by Al K. Line
I'd still kick his Elder ass and do whatever it took to stop him, that was both my job and my friendship talking. He could be whatever he wanted to be, but that didn't give him the right to steal, terrify, or meddle like he had in the lives of Regulars. Plus, I was damn sure he'd do something spectacularly stupid given time, if it wasn't already too late.
I began to walk again, emptied my mind and let my body take control. It had brought me this far and I trusted it, at least for now.
The path grew narrower, the incline steep, one side sheer rock, the other a drop to the trees growing at strange angles as they fought for life, many toppling over the years as they no longer had the strength to survive in such a precarious environment.
Hell, why did everything have to remind me of my own existence?
The mood broken, my thoughts dark once again, I pushed past a thick branch angrily and as it whipped back behind me I found myself in a small clearing. Hidden by dense growth on all sides, the circular hollow was a quagmire. Oversized footprints could be seen emerging from the woods, converging on this place. To my left, deep in shadow from a rocky outcrop ten feet above its mouth, was a cave.
"Oh, for fuck's sake," I moaned, knowing exactly where all this was leading.
Yay, A Cave
The moment I stepped foot in the cave I knew there was nobody inside. But something drew me deeper in, away from the light, and it wasn't just to escape the rain. Water seeped through the rock and dripped down, pooling in shallow gullies. Tiny ferns and several varieties of moss soaked up the water close to the light, fighting for survival.
The cave was ten feet high and must have been thirty wide, rock worn smooth over the millennia. Several steps in and already it was hard to see the way ahead. Magic and the vampire nature adjusted my pupils, giving me sight no Regular could imagine. Everything took on a green tinge as though I wore night vision goggles, but the picture was crystal clear. This was something I'd practiced on my countless nocturnal walks, until I felt as comfortable as in the day, if not more so. A worrying sign of things to come, but at least it stopped me breaking my neck.
As I crept deeper into the cave, it angled slightly and the light cut off, coming as a surprise. I paused, realizing I was breathing heavily and my heart was hammering. Should I go back? Should I call someone so if I got killed and eaten they'd at least know where I'd died? No, I was already into this and I chuckled as something Mithnite had said about being an enforcer sprang to mind. About always doing stupid stuff, walking into dangerous situations knowing you'd probably get your head bashed. Or was it Faz who'd said it? Probably both.
Getting myself together, I let my tattoos swell a little and willed my inherited magic to surge through the ink. The strange, ethereal clouds of unknowable energy revitalized me, left me buzzing and my body thrumming to the tune of the universe. This stuff is intoxicating but it's more than that. It's the most addictive substance known to man, this Hidden magic, and why human Hidden constantly steal from the Empty even though the comedown is excruciating. At least for the first hundred years or so of use. But I had no comedown, had to pay no price in pain, and what could be better for an addict than that?
I let it fade, always careful not to abuse it when it wasn't needed, until I felt the loss as a tangible thing, the high dissipating, me craving more and more, never wanting to feel like a Regular again. As if I could.
Deeper I went, the cave narrowing, the smooth edges giving way to sharp outcrops. It smelled of animals and damp and ghoul and rot, a heady mix if ever there was one. Cold, so cold now, as though I could hibernate here like the ancient ones did back in Vampire HQ. Sleep away the centuries then wake, yawn, stretch, and go see how the world has changed before fading away again to a dreamless sleep. Lulled by my longing, I failed to notice that I'd walked deep into the cave now, easily fifteen minutes at a steady pace.
Ahead there was a faint glow, a putrid effervescence that reflected off the damp walls, casting a sickly light onto the black rock. I headed for it. My mind was clear, my emotions in check, and I felt no fear. I was a Hidden vampire enforcer and I would not be afraid.
The tunnel was bisected by a natural pillar and I had to ease through the narrow gap. I was confronted with a large open cavern, maybe eight feet high and sixty or seventy feet wide, spread over numerous levels where rock had fallen from above centuries ago. Shallow pools rippled as water fell to the beat of a strange rhythm, and a few inches of ground were hidden from view with a sickening mist that eddied and circled around my feet, flowing over rock like it was sentient.
