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Subject: {ASSM} Darkness Within (Chapter 1)
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Date: Thu, 14 Sep 2006 19:10:01 -0400
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"Bring out your dead!"

Samantha heard the cry as she hurried down the street. The Plague was
still claiming dozens every day, and the wagons of the dead were almost
constantly on the move now. 'Must be coming up behind me', she thought
as she stepped over one of the latest victims. She looked at the
blistered, Plague-bloated face on the corpse and shuddered.

'It won't happen to me', she told herself fervently. She gave the small
sack she was carrying a slight shake, and was reassured by its weight.
'This will make sure of it.'

She turned off the main street and went into a narrow, smelly alley.
Half-blinded by the gloom, she walked carefully along it, one hand
sliding over the wall beside her. When her fingers came to an edge, she
stopped, and reached down. Her hand found a doorknob, and she twisted
it round and opened the door.

Stepping through, she found her tinderbox on the small shelf inside,
and struck a light with it. She lit the candle next to it, and by its
light made her way carefully down the stairs into the tiny black cellar
she called home.

She dropped the sack on the ground, and carried the candle around the
room, lighting all the other candles in the room. Last to be lit were
the five black candles on the floor, one at each corner of the
pentagram she had chalked onto the dusty ground.

Shivering with fear and excitement, she took one last look at the
battered sheet of parchment on the small table that was the room's only
furniture. 'This is it', she thought nervously, and put the parchment
to the flame. It was an all-or-nothing venture, after all.

Her hands shook uncontrollably as she reached behind her for the laces
of her dress. Their unsteadiness made it an unusually long process, but
in just a few minutes she discarded the last of her clothing and stood
naked.

'I hope no men come by now' she thought nervously. 'Dressing as a
filthy peasant has hidden me from most eyes, but lit up by these
candles, my beautiful noble features are plainly obvious. None of those
plague-infested monsters would hesitate for a second before forcing
themselves on me.'

For a moment, visions of her father's mansion floated before her eyes,
flames billowing from every window as the mob of peasants stampeded
through the grounds. She closed her eyes tightly to shut out her
memories of the results of her father's attempt to contain the Plague
by barricading the peasants in place.

'I escaped them,' she reminded herself, 'I escaped them, and now I'll
do what I must to escape the Plague too.'

She picked up her knife, and strode over to the sack she had brought
in. Untying the strings, she pulled out the small black lamb she had
bought earlier that day. Weakened from its confinement, it struggled
feebly as she carried it into the pentagram. Grimly, she raised her
knife, and cut the animal with it.

Blood sprayed out, and she hurriedly lowered the lamb, holding it just
above the floor and aiming the blood at the chalk lines on the floor.
Her back complained at the awkward way she had to hold its weight, and
she traced the five lines as quickly as possible. She straightened up
gratefully after completing the pentagram in an unbroken line of blood.

Then she cut open the lamb's throat, and held it by its back legs as
its blood flowed into the pentagon in the heart of the five-pointed
star. As the creature's life flowed out of it, she began the words of
the ritual, speaking the strange syllables aloud for the first time.
With the last word of the first verse, she felt the lamb's body relax
suddenly as it let go of its life. She threw the carcass out of the
pentagram, and knelt on the floor, ignoring the pool of blood that
covered it. She continued with the second verse as she dipped her knife
in the blood and drew a five-pointed star on her own body with it, her
nipples forming the top two points and the bottom point at her navel.

Then as she began the third verse, she raised her knife to her navel,
and made a small cut in it. Blood leaked out, and began to trickle
down. She carefully made sure that she finished the verse just as the
blood reached the entrance to her womanhood.

Then she hurried to complete the last verse, and just managed to reach
the last word as her blood dripped off her body and fell into the pool
of blood from her sacrifice.

The ripple her blood caused in the pool beneath her spread slowly
outward in a perfect circle. It took a moment for Samantha to realize
that there was a ripple even where there was no blood.

Before she could think of reacting, the ripple reached the points of
the pentagram, circling it perfectly. Then it stopped, and at the same
time, the candles in the room went out, and only the five black candles
continued to burn. She blinked, trying to adapt her eyes to the sudden
darkness, but all she could see was herself, kneeling within the red
lines of the pentagram. Everything else was black.

'It must be working,' she realized with as much dread as delight.
Hurriedly, she bowed her head and closed her eyes, as the instructions
on the parchment had said she should. Then she waited, for what felt
like years.

"You Want." said an unearthly voice.

