Red Twilight: A Dawning Of Power

Chapter 14: Surrogate Mother

Ashley stands unprotected in the depths of the maze. The music draws her in. birds line the hall, wings outstretched in a bow waving the child on. Ashley walks slow and soft she grips the leather coat to her c.h.e.s.t. Lights shine in the deep until at last the channel opens to a room, large a quiet. Cravixs sits at a throne surrounded by blackbirds, their heads lowered and tails fanned in kowtow. Cravixs holds a hand forward invitingly. "come to me my daughter." He expresses, "have a set." A second throne appears "I want to talk."

Ashley turns to run away. The maze has shifted again, the way back is now a wall. Crow brings a hand to his c.h.e.s.t to introduces himself, Ashley bets him to the punch "Fillous- Mammon." She shouts "I know who you are."

Crows eyes go wide in confusion as he hears his name spoken. "I am." Crow pulls a leg up to his c.h.e.s.t hugging one of his knees "and who are you princess?"

Ashely looks around for a weapon, she picks up a poker next to one of the many pots of coal. "I am Ashley Jacob."

Crow taste the air. He whispers to himself "Page Alouette Crow." He smiles to the child "you think you are a simple scribe like your father, don't you."

Ashley holds the stick up overhead as if it was a sword, she is ready to do battle with the black god. "I am a Jacob. I am Jesuit. I will fight you." She is shaking, she is terrified, and rightfully so.

The skin that Cravixs wears is not his own, when on earth, without the 'Keys of Salvation' he must assume the identity of a smaller, weaker, creature than that which truly is. On his last trip to this planet Cravixs took A man named Adam Crow as his avatar. He was strong, beautiful, wealthy, and hungry for wisdom and power alike. Mammon thinks this must have been sometime around the 5th century, it can get hard to keep track of time when one can jump around the cosmos freely. Crow was granted indestructibility and immortality as payment for letting Mammon use his body.

This of course means that somewhere in side the twisted body of Cravixs. Crow is still awake and active. Crow can still see with his eyes, even when Cravixs controls his hands, Crow can still hear, even if Cravixs is speaking, and Crow can still dream. Crow remembers who he was when he was human and he has spent a good deal of time and energy tracing his family, keeping track at first to the movements of his mother, then his sister, today 100 generations or so out, he can still smell the scent of his siblings in the blood of thousands of people that he would ever know. Ashley Jacob, she is one of Crow's sister's offspring, the smell of her blood is stirring Crow's soul, making him unquiet, hard for Cravixs to keep a grip on.

At the moment Cravixs is weak, the majority of his mind is tied up in his affairs on other worlds, less than 1% of Cravixs can pass over into this world. And that fact alone makes Cravixs avatar a creditable threat. Cravixs must quite Crow or risk being forced to discard this body and find another.

At the moment the cost of finding another avatar would be more then Cravixs can afford. The price in time, the price in resource, unexpectable. Of course, Cravixs has taken measures to try to elevate this dilemma but Karin isn't ready yet.

So, using a tactic that has been successful in the past to subdue Crow, Cravixs conjures a fantasy. The room full of birds lit only by torchlight explodes outwards into a banquet hall. The scholars cloak rapped around Crow transforms into an elegant silk coat, his hair works its way into a braid secured by a ribbon, Crow the void mage takes on an appearance much more like that of a prince.

The army of bird dance around and in a flash of feathers seem to shift into the shapes of men and women dressed in bird costumes. The carnival like music fades into a waltz. Ashley finds her clothing turn to smoke and float away from her body only for a new outfit to take shape on her after Crow has taken a moment to look the child up and down.

The outfit Crow provides is her is a second empire ballroom dress "Now that is a look far more suited to a child of the Crow clan." Ashley's head spins about as she is looking around. She can almost see past the vale of reality, she can almost see herself faint as a phantom forged from glass grabs her from behind. She can even almost see the void mage grab her and his fangs growing out. But the fantasy takes hold and blocks her vision.

Some scholars seem to think that there is one thing that is beyond the power of the gods, one thing so sacred that not even an evil deity would dare turn their nose up at. The sanctity of thoughts and feeling. This is ridicules. There is nothing that prevents the gods from forcing their way into someone thoughts. To force your will on another person, even a weak human, is unethical but far from impossible, after all if an illusionist has this power why shouldn't god?

Crow extends his hand and his will. Ashley drops her weapon, she holds her hand out tacking Crow by the hand. He pulls her in close to him, he grips her head to his c.h.e.s.t and the two dance. Memories of his lost life fill the sorcerer's mind. But the warmth of the child against his c.h.e.s.t turns the nightmares of reality into a waking dream. Crow is robbed momentarily of the will to fight.

It was once told that the crow traded his skin for feathers, his hands for wings and his heart for freedom, the crow gave away the ability to feel warmth for the privilege to rise above the world. Did the crow get a good deal? Now to feel warmth the crow must take that warmth from another.

Ashley can do nothing to fight Crow, yet Crow is sedated for the moment. That moment brakes when a voice calls out in the darkness, Lucia is looking for Ashley.

