#Friendly reminder that the Cult of the Lightless Flame IS a cult | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ncfan-1 · 5 years

Text

a narrative shape concealing the real thing inside

You live with the infection of the divine, and you do not know when you began to call it such in your heart, for you were always raised to be secure in the knowledge that it was a blessing. Holiness has chosen you, Agnes; you are filled with holy fire and holy rage and holy destruction, and the touch of the divine upon your form enables you to make reality what was before only a hopeless dream for your holy family.

------------

Title taken from and inspired by ‘The Pentecostal Serpent.’ The snake reminded me of Agnes.

---------------

Holy rage.

They do not call it that when they speak of you, in those shadowed places where they think you cannot hear.

In the first few years of your life, that which you can remember and is more than a haze of smoke and anger, Eugene calls you a brat more times than you can count. Your rage is holy, and yet it is unmanageable and unseemly and it is a problem, Arthur, that she keeps killing our people with her fire.

You are quiet, for you often know not what to say, and when your rage takes you it is the inferno of a forest fire in the driest summer, setting everything it touches alight, without boundary or stumbling block, unstoppable and unquenchable. When your rage takes you, you do not know yourself. You are someone else when the rage takes you, someone not to be withstood or gainsaid. It is only when the rage is tamped down to a low simmer (never gone, never entirely gone, the holy fire that burns within you will never go out, or so you think, in your early years) that you know yourself again.

You don’t remember much about the rage, don’t remember much of what you do or say or feel in the grips of the rage. If this is holiness, if this is divinity, you’d think it would leave a stronger impression upon you.

When you are still young, they send you to the house of an avatar of a different, rival god to cleanse it of its impurities and make it a haven of your own dear, dread god. Or perhaps they were simply trying to be rid of you. They have a purpose in mind for you, but you have still heard the whispers that escape the lips of some, and you cannot help but wonder…

But this will be a place for the Lightless Flame, and never again the sanctuary of the Mother of Puppets, and you will not let doubt touch you.

It is not what you expected. You look into the face of Raymond Fielding and search for the touch of the divine, and you see nothing that you recognize. Where you expect divinity, you see only the void of a man whose body was long ago hollowed out for the home it must provide for the thousands of crawling things that live inside of him. This is no holy man, no prophet, no truth-speaker in a world riddled with lies and sin. This is a hollow man stuffed with cobwebs.

And the hosts he has chosen for his spiders are another matter entirely.

They did not choose this. Here, you see the obliterating touch of the divine, and they made no choice at all to become the homes for the pulsing eggs and squirming larvae that form such twisted lumps under their dead skin. Divinity settled upon them, made a home of their flesh and a ruin of their lives, stripping them so utterly of any meaning and any will that they are bereft even of the ability to enact the will of their cunning god in this world.

You begin to think, really think, of all the tales you have ever been told of your birth. The others, Arthur and Diego and Elizabeth and Lucia, they love recounting the tale. You can see it all, the pyre, the crown of thorns your mother wore, the inferno that destroyed acre upon acre of forest, your mother, your mother’s burning, disintegrating body, as if you witnessed it all yourself. Berenice used to tell you the story as a lullaby, to send you off to sleep.

And there, in the center of it all, was you, a baby baptized in obliterating flame. Chosen.

When you said you did not know when you began to think of your divinity as an infection, you were wrong. You were lying. You know where. You’ve always known where. In this house on Hilltop Road, in this stronghold of the Web where walls seethe with spider webs and spider eggs, you see yourself reflected not in Raymond Fielding, hollow Raymond Fielding stuffed with cobwebs, but in the spider egg sacs that moan and twitch before they never move or make a sound again, and you begin to question that which you never before questioned.

(There will come a time, later, when those who know you will blame it all on a boy you met in a diner. They are wrong. That relationship only made sprout what germinated in you long ago.)

This house changed you. You will not understand how much it changed you until later. Small mercies.

