"The Thousand-Faced Totem"
May. 28th, 2022 10:44 pm"The Thousand-Faced Totem"
11/6/1879
I.
"I can't hardly believe I'm such a damned fool as to string along with you," Johnny Packard grumbled. He twisted his upper body around where he sat in the saddle to scowl at the old man riding slightly behind him. "I mean, hell, look at a-happened the last time we met!"
Machingtok was obviously very old, the long straight hair that reached his shoulders was so white it gleamed in the afternoon light and his wrinkled dark face resembled an apple that had been left out in the sun. A heavy wool mantle only emphasized how bony his shoulders were. Yet he sat upright on the thin blanket and his gnarled hands did not tremble. The medicine man answered patiently, "You were meant to carry that Gremthom coin, John. The spirit world chose you at birth."
"So you say." Johnny swung back around to face forward on his black stallion Terror and peered into the sparse trees ahead of them. Behind the scattering of trees were rounded boulders where higher ground began to rise. Not much over twenty, the redhead was short and slim enough that his handle 'Kid' did not seem inappropriate. It wasn't the black Levis, the denim vest over a blue flannel shirt or the battered black Stetson that made him stand out from the ordinary. It was the double holstered gunbelt he wore, with a matched pair of 1875 Colt Peacemakers that marked him as dangerrous.
Despite what the dime novels said, most men on the frontier did not wear holstered sidearms or even own a pistol. They relied on rifles and shotguns if needed. Seeing someone openly carrying a shooting iron was an ominous sign. Any lawman would instantly notice how Johnny Packard had tied the holsters to his thighs so the gun butts would always be exactly where he could reach them most quickly. Even sheriffs tended to carry a pistol in a coat pocket or stuck in their belt. A fast draw was not often needed for the lives most men lived. But the Brimstone Kid had lived on the edge of darkness for years now.
"I should make you take that goddam coin back, Machingtok," Johnny continued. "Find some other lost soul who wants to turn into a hellspawn ever night. I'd find me a job on some ranch and lead a peaceful life."
The old man's voice was always somber, but now it sounded deeply saddened. "It is too late for that, John. You would come seeking the coin to reclaim it. It would haunt your dreams and drift into your thoughts until you could not bear its absence."
The Kid made no answer. He knew the shaman was right. More than once he had buried the cursed token deep in a hole far from any town and had been compelled to return the next night to dig it up again. He had not been able to sleep or to think of anything else until he tucked the reddish metal disc into his hatband again. I'm damned in every meaning of the word, he thought.
"We will be at the Ancestor's Graveyard soon," Machingtok told him. "Well before the sun touches the horizon. I do not think the Reverend Scourge could have gotten there before us, John."
The black horse snorted and stomped his right foreleg as he sped up from a walk to a trot. Johnny rubbed the massive neck reassuringly. "Steady on, big fella," he said.
"The Darthan coin has changed him as much as it has changed you."
"That's true truth you're speaking," Johnny agreed. "I ain't never seen no hoss that loved trouble as much as Terror does. Ever night he wants to gallop hellbent through the darkness and if'n he ain't being shot at or trampling something, he gets all annoyed. And that reminds me, I been meaning to ask you. Whadaya mean when you say 'Darthan?' Where is that?"
"You see up ahead where the trees are close together and the undergrowth thick? That is the entrance to the graveyard. That is what your horse is excited about. The hill is too steep for them, John. We will have to leave our horses behind soon."
"Point taken. Ease back, Terror, them trees ain't going nowhere, we doesn't have to chase them. Again, where is Dartha?"
The thin elderly voice lowered to a near whisper. "Not a place but a people," Machingtok responded. "Before the red man filled this land, before even the Earlier Ones, the world was very different. It was so long ago that the rivers and the mountains are not where they are now, the birds and the beasts were larger and fiercer and no one today has ever seen their like."
"Go on, grandfather. I always did like scary campfire tales."
"There was a race of people who had cruel hearts and cunning minds. They loved tortures that would make Comanche and Apache cough up their food. And they had medicine both strong and wicked, medicine that rivaled what even the Great Old Ones could perform. These were the Darthim. It is a cleaner world without them in it."
"You made me shiver and that's a fact," the Brimstone Kid said. "These here Darthan folks, they was the ones who made that coin I'm carrying?"
