The Long Night of the Gods: Lilith Awakens (Forgotten Ones Book 2)

by M. H. Hawkins

  Screeching tires, a slamming noise, breaking glass, and an explosion followed. Between two less-mangled metal beasts, the white convertible folded in on itself and became a bundle of scrap metal and shattered glass. The passengers did the same, shattered and splattered against the car’s airbags; their legs were crushed and pinned against and weaved through the steel frame of the pretty white convertible. Somehow, glass shards from the broken windshield were still able to find their faces, and the air bags would just make the scarring even worse. The metal beast was dead, but the spoiled youths that sat inside it were not.

  So vibrant and youthful. They were pretty, and they felt invincible. Not anymore. They would live but… they definitely weren’t pretty anymore. They definitely weren’t invincible.

  Something else caught her attention, and again the balls of her black stilettos pivoted and grinded to a stop. A dog park. Barking dogs. A bench. A child sitting alone. She heard a strange electronic beeping coming from his stomach, and it stroked her curiosity. Why not?

  The wind whipped through her golden locks and sent her black dress swaying like ocean waves. Then, in a blink, she was suddenly sitting on the bench, next to the abandoned child. She took another sip of her drink before setting it down.

  Despite the crash and the noisy yells of concern and the barking dogs, the child hadn’t moved or even glanced at the commotion. With his head down, he was staring intently at the small plastic box sitting in his hands. A handheld video game system. His thumbs tapped and thumped with intent as the electronic music hummed and built suspense. The woman was intrigued.

  She ran her tongue over the razorblade tips of her fangs that hung just above her canines before retracting them further into her upper jawline. Don’t scare the child, she thought. “Child, what are you doing?”

  “Playing a game.” Answering, he didn’t look up or let alone move or flinch an inch. He added, “It’s a game about monsters. I like monsters.” His voice was low and monotone.

  She smiled. “I like monsters, too.” She noticed the oddity of him. Aside from his voice, his clothes were strange as well. His shirt was mismatched with his shorts, and his socks were pulled up to his knees. “You are an odd one, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah. That’s what they say. They say that I’m odd. The doctors say that I’m different. They call it special, but they mean different. They, the doctors, they call it Asperger’s.”

  Her thin, painted lips curled into a smile. “Asperger’s, that’s a strange name.”

  “Yeah.”

  A red scaly tail curled over the back of the bench and in front of the woman. A heart-shaped blade capped the tip of it like a large red arrowhead. She tapped her finger on it then began to paw at it like she was playing with a kitten. As if it had a mind of its own, the arrowheaded tail darted around, dodged and jabbed at her. With each slice that hit, her hand would split open before healing almost instantaneously. And by the time her tail connected with another slash, her hand was healed and once again flawless. Special, different. “Yes, they say that I’m special as well.” She wagged her finger at the tail, and it slinked back to wherever tails go before disappearing completely. The boy noticed none of this. “They do like to talk. And they like to say a lot of things.” Say things like whore. “But, they did get one thing correct. You are special. Special, not different.”

  “Yeah. Thank you lady. My name is Dylan. Do you have a name?”

  A name? She had slept for so long that she hadn’t even had a chance to think about or even select a name. “A name?” She perked up as it came back to her. “Yes, a name. I had a name once. They called me Lilith.”

  “Lilith? Like Lilly. I like that name. Lilly, Lilith, I like them both; I guess. I think.”

  “Lilly, hmmm. I like that name as well.” She thought about the old times. The stories they told. Lies. “You know what, Dylan? They used to write stories about me. Some say I was the first woman, before Eve, that I was cast out of the Garden of Eden because I would not bow before man. That was one story.

  “Another story said that I stole children in the middle of the night, that I was a monster, that I devoured babies—as if I would ever harm an innocent.” She clarified, “I mean, an innocent that wasn’t in my way, or, you know, didn’t have parents that had debts to pay—something along those lines. Those could still get it. They said that I would transform into a demon-witch and curse children.

