Page 54 of The Flesh Remembers
James barked a cold laugh and flung Fairfax against the adjacent wall. The doctor gasped, knees hitting the floor. Before he could rise, Lord Blackwood smoothly intervened, grabbing Dr. Fairfax by the collar with one hand, smirking as the doctor struggled. “Why return here if not to see how far we’ve gone? Perhaps your moral sense can’t resist the lure, hmm? You know you wish to witness the success of our years of work. You are not so very different from me, though you would like to believe it. Eh, dear doctor?”
The tension soared, a hush of disbelieving shock among the gathered staff. Eleanor realized Dr. Fairfax was cornered, orchestrated by Blackwood. Some primal part of the night’s mania latched onto the confrontation. She glimpsed robed acolytes approaching, eyes glazed with erotic frenzy. They pressed upon Dr. Fairfax, forcibly tugging at his clothes, their murmured chanting swirling into a half-lustful haze.
The entire scene threatened to become another forced display: Dr. Fairfax forcibly drawn into an erotic ritual he fiercely opposed. He struggled, voice ragged, as multiple hands pinned him, half threatening to tear his garments.James watched with a sardonic tilt of his head, as though curious whether the doctor would succumb or fight.
Eleanor felt a surge of pity and alarm. She tried to step forward, but James clasped her arm, shaking his head in silent command. The moment bristled with explosive tension. Would they force Dr. Fairfax into compliance? Or devour his spirit if he resisted?
Just when it seemed Dr. Fairfax might be battered or coerced into a humiliating act, Lord Blackwood raised a hand, halting the acolytes. He turned to the doctor, voice cruelly calm. “Don’t fret, dear Fairfax. Your role in the final ceremony is not to be squandered here. We have bigger plans, tomorrow night,” he announced, his tone ringing through the corridor. “That is when we complete the final reanimation. And you all shall attend or be consumed.”
A hush settled, each occupant trembling with conflicting waves of terror, arousal, and exhaustion. Dr. Fairfax sagged, chest heaving, relieved that Blackwood had stayed the staff’s assault. Yet the knowledge that tomorrow’s rite promised an even more monstrous ceremony overshadowed any fleeting sense of safety.
James licked his lips, turning back to Eleanor, his half-living flesh pressing warmly against her once more. She shivered, caught between the horrifying spectacle of near sexual violence around them and her unstoppable craving for him. Blackwood nodded smugly. “So, we have our final date. No more trifling. No more escapes.” He turned to Dr. Fairfax. “Stay or go. But know if you attempt sabotage, you will meet a far harsher end.”
Eleanor shut her eyes, her pulse a drumbeat of dread and defiance. The corridor stank of sweat and blood, the cloying musk of decay mingling with the acrid bite of burnt incense. The air felt alive, pressing against her skin, heavy with the weight of unspeakable acts yet to come. Tomorrow would bethe breaking point: a ritual steeped in savagery that might tether James to life, or damn them all to an abyss they couldn’t escape.
She inhaled shakily, the sour tang of fear thick on her tongue. There was no turning back. No escape. Whatever James had become, whatever she had allowed herself to want, it had already bound her to him in ways she could no longer deny. She found resignation and resolve in the devastating collision of desire and despair.
When the morning came, she would face it. And if hell awaited them, she would walk into it willingly, hand in hand with the monster she could not let go.
Excerpt from the diary of Dr. Eleanor Ashcroft
I can no longer deny it; Lord Blackwood is the very essence of deceit and cruelty. My fury toward him grows with each passing moment, blazing hotter than I thought possible. How many lives has he twisted; how many fates has he destroyed in his quest for power? And I, like a moth to the flame, have been drawn into his web of lies. Every step of this journey has been manipulated, every choice I thought was mine, steered by his invisible hand. How dare he presume to control me, to bind me to his monstrous designs?
