“What is this place?” she breathed, her voice filled with a wonder that bordered on reverence.
“It is yours,” Maruz said, his voice a low murmur beside her. He released her hand, and the loss of contact was a sudden, sharp ache. He gestured toward the structure. “A sanctuary. A place where no memory of him can ever touch you.”
He led her along a path of flat, gray stones toward a massive front door carved from a single slab of dark narra wood. As they approached, the heavy door swung inward soundlessly, an silent, elegant welcome. Lina stepped over the threshold, and her breath caught in her throat. If the outside was beautiful, the inside was a revelation. The space was immense, an open-plan expanse of polished hardwood floors and soaring ceilings. Sunlight poured through floor-to-ceiling windows that comprised an entire wall, offering an unbroken panorama of the cliffs and the sea. The furniture was minimal and elegant - a low-slung sofa in a pale cream fabric, a table made from a single piece of driftwood, shelves filled not with trinkets, but with interesting pieces of coral and unique, sea-worn stones.
“I wove this from the threads of your unspoken desires,” Maruz explained, his voice resonating in the quiet, cavernous space. “Every quiet wish for peace, every dream of light and open air. It is all here.”
He guided her through the sanctuary he had built for her. He was right. It was as if he had reached into the deepest, most secret corners of her soul and given them form. The kitchen was a gleaming marvel of stainless steel and white marble, but on the counter sat afamiliar chipped blue mug, an exact replica of one her grandmother had owned. In a small, sun-drenched alcove, a comfortable reading chair was positioned beside a shelf filled with books she had always meant to read. The house was not just a beautiful shell; it was an intimate portrait of her.
The supernatural hum of the place was undeniable. As they passed a large, empty vase, a single, perfect bird of paradise bloomed into existence within it, its vibrant orange and purple a startling slash of color against the neutral tones. He led her into the master bedroom, a room larger than her entire former apartment. One wall was entirely glass, opening onto a private balcony that hung suspended over the churning sea. The bed was enormous, draped in silk sheets the color of pale lilac, a shade she had loved as a girl but had long since forgotten. She ran her hand over the cool, smooth fabric. When she turned, she saw the closet door was slightly ajar. Inside, rows of clothes hung in neat order - simple linen dresses, soft cotton shirts, elegant evening wear - all in her size, all in colors that would complement her warm skin. It was an arsenal for a life she could not yet imagine living.
“The house is connected to you, Linang,” Maruz said, his fiery gaze sweeping over her. “It will respond to you. It will protect you.”
They moved out onto the wide, sun-drenched veranda that wrapped around the back of the house. As they stood side-by-side, gazing at the endless expanse of the ocean, a movement from the cliff path caught her eye. An elderly man with skin like wrinkled leather and a young woman with a shy smile were making their way up toward the house. They carried woven baskets laden with gifts. Lina felt a knot of anxiety tighten in her stomach. Strangers. Questions.
The old man reached the veranda and bowed his head slightly, his smile warm and genuine. “Ma’am Lina,” he said, his voice raspy withage. “Welcome to our village. We heard you had arrived. We are so sorry for your recent loss, but we are honored to have you here.”
The young woman stepped forward and placed her basket on a low wooden table. It was overflowing with ripe mangoes, purple talong, and a large fish wrapped in banana leaves. “A gift,” she said softly. “To welcome you.”
Lina was speechless. They knew her name. They knew a version of her story, a clean, respectable version where she was a wealthy widow seeking solace by the sea, not a terrified woman who had summoned a demon in a Manila slum. Maruz stood beside her, his presence utterly changed. To her, he was a magnificent, infernal being. To them, he was simply a tall, handsome man, a silent companion whose nature was completely veiled. She found her voice, thanking them with a grace she hadn’t known she possessed. They spoke for a few more minutes about the tides and the best spots for fishing, then departed with another warm smile, leaving Lina alone with the demon and the offering.
The reality of it, the totality of her new safety, finally sank in. She was untouchable. She turned to Maruz, a new boldness hardening her spine. Her fear of him was gone, replaced by a deep, thrilling curiosity. She decided to test the limits of this new dynamic.
“I’m hungry,” she said. It was not a question or a request, but a simple statement of fact.
In response, the wooden table, which had held only the basket of gifts, was suddenly transformed. A simple, perfect meal appeared upon it. The large fish was now grilled to perfection, its skin crisp and seasoned. A bowl of steaming white rice, slices of the ripe mango, and a tall, sweating pitcher of calamansi juice sat waiting. The display was effortless, instantaneous, a casual miracle performed just for her.
She sat down, her movements slow and deliberate. She looked out at the sea, then back at him. “I want to hear music,” she said, her voice stronger now.
From the air itself, the sound emerged. The soft, melancholy notes of a lone guitar began to play a kundiman she hadn’t heard since her childhood, a song of love and loss that was so beautiful it ached.