  “Of course, I did none of this. None of it, Dylan.” She took a long sip of her drink. Cool and icy, it felt nice on her tongue. She smiled and looked at the cup. Damn, that’s good. “Of course, I was just a scapegoat. A scapegoat for monsters masked as men… and for desperate and confused women—crazy women. Of course, that was the old times. There was a lot of confusion back then. Less knowledge, more lead. Lead was everywhere; plates, wells—I mean, that shit was everywhere. And it just leaks into everything, if you’re not careful. And yet, no one knew. And instead, they just blamed me.

  “’course progress is slow. Thousands of years later, it was something else. They were calling women witches and burning them at the stake, beating them, drowning them. And all the while, they still desired them… wanted them, wanted to be with them. Does that make any sense to you, Dylan?”

  She looked at him for an answer, but he was still locked onto his game and didn’t answer. So, she went on.

  “Anyways, but like I said before, they like to say a lot of things.” She crossed her shimmering, perfectly bronzed legs and straightened the edges of her dress.

  “Yeah.” Dylan’s eyes still had not moved from his game. “Do you have children? My mom says children are a gift from God.”

  “Children?” Caught off-guard, Lilith leaned back and brought her hand up against her chest. “Children,” she repeated as she deflated. “No. No, I do not have any children—not in the sense that you are speaking about. But your mother was not wrong. Children are a gift… a gift from the gods.” The look of anger and sadness that came across her face remained partly hidden behind her oversized sunglasses. A gift from the gods. “Apparently, I am unworthy of that gift… from the gods.”

  Dylan paused. He stopped playing his game but still kept his eyes locked on it. “I’m sorry, Lilly. I’m sorry you can’t have children, Lilith. Lilly. If you did have children, I bet you would be a very good mother. And I’m sorry that they said those things about you, too.” He was listening. Dylan sighed and continued, “They do like to say a lot of things, though. I don’t care. I don’t think you’re bad.” He un-paused the game and went back to playing it.

  Lilith smiled until a thought entered her mind. Where’s his mother? “Dylan, where’s your mother? She didn’t leave you here, did she?” Lilly’s fangs eased out from her mouth and began salivating.

  “Mom? No. She went to the bank across the street. She told me to sit here until she came back. I’m not supposed to talk to strangers, but I think you’re okay. You’re different, special, like me.

  “I don’t like banks. The suits, the walls, the glass. The thumping hurts my ears. The thumping keyboards, calculators. They hurt my ears. Last time I went to the bank, the thumping drove me crazy. I howled and hummed, but mom was busy; she wasn’t listening. So I hummed louder, but she still didn’t listen to what I was trying to say. And I got crazier, and the clicking kept thumping in my head, echoing louder. Click, click, click—it was driving me crazy. So I did the only thing I could think of. I banged my head on the wall. Harder and harder and harder, and it hurt so bad but not as much as the clicking. And…” Dylan had a sad look on his face and looked embarrassed from his story and unsure why he was even telling it to the strange woman. “Anyways, I don’t know why, but the thumping just drove me crazy and I... My mom said that I had to sit here until she came back.”

  Lilith looked over her shoulder at the bank, a tall skyscraper with walls of shiny glass. It was tagged with crisp blue words attached to a massive sign with blue and red slashes on it. A banner, a marked building, clai
med… empty and shallow—both the building and the business. And they call me a whore. “Yes, banks are strange.” Money, paper shields, paper castles built on borrowed money. “Very strange, indeed.”

  She turned back around and looked out at the park. People laughing, dogs bouncing around with their tails wagging, another chased after a Frisbee, other kids were sitting in the grass while midnight black puppies (Labradors) pounced on them, their mouths slobbering over long white fangs. Hellhounds? No. The wolves were lying with the sheep. A large Great Dane danced around for a treat, instead of tearing out the human’s neck.

  It was a nice scene, but something was tickling her ankle, so she looked down. A dappled brown-black boxer sniffed at her foot then at the straw of her icy drink. Momentarily hesitating and looking up at Lilly with guilty eyes, it slowly stuck out its tongue and licked at the straw of her drink. Lilly, still staring at the dog, growled before it ended up whelping and running away. What would the Wolf think? she wondered, so strange. But still, this was a better sight, at least better than the bank was. So Lilly smiled.

