24 Red Twilight Demon of the Flowers chapter 24

Chapter 24 Fractured Memories part 3

The Hyena touches her nose to my neck then playfully pushes me away. She walks over to the table on the other side of the room and reaches into a folder that is sitting in wait on the wall. "Now let us get started with the real game. I should like you to write your name here." She points out a dotted line in the lower right corner of a piece of paper she has on a clipboard, there looks as if there should be writing on the paper but it is in the form of ink that seems to not be visible under the neon lights of the 'Dungan Master' sign. I pick up the page and try to see the writing, but it simply can't be done

Samur takes the clipboard from me and places it back on the table "Silly kitten, just sign." She pulls a check out from between her breast and sets it on the table, now this I can read clearly, this is a cashier check for over ten times my annual salary "I get you to sign this paper, and I give this to you or who so ever you want me."

I can't turn that down, just think about what you could do if you had ten years pay in your hand right now. I do as I am told, Samur kisses me in turn and hands me the check. "Now, I should like you to take these." She pulls out from under the table a stack of paper that looks to be pressed from leather. Then she pulls out a candle and a pin that can't be less than 200 years old with the inkwell to go with it "Write for me three letters and seal them with wax; one for your mother, one for your best friend and one for the museum. I need you to tell them that there is work that you must do abroad, and you regret that you will not be home for three months."

I turn my head, my eyes find Samur's "three months? You want me to stay here for the next three months?"

Samur smiles placing her hands under her chin batting her eye's cutely "do you wish to not? For I think it should please me much if you should stay. Maybe you can say it to be a vacation from your little art job. How does your job work anyway? I should like to know more."

I need time to think, I can't grasp all at once how a weekend trip could turn in a three month long one or way, but again I think about the money I was just given, and then about the question of what I do "I am an artist by trade, I am specially trained in the handling of antique artwork, and its repair"

Samur waves me to sit down giggling happily "the paradox of art. Everyone wishes they can make new art that everyone can love. But therein is the problem is it not? If you should think about all the things you love are they not all things they have? And all things new are things you cannot know that you love."

I laugh embarrassed "yeah, that is why people that clean paintings get paid so well" Clearly suffering a lapse in judgment I sit down to start writing. I take note of a watermark on the pages, an emblem; three question marks, one backward, one upside down, one backward and on its side, all connected by a single ring in-between them. I can't say why this caught my attention, only that it did, and that it will again.

The letters, something about them and the way Samur asked me to write then feels like something I have seen before, something from the past. Samur reaches under the table setting a hand on my lag as I write. She tickles me to keep my attention. I feel hypnotized.

After I finish the letters Samur places them in a set of envelopes, she produces a wax stamp and seals them shut, the embroidery on the stamp resembles the letter 'V' and a set of wings. At that Samur is overtaken by animalistic urges. She pushes me at the bed in the room and forces me onto my stomach. She grips me by the haunches and pulls me up to all fours. She lays on my back play humping me as she nibbles at my neck.

For some time Samur bites and kisses at me, her heat builds, and her hips rock up against my butt. That same soft, stiff feeling starts to rise again. I am nerves, uneasy, Samur reaches around be clawing at my chest. I have never been pushed on to all fours like this and never has a girl rubbed my rump so erotically. If I may, I would also like to say that I never thought I would be with a girl from outside my kingdom.

Samur slides her hands into my pants offering to push them down for me. At that point, I try to pull away and tell Samur that 'I'm really not that excited.' I get as far as saying "I" then she rolls me onto my back and pulls my legs up to her sides as she lays me in missionary position. She takes my muzzle in her , and she forces me to kiss her. Her tongue slides into my mouth and I can do nothing but except her lust.

At some point during all of this, I can only assume I fell asleep. I awaken what I can only guess to be hours later in the room that was given to me on the second floor. I don't think I slept with Samur, but suddenly the thought is on my mind. If she starts to act so rowdy again I might just have to try to reach down and get a feel for her little hole. Thinking about it I am disappointed I didn't have that thought earlier.

I go for a walk around the castle, I find most of the doors locked. Ultimately not unreasonable. I do notice a few open doors, the entrance to the basement, a door on the second floor that leads to a study, and a door that leads into a theater room. As I walk a hand full of thoughts keep creeping to the front of my mind, first that way Samur said "…three letter." That sounded so strange to me, the words and the idea alike seemed in so many ways wrong, second everything in the main wing of the castle, why is it all painted bronze?

I come to a mirror at the end of a hallway on my walk, the mirror is eight feet wide and ten feet tall, it is pointed down the hall to a second mirror of identical diminutions, the two mirror reflect each-other creating the illusion of a hallway without ending. The glass is backed by a yellow metal giving the mirror a sickly reflection, everything looks aged and yellowed, the glass itself is imperfect, it has slight ripples in it that make the edges look like they are reflecting throw water.

There is a gold molding around the outside of the mirror with elaborate carvings in it, fish like shapes swim up the sides of the mirror, then there is a watery brake in the molding that marks fish turning into birds flying up to the keystone of the mirror, a sun-like shape… but what is that? The same shape I had seen in the watermark of the paper, the three question marks and the ring. There inside the sun. what is it? What does it mean? I reach up to try and run my fingers along it but then feel the need to try to find my way back to my room instead. I will need to remember to ask Samur about the etching.

For the next day or two, I don't see Samur. I ask Griswold about it, and he can only tell me that she is not available. I should have expected so much. Someone like her surly cant afforded to sit around all day right? The strange mark I had seen had almost slipped my mind before I returned to my room the following night to find a piece of paper on my bed with writing in red ink on bronzed paper that reads "Have you seen the mark?"

The letter seems ghastly, but I discard it ready to lay down and hopes of seeing my friend in the morning. I hear whispers in the back of my mind as I way down.

"…Silly Kitten, Just sign…"

"…Now the real game can begin…"

"…All the things that you love are they not things that you have…"

"…Just sign…"

"…Have you seen the Mark…"

My eyes snap open, I feel something pressing down on my chest, something large and heavy is sitting atop me. My arms can't move, my legs can't move, I want to shout, but my body will not allow it. I hear roaring, I feel the wind rushing out from under my bed and out the door like some sort of air tunnel, I see a haze rolling from beneath me, I smell cold in the air, I taste something bitter in my mouth. Hands reach for me from the foot of the bed, my heart pounds. Hands rest on my chest. The bitter taste like blood and gasoline chocks me.