Maruz stood by the railing of the veranda, a silent, watchful guardian. He had fulfilled her every command, anticipated her every need. He was the most powerful being she could imagine, and he had made himself her servant. But he kept his distance, his power a restrained, respectful force. He would not impose. He would not presume. He was waiting for her to lead. And as Lina picked up a piece of the perfectly grilled fish and brought it to her lips, she looked at the magnificent, terrible creature who was bound to her, and for the first time in eight years, she felt the intoxicating, terrifying thrill of being in control.
A week passed in a sun-drenched haze that felt like a lifetime. The woman who had arrived at the cliffside sanctuary, a trembling ghost still draped in the shadows of her old life, was gone. In her place, a new Lina was emerging, forged in silence and sunlight. She spent her days walking the length of her private beach, the fine white sand a cool caress against her bare feet. The salt-laced wind whipped her hair across her face, and she did not shy from its wildness. She learned the rhythms of the tides, the calls of the gulls, the way the light changedon the water from dawn to dusk. She was a creature of this coast now, as elemental as the rock and sea.
The bruises had faded completely, leaving behind unmarked skin that felt like it belonged to a stranger. One afternoon, she stood before the full-length mirror in her bedroom, clad only in a simple silk slip. She looked at her own reflection, at the slender lines of her collarbone, the curve of her hip, the warm brown of her skin. She saw no flaws, no imperfections, only a body that was hers and hers alone. She had survived. A slow, fierce pride uncoiled in her chest. She had not merely been rescued; she had waged a war and won.
Her relationship with Maruz settled into a strange, intoxicating domesticity. He was a constant, silent presence, a magnificent shadow at the edge of her new world. He would stand on the veranda for hours, a bronze statue gazing out at the sea, while she read in her sun-drenched alcove. She would speak, and he would answer, his resonant voice a comforting hum that seemed to vibrate through the very walls of the house. She would think of a food, a piece of music, a forgotten memory, and it would manifest before her. He was her guardian, her provider, her omnipotent servant. But he never initiated. He never presumed to touch her, never crossed the invisible line of her autonomy. He watched her with his fiery, ancient eyes, and he waited.
The waiting was a power in itself, a testament to a restraint so absolute it was more seductive than any advance. And as her confidence grew, so did her curiosity. The fear she had once felt in his presence had long since transmuted into a deep, consuming fascination. She needed to understand the beautiful, terrible being to whom she was now inextricably bound.
That evening, she found him on the veranda as the sun began its final, glorious descent into the sea. The sky was a painter’s palette of incandescent orange, deep violet, and molten gold. He stood atthe railing, perfectly still, a silhouette of impossible masculine beauty against the dying light. She wore a simple dress of deep crimson, the silk whispering against her skin. She walked to him, her steps silent, and stood beside him. For a long while, they watched the spectacle in comfortable silence. Then, she reached out and laid her hand on his forearm.
His skin was hot, a familiar, living heat that sent a jolt of awareness straight through her. The muscle beneath her palm was as hard as ancient stone. He did not react, but she felt a subtle shift in the energy around him, an intensification of his focus on her.
“What were you?” she asked, her voice soft but clear above the sound of the waves. “Before you were… this. Before the bargains.”
He turned his head slowly, his volcanic eyes capturing the last rays of the sun, making them burn like twin furnaces. “I had a different name,” he said, his voice a low, melodic rumble. “The old people called me Siklab. I was the flash of lightning in a storm, the heat that splits stone, the guardian of the sacred fires on the mountain.” His gaze became distant, looking back across a chasm of centuries. “This land… it had a different soul then. A spiritual heartbeat that pulsed in the roots of the balete trees and the depths of the sea. I was a part of that pulse. A guardian of its balance.”
His words painted a world she could almost see, a verdant, primal archipelago teeming with a magic that had long since been paved over and forgotten.
“Then the ships came,” he continued, and a coldness entered his voice, the rage of a betrayed god. “Men in black robes, carrying a bleeding god on a stick. They called our spirits demons and our faith blasphemy. They built their stone houses on our sacred ground and cut the throat of the land’s belief. They silenced the prayers that gave me form, that fed my essence.” He looked down at his own perfect,bronze hands. “A god without worship is a starving, furious thing. My purpose was stolen. My nature, corrupted by grief and rage, began to curdle.”
Lina felt the talisman on her chest grow warm, pulsing in rhythm with his words, a resonant echo of his ancient pain.
“The first woman who called me… she was like you. Trapped. Desperate. Her husband was a chieftain who had sold his soul to the newcomers for a bit of their power. He beat her until she was half-dead. She didn’t pray to his new, bleeding god. She remembered the old ways. She called to the rage of the land itself. And I answered.” His form flickered for a second, a trick of the fading light. For a split-second, Lina saw not a man, but something else - a being of shadow and fire, with skin like charred wood and eyes like embers in a deep forest. The vision was gone as quickly as it came.
“She offered me a bargain. Her blood, in exchange for my judgment. The pact bound me to this cycle of human vengeance. With every woman who summoned me, with every life I… redacted… the memory of what I was faded, and the demon they believed me to be grew stronger.”
