by Diana Graves
“I feel someone, Damon!”
“How is that possible?”
“Where are you?” I whispered. I walked around the pile, and it took such a physical effort to do even that.
It wasn’t just adults there. It was whole families, and that meant babies, kids, teens, and the elderly were all torn to pieces and piled up like Sunday’s garbage. If I thought my hatred for Admetus couldn’t get any more intense then I was beyond wrong.
Beyond the pile of carnage was a stage with a throne and a wood door painted gold and dark blue. The throne was lying on its side, covered in bloody handprints, like everything else in the room.
I found the spot in the pile where the feeling felt the clearest. “Mama!” yelled a voice inside my head.
“It’s here!” I yelled to Damon.
I hesitated only a second before I started digging my hands into the body parts, blood, and cold heavy meat, wet and tangled hair glided over my arms. I wanted to puke so badly. I closed my eyes, and let my hands search through the gore, reach out to the emotion I felt.
“Where are you?” I said through gritted teeth. “Help me! Damon, please!” I didn’t mean to scream it, but as I pulled my arms out of the pile someone’s large intestine broke, and whatever composure I had broke when bile spilled out over my arm, thick and still warm.
Damon came to the side of the pile I was digging in, and started helping me pull body parts out without hesitation. I was panic stricken, grabbing at arms and rib cages. My fingers were digging deep into slippery fat and muscle tissue. The flesh felt so cold and limp in my hands, but one limb felt warm and solid. I held onto it, trying to pull it out, but it was covered in body parts. There was no way.
“Here!” I screamed for Damon’s help. I could hear crying, a child’s cry. “Hold on, honey, hold on!” I cried. Tears filled my eyes until my vision was nothing but a blur of flesh and bones. Sharp jagged bones cut into my arms as I pulled at the meat.
“MAMA!” the child screamed.
“A child,” whispered Damon as I pulled a little boy into my arms from the butchery of his family. He was covered thick with blood and un-guessable bits of flesh.
The boy couldn’t have been six years old. He clung to me. His little wet arms holding on for dear life, and screaming for his mother. I looked down at the pile. She was in there somewhere, torn and broken, dead and gone. Damon took the boy from my arms, and he held him tight.
“Take another look, Raina. See if you can feel anyone else.”
“We have to take him out of here,” I said while trying to catch my breath and focus on the pile once more, but there was no one else. The pile was empty of feeling. They were all dead. “I feel no one else.”
“We can’t leave just yet,” he said. “John said Admetus was in the temple just beyond the ballroom. If we leave now, he’ll hunt us down. We won’t be safe until he’s dead, you least of all.”
“No, you’re right,” I said. My body was shaking. I was going into shock. Damon turned with the boy in his arms, and climbed onto the stage. I followed clumsily.
“There’s a door just up here,” he said.
“Let’s just get this over with,” I said.
Damon looked down at the screaming boy in his arms. “Would you mind?” he asked inclining his head toward the boy.
“Mind what?”
“Put the boy to sleep.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Your brother did it fairly easy,” Damon said.
“Sorry, I’m—”
“My sister has never been a very clever witch!” Tristan interrupted me from the doorway leading from the cement hall. Damon flashed me a curious look, and then turned back to my brother, who was now trying to not lose his stomach as he made his way across the ballroom.
“Then would you help?” he asked Tristan.
“Yes.” Tristan put the boy to sleep with a simple whisper and flick of his long wand. Once the boy was out, he set the throne upright, and Damon set the sleeping boy in it.
“Where did the boy come from?” Tristan asked.
“Raina found him in the pile of unfortunates,” Damon answered quietly. Tristan gave me wide eyes. I gave him a cold shoulder.
“Are we going to do this any time soon?” I asked impatiently. They both looked at me and Damon nodded.
“Do what?” Tristan asked.
“Kill Admetus,” I answered.
PLAYING WITH FIRE
THE TEMPLE HAD two rows of wooden pews and a huge gold statue of Apollo sitting center stage. Behind the statue was a wall of yellow stained glass, and directly in front of the statue sat Admetus in a high throne more extravagant than the chair on the stage in the ballroom.