Samantha struggled to make her voice work. "Master," she finally forced
out, "I crave your protection."

"Protection From What?"

"Plague. Illness." She replied tremblingly. A memory of her father's
death passed through her mind, and she was moved to suddenly add,
"Injury. Death."

"And What Will You Give In Return For Protection?" the voice asked.

"Everything I have," she replied. 'Oh no,' she realized almost
instantly, 'I said it wrong! It was supposed to be "Everything I AM"!'

But the voice didn't reply in anger. Instead, it almost sounded
pleased. "Truly Everything?"

Relieved, Samantha replied hurriedly, "Yes, Master. Everything."

"Then It Is Agreed!" The voice pronounced.

Relief flooded through Samantha. It had worked! The Dark One would
protect her from the Plague, and all it would cost her was the soul she
had never really believed she possessed anyway.

But nothing happened. Relief faded and fear began to gnaw at her. The
parchment had said the Ritual ended at this point, and she should be
returned from the Void immediately. She waited, but still she remained
in the void.

At last, she could bear no more. "Master?" she asked nervously.

"Yes." The voice replied. "I Will Take My First Payment Now."

"What? But you can't take my soul until I die!" she protested in sudden
terror.

"Your Soul Is What You ARE," the voice answered. "You Did Not Offer
What You Are. You Offered What You Have. You Offered Me Your BODY!"

Samantha felt suddenly sick with horror as she heard the voice's words.
Before she could protest further, she was knocked back by a sudden blow
from an invisible hand. As she fell back, she felt her flailing limbs
being guided outwards, but it happened too fast for her to do react.
She landed on her back, and struggled to raise herself, but was unable
to move. She looked around, and saw a candle flame dancing above her
hands and feet. She tilted her head back, and was just able to see the
fifth candle above her head.

An ice-cold thrill of terror ran through her as she realized she was
spread-eagled within the pentagram. She cried out as an immense weight
bore down on her, crushing her immovably against the floor of the
pentagram. Then she screamed out the last of the air in her lungs as
she felt something massive force its way into her.

"Yess. . . " hissed the voice. "Your Body, Your Virginity, Your
Dignity. All Mine Now!"

Unable to breathe, unable to speak, unable to move, Samantha could only
weep silently as the darkness took her, thrusting into her deeper and
deeper with every stroke. Suffocation combined with pain overwhelmed
her, and she felt herself fading away. Before everything vanished, she
felt a sudden wave of cold blackness wash into her womb, and heard the
voice of the darkness cry out in triumphant pleasure.

She awoke, and her stomach lurched when she saw only darkness.
Terrified, she leapt to her feet. The realization that she could move
abated her fear, and the chink of light she saw as she whirled around
filled her with relief. She was in her cellar, and a sliver of
moonlight was shining through the crack in the door.

'I'm home' she realized thankfully. She sank to the floor again. 'Did
it really happen?' she wondered. It had felt utterly real at the time,
but now it was over. . . 'I don't hurt' Samantha realized. 'If it
happened, I should be in agony - it felt like I was being torn apart. I
should be bruised all over, it was so heavy. But I'm not. I feel fine.'

Except she didn't. There was a cold, sick lump in her stomach. 'It's
just from fear' she told herself firmly. 'And from laying naked on this
cold floor for hours.'

She stood, and busied herself with getting the candles relit. Once she
could see her room again, she frowned. There was no blood anywhere. Not
a drop. 'How much of it was a dream?' she asked herself, baffled. Then
she saw, in a corner, a small black bundle. She stepped closer, and saw
to her dismay that it was the body of the lamb.

She leaned against the wall for support. 'If I killed the lamb, there
should be blood. Unless something took it all. . .'

'I can't stay here,' she decided. 'I have to get out of here. If it
happened, it went badly wrong. If it didn't, the Plague could still get
me.

'And the Library is only a day away. If it DID happen, I need to know
what else could happen.'

Decided, she dressed hurriedly by the light of the candles. Then she
used her knife to lever up one of the floorstones, and pulled a small
purse out from under it. 'Not much left' she thought glumly. She took
one last look around to see that there was nothing she had forgotten,
and then climbed the stairs and left the cellar she had called home for
the last week.

The alley was lighter now than it had been in the evening earlier - the
gibbous moon was right above, and shining directly into the alley. She
reached the corner of the alley and looked up and down the street.
Nothing moved. The Plague had scared those it hadn't yet killed, and
nobody went outside if they could avoid it any more. She hurried down
the street and made her way to the nearest city gate.

