Daemons of Garaaga (Children of Garaaga)

by Paul E. Cooley

  He stared at a small bronze statue of Ishtar. Mardahaga had never spoken the goddess' name during their coupling. She had never promised him paradise much less delivered it. Unlike the whore.

  "Drimesh?"

  He looked up from the statue. Mardahaga walked into the hallway from the darkness beyond. Drimesh smiled. "Lady," he said with a bow.

  "I did not send for you," she said in a flat voice.

  "No, you didn't," he said. "I missed you."

  A thin smile pursed her lips. "Did you now," she said. "And what did you miss?"

  "Your company. Your voice." Drimesh took a step forward and licked his lips. "Your body." He let his hunger touch her.

  Mardahaga sighed. A blush colored her cheeks. "My body," she said.

  "I can love you."

  "Yes." Her free hand absently rubbed across her breasts. "Love me."

  Drimesh smiled.

  13

  Drimesh awoke in a puddle of sheets, unsure of where he was. The large bedroom's walls were covered in trinkets from foreign lands. Wooden masks from Lothal hung from ropes; a bronze, oblong plate with strange markings on it glowed in the dim lamp light. He turned as a labored breath caught his attention.

  Mardahaga lay next to him, facing the wall. Her hair was pure white. Her dark back had deep bloody scratches, hips bruised and marked by strong fingers.

  Drimesh stared down at his hands. His nails were rust-stained. He could see small bits of flesh clinging to the edges. He took in a deep breath and rolled Maradahaga on her back.

  Her labored breathing hitched and then started again. Drimesh tried not to scream. The woman's face was a wrinkled landscape. Where there had been a passing, dignified beauty about the old woman the night before, she'd been transformed into something hideous.

  Deep bruises covered her breasts and stomach. Her thighs were purple and riddled with angry splotches. Drimesh rolled off the pallet as slowly and quietly as he could. It shifted as his weight moved. Mardahaga didn't stir.

  Drimesh looked down at himself. Blood was crusted on his foreskin, in his pubic hair, and across his belly. Her face, a scream of ecstasy and pain, drifted from his memory. She had been screaming his name over and over again as her body convulsed with pleasure. And with each wave that crashed over her, he'd hurt her, slapping her breasts, kneading her thighs.

  He stood, took a step, and stopped. His heart pounded in his ears. A tremor of fear rose from his belly. At the end of the pallet, he saw a dark, still, hand laying on the floor. Drimesh stepped slowly until he could see around the pallet.

  He shivered. The slave, Heriam, stared at nothing. Her body had been savaged. Her belly had been split open, her neck crushed. Drimesh leaned down and vomited.

  Stumbling to his tunic, he dressed. Mardahaga snuffled once more in her unnatural sleep. Drimesh turned to look at her.

  She was no longer an old woman-- she was ancient. All her vanity and wealth would mean nothing now. He wiped a tear from the corner of his eye and approached the pallet.

  "I am sorry," he whispered. He placed his hand on the top of her head. "So sorry." He twisted his hand violently and heard the snap of her neck breaking. Her breathing stopped at once, eyes flying open. They looked at him in confusion, but not terror. They turned glassy, unfocused.

  Drimesh leaned down and kissed her chapped, thin lips. "I'm sorry." He rose from the pallet and walked out of the bedroom.

  He would have to leave Babylon now. Flee to Lothal or perhaps the north. He couldn't go back to Ur, not with Abraham's tribe after him.

  Money. He'd need as much money as he could lay his hands on.

  He emptied Mardahaga's money purse into his own. As his bag became too full, he found a heavy cloth sack. It would have to do.

  Coins fell into it. Loose lapis stones. Pieces of jewelry. The slave's money pouches. He took as much as he could fit in the sack.

  Mardahaga had been screaming for him to stop, her voice a high-pitched wail of pleasure and pain. The slave had come in through the door. She had challenged him, threatened him and then stopped in her tracks when he'd turned.

  The beast. The hunger. The hurt. He'd become his true self, the visage of Garaaga, a creature of cold stone-like flesh and sharpened nails. She'd begun to scream and he'd leapt at her, killing her with quick flicks of his talons. The blood had been exquisitely beautiful as it sprayed from her wounds, further soaking the already stained sheets and pallet.

