Blood of Eden
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
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The rest of the day was mostly a blur. I don’t remember much because I kept seeing that bloody rose and the blood on my hands and the note, “Soon, Marian,” signed, “Michael.”
For some reason, I’m so psyched out that I actually sneak a kitchen knife to my room. I slide it beneath my pillow and walk away. If I happen to wake, I’ll kill him if I see him. If I can carry it to my dream with me, I’ll try to kill him.
When I at last go to bed, I slide my hand beneath my pillow ad grip the handle of the knife. Hard, black plastic handle with an extremely sharp, short blade. I quickly fall to sleep, and sure enough, my dreams give way to his face.
This time I willingly go with him, not letting him see the knife in my hand. I’ve actually got it! Now I must keep it concealed and use it when the time is perfect.
But he notices my strange change. He suspects something, though he doesn’t know what to expect.
At last I have a little hopeful security. I smile slyly, even letting him take my arm. Any moment, you fool, I think. “Where are we going? The Avari again?”
“No…I have a surprise for you. It’s quite the place, really.”
Instead of opening the arc way like usual, Leviath pulls me closer and scoops me off my feet, to which I accidentally drop the knife, and with it, any hopeful sense of security. My stomach plummets and I start to feel pretty sick. He bends his knees slightly, the black wings of darkness spreading, and he jumps as they swing down powerfully. I choke on a muffled scream, which shows he still has control of me.
By the time I manage to look down, I see the ground is already far below us. Terror grips me so that more than fearing him, I fear him dropping me. I instantaneously put my arms around him and bury my face in his shoulder, unable to scream because he still won’t let me, though I doubt I could if I tried and if he let me, and nearly unable to breathe, my heart racing furiously. To add to my fear-driven ailment, it’s cold and my fingers and hands and, well, nearly my whole body, goes numb. What makes it worse is the fact that he offers no warmth. He offers as my as would a corpse.
I feel his being gently surprised by my fear-caused course of action, and I hear a light chuckle. Then I realize he has lost control of me. But I’m not fool enough to try anything stupid. I’d plummet probably eight hundred feet or more and would definitely die upon impact…if I fell.
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After what seems to be an hour, probably exaggerated time because my fear could make me lose the real sense of time, Leviath lowers our altitude and we descend rapidly into the darkness below. The landing is gentle, and he asks me just as gently, “Can you walk?”
I can’t even reply. I’m shivering so violently and still holding tight with frozen arms and body and my head still pressed hard against his shoulder.
He understands and tells me quietly, “I’ll carry you.”
“Where?” I gasp almost inaudibly. My teeth would be chattering except for the fact that I’m clenching my jaws to keep from doing so. “T-t-to where?” I almost just chewed my tongue off trying to say that. My muscles are aching and sore already from being tense for so long. Even my bones and joints are sore.
“Inside the Coves,” he replies. “It’s warmer in the main chamber.”
I’m sure I’m gonna get hypothermia before long if he doesn’t hurry to this ‘warm’ main chamber, whatever or wherever the heck it is.
I suddenly realize I am no longer in his arms. I am lying on a pallet on a hard, cold stone floor. The pallet is strangely comfortable, thick with animal hides, black wolf, as I sense, and many pillows. I open my eyes, sensing Leviath near me and pull one of the fur blankets higher, closer to my chin. But I feel his reasserted control on my mind. I look up into his red eyes, glowing blood stones in the flickering light of a fire. His shoulder-length, greasy black hair casting extra shadows upon his face, he looks down upon me, smiling darkly. His smiles are never simply smiles. I feel hidden meanings and concealed thoughts or emotions or plans, or even memories behind the perfect teeth and gleaming eyes. As welcoming as he could be, he is also more hollow than could possibly be imagined. But by simply paying attention, I can see what he really is, and that he’s without compassion or sincerity. Sure, he may care a little if something should benefit him, or he may lust as would any man. After all, he is as any man or creature. He desires. But unlike all I know, he is absent of compassion or love or truth or true kindness.
Those are the things I see in him. Absence.
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The fire crackles and snaps, echoing in the dank, dark room, and it’s the only noise I hear. I am still afraid, but not overly so, so long as Leviath doesn’t try anything, not even moving. I am actually warm enough that I almost don’t remember how cold I was. The fire is somewhere behind me, somewhere close enough that I feel the heat as it reaches me. It’s hot enough, yet cool enough, that it has to be probably a large fire in a fire place perhaps eleven or twelve feet away from me. The fact that I don’t smell smoke definitely means there’s a ventilation shaft, or a system of air shafts and such, which means this place has been here a while, and since Leviath has taken me here, since he’s here, that has to be because this place is secluded out in the woods like the Avari is, r else it’s guarded…I’m not sure, but he’s made it clear that he and his subjects are all very secretive, which is because, the less humans that know about them, the less prepared an more easily hunted they’ll be, therefore less likely to have any Livier killed or ambushed or attacked.
“What?” I ask finally.
“Nothing,” he replies. “I was simply wondering how Elders and the other council would take it if I actually did choose you. I’m still considering from among my people, but only because my highest, most trusted servant has urged me to do so. He is rather disgusted and displeased that I bother with you, even though I can’t help it…But he’s like a brother to me, like a big brother, even though he’s so much younger than I. In a way, he seems wiser sometimes. Sometimes not.”
“Why tell me this? You think I care?” I tell him. “As far as I’m concerned, I don’t care. I don’t give a crap about any of you freaks.”
“Freaks…” he repeats thoughtfully, looking up and into the fire. “Rather humorous that you call us freaks when you are called one…and sort of are one, don’t you think?” His voice is a little taunting, egging me on.
