“Do you know what Ronwe means?” Zane ran his hand through his dark hair as he spoke, his lips pulled into a grimace.
Vega squeezed his hand, silently willing him to stay strong.
“It is the name of a lesser demon. I have learned much about this demon and his tricks over the years. The greater demon must renew the bond each year, by placing the sigil upon the resting place of his victim. Because your bodies are gone, he does so in all the places where you are remembered, and the binding is no weaker than if you laid inside. ” Gerald studied Zane for a moment, his eyes squinting against the sun. “He alright?”
“Yes—”
“No—”
The two contradicted each other simultaneously.
“Look, Zane, he needs to know.” Without waiting for him to agree, she turned to Gerald. “We haven’t escaped the curse, not completely. Zane still has a death eater trapped inside of him. We came here looking for his name, and I think we’ve just found it.”
An excited sort of exhaustion settled over them as they climbed back in the little Volkswagen. They’d spent the afternoon talking and planning, trying to uncover the meaning of the inscription and map out their next move. Afterward, they’d had a light supper of homemade stew and said their goodbyes. In the fading light of the warm day, they waved to Gerald from the dusty windows, and headed back the way they’d came.
“Zane.” A soft blush crept up Vega’s cheeks. “I thought of something. Something that I don’t think either of us had considered before. I, well I—”
“Honey, if you got something to say, say it.”
The gentleness in his tone gave her a shot of bravery. “I don’t think we should make love.”
“What?” The car swerved into the other lane as he gaped at her.
“It’s just that…passion…. Passion is very exhilarating. It’s one of those emotions, like anger or fear. It could wake the demon.”
He growled low in his throat, and her eyes widened, unsure if it was the demon. Twisting so that her back was against the door, Vega slid her arm behind her, fingers hesitating on the handle.
“You okay?” her voice was barely a whisper.
Zane shook his head, as if to clear his thoughts, his hands tightening on the wheel. “I think I need to feed.”
She’d misunderstood him; she had to have not heard him correctly. “We just had dinner with Gerald. Are you still hungry?”
He growled again, and her fingers tightened on the handle.
“I’m not hungry for food, Vega. I’m hungry…it’s hungry. I need to feed. I can feel it. The damn thing is waking up in there, and we are running out of time. If I don’t feed the demon, it is going to take over again.” He uttered the final words between clenched teeth, “I don’t want to hurt you, again.”
She watched the muscles in his arms go tense, like a guitar strung too tight, and his knuckles turned white. Her heart skipped and skittered against her ribs, the coppery taste of fear clogging her airways.
“How soon?”
“Soon.”
“Zane, we can’t just kill someone else. We can’t!”
“I have done it so many times. I’ve done it for you.” The darkness inside of him grew, webbing out in the veins around his eyes and eking out in his voice. He pressed the gas pedal harder, pushing the little car to its limits as he screamed, “Do you know how many people I killed for you?”
They were at the edge of the little town they’d passed before reaching the graveyard earlier in the day. The scenery flew by, but Zane showed no signs of slowing. His chest rose and fell in rapid succession, his nostrils flaring as he stared straight ahead, hardly blinking.
“Zane, slow down. Baby, you have to breathe. Just think. You can control this,” she begged.
As if he hadn’t heard her, he kept going, and the sign at the side of the road told her that she had less than a mile to figure out how to stop him. If she failed, someone, maybe lots of people would die.
“Zane!” her voice was a shotgun blast in the small confines of the car.
His head whipped around, his eyes boring into her face, the darkness having seeped in. “Would you kill for me?” he whispered before turning back toward the windshield.
“Stop this car. If you are still in control, if you love me, if you want my help. In the name of all that is holy, stop.” She tried to sound powerful, mastering, tried to yank the chain on the demon’s throat.