***

As Trash stumbles clumsily around the maze of walls, a strange music starts to play, like a sick music box. The sound pulls at her like a mystic rope. All at once, the trance is broken by the sound of Ashley's scream. Trash, in a maternal panic, runs down the endless halls, chasing the child's voice. Chains, ropes, and banners drop from the ceiling, obstructing her path. A faint of metal grinding chases her, like the hollow sound of a fan blade on an aluminum cylinder.

Fading from light to light is a man that moves like a living shadow, dancing down the chamber in a maddening fashion. The hall makes a sharp right, and Trash clashes with the wall. It seems to be wooden here, with faded flower wallpaper. There are numbered doors along it, but the numbers are backward. Trash, struck with nostalgia, stops her chase momentarily to regroup. This is her home, or at least a good resemblance.

She looks from side to side for the hall she had left, but it is nowhere around. The ground is soft and soggy, and there's water on the walls, creating a fall-like effect as it rushes down to fall through the cracks in the floor. She walks slowly, dazed by her surroundings. The sound of cars outside, people on the street, the smell of drugs burning in the apartment—all remind of her preteen years, before her father came into her life, before her mother left it.

Thirty-three. This is my home, she thinks. She brings one hand up and touches a door. Her heart pounds hard. Something horrible is behind this door, she can feel it, but her hand goes for the handle nonetheless. The door opens, revealing a two-bedroom apartment. The smell of burnt food and cigarettes is pungent. There is a man asleep on the couch wearing cowboy boots; the TV is set to static, and an oily cracking sound can be heard. Trash turns to face the kitchen. In the kitchen, Trash's mother is standing over the stove in a red and white checkered dress. She is a tall, bony woman with thick, red hair. She is twitching in an inhuman way, head and shoulders and one arm jerking side to side.

"Ghost," she speaks in the high-pitched voice she always had, "you worthless cow, home already?" Trash backs toward the door; Trash's mother always called her Ghost when she was mad.

"Yes, Mother," her voice cracks fearfully. The smell of burning cider hunts the young women. Her mind will not except what her eyes are seeing. She can't be here, there is no here. Lucia's mind shouts.

Trash's mother turns slowly to face her. "And I'm sure you're bringing your needs and drama home with you." Her face is black and swollen, like a burning marshmallow. Her eyes are rolled up into her head and are filled with blood. She wisps across the room, as if a tape in fast-forward. Trash yelps and falls over backward in fear. "I told you to leave yesterday," she howls like a banshee. "Why are you back already?" The banshee-like mother flails her arms dramatically. "Do you want to hurt me?" She leans over Trash as the girl crawls away, half-paralyzed with panic.

"N-no, Mother," Trash stutters. Wake up, Wake up, she shouts in her thoughts.

The banshee lifts Trash to her feet and shoves her to the wall. "You like to hurt me and your father, don't you?" She brings up one hand threateningly.

"No!" Trash cowers from the hideous apparition.

The banshee places one hand on the wall to pin Trash against it. "You have been hurting me since before you were born."

"Don't touch me, Mama!" Trash sniffles as she raises her courage.

The banshee brings her hand down to slap the child.

Trash aggressively thrusts herself at the banshee. "Stop hitting me, Mama!" Trash hits her spectral mother with such rage that she stumbles partway across the room. Trash pants and cries as she marches toward the off-balance ghost. "You can't hurt me anymore, Mama!" She pushes the banshee over. "I called the police and they took you away." The girl turns her face from the nightmare image of her mother. "And they said you can't have me no more!" Trash crosses her arms and sobs.

Trash thinks back to her days with her mother. Her parent was neglectful and abusive. Her whole life was run by a drive to be with many men and live a life of flashing lights and music. Trash was an inconvenience to her and her life. Only a handful of months before meeting up with Pistol and his friends, Trash engaged in a fight with her mother. Her mother won. Trash, battered by her own mother with a rolling pin, called the cops. Trash's mother was thrown into prison for eight months for child abuse and six months for drug charges. She also lost all rights to her child. Lucia was sent to live with her father, but that was short lived also. It turns out that Lucia's mother just couldn't attract men that weren't abusive in one way or another.

As Trash struggles to overcome her emotions, the fake world of her dream fades back into the depths of her mind and she is faced instead with a room with six halls. The sound of the music box is becoming clearer. "Trash!" Ashley's voice comes from the left. Her sense of urgency renewed, she begins to run.

A number of yards down, a new room comes into sight. It has gray stone walls and is filled by a functioning merry-go-round, from which the music is emanating. Apparently asleep atop one of the horses, Ashley is still clad in Pistol's biker jacket. Trash runs to jump the railing to reach Ashley, but she is frozen by the sight of the black-cloaked man she had seen in the hall. Now he is hanging like a monkey by one arm from a nearby horse looking dead at her with his vexing, purple eyes.

"Freak!" she yells. "Stay away from her!" Crow hungrily curls his lip revealing his viper-like teeth. He lets go of the bar and floats over to Trash.

"Such loveliness; mayhap your veins will quench my thirst." Crow smiles at her.

"Have no fear, the child will suffer no more wickedness from me."

"You bastard, what did you do to her?"

"Nothing worse than I'm planning to do to you …" Crow approaches slowly with a devilish grin on his face.