The Dying Art of Magic

by Natalie Gibson

  When he had first seen the Master storm through his complex killing guards, completely unaffected by either poison, the doctor had been confused. The Akhkharu poison should have worked on him. It hadn’t, therefore this couldn’t have been an Akhkharu. Now the doctor knew what this was.

  A newly turned Akhkharu.

  He had more strength than the Nephilim and none of the weaknesses of an Akhkharu.

  The place where Master had gripped his arm stung at the memory. It had been a bad burn. The doctor had no idea what temperature the Akhkharu’s body reached. His wounds healed mere moments after returning to the shade; the doctors still hadn’t after weeks. If only Master would share his blood with the doctor as he had with his “children,” he could make the serum.

  The doctor would just have to wait until the Akhkharu had become completely corrupted by his brotherly blood ingestion. Then he would try again to take the holy blood. Attracting a newly turned Akhkharu had been unlucky, but if he kept the Master happy, he could take what he wanted before calling the Nephilim to dispose of their betrayer. He would be the hero.

  The doctor cleared his mind of such thoughts as he approached the compound he’d used for years before Master claimed it as his own. He wasn’t sure what this Akhkharu’s special talents were. Mind reading was certainly in the realm of possibilities.

  The gates had never been replaced or repaired, so the doctor drove right up to the main building and parked the jeep. The doctor dropped to the ground as the sun was just about to set. He took off his sunglasses and traded them out for the normal glasses in his case, as he walked toward the entrance. In the desert, one had always keep track of one’s sunshades.

  As soon as he opened the door, he could smell the blood even through the handkerchief he had tied around his face to keep the sand out while he drove. He knew that blood was hard for humans to smell, unless it was in large amounts. The smell was strong so there was a lot of it somewhere in this building.

  He could even smell it over what should have been the more pungent scent. He tried to avoid tripping on the decaying bodies and dismembered limbs of his slaughtered guards, while also trying not to look at them. Master did not want them removed. He thought it served as a warning to those who might want to stop him. They worked.

  The doctor stopped at the door and knocked. He didn’t hear any screaming, only voices, so he entered. Master sat in his chair, looking very much the picture of health. The young woman sitting on a stool opposite him did not look so well. She was completely nude. Her back was plastered with blood, but none of it was hers. The doctor tried not to look at the carnage behind her and crossed over to kneel close to, but not next to, the Akhkharu’s chair.

  The woman read a newspaper aloud to Master. Her voice was hoarse and the blood-soaked pile of papers to her right said why. She had been reading about all the death and murder and war all over the world. The Akhkharu’s face looked relaxed and happy as if he were being read a fairytale by his mother. His eyes were closed, but they popped open as she reached the last line.

  The woman was scared, and rightly so. There was no movement behind her, save the breathing of Master’s children. They were frozen, at an almost imperceivable line on the floor, inches from her chair. She was the only whole and alive human in the room except for the doctor. She looked at him, begging him for help with her eyes. The doctor did not look at her, but kept his eyes down, waiting for Master to acknowledge his presence.

  The Akhkharu very calmly stood and offered his hand to the woman. He helped her stand and then very calmly turned her and pressed her face down over the arm of his chair. He held her there easily with one hand, her struggle completely unnoticed. Her round backside shone in the artificial light. The only part not coated with blood was the very bottom of her where she had shielded it by sitting.

  Master ran his free hand over that flesh for a second before penetrating her. “Ah, virgin,” he said, “I do so love breaking the laws of Ereshkigal.” He took no notice of her cries as he thrust roughly in and out of her. He continued to pump as he motioned for the doctor to rise.

  “I assume your presence here means you have reached the door.” He pulled one of her arms back, dislocating the shoulder, to bring her wrist to his mouth. He bit down, tearing the delicate skin, but didn’t suck, just lapped at it.

