- January 24, 2021
The Incarnations Chapter 6
The Lord’s Vengeance
The night is dark with rain, and it is black. As the rain hits the shadows of the Lord, he watches over the city from the rooftops, watching for one singular car to come. The road is empty except for the one coming from the coroner, just as the light from Lord Dread’s white eyes illuminates the rain falling directly before his face.
Now he watches, truly a violent spectre. He has been wronged, as has his Lady. Such a deed will not go unpunished.
The Lord kneels over the side of the building, watching as Mendax’s car flies down the street. Speeding, believing he is perfectly safe, he is on the phone with his lawyer who just finished transferring every last penny of Asinus’s wealth.
The mortal speaks with vigor and appreciation, not the grief and despair the Lord expected of him for months on end. Now the Lord begins to realize how this mortal played everyone for a fool, how Mendax has and always has been about opportunity for himself. Now the Lord capitalizes on his own.
Mendax laughs and he jests, not about anything malicious or terrible. He simply shouldn’t be doing it without seeming absolutely mad, but he is quite sane. He looks on ahead to watch a street that is most empty. Something which should appear strange to someone from the City of Angels, but alas he does not realize.
The hand of wrath bursts through the driver’s side window, and the fingers grasp around the mortal’s neck. Lord Dread appears as a spectre, his upper half visible to Mendax. Their faces so close, the man can feel nothing but terror being forced to look Dread in the face. His face so stone, so cold. It shows nothing, for the human before him is worth nothing. He chokes and squeezes the man’s neck, stealing his breath, killing him slowly, savoring it. Mendax floors down on the pedal of his vehicle, causing it to reach maximum speed.
Mendax tries to scream, for help and out of terror. The eyes of the abyss stare into him, and he cannot break free. The man feels death coming for him, spiralling across his vision to grab out and take his soul. He does not know why he is being taken so violently, he does not truly believe he deserves to leave the realm of the living. He does not know how he has wronged the reaper before him.
“Dread! Stop!”
A cry from his Lady steals away his attention. Lord Dread sees the Lady appear behind the vehicle from a plume of light. He releases the mortal from his grip, and stops flying alongside the car. The Lord materializes in the street, where he stares at his Lady, shocked by the look of horror on her face.
The Lord does not look back, but the Lady watches as her Lord releases his control of the world around them. Vehicles fly to and pass them as the Lady watches Mendax’s vehicle.
Mendax, finally released, closes his eyes to rub his throat. So sore from the grip of death that once held it. When he opens his eyes he sees death yet again.
His car barrels into the side of a cargo truck. Mendax’s flesh is vaporized, leaving behind a few tiny, bloody chunks of meat to mix in with the scraps.
Lady Love’s hands fly to cover her mouth, her horror severe. The Lord watches on in shock as the rain pours upon her, her expression masked in dread.
Lord Dread is confused beyond belief. “Why?” he asks of her. He is far away from her, yet she hears every sound from his mouth.
“Why? Why do I scream? Why do I feel horror?” she asks in turn. She holds her hand to gesture towards him, and reveals, “I meant to try to stop you from what you have done.” Each question burns with disgust.
The Lord turns and lamely points behind him, unable to understand what ails the Lady. So lowly, so gloomy, with such misunderstanding, he tells her, “I-I, I did this for you. He deserved to die.”
The Lady is crestfallen, forming a face of sorrow for he has unknowingly made her guilty. Her hair so wet, clinging to her face. I could not find a dry spot on that Lady, but now as her cheeks streak red, and her eyes become wet, I know for sure there is nothing.
“Lo, my Lady,” the Lord gasps as he reaches towards her. “Why, why do you cry? Please don’t cry.”
“I cry because of you.” She says this with disappointment, and nothing else. Still as if a sword, her words strike him in the heart he did not know could feel pain. “You murder, and blame it on me. Your hands have made me a monster.”
Lord Dread cannot fathom, he cannot understand. His hands shake, their taste for motion cannot be quenched. He looks down to stare at them, and he does not recognize them. He stumbles to his knees, staring at them, unable to close them. He looks up at his Lady, and he has only one thing to say. “I am sorry, my Lady, I am-”
“No, Dread,” Lady Love interrupts. Then as a spike through his soul, she tells him, “I am not your Lady.”