All that was fine, kind of comes with the territory for spooky as hell caverns, what wasn't cool were the things this mist seemed to caress with an icy lover's hand.
I thought about swearing but worried it would cause something nasty to happen, so settled for a silent, "Fudge," before stepping forward carefully.
No Butterflies Here
There have been times in my life when my body was very reluctant to do what my brain directed it to. This time both were in agreement, and the decision made was run. But I didn't, because although it was logical to leave this place, and fast, I knew I couldn't. I had to know what this was, what these things were. Sure, I had a strong hunch, but I wanted to be certain. And besides, there wasn't anything in here that could actually hurt me. At least not physically.
The psychic emanations were a different matter entirely.
It felt wrong. Just plain wrong. Everything about the cavern gave me the jitters. The walls screamed at me, warned me to leave, that I was an impostor, an unwelcome intruder into this ungodly scene. I was human, or was once, and this was not for the likes of me. Deep below a hillside overlooking Cardiff I was in another world, and I wasn't sure if that was literally or not.
The stink of death was heavy in the air, but also the possibility of life. Corrupted flesh was this place's purpose, home to beings from somewhere else. The air chattered and cackled, called in a strange, guttural language like spiders scratching at my mind. Like beetles' legs running across my thoughts, raking and poking and prodding and tapping at my sanity with foul, rat-like nails.
The mist wafted away lazily as I moved, the ground revealed. It was thick with rich loam, but writhed as bugs of all description wriggled and squirmed on the surface or slithered away at the sound of my slow footsteps. I squashed them as I walked. Hard shells cracked, soft bodies squirted liquid of many colors over my boots and up my leather trousers.
None of that bothered me as much as the grubs.
Hundreds, if not thousands of oversized, pockmarked grubs, or something akin to them, nestled in the mist. Milky white, with flaking brown scabs and dark bruises. Some were the size of a young child, others no bigger than my head. Something caught my eye and I bent, only to discover more of them, many as tiny as a finger. Little grubs without eyes. Long, squirming things with segmented bodies that grew even as I watched.
I stepped over to a larger one that lay on the ground, the bottom half of it hidden by the mist that drifted away at my approach. I noted that insects crawled over the lower half but left the rest of it alone. It was pus-white with a waxy outer casing just like the grubs I find when digging the vegetable plots, things I throw to the chickens to fight over furiously. Scabs fell from the strange flesh, thick, hard pieces of what I guess was akin to skin, the meat beneath raw and pink, looking tender like a new wound.
Something shifted inside, poking at its flesh-prison, jabbing and punching, maybe searching for a way out. The grub wriggled, it's body crawling in no particular direction.
Fascinated, and before I knew what I was doing, I stretched out my hand and poked at it with my index finger. My mind flashed and a thousand nightmares condensed into a single instant seared my soul, sending me reeling. I fell back on my quivering bum, squishing the bugs, but that was the least of my worries. The thing inside screamed in my mind, an awakening to sentience, and all it knew was pain. Where I'd touched, the otherworldly creature melted away like my warmth wa
s fire, pink flesh puckering and fizzing.
Thick pale goo trickled from the wound, then seeped, then bled profusely. The smell was revolting, a downright attack on all that was beautiful and clean and pure in the world.
Then the grub writhed as though in utter agony, thrashed about, rolled over and over until it hit a sharp rock with a wet slap.
It burst and liquid like sour, congealed milk, but smelling a whole lot worse, spewed from the large wound, infecting the air with a smell so vile I longed to be back in the cemetery.
I scrambled backward, not knowing if this poison could harm me, and watched, wide-eyed, as something inside tore at its cocoon. A pink, webbed hand emerged, grabbed the ragged edges and ripped at it with pointed, but still forming nails. It was tough enough to do the job though, and the grub casing fell away like a wrinkled piece of cloth.