He hesitated, his whole body trembling with the effort of pulling his foot off the gas pedal. The car seemed to sigh in relief as the engine whined and slowed. Taking a deep breath, Vega released her death grip on the door handle. The car rolled to a stop on the deserted highway, a lone red blotch on the horizon. Though it was a risk, she leaned forward and touched his arm. When Zane didn’t jerk away, she rose from the seat and softly kissed his cheek.
“Just breathe, baby. We’ll get through this. Why don’t you let me drive for awhile?” She tried to sound soothing, instead of scared, but wasn’t sure she’d pulled it off. Her breath held, and doing some serious shaking of her own, she waited for his reaction.
After a long minute of impenetrable silence, he shuddered and blinked. With a silent nod of his head, he opened the door and stepped out of the car.
Vega climbed over the seats and slid behind the wheel, unwilling to get out of the car and face him. Somehow, the close proximity of the cab had felt safer than being out in the open with him in the fading day. She waited for him, watching his shadowy reflection in the review mirror, her fingers drumming on the steering wheel. If he needed time, she’d give him all the time he wanted, but she prayed the demon wouldn’t be the one who crawled into the passenger seat.
He paced. He growled. He slammed his hands on the trunk, making her jump and squeak. Finally, having exhausted his rage, Zane slid into the car. He looked hollow, as if the battle with the demon had sapped his vitality. A man who’d spent ten years in a dark hole would have had more color.
Vega didn’t speak. Instead, she turned up the radio and drove. She kept her eyes straight ahead and her face blank, allowing Zane time to settle into himself. The final quarter mile flew by, and as they entered the town, she sighed with relief when he took her hand. His skin felt chilled and damp, but the firm pressure of his fingers entwined with hers gave her hope.
She slowed down as they passed the welcome sign, declaring that they’d entered Trowbridge—population three-hundred and thirty-six. There’d be nowhere to stay, no hotel, and any suspicious activity would be quickly noted. So would strangers. It was the worst place possible to be looking for a murder victim. Yet, it was all they had.
“Where should I go?” Her stomach lurched as she recalled Diana, Bill, and Shelley all dead. Dead eyes. Dead hearts. Dead bodies. Gone. Dead because of me. Now someone else must suffer the children’s sins.
“I don’t know.”
She heard the waiver in his voice, a battle between the demon’s need and the boy’s resistance. “Let’s just drive for a minute. Drive and think.”
She turned off the main road and headed further into town, away from the businesses and the people still heading home from a long day of work and life. The streets were not busy, and children played in well-manicured lawns. Vega turned her head, deeply disturbed at the hungry look in Zane’s eyes. Only death could sate the beast, and he was beyond the point of caring whose.
She made another turn, and the houses grew shabbier, the area less pristine. A row of small brick duplexes ran along one side of the road, and an empty field lay to the other side. She recognized the income based housing units; every town had a brick city somewhere along its borders. She hoped they’d stumble across a drug addict who hurt others and was evil to his core, though it seemed unlikely to happen. It would be less terrible if Zane killed someone with a blackened soul. When no such person appeared, Vega turned once more. As they cruised through the seedier bits of the small town, she almost was able to forget their reason for being there.
<
br /> Suddenly, as if struck by lightning, Zane shot up in the seat. His body went rigid, and his nostrils flared as if trying to catch a scent. The growl rose from deep inside of him once more, and his grip painfully tightened on her hand.
“Keep going. There. Do you see it?”
The sun had nearly set completely, making it hard for to make out the L-shaped building. “What?”
“Pull in there, drive slowly,” he ordered, rolling down the window as he spoke.
She did as he told her, scared not too. When they reached the driveway, she blanched. “Zane, no! Oh god, no! You can’t.” The squelch of her voice made him wince, and she quickly fell silent again.
“She’s in there. She’s dying. She wants death.” The cords in his neck stood out as he repeatedly clenched his jaw.
“Who? How do you know?”
The effort to be kind and patient showed in his face. “Be quiet. Be still. Just…trust me. If you love me, you must trust me.”