Yet, beneath this anger lies something darker, something I am ashamed to acknowledge. It feels like the pendant forced upon me feeds this fire within, stoking my hatred and twisting it into something nearly feral. Its weight hangs heavily around my neck, a constant reminder of his dominance. I can feel it pulsating, as though alive,whispering poisonous thoughts into the recesses of my mind. The necromantic sigil etched upon it seems to crawl beneath my skin, amplifying my rage, distorting my perspective.
I hate him, I genuinely do. But how much of this hatred is my own? Is this fury born of my heart, or has Blackwood’s cursed pendant poisoned even this? The thought terrifies me. I cannot trust my emotions, not anymore. The lines between what I feel and what the pendant wants me to feel blur more with each passing hour.
Despite everything, I must keep my focus. The ritual looms ever closer, with it, the chance to save James or lose him forever. I cannot allow Blackwood’s machinations or this accursed pendant to distract me from what truly matters. I must stay strong, though the storm within me threatens to tear me apart. For James, for the man he was, I will endure.
But I will not forget. Blackwood has underestimated me, and when this is over, he will answer for everything he has done. I swear it.
The Walls Have Ears
The city surrounding the clinic buzzed with unease. In taverns and alleys, whispers of grotesque rituals and unspeakable orgies had begun to spread. A gravedigger claimed he’d seen corpses exhumed by shadowy figures late at night, their broken forms dragged into the clinic’s unknown depths. A prostitute spoke of clients with strange markings on their bodies, murmuring about “feeding the dark field” as they shivered in lustful delirium. Even the clergy muttered warnings of a cursed place defiling the sanctity of life.
The authorities, initially reluctant to investigate a facility with such a previously pristine public façade, could no longer ignore the rising tide of fear. A magistrate dispatched two constables to inquire under the guise of a routine inspection, their approach veiled but their intent unmistakable.
Eleanor stood at a window overlooking the city, her pale fingers clutching the edge of the sill. She could see them: two men in black coats speaking with a merchant whose stall faced the clinic’s gates. Every word exchanged seemed to sharpen the tension suffocating the clinic’s inhabitants.
Behind her, Blackwood’s voice hissed like a serpent. “The walls have ears, Eleanor. Do not give them reason to hear us.”
She turned, startled by his sudden proximity. His piercing gaze pinned her to the spot. “Do you doubt our secrecy?” she asked, worry cracking her voice.
Blackwood’s lips curled into a cruel smile. “I doubt nothing. But I punish doubt mercilessly."
The clinic’s interior had transformed into a hive of frantic activity. Blackwood’s robed acolytes swept through the halls, gathering novices and staff into darkened chambers where whispered loyalty oaths were extracted. Any hesitation, even the flicker of a nervous glance, was met with swift and merciless correction.
Eleanor stumbled upon one such correction as she wandered the halls, her mind clouded with visions of James. A group of acolytes stood encircling a trembling novice, his tear-streaked face pale with terror. Blackwood’s voice echoed through the room, low and commanding.
“You whispered to an outsider,” Blackwood intoned, his tone devoid of anger but heavy with promise. “Do you know the price of betrayal?”
The novice fell to his knees, sobbing. “I swear I didn’t mean”
"Silence." Blackwood’s hand rose, and the room stilled as if the air obeyed him. "Your tongue spun threads of doubt. Now your body will bind them into the fabric of our resolve."
At his command, the novice was stripped and bound to an iron frame etched with necromantic runes. Blackwood motioned for an attendant to bring a ceremonial whip, its tails tipped with shards of glass that glimmered like stars. Yet it wasn’t the physical pain alone that made the punishment unbearable.
As each lash struck, the runes on the frame glowed, somehow siphoning the novice’s pain and sexual desire into the very air. A low hum filled the room, and a peculiar, throbbing warmth spread through the assembled crowd. Eleanor shivered, feeling the galvanic energy seep into her skin, igniting those forbidden desires she had tried to forget.
