Hellacious Hospitality Ch. 13

Forward from the author -

Warning for all new readers dropping in from the front-page: this is a highly serialized story, with twists and turns and huge character and plot development. This is not a good starting point. Turn back, and go to Chapter 01.

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Of all the absurd and unbelievable stories to come out of this place, those brief words were somehow the hardest to swallow.

"Are we even talking about the same woman?"

"One and only is she who can claim herself the Keeper."

Benson buried his face in his hand, massaging his brain in search of a less stupid response to Iara's revelation. It wasn't sinking in. Her matter-of-fact delivery didn't match the impossibility of her statement. "How? Why...?" He trailed off again, tumultuous thought process failing to articulate.

She just nodded at him in a patient way, like she had all the time in the world.

He took a deep breath. "I mean, there's no way the Caeli I know could do something like that. She wouldn't hurt a fly. I was just there, Iara. I saw her in a duel to death with an opponent all too willing to kill her, and for all the power she had at her disposal, not a single drop of blood was drawn by her. At the end, she had a knife pointed at her, and she just smiled."

"The young one is inclined more than most to respect the value of a life. She has walked and witnessed many lifetimes, and treasured each and every experience. It is for that reason she cannot position herself as the arbiter of final judgment. She is a true child of Mother Origin, and to that kindred spirit is pledged One's undying loyalty."

"See? Then there's no way that what you said could be true."

"Or perhaps a truth so antithetical to one's being that the mere act of giving its words a voice threatens to erode one's sense of self?"

"That's... fucking hell..." The words came bluntly. At least, as blunt as they ever would from the mercurial undine. Still as obtuse and flowery-poetic as ever, but he found no room for misinterpretation.

It was in the way that Iara continued to hold her body against him, hands feeling out the steady rise and fall of his chest. Deep crimson gaze affixed uncomfortably to his own, as if daring him to look away.

He wanted to object. He wanted to find some way of defending that innocent, unassailable image of the woman he loved, but the bitterness of that revelation cut through all the illusions.

And then he understood that he'd done the same thing he always wound up doing, in subconsciously placing her on a lofty pedestal far above mortal ideals. Why was that such a difficult trap to avoid? It was the supreme warmth of her humanity that attracted him in the first place. She wasn't flawless. They'd argued at times. But none of that really seemed to stick. Every time he'd been forced to re-appraise her, that mind's image glowed even brighter, obscuring the minor black spots with pure, angelic white.

Until now, utterly smitten by her, he was only given to viewing her through a lens of either adoration or yearning. It wasn't that he was immune to her supernatural charms. Just that she'd opened up to him enough that he was capable of connecting with her aside that.

Awakened to that reality, an onerous sense of loneliness and isolation overtook him. Profound as it was, a mere fraction of the heavy burden she'd laid upon herself. He'd accepted the stories she told about herself without question or doubt, but maybe he'd never fully understood them, and what they'd meant about her as a whole.

That aspect of her, never fully able to know unconditional love because people just naturally gravitated towards her; fully considering the weight of that burden, it stung at his heart deeply.

The insightful praises she heaped upon him, genuine as they were, were ultimately still just lies and smokescreens. Not to him, but for herself. That was a burden wrought of her own choices.

The ancestral wisdom of her bloodline was nothing to be taken lightly. Lives of hedonistic indolence and aloof independence that characterized most of the modern reckoning of succubae weren't just hollow fantasies, but time-honed survival strategies.

There were comments made by Iara and Merah, lost in the perpetual tumult of emotions that surrounded Caeli that, under the current circumstances, harshly returned to focus. Both of them had expressed some degree of incredulity that she was "ready" to pursue a meaningful relationship. Iara had been more encouraging and supportive, while Merah initially less so.

The paradoxes and dichotomies that made Caeli's personality so intriguing and irresistible took on a much darker color, and the implications wore worrisome.

As much as those troubled, whirling thoughts occupied his mind, threatening his carefully-balanced worldview, Iara's gentle, patient gaze was a stabilizing presence, preventing his darkest thoughts from running too wild. She wasn't telling him these things in order to chase him away. These were all indelible truths that all comprised the life of the woman he still had feelings for.

