Until Death Gives Up

For centuries, men had tried to buy its attention.

They offered gold, blood, and prayers. Some begged for mercy in the name of love; others demanded blood in the name of vengeance. There were those who sought immortality, and those whose ambitions were considerably more modest, wishing only to see their neighbors' houses burn.

The entity listened to it all in silence.

It was no god, although certain humans had come to regard it as one. Nor was it under any obligation to answer their pleas. It simply existed somewhere beyond their reach, where their prayers had somehow found their way to it.

Every so often, a particular request would catch its interest. It would then extend an invisible finger and move a piece across the board. A seemingly insignificant coincidence could alter the course of a life or, on occasion, determine the fate of an empire.

When fortune favored men, they called it a miracle. When it crushed them instead, they called it a curse.

The entity saw little difference between the two.

There was no hidden purpose or divine justice behind its actions. It intervened when something interested it, and when that interest faded, it returned to observing.

In this way, it had witnessed the rise of kingdoms, the glory of dynasties, and the downfall of rulers who had once believed themselves eternal. It had watched men erect monuments to preserve their names, only for their descendants to tear them down a few generations later.

It knew countless facets of human nature.

And yet, there was still something it could not comprehend.

It had seen men willingly surrender their lives for what they loved, while others abandoned without hesitation things that their fellow humans would have given anything to keep.

Why did some cling so desperately to things that others could cast aside without a second thought?

The entity had never possessed anything it wished to keep.

It understood death, disappearance, and the relentless passage of time. Yet it had never experienced the weight of an absence.

If something disappeared, it simply ceased to be there.

What was so terrible about that?

Perhaps, it thought, it might understand if it were to slip into human skin.

It was hardly a well-considered idea. In fact, it probably would have forgotten about it soon afterward, had it not discovered a certain blank page among the countless stories it observed.

A page destined to be consumed by flames before anyone had the chance to write a name upon it.

What a waste.

It contemplated the page for a moment and, as it had done so many times throughout its existence, decided to intervene on a whim.

And so, on January 5th, Izael Valentine was born.

At first, the experience proved rather curious.

Possessing a human body came with a surprising number of inconveniences. It needed to be fed several times a day, kept warm when the weather turned cold, and allowed to rest after a certain amount of time. There was even that peculiar custom of remaining unconscious for hours on end, something humans called sleep and considered indispensable.

Izael had no particular objections to any of this.

What he had failed to anticipate was the sheer number of expectations that came with such an existence.

As soon as he was old enough to understand words, people began telling him what to do.

Sit properly. Greet your elders. Pay attention to your lessons. Answer when someone speaks to you.

Apparently, being human involved an endless succession of obligations.

Izael could not understand why he was expected to fulfill them.

He had spent countless centuries observing these creatures without ever having to conform to their customs. He knew their rules perfectly well, but possessing a body like theirs hardly seemed reason enough to obey them.

As for the matter that had originally sparked his curiosity, he was no closer to understanding it.

Although, to be fair, he had hardly made much of an effort.

What was the hurry?

The idea had seemed interesting at the time, but that did not mean he intended to spend his days pursuing an answer.

And so, he continued doing what he had always done.

Observing.

Unfortunately, humans did not seem particularly satisfied with this arrangement.

In the past, they had prayed and cursed in the face of his silence. Now that they could actually see him, they had also developed the irritating habit of demanding answers in person.

And worse still, they could touch him.

If he failed to answer when spoken to, someone would grab his shoulder. If he looked away, they would take hold of his face. If he decided to leave, someone would invariably see fit to stop him by the arm.

All that trouble for a few words.

Unsurprisingly, Izael Valentine grew into a rather uncooperative child.

His tutors considered him arrogant, the servants did their best not to disturb him, and his father rarely found any reason to be pleased with him.

Izael, for his part, had no particular intention of defying them. He simply saw no reason to please them.

He rarely responded when spoken to and showed little interest in lessons on etiquette. Whenever an adult lost patience with him, he would merely observe them with that calm expression of his, which, for some reason, only seemed to infuriate them further.

When he was thirteen, one of his tutors finally reached the end of his patience.

The man had been demanding an answer to a question for quite some time. Izael, having long since stopped paying attention, remained silent.

The tutor took his indifference as an unforgivable act of insolence and raised his hand to strike him.

Izael broke his wrist.

It was an accident, in a sense.

He had not intended to cause such a serious injury. He had simply caught the man's hand to stop him and used more force than necessary.

The tutor's scream drew several servants, who found him writhing in pain while the young Master Valentine watched the scene without any particular concern.

The incident caused quite a commotion throughout the manor.

The tutor was dismissed, the servants began treating Izael with renewed caution, and Count Valentine found yet another reason to regret his son's existence.

Izael considered the entire affair rather absurd.

The man had attempted to use force because he could not obtain an answer. Yet when Izael used force to stop him, everyone seemed to find his reaction far more alarming than the original act of aggression.

What difficult creatures to please.

Still, the incident reminded him of something he had observed on numerous occasions.

Humans tended to feel ashamed when they discovered they had demanded something from someone who was incapable of providing it. They might grow furious with someone who refused to speak, but rarely showed the same indignation toward someone who could not.

Apparently, what bothered them was not so much the silence itself as the possibility that someone might deliberately choose it.

Izael pondered this distinction for some time.

The more he refused to answer, the more determined everyone seemed to become to get a few words out of him.

However, if they were willing to respect the silence of those who could not speak…

The solution seemed rather simple.

A few days later, Izael bit off his own tongue.

He considered it practical.

After all, he could always regenerate it if he changed his mind.

The servants did not share his reasoning.

The discovery caused an even greater scandal than the incident with the tutor. Some wept, others screamed, and a few nearly fainted.

From that point onward, they began to regard him as deranged.

Izael saw no need to correct them.

Although his new condition initially raised numerous questions, the inhabitants of the manor gradually learned to interpret his gestures. Those familiar with his reputation stopped demanding answers, and the servants discovered that attending to him was considerably easier when they refrained from attempting unnecessary conversation.

The arrangement proved far more comfortable than he had imagined.

And so, he saw no reason to change it.

As for the curiosity that had led him to take human form in the first place, he still could not understand what was so terrible about losing something.

But it hardly seemed to matter to him anymore.

After all, he had never possessed anything he wished to keep.

And in the years that followed, no one managed to give him a reason to.