Tortured Silence

by Michael Clement

  Misteress?

  “I converted his magic into life,” Sun replied. “Then, I channeled it into my flesh.”

  “You look much younger,” Taesa said, as she pulled Hana closer to her.

  “Bazal is strong,” Sun replied. “He gave me back at least ten years.”

  That put her closer to Mary’s age.

  “Can he do that for…” Mary began to say.

  “Yes,” Sun answered, smiling at the woman who was now only a little younger than her.

  Mary shifted, so she was kneeling with her heels under her ass.

  “Shall we continue?” Sun asked as Hana blinked her eyes.

  “Yes,” Mary answered.

  Sun clapped her hands as Hana sat up and rubbed her eyes.

  A fifth woman was carried into the room by Sun’s attendants. She was bound by the wrists, ankles, and knees. Tiny yelps of panic poured from her gagged mouth as she twisted and shook.

  The men set her down on the floor, careful not to smudge the circle that Mary had drawn.

  While I watched, Hana tied the woman’s arms to a shackle that was built into the floor. Helping as well, Taesa grabbed one leg, and Mary took the other. Together, they tied their captive’s legs to the floor.

  The woman was blonde with long hair that splayed out around her head in a wave. Terrified eyes the color of emeralds stared right at me.

  Somehow, she could see me, even though my lovers couldn’t. Holding up my hand, I realized that I could see through it as well.

  What the hell?

  “Light the candles,” Sun declared, forcing me to refocus on my lovers. What the hell were they doing?

  Each of the women shouted, “Jāḷaṇē!”

  The candles burst into flames on the floor, sealing the circle.

  Fuck.

  Hana and Taesa could do magic. How had that happened?

  Shit.

  They were Sun’s apprentices. It was the only explanation.

  “Prepare the sacrifice,” Sun ordered.

  Sacrifice?

  I didn’t like the sounds of that.

  Mary bent down and slicing the woman’s clothing away, revealing a beautiful woman beneath the fabric. My lover wasn’t careful. Several times she cut the captive, making her scream threw the gag.

  My oldest lover smiled at her, making my skin crawl. Mary was enjoying herself.

  Shit.

  Sometimes I forgot what a twisted psychopath she really was.

  “Margaret Vanaken,” Sun announced. “Your family has taken what is not theirs.”

  Margaret began to shake so hard that I could hear her teeth clacking. Blood was already leaking down between her breasts from the cut that had removed her bra. Her shivering was making it quake and run down her skin so that it pooled on her stomach.

  Together, each of my lovers reached out and wet their fingers. Then, they began to draw runes on Margaret’s skin, as their victim screamed and thrashed.

  “Tonight, we will remind the Vanakens to fear the dark,” Sun exclaimed.

  - 8 -

  “Bazal!” Tian yelled, slapping me again.

  “Stop,” I complained, disorientated. Part of me had wanted to see what the women were planning.

  The rest of me didn’t want to see them butcher her.

  No one kidnaps someone, strips them in a circle, paints runes on their skin… and then lets them go.

  “Hana, Taesa, and Mary are your mother’s apprentices,” I gasped.

  “Of course they are,” Tian answered.

  “What?” I muttered, stumbling over my words, before finally focusing on her face.

  “Hana and Taesa don’t want to be afraid anymore,” Tian answered.

  Behind her, I could see Candace moving closer. The zombie’s face seemed more alive and animated than before.

  Tian touched my face, pulling my focus back on her words.

  “Mary had never had a real teacher,” she added. “Mother will be good for them.”

  “They were about to slaughter Margaret Vanaken,” I snapped.

  Candace shivered.

  And, I saw her hand slowly draw a dagger. It gleamed with the same silver polish that the weapons that James had used did.

  Mockery shrugged. “So what?”

  “Killing people is wrong,” I growled, keeping my peripheral vision on Candace. I wasn’t sure what she was doing, or why, but I would find out.

  “Power is power,” Mockery said with a snort. “In order to solidify our reign, people will have to die.”

  Our reign.

  Tian had slipped it into the conversation so quickly that I almost missed it.

  Candace sprang at us.

  I pushed Tian to the side and grabbed the zombie, twisting so that her momentum yanked both of us off the bed. We crashed to the floor together, but at least I was on top.

  Candace drooled, as her teeth kept snapping together. Yanking her head to the side, she succeeded in getting the skin between my pointer finger and thumb in her mouth.

  With a snap and a jerk, she ripped a mouthful of flesh away.

  And… swallowed it.

