Stigmata

by L M Adams

  He sighs, “There aren’t many handholds, or footholds on the building, other than the windows and decorative rain spouts and the such. Often, she’d have to swing and leap to the next perch, hang on with only her fingertips. It took hours. Yet she never gave up, never called for help, never wavered.”

  I huff with a smile, “I got caught… of course. Our instructor was so angry, he made me hang on the side of a garden wall at the Cerberus building, with only my fingertips as he took a switch to me; told me if I let go before he was done with my lashes, he’d kick me out of the guard.”

  Luey laughs, “You know what the Wench does? She doesn’t make a sound or a complaint the entire time he’s beating her, stomps off and then scales the Cerberus building too!”

  I grin proudly as I remember the accomplishment, “I lost six fingernails, torn tendons in both arms… ruptured blood vessels… and a dislocated shoulder.”

  Jack looks between the two of us like we’re mad, “So are you saying there’s no getting her to be careful?”

  “I’ve tried every way known to man, Bloodsucker, I’ve yet to find it.” He sighs and leans his head back on the boulder again, “At this point I just try to keep her alive, broken bones are the least of my worries.”

  I stand up and strip out of my pants, “you should probably give me the beating, Jack, he’s too tired.”

  “What would be the fucking point?”

  I shrug, “Make you two feel better?”

  “It does help Capaneus, give her some lashes and make believe she’s learned her lesson,” he yawns, “it won’t stop her, but it will help her be a bit more careful when she does… dumb shit.”

  Jack doesn’t bother, instead he snatches my pants and sees to ‘stitching’ them up using some plant fiber.

  71

  Jaevia

  We spend the night at the camp letting Lucien rest and don’t start out again until dawn. Jack still has a massive attitude towards me, but Luey has already forgiven and forgotten.

  “We should be out of the desert by nightfall,” Lucien says, setting our path and taking hold of the small sled, now not so laden with our supplies. We have about two or three-days’ worth left. He turns to face both Jack and I… “Most of what is up ahead is stone and rock… however, we must cross the lake… it is known as Lithos – the lake of living stone. It would be fifty miles to go around, or only five to navigate across. You must both listen! And follow directions, yes?”

  Jack and I both nod in the face of Lucien’s grave orders.

  Lucien leads us pretty much the same path as I had walked last night without really knowing where I was going. It was a foolish thing I did.

  In the distance I can see massive gray mountains reaching up towards the sky. Rocky and barren until you look closer and can see the dry shrubbery sprinkled about.

  There is also a gentle reemergence of life as we walk. We spot more birds and lizards than we did crossing the large expanse of the Sahara.

  But soon my nose fills with a smell, almost like sulfur, but somehow different. We climb the same large dune I had last night, and I see a beautifully twisted horror before me. I see the lake of living stone.

  Across the entire expanse is a lake so reflective it seems like the surface is made of glass… or better yet, a mirror made of precious metal and shined high. It captures the blue sky above so perfectly that the heavens seem imprisoned within. Yet on the lake and surrounding it are unmoving statues of living art. Birds and bats… and even a few of the massive oliphants Lucien told us about caught deathly still. They have been calcified and turned to gray harsh stone by the water that I’m sure they had come to drink.

  This reminds me of the work of Set, of Azazael, when he had control of the sands of time and hunted us across New York. This runs a chill up my spine.

  “My Dark Goddess,” Jack breathes out beside me.

  Now I understand what I was feeling on my flesh last night, thick and encroaching, slimy – almost seeming to crawl over my skin… it was this stuff, water but not water at all. More like liquid death.

  “How on earth are we supposed to cross this, Luey?” I ask almost breathlessly.

  “By being obedient,” he grumbles low and begins the trek down our last dune and towards the stony shore of this lake of death.

  Soon I understand Lucien’s irritation, this place, this odd fucking place is a dead zone – none of us have access to our magical abilities at all – even Lucien is separated from his power. He can’t even light a fucking match here. Flying above the lake, carrying Jack and I, even one by one, across it – is a non fucking starter; and this lake stretches on for fifty miles in either direction.

