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A DARKER SHADE OF NIGHT
Mikael: The Embrace

It was nine o’clock in the evening. An hour ago the craven sun had receded to its hiding place on the other side of the world and that magnificent beauty that is the moon rose strong and steady against the black bringing her children the stars with her. The street lights shown like angelic halos to illuminate the city and chase away the shadows, but the shadows would always be there, the lights were not strong enough to completely penetrate the ever present darkness. It was the time of night when Saint City truly started to come to life. Like a spring morning in the wild when all the little animals begin to wake. The streets and sidewalks were beginning to overflow with young, vibrant life. The streets were veins and the mass of the sweet, vibrant, and vulnerable life that is man were the rushing, powerful, all important life source that is blood. Lines of people crowded the sidewalks in front of restaurants, night clubs, and theatres, all waiting patiently or impatiently to gain entrance.
However; at this time of night, on a lonely street at a distance from all the noise and hustle of Main Street, sat a building of solemn strength made of the same brick as the buildings surrounding it. It didn’t really stand out, but something about it would catch the eye. Maybe it was the sign. A large wooden sign that held a large, blue crescent moon done in Celtic knots on its left corner and the beautiful Old English script that read The Tangled Moon and beneath the name in a smaller and less elaborate text it read Rare Books and Curiosities.
The inside of the building was a dull, earthy green with black crescent moons and tangled vine patterns were stenciled along the bottom of the walls just above the baseboard. The same designs covered the sparse pillars placed strategically throughout the inside of the structure. Shelves upon shelves of rare and unheard of books lined the walls and walkways. Some looked ancient with molded leather bindings and yellow cracked pages. Others had certain imperfections that made them valuable and hard to fine. Black, bowl-shaped censors holding burning incense hung from the ceiling on chains linked with moons and the faces of children. Rare stones, ritualistic knives, and paganistic jewelry with symbols of the Goddess, Egyptian gods, and Norse runic symbols sat securely behind their glass cases on their beds of soft velvet. Inside music played through the speakers. They were haunting songs that spoke of beauty in darkness and life immortal. The kind of music that cause chill bumps to rise on your skin and clasp at your heart with an icy cold grip. It was the kind of music that leaves you swaying to its melodic, beautiful, and terrifying melody.
Also inside the store was a man. He was a lonely man, silent, diligent, and thoughtful. A handsome clean shaven youth of twenty with brown unkempt hair that fell in front of the deepest blue eyes, his eyes were like the fathoms of the ocean: fierce, strong, and deep, deep, deep. Few people could look inside those eyes that were so full of intensity for fear of feeling drowned, for fear of sinking in, fear of being lost in them. They would find themselves crippled under the storm of his gaze. But to see him now with his head down and his lean arms pushing the mop back and forth meticulously across the hardwood floors of the humble little book store. To see his slim figure through the fogged window you would think nothing of him.
He looked average enough if you were to take a simple glance at him through the glass. He wore a fine black shirt that had small black buttons that filed up the middle and a simple coat-of-arms embroidery above the hem of the right side. A pair of khaki colored cargo pants hung low on his hips that were baggy and made his torso look even slimmer. His shoes were black, simple, and comfortable to be standing in all day though his laces were much too big and often got caught up under his feet sometime causing him to trip and make himself look clumsy and akward.
He lifts up the mop and places it in the murky water filling the bottom of his cumbersome yellow bucket and then he arches and stretches his back. He lifts his gaze to the clock hanging over the counter to check the time, 9:05, or close enough to it. To him, all that registered was that it was time to close up shop.
The lonely youth pushes his mop and bucket over the now clean wood floors to the back of the store. He pulls out his key and opens the storeroom. He fumbles around for the light and when he finally switches them on his is momentarily blinded. He shields those fathomless eyes and pushes his mop and bucket through the doorway and to the back sink where they belong. Just as he makes his way back past the columns of cardboard boxes and antiques that fill the diminutive storage area from floor to ceiling he hears the glass entry door swing open and the harmonious chime of the bell wired to its frame.
