Lucifer Ch. 03: Ouroboros

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“Ow. Ow. Ow, damn!” I wince and shake out my arm, the angry bees all around me buzzing and swarming to drive me off. The black, glossy scales on my skin are nearly impenetrable to stings, save for the softer flesh at my wrists and elbows, and that’s what they’re aiming for.

“I told you to wrap your arms…” comes a snotty slither of Akkadian from the base of this acacia tree I’m in.

“Ow!” I swat at another damned bee stinging my wrist, then growl down to the man lounging at the roots below. “You spout so much bullshit I hardly know what to bother with! Ow!”

“I think you like getting stung, Darling. You’re spending a lot of time up there, and I hardly see any reward.”

Damnit. I crawl forward along the branch and pull the small hand axe from my belt. The hive’s just inside the hollow spot just beneath me, and I start chopping a hole. More bees start pouring out, some battering me in my scaled face. One confused but willing worker even charges into my mouth, but I spit it back out again. “Marut, the smoke!”

I clutch at the branch with my taloned fingers, ducking my head to let my scales and hair protect me until I feel a light pat at my shoulder. Peering out from beneath my arm, I see him holding up a small bundle of wrapped grasses and bark. Smoke pours out of it, and I take it up and waft it in front of the hive. The fury of the bees wanes, and when I finally have a moment, I tuck the smoking bundle into some thorns, toss the axe to the ground, and reach into the hive with my scaled hand.

Sluggish bees do their best, but I carefully twist and pull out chunks of honeycomb. Looking at the golden syrup that drips over my fingers in the sunlight, I grin and call, “Marut! There’s a lot in here!”

“I’ll get a bucket.” While he wanders over to his pack, I start to lick at my fingers, my tongue curling around my talons one at a time to steal the sweetness away. Within moments I feel another pat on my shoulder, and I look over and see Marut reaching up with a bucket that was clearly once a soldier’s helmet. In some places the land is littered with them, left behind after battles, and it’d be a shame to let useful metal go to waste. I dump the honeycomb into it, then reach inside the hive to pull out more. In a few minutes the helmet’s filled to overflowing and Marut carries it away, giving me space to climb back down.

It’s tricky business, backing down a tree covered in thorns, especially when you feel the need to rush because your companion is probably glutting himself on all your hard work. I admit that my impatience wins out and I slip, falling the last ten feet to land on my back on the hard dirt, leaving me to cough and groan as I slowly withdraw my scales and talons. The white skin beneath shows once more, dusted now with ruddy dirt.

I’m busy laying there, chastising myself for my misstep, when Marut enters my field of vision. He’s so irritatingly handsome – his tan eyes glittering even in the shade with delight at everything he sees. The man’s tall and slender, his skin a honeyed tan, and his hair is full and black, as ever shaved at the sides of his head while a crest grows long down the center. He crouches slowly next to me, suckling his bare, black-nailed fingers with obvious relish. “Here I am,” he muses down at me, “portioning the harvest into pots, toiling and sweating in the sun while you lie here in the shade.” He pauses and pouts. “I’m starting to think we have an unequal relationship, and that gets me right here,” he fake whimpers, patting his bare chest over his heart.

All I can do is narrow my eyes and wheeze out my annoyance. Unable to actually speak my mind, I send my thoughts to his directly. If you could match even a sliver of my greatness, perhaps we would be peers of any sort, you obnoxious cur.

Marut giggles. “Obnoxious cur! Now that’s a new one.” I roll my eyes as he gently helps me up to sit, checking me over for damage greater than a bruised ego. Finding none, he pats my shoulder and hands me my gray robe, a light thing made of linen. He wears a pair of loose black pants, tied at his slender waist and clinging just barely. Golden bracelets glitter and clink on his ankles and wrists, adornments for fashion only. I no longer have mine, but my key still hangs from a chain around his neck, a symbol of my trust in him.

My own pants are light gray and, by now, torn and ripped. My vanity hurts a little every time we go looking for honey, but if it takes slowly sacrificing only one pair of pants to get sweets then so be it. I tug the tunic over my head and smooth it down, tucking it in beneath the belt. Wait, where’s my axe? I only realize just now that I plummeted twice my standing height to the ground and am very lucky I didn’t land on the blade, which I take a moment to scoop up and tuck into its sheath. To be fair, I think dumb luck has been what’s preserved me all this time.