As they followed the circular drive, illuminated by the dim lamps that glowed here and there, she bit into her cheek. Praying she could trust him, wanting to accept the monster that was both her lover and her enemy, she waited.
A light came on at the far end of the building, and a shadowy figure appeared behind the blinds. Zane opened the door before Vega could fully stop. Leaning back into the car, his face looked haggard and old, the darkness spreading over his features.
“Drive away. Go down the road a mile, wait fifteen minutes, then drive back.”
“Zane—”
“No. Don’t argue.” The final word was a hiss, “Now.”
****
Zane watched the taillights disappear into the night. Exhaustion tugged at his muscles and muddled his mind, but hunger sharpened his basic instincts. He turned, a feral smile spreading his lips as he fought to reign in the monster within.
“Rise, you bastard, rise up and take your kill. I shall give you a death, but this will be done as I wish it to be.”
He stalked across the grass, his eyes on the window, the demon clawing its way up from the darkened hole. The woman stood, still silhouetted by the light, looking very much like an angel with her soft halo of white hair. When he drew near enough to see her eyes, they were wide, but not with fear. The lady recognized the answer to her desires to be rid of a body that was failing her. Zane thought of Gerald’s wife as the window opened and she beckoned him inside.
“Are you the angel of death?”
“No, ma’am. Though, I do come to offer relief.” Despite his efforts, the demon leeched into Zane’s voice. She pulled back, the first signs of regret and fear etching across her expression, but he held her arm. “What I am is not something good, but your death will save a life tonight. An innocent with years still left to experience will not fall. I will be gentle.”
As he leaned in and placed a gentle kiss upon her soft, powdered cheek, she sighed. “I am ready. All the people I’ve known are gone. I am all alone. The woman God has forgotten.”
“He did not forget you. I don’t know your name. Forgive me, what is your name?”
“Elizabeth Connor.”
“Elizabeth Connor, God did not forget you, he saved you for this. He knew you were strong enough to be the woman who called death to her window.”
“Then let’s be done with this. I want to go home.”
Zane unleashed the invisible tether that he had wielded to terrorize his victims in the past. With a gentleness he had not known possible during the rapture of feeding, he touched the woman’s mind. There, he found her memories. Not ugly, horrid things she had done to deserve his kind of sick punishment, but sweet, happy things.
He chose the best of her moments, like a gardener plucking the fullest roses and sweetest daffodils. With careful motions, his hands took hers and led her to the small bed, his mind still sifting through hers as if he were a breeze. She rested her head on the pillow—trusting him completely. A tear crept down her wrinkled cheek, but her brave gray eyes remained on his face, refusing to blink away her last wistful longing for life.
The hunger slammed into him—knocking him to his knees at the bedside. The demon screeched as it tore its way to the surface with tooth and nail. A sudden wave of hatred boiled in his guts. The desire to mutilate and destroy burned his mind.
Zane struggled not to squeeze Elizabeth’s hands. He fought against the want of her pain. He heard the woman gasp, but darkness filled his vision as instinct battled restraint. Images of her frail body broken by his hands and her mind crushed by his power filled him.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he begged, “Do not fear me. Have faith, Elizabeth. Help me fight it.”
She tugged on his hands, pulling one of her own free. As if she were a loving mother, she caressed his cheek. “Boy, I don’t know your name either. Tell me your name.”
The sound of her voice reminded him of his own grandmother from hundreds years before, and he felt a shift inside. “Zane,” he whispered.
The demon roared in his head.
“Zane, I don’t know what evils you are fighting. I don’t want to know, but you will win. If God sent you to me, then God will lead you out of that darkness that surrounds you. I will pray for you.”
He felt the demon, still raging at the forefront of his mind, but he regained control. He opened his eyes to her faint smile and began. A whispered brush of the invisible link brought up the memories he had selected and wrapped her in a cocoon of warmth. She would slumber; she would never feel the end.
