“I’m afraid I cannot let you go.” Lyon stood firm and readied himself for a fight. He did not know what to expect from a thing that looked as though it could barely stand, but he had not lived as long as he had from a lack of caution. “Nor will you touch the girl.”
Rxa tilted his head to one side by a few degrees. “Oh. Is that so?”
“You’re clearly injured. Let me help you.” King versus king would likely end in a draw. But in his condition, Rxa would not stand a chance. Or so Lyon hoped.
“Help me? Help me?” Rxa howled in laughter. “You bleeding-hearted fool. I want nothing to do with you or your brand of help. Get out of my way.”
“No.”
“Well. It appears we’re at a standoff, aren’t we?” Rxa reached up and scratched a bloody, bony hand through his matted hair. “I wonder what I can do about that…Oh! I know!” He reached his other hand out and snapped his fingers.
The sound of shuffling sent a shiver through Lyon. He took his eyes from Rxa for a brief second.
There were more than twenty dead in the room. He could confirm that now. He could confirm that many more were corpses—because they were all standing up. They walked toward them, slow and uneven in their movements. They poured from the hallways and climbed from the wreckage of the pews.
Rxa laughed—that sharp-edged, malicious cackle that sent a shiver rolling down Lyon’s spine once more. He bared his teeth at the other king, revealing his fangs.
“Yes, yes, you’re so frightening, Lyon…come, old friend. Let’s find out who truly out-matches whom!”
The battle began to the sound of that maddening laughter.
Ember watched the brawl for a second, caught in awe, before a chair that whipped past her head reminded her she was very outmatched in a room with two demigods duking it out.
With one of those demigods now in command of an army of drengil.
She ducked behind the stone column, wincing and throwing her arms up over her head in reflex as a pew shattered against the stone. She could hear the sound of metal on stone and the madman’s maniacal laughter.
The few times she dared peek around the corner, she could barely make sense of the battle. It was all happening so fast. She would think she had been knocked senseless and had a concussion if it weren’t for the drengil who moved at a normal speed, reaching and clawing at Lyon, attempting to catch the blood-drinker to tear him to pieces.
But Lyon was not interested in such an end. Golden claws tore through dead flesh and rid the corpses of their restlessness.
Rxa attacked with a kind of reckless abandon. He flew at Lyon with nothing but his bare hands, trying to kill the King of Blood by sheer force of will alone. Every blow that Lyon landed on Rxa seemed to have no effect on him.
He never slowed.
He never stopped.
Until Lyon snatched Rxa by one of his exposed ribs and tore it from his body with a wet crack. It sounded like a branch snapping under water.
The bloody and bandaged madman screamed in agony. The scream turned into a broken, pained sob.
Ember shut her eyes and threw her hands over her mouth, trying not to be sick.
In that split second, her world upended. Someone snatched her and whirled her about. Inertia hit her, as though she had been shot out of a cannon. It felt like an iron bar was around her waist, pinning her arms to her side.
When her head stopped spinning, she was standing back at the altar of the sanctuary. A hand was around her throat, pressing her head back against a bony shoulder. She could see Rxa’s fractured mask out of the corner of her eye.
She struggled. But she was stuck in a vise.
“Sssh,” Rxa whispered to her. “Do me a solid, will you? Pretend you’re terrified.”
The points of his nails were digging into her skin, and moving her jaw might slit her veins open. All she could do was make frightened whimpers.
“Ooh, I’m impressed.” He chuckled quietly into her ear. “Are you an actress, little dove?”
“Let her go,” Lyon demanded angrily.
“I don’t wanna.”
“She hasn’t done anything to you, Rxa. She isn’t to blame for any of this.”
“What’s that have to do with a damn thing?” Rxa sighed. “Come, now, use your imagination, will you? You were always so very tedious, weren’t you?”
Something wet and warm was seeping through her clothes at her back. She knew it was Rxa’s blood. Ash would be so disappointed with how badly she was shaking. But Ash never had to deal with anything like this!
