Sacrifice of the Septimus: Part 1 (Afterlife saga Book 7)

by Stephanie Hudson

  “You made it sound so appealing, with all those little moans of yours, so I decided to come and join you.” I leant back against him and told him,

  “I only started moaning when you got your hands involved.” He laughed and started to work the shampoo into my long hair and scalp. It felt amazing, not only from what his hands were doing, but also in the way he made me feel so treasured. I think there is something to be said about a man taking care of you in this way. It isn’t to belittle you or make you feel as though you’re incapable in any way, it’s simply a way to show you that they care and I for one loved the feeling.

  “You’re up early this morning.” He cooed in my ear just after his large hands started rinsing the suds from my hair.

  “Trouble sleeping?” I moaned again as he started with the conditioner and this ended up being the only answer I could give him. He pulled my hair back gently so my neck was arched and he looked down at me,

  “I don’t like waking up without feeling your skin next to mine.” I grinned at him and said,

  “Then don’t leave our bed when I am asleep and you should be just fine.” He grinned back at me knowing I was right, but I decided to make my point further by adding,

  “And look at it this way, at least you knew where to find me.” He ran a single fingertip down my cheek, still standing over me from behind and said,

  “You are right, it was my mistake to make as it is my regret to carry and now… it is my forgiveness to ask.” I spun around so I was facing him, then I pushed him back under the water spray and kissed him, telling him exactly how I was going to forgive him. The taste of his wet lips against mine was intoxicating and I looked into his eyes getting lost in their dark depths. Tiny water droplets clung to his thick long lashes and raven black hair was plastered to his forehead. I reached up and pushed all his wet hair back and in turn he lifted me up to his height and kissed me deeper. It was only when we heard my name being called that we broke the kiss.

  “I swear I am going to replace those doors with bricks and get a shaman to plant a curse on all who enter.” I laughed at his dramatic statement and said,

  “You’d better go and see what she wants.”

  “Or I could barricade the door and keep you nice and wet.” I winked at him and replied,

  “You always know how to keep me nice and wet.” This made him growl at me, only unlike the Draven in my dreams, it wasn’t a warning but more like a turned on rumble.

  “But seriously though, I have conditioner in my hair, so go…go…” I said pushing him out the shower.

  “Fine but just for future reference, you being bossy is only making it harder to leave.”

  “Good to know,” I told him and couldn’t help but look down to find he was telling the truth and oh boy, wasn’t he telling the truth!

  “Last chance for me to throw her off the balcony.” I giggled, reminding him,

  “Yeah but she’s got wings, so it will only slow her down.”

  “AND I WOULD STILL BE ABLE TO HEAR YOU!” Sophia shouted through the door, adding,

  “AS I CAN NOW!”

  “Give her a break, I told her yesterday that I wanted to talk about the wedding today.” This was when he gave me a soft smile and kissed me gently on the lips before giving me what I wanted,

  “Alright love, I will be nice.” I kissed his nose back and said with a corny American accent,

  “Thanks, sugar dumpling.”

  “You’re welcome, sugar cakes,” he replied and I burst out laughing as I always did when Draven did something out of ‘mighty king’ character. He took hold of my chin and gave it a small shake, telling me,

  “I love giving you your smile.” And before I could reply with something equally as loving, he was gone. I quickly finished off what Draven had started and rinsed the conditioner out of my hair. I walked out wearing a velvety soft black bathrobe and my hair to one side trying to towel it dry.

  “Hey, when I said I wanted to chat about the wedding I didn’t think you guys would be this early.” I said letting them know that this was what I had told Draven. Pip was sat on the arm of the chair swinging her legs, wearing a T-shirt that was bright pink with black letters that said, ‘I’m with the BRIDE’ on the front and then on the back it said ‘As one of her bridezilla bitches’.

