An Apocalypse Rising Ch 01

Author's Notes:

This story shall have squick, human/demon hack and slash violence, (though I will work to limit the gore) and other potentially icky things as it progresses. You have been warned.

This story continues in the same universe that began with "A Bargain Made" and "A Bargain Made: A House Fallen," though about eighteen months later. I intend to try to fill in important pieces as needed so that this stands alone as much as it can, but you might want to read the others as well.

*****

The sorceress looked down at the mayhem in the village in anger and shame. The demons were herding people as the people wept and tried to huddle together. They were chained together in groups before being led onto wagons. Others were being readied to be marched down the road, while still others lay dead or dying in the village where they fell, some being fed upon by some of the more feral creatures in the demon's army with blood, gnashing of teeth and zeal at the prospect of a fresh meal.

Maylin Xon considered them the lucky ones. What was happening to those being herded and marched wasn't for the faint of heart and was far worse than going back to the earth from which they all came. The only positive about what was going on was where it was in the world. This peninsula was sparsely populated overall. There were several villages and settlements that didn't qualify as large enough to be called villages dotting the region. There were three small cities on the whole landmass, but, by the time Xon arrived two at least had already been overrun or corrupted. She didn't know yet what became of the third.

Even with a mix of magic and science, it was going to take time to build an army to take the world.

Xon was certain that's what was happening. The tells were there in the subtle shift of ley lines that pointed to this place. When she took it upon herself to investigate she could sense the hints of more conventional power being used as well. She already knew what the Council's response would be if what she suspected was so. They wouldn't want to believe it was her. They wouldn't want to believe she was a threat. Some simply wouldn't care. In the end they believed themselves safely ensconced in their own paradise, impervious to everything, so, so what if the world that rejected them burned? They had no investment in that world.

Unlike Maylin.

Looking down at the ruined village, she could see and hear the people below as though she were with them all, so she watched and listened as one of the female creatures surveyed those preparing to be marched. She still looked human mostly, but her skin was a ghostly pale and her eyes nearly burned red and her white hair fell to her shoulders. She moved her nearly nude, leather-clad, hourglass frame like a predator, eying each, looking for some qualities known only to her. She orbited the line twice before pausing at a trembling young girl with round cheeks and brown eyes, Her clothes and body were dirty from having been dragged about.

A flick of the creature's finger and the shackles fell away. The girl recoiled slightly, pondering escape before remembering the creatures around her and what happened to those who tried to flee. She tried to shrink away instead, pointless as it was.

"Leave her alone," the older man pleaded with her, his rugged face contorted in impotent desperation. "Take me instead. Do whatever you want to me, just leave her alone."

Maylin weaved her magic carefully in her mind, fingers drawing runes and that energy extending outward to thread through them all. She wanted to know their thoughts. Whatever she could glean from about how they had come to be here as they were or where they hoped to go could help her. She suspected that so long as she remained passive in her presence and did not try to influence those minds she would not be detected. She couldn't afford an engagement she wasn't sure she could win.

The once-woman looked the man over, unable to decide between disdain and amusement. Her eyes narrowed to skits. "We already have you.

She

already has you. Be silent or be fed to the beasts." She turned her attention back to the young girl, smiling a smile that revealed longer, pointed incisors. The girl examined her captor with morbid fascination, if for no other reason than it kept her from focusing on how dire her predicament was.

The creature allowed it and played with it. "Do you think I'm beautiful?" She stepped back, spreading her arms. When the young woman said nothing for fear of saying the wrong thing, her captor continued. "I

am

beautiful. I have been remade. I have given my soul to Her and in return I have been given beauty and power. I have been given purpose. Feast upon the sight, girl. No more will I toil in pointless work to just keep the meager place I have in the world. Now I will help conquer it to hand it to Her and worship at her feet as she rules, or those that follow me will use my body as a step on that path."

She swallowed so hard her throat hurt as a cold pit descended and hollowed out her stomach. "If you say so."

Quick as the blink of an eye, the once-woman was nearly nose to nose with her prey. "I do not have to

say so.

It simply is." Her attitude shifted almost as quickly as she moved "Ah. I caught you again. That is the second time that those eyes have drifted to my breasts." Her voice became a conspiratorial whisper, "I promise not to tell your father."