I’m shaken from my reverie when I eryaman escort hear Marut call from a distance, “My god, what’s it going to take? Must I dip my cock in honey for you to come over and have some?” Somehow he’s far ahead of me on our way back to the campsite, a pleasant spot located in the sheltering shade of a large rocky outcropping.

“Possibly! Why don’t you try it?” I shout back, smirking. “If I don’t lick you clean, the ants surely will.”

He grimaces and shudders, the wing demarcation on his back shifting within his skin, his palms rubbing together in thought as he continues to walk. The wind isn’t high right now, but even so it plucks at our hair and clothing, kicking up dust from the flat lands beyond these foothills. I’m not sure where we are – we’ve been wandering for years now on an extended vacation, and so far haven’t run into any trouble. We might be back in the lands of Babylon, but I’m sure they’re called something else now. Much as I liked him, Nebuchadnezzar’s line fizzled out shortly after him, and all his lands were taken up by Persians for quite some time.

That hit Marut very hard, and since then we haven’t committed to any kingdom or cause if we didn’t have to. I can’t quite recall how Marut negotiated my freedom with Cyrus the Great, but I know that when the Jewish hostages were allowed to go home, I wasn’t counted among them. Despite never knowing for certain, I think that negotiations for Babylon’s control fell to Marut because his blood was royal. When he’d said that he’d raised Nebuchadnezzar like a son and loved him as such, I’d at first thought it was symbolic. I don’t think that anymore, but as my companion doesn’t like talking about it, I don’t push. Suffice it to say, Cyrus must have acknowledged something, because Marut left with me, and in exchange entrusted his beloved city to the lands of Persia.

///

Later in the evening, I lay on a blanket on top of the outcropping and look up at the stars. The taste of delicious roasted hare dipped in honey is still on my tongue, and I’m relaxed and untroubled. Marut lingers by the fire and tends to our supplies, sharpening blades with a whetstone as he sings softly to himself. Despite being a mouthy brat, he’s always been invested in keeping our supplies in good condition and number. When I first met him he was a general in the royal army that had captured Jerusalem, and I suppose that ever-ready mindset never fades.

He’s so young, as far as angels go. Only a few centuries old at best, he’s already accomplished so very much. Despite my age, he makes me feel as young as I look, challenging me to try new things and go to new places. I’m not sure what he sees in me, but he’s as devoted a mate as I could have ever hoped for – generous and affectionate but honest enough to tell me when I’m wrong or being too stubborn about something. But more than that, he accepts me despite all the baggage I carry… and trust me, there’s a lot of it. He’s never been anything but patient and understanding, and so I try to be all of those things for him.

In spite of my meditations on our relationship, I notice something now on the breeze. A smell. Horses. Human beings. There must be a great deal of them if the scent is that noticeable over the juniper bushes further down the slope. “Marut? Marut!” I crawl over the edge of the rock and peer down, my long black hair draping over my skinny white shoulders. He looks up at me with some surprise, and I point into the wind.

The smoke gets in his way, so he gets up and walks to the edge of the camp, closing his eyes and breathing in. “That’s a scouting party. What would they be doing here?” He manifests his black and gold feathered wings and alights onto my rock, crouching next to me as we both peer towards the origin of the smell to the north.

“Here? Where’s here?” I mumble, manifesting my own all-black pinions.

“We’re three day’s march north-east of Ninevah.” I look back over my shoulder at him, dipping a wing in disbelief, and he smirks. “What, you don’t chart the stars?”

I huff and roll my eyes before peering back northwards. I’m too curious to be still, so I flare my wings and push off the rock, circling up over our fire to gain altitude and a better view. The night’s overcast, so getting a sense of the size of this force, at this point still some miles away, is difficult. It certainly looks like a scouting party, but it’s hard to tell – they’re riding dark-furred horses and wearing black cloaks. I fly closer, narrowing my eyes against the wind, when I hear the whine of an arrow sail past me.

I back-wing, hovering for a moment in confusion, and then a second arrow fired from my right lands squarely in my thigh. I cry out in pain and flap hard, not caring about recon any longer in favor of getting away as fast as I can. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” I hiss, reaching down and trying to grip at the shaft, which is already slippery with my blood. It’s not coming out, and the more time I waste in the eryaman escort bayan air the better their chances of hitting me again.

