Veiled Light

For Samandiriel – as it was her AV that inspired this story, and also because she manages to bring out my dark side.

"Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody." - Mark Twain

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Mark never knew what happened.

He woke up in a hospital, burning with fever, his throat dry and his lips chapped. His eyes opened a tiny fraction and he struggled with his blurred sight. He blinked repeatedly and things cleared slightly. Another blink and the huge hazy-white blotch in front of him collected itself into the outline of an overweight nurse.

She leaned over him, jiggling her heavy breasts into his face. The musky smell of sweat hit him sharply and Mark gagged. The bitter taste of vomit rose up into his mouth and threatened to pour out of him. Mark struggled to sit up, but realised that he was much too weak, so he merely turned to the edge of the bed, almost falling off.

A thin stream of vomit landed on spotless white stockings and a shriek followed, accompanied by a steady stream of what he believed were curses. The nasal wailing voice faded away as the shoes moved out of his vision and apparently out of the room.

The overripe smell of fresh vomit reached Mark's nose and he dry-heaved until he felt like all the breath had been sucked out of him. Tears of exhaustion and weakness streamed down his face as he pulled himself back onto the bed and swallowed a couple of times, willing himself to stop vomiting.

It worked. Mark took a few deep breaths, trying to remember how he came to be here. The last he remembered, he had been hitchhiking in the north of India. His love for the exotic had drawn him to the subcontinent immediately after his graduation, and a three-month itinerary had enthusiastically been chalked out.

He traced his mind back to the last thing he remembered. He had been in a small village, trying to see the real India, not the glittery, showy metro-cities, or the better-known famous tourist destinations.

Memory stirred. A girl... a train station... a bed of straw... the feeling of arms around him... and those eyes.... He started shaking uncontrollably as it all came back to him in a rush.

* * * * *

Mark walked onto the deserted train station and looked around. It was dark. The only light came from the moon. It fell in silvery abundance over the edge of the platform, and down onto the ground, absorbed hungrily by the glittering tracks. Leaves of a banyan tree fluttered in the light breeze, hundreds of quicksilver pinpoints, making him think of pearl-edged butterflies flitting around the dark trunk. The February night held a bit of a chill and Mark adjusted the collar of his coat around his neck, snuggling into it.

A little distance away was the weak orange glow of a solitary bulb - the guard's cabin. The nondescript train station was nothing but a some sheets of asbestos thrown over a few poles in the ground. He walked over to one and knocked on it with the back of his hand. It clunked dully in the still night air. Something stirred in the periphery of his vision and he turned sharply to catch it.

He almost didn't see it, but it moved again. He squinted into the darkness and made out a huddled figure. His vision adjusted to the shadows a little better. A person was hunched in one of the corners.

As he was thinking about whether to approach the figure or keep his distance, a strong gust of wind blew into the empty station and snatched the figure's dark covering away, flinging it into the night. The person lunged for it, but missed as the piece of cloth was carried away by the current of air. Mark took off after it, throwing his backpack to the ground and running towards one of the edges of the platform. The blanket was deposited a few feet away from the rim, and Mark jumped down onto the ground to recover it.

Soft wool. Very soft. Mark rubbed the piece of fabric in his palms as he picked it up. It was a fine shawl really, not a coarse blanket of the type that was usually common among beggars around here. He had thought it was a homeless person taking shelter here, but now... perhaps another passenger?

He was in for another revelation as he turned back — a shock really. The figure had followed him and was now standing in the moonlight. It was a girl. Her straight, dark hair fell over her shoulders, her face in shadow. She wore a loose blouse and a skirt that brushed the ground. Her apparel was light-coloured, so it seemed like moonlight dripped down on her, spreading itself in liquid wantonness, flowing down the hand she stretched towards him.

Speechless, he handed the shawl back to her and stared as she wrapped it around herself and returned to her corner, blending into the darkness again until his eyes adjusted and he could see only her faint outline once more. It was over too quickly, before he could even think of saying something.

Mark considered pinching himself. An apparition? But the shawl had felt very real, he reminded himself. He pulled himself back onto the platform and walked over to his backpack, wondering what she was doing in such a godforsaken place, alone. As far as he knew, girls did not travel alone in this part of the world, and definitely not at night.

