Dark Tendrils by Claude Lalumiere Page B

from the city outside. Even this early in the morning there was always some kind of background din. The absolute silence—deafness?—made him feel intensely isolated, more than he would have ever guessed. The helplessness of being trapped in his bed combined with that sense of utter isolation from the world—it terrified him.
    The pressure of the cocoon around him increased. His lungs were being squeezed; he could barely breathe.
    He willed every part of his body to move. His terror gave way to rage, and he finally managed to open his mouth. Kurt focused all his energy on screaming. Although he sensed the beginnings of the scream in his throat and felt it move through his mouth, the scream hit the invisible cocoon and bounced back into his throat, choking him, without making the slightest sound.
    Kurt intensified his efforts to break free, but he only succeeded in slightly budging his head. Some feeling of dread compelled him to look at the door; as he did, it opened slowly. Holly walked in, leaving the door open. She was naked, her short hair suddenly grown to shoulder length, her normally hazel irises a deep, unnatural black.
    The cocoon crackled all around Kurt, squeezing him ever tighter, so tight that his rib cage contracted under the pressure.
    Holly pulled the covers off him. She was smiling ghoulishly. Without a word, she unzipped him and worked on his cock with her hands. Kurt’s erection was hard enough to hurt him. He tried to shout at her to stop, but the cocoon allowed not even a whimper to escape.
    She sat on top of Kurt and rode his erection, her black eyes laughing at him.
    Helpless, he felt the semen begin to build and rise, but he didn’t want to come. Not like this.
    Then, just as he thought he could no longer hold himself back, his consciousness was ripped out of his body. His incorporeal self rose rapidly toward the ceiling. A malevolent presence radiated from beyond that threshold, pulling him toward it. He resisted with all the strength his terror afforded him. He knew with utter certainty that he would not survive the crossing.
    Below, the demonic Holly was still riding his cock, writhing in ecstasy on his inert body.
    Kurt’s sense of time split in two: he experienced himself rushing toward the ceiling at tremendous speed, yet every second felt like hours. His fear increased with every passing moment, the malevolence ever more tangible. Calling to him. Wanting him. And just when he thought he could no longer resist—
    —he landed in his body, screaming.
    Of Holly, there was no sign. Kurt was fully dressed. The sheet still covered him. And the door was closed, as if he’d hallucinated everything. Or dreamt it. But he knew he hadn’t. He still felt the pain on his skin, in his throat, in his lungs.
    Holly—wearing a tattered white T-shirt, her hair restored to its normal length, her eyes their natural hazel—ran into the bedroom, calling Kurt’s name with frightened concern. She’d never heard him scream before. She took his hand, caressed his chest. “Oh baby, I’m so sorry,” she said. “He’s gone now. For good. Please. I went crazy. That wasn’t me. You know it wasn’t.”
    Kurt didn’t want to contemplate life without Holly, even after all this. He knew she wasn’t to blame. He knew what Giovanni was capable of. There was nothing to forgive.
    Kurt told her what had just happened: the strange paralysis, her demonic doppelganger—all of it.
    Holly held him silently for a few minutes, her hands under his shirt, against his bare skin. Her nails dug into the flesh of his back, and he felt closer to her than he had in weeks.
    Then, she said, “I need to tell you something. You’re not going to like this.” Kurt didn’t have the strength to hear this, whatever it was. But Holly barrelled on regardless. “He kept asking about you, but I wouldn’t say anything. He said there was something you always kept hidden from him. Something that you’d invested with a part of yourself.