Scarlet Night: The Complete Trilogy

by Megan J. Parker

  11

  Distant Dreams

  Blonde.

  The color of the sun.

  Zane opened his eyes, finding himself facing the sun once more. The familiarity of it all hit him harder than he’d expected, though it had been so long since he’d gazed up at it like this.

  It really was as beautiful as he remembered.

  The golden orb shimmered and shifted, making him blink against it, and, when he looked up once more, his gaze fell upon a silhouetted female form; a familiar fantasy from a far-off memory.

  He shook his head.

  No.

  Not a memory.

  A dream.

  The Dream.

  She came to him, pressing her hands to his face as she leaned close to him. The features he’d never been able to make out—features that hid his perfect woman’s identity within the rays of the sun—suddenly came into focus; becoming, in the blink of an eye, as clear as day.

  Her eyes—those beautiful purple eyes—lit up in front of him as the sun’s rays became her hair, falling over her strong-yet-soft face…

  And suddenly all the mystery faded into nothingness like the night turning to day.

  And Serena was there with him.

  His Serena…

  The beautiful blonde bombshell he fell in love with was now occupying the previously mysterious silhouette of the woman from the dreams he’d had so many years ago. He smirked at the irony that the dream-woman he had created when he’d been engaged to Celine would turn out to look exactly like Serena.

  The exact opposite of Celine in every way possible.

  “I’ve missed you,” she whispered, running her hands down his bare chest.

  “I’ve missed you too, Serena,” he smiled up at her and her eyes lit up at the mention of her name as though she’d been waiting all that time to hear him admit it.

  She ran her lips against his throat, and he groaned at the feeling, wrapping his arms tightly around her waist as she came to rest against him. Leaning up, he pressed his lips to hers. The feeling of her soft lips against his sent a shiver down his spine and he groaned in the ecstasy that her kiss brought to him.

  The memory of her kiss.

  A memory he couldn’t let go of.

  A memory he never wanted to relinquish.

  Her lips were the medicine he needed then and pushed against her, eager to take another dose.

  “I love you!” she whispered against his lips and he pulled her naked body against his, running his hands down her breasts, teasing her nipples as he continued to kiss her.

  “I love you too, Serena. Never leave me again.”

  He didn’t want to break their embrace.

  He didn’t want to not feel her against him.

  He needed this more than anything.

  Those beautiful purple eyes of hers shone down at him in need and he smiled, determined to give her exactly what she needed…

  Exactly what he needed.

  Wrapping her legs around his waist, he pressed inside her, finding comfort within her walls. Groaning loudly, he began to move with everything he had inside her. He loved her so much and he was determined to show her just how much he loved her.

  She lifted her eyes to his and he lost himself in those perfect purple pools.

  The pleasured gaze she gave him was everything he needed.

  Everything he could dream of.

  The woman he wanted.

  The woman he needed.

  She was with him again.

  The moment climaxed, and he followed after it; crying out with his release as she cried out simultaneously with her own.

  Then the cold air of reality came; a chill he was so familiar with.

  The pain and cold that he’d been forced to endure for so many nights now…

  “Serena… no. Please don’t leave. I can’t do this without you… Serena, NO!”

  His eyes shot open and he saw the faint silhouette of his hand reaching out into the lonely darkness.

  The cold, lonely darkness.

  Falling back against Serena’s pillow, he tried to loose himself once more in the fading remnants of her scent; the sweetness of cherry blossoms and the kick of spice on an otherwise bitter cold winter’s night.

  “Serena…”

  ~December 28th, 893AD~

  ~Armenian outskirts; just outside of Dvin~

  ~Palace of Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband~

  ~Just before midnight~

  Arezoo, still naked and wearing the glistening remains of sweat and Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s love on her skin, stood at the open door of her master’s chambers. The guards at the door, well aware of the concubine’s standing in the Liche’s eyes, struggled to keep their ever-alert gazes anywhere but the sensual image alluring them to steal a glance. Something that would surely cost them their lives. The challenge was made all the more tolling when, adjusting her posture against the door, her lover’s seed—despite being as dead as his magic—found fresh passage and began to trickle down her well-toned thighs.

  This fresh stream of lewdness, coupled with the myriad of pearly traces that still adorned her breasts, chin, and portions of her blonde mane—her master, powerful as he was, was notorious for both his virility as well as his copious offerings; something that often demanded the attention of multiple concubines when Arezoo was unavailable—created a visual that the guards mentally cataloged in the hopes of referring to in a more private moment…

  Should they live to see such a moment.

  Though the other concubines practiced a certain degree of modesty—none so brash as to flaunt their nakedness, let alone the liquid evidence of their exploits—Arezoo had spent too much time in the focus of others as an object of carnal lust to mind the judgments or desires of any that might bear witness to them. Should one be so bold as to stare too blatantly or—gods forbidding—lay a hand upon her, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband would see them personally through to a horrid fate.

