#her memories of herself and loneliness haunt her but Evils knows more about her inner turmoil methinks | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

evielallemxnt · 3 years

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"There are T W O types of secrets: those we hide from others ─ and those we hide from OURSELVES."

have you seen GENEVIEVE 'EVIE' LALLEMENT strolling around central park at lunchtime? rumor has it they’re actually A HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FIVE years old, but i’m pretty sure they’re only TWENTY. they’re currently posing as a PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR at LALLEMENT LAW, but when dusk falls, you can usually find them heading home to MANHATTAN by TOWN CAR. apparently they DID attend the met gala this season! @duskintro

* / CHARACTER INFLUENCES: Jake Peralta ( Brooklyn 99 ) + Veronica Mars ( Veronica Mars ) + Nancy Drew ( Nancy Drew ) + Claudia ( Interview With The Vampire ) + Rebekah Mikaelson ( The Originals )

* / ANTHEMS: PRETTY SAVAGE | YOU MADE A MONSTER | 7 RINGS

*** PENNED BY BRI FOR DUSKFELLHQ ***

FULL NAME: GENEVIEVE "EVIE" LALLEMENT

FACECLAIM: Savannah Lee Smith

AGE: 20 ( estimated @ time of changing ) physically | 135 mentally

SEXUALITY: Lesbian

PRONOUNS: She/her

POSITIVE: Intelligent, charming, loyal, brave.

NEUTRAL: Spontaneous, trustworthy, daring, cocky

NEGATIVE: Impulsive, self-destructive, snide, and Machiavellian.

ELEMENT: Fire.

MBTI TYPE: ENFJ.

MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic neutral.

HOGWARTS HOUSE: Slytherin

AESTHETIC: Breakfast at Tiffany's, fine tailoring, diamonds and pearls and rubies, late-night bubble baths with red sangria, Chanel No.5, bubbly stocked fridge, penthouse parties, drinks @ The Blond, exclusive social club, wigs and disguises, sly smiles, bad decisions, midnight sleuthing, gossiping until dawn, closets filled with Birkins, eyes that hold secrets, smudged lip gloss, devilish temptations

TW: Death, dying, blood

* / BIOGRAPHY: The history of Genevieve Lallement is a tricky one. If you ask her, she became a creature of the night in some whirlwind fashioned tale filled with love, betrayal, and sacrifice -- all the makings of a heart-clenching closed shut story. But the reality? That's much more of a mystery.

Her genesis is one filled with darkness. No memories. No family. No nothing. The only solace coming in the form of her sire -- Cassius. He saved her from a fever that took many in late 19th century England and told her as much as he knew. That he had found her bedridden and sickly in a run-down isolation ward where patients were sent to die more than to be cured. Apparently, she had reminded him of a sister he’d once lost and he acted on an inner impulse to save an innocent. The staff had told him that she had admitted herself under what they proved to be an alias, so there was no way to notify family or even prove she existed.

She was a ghost. Alone in the world. And dying.

So, he gave her new life. Eternal life.

When she’d awakened from the transition, the ripe young vampire found herself unable to remember, well... anything. It was as if the transformation erased everything human about her, wiped her slate clean as she re-entered the world as someone else. Something else. Cassius said that vampirism isn’t a perfected process. There are some ailments that the immortal blood which now ran through her veins can’t heal. By the time he’d found her, her mind had already been overcome with the sickness that was moments away from snuffing her out completely. To drag her back from the depths of near-death, she had to lose some parts of herself along the way. There were some upsides, though. She clung to Cassius like a newborn, and he grew to coddle her as if she were his own. Being inducted into the Lallement family allowed her to see a world that was previously unattainable as a mortal having had come from the dregs of England. He’d brought her to New York at the turn of the century, and it was a sight to behold as she realized…this was HOME.