  “Yes, Master. All the men have left for the day so that you may have the privacy you require. They think we will start the morning by opening the passage. I can take you there whenever you are…finished here.”

  The doctor started to leave but the Akhkharu motioned that he should wait. Master tensed up and pushed hard into the woman trapped beneath him. Then came a sound from the Akhkharu that any man would recognize. When he was finished with her, Master dropped the woman’s arm and slipped from her body. She curled up into a tiny ball at his feet, her arm laying unnaturally.

  He knelt down and tenderly cupped her face in his enormous hand. “Your body gives me pleasure and I would love to keep you for another night, but I took your maidenhead. To leave you alive would be to leave myself vulnerable.”

  He turned, crossing toward the doctor, and picked up his wrap from the hook on the wall. He waived his hand behind him, releasing his children from whatever was holding them back. He tied his skirt around his waist. The doctor closed the door behind them but not before he heard the woman scream.

  The drive back across the desert didn’t take as long as the one the doctor took to get there. The Akhkharu was with him this time and the doctor thought that the less time alone with the monster the better. Master insisted on riding in the modern chariot with hidden mechanical horses. It was new moon so he felt peaceful and unthreatened.

  The Akhkharu was about to get what he was looking for. The weapon, which Master had hidden here many thousands of years ago, rest just beyond the door that the men uncovered this afternoon. The doctor held less importance to the Akhkharu with every mile they drove toward that goal. Discovering the hidden city, especially the world’s most complete ziggurat and all the treasures it held, made the doctor a very wealthy man. He hoped that his service to the Akhkharu was enough to keep him alive long enough to enjoy those riches.

  The Master’s children, now finished with today’s last female, caught up with the jeep just as it pulled to a halt in front of a giant pit. Clearing away all of this sand was a tremendous task, but the city that was beneath was worth the effort. The headlights shone bright on the beautiful stone ziggurat, bleached white by the years of sun and then protected by the sand. The temple to the female goddess Ishtar was of no importance to the Akhkharu, though it would surely become another of the wonders of the ancient world. He was more interested in a small building on the edge of the hidden city.

  The doctor walked, more calmly than he felt, over to the main generator and switched it and the main lights on. The door at the bottom of a hill of sand lit up. The Akhkharu stood at it in a flash, his hands tracing some unseen patterns there. He turned back to smile at the doctor, “This is the door. You have done well.”

  The doctor jumped slightly when he heard the vrykolak growl at him. The children now flanked him, werewolf to the right, vampire to the left. They were none too happy about the Master’s praise of him. They stood in silent threat. The Master would only have to show the smallest of disappointment in the doctor and they would, no doubt, kill him in a second. It would only take a second if he was lucky.

  The door exploded into a thousand pieces and the Akhkharu disappeared inside.

  Damn.

  That could have been very valuable. There was an unbelievable market for items of this age. Even a simple stone door could be sold for profit and that one had been ornately carved.

  The doctor did not have much time to lament its loss before a howl came from deep below the sand. He could practically feel the female vampire smile. The one he called 603 might finally be about to get her vengeance on the doctor.

  The Akhkharu burst up through the sand, wreckin
g the control table and knocking the generator off line. The whole place went dark except the small beams coming from the Jeep’s headlights. “Empty!”

  With that one word, the doctor’s ears began to bleed. 603 leaned in and gently, like a lover, nibbled on the doctor’s earlobe, licking the tiny trail away. She breathed into his ear and said, in what could have been a seductive tone, “Here it comes.”

  Master’s glare never left the doctor’s face. His eyes glowed red in the dark and flickered as he spoke. “Another entrance was tunneled in from the other direction. Everything was taken.”

  The doctor quickly jumped to his own defense, “It was none of my men, your majesty. I fear and respect you too much to allow them to break your rules.”

  603 grasped his upper arm tightly and pulled him back against her. She tugged his hair with the other hand, exposing his neck. She was clearly about to have her desire.

