FOR SALE: ONE VAMPIRE - Chapter Three: The Birth Of A Demon

Chapter Three of the blockbuster new horror novel, FOR SALE: ONE VAMPIRE by best selling, multi-award-winning author Mark Watson...

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FOR SALE: ONE VAMPIRE

©Copyright 2024 by Mark Watson

FOR SALE: ONE VAMPIRE:

Chapter Three: The Birth Of A Demon

In the blistering heat of ancient Syria, where the sun scorched the land by day and cold crept in by night, the birth of a demon began. Her name had been Mahri, a noblewoman both feared and envied in life. Her beauty was legendary, her youth unyielding, and her appetites insatiable. Yet, her immortality did not come naturally. Beneath her silken garments and painted lips lay the secret of her eternal allure: blood. Mahri bathed in it, consumed it, and whispered incantations over it, believing it the source of her power.

Once admired by the people of her city, they turned against her when the truth emerged. In their rage and disgust, they stormed her palace, tearing her from her sanctuary of silk and gold. With animalistic ferocity, they dismembered her as punishment for the horrors she had inflicted. Her severed head was stabbed and mutilated until it no longer resembled the face that had bewitched many. As a final act of disdain, her remains were cast beyond the city walls, thrown into the desert to be consumed by scavengers and the elements. But the citizens had made a grave error, one born of ignorance: they had known Mahri as a wicked woman, but not as a vessel of something far darker. In their haste to destroy her, they failed to perform the sacred rites that might have anchored her restless spirit to the mortal plane. Her broken body was exposed, unprotected by prayers or incantations, leaving it vulnerable to the unseen forces lurking in the vast and merciless desert.

Three days passed. In the stillness of the desert night, beneath a starlit sky, the first whispers of her rebirth began. It started as a faint stirring, a light breeze carrying the acrid scent of decay from the rubbish heap where her remains had been cast. This breeze grew into a dust devil, swirling aimlessly at first but gradually gaining strength. The dust devil turned faster and darker, infused with unnatural power.

Her soul, which had not passed into the afterlife, lingered, bound by the desperate bargain made in her final moments. In the chaos of her death, as teeth and blades tore at her flesh, Mahri had not cried out to her gods but to something older and darker, offering her soul in exchange for survival. Her plea was answered, but survival does not always mean life, and the pact she had made was about to bear terrible fruit.

The swirling storm intensified, sand and debris whipping through the air with such force it stripped the earth bare. The gouged and mutilated head at the vortex’s center began to twitch, its broken jaw clicking open and shut as if trying to speak. The empty eye sockets glowed faintly, the dim light of something ancient and malevolent taking root within them. The dust devil grew into a raging tempest, pulling her head from the rubbish heap and sending it rolling across the barren desert floor until it rested on a vast, empty plain. Under the uncaring gaze of the stars, the storm reached its zenith.

Winds howled like a chorus of tortured souls, and the head began to rise, hovering inches above the ground. Sand and dust spiraled around it, forming a funnel stretching high into the sky. From this vortex, something grotesque and otherworldly emerged: a body that was not flesh but a shifting amalgamation of sand, blood, and shadow. The dismembered parts of her that had scattered across the desert were pulled toward the storm, reassembling into a monstrous form, a demonic vampire demon that would call itself Drakhashtu.

Drakhashtu's new body was no longer human. Her skin was a patchwork of blackened sand and coagulated blood, her limbs elongated and clawed. Though her head bore scars from her mortal death, it possessed a new and terrible beauty. The hollow eye sockets burned with an inner fire, and her mouth, stitched together by strands of shadow, curled into a grim, emotionless smile promising suffering.

As the storm’s violent winds continued to thrash about, more pieces of Drakhashtu’s dismembered body were unearthed from the sands. Severed arms, discarded far from her head, were drawn back toward the vortex with unnatural force. Shattered bones pierced the storm as if sensing their rightful place. Fingers, still tipped with jagged nails, stretched and reassembled, each joint snapping into alignment. Her left arm, split and shattered, fused seamlessly with its counterpart, while shadow and sand filled the gaps where flesh had been torn away.

Her torso emerged next, dragged from a shallow grave of debris and dust. The once-smooth curves of her form were now gnarled and grotesque, scarred by the violence of her death. Torn muscle and exposed ribs pulled themselves together in an agonizing symphony of grinding bone, each fragment locking into place as though guided by an unseen hand. A low hum filled the air, deep and resonant, signaling that something unholy was taking form.

Her legs followed, moving with purpose despite being gnawed upon and left to rot. They glided across the desert floor, leaving trails in the sand as they sped toward the storm. Fragments of shattered femurs knitted themselves back together as tendons reformed, wrapping like ropes of dark silk around bone and shadow. Her feet reassembled last, the remnants of her delicate toes stretching outward, elongating into talon-like appendages that dug into the earth.

