The Cult of the Lamia Ch. 13

Open your eyes.

She heard the voice in her head, coming from far within.

Open your eyes, and search for the one that must be saved. Remember who you were, and are, and could be. Remember...

She arched her back, as her soul caught fire, and she cried out as her mind ruptured open.

She woke up with a start, her chest heaving. She could remember the voice clearly, but everything else was distorted, as though it was all seen through static. She felt odd, her senses swimming. The cell was dark, but she had utterly no difficulty in seeing. It was as though the world was made out of liquid, and she could see and taste and hear all of it. And feel it, too.

Good God, how she could feel.

Her skin tingled. She could feel heat emanating from everything around her, and if she tried she could locate the sources; the mother superior in her office, the other nuns walking around, the choir practicing. She could hear snatches of song from them, on occasion; one of the basses was awful.

But that was only the beginning. She remembered all of it. It had gone so very wrong, so many times. Her kin had forgotten who they were, even what they were, and who they were together. But she knew. She was the source. The origin. She was the leader of the Watchers, the one who had originally fallen, and taken responsibility for the rest. Enoch had called her Samayza, but this incarnation's name was Gabrielle.

She sat up. She could feel vibrations on the earth; a lesser immortal walked the surface. Grigorii, she thought. Like her. She got up from her bed, and walked out, her feet barely making a sound on the earth as they fell.

She still wore her night clothes, but if anyone who she passed thought it odd they did not trouble her. She looked young, barely cresting twenty years, but her eyes glowed, the blue of them so pale as to almost be white.

She couldn't tell how far she had come on foot, but she wasn't tired. She had a direction, had a job to do. He had spoken to her, had given her a mission. Save the one who must be saved. But it was more than that; she could almost see more.

She could feel other feet on the world as well; demons, two or three other Grigori, but something else. Something both more and less. An extraordinarily gifted human, perhaps? She wasn't sure.

Then there was the stain. Two of them. She could feel their tentacles working their rottenness on the world as she walked. There was no vibration from them; they were there, present in everything. But she couldn't do anything about them. All she could do was find the Grigori. One who must be saved.

He wandered aimlessly. Indeed, that was an eloquent metaphor for what he did, he thought wryly. Where once he had direction, he now saw no path. Where he once saw order, chaos. He was chaos.

He followed smells, senses. He followed pulls and tugs he didn't even know he felt. He continued to walk, to move, his form ever shifting. He was tall and blonde one minute, short and dark the next. He was asian, then he was white. He was latin, he was black. He was completely unaware of his own mind; it never had any boundaries now. That was part of what the devil had done to him. He had no boundaries; it took all conscious control of his abilities from him, when control was the greatest skill he had before. He lived in other minds, experienced what they did, and revelled in their pleasure and pain.

He came to himself suddenly, his mind withdrawing back to within his skull. All he could hear was his heartbeat, and the rain falling, first on to the roof of the church, then sliding down to the ground. No thoughts, no presence. It was good, in a way; he felt naked, pure. For the first time in a long time, he felt human. The memories of what he had done faded from his mind.

The door of the church was open. It was an old catholic church, with heavy wooden doors framed by old stone. It was build in a medieval fashion; both to keep invaders out and filled with enough decadence to fill a peasant audience with awe. The catholic style hadn't really changed since then; just some of the doctrines.

He walked inside slowly. He ran his hands over the pews, looking through the dim light at the altar.

Mark had been raised catholic. He looked up at the crucifix, hanging in benediction over the altar.

"God, what am I supposed to do? You gave me a second chance for what? So the devil could corrupt me, and make me thirst for blood and pain? I fight every time within myself, and every time I cannot stop. I have tried to kill myself, but it seems I cannot. Tell me what to do."

His words echoed off the walls, then the silence rang. Mark burst up the aisle, jumping at the crucifix.

"WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO!!!???" he screamed into the face of Christ, his own barely inches away.

"Stop."

Mark leapt off the wall at the sound of the soft female voice.

She was stunning. Her hair was the colour of honey, and her face that of a doll. Her lips were devilishly full, and she looked slender; it was difficult to tell given her gown that looked more like a pillowcase.

All of the feeling and power he thought were suppressed returned, and he felt the evil well up inside of him. He felt like a predator, and his prey had just walked into the room.

She felt odd, watching him. His eyes were just as she had imagined; a deep dull red, muted, pulsing. His face wasn't lined, in fact as far from it as possible, every surface curved. It was almost beautiful, like a woman's face, but where a beautiful woman looked soft, or at least inviting, his face was granite. His expression was sheer hunger, want, anger, desire. She felt repelled by his baseness, but at the same time she felt her cheeks flush, and her mouth opened slightly. She took a deep breath.

