Wrath James White presents Poisoning Eros I & II

by Monica J. O'Rourke

  With their help she ripped her way completely out of the body she’d been trapped inside and spilled onto the floor in a gush of blood and amniotic fluids.

  She looked up and wiped the gore from her eyes. Black candles flickered around her in the near darkness. Beneath her was an altar, and behind her was a huge crucifix made of gold and silver, with Jesus’ crucified body pointing toward the floor. A giant pentagram covered the entire surface of the altar.

  Figures in black robes chanting in Latin surrounded her. Gloria rose to her feet. The men who had helped to free her bowed as they backed away. Their arms and chests were stained crimson from the blood of whatever vessel had born her.

  The body of a young girl lay torn open from her clavicle to her vagina, internal organs spilled around her corpse, her face twisted into a grimace of anguish. Her hands and feet had been bound by barbed wire, and it had shredded her skin down to the bone, no doubt as she’d tried to struggle to free herself while Gloria tore her way out of the young girl’s flesh. The “vessel” had been no more than fifteen years old. Young enough to be Gloria’s daughter.

  “Who did this?” Gloria pointed back at the dead girl.

  One of the hooded men who’d helped pull her out slowly stepped forward. “I did, uh … your unholiness…. I am the high-priest of the Order of—”

  Gloria reached for him, meaning to grab him, shake him, slap him across the face—whatever helped her express her outrage, her anger. But she didn’t know her own strength. She punched her fist into his stomach and drew back a handful of organs, pulling them slowly from his body, staring into the man’s eyes as his soul fled. And Gloria knew where it was going.

  She lifted her other hand to support him, to keep him from falling but the talons sliced into his neck, arterial blood spurting. Gloria disemboweled him, her hellish claws digging deep into his entrails, tearing out much of his liver and lungs. The man’s hood fell off, revealing an unlined, hairless face, and braces when he opened his mouth a final time to scream, already dead, his body just going through the motions..

  Gloria dropped his lifeless body and stepped back in horror as she realized that this “high priest” was little more than a kid himself. He was no older than the girl on the altar.

  “Oh my god, she murdered Jerry!” Another worshipper fell to his knees, sobbing, finally scrambling away from Gloria.

  “She’s going to kill us!” someone else screamed.

  But then a voice boomed from the back of the church. “Silence! What the fuck is wrong with you kids? I thought you fools wanted to go to hell? Well here it is! You should be happy for your friend. He has gone on to glory.”

  Gloria instantly recognized the voice. He wore a pinstriped sharkskin suit and looked like he was auditioning for a bad ’80s mobster movie. He still had that reptilian grin and those beady black eyes, that pasty white skin, that ring of flaming red hair circling his bald head. Murdering him had done nothing to improve his looks.

  Gloria nodded, not exactly surprised at his sudden reappearance in her life. Just like a bad penny. “Vlad.”

  “Welcome back, Gloria. You look lovely, dear! Very becoming in your new skin.” He walked toward her from the back of the church. “You ready to start your new arrangement? The Masters sent me here to watch over you. You know, make sure you don’t fuck up your part of the bargain.”

  “And if I won’t do it?”

  Bill Vlad pulled out an oversized cigar and bit off the end. He was still grinning as he held it between his teeth and lit it, inhaling deeply, blowing the smoke into Gloria’s face as he approached her.

  “If you don’t do what you’re told, what you’ve been recreated to do, you’ll never see Angela again.” His smile widened until it seemed to swallow the entire room. “But I will. I’ll see her every day for eternity.”

  Gloria looked away. The very sight of the man disgusted her, made her want to peel the man’s face right off of his skull. She thought about Angela suffering in that Stygian pit. She remembered how the girl had tricked her into killing herself. How she’d given up her last chance at heaven for her, and how Angela had then rejected her again even after her sacrifice.

  “Why should I care? The girl hates me. She set me up. All she’s ever done is fuck up my life and make a fool out of me. I’ve already given up too much for her. Fuck her. I’ve got to think about myself for a change.”