  “It was her! She wanted me to look bad, to fail you, so that you would let her kill me. You were betrayed by your own children, Master.” The doctor’s voice sounded wimpy and less than convincing, but he had very few shots at making it out of this alive and he planned to take every one.

  “No. The room was raided ages ago, I believe. It smells undisturbed, but everything of value is missing.”

  “Grave robbers, my lord. They desecrate holy places in search of riches. I can help you track the weapon down.” Any promise to raise his value in Master’s eyes. “There is a nest of women not far from here that frequently buy up artifacts for their collection. These are women of power, like the ones you need for nourishment, but they are strong. They train and use their abilities.”

  “Followers of Ishtar? Where can these modern gadishtu be found?”

  603 tightened her grip on his hair. Much tighter and she might break his neck by accident. “I can tell you, but promise you won’t let her kill me.” He didn’t have to gesture to 603. “Or it, either. And that you won’t kill me.” The last he said slightly under his breath, as if he was afraid to give the Master any ideas.

  The Akhkharu barely moved, but agreed. The vampire regretfully released her hold and she and the beast backed away. The doctor rubbed his neck as he explained where Master could find the Daughters. They would have the vase depicting Ereshkigal’s betrayal. The doctor had just sold it to them.

  Pleased, the Akhkharu opened his arms and motioned for the doctor to embrace him. The doctor, thinking himself safe, approached slowly none the less. They hugged, but touching an Akhkharu was unpleasant to say the least.

  Master spoke softly, as was fitting this contact, “You should know better than to force the hand of so great your superior. I will keep my promise. You will not be killed, but you will not find your life enjoyable. Paion have always been betrayers and I cannot trust you to do differently than your predecessors. I have been deceived by your kind before.”

  He squeezed and a horrible pop could be heard for meters. The doctor felt the most dazzling pain for only a split second and then he felt nothing. The Akhkharu laid him down gently in the sand and then poured insanity into the newly crippled man’s brain. “You may live out your long life with this assurance: I will find the weapon. I will find the One. Ereshkigal will kill the baby and its mother, feasting on their flesh. Then we will destroy all remnants of Paion and Gadishtu. I will feed from the violence of their destruction to become the most powerful creature on earth. Then I will cross the gisig to confront the Igigi. I will kill them and take their place as God of the Universe.”

  The mighty ancient king stood, leaving the doctor drooling, and motioned to the two monsters hiding in the shadows. “Come, my children. Tonight, we hunt.”

  EIRAN STOOD patiently at the gisig where soon Ereshkigal would come through. It had been Nathalia who went in to meet the Igigi, but it would be the warrior Ereshkigal who came back. She would have the answers to all of her questions. She would know her duty and fulfill her destiny.

  He felt her approach the other side of the portal. He knelt. He bowed his head allowing his hair to fall from its usual knot into a curtain around his face. He did not want his last vision of his love to be when she was so filled with hate. The Igigi would have shown her the sins of his kind and he could not bear to see their judgment reflected in her eyes.

  She stepped through. He could see the tips of her toes and feel the anger radiating off her. This was his last moment on this earth. He had lived for seven thousand one hundred forty years, and he was now experiencing his last moments. He knew it. The Igigi told him that they would bring Ereshkigal back, but once they did and had met with her, she would show her devotion to them by executing each and every half-breed she encountered. He would be the first.

  She spoke Sumerian. Do you know what they’ve done? Ereshkigal’s voice was practically a roar in his mind.

  “Yes, my love. The abominations must be destroyed.” Eiran took what he assumed was his last breath and was joyed to find his nose filled with the scent of her. What a pleasant last experience.

  I agree. Now I must discover how to do just that. Destroy the abominations. She paced away from him.

  He heard her turn and stop behind and to his right. She was about to take her death blow. The Igigi must have given her the weapon.

  Won’t you even look at me?

