Page 2 of Altar of Flesh

“What. . .” I wheezed.

Ahead of me was a worse sight. In a field of strange, prickly red flowers, several figures danced and whooped. They were dressed in cream-coloured sacks and were barefoot. Their faces were off-centre and drooping as if half melted. My chest seized at the sight of them, and I pressed back into the rock, unsure of myself or their friendliness. Their uncanny nature had me shivering—I knew they weren’t human, though they seemed akin to my form. Two legs, two arms, a head of hair, though theirs ran in wet, stringy clumps from their scalp. Demons, or spiritsand the like. Captivated, I ended up watching their work, which seemed to be little more than dancing and celebrating. They paid me no mind. Momentarily ghost-like, I could view all the secrets of their ceremony.

I did not question how I had moved. Distantly, I knew my human nature would be a bane here—I felt certain I would one day go insane if I could not reconcile my mortal mind with the impossibility of all I had experienced. But for now, I pushed upright, weight drooping as I clung to the rock for purchase.

“It is human,” a voice said, croaking and ancient. I blinked and looked up.

All five figures were suddenly in reaching distance. Five faces—all of them slumped and dripping, skin in pulled layers drooping down—were peering at me. Their eyes were entirely black, both the whites and the iris drowned in ink-like colour. I screamed unashamedly. They moved with speed, cackling and dancing. Their long hair and their bodies looked like facsimiles of women—witches, hags, crones. I felt that’s what they were, or what they were akin to. Four moved away and laughed and danced, but one lingered.

“Eat,” it told me. It knelt down and reached its fingers forward. They were long, spindly things, with more knuckles than any human hand could possibly bear. The skin faded to a mottled grey so that the fingers themselves were shrivelled. The sight of them conjured the thought of mummification, and the nails were overly long and sharp. With odd gentleness, it plucked one of the flowers from the ground and held it out to me.

I—whimpered. It twisted the stem of the flower between forefinger and thumb. The bloom danced, spinning as the crones did. I focused on it.

Stretched red petals bounced with the movement. The flower was unlike any I had seen, appearing elongated and deformed. It had filaments so long they tickled my nose, and with the flowerso close to me, it resembled some massive insect, antennas scraping at my lips.

“Eat,” the crone encouraged, and I seemed to have no preservation left in me. I enjoyed doing what I was told. Pathetically, I opened my mouth, and the creature pressed the bloom inside, nodding as I chewed.

Bitter flavour exploded on my tongue. The texture was soft and chewy, and I writhed as that awful, pervasive taste coated the inside of my mouth. I went to spit it out—and the creature was on me. It leapt up and pressed its hand over my mouth. I groaned and thrashed, but it was strong.

“Where art thou going?” the crone rasped. Gently, it scraped its long nails across my cheek and down onto my neck, where it massaged down my throat again and again until I swallowed.

I could feel the chewed flower as it slid down my throat, and I shivered in disgust, aware of its slow movement down my oesophagus. I thrashed again, and this time, the crone above me backed off. The creature, still on all fours, cocked its head and crept backwards until it was some distance from me.

Again, it asked, “Where art thou going?”

I did not know what to tell it. I worried it would keep me here with the rest of its fellows, preventing me from reaching my goal. But it was persistent. When I did not answer immediately, it croaked again, “Where art thou going?” and the rest of its brethren echoed the question whilst they danced and laughed.

I could have said Asmodeus, but I did not wish to reveal every secret of mine. I knew I must find one from each level of the hierarchy before I would come before Asmodeus, so I said, “I must find a President of Hell.”

The dancing stopped. This seemed to give them pause.

“To Malphas thou go,” a crone said. It pointed to its right, to my left—where the tower loomed in that grey distance, the red of the sun glowing violently at its back.

The distance baffled me. I coughed over a piece of that flower and sat up straighter. “How?” and then, immediately, “Will you take me?”

“We are not permitted to go there,” the crone in front of me said.

I blinked and felt somehow more in tune with my flesh. Frowning, I pressed a hand against my stomach and shook my head—which caused no nausea and no confusion. As I peeled my palm away, I saw with great delight that the wound on it had completely healed. Stigmata free, my flesh reborn. The same went for my feet, which had only the bloody smear of the old wound to prove there had ever been one.

The crone nodded at me as if to say, “Yes, I helped you,” and I did not know what to do with that knowledge. I had only my body to offer to thank it, and as much as I had told myself I did not mind what fucked me, these creatures disturbed me so wholly I wanted to rescind that statement.

“What did you feed me?” I whispered.

The crone pointed to another of the flowers it had pressed into my mouth. “Something of this plane, for thou to grow accustomed.”

“Walk this road and call out to Malphas,” another crone said. “Then they will come for thou.”

They watched me with equal parts interest and neutrality. I felt I’d had enough of this place and pushed up finally.

“Thank you,” I said, “for the flower.”

And I was told, “Thou may not like what thou wilt become during thy stay here.”

I spent moretime walking and navigating along the road, which became little more than a tiny path on a standalone ridge. The cliff fell away until I was walking on top of a thin road on a sharp slope. To my right, nothing but opaque foggy clouds and the cries of the damned. To the left, that sleek black city, though it now appeared so deep and impossible to reach that I did not dare step off the path.

In the distance, the path curved, but the light and the fog made it impossible to see its end. So I walked, and I called out the name Malphas as I had been told, though the name felt unfamiliar to me. I did not know to whom—or what—I called.

“Malphas!” I cried out. My voice was wicked away from me by the expanse and the wind. The sounds of the damned drowned out my plead, and I tried to cry out with desire and joy more so than fear, as if I could lace my words with heat and the demon would hear me over tortured screams. “Malphas, I call to you! I summon you! I want you!” I cried.

---