As the decades passed, the new Lallement glided through life. The adjustment to vampirism wasn’t as hard as it probably was for others. Sure, she had her hiccups, but it was almost as if the lack of memories helped. There was no other way of living for her to remember or to acclimate from. In some ways, there was no true loss. Her new family filled the voids ( even helped her pick out a new name ‘GENEVIEVE” ) showered her with endless love ─ and the bloodlust helped pick up the slack. For a while. As an immortal, it is easy to become distracted by the power, privilege, and play that is now bestowed upon you. But eventually, the semblance of loneliness and eternity creep in. For Evie, it was plaguing thoughts of the unknown that haunted her. Did she have a family when Cas took her away? Did they look for her? Mourn her? Soon all she could think of was the possibility that they somehow survived the plague and managed to continue on. This led her to try to trace their footsteps back to the town Cassius found her in to look for anything, any semblance of a clue that pointed to her previous human existence. Only for Evie to be faced with the harsh reality that the one hospital in town, the very town she’d believed herself to have been raised in, had burned down not long after they’d fled. Along with the patient records. Any possibility of tracing back her roots had been destroyed in a reckless accident and something in Evie c r a c k ed. Never again to be fully healed.

But if anything, she’s a survivor. Evie turned her sadness into something productive, going on to study criminology and criminal justice in the ’70s and '80s, along with a myriad of other majors she probably got too distracted to finish. Evie figured, if she couldn’t figure out the mystery of her own life, then the least she could do is help others figure out the mysteries in theirs. Becoming a private investigator sort of just happened, but it soon became her life’s joy. Piecing things together, going on recon missions, and doling out the truth was something that Evie not only excelled at but truly found fulfilling. At least ─ during the day. When the sun goes down, she resorts back to her party-girl ways, needing to find some sort of entertainment as a method to keep herself distracted. Because, you see, the only thing Evie hates most in the world is being by her lonesome. It leaves time for that inner sadness and loss to come creeping back in, to remind her that there’s nothing in the world to truly call her own. That the Lallement name is a placeholder for the truth. And that’s the one truth she cannot face.

So, she parties, boozes, pushes the limit because she has none, and there is always a need for M O R E. Because boredom is never on the menu. And when the town car arrives eventually to take her back to Manhattan, merely a few hours before she must be up for work, Evie revels in the few minutes of silence and thinks ─

‘Another day down. Only an eternity to go.’

* / PERSONALITY: Evie is, more than anything, fun. She likes to have a good time and to look good while doing it. Sure, her deviousness occasionally gets her into more trouble than intended, and in some ways, her childlike need to be paid attention to can be exhausting to people, but she is not all play. Evie truly enjoys being an investigator and will isolate herself for days, weeks even, if that means cracking a case. Her job and lifestyle have been carefully cultivated to always keep her busy so the facade can stick. No one knows about her growing concerns with the idea of unlimited time or the feeling of wanting a connection with someone -- anyone. Evie doesn't really give into supernatural politics or bias, and her ruthless side only comes out when hangry or when you threaten someone she loves. Then it's all-out chaos.

* / FUN FACTS:

She's gone to college several times and has studied many things but only holds a degree in Criminology and Interior Design

Currently paying a witch to figure out a way for vampires to get tattoos

Obsessed with all things horror and true crime

Officially identified as a lesbian in the late '60s

Has two poodles named Khaleesi and Drogon

Manhattan PD knows her by name

* / WANTED CONNECTIONS:

SCOOBY GANG/HARDY BOYS/7 RINGS - These are her people, her confidantes, her ride or dies. Can be supernatural or human, mortal or immortal. Whether they met decades ago or the night before, tipsy, in the Cosmopolitan bathrooms, they instantly clicked and have been loyal to each other ever since.

ROOMMATE(S) - Evie lives in one of the many ritzy buildings Manhattan has to offer. While having an entire floor to yourself has its benefits, it can feel quite isolating. So, the vampire opened up her doors to allow in some roommates -- free of charge!

ASSISTANT - As a private investigator, sometimes certain cases can become quite tedious. While her work rarely ventures away from mild cases Cassius needs help with, Evie does also take cases from anyone who needs help. Keeping everything organized, going with her on recon, and even offering their own input and theories is what they provide for her.

