Happy Halloween everyone!
Well…perhaps not so "happy" considering what`s happening on USAs east coast this moment!
I hope you all are taking care of yourself and your families when the great "Sandy" or "Frankenstorm" are over your heads right now. I`m following the process from my computer and TV! Reading the latest news, seeing all the pictures and cameras shots from New York, New Jersey and Washington etc I can't help to shiver when I see these terribly pictures.
So, those of you that live in the northeast area, I pray for your life and welfare and hope this storm will be over soon!
Be strong and brave my friends, I don't want to lose any of you.
The Nightmare Catcher
Chapter 14.
Carrion opened his eyes and felt a warm sticky mess trailing out from his almost rotten nose. He didn't have his glass collar tonight so he wiped the nosebleed from his nose with a gentle swipe, careful not to let the blood drip on his black nightshirt.
Getting up he walked fast and looked at himself in a small mirror hanging on the wall. He hated to see his disgusting reflection. He hadn't had a nosebleed for years!
Look at this! His veins were still flooded with blood. Warm blood!
His vision was blurred and his heart was pumping. He had no idea what had happened, but a sudden headache washed over him and sweat poured down his face.
He was still young man and the ability to control his nightmares and give them a physical form was still developing. The effort to get them out from his mind was still difficult… and pretty bloody.
Before he had come up with the idea to penetrate the back of his head with two tubes, since the only way to letting his nightmares out was either from his mouth and nose. But none of the options was not very pleasant to use. Using the mouth made him gag and almost throw up each time. The nose was easier, but it still caused a tremendous nosebleed, a great headache and it wasn`t very good for his nose either. Because of the gastric acid from his stomach, his nose had started to wither.
Carrion swayed a bit in front of the mirror, a gesture the reflection dutifully followed.
What`s the cause of this strange reaction?
Walking quickly to his desk, Carrion opened one of the drawers and pulled out a small black box. He ran his fingers across the box, mumbling something before removing the latch.
His damn mind chose that moment to bring back those images he had wished to banish from his thoughts.
His nightmares with whom he always inhabited this dark realm called his mind, the place where he is the God of pleasurable and horrible dreams. But ever since Candy Quakenbush had entered Abarat, his dreams had started to focus on her and his former love, princess Boa. Sometimes it was Candy, sometimes it was Boa who haunted him. Tempted him with promises of love, friendship and happiness. Deep in his heart he knew it would never come true, and to avoid this seductive torture he now rarely slept.
But this strange dream was different. Very different!
He remembered that she had been standing with her back to him on the main balcony on Castle Inqustict highest tower. Her black locks hung loosely around her shoulders. Her dark blue dress fluttered in the wind while she held in her hands a bouquet of night flowers.
He had moved closer. Was it his Boa or was it Candy this time? Their backs were similar. She started to turn around and he had stopped walking. Always in his dreams he expected her to look at him with a tender smile on her face. In this dream he had tried to reach her. Just simply to hold her, kiss her, to tell her how much he loved her and begging her for forgiveness of his crimes. He hadn't cared if he revealed these emotions to Boa or Candy. For him it felt they both were one and same person.
But that time it hadn't been Boa! It wasn`t even Candy!
It was that girl from Wormwood!
The hair, the dress and posture had been Boa's but instead of her innocent face was that girl's cold face, looking straight at him.
That angry, arrogant and foolish girl who had had the nerve to scream at him and call him… "Pathetic!"
How dared she invade his mind and nightmares? Letting her face replace the pure image of the princess he loved and the girl Candy that he desired to understand and control. She hadn't deserved to be there. That was his realm; he was the ruler in his dreams and nightmares and he was going to show her, that mere illusion, that he didn't tolerate trespassers, not even in his mind.
Concentrating hard he had made the long blue gown to shrink. All the ribbons, jewels, the long sleeves and the soft silk disappeared on her body, leaving on her thin body a plain white linen, more like a sterile hospital gown. Her feet and legs were bare. Her blond hair disheveled. This lack of clothes had made her look skinny and vulnerable.
The beautiful balcony and the atmosphere were changed and turned into a sterile hallway. The floor had become shiny and yet dull. The walls had become clean but the color was boring in state of greyish blue. It was light but everything was grey, grey and grey. Clean and sterile!
Strange? How had he come up this vision? A hallway?! Like a hallway in a hospital.
But he had missed the opportunity to watch his nightmare feed her fears to Wormwood. To watch her face distort in agony and horror as his nightmare fed on her fears. That had been his chance and she was ready to be executed.
The girl fingers had still grasped the blood red night flowers in her hands; but then she had moved her left hand and squeezed the soft petals hard so a strange red liquid came out through her fingers and dropped over her white gown.
