God Hounds

Chapter 2: The Tattoo

“Dante,” Alice said. Her voice echoed across the pitch-black abyss that they were in. A void; an empty black nothing—except for Dante and Alice. They stood on a sea of darkness, abandoned by stars and planets alike. It wasn’t even cold.

Dante only stared back. Wordless.

“It’s me. It’s Ali—” Dante turned away before she could finish. She watched as he stepped farther away from her. His footsteps rang solitarily across the lightless expanse they moved in. It was like a hallway. Dante could only go forward. And Alice followed.

The destitute infinity around them gradually got more inhabited as she continued along Dante’s path. Stars, albeit distant, started to glow above them. Winds began to storm in. Eventually, they reached a table. Dante moved to the other end, and kneeled down. There was a mallet, and a hafted needle. Alice realized immediately; it was the rite of the batok. An old ritual. Done by the eldest tribes. The inking of a warrior’s skin. With the warrior’s own stories.

Alice kneeled down, and looked back at Dante from across the table. The rite of the batok was only done when the skin was worthy. Or when it was on its way to be. She stretched her right arm over the table. And she revealed her stories. On her own skin. Patterns and oceans of black ink plotted her arm with symbols and sigils in a very symmetrical manner. She remembered; she had her very first batok, her very first tattoo, when she was just a child. Back then, her tattoo was only a single stretch of mountains signifying her birthplace; and her story had only just begun. Now, she was showing Dante inked images of snakes and weapons, demons and witches, on her skin. And most importantly, the pattern of lightning, just above the symbol of a hound. The batok was a privilege only the clans could have. An initiation. A rite of passage. It symbolized renewal. Rebirth. It was proof. A wielder of the batok symbolized their connection with the gods. Their adoption to the tribe. For Alice, it was the tribe of Kadlum. And the god’s gift was lightning.

“The Kadlum needs a king, Alice,” Dante said. Alice could not reply back. It was all too quick. As Dante pierced her skin with the needle, a flash of white light burst from her tattoo. The light burned violently in her eyes, and then it faded, and then she was in another place.

The sound of drums, big drums, reverberated around her ears. The flame from the torches around her heated her body welcomingly, and it gave her guidance in the dark night. She was in the sacred grounds. Alice was all too familiar with the place. But it was always different every time. The grounds grew with her, after all. The sacred grounds was her. She remembered how it was just a small hut, when she was just a child. But now, it was a kingdom. In a ritual for the batok, there was always the trial. There was always the battle.

“The god needs a warrior,” Dante echoed in his mind. The voices grew; ancient choirs sang and chanted the story of lightning, and the story of Kadlum, the god. A weapon materialized into her hand, out of nowhere. A kris, forged from the fires of the grounds. Like her tattoo, the blade was a batok in itself. An engraving of two hideous monsters. Dante resonated in her mind again, “And the warrior needs a fight.”

Lightning, in the form of dogs—or dogs in the form of lightning—circled around her savagely. She was in a field now, a plane of endless grass. And the clouds breathed nothing but thunder and lightning. “Show me you are worthy of it,” a voice roared above the clouds. It was her father’s voice. “Show me you are worthy of the kidlat!”

The elemental creatures pounced at her, but she fended off. She stepped back, and stepped in, into her attackers, slicing their lightning apart little by little with her sword. She kicked and provoked, and bolted back again. Until one of the dogs jumped at her, and she grabbed its neck, stabbing the lightning dog in the neck. The flare of blue heat dissolved, and two more were left. Another dog barked, and a bolt of lightning struck her on her shoulder. Alice toppled to her knees, and unconsciously clutched her shoulder. The dogs sprinted across the fields. The canines pounced. She sliced one back, but the other propelled her down to the grassy floor and stepped on her. Its jaws opened, and its teeth crashed down at her. Her blade stood in the way of the bite, and she kicked the dog back.