PLAYTHING - Now Evie isn't evil, she doesn't play with people's emotions ( at least not intentionally ) but she does indulge in the power and influence that comes with vampirism. Not only would this person be someone to go to for the occasional midnight snack ( where they're the snack sowz ), Evie would also indulge in their life. Making sure they're well taken care of, listening to the things they're going through, and being there for them whenever they need her.

FOES/ENEMIES - When you live forever you might make an enemy or three. Evie has ruffled a few feathers over the past century, that's for sure, and she has no problem continually poking the bear if she finds herself bored enough to do so.

also: literally anything else pls plot with me i'll send you kit kats and a coupon for a free taco.

#dusk:intro #i am: tired #but this was so much fun to do #come plot with my bby!

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wwwafflewrites · 4 years

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The Not-So-French Mistake

Chapter 6: Crossroads Angel

Sydney was seated on an ashy bench when Dean found her. “Appreciate my sobriety, kid. That,” he said, “was rough.”

He lazily watched people scatter into their sectioned camps. He briefly wondered if being an angel was like this, but dismissed the thought. Being an angel wasn't about supervision; Castiel was a warrior of heaven―not a babysitter. “Where did they get tents and sleeping bags? Half the city was fried extra crispy.”

She didn’t answer. Instead, she wrinkled her face at an intruding thought that haunted her. “Why do I get the feeling that we're losing? Guns won't do squat if this thing is an angel or a demon. No, scratch that―anything you guys hunt can't be killed with a regular bullet. This is pointless!”

Dean considered it and then shrugged, unaffected. “They're townspeople. We can't do much except shield them from whatever evil gets in the way. False hope is better than no hope at all.” He watched tent lights flicker off for sleep. “You can't expect them all to catch on. They weren't born into it.”

She protested, “But I wasn't born into this and look at me!”

“I'm not so sure about that, Sunshine.” He lifted an eyebrow. She was a smart cookie, Dean would give her that, but something told him that her abilities ran deeper than quick learning, and he believed his gut. He said, “Back at the house―those were some fast reflexes. And the way you just knew how to load a gun? Sorry, but it's kind of fishy.”

“It was instinct!”

“Tootsie, that was muscle memory. I know it when I see it.” He almost pitied her ignorance. “I’m betting the thing that brought you here also toyed with your memory.”

She fumed at the outrageous idea. “My memory is perfectly fine!”

His face tightened into a knowing expression. “You said you watched our show, Supernatural, yeah?”

“Yes. Why is this―?”

“You remember Zachariah?”

“...Yes,” she said cautiously.

“Then you'll know he implanted fake memories into our brains and tricked us into believing we weren’t hunters to prove our ‘worth’ and other manipulative bull crap. Angels can do that. It’s not difficult for them.”

Her entire expression darkened, and she deflated. “Then... who am I?”

Dean was rarely sympathetic, but she looked so lost. “Hey, relax. I just didn't want you going into this clueless.” He planted a firm hand on her shoulder in distant comfort. It was seldom Dean was even this consoling.

She gave a distracted, sullen nod, staring at the dirt illuminated in rosy hues as the sun departed from the sky. Faded scarlet light danced along the tents as a sliver of the sun began to disappear altogether.

Dean frowned at her response. God, she was sulking. Now she was reminding him of Sammy. “Hey, don't get pouty on me. Save the tears, please,” he said.

Heat pooled behind her eyes. She blinked them back. Crying in front of Dean Winchester was not on her bucket list. “What do they want with me?” The waver in her tone was poorly hidden.

He patted her back, recalling the years when Sammy had suffered nightmares; this was eerily similar. “Not sure, kiddo. But I'll tell you what, I'll do my best to make sure they don't get what they want. ‘Kay?” He soothed.

“Okay.” Her voice was hushed and timid. She sniffed.

And Dean sure had a soft spot for that. “O-kay. How about you go get some sleep? Alternate-reality-traveling can really take a toll. You look tired.” He encouraged.

“Yeah...” She stood reluctantly, as though she was anxious.. “Well, um, good night.” Her awkward parting ended with quiet patter of jittery footsteps as she strode to her lone tent.

