The Obsidian Pillar

Chapter Thirty-two - The Beast

Rosa had not returned since she had watched him drag himself into the room that morning - the morning after he had gorged on the woman. Mauden's gift to him had been as delicious as he could imagine, but he had regretted it as soon as he had seen his lover's face, her smooth, tanned skin crinkling in disgust at him. He hoped that she would have visited him since then, but that unfortunate day had been over a month ago.

Something had changed. He hoped that it was due to Rosa's absence, but deep down he knew it to be something more sinister. His only respite had been during the daytime, where he could rest peacefully knowing that he could not change as long as the sun was bright in the sky, and Mauden did not will it. It was merely speculation, but he was certain that she had a way of forcing the transformation upon him.

Yet even as the sun filtered through the cracks in the old curtains that separated the tower room from the balcony, he had been restless. He dreamt of the woman, her blonde hair bustling at her back as she ran, her soft soles scraping against the rocky ground, her blue eyes flashing wide with panic. While he slept, his mouth filled with vomit as he dreamt of the taste of her flesh, something only desirable to him when caged in his beastly form.

The memory of his feast played out behind his closed eyelids every night, disturbing his rest and planting unease in his mind. He would wake, sweating and paranoid, at one moment calling Rosa's name before screaming at the chamber door for her to never come back. He threatened her with death and he cursed the family that surrendered him to Mauden, before weeping at his helplessness.

Rosa didn't come.

When he was a scared little boy, he had wished, for as long as he could remember, for aid and help from anyone. He had longed for a hero to rescue him. But now he wished for someone to burn the tower to the ground with him inside. He was not worth saving. He was a monster.

As the weeks passed by, one day leading into night until he did not know whether it was the night before or the night hence, the dreams managed to escape his sleep and plant themselves in his reality. Surely just figments of my imagination, born out of my loneliness, he had hoped while he paced the room anxiously.

The woman's voice permeated the air around him. He could not see her, but he could hear her. It began with the words that he had heard spoken as he pinned her to the ground: My daughter... before dissolving into the silence, no louder than a whisper. Even breathless whispers can sound like a bellow in a silent room.

Her soft, lamenting voice would wake him, and he would call out desperately for Rosa. In a strange paradox he was, at the same time, alone and accompanied by this strange presence in the room. It tired him to hear her sobs from the pointed ceiling, and it frightened him when she whispered angrily for clemency. Stranger still, he did not believe that these words were meant for him.

Mauden had visited several times during these terrifying weeks. He had suffered her touch and her lips on his skin with passivity. She had grown angry with his empty responses, claiming that she would rather he tried to reject her than roll over like a dog.

'It doesn't matter if I allow you to or not, you do as you wish anyway,' he said quietly to the ceiling. The beautiful, aging face of the blonde woman looked down at him with compassion. The guilt only worsened his mood.

'Has the fight finally gone out of you, my sweet one?' she hissed, her raven hair cascading in knots down her naked back as her eyes widened in wild rage. 'Perhaps I should force your little doll back up here? You know that I can.'

'Leave her. I'm no good for someone like her. I deserve to drown in evil and you are that personified,' he said in simple submissiveness, something that Mauden would have previously celebrated hearing. The sight of him lying naked in the sheets, thin and pale, his face gaunt and his eyes sunken amazed her. It was like looking at a carcass. She knew she should have looked away, but instead she marvelled at the beastliness of the self. How one can attack, maul and eat away at themselves mentally, rather than choosing to destroy something else? She chuckled as she dissipated from the chamber.

The only word that he could conjure to describe the happenings was haunting. This woman was haunting him. Ingesting her flesh and tissue had clearly bonded her to him. But to what end, he did not yet know.