  The electronic music of Dylan’s video game sped up and grew louder and darker and more intense and suspenseful, and sequentially, it piqued Lilly’s interest even more. She leaned over the boy’s shoulder and looked at the screen. An orange dragon was fighting a yellow lion, of sorts; both were abstract iterations of the true versions. I like monsters too. “What kind of game is that?”

  “It’s a video game. You have to catch the monsters. You fight them and then you can capture them, the monsters. But you have to fight them first, and win. When you win, then you get to keep the monsters.”

  “Yes.” A big smile came across her face. “Yes you do.” Fight them, capture them. An excellent idea.

  Smiling at the boy, she realized that she liked him. Softly she said, “Dylan, I want to give you a gift.” A golden coin with a black roped appeared in her hand, and she draped it over his neck. “Dylan, I want you to hold on to this. It’s going to protect you from… If you like monsters, I promise you, you will see monsters. Many of them, many monsters, more than you could ever imagine. But first, I have to catch them, just like in your game. Either way, this will protect you from them. It may look like gold, but it is much more valuable.

  “Now, I must be going. Those monsters aren’t going to catch themselves. It was very nice to meet you, Dylan.” Lilly squeezed his shoulder as a show of affection before she stood up. Lilly brushed off her dress before pointing her open palm towards the ground—so that her icy drink could float into her hand. Taking a sip of her drink, she took a moment to ponder her next move. But Dylan…

  Dylan paused his game and looked at the coin hanging from his neck. He then finally lifted his head and looked up at Lilith. A goddess. With innocent unknowing eyes, a child’s eyes, he didn’t understand her beauty nor cared about it. He blinked rapidly; his eyes were dried and bloodshot from staring at the digital screen of his videogame. “Thank you, Lilly.” Dylan paused to give much thought to his next words. “Lilith, Lilly?” Then, he paused again. He had the words, but now he needed the courage to say them. “Lilly, are you… are we friends now?”

  Before she could answer, a gruff voice interrupted. A protective hand snatched the boy’s arm. “Dylan, let’s go.” Equal parts fear and general snark, she was clearly on edge. She barked at Lilly, “Get out of here, you psycho. Get away from my son.” Through pursed lips, she bent over and whispered into Dylan’s ear, still jerking his arm towards her, “What’d I tell you? What’d I tell you about talking to strangers?”

  The little boy swayed like a rag doll. “I know, Mom, but she’s…”

  She didn’t wait for an answer and was already dragging him back to the car. “Let’s go. C’mon.”

  This time, Lilith was the one interrupting. Ten steps towards the car, Dylan’s mother stopped in her tracks and looked up. Somehow, Lilith was now standing directly in front of her, the most attractive roadblock ever. “Ma’am, you are being rude.” She slid off her sunglasses. “It is only for the fact that your son is so delightfully wonderful that you still have the able to stand here and irrationally huff at things you do not understand. As for me, I would sooner remove your lungs as to prevent you from doing such things in the future. But alas, I do like the young lad, so I will not do such a thing, for now.”

  The mother tried to speak but as she looked into Lilith’s eyes, her words became a death rattle in her throat. Her eyes. Pools of blood swayed like ocean waves before turning into flicker red flames. Orange and red tongues licked against jagged stalactites before melting them into hellfire. Shadows screamed. Winged monsters snatched up humans in their claws and flung them into tall stone walls. Others lifted them high into the air just before dropping them, just to watch them splatter.

  “Hey.” Lilith snapped her fingers in front of the woman’s face while putting her sunglasses back on. “Don’t do that,” Lilly commanded while Dylan’s mom shook off the hallucination. She took a breath and continued, “But things are what they are, and your son, Dylan, is a wonderful young man. And thus, you will be saved.”

  The frightened mother reached for her chest. Confused and frightened, something was there. She grabbed the gold coin that was suddenly dangling from her neck and examined it.

  Lilith turned her attention towards the boy. Squatting down to get eye-level with Dylan, she held onto the back of her dress—being mindful to not reveal too much.