The storm spun faster, a cacophony of bloodied sand and shimmering darkness, until her body was complete—a grotesque tapestry of death reborn. Yet it was not merely restored; it had transcended its former shape. Her torso, limbs, and head were stitched together by an ethereal substance pulsing with sickly red light, as if her veins now carried not blood but molten fire. Her skin shimmered, a shifting mix of sand, shadow, and the faint glistening sheen of fresh blood.

At the storm’s center, Drakhashtu stood. Her decapitated head, once a grotesque symbol of destruction, reattached to her neck with a sickening squelch, sealing the jagged gash while leaving a faint glowing scar—an ember beneath coal, a reminder of her violent end. Her mouth twisted into a smile devoid of humanity, revealing teeth sharper and more numerous than in life. Her eyes, now twin orbs of blazing red, flickered to life, burning with ancient malice.

The storm did not subside; it surged with growing ferocity, its spiraling winds pulling in everything around it. Small creatures—lizards, rodents, scorpions—became the first victims. They tumbled helplessly, their cries swallowed by the storm’s roar. One by one, their bodies twisted midair, drained of life-force. Blood streamed upward into the vortex, their remains crumbling into dust.

As the storm expanded, it grew hungrier, ensnaring larger animals. Jackals howled in terror as they were dragged into the maelstrom, their bodies twisting unnaturally into brittle husks. Snakes, desperate to escape, were lifted and stripped to bone, while swarms of locusts and beetles were swallowed whole, their buzzing silenced.

A deep, guttural hum filled the air, resonating with the storm’s pulsing rhythm. The vortex glowed faintly now, veins of crimson energy streaking through it like lightning, pulsating with the stolen vitality of its victims. At the storm's epicenter stood Drakhashtu, her horrifying rebirth accelerating with each drop of stolen life. Her flesh, once dead, took on a new, unholy vitality, the pallor of decay replaced by dark luster. Her bones, exposed in places, gleamed with a hybrid of her own blood and the storm’s essence.

The decapitated head opened its eyes, no longer human but twin pits of burning fire, searing through the storm. Her mouth opened wide, releasing a primal scream—a wave of rage and hunger that rippled through the landscape. As her head lifted, rejoining her reassembled form with a sickening crunch, it became clear that her reconstruction had enhanced her. Blood and life-force torn from the creatures around her wove into her being, reshaping her into something more monstrous and divine. Horns sprouted from her brow, curling like those of a ram but sharper, glistening with the blood of her victims. Her hands extended, fingers elongating into talons dripping with dark ichor.

The storm grew even wilder, dragging more into its grasp. The earth seemed to rebel, rocks splintering and cracking, trees far beyond the desert shivering and snapping in its pull. Birds fell from the sky, life-force drained before they hit the ground. Snakes writhed in midair, their crimson fluids drawn upward in glowing rivulets. The once-dry desert floor turned into a dark mire, stained with blood.

Drakhashtu’s cry rang out, piercing the chaos. No longer a human voice, it was primal and guttural, layered with the cries of the dying, resonating like an earthquake. The storm responded with increased voracity, stretching toward the horizon as if to consume the heavens. The life-force it devoured expanded beyond land creatures, draining the earth of its vitality, the air of warmth, and the rocks of solidity. The desert transformed into a wasteland, a scarred graveyard surrounding its mistress.

At the center, Drakhashtu stood triumphant, a goddess of ruin and rebirth. Her eyes burned brighter, her body radiating power, her once-wasted form now a monument to her suffering. She stretched her arms wide, embracing the storm as it became a part of her. With a final, ear-splitting roar, the storm surged in a violent crescendo, drawing everything—blood, life, death—into her. Her body absorbed it all, glowing brighter, darker, more malevolent. When the storm settled, it hadn’t exhausted itself but had been fully claimed by her. The winds dissipated, leaving behind a barren wasteland.

Opening her reformed eyes, Drakhashtu surveyed the devastation. Her rebirth was complete, and the world would tremble in her shadow. The demon that was once Drakhashtu took her first steps upon the earth, the air heavy with sulfur and blood. The ground recoiled beneath her, cracking as if rejecting her presence, but she reveled in it, her laughter echoing like that of a hunting predator.

No longer bound by mortal limitations, her pact fulfilled, she became something far greater—and far more terrifying—than the woman she had once been. She was the first of her kind, a creature of blood and shadow, cursed and powerful, a demon that would haunt the land for generations. In the depths of the desert, as whispers of her name hauntingly carried through the wind, the people who had killed her felt the weight of their mistake. They had rid themselves of Mahri the child-killer, but in doing so, they had created Drakhashtu the Vampire.

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END OF CHAPTER THREE

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