He paced around the platform, casting sidelong glances at the figure in the corner from time to time. He couldn't see more than a dark blotch of her vague shape in the black night. She sat unmoving, not noticing him, sleeping maybe? He wondered whether she needed any help, and decided to go ask her. The worst would be that she wouldn't understand him, and if she did, maybe he could pass the few hours he had to wait engaged in a pleasant chat with her.

He walked over to where she was sitting, his sports shoes making faint thumps on the concrete of the platform. She had to be aware of his approach if she was awake, but she neither stirred nor gave any other indication that she knew he was coming towards her.

"Hello?" Mark said hopefully as he neared her.

She didn't move. Mark wondered whether he should touch her or shake her. If she didn't want company, she could say so, but ignoring him like this was a bit worrisome. Was she okay?

"Um... Miss?" Mark bent and stretched his hand towards her, and at that moment she turned to him... and smiled. He didn't exactlysee the smile, but rather he felt it. He was not sure how that was possible, because she had not uttered a word, and he could definitely not make out any clear features on her face, because the scanty light fell short of her form. If asked, he wouldn't have been able to explain it. Somehow, heknew that she would be smiling.

"Hello," she whispered.

The whisper was like the wind. Breathless, cool, free. Something that seemed to caress his soul, making him instantly comfortable, wrapping itself around him, vital, alive. Mark felt a tingle run through his body at the intensity of the feelings the one word aroused in him.

"Are you alone?" His voice sounded breathless too. He cleared his throat and continued, "I mean, do you need any help? One doesn't see many unaccompanied young girls at this time of the night around here and I just wondered."

That smile again.

Mark lowered himself to his haunches and peered at her, not too obviously, he hoped. But he had to know how he could make out that she was smiling. He tried to analyse it. Something to do with light and shadow? But no. She was in total darkness, the shawl covering her head and her hair covering part of her face. He couldn't even see the glint of her eyes.

"Yes, I'm alone. I don't need any help, thank you." The answer was polite but firm.

"Uh, well. That's fine then." Mark didn't want it to end there. "I'm Mark Davies," he said as he extended his hand, belatedly realising that she may not shake it as young girls did not consider it proper in those parts. He pulled it back when it was just halfway to her and pressed both his palms together in front of his chest in anamaste.

She nodded her head at him but didn't offer her name or a similar gesture of greeting.

Mark felt foolish, dismissed. "Well, if that's all... I mean if you're fine... I'll be around." He moved to get up.

"Where are you headed?" The cool voice interrupted his half-hearted departure.

He sank down again. "Lucknow?" He ended the word as a question, unsure whether he was pronouncing it properly.

She nodded. "The train is not due for a few more hours," she stated softly.

Mark knew that. "Well, yes, but I couldn't arrange for any transport later on in the night, so I had to be here a bit early. I don't mind waiting," he replied. "A few hours aren't much of a problem and the weather's good, not too much of a chill, though I didn't realise the place would be so deserted..." He realised he was rambling and trailed off.

"Yes, there is a nip in the air."

"Would you like some tea?" Mark offered immediately. "I have a thermos-full in my backpack somewhere, and some glasses..." He moved so that the weak light from the guardhouse fell on his backpack and started to rummage through it, unearthing a large thermos and a few plastic glasses. "The glasses are a bit flimsy, and the tea is local," he apologised as he started pouring. "But at least it's hot."

"You do not like local tea?"

The question was soft, in the same tone in which the rest of the girl's statements had come before. He could not decide if she was amused or whether he had offended her.

"No. No, it's not that. It's good, but, well, I'm kind of used to something else... so it's, just, somewhat... different." He stumbled through an explanation.

"I see."

As Mark handed over one of the full cups to her, the tips of her fingers brushed his. Cold. Utterly cold. Mark's hand jerked involuntary on contact and some of the tea spilled onto the ground between them. Mark was immediately contrite.

"Oh God, I'm so sorry! Did it splash on you?" His hands hovered anxiously inches away from her.

