Stigmata

by L M Adams

  I refuse to let the tears fall as I hurry through the lion’s den and walk back to our chambers. I want to ride off into the night and pray for the Goddess Neoma to take me back just so I don’t have to feel this hurt.

  But in a strange land, around a strange people, there is nowhere for me to go but back to our rooms.

  The space is empty, a low fire in the large open hearth. The pool in the center of the receiving room isn’t deep enough to drown myself in… or even drown out the world. I pace back and forth in front of it as I replay what I’ve just seen, the more I think about it, the worse it becomes.

  This can’t go on, I can’t be made to stay here while I watch him fall in love with another man, I cannot. They’re going to have to send me home. If he wants to take up with another man fine, but I’m not going to be subjected to it.

  Every time they embraced one another, closed their eyes, touched their third eyes together – replays in my mind on a constant loop. The signs were there, I knew they were there. Their lips so close to kissing, so close to it. Just like it was with me, when he first touched his lips to mine and promised me forever.

  I knew this would happen; I fucking knew it!

  Why couldn’t he just hurt me physically? Why couldn’t he beat and batter me into a bloody pulp? Why this kind of hurt, the kind of hurt I’ve never learned how to handle well?

  I move out to the patio, feeling confined within the walls of the palace… and start drinking. Under the moonlight and the stars I pray to Neoma, begging her with all of my heart to take me back.

  “Please,” I beg her, crying into my cup; yet she still does not answer my call.

  Goddess knows I drink everything that looks like it’ll make me forget or make me stop hurting. But they don’t make an alcohol strong enough to numb this kind of pain.

  99

  Jack – the seed of jealousy

  Pull yourself together Jack, pull it together. You shared Matthias, he slept with half the male vampires in the country… and you never said a word.

  But Matthias isn’t Lucien, Matthias isn’t my husband. My gut aches with my jealousy. Why can’t I be secure enough to let him have another man?!

  It is the same with Jaevia, I let her friendship with Demetri eat me up inside. I had no right; I am their slave… I’m a fucking slave! I have no right to become angry.

  “Oh goddess help me,” I murmur and drink down another glass of wine and another and another.

  I hear Jaevia and Nyrobi come back to our chamber. I try to wipe my face and erase the evidence of my heartache. They’re arm in arm, laughing and smiling with one another as they walk out onto the patio.

  Jae probably brought her back for us to have some… fun, this evening.

  I pull myself together. I clamp down on my emotions tightly and stand, turning on a smile, “Hello you two.”

  “Jack, my darling love,” Jaevia, purple eyes glossed over with her passions and the alcohol, pulls away from Nyrobi to come and give me a kiss.

  “I see you two are having fun,” I smile down at my beautiful wife.

  Don’t fuck this up Jack – don’t fuck this up.

  “We’re going to have so much more fun,” her cute little fangs peek out for me.

  “Not if you pass out, you need to eat a bit more…”

  “Take the hint you daft vampire, we’re trying to eat you…” Jaevia’s smile is full of mischievousness. I love it when she’s this way, playful, sexy… dangerous.

  I look at Nyrobi, the older woman isn’t so deep in her cups, but I can see the way she looks at Jae. She wants my wife badly, I’m not so sure about me or about Lucien… although, I can’t see her turning down a chance to have the new Raja in her bed.

  It’ll be me that’s the fourth wheel.

  “Come on,” I get Jaevia seated and go to find out about getting a light fare brought up.

  I have no clue where the kitchens are. In some odd way, I’m happy for the distraction, I need something to get my mind off of Lucien.

  After a bit, I find a child of Isis… I try to explain I can get the food and bring it to the chamber, but the man’s eyes widen with horror at even suggesting such a thing. I let it go, I know what it means to be royalty – something Jae refuses to get the knack of.

  I return to our chambers and the servants bring up platters of fresh fruit, cuts of meat and some dark bread with a large bowl of olive oil, the olives floating in the oil. Pitchers of zobo juice, and fresh decanters of wine and honey mead to finish out the table.

