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Siren Sweet & Harpy Shrill copyright 2003, by Natasha Von Lecter Disclaimer:
These characters were created by Thomas
Harris. They are used herein without permission, but in the spirit of
admiration and respect. No infringement of copyright is intended, and no
profit, of any kind, is made by the creator, maintainer or contributors to this
site.
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6 of 12 PART 7 It’s rocky, at first, and my bare feet dance over the sharp stones, leaving weeping red ribbons in their wake. His hand is twisted inextricably in my hair, bending my forward, keeping me off balance as we plunge through the moonlit night. I try to pry his implacable hand from my neck, but my hands instinctively flee to cover my face as he careen through uncertain underbrush. And then, the ground gives way beneath the battered soles of my feet and I slide into the soft, impermanent mire of the sand. He doesn’t slow as we reach the beach, a ethereal fog reaching out to grasp us in glowing, otherworldly tentacles. Still hurtling forward, he doesn’t stop at the surf, but drags me across the border of sea and sand. The frigid black waves lick frantically at my bleeding feet, and he pulls me deeper into the water. The cold is paralyzing, and I feel like I’ve been thrown against the unyielding black ice of a winter street. My eyes flash upwards through the darkness and I see his long black trench gliding sinuously below the waves, circling my bleeding feet like a shark. And the moment before he plunges my head beneath the waves, I think that It’s a shame that such a wonderful garment will be ruined. My eyes snap shut as he thrusts my head under the freezing gray waters. The silence is deafening. I open my mouth to scream, and burning cold water rushes in to sear my throat. My lungs tense spasmodically, searching for air, as my numb limbs beat frantically at the liquid space that encompasses me. I make contact with his knee, hard, and I think I’ve got him off balance, but that iron grip on my neck doesn’t give an inch. I open my eyes and look up at him from my watery tomb, vision dancing black around the edges of my eyes. And even through the murky filter of the sea, I can sense his eyes on me, his mind clicking placidly away as I thrash for my life. The grip at the back of my neck loosens just a fraction, and suddenly, a hand is thrust below the water and I grab it. He pulls me up through the surface, and My lungs burst with pain, sucking in a deep salty breath. Sputtering, hacking, coughing, tears streaming down my face, he pulls me to the shore, tossing me down onto the white expanse of sand. I’m face down in the grainy whiteness, the particles of sand clinging like parasites to my face and hair. And then, I feel a wave of pressure, and I’m being pushed deeper into the sinking quicksand. He is on top of me, His expensive wet clothes molding themselves to me like some ancient embalmer’s linen. He digs his weight deeper, and I shiver as I feel his hand reaching out to stroke the vulnerable hollow at the base of my throat. I’m shivering, frozen through with hypothermic kisses, locked between shore and madman, wondering, desperately, if this is finally the place I die. Not in a basement. Not in a fish market. Not among the pigs, of either porcine or human variety. Here. Now. Shivering on a beach. I feel another wave of chills wrack my body as his hand reaches up and presses something metallic against my throat. A thin eddy of red springs up under the Harpy’s wake. I can smell the sea, and the metallic tang of blood, and wet leather, and I want to burst into racking sobs because through it all, I can also detect the heady scent of subtle and delicious aftershave. He shifts, bringing his weight higher on my body, and the voice that rasps in my ear is surprisingly warm. “By your count, how many opportunities have I had to mete out your death tonight, Clarice?” He expects an answer. I try to focus in and remember how words function. “By a conservative estimate….dozens” “Dozens. Doesn’t that seem a trifle odd to you, Clarice?” “You’ll either kill me, doctor, or you won’t” He gives the Harpy a little tug and my skin cleaves just a fraction deeper. “You’re missing the point, my dear. How many times have your protector’s come to your aid? I feel like he’s thrown me back into the ocean, a sack of bricks tied to my neck, pulling me downwards to the inescapable truth. “None.” “And why do you think that IS, Clarice?” I swallow hard, and start to cough again. He waits patiently, letting the racking pass, but I have no answer for him. Or at least no answer I can bear to speak out loud. “How many times have they left you to my tender mercies, Clarice?” “Dozens.” “I could disembowel you right now, with a flick of my wrist, and leave you nicely eviscerated on this lovely beach. The first to find you, no doubt would be a hapless morning jogger and his bounding pet Labrador. He’d be horrified, shocked, applauded, maybe even throw up in the ocean. Of course, he’d have a story to tell at every cocktail party for the rest of his life, about the day he found the mutilated body of ex-special agent Clarice Starling, killed it seemed after she had dishonored her badge and been expunged from the stainless F. B. I.” It stings. Oh, how it stings. And I curse the fact that he’s never had the need to lie to me. “They left you, Clarice, Ma petite Sirene, My Melusine, They left you with little more protection than a mob snitch they hoped would accidentally be disposed of for them. Clarice, they’d like me to be their cleaner.” I start to sob into the sand, and I feel his weight shift. He’s off me, and sitting on the beach beside me, and then dragging my shivering, sobbing, leaking, huddled mass into his arms. The betrayal is cutting. But oh God. Oh God. He’s right. “I regret the theatrics this evening, Clarice, but… He pauses to look down at me, pushing a tangled went strand of hair from my eyes. “People only see what they are prepared to see. Sometimes, we need to view things through a filter of possible horrors, to see the mundane horrors that lie beneath the surface.” I bury my head in his shoulder because looking at him is far too painful. He lets me stay like that for a moment, then I feel him shift and he’s helping me to my feet. “We need to get you warm soon, before you go into shock. I have a place just up the road. Can you walk?” “I can try.” “Good Girl.” And slowly, tortuously, with bleeding feet, and weeping eyes, and a soul drenched through with salt water, I make the first few painful steps towards his rented home. FIN Part 7 of 12
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6 of 12 copyright 2003, by Natasha Von Lecter |