The Trench by Francesca Quarto
"I don't see how you can help save me from the gallows, Penbrook. My story has been recounted in every yellow rag... even turned into one of those cheap Penny Dreadful serials, I'm told. The publisher is just waiting for the last chapter to be written, when the trap door opens beneath my feet. All know of my crazed actions. They cost me everything including my freedom, and soon, my life! No. There isn't any sense in rehashing the sordid nightmare."
Charles Burgundy dropped onto the narrow cot. A thin light from the window, set high in the stone wall, settled on his broad shoulders, highlighting the thick, dark curls at the nape of his neck. His head was in his hands and he silently shook it as if denying the existence of his mean surroundings. The Solicitor hired by his parents stepped closer to the filthy mattress, careful not to brush against it with his dark suit. The bed was covered with a thin wool blanket and he noticed the rough stuffing poking through the ripped seams of the mattress. The cell was reeking of unclean bodies and the foul droppings left in its corners. There were two other prisoners being held in this cesspit and his client, the dashing Charles Burgundy, looked as out of place among the rascals as an exotic song bird would in a chicken coop.
"Charles, I have been your family Solicitor for many years. Your father has tasked me with freeing you from this unjust incarceration and I intend to do so. Your living conditions here are deplorable."
The young man looked up. It was nineteen-sixteen and two years of fighting in a seemingly endless 'War of the World,' had hallowed out his once handsome face. He smiled weakly at the older man.
"There is truly nothing here worse than what I have already seen and done. The other men in here were found guilty of desertion and they are to be shot. For me, it's the Gallows, where I'm to swing like a church bell. I have the dubious honor of being the only Officer in His Majesty's Service, to ever have been found guilty of mass murder of my comrades. I'm told I am to serve as an example of how criminals of any rank will be treated if they commit such heinous crimes. Did you know, all but two men from my squad were slaughtered because of my deranged behavior? Even shooting at me had no effect, or slowed down my rampage. The two testified they were only able to escape, because I was systematically butchering their friends in a frenzy of blood lust. They crawled through the trenches until they reached the next command position. The Officer in charge immediately reported my insane behavior and ordered that I be brought back alive to face justice. Though I'd hardly call my current state as being alive."
The prisoner took a long breath of foul air before saying, "There. Now you have the whole story, sir."
Penbrook left after a few minutes spent trying to convince the young man that his plight could be avoided. "You need only divulge the full truth about the incident," he insisted again.
The Solicitor's spicy cologne lingered for a brief time until it too was overcome by the heavy odor of fate and hopelessness. Charles lay back on the narrow bed, his arm flung over his eyes. He drifted into another fitful sleep. He saw himself in this same dream as it played out yet again, behind his locked eyelids.
He was on his belly, covered in mud from torrential rains that turned the trenches into stinking bogs. He was half-crawling through the gauged earth to reach each of his men to relay his orders and give a personal word of encouragement. They had fought together as a squad for months now. He could never quite remember how many for certain. The war was as blurred as his vision in the downpour he slithered through. The men were squatting along the wall of dirt. All of them had stunned, far-off looks in their dull eyes, and lost expressions etched into their faces. They dug this trench days before, advancing yard by yard, toward enemy lines. They had to keep reinforcing it as it continuously slid down with the frequent rains, and the constant fusillade from across the River Somme. They were in the north of France and had been engaged with the enemy for almost one-hundred days already. So many thousands had already died or been injured. Charles found it difficult to swallow after considering his next order. As a Captain in the British Army, it was up to him to show a rigid backbone to his men, no matter how wretched the circumstances.
He finished speaking with the last man and retreated for a few minutes of rest under the make-shift shelter that was his command post. Out of sight of his men, he removed his helmet, running filthy fingers through his thick hair and rubbing his eyelids with his palms. He sank to the ground, propping his head against the lose end of the tarp ceiling. His burning eyes had drifted shut, when he distinctly heard a woman's voice call his name. His eyes flew open.
There, with the strobe effect of field artillery painting her naked body in garish hues, stood the most beautiful woman Charles had ever seen. He froze as if suffering shell-shock, staring at this voluptuous apparition. He gasped when he spotted the stubby wings, covered in shiny scales, protruding from her slender shoulders. His mouth hung open, but no words were spoken. He blinked in rapid succession until he knew what he saw was real and not a vision likely to fade. He managed to ask, "Who...How did you..?"
"I'm only with you for a few minutes Charles, but I've a gift for you. It will save you from this mindless slaughter and bring you the peace you've longed for."
Charles watched as she floated to where he lay sprawled, legs akimbo with a deadening fatigue. She leaned over him, her full lips parted in a seductive smile. This close to her open mouth, her breath smelled of a mixture of floral scents and the coppery smell of fresh blood. His body was rigid with an all consuming desire this strange winged-woman inflamed in him. He tried speaking, but she laid a slender, cold finger on his lips, hushing him with a shake of her head. The movement of her long golden hair sent shivers through him as he watched it brush across her full bosom. With the same chilled finger she pulled his filthy collar away from his neck. He was looking straight ahead, but his peripheral vision picked up the long incisors hanging from her mouth just before they sank into him.
Time stood still for Charles while he listened to the strange sucking sound close to his ear. He couldn't move a muscle. When the woman pulled away, it sounded like someone pulling a boot out of the mud. He watched blood dripping from the corner of her lush mouth and down her delicate chin.
"You will be very hungry when you awaken, Charles. More ravenous then ever before. But out there, lies a feast for you. I'll feed again later, after you've had your fill. Ah, let the blood flow!"
She vanished into the muddy shadows under the tarp. Charles stared at the spot she stood a second before, seeing only the hard pellets of rain beat into the exposed earth. He shook his head hard then stood. "I am famished!" he declared to the black night. He felt his mouth shifting oddly as if he was sprouting new baby teeth. He touch the sides of his mouth where the sharp incisors had dropped neatly into place.
Charles attacked each man while they slept in war-induced stupors. None had the chance to scream out after he ripped into their throats and drank deeply of their life's blood. This went on into an endless night. Before dawn, Charles saw the last two men rouse themselves. Seeing the torn bodies, they scurried like squealing rats through the black trench, covered now with the free flowing blood of their comrades.
As always in his macabre dream, Charles returned to the small lean-to and finding his knapsack, dug out another yellowish pod. He knew he was addicted to the pure opium, but it was the only way he could survive the horrors of this war. He'd do another quick bowl before he had to rouse the men for a charge out of the trench and toward the withering fire from the enemy line. As he fingered the annoying insect bites on his neck, he took a deep drag on the pipe and smiled at the preposterous notion of death. Nothing could be worse than the trench.
The other prisoners watched him as he began to stir from his fitful dreaming and waited for the screams they knew would follow.