Blood Lies (Dark Brothers of the Light #9) (26 page)

Luck moved back among the others watching,
spied Darianna and joined her near the dais. "Where's Travis?"

"Somewhere behind the barns losing his
dinner. Seeing Anksha take myn has that effect on him."

Jingen collapsed in the snow, convulsing.
Anksha released him to stand grinning with blood smeared across her
face. A guardsmon heaved the boy across his shoulder and followed
Anksha into the manor.

Luck turned, gesturing for Darianna to
follow. "Show's over. Let's find Travis and see if he needs some
help."

The crowd began to break up in near silence.
It would take them all time to assess what they had witnessed.

* * * *

Three days had passed since they brought
Stygean and Chinisi back to the manor. Isranon tried using donors
to strengthen Stygean. The boy's three friends all wanted to
contribute once they learned what Isranon intended to do with the
spell of Shared Life. He refused Iyan because the boy was too
young, but he allowed him to sit watch over Stygean. Grygg and
Dahnig both gave of their blood and life force in the spell.
Several nibari came forward as well, including Farris and Randilyn.
Even lycans volunteered and that surprised Isranon.

In spite of that, Stygean did not waken and
continued to fade.

Nevin and Isranon sat alone by the bedside
after three days of struggling for the boy's life.

"He doesn't want to live, Nevin. That's all
that it can be. Have I been that harsh with him?"

"Only Chinisi's faith in him has never
wavered, my brother."

Isranon's eyes went distant. "Then she's the
only one who can give him a reason to live. But how do I get her
to? What do I tell her to do?"

"Tell her the truth and let her find her own
way."

* * * *

Chinisi crept into the room and quietly
moved a chair to sit close by while Isranon worked on Stygean.
Stygean looked so pale it worried Chinisi. She glanced up at
Isranon as the mage finished with the boy.

"Is he going to be all right?"

"No." Isranon walked a delicate line between
saving Stygean and damaging himself in his efforts. He could not
force Stygean to live if the boy did not wish to. "I have done all
that I can. I believe he has simply given up and decided to
die."

Isranon turned to Chinisi, his eyes sad and
his manner strained. "Stygean's parents tried to trap and destroy
me. But in a battle, innocents are harmed as well as the guilty.
Stygean lost his parents, his home, everything that meant something
to him, because his father fought a battle he could not win.
Someday I will tell you all of it. But for now, simply understand
this: Stygean has nothing left to live for."

Chinisi struggled to maintain her composure.
"Can I sit with him?"

Isranon squeezed her shoulder. "Yes. I'll
come back later."

Chinisi watched him leave. The door closed
softly behind him. Immediately, Chinisi moved to sit on the edge of
the bed as close to Stygean as she could get.

"Stygean, please don't leave me." She waited
and then kissed his lips, which brought no response. She saw his
blades hanging from the edge of the cot and drew one. They were
very sharp. She knew the basic forms a spell could take and decided
on instinct to create one to reach him.

Chinisi cut her wrist and dribbled the blood
into his mouth, saying over and over again, "This is the blood of
my love which is true, the blood that speaks from my heart, the
blood of my being to merge with your being, to make us one and call
you back to me. Before the eyes of my god, Kalirion, may he hear my
prayer, my spell, my calling and let you awaken."

Stygean's eyes fluttered open.
"Chinisi…."

"Stygean, you're my hero. Don't leave
me."

She grabbed him and planted a hard kiss on
his lips before he could say anything more. Stygean flushed. He
struggled weakly for a moment as she continued to kiss him all over
his face.

The door cracked open, and Stygean managed
to glance from the corner of his eyes in time to catch a flash of
Isranon's tired but satisfied face before his mentor
disappeared.

* * * *

Anksha isolated Jingen in a dungeon of the
manor. Straw lay deep over the floor. There was a bucket of water
with a dipper and another for Jingen to relieve himself sitting in
the corners. Each morning, if Jingen wished to drink, he had to
break the thin ice that skimmed the surface of the water in the
bucket. He huddled in the straw, struggling to keep warm. He wore a
heavy woolen robe and pants, such as Anksha made her blood-slaves
wear. The robe could be opened by a tug of the sash holding it
closed, so that she could get at his flesh easily.

