At some point after leaving Duckworks, Riel travels to Peru to confront Lil. He’s had no contact with Eva/Mary since Duckworks, and his plan is not to kill Lil (whom he knows as the Brood Queen. He’s aware of the basic Lillith mythology, and has some Ohidan history from Duckworks, but he knows very little about the true nature of the world and history), but to negotiate with her. At Duckworks, he was told that if he faced Lilit, he should show her no special deference – she is not his Queen; if she attempts to demand that he respect or grovel before her, he should ignore her, and just treat her like another person. He shouldn’t disrespect her or do anything to insult her, though, either, as she is very powerful and could hurt him. Vampires are no secret by now (c.f. the timeperiod from “Cheating Life”), so his plan is to understand what kind of territory or power she is attempting to control, as he has become aware of the multinational vampire power-surge. He also knows something of the Key of Adam, and he knows that it cannot be in Lil’s hands. He’s come to find it and take it from her.
He is able to find Lil’s jungle palace only because of the satmaps he’d been given at Duckworks. It’s a tiered ziggurat/pyramid with dense growth on each of the steps, effectively hiding it from satellites and planes, but from the ground it is ornate, made of polished marble and gold inlay. It’s about 5 miles up a path from a nearby town, which is controlled by Lil.
Riel comes to the town, and doesn’t stay at the inn. He is stopped by a family who tell him not to stay there – it is run by evil women. He tells them that he has come specifically to speak with those evil women, but they say “All the same, sleep with us, and you can go to visit the evil women during the daylight.”
The inn is brimful with vampiresses, but they are either lazy, functional, or dressed to the nines to meet with Lil. When Riel pushes his way in, he gets a lot of strange looks – there are very few other humans in there who are not food. He tells the inn’s mistress that he is there to see Lil, and of course the woman pushes back – there are many people who wish to see her, and it is her pleasure, not theirs with which she is concerned. Was he announced? Riel announces himself, and he is certain Lil will be pleased to see him. Certainly. The tax to see her is very high. How much? Riel reaches for his wallet. The cost is not dollars or pesos or Euros or yuan. It is in kisses – that is the only currency he has that is worth anything here. Then take your toll – take it double and carry it back to the Queen so she will know I’m here.
The Inn Mistress pulls him across the bar and closes her lips over the soft part of his neck beneath his jawbone. Everyone is watching him now. She takes only a small taste before she releases him. Her eyes widen as his blood washes over her tongue. He wipes away the trickle of blood on his skin, and presses until the wound closes. “I will let her know you are here.” See that you do. You will stay here while you wait. I have accommodations. No, you shall stay here while you wait, if you plan to survive the time of your waiting. The rest of the room is staring intently – some have drawn closer. You shall have a room with a lock. I shall send an attendant to see to your needs. It may be some time before the Queen will make time for you, if she chooses to see you at all.
She leads Riel to a small room in the corner of the inn, and gives him a charmed lock for the door.
When he leaves, he is accosted by vampires, and he has to kill several. Inn Mistress is not happy – assigns him an escort, who of course demand payment in blood, but the Mistress indicates it is to be very small draws. Inn mistress also takes cost of room and board from his flesh.
When Lil is ready to see him, he is taken down to the main hall of the inn, which is now emptied. He is washed in hot water and left naked. He hears a lot of commotion outside before Lil enters the room. She is nude, too, except for body paint on her shoulders and face and a tall headress of black feathers. Riel can see beyond the door that there are vampires crowding around – she shoos them away.
Riel offers her the chair across from him – he doesn’t stand – but she doesn’t take it immediately. Her eye-level still isn’t much higher than his – she’s a small, round-bodied woman not more than four-foot-eight or so.
She lifts her head and smells the air around him. She speaks in spanish. So, the hound of Ey-fa has come. Who? Ey-fa. Your mother. Riel shakes his head. You don’t know much, do you? E- v- a. Your mother – mother of the world she claims. Falsely. Hasn’t she shown herself to you? Hasn’t your brother explained? I don’t have a brother. Do you mean Mary? Maria? Is that the guise she shows you? How amusing – you must be a Catholic, yes? How funny.
So, has Eva sent you to kill me? Or is she going to try negotiating again? I’m not here to kill you. And Mary didn’t send me. I haven’t seen her for years. You found me on your own? This is very interesting. I think I might like you, hound. So why are you here? To talk. You know the price, don’t you. I demand a kiss. I’m ready. She sits on his lap, her naked ass on his bare thighs, takes his cheeks between her hands, and presses a long kiss onto his lips. He is surprised, but he doesn’t fight it. When they’re done – I thought you wanted blood? Are you offering? He doesn’t answer.
Maybe later. I think you and I will have much to talk about, much more than we can talk about today. If you have no brother, and your Mother has not been filling your head with her invective, you and I might have the opportunity to become friends. I wouldn’t hold your breath. Oh, I know a thing or two about you, Jack Riel. I know you’ve had plenty of friends like me, but none that could be as good as me. You and I will be good friends because unlike Eva, I will be honest with you. I will tell you the truth of reality. Doubtless your mother would warn you of my deceptions, of my trickery, but you will see that I speak truth, you will hear it in my words. I have no reason to lie, because truth is on my side.
