Lesbian Vampire Ch. 06 - That Which Haunts You

This is part of an ongoing story. Thank you readers for all your encouragement and kind words. I am determined to finish the story. I wish I worked faster as well but alas, I’m still in a learning phase-- I only started trying to write creatively in 2020 and the story has gotten more complicated than I intended. I find I’m needing to write the following chapter before editing the previous to “pull the thread” of the story. Hope that makes sense. But in good news, chapter 7 is drafted and the beta-readers are giving me ZERO slack. Plus, 8 is partially written and I believe that will wrap things up. Believe, being the operative word. (She’s not the Literotica writer you deserve, but she’s the one you got!)

Anyways, the beta-readers are first-class all the way and the backbone of the story. Also having to answer to them keeps me focused: Berry, whos faithful compassion and support prodded me along gently. I’m so happy you saw something in Ch 1 and reached out and transformed the story from meandering toddler speak to full coherance. Ash always brings a ton soul to the story and tells me frankly when I’m going off the rails. James has an eagle’s eye and can spot a technical issue miles off and has been wonderfully patient. Grammar feels optional to me much of the time and he has done the heavy lifting I avoid.

Rhea’s eyes burned. She felt a sharp pain where anger had hooked into her chest. Some witches froze when the door slammed behind her. My face, thought Rhea, must look like a mess. There was also the matter of the unresolved hex that still dogged her. The others filed out quietly and Rhea flopped on the couch, confused at what to do next. Was this Lucy, setting her up somehow, she wondered.

The idea dismissed itself, despite her anger. It would be foolish for Lucy to trap herself amongst witches and con Rhea. And to what end? She had nothing Lucy wanted. The memory of Lucy pressed against her rose and fell.

Rhea tried to steady her breath. Mariam’s footsteps ascended the stairs after a long while. Rhea felt the couch shift beside her. Mariam put an arm around her and pulled her in. She waited for Mariam to speak, but there was only silence.

“What did she say to you?” asked Rhea. She hated how fragile her voice sounded.

“The same thing she said to you,” said Mariam. “That her brother was in love with Janice, and by the time he got to the room, she was dead. That she knew he’d be easy to blame. That witches would demand justice, and Kyle would let them have him.”

Rhea turned toward the other witch, “You believe her?”

“He’s her brother,” said Mariam with a shrug.

“But what if he did it?” countered Rhea.

“Patrick? He’s a dipshit on a good day,” said Mariam. “There is no way he is capable of any magick you saw.”

Rhea paused. “Even if he couldn’t do the magick, he still could be involved. He’s the last to see her alive.”

“Unlikely,” Mariam answered. “The vampire that auctioned the books—Braga? I know both she and Patrick want nothing to do with him. He changed them both--into vampires.:

Rhea crossed her arms. “She didn’t say anything.”

“She told me she wanted to tell you but she thought you’d lose faith.” Mariam paused, as if debating her next words. “She wants to help you.”

“But I’m supposed to blindly trust her? When she lied?” asked Rhea.

“Patrick is her brother,” repeated Mariam. “And, for better or worse, she’s spent the better part of eternity keeping him alive--or whatever. What would you do to save the people you care about? And everything you’ve built with them?” Rhea exhaled and thought of the Center, back on the island. She thought of laughter riding the sea air, the coffee always brewed with cinnamon, and imagined them picked off one by one, to face the same terrible fate Janice now suffered.

“Why is she scared of him?” asked Rhea.

“When it happened,” explained Mariam, “Lucy had been married for a few years. To her father’s business partner. They had gotten into some debt with Braga. He attacked and changed her in retaliation. Same with Patrick.”

Rhea tried to imagine Lucy as a human woman. Everything taken for her husband’s crimes. Except Patrick, who would walk beside her through eternity. Rhea shook her head, “There’s no way I can trust her. This was already an impossible situation and now I’m in it alone.” The images of Janice’s scream were unrelenting, and the images of the others on the island, here in the mountains, everywhere.

“You’re not alone,” said Mariam. “There’s a person on the other side of that door who wants the same thing as you: to save the people she cares about.”

“Lucy’s not a person,” said Rhea, gloomy.

Mariam rolled her eyes. “Stop being stubborn.” As Rhea formed a retort when her phone buzzed in her hands. It was an email from Kivan. She explained to Mariam he was trying to figure out where Braga’s books came from She clicked the bolded field and read aloud to Mariam:

Rhea--

I’ll spare you my usual wit because this is serious. I got a hold of that researcher in Portugal and, if you can believe it, she’s been trying to track down those auctioned books for weeks. And she was not surprised to hear about a body that won’t rot.