  “Dylan.” Lilith slid up her sunglasses and rested them on the curve of her forehead. His eyes stayed glued to the ground as he swayed back-and-forth. The social courage he had mustered earlier was gone, sapped from his snapping and yanking mother. Using a soft and soothing tone, Lilith continued, “Dylan, I never got to answer your question. You asked me if we were friends. And the answer is yes. As long as you agree to it and allow it, I will be your friend.”

  Dylan smiled and looked up. Lilith’s eyes were still red, but this time, they sparkled and had a softness to them. As she smiled, they glinted like rubies drizzled in sunlight. “Yeah,” he finally answered. “I’d like that.”

  “Me, too.” She smiled, stood up, and slid her sunglasses back on.

  As she walked past them, Dylan yelled and waved after her. “Goodbye, Lilly. Good luck catching your monsters.”

  CH 6: One Man Wolf Pack

  Since the night of the blood moon, the Wolf and his pack began crossing the frozen tundra and through the winter forest. Giant paw prints indented the crusted snow. Savage claws slashed through aged and exposed tree roots and sharpened themselves on shelves of old and cold granite. For some reason they didn’t fully understand, they were making their way west. Night and day, they rode across the cold earth. They were relentless. Fur, claws, and teeth tore their way through nature. It was carnal and primal. The way of nature, survival of the fittest.

  A blizzard seemed to both encompass and follow behind the pack. Behind the blizzard, there was a trail of elk and caribou carcasses. Stripped of all their flesh, the bones were marked with deep notches and indents. Their long magnificent antlers had deep bite marks, bite marks from something strong, sharp, and large. Just as men had to eat, wolves had to eat as well. Seven are one.

  As the frozen ground gave way to icy waters, wolf fur gave way to armor. The Wolf’s flat-bladed trident and glaive were both strapped to his back and beneath his fur cloak. His icy blue eyes matched the frozen water and chunks of ice flowing before him. A long time ago, the water was frozen, but now it wasn’t. It was familiar, yet the Wolf’s memories remained cloudy. The strait, the Bering Strait, it was.

  The Northern Lights laid to his left. Green and blue lights filled the night sky with colors of the Caribbean Sea. It made him think of the neon billboards that filled the L.A. skyline. Cold, brutal, and beautiful.

  He lifted his head into the air and inhaled the frigid air through his mustache and through his widened nostrils. And as the icy air filled him so did his primal instinct. Los Angeles, go to it.
That was where he needed to go. It was calling him, or something was, something was drawing him there, to the City of Angels. He just didn’t know why.

  Los Angeles, the City of Angels. Despite being more than colloquial, City of Lost Angels seemed more appropriate. He had never been there, not as it is now, but he had seen it. While the gods slept, they dreamt of the lives of mortals. Memories and thoughts came and went, but few stuck. Mortals, fleeting dreams, they were no different from each other, and they both had the same lifespan, short. So, Los Angeles, it was.

  First he would have to cross the narrow notch of the Arctic Ocean. He slammed down his foot. Icy swirl of ice shot forward and created a bridge of ice. Crystal clear, it looked like glass.

  Seven massive wolves sprinted forward, across the glassy bridge. Their savage claws ripped six inch slashes into its clear finish before flinging shaved ice into the air.

  Hours later, Outside of a small restaurant in a small town, the Wolf stood in the moonlight. Sniffing the air with its wet nose, the Wolf’s paw hung in the air hesitantly. Finally stepping down, a black leather biker boot crushed the black snow beneath his feet. His wolf-skin cloak and armor were replaced by a cracked leather trench coat. Instead of sharpened claws or a glaive, a bowie knife was strapped onto his hip.

  As he stepped inside the restaurant, clumps of packed snow splattered on the tan tiled floor. The red and yellow color scheme was excessively family-friendly. The walls were covered in kitschy posters and pictures. One showed a herd of dogs busting out of a kennel and was captioned: “Who let the dogs out?” Another showed a suburbanite clad in a plaid jacket and a pasty-white dress shirt. Smiling with his fists arrogant perched on his hips; he stood in the middle of an office. Thug Life was written at the bottom of it.