Lilith--Blood Ink

by Dana Fredsti

  Somehow I didn’t think Randy would understand why that was a compliment. According to Seth and Sean, my previous boyfriends had been less than stellar. I had to take their word for it—large chunks of my life before the accident were still a blank.

  He downed the rest of his beer in one quick swallow. “You had enough of dumbass films yet, or do you wanna move on to the next piece of crap?”

  Was it my imagination or did he seem a little hurt?

  “Let’s move on,” I said, making a quick decision. “But let’s improve the quality of the entertainment a little bit, shall we?”

  I leaned down, wound one hand in his thick brown hair and pulled him closer so I could kiss him. He gave a low growl deep in his throat, the vibration sending a pleasurable shiver through me. Randy was good at more than stunt work.

  * * *

  Celia struggled to pull herself out of the cobwebs of a drugged slumber. It felt like she was wading through a room of cotton candy—sticky, cloying, and endless. She’d get through one section, pull herself free of the strands around her, only to stumble into a fresh batch.

  Even worse was the sensation that her mouth was filled to bursting with gum. She’d stopped chewing bubblegum years ago after a nightmare where no matter how much gum she pulled out of her mouth, she couldn’t get rid of it. Pulling great sticky, stretchy swaths of the gum as more formed in her throat and oozed forward. This was like that. But so much worse.

  Because when she woke up, her throat and mouth were still clogged with some gummy substance.

  “Mommy?”

  At least that was what she tried to say. The sound was muffled, her jaws only able to open about an inch before something snapped them shut again.

  Celia tried to sit up, throw the covers off her body, but she couldn’t move. Pinpricks of white-hot agony flared up and down her body, as if something was stitching her legs together at the inner thighs and calves, and her arms to her torso. Her bedroom, large and well ventilated, now seemed unbearably confined, the air humid and stale at the same time. Kicking up with both legs with the greatest of effort, she hit a solid surface a few inches above her.

  She struggled, trying to scream, to get help, but even as she tried to cry out again, pinkish strands like spun sugar drifted across her face, and inside her mouth, nose, eyes, cocooning her from the inside out until she could no longer move at all, not even to blink her eyes.

  She could still feel everything.

  CHAPTER THREE

  I stood on top of a towering cliff, a storm brewing overhead, oily clouds roiling around with slashes of deep red and a poisonous orange. As if the clouds were embers still burning on the inside, looking for the chance to burst into flame.

  “Lee…”

  His voice, like rough velvet, called to me, rippling through my nerve endings, promising such pleasure if only I’d step away from the edge of the cliff. If only I’d turn around and go to him. If only I’d let him touch me.

  If only I’d let him kill me.

  “Lee…” Louder this time, more insistent.

  I stepped off the edge of the world into the void.

  * * *

  I woke with a start, bathed in so much sweat I was surprised I didn’t just wash right out of my bed. And yet I was freezing, my body wracked with chills. It didn’t help that I’d thrown the covers off at some point during the night. I slept with my window open, no matter the weather, and it had been unseasonably cold last night.

  It was still dark outside. I reached for my iPhone, charging on the bedside table. 5 A.M. Time to get up. Then I remembered I didn’t have to get out of bed and drive to Angeles Forest. My body and brain were still inconveniently on early-morning film-shoot schedule. I could get up and be productive. Or I could play bed slug a while longer.

  I retrieved my covers, snuggling under the down quilt and luxuriating in the warm bedding while I thought about the nightmare that had woken me up. When I’d first gotten out of the hospital, I’d had plenty of dreams about the fall that nearly killed me, but a few months ago my subconscious decided that reliving a near-death experience—including the pain of smashing against unyielding concrete—wasn’t enough. It decided to switch things up with new and exciting locations straight out of a Hieronymus Bosch painting. It also saw fit to add a sexy shadow-figure that I knew wanted to kill me, but with a promise of mega hot sex first. Possibly during. Maybe even after. These dreams really were that fucked up.