  “Nice top.” I told her and she said,

  “Wait, wait, that’s not the best part!” Then being Pip, she did the unpredictable and lifted up her top, putting it over her head to show everyone the printed face of Godzilla over her face, one with a white veil on its head. She didn’t care that she was currently showing off her bra to us all, which was actually only a red paisley patterned bandana that had been twisted and had chains as the straps. It was cute, in a kick ass cowgirl kind of way.

  Sophia and I burst out laughing but my amusement didn’t just come from Pip’s actions, but mainly from Draven’s face. He was baffled and it was hilarious to watch.

  “I think that’s your cue to leave, brother.” Sophia said and Pip started mumbling behind her T-shirt, something I could only just make out,

  “Weddin woof”

  “That’s right, wedding stuff.” Sophia said translating for her.

  “Very well, I will leave you ladies to discuss matters,” Draven said bowing his head in a gentlemanly manner. But instead of just leaving he walked up to me, gripped my robe’s lapels and yanked me to him for one last kiss. Once he was finished with me, I was left wishing that he wasn’t and we were back in the shower. So with that in mind I reached up and whispered in his ear,

  “You know I think I am still dirty, fancy helping me with that later?” I pulled back in time to see his bad boy grin before he whispered back,

  “Only if once we are finished I can make you dirty again.”

  “Okay you get that we both have supernatural hearing, right?”

  “Ssshh, don’t spoil it, Toots is getting her freak on!” Pip said after pulling down her T shirt and looking at us both with love puppy eyes.

  “Later… Vixen.” I gave him a wink, loving it when he called me that. I watched him walk his fine behind to the door readying myself for the recruiting speech I was about to attempt.

  But then Draven stopped just before leaving and asked me a question I had no time to really think about.

  “Just so I am clear as I would hate to miss it…when is our mortal wedding, my wife?” I heard this and panicked. However, what came out sounded a lot more confident than it felt as I quickly said…

  “In a week”

  Chapter 16

  Recruitment

  “Why on Earth would you tell him that?” Sophia screeched, once Draven was long gone and we had spent about three silent minutes all looking at each other.

  “What? I panicked okay.” I said and meanwhile Pip was looking at us in confusion.

  “You do realise that only gives us a week?” she told me, pretty much confirming my suspicions of what she knew, which just made my job a lot easier.

  “Only have a week ‘til what?”

  “And that’s not even taking into account planning an actual wedding, but doing that around…well…” Sophia stopped herself rubbing her forehead in frustration.

  “Around…well, what?”

  “I know Sophia, trust me no one knows better than me, but think about it.” I told her trying to see the good in this.

  “Think about what?”

  “If we are planning this, then it gives us opportunities to plan for other things,” I added and poor Pip suddenly shouted,

  “WHAT OTHER THINGS!” And no wonder, considering Sophia and I had been ignoring her.

  “Okay Pip, we will explain.” I told her, trying to calm her down.

  “Good, because I have no Nelly what you Bitches are on about and it’s baking my noodle!”

  “Yeah well, we can’t do that anywhere here, so what do you suggest?” Sophia added and after thinking for a minute I had a place in mind.

  “Come on, I know a place.�
�� I told them both.

  “Uh…Toots, would this place happen to be in public?”

  “Yeah, why?” I asked pausing at the door.

  “Oh, no reason.” Pip said sniggering.

  “I think what our trustworthy Imp here meant to say was to remind her dear friend that she is in fact wearing a bathrobe and has dripping wet hair.” I looked down at myself to find they were both right.

  “Ah…right you are. Give me ten minutes!” I said, shouting as I ran into the dressing room, not even giving my fears a second thought. I was out the door and dressed with slightly less damp hair in eight minutes.

  “I am not getting in that!” Sophia moaned as soon as she was faced with my Bronco.

  “Oh Hellion, I am!” Pip said before jumping in the front passenger seat shouting,

  “Shotgun!”

  “You can have your shotgun! I am not getting in that…thing.”