Inside he could feel an agitated fury begin to writhe inside his gut like roiling inky black snakes but on the outside he was calm, collected, and above all things, professional. He locks the storage room door behind him and places his key in his pocket. He straightens his shirt before walking out into the open and though he heard the door open and the bell ring he doesn’t see anyone. Shrugging it off one the inside he gets behind the counter to count down his drawer.
Over the speakers he hears the beginning of Rev 22:20 by Puscifer, one of his favorite songs. A grin escapes from the corners of his mouth as he lets the haunting tone and erotic lyrics wash over his senses.
“Don’t be aroused
By my confession
Unless you don’t give a good God Damn about redemption…”
He finishes counting down his drawer and he locks up the register. The music playing smoothly through the speakers and as he lifts his gaze he sees a shadow gliding behind a shelf of books. Momentarily startled and confused by a sudden sense of dread creeping steadily up his spine causes him to take in a sharp, loud breath. The figure behind the book shelf suddenly pauses at the sound. The stillness and the silence are almost too much for him to take but to his relief the gliding shadow moves out from behind the bookshelf.
It was a woman, or so he thought at first. As she approached the counter, her supple hips swaying ever so slightly to the sound of the music, he became unsure. This angel, more like, was the most captivating and alluring presence of the feminine he had ever encountered. She had long hair that fell just to her small, delicate shoulders. The light revealed streaks of crimson in her raven black hair. The pale porcelain that was her skin stood out in stark contrast to darkness of her hair. He could see the feint traces of her blue veins peeking through her skin along her long neck and he found they were strangely attractive. Her eyes were like the silver of the moon. They shone like sterling and pierced his heart without mercy. He was wroth to look away from her, that gaze having hypnotized him so, like the hare before the viper just before the final strike. Lips so soft and pink, it was a small mouth but eager and quivering.
His grip on the counter was one so strong he felt the wood underneath his nails would splinter and leave him looking foolish but it was all he could do so that he would not stand there swaggering like the drunkards that littered the streets.
She placed her hands on the counter and their fingertips touched and he feels his body melt from the touch. His mind wondered for but a moment how that touch could affect him so. There was something dark and devious about her. He could feel it in his gut, that feeling he gets when he knows something’s out of place, knows something is wrong. And he knew that if she wanted him to be, he would be her slave for all eternity. A slave enslaved forever to serve her dark and devious ways, and though the notion crossed his mind it didn’t not bother him as much as it should, despite all the signs that this woman would eat his heart, he was in love nonetheless.
She leaned in close, her eyes narrowing into a look that screamed sex and danger. She lowers her head and strands of hair fall loose before one of her eyes as she bites her lip, and in that moment he was truly and fully caught in this trap of desire. She leans in closer and closer and the smell of her fills his lungs, the smell of the most sweet and precious of roses, her sweet was so intoxicating it cause his breath to shudder and his grip on the counter to falter.
She looks up at the speakers as they sing “…you would too if that sexy devil caught your eye…”
“That’s a good song.” She said, her voice like a soft orgasmic moan that spoke of the pleasure of heaven though he tone screamed of hell. She was seducing him he clarified and she was damn good at it.
‘…saviors and saints and devils and demons alike, she’ll eat you alive…” It was a great song, but it was an even greater coincidence. All he could do was nod his head dumbly having lost his voice trapped in his throat like a fox in a snare. She smiles softly, sadly and then wink at him. It was almost enough to bring him to his knees but she turns suddenly and walks away. She exits the building but he was still to entranced to notice that the bell didn’t ring.
Once she had been gone for a few minutes the spell was broken and he was left thinking himself one of the greater fools to have ever existed. How one person could affect him so he could not comprehend. The fog in his head began to clear and he finished closing up the shop though he was still feeling shaky and unnerved by the recent encounter with this wicked angel.
He grabs his leather coat, the inside of which depicting a scene of angels at war, and locks up the shop. The chill autumn air whips at his hair and kisses he cheeks turning them red. Pulling his jacket tight around his torso he walks against the wind heading for his apartment just a couple of blocks down the street. The further he walks the less he hears of the busy main street behind him.
