Thye Veil Of Sleep

Ron Koppelberger

The Veil Of Sleep

Agile Sin slept in quiet comfort, it was a dark and lonesome sleep she was accustomed to. As the hour of eleven P.M. approached she began to dream in rapid sequences of light, fire and shades of darkness. She was a vampire to the breath that allowed her to continue living, crimson and scarlet in color, the penance of blood stole her sunshine and today left her with demons in the form of a nightmare.
She was by the edge of a great glassy pond, partially dressed and bathing her fatigued body with the fresh spring water, her reflection cried to the gods in shadow light, to be of the caste, the vampire laden unto the task of feeding, sleeping and even bathing. She sang a lullaby as she bathed, something her mortal mother had taught her,

“Clean about little one

The day will come little one

When the seams and stitch

Of a forgotten dream will

Bring you all that it seems

All in all clean.”

She was dressing in the dream when from the corner of her vision the silhouette of a creature appeared. Startled she dressed and stood away from the edge of the pond. “What is this…..?” she spoke aloud. The sky sang songs of evening tide dread in that silhouette, in that great goblin of a beast that had found her in a moment of weakness. She prepared herself for the fight that would ensue when the great beast came to her. It was fire red and smelled strongly of brimstone. It’s horns were great appendages growing from it’s forehead and it’s teeth were pointed and dripping saliva. She watched as it plodded closer to her whispering, whispering.
“Sin, I come to collect what is mine by the right of those who feed on vampire and wolf, by the right of we who have the steadfast hold on dreams and nightmares, we who hold the key to your salvation as well as your damnation. I come for you Sin, in this dream of dreams as a messenger and the spirit that will take you to the test.” he whispered with a lashing tongue and fangs that sang the song of everlasting pain.
“But you are no vampire beast and I shall not succumb to your whim or your test!” she said with a touch of rage in her voice.
“By seasons of betrothed calm and lessons of rapture you will come to me Sin, for the blood, the blood of the condemned and the taste that lies within you. By my eyes and yours!” he commanded as he moved closer to Sin. She stepped back a few paces and drew her dagger, the pass between them filled with a dank fog and sin coughed at the stench of rotting flesh.
“You are dead beast, if you are to test me then how will you do it, you’re not a living thing, how will you do it?” she yelled at the roiling mist around her. His voice echoed in the fog and smoke.
“I will test you in accord with the vampires of old, the vampires of old my dear…to the blood of a lamb and the innocence of a babe!” his voice said closer to her now. The sky filled with the light of a thousand suns in her dream and the trees looked as if they were in flames. The beast glowed a bright crimson and maroon as he loomed closer to the edge of the pond. She could hear him breathing, he was panting now and the heat he was generating filled the space between them. “You will be mine!” he spoke into her ear, “You will be mine Sin!” She drew the silver dagger she had near her hip and thrust blindly into the glowing smoke. The sun blazed and the beast screamed in mortal agony as the blade penetrated it’s flesh. Shadows and silhouettes filled the smokey flames around them and the beast fell to the ground defeated by the one action that Sin had guaranteed him. “You will die now!” Sin said in the dream as the beast faded to nothing and the night horizon returned with inky blue velvet and the twinkle of a thousand stars.
Sin fell to her knees and prayed to the elders, the vampires of her youth and in that dream of praying she found respite with the truth of who she was, what she was and where she belonged. She knew she would never be anything but a vampire, Agile Sin the wash of a thousand dreams and the wish of a lonely vampire, and she dreamed until she awoke, and when she awoke she found a few sprigs of dandelion weed clutched in her palm smelling green and new. Like the fresh cut flowers of a new day and a new beginning.
The flowers stained her fingertips and she tasted the bloom, it was in patches close to her. The stain of crimson drizzled gray and black on the grass as a remembrance of her dream, had it been real? What of the test? She tasted blood and the sensation revived her and made her ready for the evening hunt, except for dreams and nightmares she had no care in the world except to fulfill her destiny as her caste demanded.
The night sky lay like a blanket across the landscape as Sin made her way to the village common and her food, the sweet taste of warm blood would cradle her in it’s ecstasy and give her a reason to move from today into the promise of tomorrow. She sang again,

“Patient vapors hold the

Ceaseless plumage of a raven in

Designs of ancient taboo

And shadows alive unto the twilight of a new evening

Dream and the way of wandering hearts given the

Will of the night and the taste of a tear in silence and blood.”