It wasn't his own fear that was churning knots in his stomach. It was that whatever it was that Caeli was going through right now, she had foolishly, stubbornly chosen to face that all on her own.

That stung a bit. If he wasn't worthy of being with her in such a time of need, then what really was their relationship worth?

Reaching out, he pulled Iara's amorphous body tightly against himself, relying on her soothing embrace for comfort. The waves she held mastery over gently lapped against his naked skin, granting an undeserved calm.

"Iara, please. Tell me everything. Dredging up such terrible memories, she must be in so much pain. There has to be something I can do for her."

"Does one not worry for his own safety in this matter?"

He pondered that question for a moment. Even as hard as the shock had come, none of that had translated to worry for himself. "No. And honestly, if it came down to her or me, I'd give up everything in a heartbeat. No regrets. She's got so much riding on her. Her responsibilities to all of you, to this place. None of that can be replaced. Not by me. Whatever caused her to do the things she did, it must have been for good reason."

Managing thus far to take in the horrible facts in relative stride, confronting his feelings aloud caused his stoicism to waver. He meant what he said, but the weight of that admission was haunting. For all that Caeli had made him feel loved and welcomed, the stark differences between the worlds they lived in felt an even greater, insurmountable gap.

"Help me. I have no idea what I can do for her." His lover kept talking him up, as if he magically had all the solutions to her troubles, but his wits and ingenuity had run their course. Whatever meager talent he had, it failed him when he needed it most.

He felt empty in his impotence.

Iara's touch grew chilly, her aqueous form growing stiff and solid, rejecting his embrace.

"Sorry, too tight?" He released his hold reluctantly.

Pushing away at arm's length, a wave of bristling cold erupted from her body momentarily. Both Aila and Merah yelped in shock in the distance. Even at this range, the force of that paralyzing glare could be felt, the nerves in his fingertips going numb, the cold shiver halting halfway up his spine, before the moment passed things quietly resumed as they were.

He thought he'd done something to offend Iara most grievously, but instead, her eyes quivered with what he could only interpret as adoration. But there was something else there as well. An atypical unsurety. A tinge of self-doubt, far removed of her standard blithe spiritedness.

Wide, shimmering crimson orbs that beheld the depths of the ocean probed into the core of his being with greater intensity than they ever had before. It was unnerving, his soul laid bare without consent. Like that, she remained transfixed, unmoving for an uncomfortable amount of time.

Unblinking, unbreathing, with all that had been lost over such a short period of time, he couldn't help but worry the worst for Iara as well. He chided himself for thinking that way, but it couldn't be helped.

For a life spent content in solitude until recently, he couldn't cope with the severe pangs of loneliness. He was as a beggar, given the taste of fine food and spirits for a night, before cruelly being tossed back into the streets. No, that wasn't quite right. That hospitality was never rescinded. He'd made himself an unwelcome guest, gorging himself without heed.

He gently shook Iara's unmoving form, and received no response. Why now? He needed answers, not more questions. Not more people to worry about.

Where did he get off, thinking that continuing life down this current path could lead to any sort of fulfillment? Caeli was a handful unto herself, teasing his brain with all manner of scintillating truths, seducing him in both mind and body. She was more than he could ever ask for in a girlfriend and lover. So why wasn't that enough?

It was an addiction, is what it was. Challenging him. Testing his limits. These women, they all treated him like a hero, which stoked his burgeoning ego.

What really had he saved them all from? He could only step up to the plate when the stakes were low.

Sure, his brief romantic fling with Caeli was a throwback to her more carefree days. But a few weeks of fun was in no way worth a self-imposed exile away from her adoptive family.

How about Elena? What had she really gained from all of this? A firmer hand and proper counseling is what she really needed. He'd let his dick do the thinking with her, perpetuating and enabling her flaws. In indulging herself, all she found was a constant cycle of betrayal. Always someone to be taken advantage of, rather than to come into her own as was desired.

And Luna? That made him angry. She'd played him and his stupid hero complex for a complete fool.