A ghoul lay on the grub skin, pink flesh blistering as it experienced air for the first time. It gasped then howled its way into the world. A violent birth, one it wasn't ready for. The limbs were not complete, most toes nothing but nubs. Its ribcage was visible, thin skin stretched taut, and its limbs were smooth and shiny but already it was changing.
The creature screamed repeatedly, nerves on fire, and the face, little more than a misshapen head with black holes, shifted. Eyes formed, nose grew, mouth split open, and large ears popped up. In seconds its birth was complete, and it was a fully-formed ghoul.
It stared at me and snarled, then it howled. I think I may have whimpered.
I crawled away, which caused the ghoul to wail. It was only as I looked down that I understood. I was squashing not just bugs but hundreds of tiny scab grubs that burst, staining the ground with rancid amniotic fluid. Little pink creatures like deformed chicks flailed tiny arms and legs before they died.
The ghoul tore at the air in incandescent rage, clawing it as though it could rip aside the tenuous reality to reveal, well, I didn't want to know what. Already I was unsure if this was still my world or if I had stepped through into the ghouls' homeland, but if that was the case I would surely have gone mad in an instant.
Although not certain, I was fairly sure I wasn't a nut-job quite yet, but for how much longer was debatable.
Not wanting to stick around to find out if I'd lose my sanity or my bits and pieces, I jumped up, felt the carpet of grossness rip away from my leather, and backed up. The ghoul never took her watery eyes off me, watched me with deadly intent as I moved backward, causing more damage as I did so. She kicked away her amniotic sac and shook her legs out, the terribly thin legs cracking as kneecaps popped up and she finished the last of her growth.
But she hadn't finished, and she kept on getting taller, and her skin darkened and then the outer epidermis fell from her like an unwanted blanket, revealing something darker, a hide like crocodile skin. She stretched until she was seven feet tall. Her shoulders broadened, her sagging chest filled out until the nipples grew red and sore, and a sigh of contentment escaped her lips.
Then she did the strangest thing. She sat on a rock, picked up a fat grub, and put one end of it to her bosom. I watched as the grub's segments moved in waves as a tiny puckered mouth latched on to feed. She smiled down sweetly at the grub thing and then lifted her head back, eyes to the darkness above. She began to hum.
For a moment the cavern was full of peculiar, syncopated sounds as she was lost to her feeding, but then she stopped, lowered her head and stared at me. I swear she smiled.
The room filled with noise as large grubs split apart. Disgusting, foul, sour amniotic fluid squirted in all directions, and hundreds of half-formed juvenile ghouls clawed their way to life.
Here Comes the Sun
Thinking now would be a good time to don something spangly and maybe wear a magical tiara, I did the next best thing and did my Wonder Woman impression, without the revealing costume, and just ran bloody fast. Full-on vampire shimmer shuffle, no holds barred.
I made it to the cave mouth and leapt out from the cold and the gloom into dappled sunlight that shot through the branches of the trees like arrows. Stopped in my tracks by its glory, I lifted my face to the sun and let its warmth enter me. Oh, how glorious such heat is, to let the magnificent energy soak through your skin and remind you that this is why you are alive. This distant yellow ball in the sky is all that stands between life and an eternity of death. Without it everything would be obliterated.
No way would I ever become so entrenched in the vampire life that I had to avoid the sun. If I had to I'd do what Oskari had done, let the sun burn away my pigmentation, die a little death every day as I fried under its life-giving energy until I beat the vampire within and could withstand the warm embrace of the only thing that truly gave life to our planet.
Plus, I like to get a tan. It suits me.
Cheeks feeling rosy, sun searing away the nightmare just a few steps away in the dark, I turned back to the gaping maw of insanity and readied for a hollering onslaught of ghouls intent on death and revenge.
None came.
