Originally featured in the excellent erotic art book by Monstrifex: https://monstrifex.itch.io/beasts-within where it is superbly formatted and accompanied by a soundtrack I wrote for the project.
A woman named Shama is hired to investigate and infiltrate a strange enigmatic cult known as The Astral Watchers in order to recover a noble woman who has been kidnapped by these strange witches. She uses her social skills to persuade and deceive her way into the cult only to discover the dark grip their focus has and how easily one can be converted from apathetic to fully enraptured. The moon sings a sweet song so few can hear, what if you were to open your ears to it and join it in resonating?
We Dream the Moon
The Astral Watchers Cult
By Piddleyfangs (SaltTea)
Proofread by: Grim Grove
Locations of note:
A sizable fishing city located somewhere in The Equatorial Empire
An abandoned fortress with a pristine lake to the southwest of the city
A mountain colony of cultists to the north of The Empire known as Maroth’s Grasp
The following is the recollections of a woman named Shama:
Before me was one of the most powerful men in The Equatorial Empire. He was sobbing into a posh rag. Behind him in this meeting room was a banner depicting a golden sun with beaming triangular light that then turned into the silhouette of ships. This banner covered up something beneath it, likely a shield bearing now invalid heraldry based on the outline of the covered object. The wind had whipped the corners of it before a servant closed the windows for the nobleman to deliver his request for me in peace. Mid-sentence he devolved into hysterics.
I am not particularly phased. Before even meeting for a contract, I always do a little digging into a client, so I already knew this man fairly well.
Vicari Oran was his name, and he was a touch infamous for his emotional moments. Hard to blame him, however, since his daughter had been kidnapped. At a few feasts he had made town gossip when he sobbed during his toast to the beneficial Empire that allowed him and his family to maintain their regal position. Another time, again, he had allowed the waterworks when his daughter competed successfully in a sword fighting tourney and emerged from it victorious. There, on that stormy night in that fire-lit meeting room, he was crying for justifiable reasons.
“Did she have any motivation to leave home?” I ask. I need details before I go on the chase. My services are difficult to reverse and necessitate understanding and reasoning from the client.
“Of course not!” He huffed, squeezing his finger and big thumb through his half grey beard to ease himself. His cheeks were red and wet like a sweating baker’s. His furrowed brow strummed like a violinist’s bow to show when he summoned his patience. “She was happy, my sweet girl. Successful, strong! I listened to her and turned away all the suitors she had a distaste for even though it pained me! Countless wealthy and powerful people who all wanted her… And now she’s gone. Stolen away by those… those…!”
Fury had taken him, overwhelmed by the passion of a direction to point his emotions. So rarely do we see men go from one side of the arrow to the other. As wistful and light as a father to then as hard and pointed as the iron tip of the arrow. I spoke the word he was tripping on. “Cultists?”
“Witches,” He corrected me, more pleased with the precision. He sipped his wine and sighed as the blue light of the night painted his face tragic and the shadows drew lines of age in his concerned, vengeful gaze. “It was slow. Her friend had been recruited by them, changed somehow. They cast their spells—and magic has already grown far too strange, I might add! But theirs is already bizarre, already foul, and pungent… They used her friend as bait, a familiar face she trusted! Why else would she leave home and me…? Seduced from her home and never to return. I found some of their letters after she left, read over just enough to know where she had gone and who she expected to meet.”
And it was in those steps I would repeat. The steps to track. To do my job.
My name is Shama. My profession is repairing situations that need my delicate touch. There are problems that require people who will act outside normal restraints and not with clumsy banditry but with precise and calculated finesse. This is the path I have walked since I was nothing more than a child with a rusted knife and willing to steal to get a better life. I think back to myself holding a dagger to someone’s throat and think it now childish compared to what I arrange now. Who I face has changed as well.
For this contract my enemy was a strange cult that had swept away a naïve heiress and left her father to rue and grieve. I was given letters the heiress had received. They were a sincere and empathetic correspondence she held with a dear friend who spoke of a group known as the Astral Watchers. When not by this title, they were referenced as The Sisters or Sisterhood and even just The Circle when referring to a smaller chapter of this group. Some of the letters had been destroyed or lost but the words of the initial seduction remained:
“Anaya, don’t you wish to see it? I know you feel lost, like the world has little need of you, and all that awaits you is marriage and securing heirs, but there is more than that! When I found The Sisterhood, they showed me stars. You might not know this, but the stars speak and The Moon sings. Whispers at first and not much to share. I grew disenchanted and left for a time. But I returned to them when one night I heard so much more. When my eyes changed. And I have been happier ever since. I have purpose above. I miss you so dearly, friend.”