As things got more difficult, everybody seemed worse off for him sticking his nose into their business.

Benson averted his gaze from Iara's eerie, unflinching stare. It just made him feel guiltier, devoting so much of her energy trying to figure him out. There was nothing there to solve. He was just a plain, ordinary guy, and he'd done exactly as any other guy, suddenly thrust into a position of too much responsibility and temptation. He fucked up.

Something rumbled in the distance. The great masses of vines coiling their way up those gargantuan stone pillars into the interminable heavens rustled and bristled with life, sending a shower of dust and pollen cascading in a great cloud to the water at their base. The whole room seemed to shake and rumble, but quieted down before any thoughts of earthquakes or other such disasters could fully form.

Iara blinked once with heavy lids, slowly and deliberately, returning to a perceptible state of consciousness. More infuriatingly, she was smiling again.

"A consensus has been reached."

"Consensus? What consensus? Don't I get a say in whatever it is you've decided?"

Before he could say anything else he might come to regret, a throbbing pain stabbed between his eyes. White hot. Vision blurred, seeing only stars. More intense than anything he'd ever felt before, but disconcertingly, not unfamiliar, either.

"Must I really participate in this head-to-head of yours? Can't a girl have a little germination time to herself? I've never felt so tired and emptied before." The dusky, sultry voice rang clearly in his head, even as his brain threatened to escape through his ear canal.

"Xochitl? How long have you been here?"

"Not long enough to have witnessed any of your incessant simpering, thankfully."

Great, her fatigue hasn't slowed her tongue any.

The cacophony inside his skull seemed to be dying down. Iara cocked her head in a concerned fashion, probably attempting to interpret the sour face he was assuredly making. Still, that near-permanent, gentle smile affixed to her face made it difficult to figure out what she was thinking.

He wasn't sure which woman was contributing more to his rising blood pressure in the current moment. Xochitl was a right bitch, but with how hectic and uncertain the current situation was, the dissonant serenity in which Iara floated through life was just as aggravating. Didn't she have the least bit of concern for her friend? Or maybe that's just what it meant to be an ageless being, to not dwell on minutiae like emotion. Either way, he was ready to ball his fists against his eyes and scream.

Until Iara quirked a purposeful, mischievous smirk at him, and the head-splitting pain stopped. The only thing that filled his ears was the soothing lapping of waves around him.

"WHY! You gods-forsaken watery -" The garbled howling sparked a minor resurgence of pain, but was quickly silenced, as Iara mimed a small handful of gestures in demonstration. Now he understood. She was using her telepathic abilities as something of a magical signal tower, roping Xochitl into their conversation as well. But all three of them together was creating some sort of interference, like the feedback screech of a microphone at a rock concert, hooked directly into his gray matter.

From Xochitl's pained reaction, that intense sensation had been redirected back at her. He couldn't hold back his scoffing laughter. Served her right. Iara's serenity was not to be mistaken for passiveness. She had her own bag of tricks to play.

That did partially confirm an earlier suspicion of his, though, that the workings of Xochitl's mind weren't too dissimilar from a human's. Iara seemed completely unfazed by all the mental noise, but it was crippling agony to either of them.

A small "click" sound went off in his head this time. Benson winced in anticipation of another flare-up, but it never came.

"You...argh...win." Xochitl seethed through imaginary breaths. "What hold does this frail meatbag have over all of you, anyways? She's always been a bit too soft for her own good, but I've never known you to be a chatty one except when you're with her. Is that what this is, then? A conspiracy against me?"

Another click. Like a switchboard, preventing all their thoughts from getting entangled and blaring angrily back at them?

"One should know better than to make such accusations, dearest Sister. The dedication Oneself has engendered to the health of body and soul has never wavered. Does one not see the evidence laid bare? That amelioration, long desired. At long last, the tides of change bring new hope."

"You're not saying what I think you're saying, are you?"

"Are those roots of yours just for show, Sister? Can one not sense the taste of the font of Origin within these hallowed halls once again?"