  “Oi! That thing is my baby and one I will remind you, your own brother convinced me to buy. Besides, I thought we were keeping a low profile and we can’t exactly do that in a limo or a sports car.” One look at Sophia’s face and she knew I was right.

  “Fine, but I am wearing my hood up!” she snapped whipping up her jacket hood and getting in the back of my car.

  “Righty oh.” I muttered smiling to myself as I got behind the wheel. Well, if Sophia was acting like a spoilt baby now, I was just dying to see how she was going to act when we got to the diner Jack and I used to go to. At least Pip looked excited. Sophia however, just found a sanitiser bottle I kept back there for when I looked after Ella and she quickly squirted it on her hands.

  “You do realise I don’t use this car to deal drugs, or taxi around dead lepers don’t you?” I told her and Pip burst out laughing.

  “This is so much fun! It’s like the first Bra Bongo Buddy road trip!” I bit my lip to stop myself from laughing at her as I pulled away and out onto the main road.

  “It’s hardly a road trip Pip, I am only taking you to a diner ten minutes away.” I winked at her when we both heard Sophia huffing from the back seat.

  “At least that means we won’t be in this rust bucket for long.” I frowned at her in the mirror but then Pip’s little hand tapped me on the leg to get my attention and whispered,

  “I think she’s pretty.”

  “Why thank you, Pip,” I said exaggerating it, once more making Sophia huff.

  “Yes well, Pip doesn’t count.”

  “And why not?” I snapped

  “Because you are talking about someone who goes and buys cars from scrapyards before they are crushed, just because she doesn’t want them to die.” My head whipped back to Pip and I asked,

  “You do that?” Pip’s sheepish face said it all.

  “Every broken car deserves a chance,” she informed me shrugging her shoulders and leaving me wondering how many we were talking about here. I would have asked but the diner was coming up and we had more important things to talk about…besides, it was Adam’s problem, poor guy.

  “Oh no, tell me it isn’t true.” Sophia said as I pulled into a parking space a few minutes later.

  “Just don’t eat anything and you will be fine.” I told her and she snorted a laugh before saying,

  “You really think I would?” Meanwhile Pip was out the door and skipping to the entrance as though we had just arrived at Disneyland.

  “Do you think she will be on board?” I asked Sophia quietly.

  “Are you kidding, look at her, you only brought her to a diner and she is already waving us in…that girl lives for adventure and if she thinks this is it, then just wait until she finds out what we have planned.”

  “How do you know all this?” I finally got the chance to ask.

  “After Ranka got you and the Oracle alone, she then got me and the Oracle alone.” I was glad to hear this as I would have thought my biggest challenge would be getting Sophia to lie to her brother…thankfully, it looked as if I was wrong.

  “Come on, come on!” Pip shouted, holding the door open and getting strange looks from the rest of the diners. To be honest it was most likely down to the green and blue pigtails, bright tattoos, reptile skin patterned leggings, which no doubt were to match the top and a pair of Doc Martin boots that looked to have been decoupaged with comic book pages. In fact, she looked like a Manga character or someone dressed up in Cosplay.

  “Let’s go in there before she starts a riot.”

  “Ha, you joke but it’s happened a few times before. One time, I recall, was over a limited edition My Little Pony at one of those convention things.” Sophia quickly educated me after my riot comment.

  We got out the car and followed Pip to one of the booths at the back. We all took our seats and I laughed at Sophia wrinkling her nose as she eyed up the place.

  “I can’t believe I have never been in here before,” Pip said bouncing in her seat.

  “I can’t believe I’m in here now,” Sophia replied sarcastically and I decided that maybe it wasn’t a good idea to come here and maybe for our next ‘Earth saving’ meeting I would have to pick a place where Sophia wouldn’t keep sanitising her hands.

  “Really, you had to bring that in here with you?” I asked nodding to the bottle she had nicked out of my truck.

  “Look around Keira, it’s like the back alley of a Brazilian slum, only with French fries!” I rolled my eyes and tried to see it through her eyes. I realised that I should have warned her not to wear Dolce and Gabbana to an American diner. At least they served their food on plates here as I could only imagine what would have happened if, like her brother, I had taken her to Burger King.