  Instead of sating his bloodlust, it had only emboldened it. Mardahaga had been whimpering when he flipped her over and took her from behind in as many ways as possible, his nails scarring and ripping at the flesh of her back, her buttocks, her hips.

  Drimesh lifted the sack over his shoulder and walked to the front of the house. He took a deep breath and wiped more tears from his eyes. He poked his head out the door, ensuring no one would see him leaving the house. The street was empty.

  He stepped into the street, closed the door behind him, and headed for home. The horizon glowed with the first hint of dawn. As he walked, trying to keep the terrible memories at bay, he was certain he could hear Garaaga laughing.

  14

  The sun was just over the horizon when he reached his home. Even from outside, he heard Talnor's snores. Drimesh opened the door and walked in.

  The lamp in the kitchen had gone out during the night. He imagined Talnor had not so much as stirred.

  Drimesh hid the large sack under foodstuffs, pouring more than half of his bloated money pouch into it. He took off the new dress tunic, wincing at the small blood stain near the bottom. Naked, he walked into his bedroom. Talnor lay on his side, facing the wall. The man was snoring loud enough to make Drimesh smile.

  He clothed himself in a dirty tunic and walked out of the bedroom and into the kitchen. Money pouch attached to his belt, sandals on his feet, he headed back out into Babylon's streets.

  Ama had spent years teaching him to control the hunger, to not let it control him. "You are not a beast," she had said. "You should never forget that."

  He sniffed back a tear as he headed to the city gates. Last night, he had become the beast. He destroyed two lives and tortured a kind, if vain, older woman. All because of a common whore.

  The more he walked, the more the memories flooded in. The rage, the frenzy, had left him disconnected from the night before. But now--

  He and Mardahaga had retreated to her bedroom. He'd undressed her, slowly kissing her. Once they fell upon the pallet, he had pleasured her with his fingers, his tongue, keeping to his ministrations until she moaned, begging him to enter her. Ensuring she was wearing lapis, he obliged.

  She had always liked to talk while he was inside her. Saying how she loved him, loved the feel of him inside her, the way he touched her.

  As he concentrated on her body, sipping from her essence to sate the hunger, the jealous, cheated anger had subsided. Ishtal was driven from his mind with the need to serve Mardahaga's thirsty body.

  Once they lay side by side, the two of them spent for the moment, she had tousled his hair. "I hear things," she said.

  "Like what?"

  "You visited the temple."

  He breathed in a sigh. "Is that why you were so...distant when I knocked on the door."

  She smiled. "Did you enjoy your time with a priestess?"

  Drimesh gritted his teeth. "I'd rather not speak of it."

  "Oh," she caressed his cheek. "I'm sorry."

  "Don't be."

  "I just didn't know you worshipped."

  "I don't." He kissed her lips. "I was curious."

  Mardahaga nodded. "I worship there sometimes, when I miss you and cannot find you." She licked her lips. "The priestesses are not as satisfying as you."

  Drimesh said nothing, but his fists clenched.

  "Ishtar loves you, Drimesh. She loves all."

  "That goddess doesn't love. Ishtar's a gutter whore."

  Mardahaga pushed him away. "That is blasphemy, Drimesh."

  He shrugged
. His face flushed with anger; he clawed the bedsheets. He could feel the rage building again. Ishtal's face staring down at him, whispering "mine" over and over again. The way she had worshipped his body, as he had hers. Not clumsy grapples, but tender touches and kisses that soon moved to lustful, exquisite bliss. "She is nothing but a whore."

  "You dare speak of her that way in this house?"

  "Yes," he hissed. "I do."

  Mardahaga pushed him from the pallet. He fell off the edge, his ass hitting the floor. She got to her knees, scowling at him. "You should go, fool."

  The anger. The shadow. Garaaga. The beast inside screamed to be let loose. Drimesh smiled at her with carnivorous avarice. "I don't think so."

  "Get. Out."