"Oh, my dear. You shouldn't have come here tonight." He said, his voice smooth, as he walked slowly towards her. Fear. She was afraid of him, or was that for him? She couldn't tell anymore. The memories were not flowing as freely as before.

He reached her, and as he stroked her face his arm seized up, and Mark's vision went black.

Mark...

Mark...

What, he thought groggily.

Mark...

He opened his eyes. She was over his head, her eyes glowing slightly. They were light blue, but were so pale, so huge between the fine lines of her cheekbones that he couldn't help it. He reached up, and caressed her face with his hand. For the first time in a long time, Mark felt tenderness well up within him.

She smiled down at him. Gabrielle could feel his emotions, feel all of his guilt and pain. She muted them for them moment, allowing him softer, more gentle things. But she could feel her own powers getting to her; her nipples began to harden slightly, and her breath came faster. She could already feel the hardness of his body beneath his clothing, and ran her hands down his abs to the tops of his thighs. She ran the tips of her fingers over the surface, before cupping his groin.

In the dark, burning pit, Lucifer looked up from his throne, and stared. Suddenly he screamed, "NOOOOOOOO!!"

Mark had already begun to think sexually before she had even started to feel him up. Her hair was long and straight, and it had been a while since he had seen a decent blonde. And she was more than decent; her face was sheer utter perfection, but it didn't make him think of sex. She had the face of an angel, or of a saint. She was so beautiful as to be beyond even Mark's league.

And her body was slender, so thin he could feel her ribs as he held her in his arms, but her breasts were pristine, big enough for him to cup in his palms, but he felt guilty doing so.

She lowered her mouth to his, and kissed him softly.

"Who are you?" Mark whispered when she released him, barely able to believe that he could feel normal again.

She leant back for a second, setting her shoulders back.

"I was She Who Fell First. The leader of the Watchers on Earth. I am your senior, Mark."

She lowered her face, and kissed him again.

"But in this body, I am Gabrielle. I was to be a nun, but He called me, and told me to find you."

He sat up, and shook himself a little. He knew, at least by taking it a little on faith, that he was a Grigorii or an incubus, and he preferred the former. But he couldn't recall anything about falling from heaven, or even if he did.

Mark felt odd; this girl was among the most attractive he had ever seen, and she was a nun (Yummy, forbidden fruit). But he felt almost no need to sate himself on her. She was beautiful, but in almost an abstract way, as though she was a piece of art and not normal or even natural.

She smiled at him; he was as easy to read as anyone she had ever met. His smile was so... memorable that her breath caught in her throat. She felt more protective of him rather than the sexual need she had before. Her eyes frosted over as she remembered.

We joined minds, all of us. As we always had, we surveyed the world and its inhabitants. We knew not what we were looking for. We tried, as we always had, to keep our eyes on everything; we never knew where the Event would happen, just that it would. But the world was large, with infinite variety, and we struggled, oft finding distractions amongst the world.

We drifted down, this time, to a small hut. He had told us to watch the human called Enoch, the descendant of Adam. We had done this since She Who Was Made First had left his ancestor, protecting his line. In this hut, Enoch dwelled, his sons and daughters nearby. He slept now, his head fully on his furs.

We could hear the sounds coming from nearby, and were confused- Enoch had forbidden procreation near his dwellings, preferring to stay away from the desires of the flesh. We floated along, following the sounds to their source.

The man was atop the woman, just outside the hut. His body roped with muscle; he was one of those who worked the fields. His mouth and hands were everywhere, gliding across her body, the calluses on his palms rubbing at her skin erotically. We could feel their tracks along her body, just as we felt his arousal, his hardness demanding release. But he was patient, far more than we would have had him been us. We wondered then, how he had control.

His hands and face then journeyed down, between her thighs. His beard was alternately rough and soft against her tender skin, and we moaned. Her pleasure intensified as his fingers slipped inside her body, as his tongue caressed her parts on the outside.

We felt it as a burning. We were spirits of fire, so the sensation was not strange. But feeling it through the bodies of clay that the humans were made from made the feelings stronger, made them burn brighter. We cried out as she erupted in molten pleasure.

The man drew his clothing low, and rose up between her, capturing her face with his hands. She rose again as he kissed her, and then arched her back as we felt him enter her body.

It was wonderful, the sense of being penetrated and surrounded by the warmth and wetness. He had no mind for her pleasure anymore, thrusting away mindlessly inside her. We felt his mind slip into pleasure, felt his hard rod plunging deep within her as though it was our own. We loved the feeling as he slid within us, over and over and over, now, now, NOW!