"It is one of their most powerful sigils. Many times has it been thrown into a great river or hidden under mountains of rock. But always someone finds it. You have a good heart, John. You have been able to tame the Brimstone spirit so it does not slay the innocents but think of what would come to be if the Darthan coin fell into the hands of a bandit or renegade or even a man who is weak of character."
The Brimstone Kid pulled his hat down more tightly on his head. During the day, the token in its band remained cold and inert. It was only with nightfall that the stinging heat and nagging call of the cursed disc would trouble him. "I calculate we're at your Ancestor's Graveyard, Machingtok. Appears some joker has nailed a skull to that tree."
It was true. Eight feet off the ground, a withered oak with only a few remaining branches still alive displayed the bleached white roundness of a human skull, held by a spkike driven deep into the wood. The lower jaw gaped down, barely held on with a few dried tendons.
"A warning no one could fail to recognize," Machingtok muttered. "See fresh horse prints in the dirt? Steel shoes, a white man's horse. Reverend Scourge has already arrived."
II.
With two Winchesters trained on him from forty feet away and the gunmen spaced widely apart, Johnny froze into position as if turned to stone. He was a quick draw, although not at the level of Tom Pinto or Little Clay Hawk, and he knew his limits. To make any sudden move would be his last mistake.
Inside his hatband, the Darthan token began to grow warm against his forehead. Dusk was settling down. The Brimstone Kid thought he still had a chance to survive this. He took in his surroundings. They all stood in a clearing fifty feet across, a sort of natural amphitheatre created by the vertical granite cliffs on all sides. The dry rocky soil held dozens of wooden posts in irregular rows. Knee high in most cases, the wood had been carved to form grotesque and fanciful faces of birds, beasts and men. A few upright slabs of stone resembled more conventional tombstones.
"The Ancestors' Graveyard," he said at last.
Dominating the scene was a huge pillar that had evidently been fashioned from a single oak tree. Stripped off its branches and planed down to a cylinder, the immense post towered up thirty feet into the darkening sky. Carved on its surface were many many faces, no two alike except that they all were contorted as if they had died in pain. Despite all the unnatural sights he was witnessed in the past few years, the Brimstone Kid had never shuddered as strongly as then. He knew he was in the presence of something utterly wrong.
Both of the gunmen spread out a few steps further away from each other. There was nothing distinctive about them, just two bearded men with long stringy hair, wearing drab grimy clothes and shapeless hats. It would be hard to give a useful description of them. The only detail that stood out to Johnny's scrutiny was that the rifles were new and shiny, the men held them as if they were unfamiliar with the weapons.
Next to the Kid, Machingtok announced, "There is strong medicine here that does not welcome you men. You walk where the grandfathers of our grandfathers rest."
"That is why duty has led us here!" boomed a deep bass profundo. Stepping around from behind the mighty pillar was a thin, frail old man all in black, wearing a long frockcoat and a flat-topped hat. His grey beard jutted out stiffly from beneath a long face. "Do not think you have gone unrecognzed. A redheaded youth with green eyes, carrying two pistols. And a withered old savage wrapped in a thick blanket. You have been seen riding in the area."
"You've got my attention, mister," Johnny spat back at him.
"Address me as Reverend, if you will. Ezra Irwin Scourge, serving Providence more than two score years." The abnormally deep voice was incongruous coming from such a gaunt body. "And you, Jonathan Packard from Texas. You are appropriately called the Brimstone Kid, for the stink of the Pit itself hangs overyou with all the ghosts of the men you have murdered."
"Hold on there," Johnny objected. "I ain't no saddletramp nor outlaw. Ever man I cut down was holding iron on me or on some innocent soul. My conscience is clean."
"Infernal lies! I am gifted, I see the red haze of damnation hanging over you. And you, Injun. You are as wicked. It is whispered across the frontier that you are sworn in service to pagan gods. Vile demons known as Sulla Chun, as Draldros and Margoth and Grelok. There is nothing but torture and despair waiting for you after this life."
"That," Machingtok replied quietly, "we shall see." He gingerly lowered himself to the rocky ground and crossed his legs in front of him. "Forgive an old man if he can not stand while you preach your sermon, but please continue."
"Carter, Ovid, watch the boy. He does not wear those Colts for decoration. Brimstone Kid! I think it must be a guiding hand that has brought you here at this moment. You have arrived at exactly the right time to witness me bring down this accursed heathen shrine."