From Ambling Broad Clouds

Ron Koppelberger

From Ambling Broad Clouds

Misty Smoke and dreams of a better tomorrow filled her mind with the promise, the promise of western futures and wild coyote jamborees. She tilted the Stetson against her sweating brow and adjusted the leather chaps that had gotten her as far as New Mexico. The horse wore old war paint and the froth that covered it’s flanks told her to slow down.
The coyotes were following Careful Spell with loyal abandon, tracing her hoof prints across the desert plains. There were hundreds of them and they were loyal only to Careful and her mystery. She lifted the kerchief she had tied across her mouth and called to them with a long lonesome whoop. “Yaaaaaiioooooowwwwww!” she called in a fervent gasp. The coyotes called back by the hundreds filling the desert air with the wild song in the shadow of a twilight moon. Careful gathered the little kindling that was available and built a camp fire for her and the old horse. The evening was fast approaching and it would be cold, they’d need the warmth of the fire. She sat next to the flame she had built and prayed to the old spirits and the silhouette of an approaching night, the coyotes howled and sang to her with fierce loyalty. She paused for a moment to remember, the wagon train, the party and the end of something important. It had been the end of the day, the end of the trail for her and thirty others. The desert had been merciless to them and they were suffering the fate of inexperienced travelers.
Pool Johns had told her that the road would be hard, he hadn’t intended it to be impossible. They were out of water and most of the horses had died leaving them with horse meat to eat and little else. When the meat ran out so did their hope and eventually they had succumbed.
Careful had awoke to the sound of coyotes howling the next morning and she had felt refreshed, rejuvenated by the sound. The old horse had appeared from the dust and she had saddled him and donned her dead husbands chaps and Stetson. She didn’t know where she was headed if she was really headed anywhere, west and the promise of a new beginning. Perhaps she had perished with the others, a ghost, maybe I’m a ghost she thought as she waved to the distant horizon and the army of coyotes. The night wore away the veil of sleep and she continued on to the next day moving closer to another town, her and the coyotes in silent command of the desert and the world perhaps, the world as it stood between the living and the dead, the old and the ancient, the world in sure whispers of life beyond life and living beyond the realm of the living. Careful prayed again as she rode high in the saddle, she prayed to the approaching destiny that would carry her across the great gulf and the wont of a breathing thing. All in all the coyotes knew their song and they knew the passions of a desert that could take and give the essence of a dream, from ambling broad clouds to the eyes of a legend.

The Efforts of The Hungry

Ron Koppelberger

The Efforts of The Hungry

Sworn by the underworld taverns and decreed by the lords of feasting prosperity, the clan wore its’ livelihood with relish abandon. “We feast upon the flesh of men and then we toast to the greater things that the gods can lend us. Great grand thirsts and desires of renewal and survival absorb us for the sake of what they call Ghoul.” the clan leader exclaimed as he chewed a piece of thigh bone thoroughly and passionately.
They lived and congregated in the deepest depths of graveyard commons, beneath the surface of the earth, hidden and unseen by the prying eyes of men. This was their haven, their respite from the deeds of men. In the past they had tried to live with men but the hunger had intruded and they had been killed whenever discovered by man. Beheadings, burning at the stake and even buried alive. The tradition stated and told the tale of the first. Buried alive, Buried alive in piles of bones and rotting flesh and the grandfather of the Ghoul had survived. He had partaken of the flesh and he had changed become something more than human, because of humans, because of their fear. He had started the congregation with rag tag remnants of humanity and the clan had flourished. There were nearly five thousand of them now and they were the masters of their domains. They moved from cemetery to cemetery as their hunger perused them, devouring the discarded the forgotten and the lost.
The head of the clan reflected on this as he sat atop a coffin behind the closed gates of an ancient mausoleum. “A drink for us all in the summer of our youth, our souls in the seat of those who perished without cause, a taste for the Ghoul and a glass of fine wine for the survivor in all of his glory.”