“We have guests, Connor,” Admetus said pleasantly. After what I just witnessed, after what I just did, his voice made me sick. “I’m so glad you could join us.” Admetus was all smiles.
“Fuck you,” I said.
“Tsk, tsk. Such language, Ms. Kirkland?” His smile never left his face.
I shrugged, “Just my natural reaction to standing in your presence.”
Standing in the aisle was the body guard John warned us about, Connor. He was tall, muscle bound, and naked.
“I hope you understand that we can’t let you live,” said Damon.
“Oh, I do lad, I do. And, I hope you understand that I will defend myself.” He smiled as he said it, hands clasped in his lap. He looked relaxed, entertained, like he wasn’t about to die. Silly man.
“His guard isn’t human,” Tristan whispered to us. It wasn’t news to me. I couldn’t tell exactly what Connor was, but I knew a were-animal when I saw one. They’re larger than human, scar ridden creatures that smell of musk…also being naked was a clue. Weres run hotter than non-weres, and shifting tends to destroy clothing. So unless you like to sweat profusely, and have a large monthly budget for clothes, weres tend to go naked when not in public.
“Come on!” Connor yelled at us.
“I can take this guy, stay with Rain,” Damon told Tristan.
Connor started at a run, and they met in the middle. Damon gave Connor an uppercut, and the man staggered a bit but didn’t go down. Damon launched himself at the man. Connor braced himself to take the impact, and used Damon’s own momentum against him. He grabbed Damon’s shoulder, and brought his foot up to Damon’s chest, and fell back ward. He landed hard on his back, but with that small sacrifice he threw Damon to our feet. Tristan helped him up.
“You need help?” Tristan asked.
“No!” he growled, and ran at Connor again, morphing his hands into great claws. The change was liquid smooth and breathtaking. It was as though he had liquid flesh. Damon screamed a wild sound, and his hands tore into the other man viciously. Connor could not block his furious blows, and his skin became shreds of meat. Damon shook the blood and meat from his hands, and backed away from Connor. His black eyes watching the man stumble before him. If Connor had been human he’d be dead, not staggering after Damon.
“You think this is over?” Connor chuckled through a bloodied mouth. He fell to his knees, and looked up at Damon. His smile grew wider and wider still, until it looked too big for his face. He hugged himself, screaming through his smile. His screaming smile looked creepy as fuck! Chills ran up my spine. His skin hung in red ribbons, and he dug his fingers into the wounds. His breathing quickened, his eyes were focused on us. With one ear piercing scream he yanked at his skin hard, pulling it off.
Damon backed up to me and Tristan. He looked at me with a face that was utterly black and unreadable.
“Run,” he whispered.
“Run?” Tristan questioned.
I heard them, but I didn’t respond. My eyes were stuck on the man in the aisle. His skin was sliding off his arms slowly, wetly, in shreds that revealed brown bloody fur underneath. The skin on his hands fell away like rubber gloves as huge claws ripped their way out. His claws were the size of watermelons and he racked them down his back and stomach. He was a w
erewolf! If he had time to change I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure that we’d survive, which meant I couldn’t let him finish the change. Fuck, as pissed as I was to admit it, I wasn’t strong enough to kill a werewolf…but I might be able to control one.
I stared at Connor like I was drilling a hole in his head with my eyes. It wasn’t easy. His body was more wolf than man, but he left his face for last. With great claws he ripped the flesh from his face as a wolf’s snout grew right before my eyes. Besides the scary, violent intentions behind it, it was beautiful. Like a butterfly tearing its way from its cocoon. I kept my eyes and mind on him, and when I felt a glimpse of emotion from him I screamed, “Stop!”
He stopped in mid-rip. He was almost fully wolf-man, but he did not move. I kept whispering, “Stop, stop, stop,” over and over again like a chant.