●●●

Sydney fumbled for her flashlight with twitchy fingers, her depth perception growing progressively murky as green shadows swallowed the daylight. Artificial white reflected off the metal framework and highlighted the plastic walls. The moonlight weaved through stray branches of trees and spindly weeds, and it was threaded like a spiderweb as it hit the tent. The anticipation added to the rap of her heart, and she found herself nearing panic.

The flashlight shook in her trembling hands, and her heart battered as she unzipped the door and crawled onto her sleeping bag. She kicked off her shoes, the abrasive polyester cold on her bare feet. The sleeping bag cushioned her weight as she sat in fathomless usease. She toyed with the hem of her jean jacket, too cold to depart with it. She hugged her frame, pulling the denim further around her nervously trembling form. She laid back against her pillow, tolerating the cold that seeped into her neck with a shiver.

Terror gripped her, and doubt twisted within her gut as she frantically questioned her future plans. These thoughts had been haunting her ever since she’d been left among the townspeople, yet now the full volume of her choices were attacking her confidence. Her trust was hardly reliable. Her anxiety always led her to wrong conclusions and dubious opinions.

She knew she could still search for guidance, despite how it terrified her. She desperately wanted to consult Dean, realizing he had lifetime experience with these issues. However, she also stressed he would reject and dismiss her idea, and she would wind up never returning home. She debated her options and thought back.

The town had been a disaster before she had taken initiative, it’s residents suffering as the temperatures wavered between boiling to lava-like. The heat storm seethed with fever, and chaos insued. Sydney had taken the duty of driving the remaining citizens to shelter and leading them to somewhat safe domain: ideally spaces without the nuisance of dissolving structures. It had required time to restore their faith in rescue and to gain their trust, yet soon the town was under her supervision. This leadership was natural―like it was buried within her subconscious instinct.

Naturally, her first attempts had been spent seeking outside communication. Phones, apparently, were a vain effort within the town’s ranges. Service had been cut off, wholly dead, and electricity was hopeless, considering the electric poles had literally been fused to the sidewalk. Functional cars were scarce and burdensome to run. She gave up further contact and took to the present issues before she would return to her attempts.

Those whose conditions were more severe were tended to, and, fortunately, most were responsive inside an hour. Few actually died with their watch while under medical care. She had also allotted the more alert survivors tasks, such as passing time by searching for supplies―specifically tents, blankets, and other sleep necessities. She was mindful they would be stuck here for some time. They traveled in sets of twos or threes, confident with the possession of bottled water.

However, as they came sprinting back to the temporary camp tear-stricken, her heart sank to her feet. She was responsible, and she had already failed them. Something in her stomach went rigid and her veins chilled so that she shivered, even underneath the blazing sun. The disappearance was one level of despair, but knowing that their siblings and parents were mourning them? It was unbearable.

She had ordered them to stay put, don't follow. Her urgency had gotten the best of her, and she was determined enough to bust into the liquified storefronts and townhomes to find them if she must. These were families, and she wasn't going to see them broken. Not by her. She already knew what those with homesickness suffered. There was nothing admirable about the experience; it was only a constant longing and anguish for those she had left.

Ever since she had traveled to this twisted world, she was confined to her loneliness and bound to her very own dejection, isolated from those she sought. She was alone now, and while the towns and rolling hills were spacious and distant, she felt claustrophobic. The world of Supernatural was suffocating her ever so slowly.

A few brave souls offered their assistance, and she didn't refuse, nor accept them. She simply allowed their presence. Tolerated them. While she had grown fond of her adopted band of survivors, she was fed up with being dished the sloppy, inferior plate of absolute garbage her life was gradually transforming into. Her investment in the television show hardly even existed! She didn't understand why she was chosen. Rage boiled within her, and she could do nothing to defuse it besides fix her mistakes. Her thoughts repeated her pitiful temper: unfair unfair unfair.

She marched off, kicking down crooked doorways and punching her way through cooled ashes just to simmer her inner distress. As she calmed, the sting of aching muscles brought her to a state of temporary peace.

The loyal followers trailing her seemed wary of her mood and kept their distance. She sent them an apologetic glance, realizing her actions were inflicting a mild fear into the already heated air. She felt the need to justify her behavior, but she was grasping at straws and excuses.

