[NU] The Death of Nashville, Spider in the Woods (2/10)
Evan Edwards
Spider in the Woods
October 26, Five Days from the Death of Nashville
The woman in the US Army coat touched the tree that had been uprooted. It was one among many around her, all broken and splintered, leaning away from Percy Priest Lake. But this one was important, as her nose could scent the vitae on it from miles away.
She drew the small cage from her coat, eliciting a hiss from the furry creature it contained. The mink bared its teeth, ready to begin a desperate attack, feeling instinctively that it was cornered by a predator. With a fluid, practiced movement faster than a mortal eye could catch, the woman snapped the long creature out of the cage and flayed the torso open, wrapping it's living body with scented thorns and binding the skin back. It lay feeble on the ground, blood pooling, as she added her precious vitae to the mix and sung — not to herself, but to the unseen forces that surrounded her.
Three figures stepped forward as the world around her grew dim. The Asian man with a golden claw and a golden figure whose statue stood in the Parthenon were not surprises, but the third figure caused the vampire to show her true age for a moment, shock making her face look skeletal for a moment, with a glimpse of a word written in Hebrew on her forehead. The word was a lasting scar of a battle fought before Rome fell.
Athena and Cao Lỗ stood in deference to the nude woman with pendulous breasts and belly who moved incredibly slowly, as if time was a concept she was trying to remember. She spoke in a voice of stone and blood and power nearly forgotten in the modern nights.
"Tamar, she has fled for now. The rabbit is being pursued across her link to the Prince. She will return free, but always in danger. What has claimed the city has awoken something neither she nor the Prince can control."
Rabinowitz, who had long forgotten she had once been named Tamar, replied with due deference to the powerful goddess. "I seek information from her about what has claimed the city. Others of our Circle have powerful allies in place, but we seek wisdom," she nodded towards Athena, "to use these allies. An Aztec god is here, waiting."
"He is here because there will be sacrifice. Blood." For a moment the figure's mouth opened enough to view the impossible: the mouth was a portal to a vast sea of blood, rotten and clotting, spilled for countless generations before sacrifice and murder were distinct concepts, and before tales of war and worship could be written down to be remembered. "What has crawled across the thorns is truly deadly, and can not be stopped by your kind alone."
She paused, deciding how to phrase the next sentence.
"You lack the sacrifice for us to give you what you would need. But there are many allies around you, and many allies can conquer the few enemies. You, my children, have the anvil upon which all can be broken. But you do not hunt as a pack, and can not draw what is needed there. And what must be broken can only be done with those with feet in two worlds: the dead and living, and the physical and shadow."
Scarlet blossoms exploded out of the corpse of the mink, marking the breaking of the circle. It wasn't until later that night that Army realized that the petals were feathers and wondered what that meant.
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