  “I am your servant, my love. I will do whatever you wish. If it is my choice, I choose to meet your blade and die with the remembered image of your face filled with love. I choose not to see the stroke coming.” He moved his hair slightly, parting it and exposing the back of his neck fully for her to have an easy shot.

  She knelt in front of him and reached out to take his hands in her own. Do you really think I would kill you?

  Still Eiran did not move. “Choice is an illusion, my love. I can choose the manner of my last moments, but not that they will be my last. We all do what we will do.”

  Look at me. Nathalia did more than push her words into his head. She compelled him to obey. She was more powerful than when she left and he was powerless to disobey.

  Eiran looked at her. She was a vision of beautiful vengeance. She had learned to dress herself in his mental way, but did not wear the gown he usually gave her, but a warrior’s outfit. The leather bodice and skirt were ornately, protectively, decorated with hammered copper. She wore an arm shield on her left arm. She looked beautiful and strong.

  They told me the same thing, but I have proved them wrong. I will not kill you.

  Nathalia had been stunned at first when the Shinar said, “You think you have choice? It is like when a mother of your planet asks its child if it wants to wear this garment or that. The child is happy and goes through its day thinking it has exercised free will, when really it has done exactly what the mother wanted. It wears clothing. What matter is it what color it might be? Choice is an illusion, child.” Then Nathalia laughed at them.

  She now looked at Eiran and could see the evidence that they were wrong. She reached out and traced the line there on his chest over his heart. It looked like rolling hills or the humps of a camel to those who knew.

  Eiran looked down at the tattoo. He could remember Ereshkigal giving it to him the night before she had died, but he could also remember the conversation he’d had with Nathalia yesterday concerning the lack of this tattoo. “What does this mean? How can I have this?

  She threw her arms around his neck and pulled him close. They hugged there kneeling on the ground. It means that choice is not an illusion, at least not for me. I decided to change something to test if it could be done. I can.

  She pulled back and put her forehead on his. She looked him straight in the eyes. Those beautiful eyes. Eiran, I love you. Ereshkigal chose you then and I choose you now. I chose not to kill you.

  And just like that, Eiran’s choices were no longer illusion either. He loved her. More than that, his destiny changed. He would not die by her hand, but fight by her side. “Why were you so angry? Why did you agree that we half-breeds must be destroye
d if you did not intend to kill me?”

  Nathalia stood and turned to face the door where she had just come from. Behind the gisig, the Shinar were there. Eiran stood too and wrapped his arms around her from behind. He found even one step separating them painful. He needed to be in contact with her. The night had been hard and he was only able to stand it because of the wonderful afternoon of feeding he’d had with her.

  I did not say ‘half-breeds.’ The Shinar are the abominations that must be destroyed. Nathalia heard a great laugh in her mind and felt an overwhelming wave of satisfaction at her statement. They say that choice is an illusion, and that they only watch, but they are selfish and dangerous creatures. They would never punish one another. Their criminals break the ‘Watch Only’ rule, hurting millions, with no retribution. They have the power to do anything and they know the pain and suffering of every creature on earth and they do nothing, except when it suits them. They cannot be all powerful, all knowing and all good. They allow the horrors of this earth to happen. Since I know them to be all powerful and all knowing, they must be evil.

  Yhwe had choice. She remade herself in woman’s image. She created a hoard of Gregori to love her, but when they abandoned her to come to earth because they had seen that the daughters of men were beautiful, the Shinar did nothing. They did nothing when Yhwe filled men’s heads with crazy religious zealotry and the need to control women nor when she tried to destroy us all. They did nothing to help me. They set up the perfectly horrible life that would lead me to kill for the first time and build the character for a killer that they desired in me. What they did not understand is that the human mind has changed in the last ten thousand years. No longer do we do what the gods say without question. I will not kill against my conscience just on their order. Ereshkigal would have and did, but she was not as strong as I. She could be killed. They expect me to clean up their mess and I will, but not because they command me to and not in the way they think is right.