Evann-Sin had sucked in his breath as the stinging cut was made. He could feel blood seeping down his side and lifted his head to look around at Kaibyn. The demon had taken up the jug and was removing the lid.
“Egads, the stench is even worse now!” Kaibyn remarked.
Nothing could have prepared the warrior for the agony that invaded his system as the demon shook the fledgling out of the jug and it landed with a wet plopping sound on his back. Even as the sliminess of the feeling registered and he shuddered with disgust, the pain reached up with razor-sharp talons and drove down into his flesh.
“Shit!” Evann-Sin cried out and dug his fingers into the strange mattress. He arched his back, dug his booted toes against the bunk, feeling the acute torment burning a pathway into his body. It felt as though barbed wire was being threaded along his spine and the small of his back. Though he writhed, no position helped and he pressed his forehead into the mattress, clamped his jaw shut and rode out the brutal torture being inflicted on him.
Kaibyn was fascinated at what he was seeing. The creature had barely landed on the warrior’s back before it shot down through the cut and disappeared, bunching up under the young man’s flesh as it moved. It was wiggling this way and that under the skin and each time it moved, the warrior groaned in pain.
“I need to go before you Transition,” the demon said. Though he did not fear the changing of man to beast, he had no desire to watch it happen. “The Reaper must glean the information about the Abyss from me.”
“Go,” Evann-Sin managed to say. He was shuddering violently, sweat pouring from his body, and he did not want anyone to hear him scream from the agony that was enveloping him.
“I’ll return as soon as Cainer has what he needs.”
“Go!” the warrior hissed, squeezing his eyes tightly shut.
Kaibyn took one last look at the young man then disappeared on a soft, cool wash of air.
The torment was increasing and Evann-Sin had begun to whimper. Tears flowed from his eyes, his breathing was harsh—ragged, and his limbs were as stiff as those of a cadaver. He was in such agony he could not imagine surviving it. Every vein in his body burned with a fiery pain that made sweat pour from him like water. Every muscle cramped and was so rigid he wanted to scream. Each of his bones felt as though it were being crushed in a vise and when the popping, cracking sounds began, he thought he was being compressed, being pulverized into dust. Even the hair on his head, his arms, his belly and legs felt as though it were growing at an alarming rate, being pulled out of his flesh with red-hot pinchers. When his jawbone began thrusting forward, elongating—his teeth became longer, sharper, decidedly pointed, he started to pant and with the panting came a salivating that snapped his eyes wide open. The first thing he saw was the thick, wiry bristle of hair protruding from the backs of his hands and he yelped with shock. So stunned was he, he leapt from the bunk and when he landed upon the floor, he was on fours, swinging his head from side-to-side for the pain had increased to such an exquisite torment that it caused him to howl from the intensity of it.
His backbone arched like that of a spitting cat then dropped back to lengthen even more, the pain so acute he thought he would pass out. Terrible pain racked his hips and he could hear the pelvic bone crunching as it contracted.
He was beyond human speech in a matter of moments and though he wanted to beg the gods to release him from this torture, the only sounds he could make were growls and snarling hisses that brought terror to his soul. The fear of remaining like this the rest of his life was an agony unto itself.
With the last waning ounce of strength, he threw back his head—now covered with a black pelt that extended from his eyes to the tips of what had once been his feet—and howled.
* * * * *
Kaibyn was looking at the Reaper when Cainer Cree shuddered and put his hands to his face. “What is it?” the demon asked.
“He is beginning Transition.”
“You can feel that?”
Cainer shook his head. “I can hear his screams.”
“He hurts,” Kaibyn stated.
“He does.”
Glancing toward the dark ship, Kaibyn took a deep breath. “You have what you need from me?”
“Aye,” the Reaper answered. “You can go back to him soon. He will need you.”
“Will he need…what did you call it?”
“Sustenance,” Cainer replied. “And aye, he will need to feed.”
