Gehenna

Prologue

Prologue

     "Gehenna.. Gehenna."
     Someone whispered her name, someone called her with a voice like no other—smooth and silky, raspy and enchantingly beautiful. It's like a music that you can never resist. It's fluently thick and old, but still young and bold. The voice confused her. It called her. It called her name.
     Her room is lighted by a dusted lampshade placed in a small sturdy table where she was sitting, only illuminating halfway through the table and the marbled floor. Shelves of books are overshadowed by the curtains where dust and moth have been living for ages. Windows are kept closed that she couldn't see the moon in its full blossom.
     "Gehenna.. Gehenna."
     It's a young man. Definitely a young man. Maybe her age or a little bit older. She heard it louder this time that she diserned the voice that much. He called her name, yearning in an absolute loneliness that was coated in each breath. It binded her with threads that she became a puppet, every move she made has been manipulated. 
     "Gehenna.. Gehenna."
     She stood straight from where she was sitting, her flannel nightgown's flawlessly falling above her knee, exposing a big tattoo in her upper thigh—a crystallic brimstone swirled in flames. The tattoo that was always burning. Always shining. And she cannot help herself but touch it now. Emerging from within her deepest feeling was an unfamiliar taste of fear.
     She made her way out from her comfortable chambers, only being welcomed by the cold wind which blew some strands of her hair chaffed with hue of ashes reflected under the rays of the moonlight, peeking its way from the huge entrance of the mansion. She walked fast enough to get on the stairs which at the same time, let her eyes glimpsed on the picture of her family. She definitely could feel their eyes were on her, following every step she made as she descended below.
     She stood straight near the door. The red carpet's cold under her bare feet and the chandelier above richocheted the moon's rays by its subliming glassier surface. Her body trembled along the chilly night that she hugged herself while she looked outside, wondering why it had opened when Thomas already closed it. Outside, there's a huge cherry blossom tree where its pinkish flowery leaves fell on their own. One to many, many to few. Several colors poured down until their numbers' left uncounted. Winter's about to take over the beauty of fall.
     Her eyes couldn't take off to the rainfall of the autumn tree. The voice also had stop calling her. She decided to go back in her room again, telling herself that she has been deluding about what she had heard, until she saw a figure that stood tall beside the cherry blossom's trunk. She thought that that was the person who called her so she started going towards the unknown man but was suddenly got startled by the mysterious voice that came from another direction, and this time, there was a tinge of desperation. He was calling her in a hurry, like it just tasted danger from afar. The volume of his voice kept rising as the wind blew wilder. Her feet stopped and had an itch to run where the voice was. Just as she was about to go, the silhouette outside moved and she could feel the person's eyes observing her. A shiver tingled at the back of her neck. She felt fear.
     At her first blink, it was still a shadow standing afar. But with the unstoppable blinking eyelids she have, the figure moved closer and closer, till she could fully see what the person was. It's a tall unusual man, wearing a dark suit and a century long old hat. He has a cane in his hand and he's tapping it when he's now a few feet apart from her. Then with a sudden rush of cold air that made her eyes closed longer than she could blink, the figure moved closer beyond her comfort. As she fluttered her ruby eyes open, it bulged in fear and surprise. Then she shouted. They were now face to face but he doesn't have a face!
     Her mind was blank for a second but her feet thought on their own—they ran. She blinked and blinked and blinked until she realized her situation. The old man doesn't have a face! The old man doesn't have a face!
     She heard his cane tapping so loud at her back—he was chasing her. She ran and ran and ran. She made her way upstairs into the long dimmed corridor towards the left wing where Crohn's room was located. Her breath faltered with her non-stop running. Just a few push and she will be at her limit, likely, to collapse on the floor gasping for breath. But she doesn't want the faceless man to ever reach her. She's scared. She's so scared that she bursted in tears.
     Again, the voice echoed throughout the hallway with the motionless portraits of old paintings staring at her fragile existence. She gripped the hem of her dress so hard until her knuckles turned to white. She's finding the comforting sound of her own name's calling. She's moving to where it was and was being hopeful to take her away from the faceless man.