  We have to cross it and we have to cross it without the benefit of Lucien’s power.

  “Take off your shoes and socks, roll up your pants,” Lucien orders us both.

  I open my mouth to ask if that’s smart, wouldn’t it be better to cover our skin? Before I can ask my question, Jack grabs my wrist tightly; the look in his eyes is serious and grave, he shakes his head no.

  His intent is clear – this isn’t the time to question Lucien. Either we trust him – which we do; or we don’t – in which we won’t survive, which is unacceptable.

  The shore of the lake is covered in small stony pebbles all in different muted shades of gray. I can’t help but to assume they are nothing but the bits and pieces of calcified bones from animals that were trapped inside of these deadly waters.

  There are even some branches and trees, even bushes made of stone where perfectly perched stone birds sit upon, frozen in time. A living picture, all of it – a capture of time in life.

  My eyes keep getting drawn back to the oliphants. They are larger than what we call elephants in the future. Toughened hides and large ears with even larger tusks that grow from their mouths and curve up. The magic of these waters has not turned the tusks gray, instead they still stand pure and white against this hellish picture as a testament to what they once were but can never be again.

  “What is this place?” I ask as I bend to untie my shoes.

  “Some say this is the place where the first brother was killed by brother, that once this was a bountiful land, filled with green and life – for the second brother was born of Sky and Earth and had the heart of Isis as his mother had. He loved the growing things…”

  “I know this story,” Jack whispers sadly. “It is of the old histories of vampire lore, things I did not believe in. But things my grandfather… Belly, dedicated his life to and tried to teach me. We know these stories as the histories of Cain.”

  Lucien looks at Jack with a curious expression, “Tell me…”

  Jack sighs, not seeming to really want to talk about it. “And the father Adam ordered the sons Cain and Able to switch wives, for the love Cain held for his wife was greater than the love he held for their creator and that was sacrilege in the eyes of Adam…”

  “Oh Jack,” I breathe out softly now seeing the correlation to how his father had destroyed his love for Ariella and Matthias, refusing to let Jack love anything greater than he.

  He shrugs it off, “Vampires have a thing for keeping with tradition I guess.”

  “Cain wasn’t Adam’s son…” he goes on, “… and Adam knew this and treated the boy unfairly – Cain did not understand why he could not earn the love of his father,” Jack says standing looking down to the earth, hanging his head but speaking so dispassionately I know his heart is filled with turmoil.

  Jack told us that before his parents went away, he knew love and affection from his father, that they were happy. He always believed the coldness and deep seated maliciousness that bloomed in his father was because of his father taking the final rights and becoming a full vampire.

  Jack believed it was something wrong with him, or something innately evil about becoming a vampire, it is why he, Ariella, and Matthias resisted for so long. He believed this… until Belly and Jack’s mother, Aricia, admitted to me what they’d done. That they had c
onspired and arranged for Aricia to lay with the Blood King, that Jack isn’t Evzen’s son at all, but instead a son of Cain. Evzen found out… and that’s when everything changed for Jack.

  That is when Evzen became Adam the betrayed, and Jack became Cain the living, breathing evidence of that betrayal. That is when the abuse started, and everything changed, and it had nothing to do with Evzen taking the final blood rites… although becoming the undead and losing his soul probably didn’t help matters.

  Jack looks back out across the lake, a faraway glint in his eye, “Cain and Abel were ordered by the Creator to make offerings. Cain made an offering from the bounty of Gaia, and Abel an offering of flesh and blood.”

  “God rejected Cain’s gift.” I whisper.

  “For God knew Cain’s father as one he’d cast down, and the son shall bear the sins of the father. Cain felt a swell of despair and heartache rise up, and with it, vengeance and wrath. So he called Abel to the field…”

  “And killed him.”