The small stems of the ruined flowers had begun to move and wiggle in her hand and had started to move up over her bare arms like small snakes. Holding her arms up, he saw the strange creatures trailing over her arms, her chest, her shoulders, neck and through her ash blond hair. The colors of their skins had changed from green into a mass of colorful and bright lights.
Carrion had observed the girl's face.
She hadn't reacted at all to the sudden transformation. She showed no fear.
She had looked straight forward towards him but she hadn't seen him. Moving closer he had seen that her eyes were blank and dreamy, like she was blind. She reached her hands up grabbed one of the creatures and moved it closer to her face. Her grey eyes looked at the creatures small head like in trance. Her face hadn't given away any emotions. Then she looked down on the other comrades over her body. Picking them up one by one, she had examined them closely.
Her stare conveyed no emotion. And at first, he had doubted that he heard correctly when she suddenly whispered.
"I don't understand…why are there so many? I didn't remember there were so many!?"
Carrion had regarded her for a long time, then leaned forward and took one of the creatures from her hair and had held it in his hands.
"Don't you feel anything? No fear?" he had softly whispered.
"No…I don't but…I should!? I just saw many terrible things just a moment ago. Corpses, maggots, monsters… death. Things a normal man would die in fright of…but I didn't feel anything when I saw it. This is my dream?"
The Lord of midnight had stood over her, watching her with the smile like a mildly amused father.
Was she a ghost? He always heard of trapped spirits unable to move on because of unfinished business or unjust death. She wasn't the first ghost, spirit or illusion who tried to haunt his dreams. His lack of fear, the immunity to horror and his sharp sense that he was just dreaming made it easy for him to erase and destroy them.
"Your dream? This is my dream and you are invading it my dear."
She had raised her hands in a defensive gesture, still not looking at him. "No! This is my dream, but why don't I feel anything?"
"Because you`re merely an illusion. An illusion created from my mind though I don't understand why. You are not worthy to be here! This place belongs to me and my princess." Carrion had said coldly.
Still not looking at him a small smug smirk appeared on her face. "I don't have any wish to be a princess! Being an princesses means you will only die slow and painful death in the end!" She had broke out into hysterical laughter. The girl laughed like a maniac, holding her stomach with her hands as she kneeled down on the floor. "D-Doesn't m-matter if you`re a good or a bad princess. All princesses die…" The laughing had stopped and looking up through her tangled mess of hair, her eyes glowed as she smiled at him, showing him all her white sharp teeth's in her mouth. "But some princesses deserve it and Boa certainly earned it. Don't you think?"
Seconds before, he almost felt pity for her but mocking his beloved Boa made his rage started to flood trough his veins. He couldn't help to grind his teeth's hard as he looked down at the girls shaking form.
Just as he was about to enclose her slender neck with his long fingers, she had reached out and grabbed his wrist and finally glared up at him. The creatures over her body began to meld with each other, transforming into a gigantic shimmering Nightmare. The skin shone with a light brilliance reminded him of his own nightmares when they were "happy". It had begun to move closer to Carrion.
She had shakily placed her hands in his, wrapping her fingers hard into his cold ones. "Idiot," she had told him. "This is my dream and I want you to leave it."
Suddenly the creature sent out a zap of electricity that shot through his hand and arm and into him. His whole body became numb and his eyes saw stars and flashings; then there had been the most painful but wonderful feeling he ever felt in his entire life.
The images of his beautiful and terrifying nightmares in his head always had suddenly disappeared. The girl, or was it the creatures light, had strangled his terrors and all he could feel was nothing. It had felt so peaceful and quiet that he let himself drift away, losing track of time. In this moment his dark memories didn't clench around his heart and throat with sadness, regrets and terrors.
The bad things were forgotten by this intruding, but something was ripping apart.
Opening his eyes he had looked down. The force of the girl was weakening. Tears had streamed down the girls face as she screamed. Not in terror, not in pain… He didn't know if she saw the inner parts of his soul, like Candy had in Dead Man's house but that wasn't the reason for her despair.
This kind of pain wasn`t this kind of pain he loved to watch, taste and feel.
It was something else...pain that had nothing do with ugly monsters, torture or horror.
A presence he hadn't felt in four years but now was coming back.
Then he had heard another sound, this slight bang with an echo. It had startled him and by instinct he had spun around. That was when he had seen it.
Feeling his muscles tense unwillingly and unable to move, Carrion had stood in stunned silence as dark shadowy arms extended towards him and the girl; he couldn't see a face or a complete body but it branched out in a thousand directions like watery ink running down a page, covering everything into complete darkness. It had removed Carrion's hand from the girl and like black silk it had wrapped around her, covering her from head to toe like a cocoon and was ready to take him too.
"Leave." Was all Carrion heard from this strange creature.
In this moment Carrion awoke, sitting in his armchair in the library…all alone.
He had felt…afraid?
A feeling he rarely felt because he had seen too many horrors and pain in his life. He was the Lord of Midnight. But there was something about this moment that was just so…epic.