Worse, she understood why; she knew the unspoken truth. She was feisty, deft, and clever: a sore replica of the Winchester brothers, and she knew it. God, she knew it. She was practically their sister, their personalities were so comparable. She could even somewhat relate to the hunting: despite the lack monsters, she knew her way around a gun.

The rage-driven hunt slowly morphed into something of purpose. She split off from the team―reminding them to stick together; she knew she was being a hypocrite, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

“I can help you get home,” a masculine voice said from a veil of sweeping shadows.

Sydney had been aggressively prying open a stiff, splintered door when she jerked it back in alarm, pummeling her hand onto it and stumbling as her heart skipped a beat. “Freakin’ learn to knock!” she managed to say, leaning against the wooden edge of the doorframe to regain her composure and a portion of her dignity.

“There's no need to be distressed,” the voice behind her offered, dangerously patient and bare of implications or suggestions.

Sydney turned and said to the motionless silhouette, “And why would you do that? Why would you help me get home?”

She couldn't see his face, but she could hear the deadly smirk in their words. “Because you're out of options.”

She bristled. “The Winchesters have offered to help. They're enough.”

“Are they? Two pitiful, self-sacrificing men and a hopelessly fallen angel? Castiel is useless, he can do nothing to help you,” he said, sneering.

Cas was apparently a sore topic, and she was tempted to poke that festering wound. She contemplated the course of action, and ultimately was fond of it; he was annoying. “Castiel is the only angel I trust right now. After all, he rescued me from frying in that hotel room you angels had me locked in.” Sydney eyed the spread silver outline of his intimidating, metallic wings illuminated by the cracks in the walls. “What can you do that they cannot? They have accomplished more than you possibly could.”

He followed her gaze to his sides. “You can see my wings?” He did not seem fazed. Rather, amused. “Interesting.”

She inquired, “Yes. And why is this so out of the ordinary? Should I... not see them?”

“Humans don't have the ability to see our wings,” he said to her.

She froze, staring at the perplexing lines of plumage glowing in a hazy wisp of blue grace. The question, it appeared, was never 'who is Sydney?' but 'what is Sydney?', and that was a startling mutation of the merely concerning one. It’s one thing not to know of your past, but it's another thing to not know what you are. She felt like a foreigner in her own skin.

“Never mind that,” the angel said. “I’m your ticket back home.”

She pinched her lips, gnawing at her cheek in thought. How often had the Winchester been screwed through a deal like this? Too many, was her original thought. But what if he could actually get her home? It was extremely tempting. “What’s your price?”

“My price? I'm not a demon, girl. Deals are not made by angels.”

“But you want something anyway.”

He grinned, but it never reached the eyes quite right. “I admit, there is something you must collect in order to return to your reality.” He stiffened when a shuffle and clap of an untrained foot met a floorboard above them, creaking as her team thoroughly searched rooms. He tsked. “It is not safe to tell you just yet. Meet me here tonight when your allies are asleep. Do not fail me.”

“Wait, hey, hello, pause―can't you just snap me out? I know how angels function.”

Again, that eerie smile of his. “My grace is dwindling. Had you not noticed Castiel's crippled state? We are all weakening.”

There was a lush purr and murmur of feathers, and he had vanished.

@queen-bubble

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shenns · 5 years

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“Our power,” Mama would say, staring at the sliver of the moon cut apart by the ragged concrete jungle of Kowloon, jagged horrors of steel and glass that gleamed like blades, “is waning.” Mei heard that voice in dreams – dreams that oozed blood and stung like burning flesh; dreams that felt far more real than Mondays. She dreamed of things that she couldn’t explain – foxes whose fur gleamed like snow chasing each other across moonlit plains, foxes that had teeth as sharp as the edge of a whetstone, foxes that went on hunts and returned with blood dripping down their fox-coats and man-flesh clinging in the gaps of their canines.

She’d always had dreams. Fox-dreams.

(When her therapist asks if she has nightmares, she stares at a crack on the ceiling and shakes her head.)