At that moment, the first hint of stars could be seen overhead. Beyond the cliffs around them, the sky was turning purple as the sun set. Johnny spoke with a mocking edge to his voice, "I do believe you are correct, sir. This is exactly the right time." Through the material of his hat, the Darthan coin blazed up hotly.
III.
"Machingtok, I do not blame you entirely for your heathen ways," Reverend Scourage intoned solemnly. "Our missionaries have done their noble work and turned many a savage toward redemption. You were already old and set in your ways before you heard them, and you rejected their help. There is still time. You can accept our Savior into your heart and escape Perdition tonight."
"If you are going to pass the collection plate," Machingtok replied, "I have only some coins on my person."
"Oh! Very well, refuse your final chance. You shall live to see these idolatrous columns cut down with my men's axes. Aye, and all the other smaller devil posts will be torn up from the ground as well. We have brought a goodly amount of lamp oil to burn them. The smoke of these abominations blazing away will be a pleasing offering to the Heavens."
"I must speak," the elderly shaman broke in. "Here me. These are my words. You place yourself and your men in great danger tonight. There are Those who will protect the Totems and not allow them to be damaged. You stand on ground made holy before the grandfathers of my grandfathers entered this land."
The gaunt preacher raised a long-handled axe with a grunt of effort. "No, no. The Cross stands between me and harm. It is you who should tremble in apprehension, my brother."
Feeling hot stinging pain rush through his body, feeling his muscles swell and tauten with restless energy, Johnny Packard struggled to repress a demonic mocking laugh. "These sticks ain't doin' you no harm, mister. You got no call to ruin what the Injuns respect."
But his tone had grown hollow and echoing.
"What has happened to your voice? What's wrong with your eyes... they're turning RED!"
The wandering gunfighter's face had turned long and bony, his fingers lengthened into gnarled claws. And his eye were not merely deep crimson in color, they glowed hot as coals in the gloom. "I'm what ya called me, reverend. You thought the Brimstone Kid was only a name, din't ya?"
The preacher uttered a single word that would have surprised his congregation to their cores. He wheeled around, drew back the woodsman's axe and swung it with what might he could muster... but it merely stuck to the side of the pillar without making even a scratch. Reverend Scourage struggled and tugged but somehow could not pull the blade away from the totem post.
"Some devil's trick! I will NOT yield. Ovid! Carter! What are you dullards standing there staring for? Come and help me!"
From the Kid, a low rumbling laugh echoed out across the Graveyard. He lowered his gloved hands until they brushed the walnut grips of his Peacemakers. "I believe these two fools have somethin' else they best be worryin' about at the moment."
That implied threat was enough. The two riflemen both lost their nerve and swung up their barrels. Quick enough to slap a striking rattlesnake, the Brimstone Kid flashed his own right hand up and the Colt in his grip boomed thunderously twice, its flashes white in the dusk. The gunman to his right convulsed, clutched at his chest and fell straight down in a heap.
The other fired twice and the heavy .30-.30 slugs punched directly into Johnny's chest dead center. The cloth of his flannel shirt jerked aside from those impacts. But the Kid did not fall or even twitch. He extended his right arm and mocked, "Din't expect that, did ya?" and sent two bullets buzzing through the air to drill through the man's face and leave a red splatter out of the back of his head.
Lowering his Colt, the stink of cordite rising up from its hot barrel, the Kid watched his two victims suspiciously. He had seen too many men manage to get off a final shot when they seemed to have been killed with finality. Finally, he holstered the Peacemaker and lowered his shoulders.
Machingtok spoke quietly, "I do not think the leader has anything left to fear from you, John."
It was true. The Brimstone Kid swung around to find his former mentor standing beside the giant totem post, next to where the Reverend Scourge was pressed up against the column as tightly as if glued there. The axe had fallen from limp hands. Without a word, Johnny Packard seized the preacher by the shoulders and slowly pulled him free with an unpleasant ripping noise. The body slid to the ground without even a final sigh from empty lungs.
Both Johnny and Machingtok stared down uneasily. The Reverend Scourge's face was gone, leaving only a smooth unbroken mask of skin which stretched from forehead to chin. The Kid and the shaman swung their eyes up to the totem post. There, etched in great detail between two other faces, the unmistakable features of the Reverend Scourge were trapped in the wood surface.
