Page 74 of Ashen Torment

I feel trapped in his half-closed gaze, and lips just parted in a whisper that does not reach the air but vibrates within. Something in the tension of his veins and strained muscles prevents me from looking away.

The figures around him, half-angelic, half-demonic, brush against his body with lust, leaving traces of blood upon him.

They sacrilege that which is sacred.

“Tell me, in your view, does he suffer more intensely, or does he secretly savor his torment?” Lord Dorian’s sudden voice makes me start.

“Forgive me, I did not mean to startle you,” he adds immediately. His white mask is tilted slightly toward me and, despite the hollow apology, his eyes shine with amusement.

I remain fixed on the painting.

“He seems more at peace, in truth.”

He moves to the side, flush with me.

“At peace, you say? To me, he seems lost within the pleasure of his flesh.”

I feel the heat of his side, though we are not even brushing against each other. I lower my gaze slightly toward the martyr’s face and then back to him.

“Pain, at times, is the most effective means for redemption. Is that not what martyrdom is? The sublimation of pain to reach peace.”

“Pain and pleasure, Viscount,” he says softly, “are separated by the thinnest of lines.”

He points to the martyr’s face.

“Perhaps it is not the final redemption he craves but, rather…” his fingers trace an imaginary line from the face down the martyr’s body, “…the pleasure he derives in order to reach it.”

“It does not surprise me that your every thought turns to pleasure,” I say, finally averting my gaze from the first painting and moving toward the second.

He follows me.

“You truly have a very low opinion of me.”

“I have no opinions, only observations,” I reply without turning.

“Feast of Flesh.”

I turn my head to look at him, not understanding his words. He points to the card on the easel. It is the name of the second painting.

Festin de Chair

Before me is a banquet whose participants are all naked men in contorted positions, gorging on human flesh and viscera.

“What judgment do you draw from this?”

He slides a finger through the air toward the figures.

“Why do some laugh, others scream... and these,” he indicates certain bodies, “seem to be enjoying themselves?”

I adjust my mask.

“Greed,” I say in a low voice. “Those who scream are the only ones who have realized.”

“Greed?”

“Greed is not limited to the desire for money,” I press my fingers to the bridge of my nose, closing my eyes for a moment. “It is a craving for possession so total that it makes even the idea of dismembering someone and consuming them acceptable, simply to make them completely one’s own.”

A slow voice rises beside us.