‘Mark of the Phoenix’: A Short Story

This is the final story I wrote for a short story class I took in 2013.  I have made some edits throughout the years, the latest on June 21st, 2023. I have plans to expand this universe, so you can look forward to seeing more about Ifanco and his curse in the future.

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Mark of the Phoenix

by Clinton Nix

A globe of light emanated from Ifanco’s lantern as he stepped carefully over the rocks. The cavern was dank and full of bats, but he encountered no hostility during his descent into the dark. For what seemed like days, he had searched blindly through the last known entrance to the Sleeping City, a series of cavernous veins that coursed underneath Benu mountain. They were largely abandoned, but stories of lost treasure and mysterious creatures have captivated the interest of explorers. Many of the entrances had been sealed off since that time.

Ifanco’s heart thumped as each step brought him deeper into the cave. Supplies were low, but he wouldn’t dare turn back. He kept pushing onward even as his eyesight blurred, his stomach clenched, and his muscles quivered. Ifanco’s pendant bounced against his chest as he walked, and the giant ruby inside cast a ruddy light on the shadowy corners of the passage.

He set the lantern down briefly to catch his breath, fondling the pendant as his gaze mingled with the darkness ahead. His mind danced over the rocks, but it was unable to penetrate the deep wilderness of possibilities that lie ahead. Images of golden shining headdresses filled his mind, along with the twinkling of curved armlets that cuffed thousands of dancing arms. A sea of faces swarmed around him, laughing and looking, glowing, waiting in need. A vision of a grand hall of windows and banisters, draped with intricately designed tapestries, swirled upon the rocks in the cave, and Ifanco scrunched his face to banish them from existence. His eyes hollowed out when the images receded into the blackness. His consciousness nearly faded for a moment—pleading to be surrendered forever to the blanket of darkness. But a soft light glinted between rocks in the distance, rekindling his will to proceed, and he grabbed the lantern and stepped toward it.

He pressed his face to the opening, but it was too small to see through. The light blinked in tiny bursts, illuminating the tiny brown craters in his eyes, which pulsed and hollowed in the same pattern. He was locked in a trance, until a clump of greasy hair tickled his face, provoking him with irritation and reason. He fumbled through his leather bag and pulled out a small pickaxe.

The crags gave way upon impact, but the strenuous effort took a toll on Ifanco’s weakening body. He took long breaths that widened between each swing, until a hole was made just big enough to fit through. The light vanished, and Ifanco stared into the darkened spot and wondered if he was hallucinating.

He crawled through the hole and stumbled out into another expanse of darkness. He pulled the lantern through the hole and the flickering light cast itself over the room, demanding its secrets to be revealed. Ifanco realized he was not in a cave any longer.

He stood upon complexly woven patterns carved into the floor, with an interlocking series of stones laid down with a precision that would call upon a master of architecture. The finely detailed patterns contained large circles and shapes that looked like teardrops. Ifanco swept the lantern over the floor and a peculiar image took shape in the light. It was of two birds inside of a giant circle, and they were flying in opposing directions; one bird was moving upward with a sun behind it, and the other facing in reverse, and donning a moon instead. As to the significance, he couldn’t decipher, but the symbol was a sign that he was close.

Finally, I have reached the place that I’ve so desperately been searching for.

What seemed like days had passed as Ifanco sat in the hall with the patterns, pacing erratically and inspecting every facet of detail. He hadn’t eaten for a great length of time, but hunger was only a trifle to him. And telling the hours from the days was no longer a possibility, or worry. Time itself existed without a shadow or direction. Ifanco’s only method was using his facial hair, which was far past a clean shave, becoming curly and grimy. And in this ambiguous state of delusion, all seemed to disappear in the darkness of that room. Even his reason for being there.

Ifanco’s gaze sunk deep in a small pool of stagnant water, his eyes blurry and unable to perceive what was real. A silhouette appeared behind his reflection; a spectral shape with dingy tentacle-like appendages that shimmered around the edges. The tentacles turned an ashen hue and two icy orbs glowed in the center. The glowing circles became eyes, and then a nose and lips formed below them, and the tentacles became hair, flowing in the wind. A fire awoke in Ifanco’s chest: it is Mayala; my lovely rose, Mayala. What has become of you? I can hardly remember your face…

Ifanco’s eyes radiated with a ravenous flame that mirrored his heart, and a spark ignited in the center of the room. Darkness gave way to brilliant light as a glowing orb pulsated with the same rhythm of a heartbeat. The orb expanded and rays of light twisted and bounced off the walls. A new shape was birthed from the orb, of which protruded a massive appendage from one side that spanned nearly the size of the room. It was a giant wing. Ifanco could only make out the outline of the dazzling shape. His eyes were kissed with blindness by the light, and vision did not return until the figure had taken its complete form.

It was a massive red-and-black-feathered bird that burned with a hidden, untouchable fire. It had no eyes on its head, but a large beak curved out from its face. Its one wing had large, tattered feathers with crimson tips on the end, and they dragged on the dusty floor. The creature cocked its head and took a gargantuan leap toward a broken column and perched upon it, plumes of dust fanning in its wake.

As the bird’s presence strangled Ifanco’s awareness, his questioning mind dissolved into a burgeoning sense of awe. This magnificent creature was before him in all of its broken beauty, and Ifanco could not help but sense an unfathomable ocean of pain and sorrow: the bird was a heavenly being forever tainted from true perfection by the horrendous jagged stump that remained of the right wing. It would always be marked by that ugly fate, and yet, it shone before him with a passionate radiance. Ifanco could barely come to his senses when the bird began to speak.

