youur bones

"Dark Twisted Fantasy Turned To Reality"

+1+

It was quite

Dark green grassy hills and flat wooded landscape stretched in all directions. It was all so vast and wild. An ancient place untouched by time.

There was always something hazy in the air like fog or smoke, except it was more pleasant.

The architecture was archaic but beautifully detailed. Tall intricate black stone buildings sparsed out across the fields to form a city center.  In the center of it was the spiraling obsidian towers of King Lucifer’s Citadel. Home.

My home. My Father's Citadel.

There were no oceans. I don’t think our world was large enough to have oceans, but there were clear lakes and streams throughout the forest.

I smiled, getting lost in my daydream of Homeland. Of tall slim Demon  women with wide eyes and thick curled horns. Dark wild hair and Small pale lips with thick hot skin. I can picture long slim fingers yielding sharpened axes and scythes.

Out the corner of my eyes something white flashes in my perfect daydream, a flash of molting feathers. The impression of a lace veil and colorless eyes---

I jolt out  of my daydream as my cellphone goes off.

The stack of papers, business report and numbers sit in front of me. As does copies of Helio’s maps and the Exit Agreement which were sent via boke messenger to me that very morning. I'd pushed them aside almost immediately

“Hello”, I said realizing I hadn’t even peered at the number.

“Paris,”

“Isobel”, Just saying her name soothes the rattling discomfort from my daydream.

“Paris, I need you to come down to the bakery. Now.”

“What’s wrong, Is ?”

“I can’t talk for long. He’ll think I’m up to something. Just come down here. He’s here. Please. I have to go”

“Iso--”

She hangs up and I’m already out the door calling for a cab. I nearly smack into Jona on the way out the door.

"The hell--", he starts

"It's Isobel. I need to go."

"He" could only be one person. Helios had taken this to far, it hadn’t even occurred to me that he knew about Isobel and I. He could use her against me. . . just like Isaiah had.

If Isobel died again . . . there would be no coming back.

With that one look on my face, my brother doesn't ask details but races with me out the door.

Pon de +2+

At first everything in the bakery seems normal, there is a line at the counter and the tables are filled with coffee drinkers and laptops.I spot Isobel behind the counter and she gestures to the section to my right. Jona and I turn at the same time.I scan the tables until I see Helios sitting at a bistro table in the back, he has his feet propped up  on a chair and is casually flirting with a server who is pouring him coffee.

Helios of course isn’t alone. Seraphina is sitting at the third chair, a large pair of black shades covering her eyes. She’s so still she could be asleep or dead.

I jump as Isobel touches my arm and whispers to me.

“Lori says he has been here all morning. I asked him to leave and he just. . . waved me off and ordered more coffee.”

“We will deal with him, Isobel. It’s okay"

Helio doesn't look up as Jona and I approach him. He just sweetens his coffee and starts taking a wrapper off of a cupcake as if nothing is wrong. He looks up and acts surprised to see us.

“Paris, how odd to see you here in my side of town. Who is this ?”

Helios raises a perfectly arched eyebrow at Jona.

"I'm his brother--", Jona begins

"Quiet", I order him. I didn't need Helios knowing there was another brother he'd have to get through if he killed me. Although it was starting to seem like when he killed me.

Helios offers the cupcake to Seraphina, the image  reflecting in her dark shades. If she is awake she doesn’t react. Helios shrugs it off and begins licking the frosting.

“Helios--?”

“What little prince ? I’m just getting a taste of the local flavor.”

“Helios, what are you doing here.”

“What am I doing ? What are you doing. Or did you miss the part where this part of the city is no longer welcome to Demons.”

“You wanted me here--”

“Not you”, he said, “Her”

I turn around to where he is motioning towards Isobel. She’s trying to work but her eyes keep going back to me.

“She’s not a Demo--”

“Maybe not in a traditional sense. Those vile  creatures are just as bad if not worse than your lot. Which is why you have been banished from these parts.”