A family had been sitting on them for generations, it seems. They were descendents of an old aristocratic line; they didn’t practice magick and seemed to have no idea where the books came from. When the last heir died, the books were discovered hidden away in a forgotten monastery on one of their estates.

The books were written by a priest who lived there but was, in fact, a witch in hiding.

The dates aren’t exact, but the researcher thinks he was killed in the 15th century, by one of his students. At their trials, his followers said the priest told them he had visions of a great power that had been called into our world. It whispered to him, sang in dreams, and promised it would make him the greatest witch the world had ever seen. He would ascend to godhood as would anyone who received his blessing.

The details of the rituals were stricken because they were “profane and blasphemous in nature.”

The student who killed him tried to burn down his quarters. But a follower managed to save a trunk from his master’s room. He confessed he saved as many writings as he could grab and a cast-iron urn. The follower had hidden it in the monastery. It was never found until now.

When the villagers and priests came to put out the fire, they discovered the rotting bodies of several missing priests. All the witnesses whose accounts survived commented on the strange appearance of the dead; in multiple texts the corpses are described as “husked.”

When the trunk resurfaced it ended up in the hands of a vampire named Alfonso Braga who began holding secret auctions shortly after. Honestly, I’m surprised his customers were even willing to talk; I’m not sure what you’ve heard about Braga, but he’s dangerous. His customers, though, paid through the nose for promises of secret wisdom and Braga delivered scribblings. Whatever he’s doing, he scammed the richest, most powerful witches in the process.

Rhea paused and skimmed the rest of the letter-.

I’ll let you know if I find out anything more. Rhea-- I don’t want to alarm you, but this is getting serious. I don’t think I would have let you go If we knew Braga was involved. He’s notorious. He’s a bit before your time and has hidden away for almost a century at this point. But believe me: he’s old, powerful, and STRONG. If that vampire has plans to go anywhere near Braga, don’t follow. It’ll take everything you got to control him.

Call us to plan before you make any moves.

Love,

Kivan

She rested her phone on her thigh. Mariam looked at her, expectant. “What’d he say?” she asked.

“To be careful,” said Rhea. She felt conscious of her face, not wanting to reveal too much. Braga probably had arrived in the city by now and was willing to meet with her. It could be the only thing that stopped him from getting on a plane disappearing. To continue whatever awful mission he started.

“I should email him back,” said Rhea, mostly to herself. She hit ‘forward’ and slotted Lucy’s email address into the recipient field. Above Kivan’s forwarded message she typed:

Why does the killer keep the bodies close?

“Why is he doing this?” asked Mariam.

“To take the life force of the victim and make it his,” said Rhea. “The spell devours.” She added a question below the first: If the same spell can kill vampires and humans, why is Janice’s body different? She hit send.

“Vampires already do that. Why bother with the magick?” asked Mariam.

“After Janice turned up dead, I’ve seen magick that’s supposed to be impossible. Fixed, earthly forces in spirit realms. Bodies that deny death. Something about what he’s doing gives him strength to undo the fabric of reality and serve himself,” said Rhea.

Mariam was silent. A few moments later, Rhea’s phone buzzed again-- an email from Lucy. At least the wifi worked, thought Rhea. It was photographed portions of the journal. Rhea scrolled through the photos. In one, Janice wrote that she and Patrick were fighting. She had just left the witches on the mountain. Learning with them wasn’t working. At all, wrote Janice. Rhea swiped to the next picture. Patrick broke up with her again. Said he wouldn’t stand by and watch her put herself in danger.

His resolve lasted only a few hours.

Patrick then made her swear to let him protect her. But L wasn’t working with Braga to harm her, she wrote. He was opening a universe of possibility. The next picture detailed another break up. She kicked him out of her apartment. He embarrassed her at a party, raving about Braga. The last entry was written the day she died. She asked him to meet her at a room in the hotel.

She needed his help getting out.

Braga seems to be in the city a lot. I thought he never left his home. And who’s L? typed Rhea into the phone.

So did I, I don’t know responded Lucy

“Janice was working with Braga, but something changed her mind,” Rhea said to Mariam. What did Patrick tell you?, she typed.

From Lucy: Their meeting was supposed to be a secret. She was dead when he found her. When he saw the fake bite marks, he knew someone was trying to frame him. He ran and called me.