Without delay I race back to our camp, feeling sicker and sicker with every passing moment. Marut, help! I project out to him, and just as I start to feel myself getting woozy, I see him in the air, curving around to start flying right over me. His long arms scoop me up just in time before my wings give out and he brings us back to the ground, laying me down by the fire so he can get a look at what’s happened.

“They shot me!” I grumble, irritated that the stars are tilting and swirling when I know I’m staying still.

He grimaces, bracing a hand on my leg. “I need to get this out right now. Here, bite this.” He hands me a dagger and I bite down on the leather-wrapped handle, then close my eyes and yell into it as he yanks the arrow out of my leg. I don’t like his worried tone as he murmurs, “Shit… shit, one moment.”

I spit out the weapon and wipe at my eyes, snarling, “One moment for what!?”

Manifesting his talons, he carefully reaches inside the wound and squints, then plucks out a small barb that had broken off from the main shaft. He holds the arrow up to the fire, counting them all, then holds up the one he’d just removed, confirming there are no more left inside my leg. “So that arrow maaaaaay have been poisoned.”

“Poisoned?!” I try to sit up, then settle for propping myself up on an elbow, then melt back down to the ground, too dizzy even for that. “But we don’t get poisoned. No poisons work on us.”

“This one does. What are your symptoms?”

I take a moment to think about it, my lips tingling in a weird way. “Mizzmzness. Fameeg… Numbbb….”

Marut looks confused, then concerned as my eyes roll up in my head. He calls my name but it’s no good.

I’m out cold.

When I wake up I find that I’m lying on cool stone in the complete darkness, unclothed save for iron manacles at my wrists and ankles. I feel groggy and sick like I’ve drunk too much wine the night before, and all sounds are far too loud and sharp for my comfort, and with my arms bound behind my back, I can’t cover my ears to gain any relief. My unhappy moaning must have attracted some attention, because one of those robed figures in black from the night before walks into the cave holding a torch. It’s so bright that I squeeze my eyes shut and gasp. I can hear the burning torch crackle near my leg as the person crouches near me and examines it, sliding his fingertips over the wound so roughly that I hiss with discomfort.

“You harpies are such babies,” he scoffs in a strangely-accented Akkadian. He pats the hole on my leg, laughing as I flinch and whine.

“Where’s my friend?” I demand, trying to get my eyes to focus.

“In another room.” The robed figure takes a seat next to me and pulls out a small leather bag from his robes, setting it on the floor. The torch gets set down on the stone as well, providing enough light for me to watch him. “That one was very brave. We had a hard time subduing him.”

My fingers feel cold and dry, and my stomach drops. “Is he dead?”

The man frowns and shakes his head. “No, of course not. Why would we kill him?”

“Why did you shoot me, then?!” I’m almost able to stop seeing double, and as the man’s features come into focus, I can tell that he’s not from this part of the world. His skin is pale and his eyes are blue. I’ve never seen a person with blue eyes before. It’s mesmerizing.

While I’m busy marveling, my captor pulls out a few vials and jars from a leather bag, plucking off a wad of wool and soaking it in a tincture. He wipes this over my skin and it stings, causing me to hiss and writhe in my bondage. “Ah, ah, shhh. I’m cleaning it. Have patience, Little One.”

“You…” I hiss as he wipes some more medicine on, that pain making me curl my toes and snarl, “You didn’t answer my question!”

“Ah, you’re correct. I didn’t answer your question.” He smiles and sets the wool into the flame of the torch, where it hisses and burns away, emitting a yellowish smoke. “A mighty empire far away longs for treasures like you and Big Baby.”

Big Baby. I hope to the gods he means Marut. If we ever get out of this, I’ll never let him live that down. “Then you don’t mean to kill us?”

“No, not at all. Why would I bother tending to your wound if I meant to slaughter you?”

I frown and lay my head on the stone, petulantly refusing to answer, especially when he holds my head and makes me swallow a few drops of a bitter spirit. Obviously they weren’t going to kill us outright or it would have happened by now. “I want to see my friend.”

“You will shortly.”

“Now. I want to see him now.” The man dutifully ignores me and wipes down my leg with a wet cloth, then pulls out a needle and thread. “That… that isn’t necessary!” I try to say, escort eryaman but he shushes me and swats my hip. The sensation of being stitched isn’t unfamiliar, but I’m so used to Marut doing it by now that it’s intimate. It feels wrong for someone else to do it, but I don’t have much say in the matter, and I try to ignore the heat in my cheeks as I feel the needle and thread pass through my skin.