  And all who served the Liche master knew this.

  But temptation, like hunger, can only be tested for so long before…

  One of the shakier guards shivered slightly under the weight of his own desires, his linen skirt visibly shifting over his growing erection as his eyes drifted towards the spectacle working its way down Arezoo’s inner-thigh.

  Not noticing her new spectator, the concubine discovered a lingering pearl over her chin and raked the morsel onto a painted nail before absently sucking her finger clean; never once taking her eyes from the gaping hole that the one called Utukku had left outside her master’s chambers.

  The guard groaned and pitched, his own seed abandoning his efforts for subtlety.

  Arezoo, hearing this, glanced over and giggled at the vision of the guard writhing upon post-orgasmic weakened knees.

  As the sound and foreboding chill of Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s approach grew more imminent behind her, she whispered to her admirer that she hoped it was worth it for him.

  A shimmering wave of death-magic burst through the threshold and slammed into the guard with enough force to break several of his bones. As his body was thrown into the air, a murky whimper ushered as the magic took hold and he began to decompose before their very eyes.

  By the time the unfortunate guard had reached the floor, there was no discerning his remains from the corpses that occupied the palace walls.

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband narrowed his eyes at the other three guards and asked them if they appreciated the show he’d offered them.

  Unsure if their master was referring to their comrade’s punishment or trying to lure them into a trap of confessing their own stolen glances of his prized concubine, they nervously muttered whatever sequence of words they felt might spare them the same fate.

  Satisfied that a point had been made, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband ushered Arezoo back into his chambers.

  Arezoo sighed at this, telling him that she enjoyed the spectacle that Utukku had left behind.

  Her master pressed her to e
xplain, once again issuing her to return to the privacy of his chambers.

  Reluctantly, the concubine obeyed, going on to explain that she’d long awaited a fitting challenger to enter into her beloved master’s life; to offer both him and his powers a chance to flex to their full potential.

  She offered him a coy smirk to accentuate the last part.

  Feeling a fresh wave of vitality in his loins, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband couldn’t bring himself to chastise her for her flagrant display.

  Still…

  He reminded her that her body was his and his alone to enjoy.

  Arezoo’s grin widened at that, and she made a show of massaging the lingering wetness into her breasts; reminding him, in turn, that she knew full-well that the servants’ reactions to such displays made him desire her all the greater.

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband couldn’t bring himself to even try to deny this fact, and, instead, pressed the issue of her obsession with Utukku.

  Shrugging before allowing herself to drop onto his cloud-like mattresses in a pose that was fit for sculpture, Arezoo repeated that she was excited to see him paired with a worthy adversary; that she knew that her body could stay his boredom only so much.

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband smirked at that, asking her if she’d heard of the prior night’s eclipse.

  Arezoo’s grin betrayed her, and she inquired as to what he planned to do in response.

  At nearly that exact time the night before, a great clamor erupted that the moon was being swallowed by the heavens. Intrigued by these claims, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband had hurried to witness the spectacle for himself.

  Sure enough, almost half of the moon had been rendered unseen, and, with every passing moment, more and more of the silver orb vanished. Squinting against the shadowy cloak of night, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband was certain that it looked like…

  Blood?

  Curiosity flared in the Liche then as his suspicion gave way to certainty, and he focused his powers—honing his magic senses to confirm that there was, indeed, an unprecedented amount of human blood saturating the very air—and traced the source to a neighboring hill not far from the palace.

  Though his eyes were, tragically, still quite human, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband could see beyond the veil of death that Utukku was behind the phenomenon. The blood-creature was somehow sending so much blood into the sky as to totally block out the moon!

  And, as this fact dawned upon Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband, his rival’s voice boomed within his mind, telling him that no display by a mere death-wizard could counter such a visceral vision of power.

  Unable to curse the creature from such a great distance, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband was forced to endure the inescapable taunts as he watched the moon vanish behind a massive curtain of blood.

  Arezoo crawled across the mattresses towards her master, tugging lightly on his tunic and, once again, inquiring to his plans in responding to Utukku’s challenge. Clearly unsettled by Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s silence, she—rolling onto her back to look up at him—added that such a large amount of blood must have cost many people their lives, and she casually began reciting and correcting a series of rhetorical estimates.

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband, not a fool by any stretch of the imagination, could see that his prized concubine was pushing him to counter the prior night’s “eclipse” with a display not only for the sake of meeting Utukku’s challenge, but for her amusement as well.

  Were she but any of his other servants, he’d have executed her for such brash efforts at manipulating him.