But you know this much: in this house, you come to long for connection in a way you never have before. You were isolated, when you were in the care of the cult—they had never allowed you out into the world unsupervised until they sent you to this house on Hilltop Road. You never felt your disadvantage, but here, you feel it so keenly it sometimes threatens to eclipse your fire.

So many cats and dogs wander over to the house after you take custody of it. Once, there comes a young boy. You are not supposed to, but you try, you try to tamp down your fire. You try to be good enough to touch without burning. But there is no one unconsecrated who can withstand the touch of the divine. There is screaming for a moment, but only for a moment, and then, not even bones are left behind. Barely even ash, and these are the first years you shed that do not stem from rage.

As far as the cult is concerned, burning the house will serve as the cure for all ills. All they fear is that you may be influenced by the Web in some way; the hand concerns them, and they did not see the cold seed that has taken a place next to your fiery heart. The hand is a small matter, but they do not believe you. And oh, the burning is cathartic, but it is not what they had hoped it would be. Not what you hoped it would be.

The years pass by in a haze. You do as you are told, and you wonder what would happen if you didn’t. If you didn’t take the candles, if you didn’t stay put like you were told and you actually went out and risked yourself, would you feel different? If you went out and tried to replicate the experience of those who joined the cult as adults, would you still feel this way? Would you feel as if you had chosen divinity, would divinity still feel like the infection that sinks in its roots and twists everything you are to its own designs?

What would they do to you, if you disobeyed them? Kill you? You’re not certain they could kill you; even Diego and Arthur have, at times, shown discomfort in your presence when your fire is unveiled. But disobedience must be punished, and you have witnessed that punishment carried out—it’s always played to a group audience, the punishment of the unfaithful. Even without death as the remoted possibility, pain is a possibility, and you have ever shied away from pain.

So you spend years as a fly trapped in amber, as a doll in a glass display case, as a woman caged in a pedestal so high that you can see no sign of the ground, and if you ever tried to jump, you would must surely die. If you were ever handed the key to your cage, you do not know that you would escape.

You stay on that pedestal, and ossify. The life you thought you would have, any life you could possibly have, never begins. The infection spreads, your divinity feels more you than you, and no matter how you search within yourself, you’re not sure what is you, and what is holy fire.

By the time the Archivist comes to you, you cannot find it in yourself to burn her, in spite of all that she has done. The woman is a font of arcane knowledge, and you have so many questions to ask, that rendering her tongue to ash would be a loss unbearable.

You look into the Archivist’s face, and search for the infection of the divine. You find only cold gray eyes that know more and see further than they should, a thin, pinched mouth, and the hardness of one who has paved her path with the bones of those who opposed her.

“Could I have ever done it at all?” So many questions, and that is the only one you can find the words for. This, when it is the least pressing question of all.

The Archivist shakes her head. “No,” she says matter-of-factly. “You cannot enact an apocalypse on behalf of a god you never chose.”

And unencumbered by the infection of the divine, she leaves you to the emptiness of a holy life that can never achieve any kind of culmination.

#The Magnus Archives #Fanfic #Agnes Montague #Friendly reminder that the Cult of the Lightless Flame IS a cult #And that Agnes's ability to ignore/disobey them would be severely limited #TW body horror #Tw cults #Religious imagery

3 notes · View notes

cuttoothed · 3 years

Text

For the second day of @jonmartinweek, mostly for the prompt "injury", though also a little bit "love confession" (by omission).

Set directly after episode 92. Content warnings for mild descriptions of Jon’s canonical injuries (blood, burns).

Things are...tense, when they go back down to the Archives. Actually, “tense” is probably an understatement, after finding out that Elias murdered not only Gertrude Robinson, but also the unknown man in Document Storage—who as it turned out was none other than Juergen bloody Leitner.

A lot to take on board, all in all.

