Sins 01 - Sins of Temptation

lid open to see a mass of crawling maggots within, their swollen white bodies wriggling over each other to get at the crumbs of wafer, an unholy miracle of rotting sustenance somehow sustained in this unnatural place.
    Sensing that the book was close, I knelt down at the altar and a momentary chink appeared in the madness that possessed me. My resolve wavered and I knew I should just walk away now, leave the church and be done with this place, but other thoughts intruded. My sordid apartment, the fighting neighbours that disturbed my sleep, the debts I owed at the bar and the need to top up my vodka supply ever more frequently. To walk away now was only to return to that life, but this book was something precious, valuable enough to be hidden here, a secret that perhaps I could unlock, or sell at the very least.
    My mind made up, I crawled around the altar, feeling the flagstones for any evidence that they had been lifted. The dust and grime of years layered my frantic fingers as I searched, and finally, I found a place that had been brushed clean. The flagstone was carved with a strange symbol, a curling filigree of loops ending in a forked demon’s tail, crossed through with a shaft and Roman numerals, all surrounded by a roundel of letters. It was cracked through the centre, with a chink at the side, and as my heart pounded with excitement, I levered it open.
    In the violet light that touched the stone with a sickly haze I saw the book, and immediately I felt a visceral desire to possess it, an emotional wave that overwhelmed me with infatuation. My hands clutched at the book, pulling it to my chest like a long-lost child. The cover was soft leather, a patchwork of colours reminiscent of the varieties of human skin tone and it smelled of ancient herbs, a heady scent of rich tombs and incense disguising the darker note of death.
    It opened beneath my eager hands and I tried to read the first words aloud. They were strange-sounding in my mouth, but within a few lines I could not hold back the torrent that flooded from me. It was as if the book spoke through me and as my voice grew stronger, it echoed in the nave of the deserted place, rivalling even the power of the storm that raged outside. As I reached the end of the powerful prayer, the world seemed to tremble and split as sounds of lamentation filled the air. I crouched down, utterly terrified, screwing my eyes tight shut, trying to block the cacophony with my hands. Words of agony assaulted my ears in horrible dialects with the sounds of pounded flesh, as tortured spirits howled like dogs on the hunt. Then all at once, it was over and I heard soft footsteps in the silence that followed.
    Emerging from a side chapel, where I had thought lay only tombs, came the woman from the photograph who had danced with such abandon all those years ago with the young and handsome author. Her long silken hair hung loose, with flowers wound at the crown, as if she had just woken from dappled sleep on the banks of a sparkling stream. Her skin glowed with an internal light like the alabaster from Egyptian tombs and her full lips were a deep peony pink. I watched her tongue dart out to lick them and my breath was drawn from me by her beauty. Her eyes were blue as a cornflower meadow, languid like a summer day and, gazing into mine, offered pleasures beyond my imaginings. As she walked toward me, I could see the outline of her perfect breasts straining against the white gossamer of the long flowing dress. She exuded innocence with an edge of erotic knowing, and as she drew closer, I could scarcely draw breath. She pressed herself against me, her cool hand feathering down my chest to my belt.
    “Through me, there is everything you desire in this life,” she whispered, as her hand moved lower. “You only have to write it on your skin and it will be yours.” Her lips touched mine, her tongue darting out to lick delicately at the corner of my mouth. “And there is only one tiny thing I want in return.”
    My lips opened against hers and I pushed all thought of Faerwald’s bloated body from my mind, for surely his diary could only be the ravings of a madman.
    SOURCE: “Symbols of the Occult”, Tobit’s Spirit Guide. http://tobitsspiritguide.angelfire.com

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