  “Oh, I will. I’ll fuck her in ways you can’t even imagine. Ways your brief stay in hell still could not allow you to comprehend. I’ll cut off her head and fuck her throat and she’ll feel every minute of it because she can’t die. She can’t ever die, but she can suffer. And I know you, Gloria. I know you better than you know yourself. You could never allow that to happen, not even now. You believe Angela really does love you, the same way you believe your filthy cum-sucking ass will someday get into heaven. You’re hopeless and pathetic and you will do whatever the fuck I tell you to.”

  Gloria raised one of her taloned hands, preparing to rip the con-man in two.

  “Oh, please do. I love the pain. You can’t kill me. I’m a demon—just like you now.”

  “I’m not a demon.”

  “Oh, really. You think you could have ripped that kid’s guts out if you weren’t? I guess you did that sort of thing all the time when you were alive. Look at yourself.”

  Gloria knew what she looked like. But what they had done to her physically didn’t matter. She wasn’t a demon! Couldn’t be.

  She stretched out her arms and looked at her hands which now ended in long hooked claws. Her skin was an inky bluish black, with spidery red veins and capillaries visible just below the surface. Her breasts were larger than they’d been in life, and now there was no silicone beneath them. It was all hell-spawned flesh.

  Vlad held up a mirror and Gloria snatched it from his hands. She trembled as she raised it to her face. Her hair was long and platinum blonde as it had been in life. Her lips were full, and behind them were row upon row of fangs. The most startling transformation were her eyes. They looked just like Madria’s, dark oily pools swirling with color, all pupil, no whites at all.

  “You are one sexy demon bitch. They’re going to fucking worship you!” Vlad practically danced around as he spoke. “I’m going to form a whole religion around you. The Masters will have more souls than they know what to do with, and we’ll live in hell like royalty! Just look at how these poor sacks of shit adore you.”

  Gloria looked around the room at the hooded figures. Some were on their knees, heads pressed to the floor in supplication. Others had removed their hoods and were staring at her in adoration.

  “These stupid bastards will do whatever the fuck you tell them to. And there are thousand more like them. Probably millions.”

  “So?”

  Vlad drew deeply on the cigar. For effect, she assumed. Gloria was less than impressed. “I don’t think I like your tone,” he said.

  Gloria tried to meet his eyes but her nerve wavered. She was powerful, more powerful than she’d ever dreamt of being, but beneath it all, she was still Gloria and it was hard not to still think of herself as a victim after all she’d been through.

  The reptilian sneer on Vlad’s face was replaced with a stony expression, clearly some sort of warning. Vlad had a strange habit of playing good cop/bad cop all by himself.

  “Don’t think for a second I can’t take this all away from you,” he said, leaning closer to her, blowing smelly cigar smoke in her face. “With the snap of my fingers—” He eyed her carefully, as if weighing options, as if wondering how far to push her.

  Gloria turned away, dropping her head to stare at the floor, still terribly uncomfortable in her new form, hoping he wouldn’t push too far. This was all so confusing. She wasn’t sure what she was capable of, or what Vlad was capable of now that he’d been reborn. He had only been human before and he had fucked her life up eight ways to Sunday. Now he was immortal and still driven by the same perversions, the same need to control,
to corrupt, to pervert and degrade. As much as she wanted to tear his heart out of his flabby chest she didn’t want to find out what depravity he was capable of now. She didn’t want to find out that she was still a victim after all. It was better to wait until she had time to fully assess her powers.

  Vlad was still staring at her as Gloria flexed, marveling at her new body, the phenomenal strength in her demonic muscles and sinews. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Vlad licking his fat lips, lusting after her, stroking the pudgy organ in his tight pants. Even now, her sexuality, the fact that everyone wanted to fuck her, was still her greatest asset. For once, she told herself, she’d have to find a way to use it rather than be used by it.

  Gloria kept her head turned away in disgust. She needed to find out her limitations soon but she knew better than to ask Vlad. He was a master of lies and deception and would twist any weakness she showed to his own advantage. Even after ripping that kid apart with her bare hands Gloria was still feeling strangely fragile. Better to just follow Vlad’s lead … for now.