Basira seems to have accepted her new employment status with eerie calm, and starts setting up at Sasha’s old desk (oh god, Sasha’s dead, has been for months), fetching notebooks and folders from the stationery cupboard and arranging pens and highlighters in a desk tidy. Daisy is nowhere to be seen—thankfully, Martin thinks, because she was even scarier than usual in Elias’ office. Melanie storms off into the stacks and there are sounds of shouting and things hitting the floor, which Martin is in no hurry to investigate. Tim sits at his desk with his feet propped up for about five minutes, then stands up and says: “Fuck this, I’m off to the pub.” He doesn’t invite anyone else to go with him, and Martin thinks their presence probably wouldn’t be welcome.

Jon arrives in about half an hour later, smelling of fresh cigarette smoke. Normally Martin would disapprove, but the way things are right now he’s tempted to take up a few bad habits himself. Jon looks...exhausted, defeated, his shoulders slumped wearily. His clothes are smudged with dirt, and there’s drying blood crusted around the injury on his neck; the bandages on his hand are starting to slip, revealing the angry, raw burns beneath.

Martin’s not sure he’s ever been so happy to see someone in his life.

Jon gives him a small, tired smile as he passes, then heads into his office and shuts the door. Martin knows that no sane person would try to go straight back to work looking like they’d just been through a war zone and still with an open wound; he is also aware that Jonathan Sims is the sort of person to do precisely that. He hesitates for a few moments, then makes a decision.

He fetches the first aid kit from the break room, and goes and knocks on Jon’s door. It’s a firm knock, a knock that he hopes says “I’m coming in whether you like it or not”, because it’s not beyond Jon to try to avoid them all for an extended period.

“Come in,” Jon calls, and even his voice sounds exhausted. When he sees Martin enter the room, his expression softens in a way that’s difficult to parse. Is he just relieved that it isn’t one of the others? Or is he actually pleased that it’s Martin?

It’s been two months since Jon went into hiding while suspected of murder, and the last time Martin saw him he had been quite sure Jon was planning to—to hurt himself, somehow. Before that, though, there had been a time when they were...well, close, in a way. Jon had let his guard down around Martin, in the midst of being so suspicious and afraid. He had trusted Martin, when he didn’t trust anyone else, had eaten lunch with him and talked about boring, ordinary things, the tight set of his shoulders relaxing just a little. He had even laughed, sometimes. It had been, despite everything, one of the happier times in Martin’s life, and if that’s not pathetic he doesn’t know what is.

“Hi, Jon,” he says.

“Martin,” says Jon, his tone soft. “It’s so—ahh, how are you?”

“How am I? You’re the one with a bloody great gash in your neck and looking like you put your hand in a fire.” Martin brandishes the first aid kit. “You really should go to the hospital, but I know it would be a waste of my time suggesting it.”

“Thank you for bringing that,” Jon says. “I appreciate it. You can just leave it on the desk.”

“Nope,” Martin tells him cheerily, setting the kit down and opening it. “I know you, Jon. If I leave it with you it’ll still be sitting here untouched tomorrow. Plus, I got my first aid certification when I was working in the library. It’s probably expired now, but I think it still counts.”

Jon looks as if he’s about to protest, but then he huffs a breath that might be a laugh, and nods in concession.

“All right then,” he says.

Martin snaps on a pair of disposable gloves and directs Jon to sit on the desk and undo the top two buttons on his shirt, so Martin can examine the wound on his neck. It’s shallow, fortunately, and the bleeding seems to have already stopped. Martin cleans away the crusted blood as gently as he can, though Jon still winces a few times.

“What happened?” Martin asks, as he smears on antibiotic cream.

“Daisy. She, ah, she decided that I was dangerous. Needed to be dealt with. Fortunately Basira was able to convince her otherwise.”

“Bloody hell,” Martin mutters. He’s not sure why he’s surprised; he’s always felt afraid around Daisy, like a rabbit being in the same room with a fox. But he just sort of assumed it was typical Martin fear of, well, everything. He never thought Daisy would actually hurt any of them. He applies a bandage carefully over the wound, and then turns his attention to Jon’s hand. Unwrapping the bandages reveals the red, blistered mess beneath, and Martin hisses in sympathy.

“Please tell me you went to the hospital for this.”