Jingen wept with the Presence Pain roaring
through his nerves, veins and muscles. His neck had become a mass
of ridged scars in only two days from Anksha's terrible feedings –
she came for him again and again throughout the days. Each time,
she twisted the blade of the dominance-link through his psyche, his
mage and neural nets, all the fibers of his being. She forced him
to kneel, locking his muscles with her power, while she beat him
with sticks and tore his arms, back and chest with her claws.

The door opened and Anksha stood framed by
the lamp light. She carried a birch switch this time.

Jingen whimpered and cringed.

"Open your robe and take your pants
down."

"Please, no more."

"Yes, more, young murderer," Anksha
growled.

Jingen pulled the sash and let his robe slip
from his shoulders. Anksha knelt and examined his sides, beneath
his arms and across his chest. "What are you looking for?"

"The withering."

"It's – it's only been two days."

Anksha gave a snarling laugh. "I'm
quickening it."

Jingen swallowed. "No, please…. Please, I
saw how the others died."

"Pants off. Pants off and on your
knees."

"I'll be good, just please, no."

"You'll be good, because you'll be
dead."

Jingen gave way to sobbing, dropped his
pants, and got to his knees.

"Bend over."

At first, he could not think what she
intended, and then his sphincters tightened. "No. Noooo!"

Anksha switched his buttocks until they bled
and then slashed all the fibers of his being through the
dominance-link. Jingen shrieked and went to his hands and
knees.

"I'm sorry." Jingen sobbed. "I'm so very
sorry."

"Not sorry enough." Anksha beat him
repeatedly across the back. Jingen collapsed in the straw. Anksha
dropped the switch and flipped him over. She straddled him and sank
her fangs into his neck.

Jingen began to writhe beneath her,
convulsing. She was taking him down and he knew it. He screamed.
Anksha sucked harder, drawing his blood, his magic, and all the
bio-alchemical essences from his body. Jingen's despair worsened
with his agony. He felt his mage centers and nets collapse, their
potentials blackened like baked bone as they turned to ash and blew
away. His mage-sight faded as he went mage-blind. Pain shot through
his sides and across his chest. His heart struggled and his pulse
fluttered. Anksha released him, licked the wound closed, and sat
back looking like a satisfied cat.

She stroked his sides, examining them again.
"There," she purred. "It's done."

The touch of her finger hurt. Jingen raised
himself up weakly and glanced. A long streak of red splotches
showed on his skin. "Noooooooo!"

"Yessssss." Anksha's grin spread. "You're
mage-dead and withering."

On the third day, she ordered Jingen thrown
in with the youngest group of male blood-slaves to share their
cell. All four of them were at least six years older than Jingen.
Anksha's power still burned through his body, his mage and neutral
nets. He balled up, whimpering. Between the pain and the roaring
awareness of her in every fiber of his being, he lay in torment.
Anksha had forbidden the nibari to give him anything to ease
it.

The four blood-slaves came and stood over
him, eyeing him hungrily.

"Fresh young meat," said Hertsanin with
chill dispassion.

"And a virgin ass no doubt," said Kaligulus.
His voice was hard and callous.

"Anksha has favored us," said Cautilya,
licking his fangs. His mother had been a captured Fae, and he had
the ears to prove it as well as a Fae name. "Pity it will wither
swiftly, unlike ourselves. The very young ones always do."

"Then we had best take advantage of it while
we may," said Tamyrlaenus as if he were speaking of the
weather.

Jingen looked up in fright at the four
dark-skinned faces regarding him as if he were a commodity. He
wanted to scream, but his throat was constricted and hoarse from
his trauma.

Kaligulus caught hold of Jingen's sash and
the neck of his tunic, using them to toss him onto some blankets.
He flipped Jingen over and untied the boy's sash, then jerked his
pants down. Jingen squirmed, clutching at his pants and trying to
pull them back up as they were torn from his grasp. Kaligulus
laughed and turned him on his stomach as he tossed Jingen's pants
aside.

Tamyrlaenus squatted by Jingen's head and
pinned the boy's shoulders to the blankets with his knees. "A live
one." He grinned at his companions.