You will come to my palace tomorrow morning, and every morning. She squirms on his lap, lifting a knee to rotate on his thighs and face him. We will learn each other more intimately. She continues to rock her hips until he is erect. I will tell you many things, many secrets, and you will tell me some things about yourself and perhaps we will become friends. And what then? Will you offer me a place at your side, a kingdom of my own to rule? Is that what you wish? They’re mine to give. I offered them to Adam – I’m sorry -Joshua, Jesus – and he rejected them simply because my hand held them. Think what he could have accomplished if he were King of the Jews – the title was rightfully his, but mine to grant – instead of a criminal rabblerouser. Much more than he did as Buddha, and his message wouldn’t have been twisted by Paulus or his stooge Cephas. He was foolish.
Do you claim to be Satan now? I will not help you to establish your rule on Earth. Your claims are dust – your words are empty lies. Mary did warn you about me.
Satan? No! That fool is in hell. She rubs her tummy. But I am the Devil, when I need to be. She steps off his lap. I see that there are some downsides to you being so… naive to the world. You don’t believe me – you don’t have any reason to fear me. Riel looks non-plussed. You’ll wish you’d had a little more faith. She grew, grew quickly into a ten-foot, then twenty-foot horned devil with cloven hooves and spaded tail. Her eyes and fanged mouth sprouted fire, and her breasts, which had grown very large dripped flames from the teats. In addition to her tail, she had sprouted a huge priapic cock, which also dripped fire. She stamped at the ground, shattering the wood floor to splinters, and her shoulders and wings broke through the ceiling. A body half fell from the floor above; Lil plucked the woman – Gloriana, one of his escorts – from the joist and chomped on her, ignoring her screams.
Riel was frightened, but was repeating over and over – it’s not real, it’s an illusion. Lil picks him up in her hook-clawed hand and holds him high. Her breath smells of roasted flesh. I have power more than you can imagine – this is only a parlor trick by comparison. This is not real! It’s an illusion! No, my dear – it is your world that is the illusion – your reality is a thin veneer over the substance of mind and mentality. It’s a lie! You refuse to understand, don’t you. I suppose I’ll take that taste of you now. She lifted him above her mouth and bit off his right leg above the knee. Riel screamed in pain, and continued screaming as she bit off his left leg. She chewed and swallowed, and lapped at the blood that spilled from his stumps, then pressed them to her nipples to cauterize them. Now the room smelled of his own burning flesh.
She tossed him to the ground, and began repairing the damage to the inn, pulling the floor and the beams of the roof back into place. Riel is sobbing on the floor. How is your reality now? Through his tears and shaking head, Riel still maintains, this isn’t real. Lil returns to her shape of the little Peruvian, and she places her hands on her hips. She shakes her own head. You may have your legs back, when you are ready, when you drag yourself up to my palace and beg before my throne. And perhaps I will forgive your disbelief, and we might still be friends.
Riel is flung from the inn, and he is collected by the family who housed him the first night. The cost is often high. We had five children – they have taken two of our son, and our eldest daughter is now no longer our daughter. On the second morning Riel begins climbing the path to the palace. To pull himself along with his hands takes much longer than he expects, and it takes him through the night. Several hours before dawn, he arrives at the steps of her palace. He knocks but there is no response, so he sleeps by the door. He awakens to be pulled into the palace. He is washed and reclothed, and taken to the throne room, which is her bedroom; her bed is the throne on the dais. I’m so pleased you came. I smelled you coming a little after midnight. Do you think we can be friends now? Place him on the bed and leave me.
He doesn’t need to beg, just fuck her. He won’t do that. He can fuck her, or she can fuck him, but if they’re going to be friends, they will have sex. Is he married? Does he have anyone that cares? He cares. This is sex, not a commitment. He has to give up on the Catholic dogma – sex is just a way to get closer and to make children. We won’t be doing any of that, but we do need to get closer. He hesitates, but relents when she tells him that unless they have sex, he won’t get his legs back. Once they’re done, she sends him away, but tells him to come back the next morning.
He visits her every morning for the next week.
Day 2 – she tells him about Mary, about Adam, and about herself.
Lil: Are you a Christian / I’m not sure, but I have been. Very Serious. / What kind of Christian? Your father’s religion, the Buddha Christ – or the religion of Saul of Tarsus, for whom your son is named? (Riel had already learned not to rise to the bait, but it was difficult to hold his tongue. he would have to ask her about this son later.) Oh, was that a surprise? Me and my loose tongue. But you were saying… / I was a Catholic. So what does that mean? / That could go either way. There’s the “parents took me to mass” variety- / I had the stigmata when I was younger. / Oooh, now you have me interested. Could you do it again? I’d love to see you bleed like that. Stigmatas bleed the bloodof Adam himself, they say, and in your case, I’d believe it. I haven’t tasted him since… well, a couple thousand years ago when I helped him martyr himself. / (Again Riel just manages to hold his tongue.) I don’t think so. They’re pretty scarred over. / They’re still scarred? Why didn’t I notice yesterday? This, I have to see.
Day 3 – she tells him about Baod (he’s what Coera is made of), and of Patar-Ori, etc.
Day 4 – she invites him to join her. He won’t help her take over the world. He doesn’t understand – it’s going to happen – it’s been fated to happen, without his help. He may even stop her from doing it this time, but it will be the next turn or the next. She has patience. The question is, not will he help her, but will he be her friend. She tells him not to answer, but to think on it.
Day 5 – He returns to say he cannot be her friend. Images are in his mind of how casually she killed his escort, and broke off his legs. She knows – she saw it, but she will be his friend, though – why did he come? He talks about the Keys of Adam, and she says she’s leased it out to the Well of Souls. She tells him also that he will return, and that he will not kill her – he couldn’t, anyway – she can smell him from miles away.