---

She remembers mama as a thief in the night, an echo of a self she had left behind, like a sickening sort of nostalgia. She remembers in bits and pieces, a jigsaw of memories scattered across time and the veil of reality. She recalls paw-prints left on wet soil, the horizontal swishing of nine majestic tails precisely at the moment of pounce. The salt and steel taste of warm gushing blood, the sweet crunch of bones on a starved stomach. Mama said weird things, strange things, of disappearing forests, poison air on Kunlun Mountains, and the waning power of their kind. Every time man erects another building, foxes lose a little bit of their magic. With every forest cleared and every river tainted and every cloud poisoned, men were closing in on them, shutting them out.

She remembers mama digging in trash cans when the night was young. Foxes were no longer hunters, mama said, despair in her voice, as she left long gashes on brick walls. They had been reduced to scavenging for man-made scraps.

But those are just dreams.

---

Men are the root of all evil. Another thing from her dreams, another thing mama said. Mama heard the inner desires of men, like echoes reverberating against every atom of her being, silent longings of men who thirsted for the flesh of beautiful women. Their cries drove her mad till her shivering nine fox tails shriveled into herself and turned her into a woman – the sort of woman built out of the cravings of lonely, desperate men. Mama hunted them by the time the night was done. It was the fox blessing and the fox curse - to attract prey and play with them and fill your belly with their flesh, but also to be hunted by them, haunted by them, to be used by them, to have to pleasure them night after night.

And then one night, she stopped turning back. Her tails were gone forever. She was stuck in the vessel of a woman, to be longed and chased by men she had no more use for.

Their power had waned.

---

There are gaps in her memory as wide as the gulf that separates her home from the Americas.

Motherland, she calls it and hides and nurtures it like a secret. A lost world that inhabited her dreams ever since she set foot in the US. She hates this new country at first, and then falls in love with the open plains and golden stretches of farm-land and brushes of woods that crop up here and there on either sides of lonely highways.

But the cities suffocate her. She finds herself lost in the blinding nightlife, abandoned warehouses that lie in wait in the shadows and misshapen buildings that grow too tall and too close together like a clump of autumn grass. The air smells of smoke and dust, and tap-water tastes like human piss.

(In some corner of her mind, a secret memory glares: mama in her frail, broken human form, mama slouched over in parking lots, mama with the stench of moonshine in her breath, mama with that white powder speckled across her nose and cheeks and hair, mama growing thin and shrewd and irritable, her youth sucked back deep into her sunken eyes.)

Then one day, mama disappears. The fox-dreams stop and her entire life is packed into little suitcases and transferred to matchstick box rooms with the walls painted white. This is where she’s told to wait till they find her a family. Nobody told her that one could simply return lost family for new as though it is sales weekend at Walmart.

---

She is passed around among foster families like hand-me-downs from last Christmas. Sometimes it happens faster than she can learn the names of her foster siblings, English still new and raw to her tongue. Other times, there are troubles bigger than herself, unwanted touch of roving hands and surreptitious stares that keeps her on her toes, cagey and afraid and boiling over with an undercurrent of rage she doesn’t know what to do with.

This is when she first meets Angela Reed. They sat facing each other in a diner, Mei stabbing her French fries with a fork and watching the soft potato fall apart.

“What are you always so angry about?” Reed asked, putting down her dessert as she watched.

She fumed, delivering a final blow to the last fry. “Everything.”

There were no time-outs or scolding or grounding. Reed had listened, the way one listens to another adult, as Mei poured out her simmering heart- about the many troubles of foster care, about feeling rootless and detached, about loneliness and pain, and about mama.

“Anger is good.” Reed said at last. “Anger gets things done.”

Mei spent the next few months learning kick-boxing, transferring her frustration and pain and grudge into a sandbag. She followed Reed across the country to attend protests and demonstrations and pickets. She made posters about child abuse and gay rights and climate change, handed out pamphlets, held up slogans and screamed at riot police, and poured her anger and passion and drive where it mattered. She took classes that taught Cantonese and read Pu Songling, hunting for lost threads of her lineage with a magpie’s eye.

The fox-dreams only get worse.