While the prose was romantic and assuring, my favorite part of their letters was when this seductress dictated a clear meeting place. It was a small port town just a few steps away from Oren’s city. It was likely the first time Anaya had strayed from home without telling her father where she was going or without her guard to keep her safe from bandits and suitors. I set up shop at an inn in this town and laid low.
Credit to this Sisterhood, they operated very quietly. The missives had made it seem like there was a practicing circle situated here in town and it wasn’t just where the two had met to abscond. It was through these words that I learned not just of where they met, but what might a recruiter for this cult be looking for in a person.
I made myself pitiable. Just what they were looking for. I have had a thousand jobs before where I changed who I was and made myself easy to find but hard to read. Purposefully, I visited stores and played my role until shopkeepers threw me from their shops. Word spread fast I was penniless and pitiful. With the plenty of coin I actually did have, however, I bribed a few sailors to pretend to have been lovers who led me on and then abandoned me after our voyage was over. I was alone, broken, afraid, and impressionable.
At some point I thought to call the ruse to an end. The baiting technique wasn’t always the way… and then she approached me.
Part of the bait ruse was to appear to be in violent and urgent trouble whilst also making it obvious where to find you. The hook never changed, just the bait. If this was a cult that focused their efforts on women in trouble, then I’d make it clear my life was miserable and the only place I could ever find solace would be in a nice secluded tavern. I’d yell its name at my paid pretend suitors, “You good for nothing sailor, I’ll be at Bent Penny! Bastard!” Since the cult was likely composed of locals I could rely on them to find the place with name alone, for word to reach them, for them to be nearby to hear our fights. They had heard.
My face was down on the wood of the tavern bar. Someone had seated themselves next to me on a creaking stool made of near black pitch wood. “Are you hurt?”
“Only my pride…” I rose my head. A robed woman smiled down at me. Coils of curly hair peaked past the frame of her hood. She was beautiful but hid it well beneath the rain stained hood. Her revelation of beauty to me was intentional. I had to admit, for a first look and for the sake of recruitment, it was working.
We traded names. For sake of cover I went as Vela. Her name was Ava. We talked for a while, and I filled her ears with my tale I had rehearsed carefully in my inn room.
In this tale practiced down to every consonant, I came to this town on a boat with my laboring lover. We broke up as soon as our feet met the pier as he revealed he no longer loved me and had fallen madly in love with a siren somewhere in Cythera. My family had disowned me and scorned me as a failed daughter before I boarded the boat with the damned sailor. With nowhere to return and no skill I could market myself on, I was truly lost.
Ava offered me a place where I might be sheltered for a time. I smiled as the hook notched into place.
…
We followed the road that lead out of town. The grey coast roamed nearer to us with every passing wail of wind. I watched the foam collect for a time at the grey sand filled with verdant seaweed green as rot only to be collected by water that offered cold and grey and salt. Where we went provided more color.
At one point the road veered off to a fenced gardened secluded by a wall of trees and woven canopies. I feel myself grow intrigued as Ava undid the lock on the fence and lead me down the loose cobble stone path.
The road ended in to a wide manor with deep slanted roofs and two wings each with their own little tower and met in one central chapter. This is where The First Circle laid in secrecy. My general lay of the land research had informed me lightly of this manor. It was owned by a rich maiden who was single to this day though she spent most of her time parrel across the sea in an entirely different mansion. I was able to glean that she might herself be a part of the cult as Ava explained that “We are allowed to stay in here for a time. Lady Revalia allows it as she is sympathetic to the lost.”
Inside the manor it feels like a village has settled in the living room. The windows have been closed so nary any light intrudes on the nocturnal populace. Woman lay across decorated couches in various states of clothing. I see two girls cease their kissing behind a pillar and turn to watch me as I enter. A black haired one watched me carefully, her eyes a dazzling purple with a bright red ring that seemed to shimmer and shift as I moved.
All in that house were those who either needed help or displayed earlier signs of what Ava called Resonating. When I asked her what that was she told me not to worry. “Were you one who Resonated you would be asking me other questions than what it is like.” Her only concern was that I am fed, safe, and warm. There were other women there who were in a similar situation. None of these lost women spoke with me in my time there. They held cups close and stared out the few slithers of light afforded where the curtains weren’t nailed down. They could only see the grey sea and the stifling privacy of the garden. I spent the evening examining each of these dejected lost and noted that none of them were my runaway.