Back in the present, Carrion growled, tightening his grip around the girl's pendant. The temptation to throw into the fire or out from the window was there but he didn't do it.
Why didn't he simply do it? Why keep this trash from a girl who had insulted him and called him "pathetic" and "lovesick puppy" and showed up and gave him…this "nightmare".
He had no answer for that…
Damn it. Nothing was right anymore.
Were they out to get him again? Were they going to try to plague him in every resting moment? Why did this girl outshine both Boa and Candy? His heart was beating faster but he didn't feel any soft feelings for her.
Why?
Was she still alive? Despite his having given her one of his worst "nightmares"? Impossible! But where was his nightmare he had so kindly given a decent meal of fear? It wasn't in the red bedroom when he went back to fetch it.
He needed to find out! He needed to find out who she was and where she was.
Immediately!
Carrie bolted up from her bed like she had gotten an electric shock, panting heavily. She was covered with sweat and her palms were bloody; she realized she had dug her nails into her skin while she sleeping.
Her eyes searched the darkened room for any signs of danger or monsters. She checked under her bed just in case. Leila had warned that sometimes Boggarts or rats could make a temporary nest here and these neighbors weren`t pleasant to have right under her mattress.
All coasts were clear and she slumped back against her pillows, her blond curls in disarray, trying to restrain her erratic breathing and slow her racing heart.
"What kind of nightmare was that?"
She couldn't remember exactly. Visions of terrifying beasts, maggots crawling and eating on rotten corpses. A dead man hanging in a gallows, his stomach open and all his guts hanging outside. He wasn't alone. Dozens of unfortunate victims were hanging beside him. All with open stomachs and over their heads crows were flying, getting ready to feast on the corpses. She saw Bloodsucking Bats, man-eating flower and gigantic Wasps with black eyes and sharp stingers with poisonous venom in them.
She saw them, they repulsed her but she didn't feel anything…nothing at all. She felt numb. She didn't care on what she saw.
When she turned around the images disappeared and with clear eyes she had seen Christopher Carrion coming out from the darkness, looking down at her. She had said something to him but she couldn't remember what. Suddenly her head felt like someone had dug a sharp knife through it. Making a open wound that poured out all her hidden emotions. It was so painful!
Then suddenly something wrapped like long cold fingers around her head and body and everything went black.
That was the moment she woke up from this terrible nightmare, feeling her heart beat quickly inside her chest.
It wasn't that she was unused to nightmares, she knew what kind of nightmares she mostly dreamt of but this nightmare was different. Never before she had felt…exposed and helpless, like she was a little girl again. She stroked her nose with the backside of her hand and noticed the nosebleed on it.
Nosebleed again! She shuddered.
It had felt like he had tried to rape her secrets and memories from her. Trying to see what was inside of her head. The bed creaked as she moved into a fetal position and tugged the blanket over her head, trying to ignore the awful feeling that started to make small knocks in her stomach.
Suddenly Carrie froze.
Who turned the light on?
Her breath left her momentarily but then she remembered. Eyes snapping open, Carrie gazed down over her right arm; it was her "dear Snake", her own personal night lamp.
It glowed with light grey blue color and under the skin; small white bolts pulsed up to the Snake's head, creating a bright light like a small lamp. It seemed to be very content and very fat. Like It had just eaten a very good meal and now was very tired.
Using this opportunity and without warning, she grabbed the snake by the edge of the tail and stood up. Walking to the window she opened it. Checking no one was outside Carrie tossed the Snake out and down into the street, two floors down.
"Next time you interrupt my sleep, I will use the shaker again!" She hissed.
Closing the window and with a tired groan she let herself drop back onto the bed. Taking her sketchbook from the top-drawer, she opened a page. Holding a sharp pen in her irritated and shaken hand, she started to sketch.
Ten minutes later she was pleased with the result and she felt more calm and safe. Carrie tucked the sketchbook back in the drawer and laid her now calm head down on her pillow.
It was just a terrible dream, nothing else! It wouldn't come back again.
In a couple of minutes, she could hear something in the distance; banging, banging and banging again.
Her eyes after minor resistance opened and stared at the window. It was black outside (as always.) but Snake was back, glowing, its tails and petal head hitting the window. It made a light sound with Its "mouth". Like an annoying cat.
Carrie tried to ignore it but the repeating sound was getting unnerving. She placed the pillow over her head.
"Go and torture someone else, just let me sleep in peace!" she moaned. Moments later the banging stopped and Snake was gone from her sight. She took a deep breath and began to fall into, this time a deep dreamless sleep.
If Carrie wasn't so tired and angry, she might have been more careful with her words.
Obeying the new masters every command and will, the Snake took her orders very seriously.
Great Thanks to Rutoh-Chan for helping me with the grammar and the tenses! Thank you :-)
Reviews please!