Alice regained her footing. The dog she slashed earlier had survived, and it flanked behind her. But she was quicker. The sword went deep into its chest, as the dog leaped, and then she pulled away. One more. The last one growled again, and another blue bolt closed at her. The kris whistled, as its steel deflected the electric strike. She walked closer. The dog barked again, and another bolt of lightning came to her. She blocked again. And then another one. She dodged, jolting to the side. Alice’s foot struck quickly. It hit the beast under the jaw. It yelped as she stabbed, under the belly, and raised the mongrel with her sword. The clouds roared, as a spear of blue light struck down at her. She screamed as she felt the lightning flick in and out of her. The weather muted, but the dark clouds didn’t leave. She caught her breath, and the choir of the tribe continued.

“Before he rose to godhood, Kadlum was a farm dog,” Alice recalled the story, as she heard the voice of her father from above the sky. “There was harmony in the land, and he and his master lived in peace,” continued her father. She kept going across the field.

Alice arrived at a bigger valley. And the voice was in her head now, “But the monster appeared.” A tornado. It coiled from the skies and crashed down to the ground. The clouds rumbled as a blast of heavy rain instantly battered the place. And the winds almost blew her away. The cyclone wasted away, then it exposed what was inside.

A ghoul, or a troll. A demon. It overshadowed the pasture beneath it, and Alice gazed silently. The ten-metered being hid its green lump of a face with a thin blanket, but branches from its back still sticked out of its sides. It was like a green chunk of molds with limbs growing out of it. The fungus-plagued aberration caught her eyes, and it shrieked incessantly.

The sound would have made Alice to stop dead, or curl up from the noise. But she had already begun. Alice was already behind the thing. The mist and the storm blocked her line of sight, and the breeze turned to hurricane; it slowed her down. The beast swung its hand down to the soiled floor, and dirt and rocks splattered around her. She dashed to the giant hand before the monster could take it up again. She stabbed the finger. And again. And again. The green hand pulled up and Alice found herself clinging onto the damaged skin as the creature stuck its hand just above the mouth. Its jaws broke open, and Alice leaped. The strips of blue power bundled up beside her in just a split second. Lightning coated around her dagger, and it coursed through the blade as she raised it into the sky, and yanked it into the demon’s eyes. The pathetic hellion cried at the slash of thunder, and Alice streamed down its fungi chest with the kris, completely mutilating its skin as she dropped back to the ground. Alice rolled to safety, and waited for its next move.

“The monster’s name was Makabagting, the man-eating witch,” it was the voice again, in Alice’s head. Makabagting turned to her, and the witch stretched its arms. Alice slammed into the dirt surface. It was the wind. Makabagting got close, and she laid immobilized. The soil beneath them boomed with dirt and rock, as the rancor buried its teeth into the earth, but Alice had already spun away from the attack. She sprinted for the witch’s arm and, calling for the power of lightning again, dug deep into the monster’s tissues and fiber with her blade. The blue bolt of fire cut through, slicing the arm’s flesh, then the muscle, then deep into the bone. Makabagting wailed, but its left arm was already useless as it dangled helplessly on the last tendon that still held it to the elbow.

Alice sprinted for Makabagting’s feet, and the demon kicked. She winced. Blood splashed from her mouth as the impact sent her flying. She felt her lungs stop for a second. Makabagting raised its fist and dove into the ground with another swing towards her. She jerked to the side, as she barely escaped the green knuckle. Blood sprinkled across Alice’s mouth, but she didn’t stop staring. Makabagting’s head had dipped into the earth, and the witch struggled to get it out. Then Alice walked. The kris; it flashed blue, and the lightning was now even more present in it. Makabagting heaved tirelessly, but Alice had already gripped the creature’s hair and looked at it in the eyes. The right eye had already been severed from earlier. But it still had its left. “Die,” Alice declared.

She stabbed the tearing ball above her. Thunder rolled across the pupil and deeper into the veins. Makabagting howled. Alice pulled the blade out, then lunged it again, and again, and again. Her arm had already dug deeper into the cornea. She was bathing in blood, as the eye almost seemed to eat her with the hole that she just made on it. Alice crossed away, as Makabagting’s head completely dunked into the soil. She watched as the sick being wheezed slowly into dead silence.

“With its master, Kadlum had slayed the man-eating witch that plagued their land,” her father continued. “But it was only his first step in becoming a god.”