She shrank back into her covering. "No, I'm fine." Her denial was quick.

"It's just that you're so cold. I didn't expect it." Mark felt he had to explain.

"Only the hands," she said. "I'm wrapped up snugly otherwise."

They sipped their tea as a small silence took hold around them. It was awkward, as it is when conversation between two strangers stops. Mark became aware of the night pressing around them, and the constant drone of insects, low and never-ending. The elements enveloped them and gave the twosome an intimacy that was distinctly uncomfortable in its rawness.

Topic after topic was abandoned in his mind as he sifted through what he could say to end the silence. He didn't want to probe too much about her, as she seemed unwilling to offer even her name to him, and he thought that details about him would not interest her too much. He had already babbled on about the weather and he didn't want to appear even more stupid. What then?

She interrupted his thoughts with a whispered, "The night is so beautiful, isn't it?"

He looked around. He hadn't really noticed. It was just another winter night. True, the moon was shining down and bathing everything with its dull silver light, making it shine, and if he considered... yes, the shadows and the pale light of the moon did lend a certain romantic, magical quality to the atmosphere.

"Yes," he said slowly as he took in his surroundings. "It is, really."

"Poonam nights usually are, especially in the winter months," she said.

"Poonam?"

"Full moon," she translated.

"Oh. I hadn't realised it was full," he muttered and stared up at the radiant globe.

"It is said that ghosts roam around in these parts when the moon is full and prey on young maidens." She offered this bit of information like she was talking about something usual or normal.

Mark knotted his brows. "You believe in those things?"

"It doesn't matter what you believe," she said. "What's out there doesn't care for your beliefs. What is true, justis."

Mark chuckled. "I don't believe you," he said as he shook his head from side to side in amazement. "Here you are, a young girl, alone at night. And you're telling me that ghosts stalk maidens. Aren't you afraid?"

"Of what?" she asked him.

"Of ghosts," he answered. "I could be one."

She threw back her head and laughed. The sound rushed into the night like a fresh waterfall. The movement threw her features into light and Mark was arrested by the picture she made.

"A white-skinned ghost?" Her voice was laced with mirth. "I do not think so. Why would you come across the lands to haunt me?" she asked and laughed again.

Mark followed the incline of her throat with his eyes, dipping into the shadowed valley below, screened from his eyes by the darkness and the cloth she had wrapped around her. Something about her pulled at him. He wanted to touch her, to run his hands down that throat, into.... God! He was sure her skin would feel like silk. His mind struggled to reconstruct her body from the brief, surprised glimpse that it had had of her. He remembered her as a little on the full-bodied side, but....

"So?" she murmured, cutting him off mid-thought.

"Huh? So what?" He wondered if he had missed something she said during his reflections.

"Are you dangerous?" she asked him, her voice subtly different, a sultry caress, a change from the cool monotone it had been till then. It was definitely personal now.

Or was he imagining it?

"Dangerous? No, I'm not," he replied, and then added, "Not in the way you're thinking." He laughed a little self-consciously.

"Oh? In which way then?"

No, he wasn't imagining it. She was definitely flirting with him.

And he was caught. "Um, well..." he tried to hedge and desperately floundered for a way out of this.

"Are you attracted to me?"

Surprised, Mark wondered what was going on. Girls around these parts were shy and wouldn't even talk to a stranger. And here, this one was actually asking him such a bold question. Maybe there were a dozen able-bodied men hiding in the bushes somewhere who would jump him as soon as he said yes. And that would be the end of him. Mark smiled and shook his head at his active imagination.

She took the shake of his head for a denial. "No?" she asked, clearly disbelieving.

"No, I..." Mark jumped in to clear the confusion. "Well, I didn't mean no."

"Then yes?"

She was having fun with this! Oh, well. She could have it her way then.

"Yes, I am," Mark said quietly, and the silence that fell between them was expectant.

The girl shifted slightly, pushing her blanket a little less securely around her, and light swept over her face with the movement. Mark saw her features for the first time and was captivated. She was like a painstakingly carved marble statue, every feature just right. He stretched one hand to touch her cheek, brushing his fingers lightly, and then stroking her more firmly. Her skin was as he had imagined it to be, smooth and silky. And a little cold.