  “You’re still quite the human, aren’t you?” Vlad said, tongue playing with the unlit end of his cigar. “You’re a fucking demon, girl. Don’t you know what that means?”

  “That I could crush you?” she said, still testing him.

  Vlad threw back his head and laughed. “Noooo …” he crooned in an annoying singsong way. “Not even close. But you could crush them.” He raised his hand and swept it from one shoulder to the other, indicating the small cowering crowd at the altar.

  “But why would—”

  “No, no, not them, not literally. They represent the mindless sheep who will follow you. The ones who don’t? They’re the ones you’ll crush.”

  “You really are a sadistic little bastard.”

  “No, Gloria, I’m an opportunistic little bastard. But you. You’d better learn to get over that nasty humanitarian streak of yours if you want to survive.” He puffed hard on the cigar, which had since extinguished. “No! Scratch that. Not survive—conquer! If you want to rule here, you’d better get your head out of your ass.”

  Rule?

  There was something odd about Vlad’s little plan. Since when did Vlad care about conquering? He was just a weak manipulative little man, a bootlicker, a con-man. He wasn’t the type to be a leader. That wasn’t his thing. He was a bottom-feeder and an opportunist, a schemer and a planner who always made certain to stay out of the line of fire. That’s why he needed her. He wasn’t the type to lead a battle. He was a vulture that scavenged off the remains of dead warriors and kings. He would put her up front to take the slings and arrows while he sat back pulling the strings and reaping the rewards. But who was pulling his strings? The Masters? And why her? She wasn’t exactly a warlord either. What was he up to?

  “And the Masters?” she asked, having a difficult time taking her eyes off her own glistening skin. So much to take in. so much to experience and admire.

  “What about them?”

  “We’re supposed to be collecting souls to bring back. How does ruling the planet fit in?”

  “You ask too many questions.”

  I hit a nerve? she thought. A self-satisfied smirk exploded onto her face.

  Gloria hated to admit it but she felt good in her new body. She loved it. Even knowing that she was here, on earth, in this form, at the whim of devils, she felt in control for the first time in a long time. She felt like she was once again a young desirable woman at the height of her sexual attractiveness, the same sexuality and power she’d felt when she’d first entered the sex industry. Like she could have any man she wanted, any thing she wanted. It was a feeling she’d almost forgotten. This body, this cloak of demon flesh was a vast improvement from the drug-, disease- and age-ravaged body she’d been encumbered with during her last years of life. She raised a taloned hand to push back her hair, an old habit but one that could now cause serious damage. Her claws raked her skin, got tangled in her hair and didn’t remotely have the impact she would have liked.

  Vlad chomped down on the unlit cigar and grinned. “Maybe you think I’m fucking around here.”

  “I don’t care. I just want to get this over with and get the hell out of here.”

  “That so?” He sounded truly curious, but she suspected he was full of shit. “And where were you planning to go?”

  “Back to hell. To … I thought, to be with them.” Her voice wavered and grew quieter with each word. “To, um, be one of them.”

  “Ah. I see. Is that what you thought?” He shook his head. “I can’t figure out if you’re stupid, or just naïve. You’re pathetic either way.”

  “Just leave me alone! I’m not interested in anything you have to say.” She shoved her way past him, strutting along rows of highly polished pews, across a tiled mosaic floor where her taloned feet clicked a symphony of her passage.

  “I thought you might feel that way,” he said quietly, too quietly, so unlike his usual boisterous way, and Gloria stopped abruptly, turning back to look toward the altar.

  “For whatever reason, you give a damn about these mindless siphons. Good for me, since there are just so many of them around. And I’d be willing to bet that fucking up just one of them, maybe the youngest here, will really fuck with your head. Hmmm? What do you think? Have I hit a nerve?”