  Jaevia and Nyrobi sit opposite of me, eating and chatting.

  “You can do what?” Jaevia looks at Nyrobi surprised.

  The older woman nods, “Yes, we can heal the spirit using the power of Ishtar.”

  “How?”

  “Hmm, soul? When a spirit in a person is sick, energies unbalanced, too much here… not enough there.”

  “Chakra?” Jae asks trying to piece it together.

  “Yes,” Nyrobi nods, “we balance the energies.”

  Makes sense, the children of Lilith… or Ishtar have the special power to manipulate chakras. I’ve had my seven major chakras seduced by Jaevia’s power – it is an experience I will never forget.

  The two women go on talking about other things an Ishtar can do. Jaevia munches on a bit of food and I try to pay attention to the conversation. But in truth, I’m sitting, waiting for Lucien to return. Will I be able to tell that he’s been with another?

  Will he tell me?

  Can I hold on to my emotions when I see him?

  I don’t have to wonder for long… I hear the two men when they enter the gardens from the rear door. Their deep manly laughs echoing in the night air. They stumble up the stairs and onto the patio together, both of them deep in their cups and propping each other up as they laugh over their own sorry state.

  “You kicked his ass!” Nassor laughs and Lucien joins in.

  “Oh Aye, I kicked all of your assess, sooner or later.”

  “Did you make a fucking list or something?”

  Lucien laughs and leans in to Nassor’s ear, I can’t hear what he says but Nassor laughs even harder and his joy makes my hate fire burn. All of the hurt, all of the rage I was holding on to so tightly, bursts from me all at once.

  “How dare you,” I seethe. “How fucking dare you!” I shout and stand up. The rest of the table quiets down as Lucien and Nassor straighten up.

  “Oh aye, I’m a bit in my cups, but we are celebrating!” Lucien has the nerve to smile at me.

  “How dare you try to bring another man to our bed!” I point at Nassor.

  “What?” Lucien asks and looks to Jae.

  “Don’t fucking look at her, you fucking answer me! I’m not allowed to even consider another man and here you are all but fucking him! Or have you already gone balls deep in his rose?!”

  Nassor starts to step forward but Lucien holds out an arm stopping him.

  “Leave,” he turns to look at Nassor.

  “Raja,” he bows his head and turns away to slink back into the dark night from whence he came.

  Jae whispers something to Nyrobi and the other woman also makes a graceful exit. Even the servants leave the area, the half-eaten food sits on the table and the entire world seems to go quiet.

  “Inside,” he whispers and strides past me without another word.

  100

  Jaevia - Lucien Enough

  The energy between the three of us is so chaotic it scratches along my skin like nails to chalkboard, sobering me right up.

  How quickly a nice night has gone to shit, and this time, it’s all Jack’s fault.

  We’re standing in the bedchamber of our rooms. I’m by the bed, Jack in the center and Lucien standing near the exit to the patio as if he doesn’t really trust himself to be enclosed with us.

  Foolish Jack, really fucking foolish.

  I have done everything I could to keep them from getting here. But nothing I do works. Perhaps this was inevitable and perhaps
I have to let them have it out. This poison between them cannot go on, it simply cannot.

  “I will say this to you once, Capaneus,” Lucien says softly, “I have never, and shall never betray you, I shall never share my body or my heart with another man.” He breathes in slowly, “But what you have done here tonight has shamed me deeply. Tell me in what way I have given you cause to call my honor and my word into question?”

  “I saw the two of you! In front of the statue of your mother…”

  “What did you see?”

  “You were all but kissing him!”

  “I was giving him comfort! Damn your blasted soul why can you not tell the difference in the love between family and the sickness you know?!” Lucien inhales sharply and walks further into the room. “He was hurting, and I wished to give him a bit of comfort, some kindness from brother to brother. But I cannot do this? I cannot do this because my husband does not trust my word or my heart. What has made you so bitter to me?”