“I told you Helios. I am not signing any agreement. You are not banning us from Brooklyn. Isobel has two jobs in Williamsburg, we have shops and customers here,you can’t take that away. You have no right I don’t care how big your army is.”

I bring my hands down hard on the table for emphasis, causing his coffee to rattle.

Helios stretches  further back in the chair smiling at me as if I were being precocious. He picks up his coffee taking his time to take a sip before speaking.

“You know Prince, I thought you might need a little convincing to go along with my plan.”

Helios holds up his coffee again and his eyes flicker  to Seraphina.  I hear the scrape of her chair as she stands. She takes off her suit jacket and stands in front of me,  a small  vein in her solid arms twitches.

I look up and can’t make out anything in her eyes except my reflection in her shades.

I see Helios smiling into his coffee. She takes a step forward  and I take a step back. She takes another step forward and this time I don’t move. My neck tilted up to avoid the fact that I’m eye level to her chest.

“Leave”, she demands.

“No”, I say this to Helios, “Intimidation won’t work on me.”

“You don’t want to make a scene do you ? Cause I will make a scene”, Helios says/y

"Back  off", Jona says sternly. We are starting to cause a scene.

"No", I say to my brother in a falsely calm voice, "It's alright."

Seraphina takes off her shades and drops them on the ground. There is no real life to her eyes, that striking blue is wasted on her.

“Sign Helios' agreement.”, she says

“No.”, I say for the thousandth time.

Silence

“What happens now--””

I’m cut off  by the force of my jaw slamming against my teeth. The pain is eclipsed by my head colliding with the brick wall. I try to brace myself against the wall breathing though the radiating pain waiting for my vision to come back.

I spit out a healthy dose of blood and before I can recover I receive another blow to my already swollen jaw.

“Fuck”, I yell touching my jaw. I can almost feel the indentations of her dozens of  rings.

My vision blurs again and I  stumble forward. Charging  forward with all my adrenaline I focus all my weight on  trying to shove her off her feet but she is solid and immovable.

I finally stop trying to push her over, my hands just resting on her waist, if she moved I’d probably topple over.

“Why ? Sera”, I manage catching my breath , “Why. Is this what you really want ? To be Helio’s thug ?

“It is just the way of things.”

She answers a question I didn’t ask. My ‘why’ meant so many things at once  and she had only bothered to answer the easiest one.

I manage to stand up straight,. I don’t even realize that my hands are still planted firm on her waist. My thumb is strangely cold and numb and I realize it's resting on the thin strip of cold skin beneath her shirts hem

I let out one breath

then two

Then we kiss. I don’t know how it happened or why. One minute--no one second-- I’m trying to make sense of things and the next her hands are tangled in my hair. My lips are eager to taste hers even though my jaw very loudly protest.

My hands instinctively  go for the cold hard skin beneath her shirt, an instinct she doesn’t discourage , her knees slightly bend bringing her down further into me.. The shock of her cold lips causes me to groan, my tongue and mouth lick, tease and taste her until she is just as warm as I am and then some.

She pulls away with a hand over her mouth her lips slightly blushed and swollen from the heat that radiates from me. I am so cold  my teeth have started chattering.

“Did I burn you ? I--”

“I--”

I stifle a cry as she hits me again. When I’m down her foot collides into my stomach so hard  I throw up on the street. At the same time I’m aware of Helios stepping into the alley.

“I didn’t hear him screaming. . . so I got concerned”, Helios says to her.

He turns me over with his foot admiring my face. I make an inaudbile noise from the ground but my head isn’t clear enough to make clever words of vengeance come out.

“Now ? Do you need more convincing  ?”, Helios asks.

“Yes”, is all I manage, “No deal. Next time send a man”

Helios laughs at my stubborn refusal. He turns back to Seraphina and zeroes in on her flushed lips. She is trying very hard not to look at me.

“Did he clip you ?”, he asks with only passing interest.

She just fetches her sunglasses and turns back down the alley. Helios gives me a wave and they both make their way calmly out the alley.

I sit up as Isobel burst through the backdoor, Jona is on her heels. They both help get me on my feet.