It occurs to me just then that I’ve been naked this entire time. I look very inhuman to say the least – five feet tall at best, fine-boned, androgynous, and slender with completely chalk-white skin. My irises are red like blood, and my eyelashes, brows, and hair are raven black. My back bears an image of a pair of black wings (my pinions when not in use), and between my legs there are no genitals to speak of, only smooth flesh. The only opening I possess below the waist is between my buttocks. Despite all this, even with my unusual anatomy on full display, my captor hasn’t seemed the least bit confused or shocked. “You’ve seen others like me before,” I announce out of nowhere, and that makes him pause.

“Yes. There are a number of your kind waiting for you, where we’re bringing you.”

I flush. “They won’t want to see me. I’ve been exiled.”

The man shrugs. “Time changes all hearts, does it not?” He glances at me. “Plus, I don’t think they are in charge.” He taps his throat. “Roman citizens don’t wear collars, Little One.”

Rome. Is that where I’m going? To the empire? We’ve heard about it during our travels, how it’s been growing and spreading for the last century or so. I never thought it would spread past Jerusalem, but I guess I was wrong. Another empire reaching far across the entire world. I’d hoped to avoid those for the rest of my days, but it would seem I can’t be free of it for more than a few centuries at a time. “Where am I now?”

“You are with me, in my camp. Tomorrow you will be with me, far away, at my next camp.” He smiles down at me, enjoying my frustration. “Bend your leg like so. Yes.” I sigh as he wraps linen bandages around my thigh, tying them off and guiding my leg back down again. “Do you have any other questions?”

“Are you going to answer them?”

“Ah, you see? Another question. You might have just said ‘yes’.” I groan in frustration and he laughs, packing up his medicine bag and grabbing the torch. In a language I don’t understand, he addresses someone down a hallway. Another voice echoes back up the passage, and my captor assents, walking back over to me. “You aren’t going to cause a problem?”

I give him a look, wincing as I shift my bandaged leg. “I can’t even stand.”

His smirk is irritating as he bends down and scoops me up like I weigh nothing. I hadn’t realized how muscular he was until just now, nor how tall. He’s got me all but cradled in one arm while the other hand holds the torch, and it seems effortless. “Again, you might have just said ‘no’. We will work on your manners, eh?”

I want to say something snotty, but given that I’m bound, sick, and at the mercy of someone who knows a poison that will work even on angels, well… I don’t push it. In fact I’m nothing but tame and polite as I’m carried outside into the predawn light of this human camp. A few men linger by the remains of a fire eating breakfast, though they don’t seem impressed with me, too jaded to give me a second look. That just hurts my ego, and I sulk just a little as I’m brought over to a sturdy wagon with wooden walls and a tiled roof. Another robed figure waits with an iron ring of keys, only unlocking and opening the back door when I’m brought over.

I’m gently deposited inside onto a thick layer of straw and the door is locked up behind me. A little bit of light filters in through the small barred windows up high on the walls, and I try my best to move. The manacle chain on my wrists isn’t long enough to allow for much, but I can inch my way towards the head of the cabin. There I find Marut, naked, bound, and looking disoriented, and I shift close enough to lie next to him. It’s dark in here, but aside from a few scratches on his cheek and shoulder, he looks otherwise unharmed.

“Marut?” I whisper, and he grunts. “Marut, hey, wake up.” I nuzzle his cheek, then pull back as he shifts and blearily opens his eyes.

“Hi, Beautiful,” he says softly, smiling a little.

“Hello, my love,” I whisper, nibbling my lip. “We’re captives of Rome.”

He blinks a few times, wincing a little as he shifts in his bondage. “They’ve come a long way. What are they here for?”

I curl my toes. “Us, I think. The blue-eyed man says that there are more of us in Rome. He says they’re slaves.”

Marut frowns. “I would make a terrible pet.”

Voices start calling from outside, and I can feel the wagon shudder a little as animals are hooked up to it in front. The driver gets into the seat, calling out to his companions, there’s the crack of a whip, and then the wagon begins to move. Marut and I remain still for a moment, then relax as it becomes apparent that there won’t be anything more dangerous involved than boredom, and I find that despite having only woken up half an hour ago, my eyes are drooping, and soon enough I’m fast asleep on the straw.

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