She grinned when both of their cheeks reddened in embarrassment. "What is your name, girl?"

The girl pointed her chin outward in defiance.

Another flick of the creature's wrist.

"Calla," erupted from her lips.

Her hand, nails lengthened and pointed like her teeth stroked the skin of her cheek."You are also beautiful, Calla." She judged the way Calla's eyes darted from hers before coming back, "Have you not been told that?" She brushed the other cheek tenderly. "Is it the scars of adolescence just parted that keeps you from hearing the words? You are beautiful. So much makes you so. You have a fiery spirit and a powerful heart. Look into my eyes, Calla," she tempted. "Look into my eyes and know the truth about yourself."

Calla couldn't help but look deeply into those eyes. The more deeply she looked, the more forcefully they pulled her in. She could hear her own heartbeat and the thunder rush of blood through her veins.

Do you feel it, Calla?"

She heard the voice in her mind, but answered it with her own, though she felt disconnected from it, as though she was talking to herself from a great distance. "Yes."

That is your power. It is in your hammering heart and your will. Feel the heat of your power well up inside you. Do you feel it?

She took a deep breath, relishing how her lungs tingled. "Yes. I feel it."

Feel everywhere, Calla. Feel it in every part of your body.

She took another breath to pull it through her."I feel it"

You would make a fine tool for Her.

Calla sighed in want before shame rushed in to fill the void. "It's wrong."

Is it?

The voice in her mind mocked her.

Touch Her power and then tell me that again.

The creature's hand pressed to Calla's heart and Calla was overwhelmed by the power and majesty of Her. Doubts were snuffed out as she basked in it. Resistance faded wallowing in Her perfection. Her power had the same lack of limitation as her knowledge. She saw just a hint of Her face. It teased her in the same way her captor had, but she was so beautiful Calla wanted to cry at the promise of her.

What are you compared to Her?

Maylin saw what Calla saw and it took everything that she had not to send a reaction through the threads she'd woven below. She knew that face even by only the shadowy hints that were offered.

Calla knew what the answer was even as she found reality again when pain cut across her chest. She looked down to see her top ripped away from her heart, breast exposed, nipple proud against the air, wetness dampening her thighs as the, long, sickly nail dragged over the flesh in yet another tease. She hissed from arousal as much as pain. Everything felt good. Everything drove her. She panted as her eyes met those of her her corrupter.

With a depraved smile, the pale thing unclasped herself from the front, exposing her large breasts, the nipples black with whatever fetid poison following the veins halfway up her flesh. Calla tried to hold to the tattered shreds of who she was, but she couldn't stop herself from biting her lip.

The once woman sneered, enjoying his humiliation. Not that it mattered, as whatever would happen to him would happen, but she enjoyed that breaking of him. "See, Father? She wants. She wants to be owned. She wants to be owned by Her. She wants to give herself over to submission and purpose."

Let her throw me to the beasts.

"Fight it, Calla. You

are

strong. You can fight what's happening."

"And fucking," the creature added. "She

wants

Her creatures to rut and live in pleasure." The thing tilted her head. "What do you want, Calla? Do you want to belong to Her? Do you want to own your beauty and your power in a way this world will never let you? Or do you want to keep living, hand-to-mouth, hoping a man will look beyond your blemishes and take you."

She snickered, her voice dripping derision. "Or that your father might sell you to some other father's son in return for fresh eggs each morning, and knowing you will never know the wetness in your cunt that you feel right now even at the

promise

of what is to come. It is better than you can dream. Feed from me and taste of Her."

Nails raked Calla's exposed breast before that wicked voice touched her body and soul again in equal measure. "Submit to Her."

With a whimper at the words and the promise, Calla's head dipped with the speed of a striking snake and she latched onto her left nipple, suckling like a starving infant, letting the thick, black ooze coat her throat like warm syrup. She could feel it create weight in her belly and sing to every nerve in her body. She needed more and more. 'Enough' didn't exist in her lexicon anymore. More sex. More submission. More Power. As much as She allowed is what Calla would take and wield for Her. Calla bit the flesh in her mouth to bring forth more poison in a long spurt.

The once-woman cradled her head, "Mmmmmm...bite more. Take more. Feast, Calla. Embrace it. That feels so delicious. Hurt me and feast."

