Part 2 - Cucuault, The Cuckold

He swims back to consciousness, a pain in his throat and a coppery taste in his mouth. He stands, but as he does so, he finds that his head hangs listlessly and swings like a marionette upon a string. A cough racks his chest and blood vomits from his mouth, cascading down his chest and splashing in his eyes. He holds up his head in his hands and realises that his neck is broken, that he is dead. Looking about him he senses malevolent shadows moving in the Cimmerian darkness. He tries to speak but can't, his vocal cords crushed along with his throat. He wants to call out, for help, for information. Where is he? Who is there? What is happening? These and other questions assail him. Laughter attracts his attention.

"Art thou lost old boy? Curious as to where fate has laid you? What is this place where your soul finds itself?" A voice full of dark humour laughs. "I can answer those questions for you old boy." The shape coalesces out of the darkness, susurrus sounds marking its path to Cucuault. He stares with straining eyes, seeking to make out the speaker that approaches.

"Who am I? What am I?" The creature stops, so close that Cucuault can feel the cold wind of its breath upon his burning flesh, searing him with artic blasts. "I am vengeance. I am pain, and I am suffering." Slowly Cucuault's eyes see the creature, as small fires spring from the ground, though they cast poor and fitful illumination and no heat. "I am your gaoler for all eternity. Let's get you fitted out." He laughs. In that instant, Cucuault sees his tormentor, tall, muscled, with barrel chest, a monster that is part wolf, bear and man. He tries to scream but only the only sound he can make gurgling noise. The demon gently thrusts an opened, clawed palm at his chest, and he is flung backwards. He finds himself falling through a tenebrous void. His head hanging between his shoulders as his arms flail about for anything to grab onto. Something looms up out of the shadows, moving to fast for him to ascertain its nature, only that it is big, seeming to loom off into the distant undefined horizons.

Metal sings as he impacts upon a web of razor wire. His head tears free and lands with a squish in a foetid mire of faeces and bile. He looks up, his body cut and bleeding from a myriad wounds made by the rusting edges of the ancient wire web. From the darkness come a thousand demon spiders with the faces of men and women, each screaming for blood in evil little voices. Three of them arrive, seemingly larger then all the rest, and for a moment hope springs in his eyes, as they devour or chase off the others. Their faces are familiar to him, the faces of his wife and her lovers. Wordlessly he calls to them.

Then the horror begins afresh. The three demons gloat over his struggling corpse. Instead of aiding him, they bind his flailing form to the web, sucking the blood from his body. Though he is disconnected from his body, he feels the pain of his fresh wounds and feels the bite of their fangs.

"NO!" he silently screams, watching as Colette continues to slowly devour his body while Pubis and Epicles seek to mount her. He feels the venom in her fangs, its curious properties, giving life and heightened sensation to his tormented flesh. He screams again, swallowing offal as he realises that her venom is reviving his ravaged flesh, causing it to heal and regenerate. Like Sisyphus, he realises he will be doomed to an eternity of being devoured. The pain fresh and murderous as the venom works in his system. As he chokes and coughs upon the faeces that have invaded his mouth, he hears his tormentor's laughter ringing in his ears.