  But this was Arezoo, and under the weight of her insistence he couldn’t bring himself to feel anything other than the thrill of the challenge.

  Finally nodding to her, he issued her to his balcony.

  She eagerly obliged.

  From the vantage point of Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s personal balcony, he could overlook the lights of the city Dvin in the distance. There were so many of them down there, and he absently uttered this aloud for Arezoo to hear.

  Intrigued, she asked if he meant the people.

  Shaking his head and smirking, he motioned to the great land before them and explained that so many years of death and burial had created an unseen and often ignored foundation of death beneath the feet of those going about their lives.

  So many corpses.

  So many dead.

  And the dead were his power.

  A display of power.

  The thought rolled with Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband over and over until it became auditory. And while he knew that Arezoo was audience to his ongoing mantra, he was somehow certain that Utukku was not far and just as privy to the chant.

  Then he acted…

  Willing them—all of them; each and every corpse dwelling beneath the lands before him—to awaken and make their might known.

  The hour of midnight came and went as Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband continued to usher new life into everything dead; commanding them to rise.

  So Utukku wanted to hide the moon?

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband would shake the very earth!

  The sands began to shiver.

  The wail of frightened livestock grew.

  Startled cries and shouted warnings grew…

  As did the tremors.

  Until all of Dvin and its surrounding lands shook with the combined rising of the dead.

  Buildings toppled, burying entire families and communities.

  More and more deaths; more and more fuel for Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband to will into action.

  For every body that fell, a new minion arose to follow the Liche’s command.

  Soon, excluding the corpses that had been dead prior to Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s display, he’d accrued over thirty-thousand new playthings.

  Arezoo’s eyes—unblinking and awestruck—took in the spectacle as she absently dipped a hand between her thighs.

  More than thirty-thousand deaths…

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband smirked, beckoning to Utukku and demanding to know how a mere eclipse could fair in comparison to a being that could make the very earth quake with the dead beneath it.

  Utukku answered.

  The air shimmered with grayish-blue strands of light, like glowing lengths of thread that arched over Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s balcony and wavered before his chest; tickling the marble length of the railing. Then the strands began to vibrate with such ferocity as to drive both the Liche and his prized concubine back several steps…

  And, as though he’d been there all along, Utukku was there; crouched like a lion on the railing and glaring.

  He roared; declaring him a greater fool than he ever could have fathomed.

  His mouth gaped far wider than any man’s should, his teeth quivering like the sands of Dvin and growing—two dagger-like pairs of fangs along either side of the upper row and another pair like them from either side of the bottom—and his eyes glowing like a pair of green suns. The bluish strands emerged once again, though Arezoo seemed unaware of them this time, and shot from Utukku’s shoulders; lashing at Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband’s palace. Utukku moved then, though Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband could not trace the motion and only saw the powerful creature—once perched on his railing—suddenly standing before him.

  How could he move so quickly?

  What was happening?

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband ordered Arezoo back into the chambers; demanding that she warn the guards and have them prepare for battle once and for all against this monster.

  His concubine offered none of her typical, playful resistance, and fled with such haste as to inspire some meek hope in the Liche. Confident that his beloved was at a safe distance, he worked a death-wave into his palm and prepared to strike. Though the attacks had not been fatal for the creature before, he was confident that he could cripple its onslaught long enough to grow his forces and, perhaps, call the thirty-thousand lumbering minions he’d ushered into being to his aid.

  If he could only h
old this blood-and-soul-sucking monster at bay long enough…

  His powers welled and he moved to hurl the attack…

  Only to find his left arm no longer attached to his body.

  Eyes widening as the sudden rush of pain and horror struck him, he looked up at Utukku, realizing that this creature had severed one of his limbs with such speed that neither pain nor motion had registered in any sense to him.

  He was still so very, very human…

  And Utukku…

  What a monster earns in challenging another…

  You’re no monster, Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband, Utukku snarled again, and the strange strands began to rip the walls of his palace down, But you can bring them down upon this world with such recklessness.

  Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband abandoned his severed arm and his lingering hope then; turning on shaky feet and sprinting back into his chambers as the outer walls of his palace crashed down and began to pelt the balcony behind him.

  He didn’t need to look to know that Utukku was no longer occupying that space; somehow he was already inside, laying waste to all that Meleilzsi Shaykh Naqshband had worked to build.

  The screams of his servants began to echo through the chaos—new ones birthing before the old had even had a chance to fall silent with their impending demises.

  Utukku was a true monster, and a far more effective being at bringing death.

  The eclipse hadn’t been a full display of power!

  It had been a display of control!

  A blood-red sign that true power wasn’t in breaking the dam and letting the full capacity of destruction consume all in its path, but in letting a small river destroy enough lives to show what potential awaited should the dam be broken…