  “Fuck!” I screamed as blood poured down on the zombie.

  Purple… infected blood that looked like dark red wine. It gushed all over her, while I fought to stay on top and not get bitten again.

  Candace had yanked hard enough on the metallic thread that sealed up her mouth that they had ripped loose. Feted breath that smelled like week-old garbage spewed into my face, making me gag. Shrieking, the deranged beast screamed and twisted out of my grip.

  Then... the silver blade came down right on the middle of my hand, pinning it to the floor.

  “Fuck!” I screamed again, almost nauseous from the pain. I could feel the silver inside of my hand, burning and tearing at my skin. The pain shattered my control and destroyed my defenses.

  Candace cackled, her face swooped in and bit the flesh between my neck and collarbone. The zombie’s bite felt like a vise closed on my skin and then pinched down.

  Shrieking, I pushed her away. Dark blood cascaded down her face as she swallowed again. Her eyes took on a ferocious light, almost a glow.

  Then, she turned around and sprinted to the door.

  I could only watch as she body slammed James out of the way.

  “Guntaṇē,” Mockery spat out.

  Dark black mist poured out of the ground, wrapped around Candace’s legs and tripped her. Then the spell flowed over the zombie, encasing her in bonds made of smoke, but as strong as steel.

  I pressed down on the wound on my neck as blood poured over me.

  Shit. I was tired of hurting.

  “I thought you controlled her!” I yelled at Tian.

  “I do,” she snapped. Then, her anger deflated. “I don’t know how she broke the bonds I had on her. It has to have something to do with you mentioning her sister, Margaret.”

  Sliding off the bed, Tian knelt next to me.

  “Let me see,” she insisted.

  Blood was gushing out of my neck and hand. I could feel the warmth escaping through my fingers.

  Murmuring, Tian said something that I couldn’t follow. The words twisted and squirmed in my mind. Then, I felt heat on her fingers, digging into my flesh. Squirming, I tried to get away from her, but she had locked her legs around my waist and just rode me while I tried to pull away.

  Tian let go of my neck and grabbed my injured hand, repeating the process.

  “Why couldn’t you do that in the house?” I groaned, laying back in a pool of my own blood.

  Tian sighed.

  Then, she looked away.

  “Tell me what you did,” I snapped, feeling light-headed.

  “You had third-degree burns over most of your body,” Tian said, taking a deep breath. “I did what had to be done.”

  I didn’t like the sounds of that.

  Sitting up, I felt a little less woozy.

  Tian was still latched around my waist like a boa constrictor.


  “It’s not like you could hear yourself,” she snapped.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “The sunshine damaged Blister’s runes on your back,” she answered. “It took hours for them to become functional again.”

  The pretty woman scowled at me, but I could sense that deep inside of her soul, she was afraid. I could feel her emotions, even though she was trying to hide them.

  “Tell me what you did… Now.”

  Sighing, she stood up.

  Then, Tian stormed over to the curtain on my left and yanked it open.

  An altar, just like her mother’s, sat in the alcove. It was a rough-hewn gray stone with jade overlays on the sides. A monster from a time before legend stared back at me from inside the jade. I turned my head to the side, trying to decide if the creature was a goat, or an octopus, or some strange combination of them both.

  The smell of blood poured out of the small room. The curtain had been ensorcelled to hide the scent from detection. Blood dripped down the edges of the altar. I could see a smeared handprint on the side, right next to the abomination’s mouth.

  It was a child’s handprint.

  Her tortured body lay on the top of the altar. She was naked, and her rib cage was torn open. It looked like a wild animal had ripped her apart. Pieces of bloody gore hung naked in the firelight from the bones, pink and grisly. They were still so fresh that fluids welled out of the wounds and fed the monster even now.

  I looked from the young girl, back to Mockery.

  “How… why… what have you done?”

  I stood up and walked over to the gruesome spectacle. I had again forgotten what was really important to me.

  Fucking a woman did not make her a good person.

  In fact, Mockery was just as evil and vicious as my other lovers. They were busy butchering a young woman. Mockery had just slaughtered a child.

  “Brynn dies tomorrow,” Tian started explaining.

  Then, she saw my expression. “This little guttersnipe was already dying! She was so poor that she hadn’t eaten in days!”

  Snarling, Mockery added, “I did her a favor, ending her earthly misery.”

  Her eyes were full of righteous madness. They burned with an intensity that only fools or zealots can achieve.

  I grabbed Tian and slammed the tiny woman against the wall.