Which was closed and chained shut. As it was every night, she
remembered belatedly.

A sudden, unreasoning claustrophobia came over Samantha. 'I have to get
out of here!' she thought desperately. She looked around frantically. A
wagon had been parked beside the city wall on her left. If she stood on
it, she might be able to reach the top of the wall, and scramble over
it.

Not giving herself time to think about it, she scrambled up onto the
wagon and reached up the wall. The top was still a good foot away.
Gritting her teeth, she searched the wall for handholds, and climbed up
it.

Hitching her skirt up so high the Watch would have arrested her had
they not been hiding indoors too, she managed to get a leg over the
wall, and sat astride it. Then she looked down.

The ground was twice as far below her on the outside as it had been on
the inside. She had forgotten that, too. The road was built up on a big
pile of earth to come through the gate. 'I can't climb down that!' she
realized in despair. She slumped down in defeat. The movement rubbed
her against the wall between her legs, and suddenly it seemed she was
in the black void again, being violated by the darkness. Vertigo and
nausea swept over her, and she fell.

The impact with the ground knocked all the air out of her, and the
struggle for breath only increased her feeling of being back in her
ordeal in the darkness. 'Please, don't let me be there again!' she
prayed, utterly disoriented.

The world came back again as she slowly and raggedly managed to draw a
breath in. She opened her eyes and the moonlight shone into them. She
smiled in relief, and shakily stood up. Then she realized she had
fallen outside the city.

She looked up at the top of the wall, barely visible in the dim light.
She looked down at herself. 'No pain' she thought in wonder, 'not even
the slightest ache. That fall should have killed me, or at least broken
half the bones in my body. How. . ?'

A voice echoed through her memories. "Protection From What?"

"Plague. Illness. Injury. Death."

'Protection from injury?' she thought wonderingly. 'Is that it? It made
me immune to harm? And if so. . . did it make me immune to Death as
well?'

It was too much to deal with. She pushed the thought away. 'I have to
get to the library,' she told herself, 'I'll find out everything
there.'

She dusted herself off, straightened her clothing, turned her back on
the city, and walked away. After a short distance, the road came down
to ground level, and she was able to walk along its firm surface
instead of the muddy fields next to it, and her speed increased
noticeably. By the time dawn cast enough light for her to see any
distance, she was out of sight of the city. For some reason, she felt
very grateful for that.

Her stomach grumbled, and it occurred to her that she had left without
thinking to bring any food with her. 'Idiot', she told herself, hunger
making her bad-tempered. But she had, at least, plenty of money to buy
food at the first village she came across. In fact, she realized, she
was probably better off buying food rather than carrying it. After all,
she wanted to get to the library as quickly as possible, didn't she?

About an hour after dawn, she saw a few spires of smoke rising into the
sky just over the next hill. Anticipation quickened her tired steps,
and she soon crested the hill to see a good-sized village. It had
evidently grown up around the crossroads that split it into four, and
there were two inns on opposite corners. She opted for the slightly
cleaner-looking one, reasoning that the other inn probably catered more
for men who wanted to drink.

"Hello, miss," the young woman inside greeted her, looking up from the
floor she was sweeping. "How can I serve you?"

"Breakfast," Samantha said hungrily, sinking gratefully into a chair.

"There's porridge," the maid offered, "and fresh-baked bread. We can do
bacon and eggs if you'd like to wait a while."

Samantha shook her head. "No waiting. I'm starved. Porridge and bread
will be fine."

"Yes miss," the maid nodded. She leaned her broom against the bar and
retreated into the kitchen. A minute later, she brought in a bowl of
porridge, a small jar of honey, and some buttered bread. Samantha
started spooning the porridge in without hesitating long enough even to
thank the woman. The long walk and such a long wait before eating had
made her ravenously hungry, and she had cleared the bowl sooner than
she would have believed possible. She called for more, and turned to
the bread as she waited for the next bowlful.

The maid looked half amused and half concerned at her hunger, but she
dutifully brought food until Samantha finally leaned back with a
contented sigh. In the bright sunny morning, with a pleasant ache in
her legs and her stomach pleasantly full, the dark events of the night
before seemed no more substantial than a dream.

As the young maid leaned over to pick up the bowl and plate, Samantha
felt a strange stirring in her stomach, like a thrill of excitement.
She dismissed it, and asked the woman how much she owed.