I would lie if I said I felt guilt for manipulating my way through to this place. I saw the logic that should have sparked this feeling in me, but if it were guilt that controlled me then my blade would be stayed, and I would not be where I am now.
Through the letters the heiress had received I knew much of the process and what it was the cult looked for. The first night I slept soundly, gave them more time to grow used to me, let those glares on a stranger slowly subside.
Cults, more so than any, are excited to believe. You might think I should have spent a week, maybe a month, feeling out their personalities or getting them further used to me but you would be wrong. So eager are cults to have their beliefs enforced that they would sooner believe their miracle occur again and again than doubt my words. All the same, I recited carefully.
The next day I awoke in a convincing cold sweat and caught Ava before she made it to her bed chambers (which notably were not empty.) I said to her that I had heard something in my dreams. Something incredible. She raised a brow. In the early morning light I could see her eyes more clearly. They were this intoxicating blue with purple and a bright cyan swirling around, like a star bleeding out on a canvas. It was oceanic almost. This was my focal point as I spoke.
“What was it you heard?” She asked.
“It was like… a low… no more that it starts high. Whale song but the swirling effect is more intense like it is spinning around you and through you. And then it grows lower and lower, lower than you think anything can possibly go. All the while the sound is… noisy. There’s this sharp whistle that blisters at the whale song like sharp nails of rain batter the side of your ship so violent you think the deck will collapse…” I had tears in my eyes. I hid my smile in my mind.
Ava had her hand over her mouth.
If before I was watched, that day I was studied. Every movement was looked over. The women there just for a meal and shelter never approached me again but the strange ones were now upon me constantly. Black hair was now close to me at all times, accompanying me to meals and leisure like a puppy. Were the door not closed on private matters I perish the thought of her continuing to watch me with those red ringed eyes.
With her so close I could see something… more.
Her chest strained against her rags. Between her mounds there was something strange. It seemed harder than skin but softer than armor, the gloss comparable to an acorn and the color dark grey. She was always close and constantly teetering over the touch barrier so I hazarded to graze my finger over it to examine.
Chitin.
“I’m so sorry!” I apologized but black hair didn’t mind my clumsiness.
“An accident?” She asked for me to clarify. I nodded my head and she almost seemed disappointed. “Your visions are strong. Ava says they are much stronger than mine. The last people who came here with visions strong as yours were moved up right away. They’re very happy now. I hope I get stronger visions soon!”
No guilt entered my mind. All I could think of was how to not break the puppy’s heart and keep her naïve. “Of course you will. Just… focus. Let it come to you and you might resonate beautifully.”
“That would make me so happy!” She laughed and threw herself on the couch on her back. The two woman were disturbed from their seat and arouse. She rose her feet in the air and kicked her shoes off. I saw they were strange but couldn’t collect more detail. Her count of toes seemed off.
It was the next day that Ava asked me if I was still having the dreams. I said yes. She smiled.
“Last night I communed with the next Circle above ours nearest to us. They agreed to take you in since you show potential.”
I smiled, perhaps my true smile even. Intruding this strange cult excited me in all honest, but this also meant I came that much closer to catching the runaway and returning to my home. The coin from this job would be enough to move in to a proper house and start investing in something more powerful for myself.
Ava gave me the most empathetic gaze I ever saw. Again, I was intoxicated by her eyes. “This you must heed… The next Circle are eccentric members who have dedicated themselves to learning Resonation as well as encouraging others. With this Circle you may stay for a while and decide if you wish to learn to Resonate more deeply or if you are pleased with what of the song you’ve heard. But… if you go forward you will for all but certain change. Be it your mind, your body, or who you very well are. There is no shame in departing now and this is no game. Proceed further only if you truly wish to learn, Vela.”
I nodded my head. I don’t remember the words I said but I am certain they were convincing for Ava’s worried face was dispelled and all that was left was relief.
“I will be proud to call you my sister, then, Vela. I shall send word of your coming and we shall see you there shortly.”
…
Three days pass of us journeying. Ava accompanied us for the first day where I was traded not dissimilarly to a prisoner. It was clear to me that if I changed my mind at this point it would be much too late and the occupants of the new cart would be forced to use the daggers they kept hidden beneath their cloaks.