"You forget yourself. I'm not as old as you. I assure you I have no clue what you're... wait, there is something different here. Something... refreshing? Alright, out with it. I have no patience for your roundabout ways."

As exasperating as her foul attitude was, there was some kinship to be gained that Xochitl could feel just as perplexed by Iara's enigmatic words as he did.

There was still much he didn't understand of the workings of the magical realm, and the fact that it somehow pertained to him was more than a little concerning. He really didn't need to hear any more ways in which he'd totally screwed things up.

"The pain you harbor blinds you so, Sister. Your prejudices obscure the truth before your very eyes."

"Don't you dare lecture me! You have no right to judge. You were worshiped, treated like a goddess. Even here, you're isolated. Safe. Insulated from the atrocities they're capable of. The way you act sage and all-knowing, I hate it. All because you can 'read' souls. Everybody turns to you for guidance, for answers, as if you can do no wrong. Well, guess what? You don't know everything. Not everything is carried in the soul. The mind lies, hides things away to prevent the spirit from falling into darkness. That's what you're trying to tell me, isn't it? That she was finally starting to heal? It's not that simple. She still bleeds from the inside, Iara. She just knows how to hide it from you."

Silence.

Merah and Aila's undisturbed laughter in the distance was proof that Xochitl's outburst was only for them to hear, but her sharply impassioned pleas rang clearly in his head.

Benson very nearly had to remind himself to breathe. The weight of her words emitted an indescribable pressure, on top of everything else he had just learned. To hear them from Xochitl, of all people. Not exactly the most endearing of personalities, the disdain and jadedness that colored her words gave her a self-important, imperious quality.

But these were words of pain. Of deep-rooted experience. Something bottled up and burdensome. These weren't airs she put on, but something honest and heartfelt. Be it love, loyalty, or however else she classified her relationship with Caeli, Iara's prompting had coaxed something of her true feelings out of her.

Through all of this, Iara's proud smile was something to behold.

"Then, do enlighten us, dear Sister, as to the truth that has been withheld from Oneself."

"Grr. You... it seems I've been played for a fool."

"Look, both of you. Whatever our differences or squabbles, that's not going to fix anything. We all want the same thing, don't we? This is all about Caeli, and what she did, isn't it? Or rather, her guilt over what she had to do. You know something, don't you Xochitl? Something she's never told either of us."

"I..." He expected her to come out swinging again, defensively. But instead, there was a hitch in her voice. A silent sigh of relief.

Iara silently clasped his hand and flashed him a subtle wink. Had she been expecting his interjection?

"As she is now, I have no hope of reaching her... I'm powerless to do anything. Just as I was all that time ago."

She wasn't wrong. It was really annoying just how right Iara could be about everything, all the time. Even now, supposedly left in the dark, she'd set this up far too well.

It chagrined him to think so, but perhaps he'd judged Xochitl too harshly. Mired in his own troubles, there was never any attempt made to de-escalate their contentious interactions, perpetuating her ill rapport in his mind. For Caeli's sake, that had to stop. Even in her own headbutting contests with the stubborn alraune, she never regarded her as anything less than a dear friend.

Was that forgiving nature her own, or one tempered through her time spent sheltered under God's auspicious graces? Was that even an important distinction to make? That was simply an intrinsic part of who she was, and one of the multitudinous reasons he'd fallen head-over-heels for her. It wasn't something to be questioned, but an example to live by.

If there was any hope of salvaging any sort of relationship with the woman he still maintained great admiration for, he couldn't disrespect that by picking fights with her friends at the same time.

"Xochitl, I'm sorry. I don't think I understood just how hard this has been on you. You've been trying to protect her in your own way, all this time, haven't you?"

"... Yes. Her life is what gave mine meaning. I have wanted nothing less than to be able to return that favor."

"Well, you know what? Mine too. Before her, I was adrift in a sea my own ennui, stuck in a rut of bad habits with nothing to show for it. She showed me what it was like to live for myself, and I will be forever grateful for that. I have a feeling she's touched a great number of lives like that in all her time. I'm indebted to her all the same. So why don't we pool that debt, and show her, together, that she doesn't have to bear her burdens alone."