Hunger

Part II - Chapter 31 - Distorted Definitions - Part 1

Flickering torchlight cast unnatural shadows about the chamber.  Jetheel bobbed his head, furiously taking notes.  Hir’at stifled a giggle as this motion gave him the distinct air of a bird.  He was a thin, older man, and wore his grey hair long and pulled back with a simple ribbon.  Sated for the moment, her power restored by syphoning off yet another prisoner’s soul, she smiled a cloy smile at her bird-aide.

“This captive is far more dangerous than any that have had the privilege of an extended stay at our,” Hir’at gestured at the dungeon’s antechamber, “luxurious resort.”  She flashed a malevolent grin at Jetheel, her eyes bright blue and ablaze with power and malicious intent.

“Replenish your sleeping concoctions—and double them,” she added, tapping a slender finger on her pointed chin.

“Yes, Mistress,” Jetheel said.  “And with the aforementioned formidable addition, shall I take the liberty of replenishing your current stock?”

Hir’at’s laugh was high and full of childish delight.  For the briefest of moments, Jetheel could see the woman could have been once—before.  He shivered as the sound caressed his skin like a swarm of fire ants.

“And that, my dear Jetheel, is why I keep you,” she said, bestowing one of the rare genuine smiles upon him.  Jetheel flushed and ducked his head.  As spontaneous as the smile had graced her face, it was gone. 

No, it would not do to run dry of power while that Dyrvish traitor was here, a voice whispered in Hir’at’s ear, and miss the opportunity on feasting upon him.

“I know that!” she said irritably, and Jetheel jumped. 

“I beg your pardon, Mistress,” Jetheel said, bewildered.  Hir’at waved a dismissive hand at him. 

The voice chuckled in her ear, and a Hir’at suppressed a shudder that crawled along her spine.  Curse that Seventeen! She touched the Myriad safely tucked away between her breasts to reassure herself.  The Myriad pulsed with recognition, and she sighed with relief, yet her anger flared.  It was the disappearance of her experiment, Seventeen, that had started this whole business.

Hir’at stirred the pearlescent liquid in her viewing tureen with a dagger coated in her own blood.  Her eyes were bloodshot and felt as if she had shoved fistfuls of sand into them. She couldn’t remember the last time she slept. 

“How could he just disappear?” she asked aloud, not expecting an answer as she was quite alone.  In fact, she had not left her chambers nor permitted her maid, Ahme to enter, since she’d lost contact with Seventeen.  She had scoured the known world, and could not disprove the simple fact that he was nowhere.  He wasn’t dead, but he certainly wasn’t alive, or she would be able to locate him.

Frustrated and weary as she was, she almost didn’t hear the whispers.

“Where is he?”

“Where could he be?”

“We must find him—he is a part of us.”

Hir’at frantically glanced about her chambers.

“Who is there?” she ask, her voice shrill.

“It is us,” the whispers came again, and the Myriad pulsed gently against her chest in concert with her heartbeat.  Hir’at pulled out the talisman, an amber light filled her chambers.  As her gaze fell upon the jewel with inlaid silver filigree, she felt the presence of the shattered souls within swirling through her mind. 

At first, Hir’at felt as if her body were not large enough to hold so many beings and she struggled to keep her own essence separate.  Searing pain laced through her mind as she fought against them. 

“Let us in,” the voices begged.  “You want to be whole.”

Hir’at was suddenly aware of the portions of her own self that were missing—the portions she had instilled in her experiments.  It was like looking into a chasm of despair in the middle of the essence that was her own self.  It was dark and cold, and full of endless falling.  She was incomplete.  Waves of emotional anguish surged through her and tears wetted her cheeks.  She was alone, so very alone. 

“We want to be whole, too.  Let us fill the void.”

Suddenly amber light filled the chasm, and surges of pleasure thrummed through her.  She gasped as her body responded to the sensation of the souls rubbing against the walls of her mind.  They were soft, and sensual, and such a blessed contrast to the pain and hopelessness that had overwhelmed her just a moment before. 

“Let us give you great joy, great knowledge, great power.”

“You need us.”

“We need you.”

Hir’at’s defenses shattered as she reached the peak of pleasure with a cry of gratification.  While she lay there, quivering, the voices swirled around her. 

“You made us what we are.”

“Now we make you what we are as well.”

She snapped out of her reverie with a jolt.  Her skin crawled with wanton desire, and the sensation of clothing was simply too much to bear.  With deep, even breaths, she beat the Myriad and the voices back, whipping mental lashes at mental beasts. 

“I would see the girls now,” she said, catching Jetheel off guard.  He quickly finished his note and dusted the paper with a fine sand.  He set it on top of the pile of paper that would make his mistress’s first volume of her studies.  Fumbling with the large ring of keys that hung on his belt, he unlocked the door that led to the subject’s cells.  He grabbed a torch and led Hir’at down the corridor, they had just visited not a turn of the glass before.  Two more chambers with as many locked doors and they reached the antechamber to the girls’ quarters. 

In the antechamber, a wizened old woman looked up from her sewing as she sat near a natural hearth.  The old woman sat still for a moment before urging her creaking joints to her feet and dropping into as low a curtsey as she could manage. 

“Rest your bones, good mother,” Hir’at said as she picked up the old woman’s sewing.  The old woman had been letting out the hem of dress.  “They have been outgrowing the dresses?”

The old woman bobbed her head.  The cheeks of her face were curiously puckered and Hir’at realized it was because the woman had no teeth to keep the shape of her face.   Hir’at flashed her a wide grin.

“Good,” she purred.  She lifted the bar to the girls’ bedroom and entered with a swirl of skirts.