by Tara Chau
“Very smart, you’re right, as usual. But Dianna, you came to me.” he reminds, “You came to me, therefore….”
As realisation dawns on me, I scream in exertion, lifting my head in an effort to drag the rest of my lifeless body up as well. I hear Lucien’s low laugh, as well as Gabe’s voice, cursing with bright colours. Lucien approaches me, his hand now holding a familiar ball of power. Memories flash past when he used it against that small boy, months ago, dead on the spot, incinerated instantly. I let out another shriek as I plead with my body to move. Move. Even the ancient power in me has quieted, there, but somehow asleep. As Lucien leaned against the marble block, his hand slides down my leg in a fevered caress.
“Don’t you touch her!” Gabe roars.
Lucien ignores Gabe but stops teasing, simply moving my useless limbs till I’m lying flat on my back, staring up at his cruel face. The ball of flame in his other hand starts to morph, shift into a solid shape, a fine, sharp dagger.
“Now, this,” he says, lifting my right hand and staring at my tattoo, “is troublesome.”
Unable to rip my wrist from his grasp, I simply bare my teeth at him, daring him to do something, which I instantly regret. Lucien uses one hand to steady mine to the stone, wrist turned up, as he draws the knife close. I hear Gabe’s voice, but it seems far off as I watch the knife descend, reaching my skin.
I scream with agony as the heated blade touches my skin and digs in deep. Lucien drags the knife across my skin mercilessly, drawing blood as he carves something over my tattoo. The blade cuts my skin like soft butter, my blood pooling. The searing heat seems to move up my whole arm, adrenalin the only thing keeping me from passing out.
“Dianna!” Gabe screams, my head whips to Gabe as he struggles against the heating flames, “Call her, call Vain!”
Lucien’s hand halts but doesn’t slip. He continues, supposedly unfazed, but I can feel the difference, his once careful hand now rough. Another shriek escapes my lips as he digs deeper, tracing over the top again. My breathing becomes laboured as tears fill my eyes. They begin to blur as the pain takes control of my head.
“Vain!” Gabe screams, his cries of pain hurting me more than the dagger. “Call her, Dianna! Please!” Over the sounds of my own shuddering heart, it takes me a few seconds to remember and take in what he is screaming.
“Vocare ausus.” I cry, hearing Gabe echo my plea. “Vain!”
A red mist starts to form on the platform a metre away from us. Lucien halts, looking over his shoulder. Her cold voice is somehow comforting as he releases my wrist, giving it one firm nod of approval before turning to face Vain.
My breathing evens out a small fraction, but a new kind of sensation fills my body, a loose unplanted feeling. Something in my stomach moves and smiles with glee as my ancient power keels back. A cold emptiness seeps in, sucking the warmth from my body as I start to shiver. Turning my head, I look at my wrist. Looking through the blood, I see what he had carved. A signum, a sign that cuts at my tattoo. Through my tears, I see Lucien approaching Vain, his swagger dulled down but not gone, and her grin was putting Lucien’s to shame, one that has been moulded over centuries. The tension between the two of them a dangerous mix of old and new.
“This does not look like it was part of the plan.” She smiles.
“Just get him out of here!” Gabe roars, bring attention to himself.
“Oh, well, look at this.” Vain says in a glib fashion, “Dyla, I’ve waited so long to see you helpless, see that arrogance burnt away.”
Lucien laughs, but he doesn’t relax. Hearing Gabe snarl, I let out a wail as the hole inside me begins to stretch and consume things within me.
“Oh, that! Right.” Vain remembers.
Without so much as a click, red hands rap around Lucien’s shoulders, holding him firm as a door opens up. Lucien struggles but isn’t able to break free.
“Your struggles are sweet; they have a certain beauty to them.” Vain coos. “But I, child, am hundreds of years older than you. And one-hundred times more powerful.”
With those words, she raises him in the air and smashes him to the ground. I cringe, but the circle of flame dies, and Gabe comes running over to me. He swears as he looks down at my wrist before grabbing me to swing my body into his arms.
“Let’s go,” he says, struggling under my weight but heading for the escape door.
