Blood Vengeance [COMPLETED]

Chapter Six - Speak in Tongues

Beneath her feet the rock felt slimy and cold. She was herded through the opening in the rock alongside the other prisoners, feeling the coarse fabric of their uniforms rub against her naked skin. That so many people could be totally silent filled Selene with horror; it was as though they were barely human at all.

"You there," came a voice through the crowd.

Instinctively Selene looked up only to find herself being dragged through the clothed prisoners to join others who stood wearing nothing but their own skin. They were being pushed into what looked to Selene like a large cage, but it clearly hoisted into the air, given that a thick and rusted chain was wrapped about it and pulled taught above. Selene craned her neck back to gaze upwards, seeing only a huge dark void, into which the chain disappeared.

With laugher the Vampire guards touched her and pushed her, forcing her skin to touch that of the other prisoners, and she stuck to them with a dampness that she had not formerly been aware of. The men were weak and dirty, their muscles slack about their bones. Selene had never seen a man completely naked, and yet there was nothing remotely erotic about the experience. Their bodies, worn and filth-streaked, filled her with disgust. The women, their breasts small and empty, were just as bad.

No one looked at one another, their shame too deep and thick to allow human contact or compassion to break through.

The guards, their scarred faces warping as they smiled, pushed them one by one into the vast cage, filling it so full that body parts squeezed out and hung limply between the bars. Selene felt hands on her back and buttocks and found herself being pressed against the other bodies. she turned her head so as not to be smothered against the back of a tall man who stood in front of her. She felt his spinal cord against her cheek.

When the cage was so full that Selene could barely expand her chest enough to breathe a guard began to turn a crank, and with a deafening squeal of metal on metal Selene realised they must be in the air. She tried to look down to her feet, to see between the bars that ran closer together beneath them, but she didn't have space to lower her head to look.

What if the chain could not hold their weight? What if they plummeted to their deaths? As the rose higher and higher inside the rock that held up the glorious Epershand, Selene wondered if she really cared whether she lived or died right now. This was the lowest she had ever sunk, and doubt stole into her mind and asked her whether it was worth it. Was Xander worth this? Was Hector?

She felt someone's bare foot move over her own and she tried to shift it but she couldn't. She felt hands and fingers of other bodies pressing into the muscles of her thighs. But the bodies were dead, limp. The prisoners barely moved, and still they were silent; as though they had no tongues at all.

And then Selene was compelled to speak, to get someone to acknowledge her, to see if these men and women could speak! What if they couldn't? Why would that be? Her panic increased as she thought of it and she tried to lift her head, detaching her skin from the man's back bone. When she raised her eyes she was surprised to find her gaze met by a man who stood next to her.

For a moment they did nothing but stare, and Selene attempted to muster the courage to speak. But then something in his eyes told her not to, a brightness, a sharpness, and she quickly looked away again, immediately becoming aware that his naked body pressed against hers all down one side. She vehemently wished she had not looked at him long enough to make him an individual; long enough to make him real.

With a jolt that swung the cage, the cranking of the chains stopped. Bodies crushed against one another as the cage rocked back and forth. Suddenly the pressure in the cage was relieved as people began to push out, and as though in a vacuum, Selene was sucked out into space and found herself standing in the middle of a grand room. The floor was a pale marble, that glittered in the light cast by the crystal chandeliers that hung at either end of the room. Her feet relaxed against the cool, smooth marble as she looked up at the ceiling that was painted in a dark blue and decorated with golden stars. With a shock she realised how similar it was to Stanley Hall.

A guard swung the gate of the cage closed and locked it, and another signalled that it was ready to be lowered. It disappeared back where they had come from, but the vibrating chain still hung from the ceiling, its tautness a painful reminder of what they had endured.

Selene looked around her, noticing that the others did the same. For the first time they seemed human, reacting to their surroundings, glancing at the ceiling, moving closer together for protection from the guards who around them, circling like wolves about their prey.

"So these are the naked ones."

Selene's heart pounded harder than it had for a long time; the voice was Hector's. She found herself trying to cover her breasts with her hands and noticed that the other women were doing the same.

She noticed that they had all turned in the direction of the voice, and she dodged between people to get a view of the speaker.

When she saw him she wanted to weep; he was as handsome as he had ever been, but something was different. His eyes held a cruelness that had not been there before. His movements as he strode towards them were elegant, but not as they had been before. He was almost Hector but not quite.

Arthur.

Selene's heartbeat faded as she realised who stood before her: Hector's twin brother, Arthur Stanley. He wore a black tie suit and patent leather shoes. His formal attire was frightening; it suggested an event, a party, at which they would certainly not be guests.

"And how was your journey?" he asked, with mock politeness. When no one spoke he began to laugh. "Cat got your tongue?" He slipped his hands into his trousers pockets and rocked forward on his toes.

"Ha!" he spat. "I have your tongues, is that not so?" He nodded to one of the guards who stood behind him. He held a vast jar in his hands that held blood flesh, slithering against one another, crammed against the glass surface.

With horror Selene realised that the jar held the tongues of the men and women she stood beside. The guard began to unscrew the lid, slowly, not taking his gaze from teh prisoners who stood before him. Then he tipped it upside down and the mass of tongues slopped onto the floor and lay still like dead fish.

The prisoners began to groan, deep guttural noises coming from somewhere low in their throats.

"What's that you say?" asked Arthur, stepping towards the pile of flesh on the floor. He bent down and picked one up, squashing it between finger and thumb. He held it aloft so they could see and then, slowly, he dropped it into his mouth and chewed.

When he had swallowed the tongue of one of the people who stood, trembling, before him, he wiped the corners of his mouth with two fingers and turned to the guards.

"Shower them. Clean them. Feed them. Dress them. Make them ready."

Arthur spun on his heel and left the room, leaving the guards to round up the prisoners. They herded them together, tying their hands between their backs, and then forced them out into a corridor and down some concrete stairs with an iron banister. The lighting was dim and the corridor had an institutional feel to it; a backstage area in a hospital.

At the bottom of the stairs they spilled out into a shower room, not unlike that in Central Control. The ceiling was covered with shower heads, and Selene noticed the guards retreating back up the stairs and closing off a trap door; they were sealed in.

The water hissed through the exposed overhead pipes and with surprise Selene noted that the water was hot and fragranced. The water began to froth with soap as the prisoners began to clean their flesh. Filthy rivers of water ran down their bodies collecting in the gullies that ran down the tiled floor and into the drain, swirling in a mass filth-crested foam.

As Selene felt the bliss of a hot shower, she watched in horror as the sewage covering ran from her skin, leaving her utterly naked, utterly unprotected. Her human scent would be released, allowing any Vampire to detect it and to choose it.

She realised once and for all that she was not a spy within the walls of Epershand anymore, or more likely, she had never been one. From the moment she stepped into that boat she was just like the others: a prisoner.

This place would take her virginity. This place would destroy her.