Then: He was in love with her.

Rhea typed, I want to talk to Patrick

Her phone buzzed: Come back down. We’ll call him now.

No reception now. Tonight, after I meet with Braga

Ok, wrote Lucy. Then- come back down.

Rhea placed her phone face-down on the table. “I need to do something dangerous, Mariam. Foolish,” said Rhea.

“Lucy’s not that dangerous. At least not to witches,” said Mariam.

Rhea failed to suppress a smile. “Listen. I have to meet with Braga. Alone. If it goes sideways, I need you to tell the coven.”

“Rhea—,” said Mariam.

“Whatever you are going to say, we don’t have time,” Rhea insisted. “He’s agreed to meet with me.”

“But why?” asked Mariam. “If he’s behind all this, what would he possibly tell you?”

“Everyone describes him as ruthless. Powerful beyond imagination--but he hides in his castle for a century? And when he resurfaces, the first thing he does is detonate his reputation by ripping off all his contacts?”

“I--” Mariam paused.

“He’s acting like he’s desperate. If he didn’t intend to actually sell the magick, which he can’t use--” Rhea paused. “He’s working with someone. Someone powerful.”

Mariam shook her head. “You have no idea what you’re up against. You need to tell Kivan. Seriously.”

“I will, I will,” said Rhea, feeling a flush of fatigue. The sleepless nights were catching up to her. “I should probably go back down to the safe room, but I’ll email Kivan first.”

Mariam nodded and stood then walked out the door. Rhea laid down and rested her head on the side of the couch. She held her phone in front of her face. As soon as she hit ‘reply’ on Kivan’s message, another wave of fatigue passed over her. She closed her eyes for a few moments to rest them as considered what she would write.

“Rhea,” she heard, and woke up with a start. It was dark in the cabin. Rhea groaned. She must have fallen asleep.

“Rheaaaaa-” called the voice again in a snaky whisper. Rhea sat up

Mariam was standing in the door. Bright beams of light shot through the negative space around her into the room. “Mariam?” Rhea asked. Mariam gestured for her to follow.

“Wait,” Rhea managed and scrambled after Mariam’s long shadow that receded slowly across the hardwood floor.

It was dark, with just the light of the stars and a sliver of moon. But Mariam appeared lit from within and glowed bright enough to guide the way. Spectral light bathed the dark, bare trees. In a long white nightgown, she walked just a few paces ahead. Rhea scurried to close the gap between them, but found it impossible. She stumbled across the dirt pathway and cursed the sharp edges that jabbed her bare feet.

Mariam’s steps were smooth as if gliding across ice. She disappeared into the mouth of a cave. The light that emanated from her body bounced off the rocky walls. Rhea followed and found Mariam, still aglow. She stood in a cavernous chamber before a large body of dark water. It stretched far beyond where Rhea could see. It was humid in the cavern; the air smothered her and the water reeked of mildew and sulfur.

“Why are we here?” asked Rhea.

Mariam smiled. The pupils of her eyes slowly dilated, expanding outward and swallowing up the iris, then the whites of her eyes. The black crossed the barrier of her eyelids and subsumed her adjacent skin. It did not stop until it had swallowed her face. In its wake was a caul of iridescent black scales.

Her body began to stretch and expand in all directions, doubling and tripling in size.

From her face, the black moved on to consume what remained of her form, covering her in scales. Bones cracked as Mariam’s body spiraled upwards. Her legs merged into a tapered tail. It shot outward at a fantastic speed around Rhea.

Rhea had nowhere to run besides toward the shore of dark water.

She looked up at the caul that covered Mariam’s face. It began to warp; the rich black membrane paled to gray before it split open. The caul fell away and the monster’s face unfurled.

More black membrane in thin layers that peeled back like lace. Then thick black petals, shiny and slick. They were dotted with a dozen yellow blinking eyes. Tuberous whiskers grew from the center and fell downwards like tentacles.

It shrieked, then lunged at Rhea.

Rhea stumbled towards the dark water. When she neared the lake’s edge she fell and her hands landed in the dark water. She felt a slick layer of pond scum and something else beneath her hand--metal, human made. She gripped it and found it was a blade, still so sharp it cut her hand.

Mariam stood over her when Rhea woke, still laid across the couch. Mariam’s long black hair was tied into a bun on the top of her head. She looked down at Rhea with a worried expression, her thick brows furrow over a long, arched nose. The monster’s terrible shriek still rang in Rhea’s ears. Her forehead was dotted with sweat and her mouth tasted sour. Through the window of the main cabin, she saw the slowly-descending sun creeping within range of the westward mountains.