“Stand down, Rxa. This is your last warning.”
“Mmhm.” Rxa rested the cheek of his mask against her jawline. She could feel the cracks in the plaster. “I told you. Tedious. Well, my dear old friend, you have a bit of a conundrum ahead of you. You can either stop me…or you can try to save your beloved world.”
“What?”
“Do you think the people in this room were the only ones I ate?” Rxa laughed. “I’m afraid I’ve killed all our precious vampire children. Well…every single one I came across, anyway. I’m sure a few survived.” He sniffed. “I’m not really feeling up to snuff today. Bit under the weather. Hope you’ll excuse me. Anyway. I commanded my new children to strike out into the city. I commanded them to kill everything and everyone.”
“But—but why? Why would you do this?” Lyon took a step toward them, but Rxa’s hand around her throat tightened. She squeaked, and Lyon hesitated.
“Why?” Rxa snarled. “You have the gall to ask me why? I was betrayed, Lyon. But not just by you—by everyone! And they will all pay. I will have my revenge. And their walking, hungry corpses will help me. Every single one of your traitorous bastards will help me kill the next one in line.” He cackled. “How wonderful.”
“Call them off, Rxa. Call them off now.” Lyon sounded more and more desperate. “We can work this out.”
“No. We really can’t. So, here’s your choice, old friend. Fly off and try to save the city as a whole before it’s too late…or save Ember. Which’ll it be?”
Lyon’s gaze flickered to her.
She risked it. “Go.” She tried to speak without moving her mouth as much as possible. “Go, Lyon. Save them.”
He bowed his head and, in an instant, exploded into a cloud of white bats. They swirled out the shattered glass window over the entry door.
“He always was a predictable fuck.” Rxa loosened his grasp on her. “Anyway. Oscar performance, by the by. I wouldn’t have ever believed you—oof!”
She stomped on his foot as hard as she could. He teetered, and that was all the chance she needed. She shoved him hard, sending him staggering. He had to release her to grab hold of the edge of the altar.
She ran.
She tried.
She made it exactly ten feet before she ran into Rxa. He had somehow appeared in front of her! In the blink of an eye, he was there, and she was back in his grasp. He tugged her against his chest. An arm around her lower back zeroed the space between them.
“Careful, little dove. I like it rough.” He chuckled. “Everyone always pegged me for the nice guy. The sweet one. Please.” He moved his head closer to hers. “How about you? You don’t seem to be the gentle type, either.”
“Let me go—”
“You can stop the act now. He’s gone.” A tendril of blond hair fell across the cracked eye of his mask as he tilted his head to the side. “Don’t tell me you’re a method actor.”
“I’m not acting, please—please let me go.”
“Why? I thought we were having a nice time. Until you stabbed me. Oh. You dropped your knife around here somewhere.” He glanced left and right. “Whatever. I’ll buy you a new one. Come on, we should go before Crabby McFlagpole comes back with friends.”
Ember was helpless as Rxa took her by the wrist and began dragging her toward the door. He was walking normally, but she might as well have been tied to a boulder thrown over a cliff. He didn’t even need to try, and she was stag
gering behind him, no matter how hard she dug in her heels.
She struggled. She kicked. She tried to grab on to columns only to have them peeled out of her grasp.
And he just hummed a little tune.
“I think we’ll visit my dear friend Aon first. I think I’d like to rip his liver out a few times. I’ll let it grow back, and then I’ll do it again, and again, and again. Oh! I’ll let you have a go at it. It’ll be fun.”
“Rxa, please, let me go. I—”
He cackled. “Nice try. No, no, it’s pronounced Rix-ah. Points for effort. It’s always rough on the first try.”
“I don’t want to go with you. I don’t, please—”
He whirled to face her, yanking her close to him again. His hand tangled in her hair at the base of her ponytail, tightening it into a fist. “Quiet, little dove. You are the only one who knows anything about the pissant creature who resurrected me, your ‘Dread God.’ You will come with me peacefully. I do not plan to hurt you. Unless you make me.”