  “You say you love me, but you will not be with me! You’ll barely even touch me! Yet I find you so fucking ready to be with another?!”

  “I will be with you Capaneus, but you need hate so much that you can no longer see my love. If I had known that sharing my body with you would make you hate my love so much, I would have never lain with you. I promise you; it will never happen again. We can put… this, to rest.”

  I can watch the fear and shock cover Jack’s face… he’s realizing he’s taken things too fucking far. He pushed Lucien right over the edge. “Don’t say that…”

  “I am done with this!” Lucien roars, his anger and his pain thundering in the opulent room. “No more, I will not hurt you one iota! No whips, no chains, no shaming… nothing! You will fucking love me or you will get nothing. I am done with feeding the sickness in you.”

  Jack looks shell-shocked, completely lost. “Lucien…” He whispers.

  “No, Capaneus! I cannot believe you would accuse me of unfaithfulness. I have done everything to reassure you, to be affectionate, to show my love, to show others that I have claimed you as my man. You turn away from it at every chance, you run from it, hide from it. You get sick with the thought of me touching you in love. And now you dare stand there and accuse me of unfaithfulness? I have never wanted a man in my life. Never!”

  Lucien inhales deeply, “But you… you are Capaneus.”

  He whispers the last bit as if he is lost on how Jack still does not understand what he means to him. “You crept into my heart bit by bit, and now you won’t even let me love you.”

  Jack shakes his head, “I know that you love me, but you knew what I was before we got married. I never hid that from you.”

  “But you promised you would try! It would be one thing if you tried and it didn’t work. At least you had tried. But you do not love me enough to even try.”

  “That isn’t true!”

  “It is, and you know it! You did this to Jaevia, forced her to hurt you, forced her to let her succubus out, forced her to feed the sickness in you. Perhaps this is the way you two are yoked.” He waves an errant hand towards me. “She would cut you up and throw you in the streets if it would bring her pleasure. And you… you would kneel in the filth of a gutter waiting for her to take you back and beg her to do it all over again!” He all but spits at Jack.

  My heart drops, not because it is a lie… but because it is a truth. A cold, hard, painful truth. No one takes it like Jack.

  “But me? I do not wish the vampire! I did not fall in love with the Blood Lord. I fell in love with the man! And I thought he had fallen in love with me. Yes, I love hurting you, breaking you, grinding you down until your soul is but fine sand that slips through my fingers – but I want more.” Lucien slaps his chest, “I want to know you love me as me. Not the sadist, not the evil that burns in the sky, not as the wrath of god that I carry on my back! I want to be loved as the man who wishes to stop hurting, to stop seeing the people I love... hurt. Instead all that you desire from me are the things that make me hate myself.”

  Lucien shakes his head no, “But no more, you will either learn to love me or you will live the rest of your miserable life without ever knowing my whip or my flesh upon your flesh again.”

  “That isn’t fair…”

  “No, what isn’t fair is that you look high and low for reasons to say ‘Ah ha! I’ve got you’ – you look for ways that I fail you as a husband so you can justify not giving me your heart! I am not a perfect man! I am not a perfect husband, but I fucking try! And you won’t even do that.”

  Lucien’s bottom lip shakes as he inhales. “I do not wish for our parts to be the same. But I learned how to focus on the pleasure it gave you for me to touch you so intimately. I focus on how much your body reacts to me until nothing else matters but your happiness with me. I am willing to learn how to touch you, and kiss you, and fuck you... I am willing to work on my discomforts for your happiness. But I wish those touches to be in love too and you won’t even let me try. I would not do this for another man, no other – in heaven, or hell, or all the worlds between. And yet you stand there and accuse me of lingering eyes on another man? Desiring another man? Fucking another man? All the while rejecting me every time I try to give you my heart…” he inhales deeply, “You are cutting me apart and I cannot do this anymore; you hurt me too deeply.”