  "I want to please you." He crawled onto the pallet, his eyes glowing. She backed away from him, confusion filling her face. "I want you to please me."

  She reached out a hand and slapped him hard across the face.

  The rest was blurred memory. Garaaga's shadow had filled him, loosing the thing inside. He had taken her. He had tortured her. He had fed with reckless abandon after he tore the lapis necklace from her naked body, bringing her to the edge of bliss, and hurting her with his hands, his talons, before visiting her body with more pleasure. He had become the shadow and killed, all because of Ishtal.

  The olive grove was empty and quiet. Drimesh hung his robes upon the branches and waded naked into the water. Cool liquid soothed his burning skin. He rubbed at his manhood, washing off blood and flakes of Mardahaga's inner flesh.

  He swam upstream at a fast pace, ignoring the boats that passed by and the men that waved or shouted to him. The hollow place inside him grew stroke by stroke. He felt numb, purposeless, but he kept reaching forward, driving himself against the current.

  All Ama had taught him had gone to waste. The lessons of love, of treating women like people rather than cattle, of control, were for nothing. He had become like his mother, for even she, with her beliefs, her careful tending to the herd of men around her, had ultimately succumbed to the beast within.

  That night in Ur, she had left the house and headed into the heart of the city. Drimesh knew something was wrong with her. She didn't speak to him and her eyes were glowing. He had seen her that way before, but only when protecting him.

  He had already fed that evening, and soon fell into a deep slumber. But his mother had entered his dreams.

  A throng of men at the tavern, drinking strong beer and gambling slices, had filled his mind. Through his mother's eyes, he watched as the men all turned at once. Lust filled them.

  Cool air greeted naked flesh as he watched his mother's robes fall to the floor. Her hands caressed her breasts, massaged her vulva. The men stood from their table, walking toward her like willing slaves. She growled to them, called to them. As one, they stripped. Even the tavern keeper and the slave servers, men and women, had complied.

  The orgy that followed pulled him from the vision. He awoke, stiff and hungry. The world was still dark as pitch in the small house. Drimesh quickly dressed himself. He could feel his mother's power, could smell her hunger somewhere in the city.

  He ran through the streets, using her scent for direction. He ignored the stares of other city folk as he ran across the clay and dust.

  As the scent grew, so did the tingling on his skin. His mother had opened herself; she had loosed the beast.

  When he reached the tavern, bodies were strewn about the floor. The women had been ravished by the men. Some of the men had bedded one another and remained coupled together.

  Ama lay in the corner, crimson eyes burning from her stone face, long talons dragging across the clay and leaving deep marks. Three bodies, two men and one woman, lay next to her clawed feet.

  The men lay in ecstasy, their ruined penises still erect. The woman's vulva leaked semen and blood onto the floor. Deep scratches had been carved into their chests, one of the woman's breasts hung by tendrils of flesh.

  "Ama," Drimesh said to her.

  The beast glared at him, the eyes mad with lust. After a moment, the eyes softened. "Drimesh?"

  He nodded. "Ama, come home."

  Her stone features melted into flesh, her body growing smaller, normal. The talons disappeared into finger and toenails. Her triangular face rounded and shrank. His naked mother sat before him in a pool of blood and spent seed.

  "Ama," Drimesh gulped and held his hand to her.

  She looked about the room in confusion. "What--"

  "Come, Ama."

  She put her bloodied hand in his. He pulled her upright with ease. He wrapped her in her blue robes and led her into the night.

  They shuffled through the streets of Ur, heading back to their home. Ama said nothing, but wept. He gritted his teeth against the sound.

  Once inside the small house, he had bathed her with water, washing the mess of blood from her body. She had slept next to him on the pallet while he lay awake.

  He tried to push the images from his mind, but the memories of the men and women who rutted themselves to death would not leave him. Their ruined bodies, faces locked into grimaces that weren't quite pleasure, not quite pain, haunted him.

  When the morning finally came, Drimesh headed to the river to bathe. He hadn't been able to bring himself to wake his mother, much less look at her. What she had done, the terror and death she had wrought, all of it was more than he could bear.