The thought of that woman kept dancing inside his head and he couldn’t seem to shake it loose. The wind started to pick up, howling and wailing like a banshee as it rips through the cold night air. Almost like a warning the wind is followed by the pressure in his chest. A sudden deep seeded feeling that had always let him know that things weren’t right. That things were about to go all wrong.
He ignores it, just wanting to get home as soon as possible to sit down with a hot cup of coffee and watch television like most lonely men do. But that pull, that fear that made his chest sink just wouldn’t go away, and he soon realizes why when he reaches the steps to his apartment.
A thin silhouette against the street lights catches his eyes, hunched over on the stoop, waiting. He stops abruptly and narrows his eyes against the street light to get a better look at the figure that sat between him and the comfort of his home. The shadow stands and reveals herself to the light.
It was her, that woman who had invaded his thoughts with such delicate ease. She didn’t have him feeling so week as before so now he noticed more about her. She was a head short than he was. She was wearing a pair of slate gray paratrooper pants that hung low on her waist to reveal the upper curve of her hip and the pale skin of her slim stomach just below her pierced naval. She was also wearing a thin black tank top that made him wonder why she wasn’t standing shivering violently in the autumn cold though he couldn’t help but notice the outline of her nipples beneath the fabric.
The sound of her black military boots brought his attention to the sway of her approach. The rocking of her hips causing an intense craving he had never before experienced. The intensity of her stare, the wind whipping the hair away from her beautiful face, her graceful and fluid approach all contributed to an overwhelming lust for this stranger. His mind fumbling for a name. She was Cleopatra, Aphrodite, Freyja, she was…
“My name is Helen.” She spoke with a smile and that ever lyrical voice that drew his soul out for all to bear witness.
“I have been waiting for you Mikael. I have been waiting so very long for you, my love.” Her lips pouted slightly and her eyes showed so much longing. It was all most too much him to bear that he didn’t even register the fact that even though he had never met this woman before she somehow knew his name.
“Why have you been waiting for me?” He asks though he had never meant to speak a world. It was as if she herself had drawn them from his lips. His voice was but a whisper as if he feared that were he to speak too loudly she we fly away to leave him cold and shivering and in despair.
He never got an answer. She placed her small delicate hands as soft as silk on the sides of his face. That simple touch alone made him feel as if he was in the middle of an inferno even though her hands were as cold as ice. She drew him in and kissed him. He mouth was eager, with delicate lips and a wet tongue that curled around his like a snake.
The kiss lasted for an eternity, or so he had hoped. He no longer felt the cold air nor could he hear the cacophony of the city that surrounded him. All her could feel were her hands and her lips and her tongue. All he could he could hear were the soft moans that that escaped her lips and made his knees want to buckle.
He couldn’t remember being led up the three flights of stairs to his apartment. He could only remember being pulled to the door and the pressure of his chest against hers as their mouths complimented each other in fierce intensity. Her lips brush his neck and he could feel her wanting to take in every inch of him.
Through it all he somehow managed to open the door to his apartment and then shut it behind them as they entered, entwined in each others arms. She pulls back and smiles as she runs her hands through his hair. She’s breathing heavily and the scent of her mouth was sweet and intoxicating.
She starts to back away taking slow seducing steps. Without ever having to take a look back she maneuvers around the furniture and makes her way towards his bedroom. For but a second his mind wonders at how she knows where everything is without never taking her eyes off of him but he’s inevitably drawn back in when she bites her lips and curls her finger, beckoning for him to follow.
He follows her like a moth to a flame. She smiles and he melts, she laughs and he’s done for. They enter the bedroom and she presses him up against the wall and they kiss hungrily. Her lips and tongue slide down his neck and back up to his mouth and it causes the hairs on the back of his neck to stand up with the sensation. The heat between them starts to become so intense that beads of sweat already begin to adorn his forehead and neck. She takes a step back and pulls her shirt over head with graceful ease. The mounds of her pale breast press against her black lace bra and demand his attention. In a second she unsnaps her bra and it falls away to reveal her pale, ample bosom.