  “You are a piece of shit,” I snapped at her. “She was a child.”

  Then, I turned and walked out of the room.

  - 9 -

  I stormed down the sewer, not even paying attention to where I was going. It felt like a live thunderstorm raged inside of me. I barely even noticed that I was naked.

  Or, that James was following me.

  I walked for hours, furious with myself for trusting Mockery. She was evil, through and through. Being a good lay didn’t make her a good person.

  She had butchered a child.

  To save me.

  Damn her. I’d rather be dead.

  Eventually, I got to an end pipe and turned around, and there he was, dragging Candace behind him. Mockery’s spell still entwined the other zombie. It covered her in a cocoon of silk that misted and quivered as if it was alive.

  “What the fuck do you want?” I cursed at the zombie.

  Then I noticed, like Candace, he had pulled his stitches out.

  “She is yours,” he hissed. The sound of his voice reminded me of an old wheezing steam radiator.

  “What the fuck do you mean?” I shouted at the zombie who had once been a businessman. James scowled at me, then he turned and shuffled away, dragging his left leg behind him.

  I looked down at Candace.

  And, stopped thinking.

  She was breathing.

  Kneeling, I looked at her closer.

  The zombie was actively breathing in and out.

  What the fuck?

  The blood.

  My infected blood had poured all over Candace, changing her somehow.

  Or possibly, it was my flesh that she had swallowed.

  Wheezing, Candace took another breath.

  And, her skin was healing.

  Kneeling next to her, I stared at her chest. The massive hole that had been stitched back together was healing as well.

  Blinking my eyes, I switched to magesight.

  A golden cord connected her to my chest. Looking down, I saw that several other golden cords came out of it as well. Sun had changed how I connect to my lovers, and something had connected Candace to me now as well.

  Fuck that.

  I turned and started walking away.

  “Please…” she rasped.

  I started walking faster. “Please… I know where Brynn is being held.”

  I skidded to a halt.

  Fuck.

  Dammit!

  I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs. Gripping both of my hands tight into fists, I turned around.

  Licking her lips, Candace grimaced.

  “I know,” she repeated, drawing in a ragged breath, “where she is.”

  Mockery had said that Brynn would die tomorrow.

  Candace was my only lead.

  Laughing, I realized that I was in a sewer with shit up to my knees, naked as a beggar. I had about as much of a chance of saving Brynn, as I had of becoming the King in the Darkness.

  “I can help,” Candace insisted.

  Coughing, she hacked and snorted, sending snot flying everywhere.

  Stomping over to her, I knelt down.

  “I don’t trust you,” I hissed. “This is all your fault.”

  Candace coughed and nodded. “My father made me.”

  “Bullshit,” I hissed. “You wanted to fuck Brynn again.”

  The ex-zombie blushed.

  It made me almost sit down in the stream of shit.

  Fuck.

  She really was alive again.

  None of the legends that I ever heard of mentioned Unclean blood bringing someone back to life.

  Well… except for vampires.

  Reaching out, I put my hand on her chest.

  “Hey!” she shouted, worried I was copping a feel.

  Ignoring her, I felt for a heartbeat.

  It was steady.

  Lurching back, I stared at her in shock.

  “You’re alive,” I gasped.

  “Get me out of this webbing,” she wheezed out, fighting against Mockery’s spell.

  “If I do, you’ll just attack me,” I told her.

  Candace rolled her eyes.

  “If I kill you now,” she said, fighting to get her words out. “I’ll die again, and this time for real. I’m your bitch now.”

  - 10 -

  “I already have too many bitches,” I spat out. “I don’t need another.”

  Candace laughed despite her situation. Something about her laughter made me smile. Then, I frowned and looked away.

  “Bazal,” she said with a grunt. “I swear on Kastubal’s frozen tit that I will faithfully serve you until the day that I die. And, even then, if I can aid you in heaven or hell, I will.”

  I felt the oath snap in the ether. It was as potent as any promise that I had ever felt. Pledges of fealty, from one wizard to another, held weight and had terrible consequences if they were broken.

  “And,” she added, taking a deep breath, “I promise to shine your cock whenever you wish.”

  Now, it was my turn to blush.

  “Though,” she said, “Right now, it is a bit dirty, and not in a good way.”

  Before I met Brynn, women hadn’t been that interested in me unless I charmed them. Why did they now flock to my banner, even when I didn’t want them too?

  “If I break my oath, the Forgotten Goddess of Nightmare’s will rip my soul to shreds,” she pointed out.