocent lives I had taken. I flung a first into the wall behind me as the great flood of my past overwhelms me.

My consciousness is taken over by my memories of the distant past and I cannot help but surrender my mind to these overwhelming thoughts. I clearly remember my time as a child, growing up in the orphanage; living there with my best friend. I don't remember my life before then.

Did I even have a life before then?

I pause, the reality of truth suddenly dawning in my mind. I gather myself, focusing my attention on life at the orphanage once again.

The darkest memories of my time there flash through my mind and I almost collapse from the depression that wracks my soul. There is one thing that keeps me standing, one thing that keeps me going even if all hope seems lost: my friend. My best friend; She was the one small light in the great overwhelming darkness of my life. She was the most understanding girl I had ever met, a true angel amongst the demons of my past. I had told her all I knew about what I did, what I was. I trusted her, and she had trusted me. She had listened to everything I told her. She did not panic or fear me, but she listened. Listened and understood. She cared about me, and I cared about her.

"But you didn't care did you? You killed her." The sound of my own thoughts echoes in my mind, tormenting me.

I scream. I do not scream with terror nor do I speak a word. I simply howl with the rage that resides at my core. I feel something change around me, but I do not care. I continue, my throat turning raw from the prolonged sound.

I didn't know.

The thought sounds weak and forced in my mind. I stop after what felt like full, torturous hours. I breathe deeply, until I feel calm enough to think, and I freeze. I do not hear a single sound, not one soul had been stirred by my outburst. The city was lifeless. I realise then, what I had done as my gaze passes over the dead rat before me.

"She was your best friend and more." The voice in my head sounds again. "Everything you did, every time you spoke it was with her. She cared for you Roland, but you let her down."

No.

I try to deny my own dark thoughts, but I knew they were true.

"You found her out in the cold of winter Roland, when she was as pale as a long dead corpse. You took her off the streets in your mad fashion, telling her she would get a home."

The voice in my head laughed, it sounds pathetic; forced.

"You saved her from certain death, just to kill her yourself."

No.

The part of me in denial spoke more strongly now, but my resistance faded quickly.

"You ended her life just like you did with all the men and woman in this city now."

It was true, in my howl of rage I had taken the lives of all in the city without realising what I was doing; just as easily as I had killed the rat.

My own power frightens me.

Now all of my willpower had faded.

"And indeed it should. She was a child just as you were, but she was living on the streets. She had to steal to eat, and she never slept in a safe place. You took her back, back to cheap meals and the lumpy beds of the orphanage, but it kept her alive. You kept her happy."

Enough. I was almost yelling the thought.

No more.

"You ended it all, Roland; you snuffed out the one small light in the great overwhelming darkness of your life"

Yes.

I give in, seeing no reason to fight the truth.

"When the priests found her dead, they thought of you. Over time, they began to realise you're to blame for her demise. You ran Roland, living like she did. Stealing to eat, sleeping in alleyways."

"Yes."

I murmur that aloud, already feeling that the worst of the truth is coming.

"You did not run from them, you ran from yourself. From the truth, you heard the legends; the stories older than the nations of men."

"NO."

I try to deny it, but the attempt is futile now.

"You know what you are Roland. You are the envoy of the true gods, an ancient prophecy come true; sent to wash clean the sins of the greatest tyrants in their own blood and shame."

Roland's thoughts silenced, his heart missing a beat. He howled once again into the night; this time, it truly was of terror. Terror for what he was.

The tales told of the prince of lies, the man with the power to control a soul; the man with the power to rival a god.
(Extract from The study of legends.) Written by Elroth Wilhelm in the year 5472.