The Wings of Ashtaroth

Chapter 15: Dreamers: Section II: Ashtaroth

Ashtaroth: The Palace: Qemassen

Mad mad mad. They all thought he was mad. And maybe he was mad. Maybe he'd imagined everything. Maybe he'd pierced his own flesh like they claimed. Maybe he'd stripped himself naked. Maybe he'd—

Click, scrape, came Lilit's footsteps.

Ashtaroth bent lower over his work, frenziedly scribbling. It didn't matter. None of it mattered. He was fine in his room, alone, crownless, and what did prophecies mean anyway? Certainly, Samelqo had never said anything about Qemassen's promised saviour being mad.

"It's not very nice of them," Lilit purred, strolling idly about the room, picking up this and that ornament to turn over in her hands, "but I did tell you."

Ashtaroth looked back down at his work—the translation he was now struggling to finish: one of the great epics of the Lora poet Naeus. A moment later and Lilit's hand was flat atop the scroll, smearing the fresh ink. Lilit was rather a lot like a cat he'd once owned.

"Stop thinking about cats. I want you to think about me."

"I am," Ashtaroth admitted grudgingly, "and about cats." He looked up. "Why are you still here?"

Lilit removed her palm. She tousled her bloody curls. "Because you are."

A burning ache spread across his back, a pain he'd been feeling for days and couldn't explain. Probably more of Lilit's doing, which meant there was no point calling for Qirani. There had never been any point in asking anyone for their expertise. Where Lilit was concerned, the wise men of Qemassen were novices.

"I don't see where else I'd be," said Ashtaroth. "They won't let me leave unaccompanied anymore." He rubbed his back. The flesh was tender and puffy. Swollen.

Along with everything else, perhaps he was developing a hunchback.

Ashtaroth swallowed the frenzied laughter that threatened to explode past his lips.

Lilit chortled and stepped away from him. "Give me what I want and no one has to let you do anything. You can come and go when you like."

Ashtaroth stared dully at the smeared poetry in front of him. It was no use; his work was irreparably damaged. He frowned at the last vestiges of his connection with the ordinary world before rolling the document up and pushing it to the side. "What do you want? I can't see what else you could possibly take from me."

The click, scrape of her footsteps transformed to an uneven stomp. She slammed her palms on the table, making Ashtaroth jump. "You. You, you, you. You know that."

"What would a god want with me?" He surveyed Dannae's pleading eyes, her light bronze skin, her battered face.

"Gods are only ideas, Ashtaroth," said Lilit. "The idea of love, of eternity, of revenge."

Ashtaroth scratched absently at his back and felt the skin give way. Something wet trickled out. He drew his hand back and found his nailbeds filled with blood and milky yellow fluid.

"Ideas don't cut holes in people," Ashtaroth said plainly.

Lilit grinned, the expression made crooked by the hole in her face. "Become one and find out, little twin."

The door opened.

No one had even knocked this time. Did they care so little for his own wishes? He didn't want to see anyone. He didn't want to see his shame reflected in their eyes.

One of the guards gave Ashtaroth a wary glance as Aurelius walked in, then closed the door with a thud, leaving the brothers alone.

Well, alone with Lilit, which according to everyone else amounted to the same thing.