  “Cain raged to all that would hear – So you desire a sacrifice of blood and flesh then look upon my own and find it unworthy!”

  Lucien nods, “When the first mother came upon the body of her son, her other son with a bloody dagger in his hand, the mother wept and wept, and the salt of her tears scarred the earth. And this place would be known as the lake of living stone, where nothing could live, not even majic.”

  Jack sighs, “The Creator was heartbroken that his perfect grandson had met his untimely end. So he cursed Cain to longevity. Cursed him to walk the earth, unable to die, tortured with the memory of his sins…” Jack whispers, “and so begins the curse of the vampire.”

  “It was Ra that cursed him,” Lucien grumbles low.

  Jack and I look at him in question, but he looks away, “That fable is known as the wrath of Ra. Some say it was Horus that beseeched Ra to curse Set’s son, that he used the seal of time to curse the betrayer to walk outside of it for an eternity. Some say this is what began the rift that would last a thousand years between the Sons of Ra and the Sons of Set. Some say it was just the same fucking war passed down again.”

  Let them be lovers before the world reminds them that they are enemies.

  I hear Henenu’s warning run through my thoughts clearly. In a rare act of emotion from me I take Jack’s hand and Lucien’s hand in mine and then pull them towards one another until we’re standing in a semi-circle, “That won’t happen with us, you two love each other and you love me and that is all there is to it.”

  “Aye, Wench,” Lucien grumbles low.

  Jack nods, “Above all others.”

  “May I have a small kiss then, Bloodsucker?”

  Jack looks away shyly but nods, Lucien is quick and gentle with a small peck on the lips. It’s almost innocent.

  I grin like a loon staring at them.

  “Ugh,” Jack pulls away, “you always make it weird Jae.”

  “What? I like watching you two, what’s wrong with that?”

  “You’re a perv.”

  “Lucien’s a perv too!”

  “We’re all pervs!” Lucien shouts, trying to break up our bickering.

  Then awareness fills his eyes about what he’s just said and the corner of his lips twitch with laughter. That laughter turns contagious, and soon Jack and I join in.

  Well hell, it is true… we’re all pervs.

  The laughter we shared is gone too soon as we turn back to preparing for the task ahead.

  Lucien breaks down the sled and turns it into something like a long folding stretcher, or a supplies taco. We each throw our shoes into it along with the supplies and use our belts to fashion loops at each end and then the center to carry it.

  “There is a stone path that runs clear across the lake, we’ll use it to walk across, we must keep moving, standing still will be the end of us, our feet moving will keep the stone from solidifying around our flesh.” Lucien stares at me, “No stopping to admire the view, or walking off because you see something pretty, Wench.”

  I wave a hand in defeat, “I’ve got it, I promise.”

  He grunts and turns to pick up his end of the sled. I raise an eyebrow, “You’re not going to give Jack an extra little speech.”

  “He’s better behaved than you.”

  “Hey!”

  Jack just laughs and laughs.

  “On the count of three,” Lucien says and begins counting.

  We each grab a loop, and all together heft our little supplies taco up. Lucien is in front, me behind him, and Jack in the rear. Honestly, I think Lucien only has me holding onto the sled, so I won’t wander off. It’s just awkward for me to hold with how tall they are compared to me.

  Lucien finds the path and steps into the water with no fear. It gives me courage and I follow suit. The water comes up to my shins, but I feel the stone path beneath my feet, and I sink no further. The water is slimy and warm now, sending a tingling sensation up my spin.

  Jack groans as he steps in, “Never call me boujie after this, because this? This is fucking gross… it feels like I’m walking in warm snot.”

  I expected there to be resistance as we walk forward through the mucus water, but it’s almost smooth.

  Lucien keeps us on a fast pace, he says being out here in the midday will be unacceptable, which means we’ll probably die. For once I don’t complain and put all my effort into keeping up. Talking is also a no-go, unless you want your tongue covered in the flavor of sodium carbonate, which trust me, you don’t.