  Jack runs a hand through his hair and hangs his head nodding, “I am sorry Lucien. You are right… about everything.”

  “I do not wish to be right; I wish to be loved in return.”

  Jack looks up, tears in his eyes. “I do love you; I promise I do.”

  “How could you? When you don’t even have the strength to love yourself, or the courage to try?”

  101

  Jaevia

  Lucien turns away and walks out onto the patio, saying that he needs time to calm down and not to follow him right now. But it is not anger he’s feeling, its unrelenting heartache. For the very first time, he’s letting himself believe marrying Jack was a mistake. Lucien believed with all of his heart that he could love the pain, the insecurity, the legacy of damage – out of Jack… and now he has to accept that he’s failed so miserably – one thing Lucien isn’t used to, is failing.

  I stand in the bedroom, not sure what to really say but knowing something needs to be said. Jack is just staring at the spot Lucien was just standing in, unmoving.

  “I fucked up,” he finally whispers.

  I sigh and lean back on the edge of the massive bed, “Yeah.”

  We are way past giving one another comforting lies.

  “Please tell me I can fix this, Jae.”

  “Not if you’re unwilling to change,” I just say it simply. “The Jack you’ve always been is never going to be enough for him.”

  “I don’t know how to fix myself... I try...”

  “No, you don’t.” I say simply, because everything Lucien just said was right. “You don’t and you know it.”

  “I cannot change the way I feel! I cannot change what happened! I cannot make myself some unblemished being without a damaged soul... what he wants is impossible!”

  “He doesn’t want you to be pure, or good, or to pretend that your life wasn’t hard. He knows that you are scarred, Jack. He wants to be more important than the pain.”

  “He wants me to change who I am!”

  I sigh, feeling like I’m just fighting an unwinnable war. Jack sees things this way, Lucien another and it’s not that either of them is wrong or right. Jack has a right to feel the way he does, to wish to be loved the way that he does – yet so does Lucien. It’s about what is sustainable in a marriage. Even I know that sometimes, sometimes you have to let the pain of the past go to move forward, it will weigh like an anchor on your soul if you don’t.

  Jack just isn’t ready, and he’s going to lose Lucien over it and where will that leave us?

  I rub my neck, trying to think of a way to make Jack understand. “It wasn’t easy for me to take that leap of f
aith with Lucien. I was so hellbent on having him the way that I wished him, on my terms. And I think if he hadn’t almost died in that tent in that bog, I would have never opened my heart to the possibilities. I did not realize that if I gave him the things that he needed; he would give me a life of abundance with the things that I wanted. It may feel like you have to give up more, that it isn’t balanced, or fair, or your journey to him is longer – but even if those things are true, is he not worth it?”

  He sighs deeply, and nods, “There is no one like him.”

  I nod, “There is no one like any of us. But I guess the true question is – would you rather a man that would be content with you living this broken half-life to keep the peace – or a man willing to make war to give you a full life? Is he so wrong for wanting to be loved the way he wishes to be loved?”

  Jack looks away, his spirit troubled, because obviously the right choice is to fight for Lucien, to give up his determination to live as a sexual masochist and slave and learn how to live as an equal. But knowing the right path and having the courage to walk it – is the difference in a mountain and a molehill.

  “I know I want to fix it, that I don’t want to lose him, and I’ll pay any price to keep him.”

  But are you willing to give up your core identity? This belief that you are only this Blood Lord, a son of perdition, cursed to live in pain and disgrace? Are you willing to give up your comfortable agony for him? Are you ready to discover who Capaneus is?

  I ask none of these questions, because I know he would not have the answers.

  “Then that’s a start.” I sigh… “You have done a lot of damage tonight; I’m not going to lie to you about that. But you can win him back, if you’re willing to fight for it. You will have to lay it all on the line.”

  He clears his throat gently, “This is a lot to ask, and I have no right to it… but do you think… it would be possible, if you would… give me some time with him… alone? It’s just that, I can be more…”