“What have you done to me?” Connor screamed. He was looking right at me with eyes that were strangely still human, and I felt the weight of his anger crash down on me like something physical. I stumbled back, but I never stopped my hushed chant. I was afraid I’d lose my hold on him if I did.
Tristan looked at me like I had done something outrageous, but Damon wasted no time. He picked up an entire pew, and slammed it against the cement walls. It broke and cracked into hug sharp shards of wood. He grabbed a large stake of wood, and ran with it. He ran at the unfinished werewolf, and like a knight with a javelin he drove it through him. The sound of Connor’s scream as his body broke were disturbing, but it was Admetus’s laugh that made me cringe. Was he completely mad? He laughed until Tristan left my side, and pointed his long wand at him.
“Come with us quietly, and you may still live,” Tristan said. I looked at him then. He was still trying to save people. He just didn’t get it. Some people deserve death and nothing better.
Admetus stood abruptly, “You have lost already!” he announced.
Damon went to stand by Tristan, breathing heavy. “You can’t hope to escape, Admetus.”
Admetus brushed his hair out of his face as though he had all the time in the world. He was eerie calm as he weakly gestured to the ceiling with a delicate hand. The ceiling was at least thirty feet high. Against the wall to our left was a metal ladder that reached all the way to the top, where a cage hung suspended in the air. Alcestis was holding onto the bars, and making noises that human’s don’t make.
“What is this?” Damon asked.
Admetus smoothed his pants down with his dark olive hands, and smiled wide. His dark eyes looked up at the window.
“Dawn is near, and she’s a vampire,” he said in a singsong voice. I ran to the ladder, my fear of heights completely abandoned. “I wouldn’t open that cage if I were you. She’s the newly undead. You should know better than most what that means!” he yelled after me. I stopped in my tracks and looked up. He was right.
“You can’t save her, and at dawn I will be invincible again!”
“We can still kill you where you stand!” Damon yelled.
Admetus pulled a gun from some place unseen, pointed toward Damon and Tristan, and pulled the trigger twice. The sound echoed throughout the temple.
I didn’t scream “no!” or run to my brother’s side to tend to his wounds. I didn’t even wait to see if either of them had been shot. My immediate reaction was to run and throw myself at Admetus before he could turn the gun on me. I tackled him down, and knocked the gun from his hand. When we hit the floor he rolled on top of me, pinning me beneath him. He hit me twice in the face, hard enough that I could taste my blood. I was getting punched in the face way too often these days. Yet, every man that’s punched me has died. Someone should have warned him of that fact.
“My, my, aren’t we feisty—,” he tilted his head, like a new thought had come to him. “Now that we’re finally alone we can have some fun together, you and I. Or perhaps I’ll just shoot you, and do what I was planning to do to you to your mother, Annabelle Selena Kirkland, age forty-five, the proprietor of The Natural Kitchen.”
“Mom,” I whispered, because a whisper was all I could muster.
“You won’t lay a hand on my mother!” screamed Tristan.
I looked for him. He was on the floor too, holding onto his shoulder with a bloody hand. He clenched his teeth, and screamed with the effort to bring his wand up and point it at Admetus, but he couldn’t, and Admetus laughed at him.
I looked into his face as he smiled at my brother’s useless efforts to strike him down, and anger filled me. It was a blood curdling, heart wrenching anger that made it hard to breath. My whole body felt hot, boiling hot. I felt a tremor run through me, like lava was running through my veins. He looked down at me then, as though he, too, could feel the heat building inside my body. I screamed as the heat reached the point of pain, a pain so excruciating that I thought for a moment I might pass out, but I didn’t.
I looked down at my body. Admetus was sitting on top of me, pinning me to the floor, but something was happening. The heat soaked through my body, through my skin. White hot flames peeked through, burning my clothes. He jumped off, and looked down at me as the white flames expanded to engulf my entire body. The flames left me naked on the floor, full of unquenchable rage. I sat up, and I could feel my dark auburn hair dancing in the fire, not being burnt by it, but living in it. The room looked blurry through the flames that surrounded me.