I turn my head so that I’m staring up at a dark ceiling far above me. Our voices echo and carry on throughout this room, making it seems almost haunted. I slowly sit up, and my heart beat quickens pace a bit since he’s sitting by my side and my sitting up kind of puts me closer again as I try to scoot away, putting my hands on the pallet of fur to push and scoot back a little. But he stops my movement just as I start to push myself back with my hands.
Hey!
I look up into his red eyes. For several moments, he doesn’t let me go, and yet he does nothing. But then, as he starts to lean toward me, he stops and tells me, “You have no idea as to how captivating your own strange darkness is, how hard it is for me to keep control over your mind. Your mind is simply so strong at times…Still yet, you don’t know how hard it is for me to resist you…”
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I feel his right hand gently cover my right hand. I want so badly to have not dropped that knife. His lips brush mine softly, slow and unsure, pulling at me mentally and emotionally, pleading weakly that I not resist. Suddenly he pulls away, concealing his emotion and killing. I hadn’t even realized the weak warmth in his heart, the small hint of Life and sincerity, until he suddenly just now destroyed it. Something had intruded into his mind, a painful memory of some sort, and I still see it haunting him as he shoves away that warmth, steadily returning to his cold heart.
I start to speak, though I’m not sure of what to say. First off, he had no right to control my mind. Second, he had no right to bring me here in this dream. Third, he’s got no right to kiss me. Fourth—I have thousands of reasons to be angry and boiling mad. But all that is put on hold as I want to know what the memory was that killed his heart—or, no; I want to be able to see and feel that warmth in him. I don’t know why it came or where from, or what made him shove it form him. But I want to know.
Before I can say a word, he stands and walks away from me angrily, gritting his teeth and clenching his jaws as he shakes his head.
“Heart,” I whisper sadly, nearly choking on tears.
He’s almost opened a massive set of doors. He’s started to twist the latch and swing it open, but he heard me and stopped. Right now he is so cold, yet he’s fighting to remain that way. “Jocylin…” he cries silently, putting a hand on the door and bowing his head so that his forehead touches the stone and steel.
I am at a loss as to how to react. Heartless. It’s all I’ve known from him. Anything other than that was deceivance. But now? Certainly, this defies all rules that he’s nothing but evil…I feel grief!!
What was the word he whispered that he’s crying over silently? His grief turns to anger unexpectedly just as I begin to stand up, now under my own control, and he slams his fist into the door so hard I hear a loud crack, as if he’s just busted it. He hits it again and then stops and turns to slide down to the floor, hands bleeding as he cries again, this time harder as he covers his face, his knees up. He looks so very pitifully sad and heart-broken as he cries unwillingly but bitterly; I can only find it in myself to want to comfort him, even though he’s done what he’s done, even though he is who he is and what he is. I feel tears in my own eyes because I don’t only see his anguish and true suffering, I feel it, and more strongly so than anyone could ever. I feel it almost as if it’s my own; his raw, true emotion bleeds into me through the rivulets of my psych, something I can’t stop or control.
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I move toward him and in drawing closer, he never senses me and never looks up. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t even feel me there, though he knows I am somewhere in the room. He doesn’t care. This memory is so strong, yet so old, from so long ago—and yet it has returned as if it’s just come to pass.
Why does he hurt so?
I reach out for his arm. But as soon as my fingertips contact his skin, the next thing I know I’m thrown off balance by a powerful, painful blow to the right side of my face, my jaw, and dazed, I see him standing over me with wild rage, wanting to simply kill me and everyone he knows or doesn’t know for want of venting all his pain.
Leviath grabs me by the hair and pulls my head back and proceeds to rip my throat open with his fangs, but he jumps as I cry out, and he lets go in horror and dismay as he backs away, stuttering, “I-I’m…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—I was going to…I…” He looses his words and rushes to my side, cursing himself for hitting a woman, even if a human.
I slap his hands away, regaining my senses from shock and pain, and I hiss, “Stay the hell away from me or I’ll rip out your throat! I’ll tear out your heart with my bare hands and crush it while you watch and bleed to death!”
I actually scare him! He stops abruptly and hold a look of pure fear on his face. It’s not just my dark pulse of energy or my wile, hurt rage or his being now unable to latch onto my mind. He sees what I’ve become physically. I feel the incisors pressing against my bottom lip on the inside of my mouth, and in my mind, I see my eyes are completely dull, bloody red, as if I have no eyes, but red abysses instead; shining, hollow red eyes, and I have blood trickling down from my eyes, dark blood. My nails are even slightly sharper. I am panting hard, angry and hurt, feeling completely stupid for caring at all.
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I start to say something else to him, another threat, but my strength evaporates, causing all my change to vanish, and I choke and fall to the floor, everything going black for a moment. Then I see him down on his knees by me, an amazed, yet fearful, yet confused, and even awed, look upon his face. There is also concern for me, even newfound respect. I hear him calling my name, trying to keep me conscious. My nose is bleeding and blood has trickled down from my mouth. I taste my own blood and can’t breathe well because it hurts. My jaw also should hurt, but it’s only numb. My eyes roll back in my head and I have a couple of weak convulsions and more blood bubbles out my mouth.
His pleading, scared, confused voice is only echoes all this time, but they fade soon as well, and my heart stops like it did at the hospital. Then…the it’s almost as if I’ve lapsed back into my coma again, except for the fact that there are no visions and it’s peaceful—yet I know I’m not dead, that this is only the beginning of my journey, the path I must take. I have much to come in my future; many toils, many hardships, but an end must come at the appropriate time, not now, not before my deeds are done, but in time.
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