Live for every second.
Live for every second.
Tears slipped down her cheeks. She stopped shoving on his chest, trying to push him away.
His hand released her ponytail. “Good. Now, I—”
Blam!
12
Rxa woke up with a long groan. He put his hand to his temple and felt the small round hole there in his skull. “Owww…no fair…guns ’r cheating.”
It hurt.
Everything hurt.
It had all been going so well. He had made a new friend, he had eaten a bunch of old ones, and then he had a chance to say hello to his old second-in-command and closest compatriot. And then promptly tried to kill him.
His day had been looking up.
But then it all went wrong. He had heard the gunshot, and then everything went dark. Now, as he pushed himself up to his knees, his new friend was nowhere to be found. “Little dove? Where’d you go?”
Silence.
He was alone. Standing, he walked to a dark corner between two columns and collapsed. The stone was cool, and it felt a little bit like relief against his aching and stinging body.
Everything hurts so much…
Why did his new friend run away? Why did Ember leave him? Clearly, he needed help…she seemed like a sympathetic soul. I must look like a piece of work, huh?
He pulled his mask from his face and held it up, looking at it in the darkness. The moonlight was bright and cast enough for him to see. There was a moon in the sky that he did not remember, casting light through the doorway and the shattered windows. It was a sickly shade of yellow. And he knew…just knew…that moon was for him.
Time was once that his mask was smooth, porcelain, and perfect. It was as beautiful as his true face—as eternal and wonderful. He remembered how the humans of Earth would fall to their knees in front of him in worship, his great white wings that spread behind him inspiring them to weep in awe and reverence.
He had been loved.
But it was all a lie.
Now, it was revealed for what it was.
Now, his mask was shattered.
Broken. Yellowed and stained and feathered with cracks and gaps in the surface. One crack made it look like a twisted grin on one side. How fitting.
It was really quite funny when he thought about it. He laughed, even if it hurt. His lungs were still mostly missing, and what was there was bleeding badly. Occasionally, he had to cough up ooze that tasted sickly sweet and strange. The thick black substance that came from his heart and lungs was disgusting.
Slowly, he peeled some of the bandages back from his hand and shuddered in pain as the threads pulled free of the sinew and tendons that were trying to grow.
He examined the raw wounds on his hand. Some of the blood there was crimson. But what came from his mouth was thick like tar and shone yellow in the light. Odd. Perhaps the crimson was what he had consumed, and the blackish-yellow gore was what it converted into once it was in his system?
Theories.
Whatever.
Didn’t matter.
He tied the bandage again and curled up on the floor, his mask still in his hand. He had a headache. Someone put a bullet in my head. That might be why.
That pale-yellow moon hovered over him, mocking him. It was the same color as the ink he could see forming on the one piece of skin he was growing on his arm.
He was the beautiful King in White no longer.
He sighed.
But he wouldn’t be the King in Yellow for long. Not if he had any say in the matter. He was going to gather himself an army. He would create more of those shambling squishy corpses that seemed to follow him around. He would destroy this world and everyone in it, once and for all. He would condemn the Ancients and all their creations to the void.
They should be grateful!
Better the void than all this pain. All this suffering. And for what?
The amusement of the Ancients?
What was the purpose of it all? Why let him spend five thousand years in service to their grandeur, only to betray and abandon him? Why was it all a lie? Why let him believe? To what end?
Their amusement.
All he had ever been to them was a puppet on strings. Dancing to their tune. Dancing to entertain their true son—their true favorite—Aon. That creature that was made mad by their absence, and only whole in their presence. He remembered the dreaded and cruel King of All. He remembered the sneer he would wear as he made them all bleed for his laughter.
This wasn’t the first time Rxa had been without most of his skin and organs.