My fellow passenger was a woman who was likely a much more ardent believer than I. She introduced herself as Ylva but was intensely excited to receive her moon name at some point. She chittered to herself and hummed strangely beautiful music that was always just a cent short of the correct pitch. Was often she ceased suddenly and apologized to me for being a nuisance and each time I told her she was forgiven.
Were she screeching that would be another issue but luckily enough my moon obsessed partner was a composed and considerate one. It gave me hope for my new Sisterhood.
I gazed through the tarp on the day we were due to arrive at our next Circle, both me and my cart-mate starved without any rations. I considered this might have been intentional and was grateful I had smuggled a ration aboard. I looked out and saw a crystal-clear lake nestled by trees with long beautiful leaves. None of their branches blocked the moon’s reflection upon that peerless sheen. Stars uncountable dotted the canvas and the wind rippled the mirror for only a moment. A dark shadow was cast by the featureless stone wall of a fortress.
Alas, wise as I often was, I did not know what this place was. Three days’ travel meant we could be anywhere. Perhaps then we were in the middle of a war path covered in once vital reinforcements and defenses now condemned to tomes covered in dust. What better place for insects to settle? I was not so different, having slept in abandoned buildings during my upbringing.
Banners had been torn down from those solemn walls. Where huge chunks of stone were missing from cannon fire or spells there was now wood patching shut these wounds like stitches. The cart came to a stop and the tarp was opened by a mysterious figure.
The figured gazed at us with glowing yellow eyes. “The stars…” She cackled to herself. “You are Lynette, yes?”
My cart friend giggled with ceaseless enthusiasm. “You know of me?”
“How would I not? As you grew nearer, the outline of your name shivered through my mind all last night. I woke whispering your name and knew it then you’d be here…” She reached out her long, chitin covered hand and stroked Lynette’s cheek. The freckled girl shuddered and gasped and shrunk into the grasp of the tall woman. This woman turned her gaze to me. Two piercing yellow eyes. White chitin covered most of her face. Frilly long black and red hair oozed out from her hood like tongues on some sinister beast. And yet she glowed like the moon in the lake and smiled at me. “And yet your name was not said to me by The Moon above. It was Ava who told me of you.”
Was this bad? I didn’t waver. “Were it I knew why, sister.”
“I am not your sister yet, dear. Vela, was it?” She asked for confirmation. She trusted the moon for certain, but words spoken to her from a fellow mortal demanded confirmation. I nodded my head for at that time I was Vela. “Vela. It is exciting. You may very well have a new piece of the song we have been searching for. Strangers to me are opportunities for our moon above. Come, let us make a sister of you, Vela. I’m certain our Mistress will be ever pleased to meet you.”
…
The prior Circle I stayed at was owned by a rich woman donating it to the cause so it hadn’t been blessed by the cult’s moniker, but this place was fully and entirely their own. They called it Gazer’s Lake.
Humanity was abandoned at Gazer’s Lake. Here there were none but those truly thrilled by the song. I watched girls itch their skin and then tap their chitin in comparison. The lowering ratio excited them and drew them to share the pleasure with another within arm’s reach. Hedonism rose in prominence as did their lunacy scholarism.
They pondered the stars in near obsession. That lake dotted with stars was oft occupied at night by the most lost, desperate to maybe see themselves in the lake or perhaps watch that figure of themselves fade so that they might see the stars more clearly. I was searching too. For my payment.
Anaya Oren was still nowhere to be found in this dark place. I was more careful than ever to speak her name rarely. Still, if she was not here then where could she be?
I felt more eyes upon me than ever. If it wasn’t the woman with yellow eyes who had greeted us in the cart it was these stranger members. There were these girls who rarely spoke and often wore masks that covered their mouths but not their eyes. Each shared these deeply frightening eyes. Purple on the rims and bluer and cloudier near the center only to be speckled with violent red in the center. Their irises were shaped like two dots connected by a single strand in the center; like barbells.
Besides that they acted similarly and calmly. They watched me. And I despised being watched. This was the closest I came to turning tail and running. Everywhere I went there were girls in various states of surrender to the stars moaning their dreams into each other’s lips and studying magic… strange terrible magic.