“Why does one approach this forgotten place?”

Indecipherable sounds merged and danced in Ifanco’s mind, alchemizing into recognizable speech patterns. However, the creature’s beak did not move.

Despite the unfathomable figure before him, Ifanco held himself unflinchingly as he faced it.

“I came for your power. Legend says you possess the gift of bringing the dead back to life.”

The giant bird flapped its wing with a brutish intensity that crackled the air.

“There exists no such thing—nor any desire to share any such power, or thing, at all, with another.”

Ifanco took that as a sign to be steadfast, and tightened his mental bow as far back as he could pull it. He boldly stood up and took one step toward the bird, and the image held in his mind became an immovable stone that he embraced.

“I will do whatever it takes. Please impart your gift to me.”

The bird spread its wing and flapped once more, with a force that would surely break Ifanco’s bones into tiny fragments. For the first time, the creature opened its beak and cackled.

“Perhaps there can be such an arrangement. But a sacrifice must be made.”

“A sacrifice?” Ifanco’s eyes drifted in thought.

“Your highest held possession. Only when that attainable fruit is lost in time forever, will this gift be imparted to you.”

The words shook Ifanco’s mind into a turbid state. He thought of the many things he once cherished in his life. He thought of the country and the countrymen, of his family, and of Mayala. After a long moment of silence, Ifanco gripped the emblem hanging from his chest and ripped it off. He stepped forward and placed it on the ground below the column that the bird perched from.

“I offer you Bennupoli—my kingdom— in return for the gift.”

The bird shifted on the column, stretching its gnarly clawed feet. It let out another ear-piercing cackle, rolling its head back and forth, and then returned to a statuesque posture.

“Your offer is accepted.”

The mysterious creature cocked its head to the side, and stretched out its right foot and dangled it as if it were pointing towards Ifanco.

“Your kingdom will forever slip from your grasp upon return.”

A pang of regret seared underneath Ifanco’s skin as he realized what he had just thrown away. The bird raised its wing and puffed its crimson-feathered chest in an intimidating form.

“Remember this, foolish one: the giver of rotten fruit shall forever eat it.”

As those words echoed through Ifanco’s mind, the bird draped the blood-tipped feathers around its body and disappeared within a wisp of light, and the room fell to darkness. A thought rippled in Ifanco’s mind that came not from him, but somewhere else: Just raise your right hand and the strength of will shall give life to the lifeless.

***

Ifanco staggered through the moonlit meadow outside of Bennupoli with a long, narrow bundle hanging over his shoulder. He parted through the knee-high grass and stopped when he reached a large willow tree that hung over a clearing. He kneeled, laying down the bundle with the grace of a mother carrying a newborn. The unwrapped layers revealed a rotted, indiscernible lump of mass, the stench of which caused Ifanco to gag. He gently grabbed two protruding parts that looked like limbs, and crossed them over the center with his dirt-stained hands. He stood back, closed his eyes, and raised his right hand, palm outward, until it was level with his face.

Mayala…

An emblem flashed on the top of his hand, revealing the black shape of a bird with one wing spread out, and the other missing.

Come back to me…

Ifanco fell into a somber gaze, entranced by the symbol, as he grasped the reality of where he was. His heart ceased to beat, and a thick blackness devoured his eyes. The air had become frozen, the leaves on the willow tree stopped rustling, and the meadow fell into a silent vacuum of emptiness. A faint gurgle echoed in front of him and pierced through the empty air. Ifanco witnessed the extraordinary happening and reveled in the sight of the image that was before him. It was like looking at a dried rose, stiff and poised: an image of beauty, but devoid of the moisture that made it fluid and supple. The disgusting corpse had thus transformed into the curved, beauteous shape of a human being. The body lied there with grace and elegance, and the arms were crossed over the breasts. Rays of moonlight fell upon the face through the leaves of the willow tree, framing the elegant features that carried exact likeness with Mayala’s. The eyes were closed, but the lids were soft and round; the nose was small and pointed, and covered in delicate freckles; strands of black hair coursed along smooth cheekbones. Ifanco engulfed himself in the sight, painting every detail of Mayala’s figure in his mind that was illuminated in the night, but his heart was curiously silent as he stood before the body.

Before Ifanco could approach it—her—the figure hoisted herself up suddenly, like a lump, and a hideous moan bellowed from inside of her that repulsed his eyes and forced his gaze downward. The beautiful Mayala began to slither and flop, as if she didn’t know how to use her legs, and ambled herself away from Ifanco. His heart ached with an unknowable pain as he watched the haunting creature snake in the direction of a stray carcass of a crow lying in the grass. The crow’s wings were spread out stiff as she picked it up, and it maintained a rigid, frozen posture of flight, as if it had plummeted from the air inexplicably. Ifanco moved closer to her as she feasted on the feathered body, devouring it with an unquenchable, ravenous passion. The bird crunched and crumpled in her mouth, and her silver-eyed gaze faded and pulsed, shifting and dissolving into a glowing, pale-blue hue. Ifanco stepped closer.

What is this?

The creature flopped over and gurgled as she—it—curiously felt the ground around it.

This isn’t Mayala..!

Ifanco pulled out a knife from the side of his belt, which was resting in a flap around his hip. His eyes flashed with an impassioned craze, and he ran toward the creature holding the knife with a tense grip that would crush statues. He brought the knife within inches of the creature’s neck when it gurgled sounds that formed a complete word.

“I-Ifanco…”