3/20/2022
11/6/1879
I.
"I can't hardly believe I'm such a damned fool as to string along with you," Johnny Packard grumbled. He twisted his upper body around where he sat in the saddle to scowl at the old man riding slightly behind him. "I mean, hell, look at a-happened the last time we met!"
Machingtok was obviously very old, the long straight hair that reached his shoulders was so white it gleamed in the afternoon light and his wrinkled dark face resembled an apple that had been left out in the sun. A heavy wool mantle only emphasized how bony his shoulders were. Yet he sat upright on the thin blanket and his gnarled hands did not tremble. The medicine man answered patiently, "You were meant to carry that Gremthom coin, John. The spirit world chose you at birth."
"So you say." Johnny swung back around to face forward on his black stallion Terror and peered into the sparse trees ahead of them. Behind the scattering of trees were rounded boulders where higher ground began to rise. Not much over twenty, the redhead was short and slim enough that his handle 'Kid' did not seem inappropriate. It wasn't the black Levis, the denim vest over a blue flannel shirt or the battered black Stetson that made him stand out from the ordinary. It was the double holstered gunbelt he wore, with a matched pair of 1875 Colt Peacemakers that marked him as dangerrous.
Despite what the dime novels said, most men on the frontier did not wear holstered sidearms or even own a pistol. They relied on rifles and shotguns if needed. Seeing someone openly carrying a shooting iron was an ominous sign. Any lawman would instantly notice how Johnny Packard had tied the holsters to his thighs so the gun butts would always be exactly where he could reach them most quickly. Even sheriffs tended to carry a pistol in a coat pocket or stuck in their belt. A fast draw was not often needed for the lives most men lived. But the Brimstone Kid had lived on the edge of darkness for years now.
"I should make you take that goddam coin back, Machingtok," Johnny continued. "Find some other lost soul who wants to turn into a hellspawn ever night. I'd find me a job on some ranch and lead a peaceful life."
The old man's voice was always somber, but now it sounded deeply saddened. "It is too late for that, John. You would come seeking the coin to reclaim it. It would haunt your dreams and drift into your thoughts until you could not bear its absence."
The Kid made no answer. He knew the shaman was right. More than once he had buried the cursed token deep in a hole far from any town and had been compelled to return the next night to dig it up again. He had not been able to sleep or to think of anything else until he tucked the reddish metal disc into his hatband again. I'm damned in every meaning of the word, he thought.
"We will be at the Ancestor's Graveyard soon," Machingtok told him. "Well before the sun touches the horizon. I do not think the Reverend Scourge could have gotten there before us, John."
The black horse snorted and stomped his right foreleg as he sped up from a walk to a trot. Johnny rubbed the massive neck reassuringly. "Steady on, big fella," he said.
"The Darthan coin has changed him as much as it has changed you."
"That's true truth you're speaking," Johnny agreed. "I ain't never seen no hoss that loved trouble as much as Terror does. Ever night he wants to gallop hellbent through the darkness and if'n he ain't being shot at or trampling something, he gets all annoyed. And that reminds me, I been meaning to ask you. Whadaya mean when you say 'Darthan?' Where is that?"
"You see up ahead where the trees are close together and the undergrowth thick? That is the entrance to the graveyard. That is what your horse is excited about. The hill is too steep for them, John. We will have to leave our horses behind soon."
"Point taken. Ease back, Terror, them trees ain't going nowhere, we doesn't have to chase them. Again, where is Dartha?"
The thin elderly voice lowered to a near whisper. "Not a place but a people," Machingtok responded. "Before the red man filled this land, before even the Earlier Ones, the world was very different. It was so long ago that the rivers and the mountains are not where they are now, the birds and the beasts were larger and fiercer and no one today has ever seen their like."
"Go on, grandfather. I always did like scary campfire tales."
"There was a race of people who had cruel hearts and cunning minds. They loved tortures that would make Comanche and Apache cough up their food. And they had medicine both strong and wicked, medicine that rivaled what even the Great Old Ones could perform. These were the Darthim. It is a cleaner world without them in it."
"You made me shiver and that's a fact," the Brimstone Kid said. "These here Darthan folks, they was the ones who made that coin I'm carrying?"