Gabe quickly raps my arms around his neck for me as he struggles to reach the door. A shout comes from Vain, not in pain but in-
A hard body slams into Gabe, sending the both of us flying across the rough ground, protected barely by our coats. I yell in exertion, my body still refusing my commands. My limbs twisted in unnatural angles. I groan in pain, unable to do anything to correct my position as Lucien comes strolling towards me, kneeling to look into my face. I look around desperately, first towards the exit that is mere steps away and then towards the place where Vain had just been.
“Your warlock is gone.” Lucien smiles, “Vanished as soon as she saw this thing.” He says, holding up the source of his power.
I make an embarrassing attempt to grab at it, my arm only moving a few centre metres, though even that is a success. Lucien simply laughs, hauling me up into his own arms, to my uncovered horror, and dropping me back onto the stone block. He looks over at Gabe like he is an annoyance soon to be exterminated. The flame circle appears around Gabe again, making him scream in pure agony as he trips to stand from the ground, where he had been lying worryingly still, clutching his arm. Through the wall, I can see. The arm of his coat has been burnt, a big hole that gives all a clear view of the burnt skin beneath. I almost vomit upon seeing it. The bubbled and bleeding skin, the pieces of flesh still sizzling.
“Gabe.” I breathe, seeing my own horror reflected in his eyes.
“J-just focus on getting feeling back… to your body.” He gasps, gazes torn between his ruined arm and me.
“Gosh, that’s nasty, best not to look at that.” Lucien winces.
My body shakes as I feel the intense need to pounce on him, claw my fingers into his eyes and make him suffer the same way he’s made all those others. Looking back to Gabe, I see him holding his arm still just below the huge wound, keeping it from shaking. Lucien’s cold voice next to me bring my focus back to him.
“Sorry.”, he says. I’m surprised to find the sincerity in his harsh voice.
“What are you doing?” I demand as he approaches me with the flame blade again, not quite sure if I desire the answer.
He halts, that cruel smile instantly back in place, but he stops. His voice is more malicious than ever as he turns to Gabe.
“You have an old friend on the town, correct?” he asks a sweating, pale Gabe.
Even while he’s being boiled, and the heat must be searing his already burnt skin, he just glares at Lucien, refusing to speak. Lucien clicks his tongue in annoyance, turning back to me.
“Grey has immense powers, though he is as arrogant as your boy over there. What goes one way can go the other.” He warns, sending chills travelling down my slowly dumbing spine, “He knows nothing. Therefore, you know less than nothing.”
“Just spit it out. I’ve had enough of being toyed with.” I seethe.
Again, Lucien just smiles at my annoyance and fear before continuing to his point, “The Grey boy searches for answers. I feed them to him, he tells you.” Horror shakes my body at the thought of my fate, the fate that has been twisted till it is false before being delivered to me, “Yes, you will die.” He answers my silent question, “But you will also be reborn.”
A scream sounds through my body at his words. I collapse into myself as the ancient power seems to be clawing itself deep, deep enough to stay hidden from the cold, still making its way through my useless body, desperate to keep itself alive. My power screams again, anticipating the imminent threat that seems inevitable, that the endless nothing is preparing me for. Though no control has come back to m
e, my back arches as the cold surges through my neck, spine, chest. I gasp for air, craving something warm to cling to.
“You feel that?” Lucien asks, gazing down at me, “That’s what happens when you mess up one of those fancy tattoos. That’s what happens when a force no longer claims you. The feeling of being vulnerable to things not as friendly as an Angel.” Lucien spits the last word, his face full of scorn, “This… emptiness is what it feels like to be rejected by your own origin. Harsh, isn’t it?”
Rejected, this is what it feels like when you’re disowned by everything you’ve trained to be, by what you are. The slicing pain arcs through me again, slashing at my insides, trying to wipe away any claims that my tattoo had tied me to.
“What are you doing?” Gabe booms, looking at me desperately, “What is the point in doing that? It will just kill her!”
“Well, I needed to sever her tie to you. You and your kind anyway.” He says, smiling happily, “She needs to be free.”
“You have no right to touch her!” Gabe thunders.
“I’ll explain something,” Lucien starts patiently, “You, Dianna, are going to become a demon. A demon of sin.”