She takes his hand and presses it to the line of her jaw as she pulls him towards his bed. Once she reaches the bed she takes his hand and slide it down her neck and over her breasts and down her firm stomach until they reach the hem of her pants. As she unbuttons them he pulls them down to reveal the alluring curve of her hips and he feels the smoothness of her skin against his fingertips. She isn’t wearing any lingerie and the sight of the pinkness of her sex draws him closer. He wraps his arms around her waist as his strong tongue stimulates the wetness between her legs. Her hands clench the back of his head and his shoulder with such strength that it’s almost painful. Her head rolls back and her eyes shut tight as the moans of her satisfaction grace his ear.
She finally can take no more and she pushes his head away. She lays atop the bed and arches her back nearly begging for him to take her. He removes his shirt and lets it fall to the floor, the fabric of his sleeves slowly falling away to reveal the leanness of his arms and the muscle of his chest and stomach.
Her eyes widen and a wicked grin pulls at the corners of her little pink mouth. She sits up and runs hers hands over his chest and stomach. She lays small delicate kisses down his stomach and licks at his hipbone.
He runs his hands through her thick red streaked hair. She deftly removes the rest of his clothing, her mouth takes him in fervently, her tongue rolling him in her mouth just to the point of emanate explosion before she pulls away and slides her hands up his stomach and over his shoulders to pull his body down to hers.
He can feel the fiery heat of her sex as she wraps her legs around him, drawing him in. Her sighs are sweet as he enters her and only become louder and louder as their intimacy intensifies. Her nails digging motes into his back and his teeth sink into the flesh of her neck against the pain which only spurs her on.
He rolls onto his back so that she is on top and she digs her nails into his chest as she throws her head back, her hips rolling methodically and their bodies writhe like snakes as they become hotter and hotter with each moment of perfect ecstasy.
He sits up and wraps his arms around her waist as his mouth finds the hardness of her nipples, his tongue doing quick stimulating circles. Her thighs clench against his hips as her bodies sways back and forth like a strong and gentle wave. She tangles her fingers into his hair and jerks his head to the side to nibble at his ear; her moans and sighs sounding what angels must sound like. He digs his nails into her hips and her sighs turn to screams as her their bodies thrust themselves harder against each other. The minutes roll into hours until she pushes his him down to the bed and crushes her chest against his. She kisses him harder than she has ever kissed him before as the wetness between her legs erupts and so does he. She giggles lightly in his ear as they both try to slow down their rapid, heavy breathing. She slide her legs down and rests herself on top of him, curling her fingers around a spot on his shoulder. He rubs his hands up and down her sweat covered back, cherishing the moment and surprised at how so easily it had happened, and at so easily he had succumbed.
She giggles and nibbles on his ear a bit before sliding her lips down his neck and then it hits him. He is suddenly overcome with an overwhelming sense of terror that he can’t readily comprehend just before he feels the p***k of her teeth as they enter the bulging vein of his neck, and then that sudden terror becomes a pleasure more powerful than he had experienced just moments earlier. Our bodies already slick with sweat but he can feel the thickness of his blood as it trails down his neck to pool next to his head and stain the sheets. He begins to feel suddenly, and alarmingly weak from the blood loss but he doesn’t want to push her away. His eyes roll into the back of his head and he lets out a deep moan as he feels her tongue lapping away at his life blood, her teeth digging deeper into his flesh. His vision begins to blur as all the colors of his room fade together and his breathing becomes shallow and haggard. She sits up and wipes her mouth like a preening cat and the vision of her slick and naked is almost heavenly, save for the blood…his blood, dripping from the corners of her mouth and making a thin red stream down between her breasts and the middle of her stomach.
“Now you have a choice my love…you can die here as happy as you’ve ever been or you can spend the rest of eternity with me and never know sadness or loneliness ever again.” She strokes his face and smiles sadly, and all he can remember is that it was such a tempting offer that he must have said yes.