"It is one of their most powerful sigils. Many times has it been thrown into a great river or hidden under mountains of rock. But always someone finds it. You have a good heart, John. You have been able to tame the Brimstone spirit so it does not slay the innocents but think of what would come to be if the Darthan coin fell into the hands of a bandit or renegade or even a man who is weak of character."
The Brimstone Kid pulled his hat down more tightly on his head. During the day, the token in its band remained cold and inert. It was only with nightfall that the stinging heat and nagging call of the cursed disc would trouble him. "I calculate we're at your Ancestor's Graveyard, Machingtok. Appears some joker has nailed a skull to that tree."
It was true. Eight feet off the ground, a withered oak with only a few remaining branches still alive displayed the bleached white roundness of a human skull, held by a spkike driven deep into the wood. The lower jaw gaped down, barely held on with a few dried tendons.
"A warning no one could fail to recognize," Machingtok muttered. "See fresh horse prints in the dirt? Steel shoes, a white man's horse. Reverend Scourge has already arrived."
II.
With two Winchesters trained on him from forty feet away and the gunmen spaced widely apart, Johnny froze into position as if turned to stone. He was a quick draw, although not at the level of Tom Pinto or Little Clay Hawk, and he knew his limits. To make any sudden move would be his last mistake.
Inside his hatband, the Darthan token began to grow warm against his forehead. Dusk was settling down. The Brimstone Kid thought he still had a chance to survive this. He took in his surroundings. They all stood in a clearing fifty feet across, a sort of natural amphitheatre created by the vertical granite cliffs on all sides. The dry rocky soil held dozens of wooden posts in irregular rows. Knee high in most cases, the wood had been carved to form grotesque and fanciful faces of birds, beasts and men. A few upright slabs of stone resembled more conventional tombstones.
"The Ancestors' Graveyard," he said at last.
Dominating the scene was a huge pillar that had evidently been fashioned from a single oak tree. Stripped off its branches and planed down to a cylinder, the immense post towered up thirty feet into the darkening sky. Carved on its surface were many many faces, no two alike except that they all were contorted as if they had died in pain. Despite all the unnatural sights he was witnessed in the past few years, the Brimstone Kid had never shuddered as strongly as then. He knew he was in the presence of something utterly wrong.
Both of the gunmen spread out a few steps further away from each other. There was nothing distinctive about them, just two bearded men with long stringy hair, wearing drab grimy clothes and shapeless hats. It would be hard to give a useful description of them. The only detail that stood out to Johnny's scrutiny was that the rifles were new and shiny, the men held them as if they were unfamiliar with the weapons.
Next to the Kid, Machingtok announced, "There is strong medicine here that does not welcome you men. You walk where the grandfathers of our grandfathers rest."
"That is why duty has led us here!" boomed a deep bass profundo. Stepping around from behind the mighty pillar was a thin, frail old man all in black, wearing a long frockcoat and a flat-topped hat. His grey beard jutted out stiffly from beneath a long face. "Do not think you have gone unrecognzed. A redheaded youth with green eyes, carrying two pistols. And a withered old savage wrapped in a thick blanket. You have been seen riding in the area."
"You've got my attention, mister," Johnny spat back at him.
"Address me as Reverend, if you will. Ezra Irwin Scourge, serving Providence more than two score years." The abnormally deep voice was incongruous coming from such a gaunt body. "And you, Jonathan Packard from Texas. You are appropriately called the Brimstone Kid, for the stink of the Pit itself hangs overyou with all the ghosts of the men you have murdered."
"Hold on there," Johnny objected. "I ain't no saddletramp nor outlaw. Ever man I cut down was holding iron on me or on some innocent soul. My conscience is clean."
"Infernal lies! I am gifted, I see the red haze of damnation hanging over you. And you, Injun. You are as wicked. It is whispered across the frontier that you are sworn in service to pagan gods. Vile demons known as Sulla Chun, as Draldros and Margoth and Grelok. There is nothing but torture and despair waiting for you after this life."
"That," Machingtok replied quietly, "we shall see." He gingerly lowered himself to the rocky ground and crossed his legs in front of him. "Forgive an old man if he can not stand while you preach your sermon, but please continue."
"Carter, Ovid, watch the boy. He does not wear those Colts for decoration. Brimstone Kid! I think it must be a guiding hand that has brought you here at this moment. You have arrived at exactly the right time to witness me bring down this accursed heathen shrine."