Every night I slept restless, disturbed by sounds I didn’t know stone walls could make. I slept and had the stillest, coldest dreams of my life. My feet felt icy and like my body weight might shift and fall. Everyday I awoke there was one of the violent eyed women standing outside my room and peering. I’d be checked upon either by another woman then or the yellow eyed woman. They’d ask me what I dreamed in excruciating detail wanting to know every single thing. I often fibbed and said my dreams were just as brilliant as the ones that got me here or other days I’d state the truth, that my dreams were bleak and dark. Luckily enough I didn’t lack for detail and could simply parrot the stories I had the fresher recruits discuss. I did notice that; the new members spoke often and furiously and kept changing more and more, but the older members seemed more settled, entrenched and entertained. It was like watching philosophers admire new students wonder when enough parts had been replaced on the boat to consider it a wholly new ship.
It was a week in that I was certain I was going to be kicked from the cult. They must have known. My cart mate Ylva was being called sister now, was having her skirt torn down and her loins kissed. At some point she had grown mandibles. Her chitin glittered like stars. But I was still as I was with rough unflattering skin and scars. I wasn’t touched save for teasing glances and an occasional finger teasing my chin. I began to fear they knew through touch alone. Ylva lifted her mouth from a higher ranked matron and smiled an inhuman grin. “Will the moon spell the end of all empires?”
“Absolutely shall,” The matron replied and stroked her fingers through Ylva’s hair. “Though we are still learning…”
The Violent Eyed roamed the fortress. The learners regarded them with curiosity, but the veterans didn’t seem to mind their presence much. They only gave occasional, knowing looks. They looked at them differently and never spoke with them.
I walked past a pair of them and returned to my bed and laid down, thankful I wasn’t sharing my chambers with anyone else. A place of privacy… to collect my thoughts. There and then I decided I would give this a few more days and then…
My eyes were so heavy.
I was stood naked.
What was this place? For as far as I could see was the pale crystal ocean. It moved slowly across my feet, waves in infinitely slow motion that slowly spanned nearer normal speed as they fanned away from me. The sky above was black. There were no stars. And then there was the moon.
A dark, deep sound rumbled across the sea. The waves grew faster and began to rise in height. Higher. Reaching for the moon. The moon reached back. Deeper, the sound sunk in to my chest. I felt like a church bell. I felt rusted and broken and then of iron older than the fortress I grew up in.
The moon grew closer. And closer. I could hear its song. I could hear it through my entire being. Sweat dripped down my form. The echoing toll struck me so fierce I thought my eyes would cry not for sorrow but of physical failure.
I squinted and tried to look behind the moon. All I could think in my dream was “where is this sound coming from?”
When I awoke there was a Violent Eye on top of me.
I was panting, broken, so horrified. Death shivered through my bones and I rubbed my eyes for fear they were bleeding. I wanted to sob and throw my body in to the corner, beneath my bed, anywhere but be in this stranger’s bed with this stranger atop me. The Violent raised a finger and wiped the tear away and whispered to me. “Ssshh… Are you okay, dear?”
“I’m… I…”
“We will hear what you saw, if it comforts you. Do you wish to share?”
I nodded my head.
“Then… let us meet.” She smiled.
…
That morning I was surrounded by three Violent Eyes at all times. They would never leave my side but they wouldn’t reply to any questions I had either. I was asked countless questions by the new members but the veterans remained silent. In fact… they looked scared. Eyes wide, some of them anxiously checking the windows. When, when, when… Their chitin claws moved curtains to peer through partially boarded windows to look out at the sun slowly falling on the mirror lake. I felt my eyes begin to tear up when I saw that peerless water.
Anxiety was contagious. Seeing the higher ups be so worked up and knowing that it was likely my fault didn’t make me feel calm. After today I’d leave. I’d sneak out. I still had a dagger hidden in my stuff and I’d use it if I had to.
“A vision that brilliant… didn’t your last recruit cause a commotion?”
“You mean Anaya?” A woman replied, her voice frail and haunting.
“What Lunar Name did she receive anyways?”
My ears violently perked. I turned, careful that my sudden attention wasn’t detected by The Violent Eyes that refused to leave my side. I memorized the look of the woman who had said that. Was this her penpal? She wore a hood so it was hard to make her out but she was also the only one hooded indoors. I somehow managed to shake The Violent Eyes and follow her as she made for the kitchen.
“Were you speaking of Anaya earlier?” I asked. I could afford to be more direct. If this didn’t work I was leaving no matter what and telling Anaya’s father that she was good as gone. “I was a friend of hers for a while. Might you know where she is now?”
“She excelled…” The woman slowly turned to me and gestured for me to follow her. She walked through the fortress and led me away from the others to a further wing. Was this going to be a trick? This was the person who had seduced Anaya to the cult, this was the one who knew everything about her. I wished I had grabbed my dagger.