“Oh, God. Paris”, she watches the departing figures round the corner, “Don’t move. I’ll call Damien. Hold on I’ll get you some ice.”

She runs back inside and I curse as loud as I can.

What the hell was going on ? I’d kissed her again, the enemy. Because now she really was the enemy.

I had no excuse. I wasn’t doing it because she was dying and I certainly didn’t find her attractive, I did it because . . .I felt there was something there to playout ?

Isobel come back out pressing a towel wrapped with ice over my mouth.

“They are going to pay.”, she says, “We aren’t going to just take this anymore.”

“Isobel ?”, I slurred

“What ? What’s wrong, baby ?”

“ I love you, I said more to myself than to her.

Then it all went dark.

+3+ Pompeii VSQ

What a dream !

I could hear my footsteps pounding against the stone as I ran through the Citadel. Footsteps were important. Remembering to hear footsteps is what made a dream feel real.

Lucifer’s Citadel is empty and I’m free to run along the halls with youthful abandon. My father, the king, would have never permitted me to do such a thing but it didn’t matter because I was an adult.

I could almost imagine my Father away on some noble quest, leaving his eldest and least favorite adult son in charge.

I slide to a stop as I run past a mirror.

I marvel at my reflection. Large deep pupils and violently bright irises. A strong cut jaw and skin that seems matte and chalky  tinted with something to add a slight blush. My smile scar is gone, a product of a thing that never happened in this dream. I was handsome.

A pair of beautifully twisted horns burst from around my princely crown. I am solid and strong.

I continue my exploration down the spiral staircase and open the double doors to the back courtyard.. The forest and setting  of my childhood calls to me. I want to see the river, eat the food  and watch the borealis.

It’s beautiful and wonderful.  I am home.

When I reach the tree line I feel as if I’m being watched.

I turn to see a tall thin white figure several feet away from me. It the only thing in the open field just before the wild untamed forest.

The willowy  figure is as whispy and tall as a young tree, nearly 7 feet. It has long straight colorless hair covered by a thin off white lace veil  The figure’s dress is a volume of delicate white fabric. It’s  wise eyes are small and whitish-blue, its lips a warm pink. I don’t think I’ve ever seen skin that clear and porcelain.

The air shifts as a pair of large white wings open behind the tall willowy woman.

An Angel

Why would I dream such a thing ?

She looks wise and pious. Like something sacred I shouldn’t touch. Holy but not in a traditional sense. Her dress is etheral. A structured white gown that touched the ground. It was solid and soft giving her the illusion of a large puppet.

“Angel”, I say in a rough language, “This is Demon land. You should not be here.”

I say this even though it is a dream. No one else is even around and I can’t even hear the birds or animals unless I think about it.

“Your highness”, she says

I find it hard to believe such a ethereal looking figure can bend to bow to me. It’s as if imagining a great and old tree bending at your will.

There is an odd detail though. The top of the Angel’s wing is an off putting black. Its been charred.

I hold out my hand to the unearthly creature, even though it is several feet away from me. This creature is all there is to inhabit this place. I think I’d rather not be alone in my dream.

I wake up drenched in sweat. I’m in the infirmary and I can see Damien watching ER on his laptop. It’s the middle of the night but I’ve never felt more awake.

“Finally awake, Sleeping beauty”, he says, “Helios gave you quite a beating.”

I’m still rattled by my dream. It felt so vivid and real. I cough a little wondering if it has to do with the marijuana smoke coming from Damien's desk..

”What the hell kind of drugs did you give me”, I slurred looking at the tubes in my arm

“The good kind”

“I think”, I slump against the bed, “I think I want some more”

A/N

So, this chapter introduced the third storyline. . . .Paris' dream. Which takes place in Homeland--ish. I don' t know. Paris' dream was supposed to end at the first part at the top . . . but it kept going and going.

I know what you are thinking. Lile are you using inappropriately upbeat music in this chapter ?  I did this because I think the beat mimicked the escalation of the tension between Helios and Paris. Also how funny would it be if I was able to come up with a chapter title based on the lyrics from that song ?