“What?” he mutters. His eyes squint, his ears do not believe. He whispers, “Lo, no. Please.” She turns his back to him. He screams out in desperation, “Lady Love, please!”
The Lady turns her head only once to speak to him. “Do not follow me!” Then in a spiralling blight she disappears.
“No!” he screams after her. He follows her through space and time. She tries to get away but he will not let her.
She escapes to their domain, to her castle. She appears in her halls, her servants suddenly shocked. They see their Lady bleaked by rain, and her cheeks stained by tears. They move to her, they comb around her, and they wish to do nothing but take away whatever is causing her cries of pain and agony.
Then the Lord appears. He appears before them all, and with his arrival they all feel a stab of pain. They all know, every servant of Love knows, he is the cause.
They scream, they yell, they chant, and they bade, “Leave this place, Lord Dread! For you are not welcome!”
The cries of the servants mean nothing to him. He walks towards the Lady with devotion and apologies. She sees him, and she breaks free to flee. She tries to escape from him to her chambers.
The servants now move to swarm him, an ocean of cream and green surround him, clutch at him, and hold him down. They wish to keep him from her. That is not allowed.
Lord Dread knows he cannot kill them, he cannot harm them, no matter what his rage calls of him. He turns to smoke, to shadow, and slips through them all. He flies over their heads and after her he goes. He chases and she flees.
When the servants are no longer atop of him, he transforms back onto his feet. The Lord then continues to run as the Lady continues to sprint away. He never comes close, but she never gets far. Through the castle they go, and when they reach the level of her chambers she gets there.
Lady Love turns around to grasp her doors. To shut them clean. She sees him running, holding his hand out for her, to hold her, to apologize to her, to beg forgiveness. All of her momentary desires but one. She cannot give herself to him, for he cannot remove her guilt.
The Lord screams, “Love wait!”
The Lady but only hesitates. In a whisper she goes, “No.” Then she closes her doors.
In a rage, and in a scream, he calls the word she just said to him. He slams his fists against the door once, and then he sinks, his fingers clawing against it. The Lady hears his cries, his pain, she can only cry for herself as she inches away. Never removing her eyes from the door. She backs away to her bed, where she falls and crawls away. She claws for her blankets and holds them to her face. Her tears still break way.
“Love!” he calls. “Love!” he cries. “Open the door!” he begs.
Holding only the power for one last act, she says so low, “No.”
Somehow, above all, he hears.
Lord Dread kneels before Lady Love’s door, and forms fists. He knows to bash against this door is to bash against the power of Lady Love herself. He knows his own is greater. He brings back his hands, and he bashes only once. The doors break open.
Lady Love screams in terror. The Lord not noticing how she now fuels him, limps to her bed. Her cries to get away fall on deaf ears. He pleads and pleads, and she cries for him to leave. And just when he is about to get to her bed, just when she knows she would no longer escape him, she screams, “I am afraid!”
The Lord stops, frozen, shook. He believes he knows why, but full of fear, he asks, “Of who?”
In a whisper, not a shout, the Lady replies, “You…”
With that, he sinks. His body sinks to his knees, his arms fall upon the feet of her bed. He is defeated, and brings upon himself great shame. His body may have stopped at the floor, but his soul sinks ever further, never rising. He looks up at her, from his place below with solemn eyes, and she stares back with eyes of dread.
The Lady has never seen the Lord so defeated, so dead. She cannot help it, there is pity. She knows he would never lay a finger upon her to harm her, so why did she feel fear? What has driven a wedge in the bond she once thought unbreakable between them? To see him so beaten, she cannot stand it.
She lies, “I did not mean it.”
“Yes, you did.” With that she does not to try again. For a time, they stare into each other’s eyes, knowing not what to say.
She only knows of one thing truthful to say. “I still love you.”
In response, all he has is one thing. “I am so sorry… for everything.” Then he evaporates, leaving destruction in his wake.