  The details of the dream changed, but with variations of the same theme in each iteration. I was always on the edge of some place uncomfortably high. A cliff above an angry ocean. A snow-capped mountain peak. Once I even stood at the open door of an in-flight airplane. It was always dark and stormy, with fiery, black clouds filling the sky.

  There was also always a man—or something that looked like a man—behind me. Face in the shadows, eyes glowing with the same banked flame as the clouds. Palpable waves of hate rolled off him, combined with undeniable lust. I could never tell which emotion was the stronger. Maybe my dream stalker didn’t know either.

  He would call my name, try to get me to turn around. Sometimes he’d caress me, his touch an icy-cold fire spreading through my body. Part of me always wanted to pull away from the death drop and go to him. Rather than let him touch me, though, I took the step into the abyss every time. Falling into an endless night. Waking up before I hit bottom.

  Each time I had the dream, however, the urge to turn to him grew stronger, and the subsequent fall seemed that much longer. Was there even a bottom in these new dreams? If I found out… would I wake up?

  And an even scarier thought… What would happen if I stepped away from the endless drop and let him claim me?

  The smell of freshly brewed coffee and bacon with an overlay of maple wafted under the crack at the bottom of my bedroom door. The enticing and down-to-earth aromas drove the last lingering shreds of death drops and scary, sexy men out of my head, replacing them with visions of breakfast.

  I sniffed again, then took a deep inhale. Yup, time to get out of bed. There was work to do in the kitchen. I wandered down the hallway in Black Watch-plaid pajama bottoms and a baseball-style jersey with Grumpy Cat on it, fuzzy socks protecting my feet against the cold hardwood floor.

  My godfather, Sean, sat at the kitchen table playing on his iPad, a mug of coffee giving off steam in front of him, while his son Seth was in the command position in front of the stove, three separate burners going. A rugged blond with blue eyes, Sean could have been anywhere from late forties to early fifties, but his nephilim heritage meant he might be many years older. It also meant he and Seth were naturals for high falls—when your ancestor’s an angel, the laws of gravity aren’t a problem. I had no idea what Sean’s actual age was, and he wasn’t telling.

  He got up at the sound of my footsteps, and gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

  “Hey, hon. How did you sleep?”

  I gave a jaw-cracking yawn in reply. Sean looked at me knowingly. “Out late last night?”

  “Not too late.” I’d gotten back from Randy’s a little before two. A normal bedtime when I didn’t have to get up the next morning was generally midnight, especially when any of the regular crew stayed after training.

  I helped myself to coffee, pouring a generous dollop of cream into my mug.

  Seth cast me a glance. “You do realize that this coffee is over twenty bucks a pound, right? The flavor stands on its own. Why are you adding cream?”

  Even in sweatpants and a faded red T-shirt, my quasi-cousin looked like a movie star. Cheekbones most supermodels would kill for. Eyes the rich brown of bittersweet chocolate, framed with long, thick lashes. An artfully tousled mane of dark brown hair that you’d think a team of stylists had spent hours working on. His eyelashes alone made it hard not to hate him, especially since he was a jerk ninety percent of the time.

  Ignoring Seth’s kibitzing, I sat at the table across from Sean, enjoying that first precious life-giving sip of coffee
. A blissful smile spread over my face. Like everything Seth made in the kitchen, the coffee tasted better than it should have. He’d used a French press this morning, but he could have used a Mister Coffee and gotten the same results. Rich and smooth, with notes of caramel lurking underneath. It almost didn’t need cream. Almost.

  “So. Out with Randy last night?” Seth spoke with a studied nonchalance that would have failed totally had he not been busily tending the stove.

  My smile faded. Last thing I wanted to do was discuss any details of last night’s date with Sean and Seth.

  “Uh huh,” I said noncommittally.

  “That’s nice,” Sean chimed in.