  “Just don’t order any food and you will be fine.” I repeated my earlier warning, one obviously Pip decided to take no notice of.

  “Yes, I will have the burger and fries, with extra cheese and an extra burger, and cheese on the fries…oh, oh and do you do any little fried bacon bits?” I looked up at the waitress who was looking down at Pip, no doubt wondering why she was ordering her food like a two hundred and fifty pound trucker.

  “Yes we can do those.”

  “Great! Okay so sprinkle that shit all over my plate and we will be on the way to happy tummyville.” The waitress looked to me as if I was the only normal one on the table she would get an answer from.

  “She will have the bacon bits.” Her eyes widened and she gave us an ‘uh huh’ before jotting it down on her abused folded pad.

  “I will also have a side of onion rings, but dunk ‘em twice as I don’t like it when those slimy buggers break out of their crispy shell…they’re like worms,” she elaborated.

  “Uh huh.”

  “Can you put cheese and bacon on those too.”

  “Uh huh.” I looked over to see the waitress writing down in big letters ‘Shit loads of Bacon and cheese’ and I knew she had pretty much got the picture.

  “Oh but no pickles…those little bastards make me gassy.” I wanted to ask if the extra burger and extra, extra cheese and bacon didn’t? Needless to say I decided to keep quiet for the sake of our waitress’ sanity.

  “Anything for you two?”

  “Water.”

  “A clean bill of health.” Sophia muttered and I ignored her saying,

  “Make that two waters, please.”

  “And an iced tea for me, with extra sugar.”

  “Right.” The waitress said nodding as she walked away from ‘bonker’s booth’ to go and put our order in.

  “Right, so what’s the crack?”

  “Yes, let’s get this meeting done sometime before we all get rabies.”

  “You know, for an immortal, you sure do worry about catching a disease.” I told her and this was when Pip dropped the fork she was playing with.

  “If anyone mentions the Black plague…” she warned and I let my head fall into my hands on a sigh, thinking this was going to be a long day.

  “Fine, we will behave, now tell us the plan.”

  “Alright, but should
n’t we fill Pip in first?” I asked Sophia and we both looked over to Pip, who was currently firing paper from her straw like a five year old.

  “What? Like how we have to help you go back in time to get you pregnant by a younger version of your husband because he won’t give you a baby in this time and we need you preggers to help save the planet from giant monsters that are currently imprisoned under Hell?” I should probably mention that it was at this point that our waitress came over and had been stood over Pip during her overly insightful speech. If I thought our waitress’ eyes were bulging before, then now she looked as if someone had just shoved a spatula up her ass.

  “We are writing a play.” I told her and she put down the drinks muttering her usual,

  “Uh huh.”

  “Ooops, my bad,” Pip said, slurping on her straw.

  “How did you know all that?” I screeched out my question, wondering if the Oracle hadn’t just sent out a mass email by mistake!

  “Wait, don’t tell us…the Oracle spoke to you.”

  “Yes! And did you know that she is no longer black?” She whispered leaning over the table.

  “Yes and she is also no longer a child, we know this.”

  “Wait! She was a child? Umm…I just thought she was really small with cool dress sense.”

  “I fear we are getting off track here.” Sophia commented and I wanted to ask, ‘what do you expect with Pip on our team’, but managed to convey this with just a look, one she shrugged her shoulders at.

  “So what’s the plan, Stan?”

  “Honestly…I don’t know,” I admitted. Pip and Sophia exchanged troubled looks and finally asked,

  “Didn’t she say anything that would give us a clue on how to pull this off?” I shook my head at Sophia’s question.

  “All I know is that somehow the three of us, plus Ari, have to go back in time, get close enough to Draven…” Pip snorted a laugh interrupting me and said,

  “I would say in your case ‘very close’ as in Bump and Grind close.”