Lemarchand's Legacy

By SarahFish

Chapter 1

I was born the night that Alexandra Palace burned nearly to the ground, less than a fortnight after its opening. Living in the country, we thankfully managed to avoid the commotion, as well as the smoke, and I was born healthy, pink, and screaming. The only other excitement in the house that night, Nanima later told me, was the fight that erupted after my father told my mother that he hoped that the two events – that is, the fire and my birth – coinciding was not a portent of things to come. It seems my mother always was a humorless, short-tempered woman. Yet I wonder if perhaps that even then my Father suspected something of what was to come, and if it was, in fact, the hint of truth in his words that set my Mother's blood boiling.

But never mind that yet. For now, you must understand that our estate was a magical place for a child to grow up. I came from a family of naturalists – my parents had traveled the length and width of Europe, Asia, and Africa, and my father's father had sailed the world on the Beagle with that most astounding of heretics, Charles Darwin. Our home, therefore, served as a museum for all the artifacts collected over the years, and nothing was off limits to me as a child. No object, that is, save for one – a little black lacquered chest which sat on my Mother's bedside table. Yet so absorbed was I in other pursuits, that I gave this one forbidden thing little thought.

My early years were happy. I remember how my Indian nanny – Nanima, I called her – dressed me in red silks like a little harlot, and taught me to dance with bells on my wrists and ankles. Father would laugh and clap, keeping time for me. Other times, I would stomp about Father's study wearing one of his grotesque carved masks from darkest Africa – masks as long as I was tall – pretending to be a Fearsome Native Warrior. A thousand other pursuits were not only allowed, but encouraged. And for a while, we were happy.

But then, quite suddenly, my Father died. When I went to bed one evening, he was sitting in his study, engrossed in some book. The next morning, he was gone. I was four years old, yet still I remember awakening to my Mother's shrieks that night. A gloom descended over our home after that, and I found that none of the artifacts or my toys – so recently fascinating to me – bore any interest. None save one – that one object among hundreds that was absolutely forbidden to me.

The chest had been on my Mother's bedside table for as long as I could remember. Ebony and copper, it was a darkly beautiful thing, and one I knew well was completely forbidden to my wandering fingers. A family treasure not meant for little hands, Mother had said once, before promising to tell me about it when I was old enough to understand.

But how many times in the weeks and months after Father's death did I find myself creeping into the bedroom while Mother was engrossed in her sewing, and Nanny in a novel? How often did I run my hands over the chest, watching the reflected light from the oil lamps or a wayward sunbeam reflected in the wood? It became an obsession, one I indulged myself in at every possible moment.

I loved the feel of the polished wood and the cool metal hinges and ornate locks beneath my fingertips. Once or twice I thought I could hear movement in the box – a soft rustling or a chiming of bells faint and far away. But whenever I tried to open it, I found it, as always, locked.

One night when I was five, I found myself, as I often did, creeping across the floor of Mother's bedroom to examine the chest. Though I'd grown a full inch that spring, I was still too small to see atop the table clearly, and so I'd brought along a sturdy book, almost as heavy as I was, to stand on. Placing it on the floor beside the table, I climbed up on it, coming face-to-face with my own reflection in the polished wood of the chest.

I was surprised at how warm it was under my touch. It seemed an odd thing, especially as the first chill of Autumn was already in the air. But the dark chest was warm, almost as though it had been sitting out in the sun. On a whim, I tugged on the lid, not expecting anything, not really.

It opened.

A faint tinkling of bells filled the room in a disjointed melody. A music box. The chest was a music box. I stood on tiptoe to peer inside. The candlelight gleamed across something metallic. I could almost make out the contents, could almost see the mysterious object inside the chest. I stretched as tall as I could, and reached in, pulling back a bit of black silk, straining against the dim light to see.

"What are you doing?!"

I jumped at my Mother's voice, and my foot slipped. The book I'd been standing on slid from beneath me, and I was falling backward, grabbing at the table to stop myself. My hand caught the tablecloth, and I pulled it with me, spilling everything that had been atop the table onto the floor. The chest hit the ground and a small wooden box spilled out of it. It bounced across the marble floor, sliding to a stop at Mother's feet.

She scooped up the box, and without warning her hands were on me, raining down blows and slaps upon any part of me she could reach. Here an open palm to my face, there a glancing blow on my shoulder and as a tried to run away.

"I told you to never ever go near that chest!" she screamed. "Why was it open?! Never touch it again!! Never!" Mother snatched me up by my long braids as she threw the box into the chest, slamming down the lid where it latched with a soft click.

Then her hands were on me again as she dragged downstairs and out into the garden where she cut a willow switch. There in the garden she tore my dress off, and beat me with that switch until I bled, until stripes covered my stomach, my legs, my back, all the while screaming, "Why was it open?? I told you never to go near it! Do you understand that? Never! Why was it open? Damn you, why was it open?"

I vaguely recall Nanima rushing out into the garden, trying to shield me from Mother's wrath, but to no avail. Her only reward was several sharp lashes on the backs of her hands, which left deep gashes. Mother beat me until my body was raw and I could cry no more. And when she had exhausted herself from the beating, she left me, naked and bleeding beneath the willow, too furious still to bring me inside.

It was Nanima who carried me into the house that night. Nanima who bathed me with her own bruised and cut hands, and she who slathered my wounds in ointment and bandaged them. After tucking me into bed, she slipped me a chocolate, sneaked from Mother's own store, and a few sips of brandy. The liquor warmed my belly, dulled the pain, brought a haze of drowsiness over my eyes. Still, Nanima fetched a book, curled into bed and read to me. I realize now it was most likely to soothe her own nerves, as much as mine – yet I was grateful for her presence, as well as her voice as she read from the Bhagavad Gita.

"Tell me who are you in such a fierce form? My salutations to you. Oh best of Gods, be merciful! I wish to understand you, the primal being, because I do not know your mission.

The supreme Lord said: I am become death, the mighty destroyer of the world, out to destroy. Even without your participation all the warriors standing arrayed in the opposing armies shall cease to exist.

Therefore, get up and attain glory. Conquer your enemies and enjoy a prosperous kingdom. All these have already been destroyed by Me. You are only an instrument, Oh Arjuna."

Krishna and Arjuna rambled on, in Nanima's low, melodic voice. Though I fought it, the two combined to start lulling me into sleep. "Read my favorite," I interrupted, growing impatient with their conversation, fighting the edge of sleep. She went silent, and for a moment I feared I'd upset her. Then, the pages shifted, and her voice filled the room again.

"Arjuna saw the Universal Form of the Lord with many mouths and eyes, and many visions of marvel, with numerous divine ornaments, and holding divine weapons.

Wearing divine garlands and apparel, anointed with celestial perfumes and ointments, full of all wonders, the limitless God with faces on all sides.

If the splendor of a thousand suns were to blaze forth all at once in the sky, even that would not resemble the splendor that that exalted being."

She hardly finished the passage before I dropped off into a deep, blessedly dreamless sleep.

This story is for entertainment purposes only. All characters are the sole property of their respective owners. I am not making any kind of financial gain from posting this.

Quick note from your author - Be aware that this story is based more heavily on the novella The Hellbound Heart (which inspired Hellraiser) than it is the films. While the story you're reading does have its share of Everyone's Favorite Cenobite (or "That fucker with the pins nailed into his head," as Clive Barker once called him), the cenobites are...well... a bit different...