Desire Reborn

Lovecraftian romance for Power up Prompt #5

Image: Mana5280 via Unsplash

The dead world of Tenakath was a place of utter silence. Death and decay had long since departed, leaving nothing but ash in their wake. The crumbling structures of once thriving civilizations were reduced to dust with the passage of time.

On the surface, it was a wasteland, but beneath, a tortured soul served his eternal sentence.

Balroth, once a great king who ruled over an empire that spanned the realm, was struck down by unfathomable gods who tore through the fabric of reality to devour all that they touched.

Balroth was not spared, nor was he given the mercy of a swift death. Instead, the dead gods who sowed his fate saw fit to fill him with their seed, transforming him into a hideous creature that knew not the passage of time.

Eons passed, and Balroth was no closer to the sweet release he so craved. He carved out a kingdom of his own, deep beneath the surface. He couldn’t bear the sight of his failures each day.

He took with him the last vestiges of his people, who were also cursed with eternal life. Unlike Balroth, they maintained their human forms, though a pale reflection of who they once were.

Among the many pains that afflicted the fallen king, Balroth’s greatest torture was the loss of his love, Sariel.

Every night, he saw those final moments in his nightmares. The dead gods, with their mass of tentacles and tendrils, mercilessly dismantled her body. In doing so, they ended his entire world a second time.

With nothing but time and the forbidden relics of the dead gods that they left behind, Balroth and his trusted circle went to work. Using their ancient magics, they could reach into the well of souls and pluck one out, returning it to the mortal plane.

Balroth’s acolytes would carve sculptures of living flesh based on his description of Sariel’s beauty and insert a soul into the stone body.

They had achieved her form almost perfectly. Crimson hair that fell across snowy skin. The subtle curvature of her waist, the shape of her legs, the softness of her lips, all of it was nearly perfect.

But each time, they failed to find her soul, and it ended the same way. When he looked into her eyes, it was not his Sariel reflected back at him.

His rage at each failure simply perpetuated the cycle. He would descend into pain and madness, ripping the facsimile of his love limb from limb until she was unrecognizable.

Balroth grew tired. He began to think his acolytes would never find her soul within that sea of spirits long departed.

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One day, as he floated just above his throne of stone overlooking an infinite abyss, he heard one of his acolytes fast approaching.

Balroth turned, his visage a horror to behold. A single, massive eye, surrounded by writhing tentacles and dripping with fetid slime.

“Sire! We may have found her,” a voice said.

Balroth’s eye sharpened. His gaze turned to an acolyte approaching the throne. With no mouth to speak of, Balroth spoke directly into the acolyte’s mind.

SPEAK!

“Your grace, we have completed another Sariel. When she awoke, she asked for you by name.”

Balroth’s entire body quivered with anticipation.

SEND HER TO ME, NOW!

The acolyte bowed and fled back into the darkness. Balroth felt the flames of desire spark within him. He dragged his tentacles across the cold stone floor.

They were incredibly sensitive, able to detect even the most subtle of sensations. It amplified his pleasure, his pain, and everything in between.

“Behold, Sariel reborn!” a voice proclaimed.

Balroth floated off his throne, hovering across the distance until he could see the whites of her eyes. Her gaze was unmistakable.

Those eyes housed an endless depth of passion. It was her. There could be no doubt.

“Balroth my love, what have they done to you?” Sariel asked.

Balroth recoiled at the sound of her voice.

I AM HIDEOUS! A MONSTER UNDESERVING OF YOUR LOVE!

Sariel shed the robes given to her. Her naked body shimmered with the primordial ooze from which her new body had emerged only moments before.

“I care not what form you take,” she whispered.

She reached up with a tender hand and grabbed one of Balroth’s tentacles gingerly in her palm. Her touch sent lightning through Balroth’s veins.

LEAVE US!

“As you wish, my lord,” The acolyte said.

Sariel reached forward and buried her hands in the mass of tendrils that made up his body. He felt her touch around his eye as she gently massaged the surface.

For the first time in an eternity. He felt in control of his voice. The rage he had held so long dissipated.

How I have longed for your touch.

“My love, I have spent my time on the other side studying the magics of the Exiled Ones. I cannot undo their curse, but I can give you this…” Sariel said.

The scene before Balroth faded away. It was replaced with a distant memory. Balroth was human again, laying on silk sheets in his castle chambers. A crisp winter wind wafted in from the open window.

Sariel laid beside him. He felt her warm against his skin. It was a sensation he had dearly missed. Her fingertips danced across his bare chest.

“How is this possible?” Balroth asked.

“This is my gift to you for my rescue. We have this moment together, a brief collision of our souls before we must return to the present.”

“Sariel, I do not wish to keep you here. You should not be forced to live out your days on this dead world in the presence of my hideous form.”

Sariel laid her head on Balroth’s chest. “I choose to be here with you, my love. In fact, I wish to join you in your sentence.”

Balroth was confused. “Truly? You would join me in this eternal prison?”

“I would. There is nowhere else I’d rather be. Turn me into one of them. If we must exist forever, let us use their power to rebuild Tenakath from the ashes.”

Balroth blinked and the moment was over. He was back in the present. Sariel looked at him with those endless eyes. She was his moon and stars. His entire universe.

You are sure this is the fate you desire?

Sariel nodded.

Very well.

Balroth floated over her. A fleshy ovipositor emerged from deep within his body. The hollow tube shot forward, burrowing itself into Sariel’s chest.

A yelp of pain escaped her mouth as blood ran down from the corner of her lips. Balroth watched the eggs tumble through, falling into Sariel’s body. He pulled the ovipositor out of her and waited. Within seconds, the transformation began. He couldn’t bear to watch.

They echoed across the interior of the dead world, joined by the visceral snapping of bone and the sundering of flesh. An eternity seemingly passed before he heard her voice again.

“Open your eyes my love,” Sariel whispered.

Balroth’s single eyes flickered open, and he saw the transformed visage of his eternal love. Her skin was replaced with shimmering scales from head to toe. Where her face should be, a collection of small eyes all blinked in rapid succession.

A mouth filled with glimmering fangs housed a forked tongue that danced across her new lips. Tentacles adorned her scalp, writhing with new life as she reached out with clawed hands.

Somehow, she had become even more beautiful to Balroth.

Together at last, my love.

“Together at last,” Sariel whispered.

The two looked down at Sariel’s bulging stomach. The surface rippled as countless offspring incubated within her new body. Balroth had no mouth, and yet, he smiled.

Soon, the dead world of Tenakath would finally be blessed with new life.

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