“Raina?” Tristan moved to come to me, but stopped feet away, as though to come any closer would hurt.
I stood, and saw the floor scorched around me. “What’s happening to me?” I asked.
“I think you’ve found your vampire talent, Raina,” said Damon. He was sitting up against a pew, holding his chest. A shot in the chest should have killed him, but I couldn’t pretend to know the anatomy of a barguest. They’re shape shifter. Surely having bone structure and organs such as any humanoid would make shifting from one animal to another with liquid grace impossible.
“But, my empathy?” I began, but Damon interrupted me.
“It was always in you. This is pyrokinesis. You can create and manipulate fire, Raina.”
“I don’t give a shit what it’s called!” Admetus yelled. He had his gun back in his hands, and he fired it at me three times.
I flinched, as though that would do any good, but the bullets never made it past the fire. They melted inches from me. He shot at me until the gun clicked empty, but no bullets touched me.
I looked down at my hands. My skin was glowing white, and white flames were dancing, flaring several inches out from me. It looked like I had an aura breathed in flame, and even though I was no longer in pain, I was scared.
“How do I stop it?” I asked Damon.
“Don’t try to, not yet at least.”
He stood, tall and strong and apparently all better somehow. He looked at Admetus, and even though his face was utterly unreadable, his thoughts were those of triumph. “End this, Raina,” Damon said.
“No, Raina. Mato called the police. If we escort him outside he’ll be arrested, and you won’t have to kill anybody,” said Tristan.
“Listen to your brother, witch.” Admetus smiled. Even now in the presence of a woman breathed in flame he was an arrogant bastard.
“He’d just buy off the police and judges, like he’s done so many times before. You don’t know the centuries of crimes this man has committed. You don’t know what horrors, what atrocities he’s done. For Goddess sake, you saw what he did to his own family!”
“That’s why he’ll go to jail, and face a fair trial.”
“No, he has to die, Tristan. Some people don’t deserve fair, some people just deserve death.”
I didn’t wait for Tristan to say another word. I advanced on Admetus. I left small patches of fire where my feet touched the floor. He backed away from me with his empty gun still in his hand. His face was stubborn, pompous, but I could feel his fear. I could smell his sweat. I could hear his heart beating wild just behind his ribs. I wanted him to suffer for Paul, for Michael, and
Nil, and Greg, and Ranger, and that little boy and his family.
“Now, stay very still,” I said calmly. I balled my hands into fists, and the flames flared.
Admetus didn’t stop, because I didn’t make it an order. He ran for the door, but Damon caught up with him. They wrestled as I walked down the pews toward them.
I was strutting more than walking, making a big show of my approach, but I was afraid. Damon wanted me to kill him with the fire, and the only way I could think of doing that would be to give him a great big hug. I wasn’t looking forward to that. I had one man turn to ash in a blaze of fire while touching me this week, and once was quite enough.
“Stop, please stop,” pleaded Tristan from behind me, but I couldn’t. I wish I could, I truly did, but I had no choice. If I let him live he’d buy his freedom, and hunt me down, or hunt down the people I love. I couldn’t let that happen.
“He deserves this.”
“No,” Tristan said. “No one deserves what you’re about to do.”
I was feet away from where Damon and Admetus were fighting.
“If you don’t want to see him die close your eyes, brother,” I said.
“Raina, look at me!”
I turned, and looked at him. He was still on the floor holding his shoulder with one hand, and his wand limply in the other. The sun was rising behind him, splashing through the yellow windows.
“How can you do this? I don’t understand.”
“Maybe you never will,” was all I said to him before I turned back around to find Damon holding Admetus with his arms behind his back.
Before I could react Damon threw him at me. My flames flared out to meet him. It was impulse to wrap my arms around him as he hit my chest, and he screamed wild, crazed screams that matched Alcestis’s. They were burning together.
I felt his flesh collapse under my arms. I felt his mind go static with unthinkable pain and then void as death finally took him. I held his body to mine until he was nothing but ash, and his ashes danced at my feet, all that was left of the ancient king.