“How long have I been asleep?” asked Rhea.

Her neck ached. Her throat was inflamed from dehydration. The weather had swung from snowfall to smothering heat. Southern California was prone to false springs and soon much of the region would be covered with wildflowers of all colors.

“9 hours,” said Mariam. Rhea sat up in astonishment. “Why didn’t you wake me up?” she asked.

“A guide asked me not to,” said Mariam. Rhea didn’t bother to ask which one and instead laid back down. Mariam had many guides; she excelled at natural magick and could talk to animals of all sorts. The last time she visited, Rhea saw Mariam talk to a snail, a squirrel, and a lizard on a wall, all in the same day.

“Are you ok?” asked Mariam.

“You were in my dream,” Rhea managed. Her voice was thick.

Mariam scarcely heard as she stared at an oft-folded piece of white sheet paper in her hand, “Lucy found something. Hidden between the lining and cover of Janice’s journal,” said Mariam. She handed it to Rhea. Printed in the center of the paper was an image. She squinted. It was a low-quality photo, probably taken from a camera phone. The image was blurry and made worse by the cheap stock of paper.

“Why are you showing me this?” mumbled Rhea. She wanted water for her parched throat.

“Rhea, don’t you see?” asked Mariam.

Rhea sat on the edge of the couch and looked at the paper again. In margins around the image were symbols written in red ink. Jagged edges, all sharp twists and sudden falls, across a field of harsh white.

“Those symbols?” she asked. “I don’t know what they mean.”

“You’re scaring me,” said Mariam.

Rhea tilted her head. She could see 4 figures, one with brown skin and 3 fair.

Mariam tapped the brown-skinned figure. “That’s you,” she said.

“How can you tell?” asked Rhea. All of the figures in the picture were so blurry they looked more blob than human. She looked again, hard, and the blurred image slowly sharpened. She saw her eyes, one then the other. Rhea squinted to focus, but the room around her began to spin. The image was clearer now. She could see her own face, smiling at the camera. The picture had been taken at least a year and half ago; her hair was still in braids then. Mariam pointed to the woman who sat beside her.

“That’s Janice,” she said.

Rhea shook her head. “No, I’ve never met her.” She felt a small nudge of nausea.

“Maybe you don’t remember, but that’s her,” insisted Mariam.

The rest of the image began to sharpen. The distortion that obscured it now receded into the white at the edges like water receding across sand. Janice was a petite woman, about a head shorter than Rhea with a bright smile and lustrous hair.

“I don’t remember this,” whispered Rhea. A breathtaking jolt of pain spiked through her head. She squeezed her eyes shut. When she felt steady, she wrenched them open. The faces of the other two figures, now clear, also looked familiar.

“Them” Rhea managed. “I know them.” Her head pounded and she groaned. Mariam looked on, her eyebrows knitted in concern.

Saliva flooded Rhea’s mouth and her stomach curdled. She leapt off the couch and charged towards the snow-covered deck outside. She made it down the stairs and a few feet into the snow on the ground. It was hard, icy and half-melted from the heat of the day.

She fell to her knees and heaved. Viscous green bile dripped from her mouth that made wide, terrible shapes as she retched. The bile seared her from the inside. Something blocked her throat and she clawed at the skin of her neck, still heaving. She felt the smooth muscles of her esophagus stretch and warp as if the blockage was crawling upwards. With one grotesque and guttural heave, a slug-shaped mass the size of a water balloon fell from her mouth and plopped on the ground.

It slid a few centimeters, propelled by its own mucus.

“What the--,” said Mariam, a few paces behind Rhea.

The mass burst like a zit and Mariam screamed. The thin membrane split down the middle like a pouch and retracted into itself. Its innards were a vile slurry of pus and green bile. It began to boil when it touched the air. Rhea’s lip curled at the stench of sulfur.

“What the fuck is that?” yelled Mariam.

“I don’t know,” said Rhea. “I coughed it up.”

“I saw,” said Mariam. “Why?”

Rhea’s hands were still pressed into the snow. The cold must be burning them, she thought, yet she felt only a dull ache then a hand on her back. Mariam helped Rhea upward. “We’ve got to get down to the safe room,” she said. Rhea’s legs felt wobbly but managed to get herself upright then down the stairs.