"Three coppers, miss," the maid told her, bustling away with the
crockery. Samantha pulled four coppers out and dropped them on the
table, and got up to leave. Her dress felt tight around her middle, and
she smiled slightly in amusement as she realized her large breakfast
had expanded her stomach. She walked out of the inn, and turned to
follow the road. If she could keep up a good pace, she should reach the
library by noon.


The sun that had made her smile cheerfully soon brought a frown to her
face as it became hotter and hotter. At every well and stream she came
across, she splashed water in her face, and made no effort to keep from
splashing her clothing with it. Her breakfast, so satisfying when she
had been seated in the cool inn, seemed to weigh down on her stomach
ever more heavily. She had loosened her clothing around the waist
shortly after leaving the inn, but instead of loosening through the
morning, it seemed to just get tighter and tighter.

'Must be the heat,' she thought as she tried to loosen her dress even
more. 'I hope I get to the library soon!'

As though her thought had summoned it, she suddenly saw the small stone
building off in the distance. She smiled in relief, and picked up her
pace for the final stretch. Apart from anything else, the stone
building would be cool and shady, giving her respite from the merciless
summer sun.

She knocked on the heavy wooden door on the front. After a few moments,
it was opened by an elderly man in a monk's robe, who stared at her
silently.

"I seek entry to this house of God," Samantha told him ritualistically.

He shook his head. She reached down her front and pulled her father's
amulet out. She showed it to him. "I have a right to enter this house
of God," she told him, aware that using the right words was as
important as the amulet itself.

He studied the amulet for several seconds, then finally nodded and
stood back. She walked past him, and he shut the door behind her.

After the heat and light, the sudden change to cool darkness made
Samantha feel almost ill. A pain rippled through her stomach, causing
her to wince, and she felt weak and giddy. She closed her eyes and took
several deep breaths. Her dizziness faded, but her stomach continued to
throb in pain.

"I need to see the books in the basement," she told the monk. "I know
the way."

He nodded, and went out of the entrance room through a small door in
the far end. Samantha went to one side, and lifted a large heavy candle
out of its ring in the wall. She heard a slight click as she did so,
and smiled. Then she set the candle on the floor, and pushed hard on a
small round stone in the floor. It sank an inch or so, and the stone
next to it rose the same distance. She took hold of the elevated stone,
pulled it up, and then reached into the hole it had left. Bracing
herself, she pulled upwards as hard as she could.

A whole section of floor lifted up. She wedged it up with a stick that
had been hidden beneath it, and then slid into the hole. She reached
back for the candle, and walked by its light down the stone stairs. At
the bottom of the staircase was a small room, with bookshelves lining
every wall. Each shelf was filled to overflowing with books. The small
amount of space remaining in the room was mostly taken up by a small
desk and chair.

'Hasn't changed,' Samantha noted. "Looks like the pious idiots are
still too afraid of the Forbidden Books to come down here. My pen is
still on the table!'

She put her candle on the desk, and reached for the book she had so
laboriously read on her last visit. It opened to the page describing
the ritual she had performed the night before, hardly surprising after
the amount of time she had spent copying it onto parchment.

She turned back a few pages, and started reading carefully. She had to
know what would happen to her after carrying out the ritual
incorrectly. The writing was as incoherent and archaic as she
remembered it, but she gradually pieced together the rules that applied
to the ritual she had performed.

She looked down at the notes she had taken. As far as she could tell,
the Dark One couldn't manifest unless it was summoned by the ritual. It
could also manifest only in darkness. It also seemed to need blood to
sustain its manifestation, although the passage was unclear - it just
referred to "fluids of life from a living body", and she was confused
by the pleural.

'So,' she concluded, 'it can't manifest without darkness and blood. And
even then, it can't manifest unless it's summoned. So last night was a
one-off. It can't get me again.'

She almost laughed in relief. It appeared her little mistake might have
left her in an even better position than she had thought. She had sold
her body to the darkness, but now her body was beyond its reach. She
had everything she wanted, and her soul was still her own as well! 'Not
bad at all,' she concluded.

She shut the book decisively. 'I've spent enough time in this dump,'
she thought. 'Time to get on with getting myself re-established as a
member of the nobility. And to seeing those murdering peasant scum
burning at the stake for their crime!'

She put the book away and went back up the stairs. She didn't even
bother to close the secret entrance behind her - just left the place
and began walking back up the road. The moment she was out of the
little monastery, her stomach pain vanished. She did laugh then:
Everything was going her way from now on, she decided.

-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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