Kaibyn frowned. “Ugh, that makes me sick just thinking on it.”
“He’ll also need the tenerse but that won’t be until tomorrow. The first taking of blood will satisfy him for now.”
The demon turned his gaze from the ship. “If he never starts taking that shitty stuff…”
“The parasite within him is accustomed to it, demon. It was inside me. Remember? What I crave, so too, will Riel crave.”
“Oh,” Kaibyn said with a sigh. “All your curses are now his.”
Cainer got up from the rock upon which he had been sitting and stared across to Achasán Island. For a moment, his eyes glowed bright red and Kaibyn’s mouth dropped open in shock. When the Reaper turned to look at him, the demon shot to his feet and moved back. There was cruelty in that handsome face and those scarlet eyes were fixed upon Kaibyn.
“All my curses,” the Reaper said forcefully. “Aye, each and every damned one of them!”
“I didn’t mean…”
“When they come here seeking to become like me, they don’t realize what a vile curse it is. They hear the whispered tales of a man stronger than ten men combined. They hear they will be able to read minds and thus know what their enemies are thinking. They hear they will be nearly immortal and that disease and old age will never touch them. Wounds will heal in the blink of an eye. All those things they know will make them almost god-like and they are eager to become One with the Blood.”
Kaibyn could feel the power in the hands that were clenching and unclenching into fists. He could smell the aura of savagery that had come upon his companion. More than just the brutal look snapping from those red eyes, the stare seemed as though it had a lethality of its own.
“Once, a long time ago, a woman came to me and I made her deargs dul.” He put the heel of his right hand to his eye and held it there as though a great pain stabbed at the orb.
“She had not wanted to come here and she did not know what it was that awaited her here. Neither did her kinsman who had sold her to me.”
Despite his unease, the demon was intrigued by what he knew must be a very complex tale. Warily, he resumed his seat though kept his body rigid should he need to spring up and flee. “Her kinsman sold her to you?” he queried.
“They did not want to be burdened with her, and no decent man would take her to bride for she was considered soiled goods. It was only by chance I overheard two fishermen talking about her as they put out to sea. I knew I had to offer her a chance to have a life.”
Kaibyn glanced out at the sea and knew the Reaper had gleaned that conversation from the minds of the passing fishermen. “What was she like?” he asked.
“As lovely as a spring morn, she was,” Cainer remembered. “And as frightened as a doe.” He smiled slightly but the smile never reached his eyes. “She had been brutalized and hated men.”
“Ah,” Kaibyn said. “I begin to see why you bought her.”
“Do you?”
“I see a pattern emerging here. You are a do-gooder, Cainer Cree. You put things to rights.” He cocked his head to one side. “Is that not so?”
“As best I can,” the Reaper agreed.
“So you gave her the means to turn herself into an avenger upon the man who had raped her, but now you regret having done so because you see it as a curse.”
“It is a curse,” Cainer said. “Ask Riel in a few weeks if he doesn’t think it is.”
“And did this young woman—what was her name—think she had been cursed?”
“Kynthia,” the Reaper said. “Her name was Kynthia and no, she welcomed her Transition and I imagine she still does. It set her free and she went back to her kinsmen, with the parasite confined in a jar to later be inserted into her body.”
“Why did you not insert the creature here?” the warrior asked.
Cainer’s smile was grim. “Because if I had, she would not have been able to ever leave the island.”
“Ah,” the warrior said, nodding. “I understand. If you can’t leave, neither could any other Reaper. Did Kynthia leave willingly?”
“She was content with leaving for she went back the master of her own fate, never again at the mercy of any man.”
“To me, that seems a blessing. So why does it bother you so badly?”
“It is no blessing, demon. It is an evil thing I help do to these people. It is a sin for which I must one day atone. Each time I feel them Transitioning and I am reminded that it is I who did this to them. I hear their screams. I sense their confusion and anger and disgust. I feel their terror by reliving my own.”