The mist died out, and Alice was now looking at a mountain in front of her. The wind stopped its rushing, but the rain continued. It smelled of petrichor, burnt meat, and blood. The downpour helped Alice wash the blood off her body, but it was still too much, too thick. At the mountain’s peak, energy pulsated in orange colors. And she walked towards it, drenched in red.

A path snaked in front of her. A road leading to the summit. “Many countless battles did he have to win, in his path to glory,” the voice said. Alice could hear people, rolling down the uphill road. A battle cry. And then a bow, manifesting into her hand out of thin air. A bow of the clouds. A bow of lightning. She could feel the invisible arrow gradually materialize into a thunderbolt, as she fixed her hand on the newfound weapon. She drew, and the arrow blossomed blue. She waited, her breathing went to a stop, as groups of tribesmen bowled down her path. And she released. The first shot landed right in the middle of the cluster of men. They screeched and shouted, as the arrow blew into a bomb of lightning, taking chunks of flesh and meat from their body; some completely turning to ash. But there were more. She continued the path up, mowing down her victims with missiles of death. The smell of wet soil slowly turned to the smell of burnt flesh, and ash leisurely descended around her. More screamed, but the cries weren’t out of bravery anymore. She kept on.

“The path to godhood was a lonely one, as Kadlum had slowly noticed,” her father said. Many more came down from the mountain, their swords and shields held high, ready to cut down the woman beneath them walking amidst the red and the black. They shouted for war, and Alice shouted back. She stretched her hand into the sky. The streaks of blue energy from the clouds clamored towards her in a circling motion. She jerked her hand down, and pointed towards them. The lightning followed. Another explosion. The shields were useless, and they dropped to the ground, dead or dying. Alice closed at them one by one. And one by one, she opened their throats with the kris. “But the price for power… was worth it.”

She was close now. “Kadlum continued, and he endured. He sacrificed, and he fought for the freedom of the world from a destined fate.” The winds were back. “And he became a god.” Hurricanes and tornados encircled the land below her. “But he was not strong enough. Not yet. He was a god, but a lesser god. And they would mock him. For trying to free the creatures from the bands of fate.” Alice just kept going. She could hardly catch her breath, and the storm had already lost its temper. “So, he fought to rise even higher.” The orange aurora glowed even brighter before her. “But it was all in vain. When Mulayari became the king of the gods. Mulayari, who was the last Bathala,” Alice could hardly listen to her father speak. She grasped her knees, as she fought for more air. “The king was delusional and insane. He enjoyed sadness and sorrow. He only wanted suffering in this life. And that was his goal.”

“So he committed genocide on all the gods and deities.” The earth shook, and the air went thinner and thinner. The skies turned orange and the pulsing of magic boomed louder on her ears. She felt the atmosphere vibrate around her. Alice could feel her legs going numb. Everything was against her. Everything. But the ancient choir pushed her on. The drums. The drums were back. The chanting grew more boastful. Prouder of her trek. She crawled and grabbed on steady rocks. She could feel the wind bite against her skin. Or was it the aura? It got blurry. It also got louder. Her feet dug down to the soil and she was throwing herself just to go higher. Her ears were ringing, and all she could see was the ground. The drums grew louder, and louder, and louder…

And then she reached the summit.

Everything was beneath her. Even the clouds seemed to bow. Below her, the land had already turned to the shade of red and orange. It only smelled of fire and smoke. The heat held her back; and it felt like the mountain was an oven. But she was already on the top now.  

There was a platform, on the center. A circle of engraved clay on the floor. The torches circled around it carefully, and almost symmetrically. Streams of blood ran across the platform’s carved lines. She drew closer. The chanting was apparent. They were there. Alice looked around. The choir; the shamans, the witch doctors, and the warriors; they danced to the song as they walked out of the trees and closer towards her. The tribe revolved around Alice. And then, a bright orange flash.

It was at the center. A sphere. Dark and abyssal. An orange ball of fire, with a black gateway on the center. It was a portal. And the drums steeled her on. And Alice walked closer. The heat grew more intense as she paced towards the gateway, but the wind was already leading her on. She entered, and the fire imploded.