  “How late did you work?” Seth again.

  I shrugged even though I knew he couldn’t see me. Or maybe he could. I caught a glance of his eyes reflected in the shiny steel of the stove backing.

  “Got done around five.” I drank more coffee. A big gulp this time.

  I could almost feel father and son calculating how many hours I’d spent with Randy. Suddenly the thought of cooking my own breakfast wasn’t so bad.

  “Did you two go out to dinner?” Sean asked.

  Translation: Were you out in public, away from a bedroom?

  “No, we watched movies and had pizza at his place.”

  “Oh.” A slight pause. “What did you watch?”

  Translation: Do you remember what you watched or were you too busy indulging in original sin?

  “Grid Wars and some other piece of crap film. It had zombies in it.” Okay, a little white lie there, but we’d planned on watching the zombie movie. Besides, twenty-seven was just a little too old to deal with the Dating Game interrogation.

  Seth plunked down a plate in front of his father and then one for me. I stared at the beautifully plated scrambled eggs with tomatoes and feta cheese, perfectly crisp bacon, and a short stack of fluffy homemade pancakes with maple syrup and butter pooling on top and drizzling down the sides.

  One of the few things that endeared Seth to me—and possibly why I haven’t killed him—was his improbable love of cooking shows. He watched them all, even the ones with lots of yelling and artificially created drama. Yeah, I’m looking at you, Gordon Ramsay. Seth’s favorite was The Great British Bake Off. He liked to try out recipes. I liked to eat them. So very dangerous. I had a fantasy about reaching a point in my life where I no longer worried about the size of my jeans. Until then… well, only the fact that I spent more hours exercising than eating saved me from obesity.

  My stomach growled, making its opinion known.

  “Thanks,” I muttered even as I filled my fork and took my first bite.

  Ambrosia.

  “So. Good.”

  Seth gave a little satisfied huff. He and I may not get along most of the time, but I never failed to show proper appreciation for his cooking skills. He served himself and sat down at the table, digging into his food with enthusiasm. My shoulders relaxed. The gentle inquisition was over. At least for now.

  “When’s your next gig?” I asked casually.

  “Two weeks off and then we start pre-production on the sequel to Twitch.”

  Twitch was the first book in one of the silliest YA dystopian series out there. It made the plot twists of the Labyrinthine Walker series seem logical. Still, I felt a little drop in the pit of my stomach. I should’ve been working on this film. “What’s it called?” I asked, just to be polite.

  Seth gave a snort. Sean grinned. “Spasm,” they replied at the same time.

  I almost did a spit take, but that would have been a waste of good food, not to mention gross. “You have got to be kidding. Please tell me you’re kidding.” They weren’t. “Is the third film gonna be called Seizure?”

  That actually drew a smile from Seth. “Well, of course. Because, you know, metaphor and symbology and all that shit.”

  Seth and I started snickering even as Sean frowned at his son for his use of the “s” word. He gave us both a half-hearted glare, shaking his head as he tried not to smile. He’s always happier when Seth and I aren’t at each other’s throats. Luckily there’re plenty of other things that make him happy.

  It’s not that I enjoy fighting with Seth. In fact, it’s one of the things that makes my life much more stressful than it should be. We’ve always squabbled, but over the last few years our minor disagreements had transmogrified into bitter wars. I hated it, but I didn’t know how to fix it. My friend Eden opines that Seth has feelings for me that go beyond those of a protective pseudo-cousin. I opine that too much chardonnay has killed off some of her brain cells. We agree to disagree.

  “What about you, hon?” Sean speared a forkful of pancakes. “Got anything else lined up now that Dragon Druid Mages has wrapped?”

  “A couple of possibilities in the works, but nothing definite.” I kept my answer deliberately vague but I knew that they’d be able to translate it to “no prospects” without any problem.

  I hate feeling pathetic.

  “Well,” Sean said after a beat, “I’m sure that something will come through.”

