Dakryma to see it. The incubus remembered the moment well. It was overcast but not raining and a perfect diffused natural light filled the large windows of Stuck’s studio illuminating his latest canvas. Dakryma advanced apprehensively. He was worried that Stuck’s actual work would pale in comparison to the one he had envisioned so many times as he posed on the hard bench, eyes trained on the huge canvas in front of him and the handsome artist who would peer around its borders from time to time, using his alchemy to transform life into art.
When he saw it he was stunned, and he suddenly realized why Stuck had wanted to keep the piece to himself until it was finished. Dakryma’s muscular body was accurately rendered and even the contraction of his brows with the two vertical lines that appeared just above his aquiline nose, a mark of his pensive nature, were tenderly reproduced. But the eyes. Dakryma was astounded. They were his eyes, to be certain, but not the glacial blue ones he had been expecting. Instead, two phosphorescent orbs seared the surface of the painting, each one with a glistening ruddy pupil that was more like an abyss, a tunnel straight to hell, than a window on the world. They were Dakryma’s eyes when he was in koshmar .
Dakryma hadn’t realized it, but the energy that permeated the air of Stuck’s studio had activated the incubus he had always tried to hide from the daylight world. No wonder he had been able to remain so focused, so fixated on the artist before him. Stuck’s work had been feeding Dakryma’s soul and in return the artist had laid the dreamwalker’s essence bare on the canvas.
It took Dakryma a long time to take in the rest of the painting, so concentrated was he on the intensity of those incubus eyes, scorching yellow fires amid the gloom of dark grey and midnight blue. Many minutes went by before he was able to take in the iridescent black feathers trapped beneath the heavy fist of his right hand. He had to stare for a few minutes more to see that the feathers were only the end of a magnificent wing, shadowy as a crow’s, that grew from his back. The traces of another wing filled the other side of the work, but the details were lost to the inky background.
He should have known, should have destroyed it when he had the chance, before he had even seen the painting. Having laid eyes on it, that powerful portrait, he had consigned himself to fate. There was no way he could lay a finger on it now. The painting was nothing like the avant-garde art he had seen in Paris. In fact, in comparison to those modern masterpieces, this work was almost outmoded in its realistic depiction of the human body and the way the canvas became a window into another world. It was the subject matter, Dakryma himself, that made the painting special. The French modernists appealed to the brain. Their work was cerebral and Dakryma appreciated them for their intelligence. But this portrait operated on a purely visceral level. It struck at the emotions, with the capacity to send a frisson of alluring terror down the spine of whoever stood in front of it.
“It’s called Lucifer ,” Stuck said in a barely audible whisper.
Dakryma had nearly forgotten the artist was even there, and he started a bit when the whisper interrupted his deep revelry. Lucifer, of course. The name of the devil before his fall. The morning star, the bringer of light consigned to hell, his wing broken, his essence occluded by pride and jealousy. Here Stuck had shown the angel’s inner light corrupted by rage into a vile luminescence, but there was still room for empathy in this painting, a way to understand and acknowledge the darker parts of humanity and find in them a strange beauty. It was a masterpiece of emotional connection and it had Dakryma trapped.
He had revealed his true self and now it was captured in the work. It was a dear price to pay for vulnerability. When you come from the Verge, you keep your identity close. They
When he saw it he was stunned, and he suddenly realized why Stuck had wanted to keep the piece to himself until it was finished. Dakryma’s muscular body was accurately rendered and even the contraction of his brows with the two vertical lines that appeared just above his aquiline nose, a mark of his pensive nature, were tenderly reproduced. But the eyes. Dakryma was astounded. They were his eyes, to be certain, but not the glacial blue ones he had been expecting. Instead, two phosphorescent orbs seared the surface of the painting, each one with a glistening ruddy pupil that was more like an abyss, a tunnel straight to hell, than a window on the world. They were Dakryma’s eyes when he was in koshmar .
Dakryma hadn’t realized it, but the energy that permeated the air of Stuck’s studio had activated the incubus he had always tried to hide from the daylight world. No wonder he had been able to remain so focused, so fixated on the artist before him. Stuck’s work had been feeding Dakryma’s soul and in return the artist had laid the dreamwalker’s essence bare on the canvas.
It took Dakryma a long time to take in the rest of the painting, so concentrated was he on the intensity of those incubus eyes, scorching yellow fires amid the gloom of dark grey and midnight blue. Many minutes went by before he was able to take in the iridescent black feathers trapped beneath the heavy fist of his right hand. He had to stare for a few minutes more to see that the feathers were only the end of a magnificent wing, shadowy as a crow’s, that grew from his back. The traces of another wing filled the other side of the work, but the details were lost to the inky background.
He should have known, should have destroyed it when he had the chance, before he had even seen the painting. Having laid eyes on it, that powerful portrait, he had consigned himself to fate. There was no way he could lay a finger on it now. The painting was nothing like the avant-garde art he had seen in Paris. In fact, in comparison to those modern masterpieces, this work was almost outmoded in its realistic depiction of the human body and the way the canvas became a window into another world. It was the subject matter, Dakryma himself, that made the painting special. The French modernists appealed to the brain. Their work was cerebral and Dakryma appreciated them for their intelligence. But this portrait operated on a purely visceral level. It struck at the emotions, with the capacity to send a frisson of alluring terror down the spine of whoever stood in front of it.
“It’s called Lucifer ,” Stuck said in a barely audible whisper.
Dakryma had nearly forgotten the artist was even there, and he started a bit when the whisper interrupted his deep revelry. Lucifer, of course. The name of the devil before his fall. The morning star, the bringer of light consigned to hell, his wing broken, his essence occluded by pride and jealousy. Here Stuck had shown the angel’s inner light corrupted by rage into a vile luminescence, but there was still room for empathy in this painting, a way to understand and acknowledge the darker parts of humanity and find in them a strange beauty. It was a masterpiece of emotional connection and it had Dakryma trapped.
He had revealed his true self and now it was captured in the work. It was a dear price to pay for vulnerability. When you come from the Verge, you keep your identity close. They
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