---

It comes with her first blood. The world shimmers and shifts for a moment, and then for one split second, she hears it: thousand voices and their thousand sick, twisted fantasies. Men and the murmurs of their heart, their deepest, secret fantasies, their calls of loneliness.

She shudders and digs her nails deep into her palms so hard that they bleed.

That night, she wakes naked in her bed in a puddle of torn nightclothes, blood trickling down her face, her hair, her skin. There’s a strange sort of taste on her tongue, something raw and tender and meaty. It comes to her in a moment of horror- flesh. She doesn’t know what kind.

There are reports of bear attacks in the news the next morning, and Angela mentions that the next door cat, Mr. Muffins, is missing.

She finds half the mystery in Pu Songling’s pages. Huli Jing. The word comes flooding back to her, like the rekindling of an old flame. Fox spirits, fox demons, fox gods. Creatures who could swindle gods and emperors alike of their kingdom, ruin dynasties and burn down empires, creatures that played nasty little tricks on human men, possessed human women, and sometimes, sometimes, fell in love with mortals.

She burns the book the next day.

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spookyspaghettisundae · 5 years

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Baring Fangs in the Singing Cave

Singing echoed through the cave, sending shivers down her spine.

She struggled to remember who and where she was, but she knew that the singing was not her own. The songs blended together, born from many different voices—and not a single one of them human. Not one of them contained words. They conveyed such pure beauty to her ears that she wanted to collapse and cry.

She felt a profound loss and loneliness as she regained her bearings, and shreds of memories began to surface in her mind, like small shards floating in a calm pond. She sensed that being here was wrong, that a catastrophic event approached her in a silent steady stride.

Instead of being filled with darkness, a strange green light flooded this cave. The jagged stone grounds inside the cavernous chambers hurt the tender skin of her bare soles, forcing her to hobble forward like a toddler learning how to walk.

The singing and the light shared the same source: crystalline shapes the size of full-grown men. The magicked minerals hovered several paces off the ground, they rotated with hypnotic slowness and the sweet and surreal serenades emanated from their cores. Their centers shone so brightly that looking upon them burnt her eyes in the same way that staring at the sun would do. Yet the glow that radiated from them shone with a softness that reminded her of silky furs caressing her skin.

Waters pooled in the cave, gentle streams and reservoirs reflecting the odd green lights that failed to penetrate their depths. In her palm, she caught a single drop of liquid that rolled off the tip of her nose. She shivered again, caused by the cool air sweeping over her. The skin of her hands, and arms, and legs, and every inch not covered by tattered rags and colorful leaves and feathers bound together with vines and spider silk—smooth gray skin, coated in the sheen of pearls of water. She must have emerged from this cavern’s waters just before.

What was she? Why was she here? Why did she even exist?

The unceasing singing offered no answers, but it lured her to the center of the cave like a beautiful siren’s song. There, pure energy rose like smoke, emerging from a pit in which life itself circled and pooled like liquid. She reached out and dared to stick her hand into the tendrils of this energy.

It tingled with pleasant warmth.

She allowed the entire length of her forearm to glide into the billowing energy and linger there, awash in waves of pleasure that pulsated from her arm and traveled through the rest of her fleshly vessel, permeating her entire being and transcending her body and saturating her very spirit.

Here was where she came from.

Not where she was born. Not what had made her. But where she had reemerged into this world. Where she had awakened.

What she was a part of and apart of, now. As she had done, many times before.

Satisfied by the warmth from that pool of energy having filled her corporeal form, she stumbled away from it. The shivers returned as the singing continued without pause, invading and consuming the entirety of her perception.

She needed to know who she was, so she hobbled towards the edge of the natural waters, taking one careful footstep after the other, shaking with each like a newborn child—or something that needed to learn how to use this body once more.

When she finally saw her reflection in the soft green glow upon the water’s surface, she shook like leaves in the breeze. She struggled to understand whose face she was wearing, adding to the confusion over her own identity.

Eyes with neither white nor irises glowed in their entirety with the same strange blue light as the energy she had just bathed in. A headdress of ram’s horns and bright and colorful feathers adorned her head like a primitive crown, as did hair with the color of rust tied back into long thin braids. She ran her fingertips first over the pale gray lips that matched her skin tone, then along the bright yellow lines painted onto her face in arcane shapes and unfathomable patterns.