“I went to a walk-in clinic,” Jon says. “They cleaned it up, gave me some antibiotics and painkillers. They, uh, they did recommend I see my GP for follow up monitoring, and that I should get a referral to a physiotherapist, but, well, it’s been a busy few days.”

“Jon,” Martin sighs, exasperated, and Jon smiles a bit shakily.

“I know,” he says. “I will go to a GP, I promise. It’s just a bit tricky when you’re wanted for murder. Anyway, it seems to be healing rather well, all things considered.”

Martin considers whether to apply antibiotic cream, but the skin doesn’t seem to be broken, and he knows it’s best not to touch the area more than needed. Instead, he rewraps it with clean, dry bandages, being sure to keep them loose.

“How did this happen?” he asks, to distract himself from the fact that he is, technically, holding Jon’s hand. Jon gives a self-deprecating laugh.

“I, uh, I was trying to get information from a devotee of the Lightless Flame. This was her price.”

“The Lightless Flame? That cult—from the statements?”

“The same. As it turns out, a—a lot of things from the statements are real. Unpleasantly so.”

“I—yeah, I sort of figured that out when Tim and I got trapped in these weird corridors for days by that Michael...thing.”

Jon’s face blanches, his brows furrowing.

“You—god, Martin, I didn’t know. Are you—I mean, you’re okay, obviously, but— Have you seen Michael since?”

“No, and I hope I don’t.” Martin feels faintly nauseous at the memory. He doesn’t realize his hands are trembling slightly until the fingers of Jon’s hand, the unburned one, touch his wrist.

“I’m so sorry, Martin,” he says. “When I realized a-about Sasha, about that thing, I hoped I could take care of it myself, spare you and Tim. I never wanted to drag you into all this.”

“I don’t think there’s much avoiding it,” Martin mutters miserably. “And you didn’t seem to mind dragging Melanie into it, while you were on the lam.”

“I shouldn’t have asked her for help either. It wasn’t fair to put any of you in the position of aiding a suspected murderer.”

“I never believed you did it,” Martin tells him fiercely. “It just would have been nice to know you were okay, you know?”

“I know, and I’m sorry. I—I wanted to contact you, but it seemed too risky. I knew the police would be watching you, since we’re friends. Or—or at least friendly.”

Everyone I’ve talked to says you and him were close. Martin had been ridiculously pleased by the accusation at the time, and he feels the same now, with Jon’s injured hand cradled in both of his. Jon trusts Martin with his wounds, his vulnerability. Jon wanted to contact him; Jon thinks they’re friends.

“I—” Martin starts to say, and he doesn’t know if his next words will be I missed you or I worry about you or some humiliating romantic confession blurted out and impossible to take back. He draws a deep breath, and instead says: “I’m glad you’re back, and that you’re okay. I don’t have that many friends, I can’t afford to lose one.”

He says it like a joke, and mercifully, Jon takes it as one, and gives a relieved laugh. Martin realizes he’s long since finished bandaging the burn and is now just sort of...holding Jon’s hand; he releases it, reluctantly, and Jon smiles, lifting his other hand to touch the bandage on his throat.

“Thank you, Martin,” he says, hopping down from the desk. “I appreciate it, really.”

“As a token of your appreciation, you can go ahead and make a doctor’s appointment for that hand,” says Martin firmly, closing up the first aid kit.

“I will,” Jon says solemnly, and Martin believes him, but he’s also going to check in and remind him at the end of the day because Jon has a tendency to forget about trivial things like his own wellbeing. It’s just who he is, and Martin’s made his peace with it, like he’s made his peace with being utterly, hopelessly gone for Jonathan Sims.

“I was going to make some tea, if you fancy,” he says as he opens the door. “You look like you could use a cup.”

“Oh, yes, that would be lovely, thank you. Oh, and Martin?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad I’m back as well. I—” Jon hesitates a moment, then says: “I missed your tea.”

It’s not much of a declaration, but Martin understands what Jon means by it; for the two of them, it means a lot.

#the magnus archives #jonmartinweek2021 #tma #my fic #jonmartin #cw injury

317 notes · View notes