“And Kadlum, along with the other gods, fought to dethrone him.” Smoke obscured her vision. But she knew she was in a different place. The air was different, or maybe there was no air at all. She stepped aimlessly, as the black fog continued to blind her. And then a roar. A shriek. No, an eruption. The smoke faded away, and she found herself standing on the edge of a cliff. A cliff, inside a volcano.

The throne of Bathalang Mulayari. A monumental seat rested on top of the ocean of lava below her. And she watched the colossus who owned it. Mulayari, the last king of the gods, stood defensively in front of his throne, and looked down on the gods below him. “Kadlum did not hesitate,” the voice rang. “He joined the fight.”

Just behind Alice, an eagle shrieked. The bird was easily larger than the cliff she was on. It glided beneath her, and she felt it call out. Alice leaped. The soft, gold feathers suppressed the pain of the fall, and they jetted towards the king.

His skin was pure, black rock; and streaks of burning water streamed across his skin. Alice watched the others fight him. The other gods that stood below. They were no match. None were bigger than the king. The titan bird orbited around the colossal Bathala. The king’s crown palpitated and pounded of orange magic. “But,” the voice in her head rang for the last time. “They were too late.” A bright flash, immense and stellar scattered around them. Then it was dark.

She was in another place, now. Murky and hot. But Dante was there. “Dante,” Alice gasped, as she ran towards him.

“Kadlum needs a king, Alice,” Dante’s cold voice stopped her in her tracks. Another figure came out of the darkness. Something bigger than the two of them. Something the size of a god. Its eyes flashed red, and it paced gracefully behind Dante.

“Kadlum,” whispered Alice. She knelt on the ground, as she felt the god-beast approach her.

“Arise, Alice,” the voice shook the floor beneath them. Alice raised her head slowly. The god stared back at her. Kadlum, the monolithic dog. Kadlum, the god hound. His fur was cosmic black, and his paws were death and grace. Smoke puffed out of the god’s nose, as it breathed and sniffed on Alice. “Prepare,” Kadlum’s voice caused another tremor, but his mouth didn’t even move.

“What?” Alice replied. But a blast in Kadlum’s red eyes rendered her sightless, and pulled her to the darkness. Then it was all pitch-black.

Alice bolted out of her bed. Her breaths ran endlessly and rapidly, as her eyes darted aimlessly around the dimly-lit room. She was back. In her room. She gasped for air for the last time, then calmed down. Alice closed her eyes, and tapped her forehead. “What time is it?” she sighed. The sun hadn’t come up yet.

Alice remembered. The dream was about the batok, her tattoo. She uncovered the sheets, and looked at her right arm. It was still the same. She was expecting a new symbol. A fresh new ink. For literally killing everyone in the dream. But there was nothing. No new ink. Her tattoo still ended on the pattern of lightning. She had hoped, it would reach her shoulder by now. “All that for nothing, huh?” she spoke under her breath. “Maybe it really was just what Kadlum said it was. Preparation.”

Alice looked out the window. “I still have a meeting at eight,” she said to herself.

The water silently rushed down the sink as she washed her face in front of the mirror. She smirked, in the slightest. Her short, white-dyed hair had never lost its touch. The salon did a good job. The soap rubbed enviously against her body. Her skin was almost as bright as the soap itself. But her complexion couldn’t get any peachier. Could it? She chuckled at the thought.

A cup of coffee rested on her table, and it was slowly getting cold. Alice leaned on the balcony, and adored the heights of her condo. The streets were still quiet at this hour. The sun still hadn’t showed itself yet. She looked back at the hot drink. Alice never did like coffee. It was Dante’s idea to have coffee every morning. She hated cigarettes, too. Anything that damaged her body. Anything that slowed her down. She’d tell Dante it was to keep her strong, and swift. But she really did just like being the prettiest one in the room. In a way, it helped get her point across.

Alice laughed under her breath. If she hadn’t followed her father's footsteps and didn’t marry Dante, she could be a model. But that was all just far-cried thinking. She was the wife of Dante Buenaventura. The wife of the leader of the Kadlum clan.

It had only just been a month since her husband’s death. And all they kept telling her was to wait. Wait and prepare. Until Dante would come back to life the next year.