  Even breathing in the stuff is horrid, making my eyes water and my throat tight and itchy. I want to get across as fast as humanly possible.

  By the time we make it midway across the lake of living stone, I’m filled with despair, or better yet pure sadness. I’ve watched flocks of birds dive to their deaths again and again, and even if they surface and take flight once more, they seem to turn to stone midair and fall back to the lake.

  “Goddess,” I whisper sadly.

  “Don’t Wench, just don’t. If you let those emotions bloom, you will get lost in it.”

  But I hear the sadness in his own voice. I’m not sure if we mourn for those birds, or if this odd lake just emanates sorrow and our souls absorb it.

  Soon I am crying, adding the salt of my tears in offering to the waters, I don’t know why I’m sad, only that I am and that I have plenty to be sad about. The water seems to remind me of all the things that have gone wrong in my life. It’s enough to make me want to fall to my knees, to give up, to just stop. What am I fighting for anyway? To continue a life filled with so much sorrow?

  My steps forward slow.

  “Keep going, Jae,” Jack’s voice shakes with emotion, “I know… but just keep going.”

  All of us, Lucien, Jack and I, have enough sorrow to fill our own lake of tears. And these waters strip us bare. We don’t talk, what is there to say? We mourn, and we cry, and we feel the weight of our hurts settle in our chests like pebbled stone.

  I can taste their heartache, feel it in my bones. Jack’s hurts, Lucien’s hurts – and I know that they can feel my own. Yet it is a familiar flavor, for have we not shared in each other’s hurts? I know of the pain in the young lion’s heart as he watched his mother being brutally raped and killed. I know of the young prince’s despair as he begged his father to love him in any way, even if it was abuse. They know of the pain of losing a child, losing oneself, and the pain of trying to put it all back together again. Yet we keep walking, because that is what we do. Each of us has had this battle before, many, many times.

  We are no strangers to despair.

  When you cannot be brave, survive. And every step we take is a commitment to survive, even knowing that the pain won’t go away, that there will be more tears to cry; but there is strength within us to endure the hardships because we each found something to live for, to believe in… and that something is one another.

  Yes, the lake of living stone would swallow us alive if not for our commitment to
one another. Love… love wouldn’t do much against this. But our determination and commitment to live and help each other through our darkest nights and even our brightest days is what sees us safely across this.

  We make it across the lake right when midday begins, just in the nick of time.

  Jack breathes in a shaky breath, “Fuck.”

  I wipe my face, “Yeah.”

  “Very well done, both of you,” Lucien says deeply.

  We all put down the sled and immediately move to embrace one another. Needing contact with living breathing things, needing contact with our support structure. Some may believe our love sits on stilts, but I know that it is bedrock and it will be unbroken, by man, by monster, by god – or even a fucking lake of tears.

  72

  Jaevia

  Lucien finds a small pool of water that has been filtered by some of the more curious plants that have adapted to live by the lake. Still, the water is not good for drinking, managing to be just good enough to rinse off our feet and calves before they turn to stone.

  This side of the lake is different, it’s just different. There’s more shrubbery, and birds, we crossed the breaking between the sands of the Sahara and what will soon be the savanna… I hope.

  The desert is beautiful, I admit, and the magic there is so pure and untouched that I will always remember it fondly… but dammit, I’m ready for a bath, clean clothes, and a good meal.

  Lucien gets the shelter set up and we strip out of our pants before climbing in, completely exhausted. The sandy-stone ground is a lot less forgiving than the sand and the palm leaf matt does little to cushion us, but no one complains; too exhausted to complain.

  Oblivion claims us all, even Lucien I’d hazard, and so we sleep having survived the lake of living stone.

  Luey is waking us up before I can get a good rest and I grumble, rolling to my side, away from him, “Leave me alone.”

  “Come Jaevia, the sun is past its zenith. We can reach the grasslands by tonight; won’t you like that?”