Unable to move his shoulders, Jingen twisted
the lower half of his body, trying to keep them from entering him.
His knees pushed at the blanket-covered ground futilely. His nudity
sent feelings of vulnerability rushing through him, stained with
terror.

"But already withering," Hertsanin observed.
"We had best enjoy him while we can."

Cautilya unfastened his pants, shrugged out
of them, and knelt to shove a bit of cloth into the boy's mouth. He
rocked back on his heels to play with himself while he watched
Hertsanin knead Jingen's soft buttocks before rimming him with a
large thumb.

Jingen writhed and tried to scream through
the muffling cloth as Hertsanin shoved his large, thick member into
Jingen's small, tight ass. They laughed at his struggles and passed
him around like a party favor. Tears rolled down Jingen's face as
his flesh tore beneath their thrusts. Blood oozed from his
buttocks. Finally they each sank their fangs into one of his limbs
and began to feed. Jingen passed out.

* * * *

Lobelia went to Anksha. She hated having
anything to do with the creature, but she had no choice. She had
decided to intervene on behalf of Jingen so that he could visit his
mother more often. The few times she had seen him, he had not
looked well. She had been overhearing references to something
called ‘the withering,’ and she had a feeling that she would not
have the boy much longer as a card with which to pump Disharyl for
more information. It had been weeks since she had had time alone
with Disharyl.

"With your own child coming, Anksha, surely
you can understand how it must feel for Disharyl. I hear that her
son is already withering. While I don't know what this withering
is…."

Anksha's lips curled back, and she drew
herself up. "It means he's dying. I quickened it in him. I didn't
want to wait for it to start on its own. He's nasty."

Lobelia flinched at her callous tone. "I
understand, Anksha. I really do. It was my niece he tried to harm.
Compassion and forgiveness are divine. I feel for him and his
mother. I raised three children, my two sons and Chinisi."

Anksha's hackles lowered. "I don't
understand."

"Perhaps after your child is born, you will.
All that I am asking is to let Disharyl see him as often as
possible. Allow me to comfort her as often as possible over the
impending death of her only child."

"I don't have time for it."

"I can make time. I can walk the boy to her
cell and bring him back to his own. Please, Anksha. I'm asking you
as a mother."

Anksha blinked and her lips compressed as
she thought. "So be it. I will allow it so long as his chores get
done and he is available to me when I want him."

"Thank you, Anksha." Lobelia rose, grasped
Anksha's smooth hands in gratitude and then left. As soon as she
was out of sight, Lobelia wiped the feeling of having stained her
hands off onto the sides of her skirt.
To think I actually
touched the creature!
Lobelia shivered.

She went directly to the cells of the
blood-slaves and found Jingen. The boy looked pale and drawn, his
eyes glittered with a feverish turn. Lobelia found him sitting on
the ground in front of his bed, wrapped in his cloak yet almost
indifferent to the cold. She touched his shoulder to get his
attention. "Jingen, I have come to take you to see your
mother."

He glanced up at Lobelia, and she saw just
how off his eyes were. "My mother?" he asked in a listless
manner.

"Yes. Come with me."

Jingen did not offer his hand, so she bent
and took it. Jingen allowed himself to be drawn along, walking in a
dazed and deeply disoriented manner. From time to time he would
stop and simply stare, requiring Lobelia to urge him along
again.

Lobelia found Disharyl in a large cell she
had to herself. Disharyl looked up and saw Jingen. She threw
herself across the small distance and gathered him into her arms
with a soft cry.

Lobelia waited patiently as they hugged and
then settled. Disharyl looked at her. "Thank you."

"I'll return for him in a few hours. I will
try to bring him to see you each day and perhaps we might even find
time for one of our old chats, Disharyl."

"As you wish."

* * * *

Disharyl found every opportunity to see her
son that she could. Lobelia resumed their early pact at Ildyrsetts,
although they had not had any of their long talks in several
days.

"They rape me, mother," Jingen moaned,
huddling in her arms. "Constantly. They feed on me as a snack. I
hurt so bad and it never stops. The nibari will give me nothing to
make it better."