  He washed himself in the river, leaving his clothes on the bank. Once he felt somewhat clean, he floated on his back. He let the sun warm his body and headed downstream with the current.

  The cool Euphrates water drove him into the ocean. He stayed on his back, floating until the sun had passed its high mark in the sky. He had managed to push all thoughts away. And then he shook with ague. His body writhed and he slipped below the ocean's surface.

  His mind filled with the sight of long, bearded men clothed in black robes. Each held a dagger, a crimson jewel affixed to the blade's point. He watched in horror as the men chanted as one.

  "The eye sees, the ruby destroys!"

  Together as one, they plunged their daggers down.

  A wave of screaming pain wracked his body and then the vision went black.

  Drimesh opened his eyes and found himself floating in deep water. He clawed and kicked for the surface and broke the blue-green barrier into sunlight. Water sprayed as he coughed it up from his lungs.

  He took in a deep burning breath of air, shuddering with the effort. A wave crashed over him, driving him beneath the surface. Near panic, he had kicked upward, and forced himself back into the light.

  The memory was as fresh as if it had happened yesterday.

  Drimesh let out a sigh and ceased his swim in the cool river. He treaded water against the current, looking back toward the high walls of Babylon. So many years had passed while he had hidden in the great city. He flipped over onto his back and drifted downstream.

  He remembered climbing back on the shores of the Euphrates, grabbing his clothes and running into Ur to head for home.

  Ama was dead. They had stabbed her with their weapons over and over until she was little more than blood and bone. They had cut out her vulva, removed her breasts, and finally sawn off her head.

  Drimesh had stared at the sight, unable to move. It wasn't until he heard a rustle in the front room that he'd climbed out the house window and into the alley. Four of the tribe had been waiting there.

  He ran through Ur's streets with the posse chasing him. The four men managed to keep up with him until he reached the city gates. Once free of the twists and turns of the buildings and the passersby, Drimesh had been able to easily outdistance them.

  He'd kept running well into the night, always keeping to the banks of the Euphrates. It took days, but he managed to reach Babylon, the beast within starving and angry.

  It wasn't until he'd secured a home that he'd even had time to mourn Ama. On his fourth sunset in Babylon, he'd scratched his skin and a flake of
it had peeled off, turning gray as it fluttered in the air to the floor. His dead mother's voice had whispered in his mind. "Above all, Drimesh, you must survive."

  It was enough to make him want to live. He'd headed into the night to feed as carefully as he could. If only to survive long enough to one day avenge Ama, he would live.

  Babylon was closer now. The current was taking him near his olive grove. A figure clothed in purple and crimson stood on the bank. He watched as the robes dropped, exposing naked flesh. Drimesh felt a tingle on his skin.

  Ishtal dove into the water, skimming across its surface and paddling toward him. He turned over, ducked beneath the water and swam for the bottom. He grabbed a handful of the rich silt and then kicked back to daylight.

  When his head broke the water, he looked straight into Ishtal's eyes. She was no more than two lengths away, her dark braids floating behind her.

  "Drimesh?"

  He blew water from his nose. "Why are you here?" he asked.

  "You left last night. You didn't--"

  He threw his hand forward. The black mud splashed against her cheek with a wet slap.

  Ishtal's face twisted in surprise. She lifted a hand and wiped the muck from her cheek. Her eyes narrowed and she bared her teeth. "Wretch," she hissed. "Why did you do--"

  "You're a whore. Nothing but a foul gutter whore." Drimesh kicked onto his back, splashing her with the water.

  She growled and swam toward him. "How dare you," she said. Ishtal kicked upwards and smashed both fists into the middle of his chest. Breath rushed out of Drimesh's lungs, leaving him wheezing. "I am a priestess of Ishtar. How dare you."

  He struggled to breath and tread water.

  "You saw me performing worship. That is all."

  "Just like with me," he panted. "Just like with me. I was nothing but a--"

  She shook her head. "No," she said. "No, you weren't. You aren't a believer of Ishtar. You'd never been to the temple, and you wouldn't have come there except by my invitation."

  Drimesh was breathing normally again, but said nothing. He watched her quivering lip and felt a pang of regret.