But back then, it had still felt like he served a glorious purpose. That he carried worth. Now, he was nothing but a discarded toy brought back from the garbage pail. But why? Why him?
Why?
Why?
He didn’t realize he was shouting the word until he couldn’t do it anymore through all the blood in his throat. He turned onto his side, retching the gore onto the stone floor.
But nobody answered him. Nobody.
He was alone.
Alone. And alive. And for no reason at all that he could tell.
Curling on his side, he wept.
Ember leaned against the wall with her hand, her head lowered. She was used to running and knew how to steady her breath to keep from making herself sick.
Maverick, however, was clearly not used to such a sprint. He was busy being sick over the side of a railing into a shrub.
“You all right?”
He nodded and pulled out his pocket square to wipe at his mouth. “I am not used to cardiovascular exercise, as you can see.”
“If you’re going to faint, let me know.” She smirked. “I’ll drag you to safety. It’s the least I can do since you saved me.”
“I am not going to faint.” He straightened and took a shuddering breath. “And if I do, say nothing to anyone. My dignity would never recover.”
“Deal.” She chuckled. She touched the strap of her spear. Maverick had not only shot Rxa—downing the poor madman mid-word and sending him crumpling to the ground, but he had also fetched her spear and bag from her room. He had tossed them to her before they both made a speedy exit from the cathedral, heading toward the Great Hall. “Thank you for getting my things. How did you know?”
“I didn’t. I couldn’t sleep. When I heard a scream, I went to investigate and found nothing but blood and bodies. I went to fetch you and Lyon, only to find both of you already gone. I thought perhaps you might want your things if I found you alive.” Maverick began to walk down the street, if with a slight limp.
“Did you hurt your leg?”
“No. I am wearing dress shoes.”
She laughed and fell in step beside him. “Well, that’s what you get for wearing fancy clothes. Pretty soon, you won’t have to worry about it. You’ll be dressed in rags like me.”
“What a grand thing to look forward to.” He smirked down at her. “Now that we can speak, may I ask what tr
anspired?”
“I don’t honestly know. I went to the sanctuary to pray to the Ancients—to ask them to show mercy toward my gods if they could. That man was there. We talked, and then…he attacked me. Lyon saved me.”
“Who was he? The man?” Maverick furrowed his brow. “He wore a full mask.”
“He said his name was Rxa. Lyon seemed to recognize him.”
Maverick let out a long, colorful, and angry string of obscenities. And once again, he began to run in the direction of the Great Hall.
With a shrug, Ember followed.
Rxa awoke, not realizing he had fallen asleep again. He hadn’t even realized he could sleep, to be fair. He jolted and thrashed and expected to find himself in a jail cell or a cage. Maybe chains would bind him to a wall. No. He was still tucked between two stone columns in the cathedral he had once called his home.
But he wasn’t alone anymore.
He shot up to his feet, teetered, fell, and groaned as he impacted the floor. His raw wounds—if the fact he was missing most of his organs and skin could be considered a wound—screamed in pain from the hit.
Everything still hurt. At least in his sleep, the pain had gone away for a little while. He pushed back to his feet more slowly, wavering, and turned to see who had snuck up on him.
Oh.
Hah.
“Hello, children.” He chuckled. There, standing among the pews and statues, was a small horde of mutilated bodies. Missing pieces, eyes, chunks of ribs, it didn’t matter. They stood there, staring sightlessly at him.
He tilted his head curiously at one of them. Their faces were intact…but he saw no marks. He took a step toward them. These weren’t the dead bodies he had raised while fighting Lyon. Their clothing was a hodgepodge of leather and fur. Bits and pieces of a dozen articles of clothing dashed together. It was hard to tell how much dirt was fresh and how much of it was old.
Rxa tilted his head the other way.
There was not a mark on the man in front of him. He was not of Under…
Like his little dove. She had been dressed in the same fashion. These corpses were from Gioll.
Mask of Poison (Fall of Under Book 1) Page 12