At that moment, the first hint of stars could be seen overhead. Beyond the cliffs around them, the sky was turning purple as the sun set. Johnny spoke with a mocking edge to his voice, "I do believe you are correct, sir. This is exactly the right time." Through the material of his hat, the Darthan coin blazed up hotly.
III.
"Machingtok, I do not blame you entirely for your heathen ways," Reverend Scourage intoned solemnly. "Our missionaries have done their noble work and turned many a savage toward redemption. You were already old and set in your ways before you heard them, and you rejected their help. There is still time. You can accept our Savior into your heart and escape Perdition tonight."
"If you are going to pass the collection plate," Machingtok replied, "I have only some coins on my person."
"Oh! Very well, refuse your final chance. You shall live to see these idolatrous columns cut down with my men's axes. Aye, and all the other smaller devil posts will be torn up from the ground as well. We have brought a goodly amount of lamp oil to burn them. The smoke of these abominations blazing away will be a pleasing offering to the Heavens."
"I must speak," the elderly shaman broke in. "Here me. These are my words. You place yourself and your men in great danger tonight. There are Those who will protect the Totems and not allow them to be damaged. You stand on ground made holy before the grandfathers of my grandfathers entered this land."
The gaunt preacher raised a long-handled axe with a grunt of effort. "No, no. The Cross stands between me and harm. It is you who should tremble in apprehension, my brother."
Feeling hot stinging pain rush through his body, feeling his muscles swell and tauten with restless energy, Johnny Packard struggled to repress a demonic mocking laugh. "These sticks ain't doin' you no harm, mister. You got no call to ruin what the Injuns respect."
But his tone had grown hollow and echoing.
"What has happened to your voice? What's wrong with your eyes... they're turning RED!"
The wandering gunfighter's face had turned long and bony, his fingers lengthened into gnarled claws. And his eye were not merely deep crimson in color, they glowed hot as coals in the gloom. "I'm what ya called me, reverend. You thought the Brimstone Kid was only a name, din't ya?"
The preacher uttered a single word that would have surprised his congregation to their cores. He wheeled around, drew back the woodsman's axe and swung it with what might he could muster... but it merely stuck to the side of the pillar without making even a scratch. Reverend Scourage struggled and tugged but somehow could not pull the blade away from the totem post.
"Some devil's trick! I will NOT yield. Ovid! Carter! What are you dullards standing there staring for? Come and help me!"
From the Kid, a low rumbling laugh echoed out across the Graveyard. He lowered his gloved hands until they brushed the walnut grips of his Peacemakers. "I believe these two fools have somethin' else they best be worryin' about at the moment."
That implied threat was enough. The two riflemen both lost their nerve and swung up their barrels. Quick enough to slap a striking rattlesnake, the Brimstone Kid flashed his own right hand up and the Colt in his grip boomed thunderously twice, its flashes white in the dusk. The gunman to his right convulsed, clutched at his chest and fell straight down in a heap.
The other fired twice and the heavy .30-.30 slugs punched directly into Johnny's chest dead center. The cloth of his flannel shirt jerked aside from those impacts. But the Kid did not fall or even twitch. He extended his right arm and mocked, "Din't expect that, did ya?" and sent two bullets buzzing through the air to drill through the man's face and leave a red splatter out of the back of his head.
Lowering his Colt, the stink of cordite rising up from its hot barrel, the Kid watched his two victims suspiciously. He had seen too many men manage to get off a final shot when they seemed to have been killed with finality. Finally, he holstered the Peacemaker and lowered his shoulders.
Machingtok spoke quietly, "I do not think the leader has anything left to fear from you, John."
It was true. The Brimstone Kid swung around to find his former mentor standing beside the giant totem post, next to where the Reverend Scourge was pressed up against the column as tightly as if glued there. The axe had fallen from limp hands. Without a word, Johnny Packard seized the preacher by the shoulders and slowly pulled him free with an unpleasant ripping noise. The body slid to the ground without even a final sigh from empty lungs.
Both Johnny and Machingtok stared down uneasily. The Reverend Scourge's face was gone, leaving only a smooth unbroken mask of skin which stretched from forehead to chin. The Kid and the shaman swung their eyes up to the totem post. There, etched in great detail between two other faces, the unmistakable features of the Reverend Scourge were trapped in the wood surface.
3/20/2022