We arched our backs, and strove to remain quiet as we built up, and thickened within her. We felt his semen fill us up with molten pleasure, and we flexed around him, caressing the last of his pleasure from his body.

We separated, and became as the two hundred we were.

What are we to do? Are we to continue to watch the world, even knowing that it was harder and harder not to take a form and become as mortals are? The sons and daughters of man are too much; we see merit in them, and heaven is so very far away. We can no longer remember what Rapture looked like, or the feeling of knowing His will.

We agreed, then, to take up the human body, and dwell as mortals on the world. We would be as Watchers forever, until He comes to this world to judge us. We agreed not to forget who we were, and to stand against She Who Was First and the Morning Star.

I can still feel it, the sensation of withdrawing my form from the sky, and inserting myself into a lump of clay. We had moulded two hundred, one for each. I can still remember the looks on the others faces, as they became aware of their flesh only, and how their minds shrank and were confined. We could feel the air on our skin, and the warmth of each other's bodies on the air.

More than that, we could feel each other, could see into each other's minds.

I can still remember how we separated, each to watch over humanity as we chose. I saw the world, forever watching, wanting. But I slowly forgot. The years had their toll on me, and I forgot who I was. I lost my name, then my sense of self. I became completely human, and I died when Enoch's descendant, Noah, brought His wrath down upon the world that We had made corrupt, and purged it of all of She Who Was First's children.

I can remember now, the last time we as a collective banded together, to do His work. The Morning Star had unleashed horrors we had never known on the world, and we had to fight him. But his voice was too seductive, and we fell again. Some of us truly died, and became less. Some sold their fire, and became the Stain. Most faded away again, and let our awareness diminish.

But the reality of our choice had effects we had not foreseen. I died, then I felt again, in another body. A baby girl, gorgeous, innocent. I was complete. I remembered again. Only to lose it all again when I became aware of myself, aware of my body. Aware of my human parents, of my human flesh.

I have died, over and over and over. But this time, He has chosen to remind me of what I am, and who we were.

Mark saw it all. She could see it in his eyes, but all she could sense from him was confusion. She realised that, even though he was Grigori, she had never seen his soul before. He was Apart.

He looked up at her, and ran his hand alongside her face. Suddenly he flipped over, his body pinning her to the ground, his eyes flashing crimson again. He looked into her eyes, and snarled.

"You were SENT to me?! Sent to do what exactly? To make good of me, to REDEEM ME!? How exactly? You have no memory of me, no experience of me doing ANYTHING!"

He kissed her fiercely, the animal within him burning. He could feel her body beneath him, feel the curve of her thigh, feel her softness. He ran his fingers along her arms, and under the small of her back. She raised her hands above her head, and ran her knee along his thighs. She bit his shoulder hard, making him draw back.

Mark steadied for a second, retreating. She looked at him, breathing hard. She could remember what it- sex- felt like, but this body had never known the feelings running through her. She was so eager it wasn't funny. But it was strange; it felt like more than need to her, more than physical willingness. It was as though she was deliberately encouraging him.

She looked at him, hungry.

"I am your penance, and your redemption. If you can hold yourself in, be strong, than you are redeemed. But if you cannot, sex with me is your ticket out. Your physical taint will end with this and your soul will be restored."

The animal firmly locked away, Mark felt his humanity return.

"But what happens to you then?"

She pushed him up, and he didn't struggle as she got up and sat down at one of the pews.

"I cease to be anything other than human. I become human. I... evolve."

She saw his eyebrows raise.

"You think humans are more evolved than us?"

She nodded.

"I believe that humans are more capable of change than we are. Twenty thousand years ago, we were exactly as we are now. Humans have gone from little better than animals to moralistic, potentially philosophical creatures. If they continue their development in this fashion, than they may even surpass Him. Rapture knows how they have already developed thus far, given what the Light Bringer and his wench have done."

She shrugged.

"We have power over them now, but..."

Mark's eyes faded, the crimson dulling down to the same mute red it was when he entered.

"So, say I went along with you. What then?"

She looked at him directly.

"You continue, in whatever manner you can, in trying to take down Lilith and the Stain's operation on this planet. You must avoid contact with regular people; you must not sleep with anyone other than other Grigori."

Mark closed his eyes. "I did not believe in your god, and nothing I have seen had made me agree with him any more than I did when I was human."

She smiled. "Spoken like a true fallen angel."

He nodded his assent, and she took his hand as she led him away.