We entered an abandoned chapel. Fortresses that are meant to last a very long time will have stations of worship installed to keep piety high and a feeling of normal life. Normalcy was lost on the rotted stained glass and the darkness that filled this room. Until a pair of Violent glowing eyes filled me with dread. They were ringed with red across that beautiful purple and blue nebula.
“Another one of you?” I sighed.
“No…” The robed woman pulled her robes down. Her eyes were the same.
In the darkness, the figure opened a second and third set of Violent eyes and slowly she came to stand. I watched as her rising head matched my height and then went until she was stood twice as tall as myself. The candles were each ignited blue. I was stood before her.
“Hello, dear,” She purred to me. This woman was tall. Her hair was a long cloud of intricate dark purple haze, little clusters of blue glowing in it occasionally. Her bangs were long and covered a large part of the right half of her face. Crooked horns and antenna stretched out from the top of her head. Mandibles decorated the sides of her head. Her chitin was smooth and dark, layered perfectly and precisely, her heavy breasts hidden behind a veil I could nearly see through in the candle light. Her robes opened to reveal all four of her arms. Her under arms and the palm of her hands were slightly see through and showed strange astral magic flowing through her, as if she had stolen a part of the sky. She leaned down so she might be eye level with me.
“I… I…” Every part of my body shrieked to leave. Danger sense yelled the nails out from the floor boards and shattered every window. She wiped the tear from my cheek.
“Ssshhhh… have you been having bad dreams?” She titled her head, her eyes moving like a venomous moth swinging in the haze of night. “I was there to comfort you. I am glad I was; you must have seen something truly frightening.”
“What… why does she have the same eyes as you?” I could only focus on my curiosity rather than her.
“Because she is one of my vessels,” The woman said as though it were normal. “She is still in there, happy, content, able to take control whenever she wishes, but through her I may extend my reach, and through all my closest sisters I may spread my careful coddling through every Ring and Sister,’ She smiled at me. “And you seem the most deserving of all of my attention. Tell me dear, what is your name?”
“Vela…” I stammer out.
She seemed amused.
And then she said, “And I am High Matron Maroth. What a pleasure it is to meet you as myself.”
“This is… your true form?”
“The main vessel. This is who I was first and final and the part of me that still experiences the dreams. And it was a few nights ago when you joined me in one of them. How excited I was to see you finally have your own dream.”
I wanted to correct her, run scared to my cover story of my numerous false dreams before this day like a scared dog huddling under cover, but all I could think of in that moment was two things. How beautiful she was. And how did she know to mention Anaya?
…
Every night I had another dream.
The moon visited me.
And what it said thrilled and horrified me.
Why did I wake up every day wondering then…
Where was this sound coming from?
…
Maroth became the focus of my life from then on. Every day I awoke to one of her Puppets patiently waiting for me, their eyes peeking at me through cracked doors and windows. Whenever I was with one of the Puppets the others were at ease and calm. Ylva would chat with me and show me how her body was changing. However, when Maroth came to visit they all left me alone and stayed as far as possible.
When Maroth visited she brought with her banquets and treats and became incredibly possessive. Her hands met my neck often as if she was fascinated by it. Was she testing how easy it’d be to end a spy’s view of her cult, or was she more enamored by the fact I let her?
Every time her hands went lowered I didn’t stop her. My panting and moans encouraged it. Her claws slid my robes apart. She saw the scars that lined my stomach and traced them tenderly. I want to grab her wrist and squeeze shut some part of me and keep it secret but she was so soothing in her approach.
“Are these from your sailor lovers?” She asked me.
My eyes went wide. Her fingers were at my neck. My pulse thrummed against her thumb. She squeezed down a little tighter. “They’re so used to gutting fish and leaving refuse to the sea that they must have forgotten how to treat things of value…” Her eyes lowered to my scars and then back at me. The main row always snapped first and then the bottom and then the top.
“No… they are from… guards,” I muttered. “When I was young I would steal. When guards came for me they started by throwing rocks and then trying to grab me. Eventually it came to blades.” I had no idea if I should be telling her truths or desperately clawing at my lies still. I knew if I left or tried to escape I would find one of them waiting for me, one of her servants.
Maybe she’d answer my questions. “Why do the others stay so far away from you?” I asked. “You are a High Matron, you outrank them, shouldn’t they treat you with reverence?”
