Requiem for the Fallen
By
Tabitha Vohn
Barbara Books
Requiem for the Fallen
©2013 by Tabitha Vohn
Barbara Books
This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is strictly coincidental.
Printed in the United States
www.tabithavohn.com
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
First Edition
Cover Art: Christina Rogombe
About the Author:
Tabitha is a pen name. Her creator is a certified bookworm, thanks to the countless fairy tales, Bible stories, and nursery rhymes she was read as a child, and the Gothic, Romantic, and Contemporary novels she enjoys today. She counts Emily & Charlotte Bronte, Angela Carter, and Carol Goodman among the many notable authors who have inspired her. She has earned a B.A. in English and a M.A. in Teaching, and currently teaches high school English.
One day, she heard an old, early 90’s rock song; it was one of those songs that make you feel as though you’ve discovered music for the first time. As she was listening to it, Requiem was born.
This book is dedicated to those whom without I would be nothing.
My Father above, my Soul Mate, and all of my mothers who read to me.
Table of Contents:
Am I Fallen
Howl
Requiem for the Fallen
Requiem for the Fallen
By
Tabitha Vohn
-Am I Fallen-
The discordant howl of electric strings filled the night with a dark cloud of smoke, sweat, and hunger, as she made her way to the front of the pit. The opening band was ending their set. They had worked the crowd into a small frenzy with their surly lyrics and guttural growls, which really were quite ominous and stunning, but they were not who she came for, and so she could’ve cared less. She put her hand on the large shoulders of the men blocking her path, leather-clad, brass-knuckled fists pumping the air. Eyes turned on her vicious and charged at first, but then cleared of their metal-induced haze as she slid past them, sometimes moving her whole body against and around them, holding them with her gaze until safely past. They would stand lost for a moment, thinking what the hell? None of them dared touch her or push her back, unsure of exactly what hidden force she commanded as her arms, her hips, her eyes wound over them. She moved with purpose and left their skin burning from her soft crush of flesh, and an expression that dug in them, not through them.
This is something like power, she thought, as one after another she passed over them, moving closer to the stage. She had felt it earlier when she first entered the club, that rush of not belonging. It was one of those joints that had fit itself for only this music and this type of crowd. Dark amber lights haloed a black door which led down into electric blue dark. All smoke, leather, and chains worn as collars; black bandanas and biker boots. Women in cut-up tee shirts with fiercely tipped nails, red mouths and kohl-smothered eyes, their hair teased, crimped and reeking of cheap hairspray. The bouncer had a shaved head and prison tattoo. He met her eyes with vaguely camouflaged bewilderment as she held out her ticket and descended the stairs. White-crusted flashes of light made her eyes glow like blue-beads, their glow shown on her milky skin so that she looked translucent, a snowy owl passing through a forest of black. She had chosen to wear all white so that, as she faced him, he wouldn’t be able to miss her. A ghostly apparition: hair like honey pouring over her shoulders, almost to her elbows; eyes, skin and warm, pink mouth piercing in the strobes and the smoke.
The front band finished their set and, as they took their bows, her skin went numb. There’s no turning back now. Here she was at dead-center stage, fourth or fifth row, so close she imagined reaching out and touching the shoes of the guard dogs crouching in wait onstage, ready to push back the fans, snarling and restless with the wildness of rabid beasts thirsting for blood. They chanted his name and it swelled like its own music, full of violence and a desire deeper than sex- his black magic; balm to their misery, their blood lust. She felt it too, the swell of electric pulse charging her fingertips, her thighs. Every chant of his name drove it deeper; this fiery agitation that would rob her of breath upon the sight of him, only to swell again as his voice, dark and sweet as molasses, left his throat.