Demon of sin. Ice shoots through me, not just from the pain of my body but the fear. The meaning behind it is vague words. Looking to Gabe, I see shock and understanding smother his beautiful features. The realisation of something terrible about to unfurl, unleash.
“You’re a monster.” Gabe whispers, dark as night.
“I think that you’ll soon be finding yourself using that word sparingly.” Lucien grins.
“Gabe,” I say softly, turning my head to look at him carefully, peering through the flame to look at him, to study his reaction, “Gabe, this changes nothing.”
I see his mind spinning, remembering the thing I made him promise me only a week ago. “T-this changes everything!” he swears, looking around for an escape, one that does not exist.
“It doesn’t. You still have… you still have to do the next right thing.” I say, letting tears slide down my cheeks as I turn his own words against him.
He looks at me then, stops searching, only looking at me, his gaze a weight on my shoulders. I don’t break his stare as Lucien approaches me with a piece of charcoal, as he writes some symbol harshly onto my forehead, and even as pain shocks through my body. Gabe’s pleading cries drift away, giving way to the new foreign agony, but I still don’t break his gaze.
It’s freezing cold, it’s blazing hot, it’s a dark void, and it’s unexplainable. The sensation is old as time, old as humanity. The thing I can feel slowly seeping into my pores is ‘dark magic’ and it’s nothing compared to Lucien’s. He cannot control. No one can, and it’s not just me that knows it. Even with the smallest inch of it inside me, I can feel it laughing, sucking away all the energy and power I have still stored inside. I cry out, my power cries out, as it laughs, as it writhes and journeys through my body, exploring, savouring.
Lucien finishes marking my head, and I feel him lift the coal and surveying his work, comparing it to the sheet of paper from the book which he had lain on the block as well, an inch from my arm. I focus not on keeping the thing out but on moving my arm. The one thing I might have a chance at doing, but stopping the demon that is out of my hands. Accepting that it is too strong is not as hard for me as it is for Gabe.
Ignoring my pain, I steady my breathing and continue to watch him, to implant his face into my mind as I struggle for control. I see Gabe flinch, his arm still shaking against his body but otherwise forgotten. I see the page under heavy surveillance by Lucien from the edge of my vision, but I’m closer. As it stabs at me again, gaining more, consuming more, I scream, a sound that rips my throat, and even halts the sounds of battle in the distance.
As my hand shifts half a centre metre, I gasp, the fog’s effect slowly, so slowly, clearing. I silently curse myself as I’m forced to look away, down at the page, but almost smile as I see. I let out another scream as the demon pushes against me again, but I use this to propel my hand forward, capturing the page and dragging it over a small, jagged space in the stone, ripping the paper in two.
Lucien lets out a shout of anger, ripping the page from my closed fist, damaging it further. I smile through the pain at the ruined information, at the unreadable priceless sheet. Despite everything, Lucien’s face softens and eventually settles to a smile, not fake but not pleased.
As if in repercussion of my rebelling, the black strikes again, this time focused on a small weak part of me, my heart. Another shattering scream breaks from my throat as I throw my head to look at Gabe, to remind myself of something right. He stares at me, helpless, as my splintering shrieks slowly shred my throat. It takes me less than thirty seconds to realise that I’m starting to slip, starting to fall into the black, another few seconds, and… I’ve blacked out.
A loud shout wakes me, jolting me back as the demon mercifully recedes for a moment, maybe just to allow me a breath before it continues to make me scream. Anne comes crashing onto the platform, blood-caked and shaking but alive. And furious. Lucien whirls around, but not fast enough before she literally jumps on his back. I watch with shock as she clings to him, using her other hand to bash the hilt of her sword against his head, again and again, ruthlessly.
Even as the flame wall around Gabe falls and he comes lurching towards me, she still doesn’t stop. Gabe does nothing to help the collapsed Lucien as he reaches out for me. He sits me up quickly but carefully, wincing as his arm brushes my coat. But I look to Anne, who is now atop of Lucien, punching his nose, his jaw, his eyes, and screaming four words over and over.
“I will kill you.” Anne wails, her fists not once halting or faltering.
Gabe looks down at me and instantly rubs his thumb against the mark on my head, not too carefully. The demon, ready to pounce again, recoils, shrieking as its opening closes. But with its essence already surging through me, the pain only subsides a fraction, the black only slowing to a fast crawl.