She was young again, beautiful and full of vibrant laughter. She danced in the arms of the boy she loved, dressed in wedding finery. As the champagne glasses tinkled, the two kissed, lives wrapped in the promise of forever.
Zane lifted the pillow from the bed, his fingers clenching the fabric. He hated himself in that moment, more than he ever had. This is murder. She has done no wrong. He couldn’t rationalize away the loathing, though the woman had wanted her death. He nearly backed down, but when the demon screamed, he knew it was the stranger or the girl he loved. With trembling hands, he pressed the pillow down.
Elizabeth lay in a white room, her husband standing at the head of the bed. Together they stared down into the deep blue eyes of a newborn babe. Their first child, a daughter to love and cherish, filled her heart with a joy that swallowed and frightened her.
The body didn’t struggle, the mind was lost in the visions he created, but the woman’s spirit was strong. She clung to life, even as Zane pressed harder, wanting her death to near. Far more than the gnawing hunger and pain, the need to escape pressed at him.
Finally, she was a woman in her golden years, still a beauty. Her children gathered together, home for the holidays. She looked out from her place by the fire, holding a grandchild on her knee, and saw her life complete. She had known love, heartache, desire, and pain. She had lived beyond her years and both above and below her means. She’d spent years caring and loving the children before her and the man by her side. She smiled, knowing they would be her legacy to the world.
Her heart stuttered, and her lungs fought to draw a final breath. Zane threw the pillow away from him and leaned over the dying woman. He whispered, “Goodnight, sweet Elizabeth,” and drew in her final exhale. The taste of her death was milk and honey, sunshine and fresh picked berries.
The demon nearly choked as it fed, hunger and anger consuming it. The taste of a pure soul was like poison, but starvation pushed it to swallow down the goodness that burned like fire.
The kill done, Zane placed another kiss on Elizabeth’s cheek and exited through the window once more. He knew he’d been gone longer than he had intended, knew Vega would be distraught, but the woman had inspired something inside him. As if the demon had receded even farther than before, Zane almost felt purely human. The darkness completely lifted from his vision for the first time in many years, and he looked up into the night sky, contemplating if the woman had truly been a divine gift.
****
&n
bsp; “Damn it!” Vega screamed into the empty car as she turned to make a third pass down the road. “Where are you, Zane?” She bit into her bottom lip, worrying it with her teeth fighting back the tears. An onslaught of nightmarish images filled her mind, until she punched the wheel. “Please, please be okay.”
She slowed as she neared the nursing home, prepared to turn in and go hunt for him if needed. Staring so hard into the shadows that her eyes blurred, she nearly missed him standing at the edge of the road. With a desperate jerk, she slammed her foot down on the brake pedal and the car shimmied to a hard stop.
The way he stood on the edge of the road, hands in his pockets and head tilted toward the starlit sky, looked out of place. Before Zane’s fingers could grasp the door handle, Vega reached over and slammed her hand down over the door lock. Terror seized her as he bent down to look at her through the window. He didn’t speak—there was no need.
She knew he was okay the minute their eyes met through the dusty glass. Feeling silly, she unlocked the door, a fragile smile on her lips.
At the same moment, they both breathed, “I’m sorry.”
“Did you? Are you?” She couldn’t even form a full question; no words could cover what she knew he’d meant to do.
“Yes. Please don’t ask for details. Know she did not suffer, and what I did for her, it was what she wanted. I might be a monster, but I am also a man.” The fear of her rejection made his tone turn sharp with defensiveness, even as he longed to take Vega in his arms.
“I love you.”
Vega opened her eyes and groaned. Sunlight blazed through the broken blinds over the window, and the sounds of the nearby highway echoed through the sparsely furnished motel room. The journey had worn her down until she felt physically raw and emotionally drained. The only thing holding her together was the warmth of Zane’s arm draped across her body and the sound of his deep breathing.
Fated to Return (The Death Eater Series Book 3) Page 4