"Are you cold?" he asked her, concerned. It wasn't that chilly, and she was in a woollen blanket.

"No, just my body temperature..." she murmured as she reached out and trailed a finger along the edge of his face. "I will soon be warm. Hopefully."

Mark didn't need any further invitation. He leaned in and kissed her. Her lips were cool, yet soft and supple. She opened her lips and invited him in, leading him into her mouth with an abandonment that was not the place of first kisses. Her hands entwined around his head, enveloping him, demanding much more than what he was giving.

He obliged. One hand pushed into her blanket and found her breast. It was heavy in his hand, and he squeezed it experimentally, getting a soft bite on his lip in return. A sweet, heady feeling invaded his mind, drugging him and he felt like he had never felt before.

He felt surrounded by her, by her scent, by her arms, by her very presence. There was nothing else beyond her. Breaths mingled and wet lips sucked at each other with a desperation neither could control. Her hand bunched around a fistful of his hair as she moved her knee up his thigh and arched into him. He wanted so much to pacify the escalating hunger that had him in its grip that he pushed her back, against the corner, looking for a way to connect more of his body to her.

She held him back. "Not here," she said, her voice a ragged whisper snatched out of her heaving chest. Looking around wildly, she spotted something and gestured towards a spot on the other end of the railway tracks. "There."

Mark turned his head and spied some straw on the ground under the banyan tree he had noticed earlier. Both of them scrambled to their feet and started towards it. The girl left her blanket on the ground, whether by mistake or intentionally, he'd never know. But what emerged out of that blanket was akin to a butterfly coming out of a cocoon.

The vision that faced him that night was the most beautiful thing that Mark had ever seen, and one that would remain with him for the rest of his life, he thought. She was magnificence in black and white, purity and innocence dripping off her face and evaporating into the night. Midnight black, silky hair fell on either side of her cheeks, the parting between them glistening in the light of the moon. Dark lips contrasted with alabaster skin, her eyebrows straight lines in the ivory oval of her face. Her eyes were veiled by dark lashes, and he wondered what her eyes would be like in the light, but he didn't have much time to think about it because she was pulling him down on the bed of straw and the unrelenting desire gripped him again.

They joined with a raw hunger, not caring for the chill of the night or wayward eyes. They tore the clothes off each other, warmed by the heat of their desire, the craving a need so primal that it sucked the breath out of Mark, leaving him gasping and weak with wanting. He tried to mount her, but she laid a hand in the middle of his chest and pushed him back with an uncanny strength he'd never have credited to her slight frame.

As he fell back onto the bed of straw, she appeared above him, her pale face glowing in the moonlight. Mark wondered briefly how that could happen – the moon wasn't shining directly into her face, was it? Then she leaned in and her lips made him forget about light and shadow for a bit as another kind of light exploded behind his eyelids.

He didn't know what happened as every nerve in his body flared up and he felt heated. His skin burned. The sensations on his lips were the centre of his being and everything else paled beyond it. Mark felt her move above him and take his hardness in her hands. Her body draped over his and suddenly he felt like he was shrouded in something clammy, dank, and cold.

His arms flailed and his breath caught in his throat as he struggled to get up, but he realised he was pinned to the ground by the strength of the slight girl. She led his hardness into her and Mark gagged at the sensation. He felt simultaneously aroused and disgusted, pleasure and repulsion warring within him as he felt something wet and slimy, something otherworldly and forbidden encase him. She started moving on top of him, using her thighs and pelvic muscles to grip him tightly inside her. Her lips were locked on his, her breath filtering into his lungs and preventing him from taking even a gulp of the cold night air.

She moved against him, the rhythm taking him to the peak of ecstasy. He had never felt like this before. He knew he was nearing the height of pleasure and concentrated on the wetness into which he was being plunged time and again, faster and faster. Mark closed his eyes tightly and felt himself drifting away. He felt his blood rush out of him, dry up in his veins. His senses turned sluggish, and he made one last effort to buck his hips and let the pressure reach its optimum. Gathering all his energy, he opened his eyes and focused on a distant star...