Gabe uses one arm to steady my back and shoves the other under my legs, lifting my shaking figure against his body. Beginning to run to the door for a second time, I pray that Anne can hold Lucien back for a few minutes longer, shame flowing almost as freely as the black through me, as I’m too tired to go back for them. As if reading my mind, Gabe speaks, “I’m going back for them as soon as you’re safe.”
My body reacts instantly, putting a hand on his chest slowly as he opens the door and closes it firmly, dashing down the long black corridor.
“We need to go back now.” I insist, trying to wriggle out of his grip.
Gabe tightens his hands on me, running faster still.
“I need you safe.” He grinds through his teeth.
“Gabe,” I shout, unable to keep my anger from my tone, “I can already feel it. It’s coming, and it hurts. I need to help our friends. I need to do one more thing before-”
An intense agony strikes me, a weight that shakes me and brings my body back to life. My arms fly out, my feet kick, and I fall from his grasp. Panting, I hit the ground hard, but the pain goes unrecognised as I crawl away, as I try to escape. Gabe is upon me instantly, trying to haul me up as another scream fills the hall, but it’s interrupted by a cold voice that is not my own, my scream becoming a bark of laughter. The voice is smooth and horrifying, coming from me, the gender unidentifiable.
I recoil from Gabe’s touch, my arms shaking, causing me to fall on my stomach. He reaches for me again, and if the voice had affected him, he does not let it show. I claw at the dirt floor, untiled by the builders - anything to get away. Get away. The demon strikes again, stopping me, laughing and revelling in my pain and fear. Through my tears, I see Gabe approaching me, reaching to pick me up again. I scream at him to stay back, to run, to run away from me. Gabe simply shakes his head and tries again, but I kick at him, feeling the dread in my face shift to cold amusement.
Gabe stops, staring down at this new face, this t
hing entering me that he doesn’t know. Looking down at my hands, I collapse onto my back as I see red veins surging through me, my vision already turning smoky and red. He’d lied, again. Lucien didn’t want my blood. He wanted what was already inside me, the red. I laugh, or the demon laughs at my horror and dances at my realisation.
Turning back onto my stomach, I begin to claw again, to drag myself across the dirt floor, my body shaking so much that I’m unable to support myself, even to crawl. It stabs again, the flare burning my insides as the ancient power cowers in a small part of my soul, unreachable and unhelpful.
“Dianna.” Comes a soft voice, Gabe, I’d forgotten he is here. “Listen to me. You need to fight it. You need to shut it out.”
“I can’t.” I scream, again it turns to amused laughing. I turn to Gabe, a memory tugs at my failing brain. “Gabe,” I gasp, “kill me.”
“No.” He says simply, not even stopping to consider it.
“Y-you promised you’d stop it.” I remind him, pushing myself against the wall, clutching at my stomach as the demon makes another jab at me.
“It’s not an it.” He says through grinding teeth, “It’s you.”
“It’s inside me. It is me. Now Gabe, before it’s finished.” I plead.
As if anticipating the possible threat, it stabs again, clouding my vision so I cannot see past my nose, and so my body screams. Gabe flinches, and I let him come to kneel over my crumbling body. Let him stare into my now red eyes with no sign of the saviour told in prophecies.
Gabe still doesn’t take his gaze from me, still does not stop as he places a hand on my skin, brushing a thumb over the bulging red veins. As his hand reaches out to hold my face, I spit at his feet, a part of me recoiling in shock and the other part keeling over in laughter. Looking to the door, I see pale light shining through and the cries of fighters, friends on the other side. Everything becomes white noise, his voice, their screams, the clashing of weapons. The only sound is my rapidly beating heart and the deep wheezing breaths that are not my own anymore. I feel the demon slowly smashing down my walls, each one crumbling away like a pickaxe to sandstone. My limbs shake with agony as if each wall were instead a bone or a muscle, but I know that it’s my mind, the mental barriers shattered with each swing of the axe. Church bells are singing in my ears, familiar, continuous ringing, a constant reminder that my senses are no longer my own. Deep shuddering breaths, the bang of each wall being broken rattle my body, rattle my heart.