To be honest it was a bit of an anticlimax. If they attacked then I could kill them, kill them all and blame it on self-defense. Scour the whole despicable cavern with wild magic like a flamethrower. But they stayed put, maybe had no interest in little ol' me, wanted to be left alone to be born, to become whatever they were meant to be in this world. Or maybe they'd already left, dragged back down to what surely must be their true home. The ghoulish otherworld where they belonged.
Or did they?
I'd never heard of ghouls being born here, in our world, but there was a lot I didn't know about ghouls and more I didn't know about all Hidden than could ever be learned. They were magical creatures and had histories, cultures, languages, afterlives, pre-lives, and all that jazz that hardly a single human on the planet knows about, and nobody has knowledge of them all. Nobody.
Hating myself for doing it, but knowing it would at least ensure they couldn't come out if they plucked up the courage, I blasted the rock above the cave mouth until it was blocked.
I left, wandered back to the car, passed several walkers on the way using their weird poles to assist with their slow hike. I smiled and nodded and they smiled back, quickly forgetting all about me.
At the castle there were several new cars, with people unloading kids who splashed in muddy puddles and harassed parents trying to stop them running off. Back to business as usual. Like fortune tellers, the people of Cardiff can sense when the clouds will lift and the rain will stop—they can time an outing to the minute.
The sky continued to clear, bringing with it an icy freshness. It eradicated the last of the darkness and my jittery nerves. I needed to think, I needed to rest, I certainly needed to plan.
Maybe a nice cup of tea would do the trick, allow me to put things into perspective and decide how to deal with this going forward. The Chemist had to be stopped, that was obvious, but I was no closer to knowing what his end goal was, and that was the most worrying thing of all. The ghouls in the cave, they'd stay put until I figured something out. Even if they escaped, their permanent Hidden veils would mean anyone they met would see them as just some odd looking guys and gals, not the mangled things they were.
I unlocked the vehicle, sighed as I closed the door and new car smell greeted me, although it was wearing off, making me wonder if I could swap this one out for a new vehicle. With a shake of my head, questioning my choice of job, I drove back to the city.
Tea!
"Be there in a minute, love," said Grandma as I called her name then walked into the hall. Her head disappeared back around the doorway to the kitchen and I heard her mumbling about something to do with her potions.
Grandma is an expert potion maker, nothing like the Chemist, as nobody else is that nuts, but what she creates has true power and is not to be taken lightly. She can cure you of many ailments of the mind, body, and spirit, and she can also make your insides melt or your eyeballs pop. If you cross her, she'll make you a perfect cuppa, sit you down
at her kitchen table and talk nicely, then sneak up on you and slit your throat.
This sweet woman is a witch amongst witches, looks like a harmless old lady with her slippers and her housecoat and her wrinkled face, but she's truly ancient, knows just about everyone and everything in this Hidden world, and I love her.
And have I mentioned she gives the best hugs ever?
"Hey, Grandma," I said as I entered the kitchen and the inferno hit. I removed my coat immediately, my skin already sweating as the humidity permeated everything. The extractor fan clacked away like it had done for decades, the windows were only open an inch, and steam made it hard to see.
Hunched over the stove, with a protesting spoon in arthritic hand—who's she trying to kid?—Grandma stirred something noxious, body tense as she tried to get her latest concoction to do her bidding.
"Hey, love, sorry, but I haven't even made sandwiches."
I noted the teapot and two cups and saucers already laid on the table—she always knows when someone's coming to visit—and smiled. "That's all right, tea would be great though."
"Then pour it, girl. Family don't stand on ceremony."
"Yes, Grandma." I got busy with the tea.
Neither of us spoke for several minutes, a comfortable silence that's rare to find outside of family. Grandma may not be family by inherited blood, but she's family by blood of another sort. Mine. If it hadn't been for her and Faz I would have died after being bitten and left for dead by a rogue vampire. They saved me, she saved me, and I love her. She doesn't judge, doesn't look down on me, or others, she sticks to her own moral code and if you pass then you are on her team, for life.