“To be a High Matron is to be as far from sense and humanity as possible,” She mused, sounding the most like the others she had so far. “In our Sisterhood, there are a few ways of thinking. We all agree that on The Moon there is a great source of power, perhaps a being that wishes to be freed, and we all agree that The Moon must be brought here so the power might be shared beyond simple song resonance. The performance we hear is distant and muffled…
“To hear it in full, to truly become a part of it…” Her fingers traced my thighs as I was tugged deep in to her lap. I shivered at her touch but relaxed in to her. When her finger traced my lip I found my mouth opened. She laughed and slowly slid her finger against the broad side of my tongue. My tongue slowly turned blue at her touch. I didn’t know this was happening at the time. I couldn’t feel the edges of my tongue grow sharp and grubby with little feelers lining either side in parallel. “Whilst we all agree that The Moon must be brought here, we however don’t all agree on what should happen next. One sect thinks when The Moon arrives we will return our power to it and be granted new, greater forms. The Reborn. Another group thinks once The Moon arrives the song will grow so loud it will deafen the world and turn all into our strange forms and bring peace to each and every nation and bring about the downfall of all empires. The Peace Birds.
“And then, there are a final third sect. A wretched, cruel group. These members believe that when The Moon arrives…” The red circles in her eyes grew brighter, consuming her entire eye in pure red, her black barbells narrowing into a cross shaped slit. “We will kill it. Consume it. Take its power and make it our own. We do not know, truly, what The Moon will do. We peruse our dreams and visions like readers of lost tomes trying to find some key phrase to retroactively translate all these horrors into truths… These are called The Devourers. I… am the leader of this group.” She squeezed me as tightly as she ever had before. Her face pushed right next to mine. She whispered in my ear as it grew longer, “And this is why they fear me. I mock their peace. Let them dream… I’ll plan instead.”
She laid in her bed moments later. I fell on top of her. She tore my dress apart. What was this fire?
Her legs spread. I dared not look what she had but I knew it slithered and pulsed, I knew it moved by her command. I looked up from the bed they had placed in the church and saw all of her Puppets watching us. I looked down at her again as her hands grabbed my hips and the other set groped my breasts.
Consume me.
I fell again and again. She felt so good inside me. I can’t remember what drove me there but the intoxicating sensation had grown so powerful that I couldn’t bring myself to eat or think of anything but her. She never left me alone even when I was certain she was gone.
I think I loved her. Then and there if I had read the same letters that Anaya had read I might have fallen just the same. I kept my hips high but lowered my frame so I could feel my head against her chest. “Do you love me more than Anaya?”
Her hands wrapped around my back. “You are the most interesting woman I’ve ever held. I won’t say I love you more or less, I won’t dare compare you until I solve you. A conclusion like that would be… unfair to who you might become.”
“Do you love me more?” I repeated, louder. I broke from her hug and sat up so she could see me in full. I stared down at those daggers for eyes she had. “You must love me more since you keep me near. She is not here.”
Maroth didn’t move an inch. “Of course not… she’s elsewhere, pursuing her own studies now, deciding who she is. I brought her in, but I dare not define her. Every choice she made was of her own volition.”
“Every one of them?” I pressed. “When she began to dream? Did she choose to dream?”
“Does anyone? How often do you choose what you dream, when your sun rises, what knife cuts for you? I wrote to her of how to dream, how to see it, and when saw it by her own choice every action after was beautiful…” Maroth smiled the way I hoped she wouldn’t. She grabbed my shoulders and roughly pressed me down. She filled me. Thrusts grew in strength as moonlight poured through the stained glass.
I gasped and groaned. I felt passion burn with fury and curiosity, a bouquet of emotions that turned amber in my heart. When I opened my eyes I saw that my hands pressed into her had turned to claws of chitin.
When she finished inside me I felt her power glowing through me, felt her possessive eyes never leave me even as her Puppets left to patrol.
And that night I left.
I pretended to fall asleep, grabbed my dagger, and raced out the door. There were no guards that night and I still wonder why. I ran and ran. My thighs were covered in a slow growing dark armor of chitin, my feet claws now. I couldn’t look back. I’d see the moon reflect in the pond and it would drive me to tears.
Every night, every inn, I dreamed of her again. Maroth haunted me. I wore robes that hid my face and yet I scanned every face I saw for her. She could be anywhere. And yet… she never did intrude on my life again, at least visibly.
I met Vicari Oran again one day after retracing my steps. I wore careful clothes and never revealed who I was. That day I had an especially terrifying dream of The Moon. With no hand to wipe my tears I feared I was still a mess. And yet, the need of payment still needed to be discussed. “Shama?” Vicari Oran asked.