  She turned completely to face him. For a moment she considered bluffing, pretending she didn’t care about their fate but something about his choice of words: Have I hit a nerve? They were her exact words, the ones she’d thought. Can this freak read my mind? If so, there was no point in bluffing. He’d know she was faking. But why did she care? Hell, she was a demon! Why was she still cursed with compassion for the same fucked up species that drove her to drugs, porn and prostitution? Why did she still give a fuck?

  Gloria knew she wasn’t prepared to witness any more innocent deaths should he call her bluff. She’d been to hell and the idea of sending anyone else there was one she couldn’t accept. Vlad had nothing to lose. He’d never had much humanity. He’d always been a predator, a parasite, but she had everything to lose. Even beneath the layers of infernal flesh, she still had her humanity.

  Vlad stuffed the remnants of his cigar into his shirt pocket, very slowly, exhaling grandly as he moved closer to the altar. “I don’t like the way you’re behaving,” he said, as if addressing a child. “I need to believe you’ll obey me.

  “So,” he said, stepping quickly back onto the altar now, faster than she had ever seen him move, “every time you disobey, they’ll suffer for it.”

  He grabbed the first worshipper within reach and clamped his hands around the throat of the hooded figure.

  Gloria had almost forgotten they were there, they’d been so quiet. She took maybe two steps toward the altar before Vlad shouted for her to stop.

  She stopped.

  “That’s better.” He pulled back the hood and revealed the face of a terrified girl, maybe all of 17, her long dark hair spilling over her shoulders.

  “Please,” the girl begged, scratching at Vlad’s hands. “I don’t want to die!”

  Vlad turned his head back to face Gloria. “She doesn’t want to die. What a surprise.” He turned back to the girl. “Not even for your demoness? You aren’t willing to sacrifice for your master?”

  “Please!” the girl cried, beating her fists against Vlad’s two-fisted grip around her throat. “Can’t … breathe …!”

  Gloria tried to force herself not to care. She tried to think of all the hell, literal and figurative, people had put her through over the years. She tried hard not to see herself and her daughter in the face of the terrified young girl.

  She failed. “Let her go, Vlad!” Gloria moved another couple of steps toward the altar.

  Vlad roared, squeezing harder, choking the life out of the wide-eyed girl. The crunching of her neck bones ricocheted off the church’s stone walls. He dropped her lifeless body at his feet.

  Gloria leapt across the altar, connecti
ng with Vlad, knocking him onto his back. She pummeled him with her fists, raked her claws across his face and neck, tried to tear his head from his shoulders. Blood spurted with each slash, great gouges of skin hanging from his cheeks, one eye dislodged from its socket and hanging by a fleshy thread.

  He lay there silently, trying to block her attack, his arms folded across his face. She continued the assault until he lay still, until she had no strength left to continue. With great effort she crawled away from his still body, amazed it had been so easy, that he had simply taken the beating.

  He raised his badly beaten head and sat up. “Feel better?” he said, though speaking was difficult with his lower lip torn from his mouth. Despite the attack he grinned, revealing bloody nubs where teeth had been. His nose was mashed flat and was closer to his ear than the center of his face.

  She knew she couldn’t kill him—couldn’t kill any demon—but she hadn’t expected him to recover so quickly. This was going to be hard, she reasoned. Maybe impossible.

  “You love to learn the hard way. You always have.” His face began to change, to regenerate. Gone was the damage Gloria had caused: his lip healed, the deep furrowing lines plumped up. But worst was what he was changing into. Vlad barely resembled a human now. His forehead and chin elongated, almost to points, and his skin took on a marbled, cheese-grater quality. He stuck out a ridiculously long, reptilian tongue, split down the center, and flicked it at her. His body continued to grow and change before her eyes, toughening, growing muscular and glistening and hard.

  She was looking at his true demon form.

  He charged, grabbing Gloria by the throat and lifting her off the floor with one hand. She pounded against him but he backhanded her, and carried her quickly across the altar, slamming her into a stone pillar. The pillar cracked, great chunks of plaster falling on their heads. He slammed her several more times until Gloria was sure she would black out.