Calla's teeth found purchase again and she bit, rewarded with more demon milk and more whimpers of demon pleasure. The thought of rubbing herself flitted through her consciousness and, without actively deciding to, her hand darted up her modest, earth tone dress, ripped away any semblance of protection cloth gave and rubbed herself, hand hard against her mound. Her hand was slick in seconds and she screamed a scream of ecstasy, muffled by a mouth full of breast. She bit down again and the fresh eruption filling her mouth drove her to a new peak.

She kept suckling, even as the creature gently eased Calla from her nipple. Bite marks could be seen orbiting the blackened areola and the thing smiled at the black coating Calla's tongue, dripping from the corners of her mouth and down her chin. Calla wobbled on her feet, eyes glassy as though she were drunk. She let herself be led several steps forward before being stopped away from the others, so they could have a full view as they looked on in shock, disgust, and, on a few faces, the morbid fascination that Calla herself felt.

"Take off your clothes."

That seemed like a good idea. Calla wanted to be naked. She needed to be. She shed them, mostly with the creature's help, but, eventually, she stood there in that haze, nude and waiting. The thing ran her black tongue down Calla's breastbone before swirling around both both breasts, letting her teeth nip as she went before her tongue went over that soft belly and her nose teased that thick thatch of hair.

Hot breath against her pussy snapped her from her dream state enough to look down and see the once-woman waiting. Calla spoke without being asked, slurring her words. "Make me like you."

"Call out to Her. Offer yourself."

As soon as that tongue buried itself inside Calla, extending farther into her than any human tongue ever could, she jerked as though electrocuted and screamed to the sky, "I am nothing. You are all."

The orgasm that came with her declarations never ebbed. "Make me

something.

Make me

Yours.

She humped herself against the mouth working her. "I am Your servant. Change my body and fuck my mind. I give You my will. I give You my soul."

Calla's convulsions increased and the once-woman withdrew from her, bringing her gently to the ground as she watched Her work with excitement. Calla's skin bulged and caved as the body under it changed. She twisted and contorted, her face a study in pain, confusion, and lust as her limbs and torso lengthened.

The changes slowed, then stopped as Calla stared into nothing for long moments before blinking rapidly to show her awareness. The once-woman extended her arm, her smile actually approaching warmth. "Welcome, Sister."

Calla rose smoothly, taking stock of herself. She still looked human, save her eyes with the irises black as night. Her body felt hard and ready to inflict pain or endure it. She stood a head taller than her seductress. "Thank you, Sister." She felt her face, feeling her fingertips glide over porcelain, unblemished skin. What remained of the person she was that still lived felt pride. "She is generous and merciful."

"She is," the other agreed. "I am Nata," she began sweetly before hardening only a little. "The meat you were did not deserve my name."

"I understand completely." She looked around at some of the lesser creatures, "Fetch me something that will fit until something proper can be fashioned." It felt

good

to watch them scurry.

"Do not cover up on my account."

She looked at Nata hungrily. "Rest assured we will play later, and you will teach me."

She surveyed the line again, looking down upon all of them, even those few that she was not now actually taller than. She closed on her father, watching him as a cat would watch the mouse she was just about done playing with. "Do you like what you see?"

He consciously kept his eyes on hers.

"I won't let you be thrown to the beasts because you were trying to be helpful to me," she told him before slamming into his jaw with the back of her hand. He crumpled to the dirt, almost taking those he was linked to to the ground with him, "but you were told not to speak."

Nata narrowed her eyes with a sinister smile. "Are you sure you're doing him a favor?"

She didn't take her eyes from him. "It hardly matters. He always wanted a son anyway. Isn't that right, Father? Did you think I was blind to your disappointment? To be stuck with a daughter

and

an ugly one at that? How you have suffered me." Her face was a mask of contempt. "One way or another, you shall not suffer much longer."

She watched with satisfaction as he withered under the weight of her words and finally looked away.

Maylin carefully pulled her magics away from the group. She was tempted to try to plow through the growing hoards just to see how far she could get. She thought, with some satisfaction, that she might even be able to make it as far as the witch. But, as much as the vision of the conflagration pleased her mind's eye, she knew it was too foolish to attempt. She knew she needed help.

There was some personal satisfaction to be had with knowing where to get it.

To Be Continued...