It was my turn to speak. He smiled at me as I rose from my chair. “I failed to return your daughter to you. I am here to report why. In my mission to rescue her I infiltrated a cult known as The Astral Watchers. They are a large organization formed of people of various creeds who have shared a dream of The Moon singing to them. I too have witnessed one of these dreams.”
At the confession I saw his smile flicker like a candle flame. Was he losing his confidence in me? I continued; “Your daughter has been seduced by an extremely powerful High Matron of this cult known as Maroth. Maroth… is likely one of the most powerful witches in all of Tamor. She seduced your daughter, but she went by her own free choice. Maroth controls multiple bodies, likely in every reach of the world, but her main vessel is the host of her power. Even in this cult, she is considered a radical leader, feared for her ideas, her sway, her power…” I wondered if I was shaking. His smile was gone.
“You dare…” He raised his voice. “How dare you speak of my daughter like that. She is not so weak. Whatever spell this Maroth cast can be undone. Much the same as this,” He brought the contract we had written. He ripped it cast it in to the flames.
My eyes narrowed. I felt my half-grown mandibles curl beneath my hood.
“I wanted my daughter, and you failed me, assassin.”
“And I expect to be paid.”
He grumbled at that… but he made good on our promise. His servant appeared with a pocket of coin for me. For what it was worth it was the full amount. I gave him vague directions to where he might find The Circle I last saw Maroth and we parted ways.
I walked slowly from his castle.
That night the dream came to me again.
More clear than ever before. The bell rang again. But when I focused…
I should have known sooner. A smile spread across my face.
When I awoke I broke into laughter. A eureka moment uninvited and terrible that it made me shake. I curled in to a ball on my bed and felt my still growing abdomen from my rear chitter and shake. I stared at my jointed claws and rubbed my fingers across my belly. The chitin covered half of my scars.
“Maroth…!” I laughed. “Maroth please…! Tell me you’re near! Please…! The thought of keeping these words to myself…! No one else will understand it. I’ve learned something so terrible just now. You said I’d never be alone, I’d always be comforted after my nightmares!”
A part of me wished the silence had been longer. A finger pushed my tears away. A set of eyes emerged from the darkness. “I feared you might never return, Vela. There there…” The tears were cleared from my cheek. She gave me a moment. “Tell me… what have you learned?”
I laughed as I tried to speak. “That bastard… he doesn’t deserve his daughter first of all!”
“I agree,” Maroth laughed. “And? Of your dream?” This was what she was hungry for. She was starved to hear my words.
“The sound… we have it wrong! The Moon isn’t what sings. We resonate, do we not? The Cult members, the Sisters. We resonate the song and spread it, yes?”
“We do,” Maroth replied. “We are the Vessels for the song that the moon emits.”
“The song is coming from behind The Moon. It is a Great Vessel.”
Maroth’s eyes narrowed into slits. And then she laughed. And I laughed too. I cried through my laughter. Maroth wrapped her arms around me. “Let’s go home…”
…
The Oran home was lit ablaze that night. Fire punctured the wooden structure and swallowed every painting. Their estate vanished into the soot and ash. I returned in Maroth’s arms to the fortress but that was only for a short while.
She wanted them to witness how far my change had progressed and encourage me to go further. My form became sleek and agile. My clawed fingers glowed cyan at their tips and my dark scales turned bright white in the night as if I was changing with the rising of the moon. The recruits kissed my thighs and admired every inch of my body. The veterans looked at me. They feared me just as much as they feared Maroth.
“And where is this that we head now?” I asked Maroth when our travels neared their end.
“To my home. We have much to learn together…”
Stretched over the edge of the mountain was a strange palace of pale stone and water. Situated near it was a colony of strange buildings etched from stone with methods that made the stone seem partially organic. I watched as the seams in the brickwork vanished the nearer we came to the stairwell that lead to the massive building ahead. The streets were marked with hood figures and naked Sisters glowing in the moonlight.
We walked across the glass stairs towards its crooked door where servants with Violent eyes awaited us. It was this home where Maroth’s loyal Devourers studied and dreamed. I knew this would be my final home. I was growing taller. How long until I matched Maroth? I hoped I never would. I vanished in to Maroth’s Grasp, the name of this place hidden deep in the world.
I eagerly await my next dream and my next chance to convince others of the truth. There is something out there beyond it all. And we must end it and take its place.