Her fingers trembled as their tips explored the length of her pointy ears. Smooth, cold, damp, unfamiliar.

She whispered at her own reflection, “Who are you?”

Her reflection knelt and gripped a long spear in both hands as she rose again.

“I was Llanugeth Valai'i,” the reflection replied with the certainty of engravings on a tombstone, lowering her face and causing her mien to darken.

“Was? What are you?” Her voice sounded the same—but dull in contrast to the singing crystals that floated all about inside this cavern.

The spear in the hands of her reflection gave her a menacing air when she then said, “I was a powerful priestess of the Scorpion Tribe until you stole my life, demon.”

She looked down and found the spear in her own hands, matching the one in the hands of her alien reflection. It felt so unfamiliar, like her hands were not her own. Could this be true? Why did she not remember?

Her voice now trembled “Demon, am I?”

Her reflection sneered at her and answered, “I do not know what you are, but you are not natural. You do not belong in this world, monster.”

“I must remember,” she said so softly that it emerged as barely more than a whisper, barely distinguishable from a sigh.

“You must not remember, forsaken one,” her reflection said with contempt.

She raised the spear over her head, testing its weight, while her reflection pointed the spear back at her in a threatening gesture, disconnecting their motions from one another.

“Exiled, was I?”

“You must not remember.”

“An unwilling passenger in the exodus,” she droned on. Her voice gained more certainty and strength with each word that followed. “Not fortunate enough to be brought along my kind when the horned god ensnared us all, scorpion priestess.”

She lowered the spear and her reflection followed suit. She lowered her head. Shadows grew and crept across her face. A single drop of water rolled from the tip of her nose once more. It fell into the pool, causing waves to ripple outwards from its singular point of impact, distorting her reflection to the point of no recognition.

“I was not chosen like the others,” she said. “The gods saw me not, heard me not, or ignored my presence. Instead, they chose men and women and dragons to lead your foolish people.”

When the ripples smoothed over and her reflection regained tangible shape, she saw herself gritting her teeth, baring her fangs at herself.

“You stole my face, you witch.”

“And you tried to steal the life from these pools of energy. Compared to your transgressions, what I did to you was a mercy.”

“It was only energy, raw magic. An experiment. I was on the verge of a breakthrough. I was a scion and a prodigy. What are you? You are nothing, forgotten, faceless, nameless. A thief.”

She began to remember—she was not one, but many. The presence of the many surrounded her, invisible within the cave, but reflected in the waters she gazed upon. The many victims she had claimed over the course of an eon. They all stared back at her—not with contempt or malice in their glowing blue eyes, but with emptiness.

Certainty filled her every fiber. An inner heat purged the cold sensations completely.

“What you did felt like flesh being ripped from bone. You had the audacity to play with powers you do not comprehend, elf. You were the thief, not I.”

“Yet here I am, a remnant within your being? A ghost to haunt you for your many murders? How many before me did you slay? How many other faces have you worn before mine?”

She spoke to herself, but the rift between the voice of her reflection and her lips grew greater by the minute.

“You are nothing. Not even dust and shadow, you are. I unmade you, just as I now remade you, all just to remember who I am. To comprehend why I am here again. You are nothing but an instrument. A tool.”

Her reflection screamed at her, but no sound emerged from her mouth. Only ghostly singing resonated throughout the cave.

She looked up, basking in the green glow. She swayed to the rhythm of the songs, breaking out into a trance-like dance. Then she hummed along, out of tune.

“Nameless one, uncorrupted. Exiled one, unchosen. Deadly one, unknown,” she sang, now chiming in with the tunes of the singing crystals.

She was the necessary evil that upheld the order. Unsung and forgotten, for nobody ever lived to remember her. And in her black unseelie heart, she knew that when her dance would end, she would face the next trespassers seeking to steal the life force.

When next some self-proclaimed “heroes” came, she would greet them and fill them with dread.

Should they try to take the life, she would make them dead and take their faces.

—Submitted by Wratts

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