     A foolish move she made when she craned her neck to take a look at the back for a second. And she screamed again—an agonizing one. The faceless man was just an inch from her face, floating at the back of her, tapping the cane on his side, but strangely not reaching out for her.
     He was observing her without eyes. He seemed breathing without a nose. And she felt that he was viciously smiling at her without a mouth!
     She shook the horrid sight she saw from her head and look again in front of her. She cried in silent. How could she outrun him with her little toes? How could she wake up from this nightmare if it's so true that when she tried pinching herself, it definitely hurts? How could she—
     Just when she was drowning in herself's little arguments, a cold hand pulled her out of nowhere. She gasped. A sudden spark of strange electric currents radiated throughout the air and into her skin. She was bitten with a nauseatic feeling of another fear. Who pulled her and made her like this?
     Her eyes fell to the person where now she could fully hear but could not clearly see. He's the who one called her name with a thick old accent and a low intoxicating voice, but definitely young. It was so dark in the room that she could not see a single thing, but her ears were not lying. It's him. He's the one that's calling her.
     She rubbed her eyes, hoping to adjust them in this pitch black room. But to no avail, she still cannot see and that frustrated her. The voice now stopped saying her name and she's scared again. It was her little comfort in the nightmare she's going through. She thought that without the voice, maybe the faceless man would appear again and take her to hell.
     "Help me." Her own voice whimpered in the dark room. No one answered that she thought he was gone and she became all alone again. When there's no hope left inside her drained heart, the person suddenly scooped her from the ground that her breath was held to her lungs. She was in his arms, and it was so strange that she was so sure it was him. At first, she trembled really hard but calmed down within a second when he called her name again with a sweet voice, whispering feverishly in her ears. Her heart hammered loudly that she's afraid it will burst out from her chest. She cannot stop this feeling. She cannot fathom this strange occurence.
     He put her carefully in the bed full of cherry blossoms, and she lunged for air as he released her from his tremendous touch. A wild wind blew the windows open that her eyes were filled with the mysterious man's back. His white suit coexisted with the glow of the round shaped moon that it illuminated everything that surrounded him. His hair was so black that it camouflaged with the remaining darkness. She wanted to reach out for him, wanted to feel the moment of comfortable relief and breathtaking sensation he gave. But to her disappointment, he walked away, leaving her confused as he faded in his own mystery. And she couldn't help but brought out the tears again while her eyes fluttered to sleep. Then when her eyes were fully closed, everything turned dark, just like the color of his hair.
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     She woke up minutes till dawn that she stiffled a yawn and stretched her arms. As she rubbed her eyes to fully see the surrounding where she slept at, she couldn't help but gasped loudly that she fell off from the bed. She thought it was just a dream. She thought it was a nightmare and she'll woke up from it. And she just did, but in the same room with dried cherry blossoms scattered around the bed. The windows were still open and the moon was replaced with the dawning of the day. It was all the same just like what had happened in the nightmare. But there was no one calling her to begin with.
     When she pushed herself to stand up, making the bed as her support, a letter came to her sight, enclosed with an envelope in a seal that looked like her tattoo. She reached for it then looked at it closely, a waft of familiar sweet aroma filled her nostrils that she was drugged by it, just like the sound of his voice calling her name in what she thought was just a dream. It strangely binded her. She cannot help to wonder but why.
     She decided to open it since it wasn't addressed to anyone and it's been in the room where she slept in. She pulled off the seal then compared it to her tattoo, they really matched! She then brought out a dark folded paper, so old and was burnt slightly on its sides. She opened it slowly then her pupils dilated at the neat cursive handwriting pasted in glowing bold letters at the strange dark letter. She cannot comprehend a thing it said that she read it loud enough for the sun to eavesdropped its way from the gaps of the window frame.
     "Famished, death by love. Eat me with your lustful touch."

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A/N: How was it?