“Each one who came here for you to change knew what they were doing,” Kaibyn reminded him. “They came of their own free will, did they not?”
“Aye, but Kynthia didn’t. They brought her here against her will.”
“True, but did you browbeat her into taking the parasite?” When the Reaper remained silent, Kaibyn asked if he had forced the young woman to incise her own flesh and apply the fledgling to the wound.
Cainer closed his eyes. “No, but having given her the means to become a monster still doesn’t set well with me.”
“Well, you can look her up when we leave this place and you can see how she’s handling being a deargs dul. For all you know, she might be avenging other women who have been hurt as she was. Would that not be a good thing?”
The Reaper chuckled mirthlessly. “Only a demon would think revenge a good thing.”
Silence settled comfortably between the men, and both turned their gazes back to the airship. After a moment or two, Cainer’s shoulders relaxed and he appeared calm.
“Can I join him now?” Kaibyn asked. “I am worried about the little shit.”
“Surprised you are acquiring affection for a man, demon?”
“Unfortunately, he grows on you, and if I am to take his woman away from him…”
“No man will ever take a Reaper’s woman away from him, demon. If you try, you will find yourself installed back in the Abyss. That, I guarantee.”
“I was joking,” Kaibyn said.
“Sure you were.” When Kaibyn would have protested, Cainer waved him off. “Go. He is weak and he will need this.”
Stunned at how quickly the Reaper moved, Kaibyn gasped. He barely had time to gain his feet before Cainer Cree was beside him, holding up a squirming rabbit.
“You must not allow him to kill the beast. Let him take only enough blood to satisfy the hunger then take it away from him and bring it back here.”
“You don’t kill the animals on the island?”
“I don’t eat meat,” the Reaper answered. “I never have. The blood sustains me, and I never take enough to do harm to the beast. If you allow Riel to kill, he will develop a bloodlust that will be unlike anything you have ever seen. It will make him even harder to live with.”
Kaibyn took the animal, wrinkling his nose at the gamey smell. “When will he be strong enough to fly your airship?”
“When he has fed. The sooner, the better,” Cainer replied. “I can not wait to leave this place.”
Disappearing with the little animal held out in front of him as he held the fledgling, Kaibyn was barely back in the ship before the Reaper realized he was not alone on the island. He stiffened and turned slowly to find Morrigunia sitting upon the rock the demon had vacated.
“What are you up to, my love?” the goddess inquired in a soft voice.
The light died in Cainer Cree’s eyes and his wide shoulders slumped. A faint groan of hopelessness pushed from his constricting throat and he looked away from his tormentress, turning his gaze longingly to The
Levant
.
“Did you really think I would allow you to leave, my deargs dul?” she asked. “Surely you knew I would not.”
The Reaper hung his head. “I should have known it was too good to be true.”
“Ah, my love,” Morrigunia said with a sigh. “You would have left me and flown away to your world without so much as a goodbye.” She made a tsking sound and waggled her finger at him. “You are a bad boy, indeed.”
He looked around at her and his eyes were stricken, filled with tears. “I am a lonely man, Morrigunia.”
She smiled. “And whose fault is that, Cainer? I do not count the times I offered you comfort and you threw it back in my face.”
“I wanted no woman but Aisling!” he said fiercely, swiping at the tears that were falling down his cheek.
“But you couldn’t have that sleeping beauty, now could you?”
“Don’t remind me of her loss, you bitch!” he threw at her.
Morrigunia’s smile turned nasty. “Her loss,” she said, the words dropped like a heavy rock. “Did I ever tell you she was lost?”
“Stop it!” he shouted, covering his ears with his hands. He hunkered down and knelt there, rocking with the weight of his despondency.
“So pretty she is,” Morrigunia said with a sigh. “That soft blonde hair and lovely blue-green eyes. She is a bit too tall for the tastes of Chalean men, but I know you admire that in her.”