  I gave a small inward sigh. I guess—no, I knew—I wanted him to say, “Look no further, because there’s some stunt doubling that you’d be perfect for on this stupid piece-of-shit, high-budget film.”

  Although he would never say “shit.” Sean frowns upon bad language. Not sure how he’s managed to make it as Papa Bear for the Katz Stunt Crew for so many years without his ears falling off. Most stuntmen and stuntwomen are not known for their lack of vulgarity.

  At any rate, part of me totally got why Sean didn’t want to have me on a production until I’d gotten over my problem with heights. The KSC—and no, I’m not the only person who thinks it’s funny to call Sean “the Colonel”—was known for radical wirework, high falls, and near-insane aerial stunts that few others would try. If I couldn’t keep up with them, I could be a liability if a director suddenly wanted a female character to dangle from a helicopter. Another part of me, however, was pissed off and hurt that he wouldn’t even bring me in as a fight double.

  Oh well, I’ve been working on my high falls again and could now take a dive from more than twenty feet without freezing in place or holding onto the practice tower like a scared kid on a high dive board.

  The back of my legs still crawled and my stomach flipped over, mind you, and it was still an effort of sheer willpower to go any higher, but I was doing the work. I just wasn’t doing it fast enough or good enough to earn my place back on the crew.

  “What’s next for you after Spasm?” I asked with forced lightness.

  “We’re talking to Spielberg about some space opera project. Pirates in space, that kind of thing.”

  “Any chance you think I’ll be ready to work with you if this one goes through?” Wow. I hadn’t known I was gonna ask that until the words had already tumbled from my mouth. Whatever, the question clunked like a brick dropped in the middle of the kitchen table, leaving an awkward silence that I hustled to fill. “I mean, come on, pirates in space? They’ll have to have swords or light sabers, right? You know you don’t have anyone better than me on the edged-weapon side of things.”

  “Well, hon…” Sean paused, evidently trying to word his reply with care. Which told me the answer was going to be either, “I don’t know,” or just, “No.” I barged ahead before he could prove me right.

  “What, then?” I took a deep breath and finally brought up the subject I’d been avoiding for the last two months. “I’m just expected to sit around and wait for monsters to find me so I can kill them? Because, seriously, I need to find paying work and I doubt there’s a lot of money in demon killing. Although I guess I could put up an ad on Craigslist and see if I get any takers.”

  Seth choked on a mouthful of eggs and bacon, covering his mouth and coughing until he’d managed to swallow without asphyxiating himself.

  Sean set his fork down.

  My first impulse was to apologize. Instead, I pushed away from the table with a mum
bled, “Excuse me,” and left the room before the hot tears welling in my eyes could escape. I fled to the bathroom and let them spill out for a few minutes, long enough to release some of my frustration and regain a little bit of equilibrium. Oh, it was hard, though. My heartbeat thrummed in my ears, at least twice as fast as it should have been, and I didn’t know if I was going to throw up or punch the mirror above the sink. Possibly both.

  This whole fucked-up situation was not my fault and I was tired of acting as if life was normal. Because it wasn’t. It never would be again. I’d trusted Sean and he’d pretty much lied to me most of my life. He’d raised me since I was five, taking me in when my parents had died in what I’d been told was an auto accident, but what had actually been a hit job by a pissed-off demon. And it was only a couple of months ago, after a film set I’d been working on had fallen under demonic attack, that Sean had finally told me the truth—there were plenty more demons in my future. Not only that, but I was a veritable demon magnet.

  Turns out that El—also known as Yahweh—a god with serious anger-management issues, had put a curse on my ancestress Lilith when she decided to ditch Adam and choose her own mate. As punishment, El turned most of Lilith’s kids into demonspawn, and then cast her into a hell dimension. Only a few of her descendants remained human, and El ordered them to clean up the mess he’d created—hunt down the monsters and kill them. Talk about harsh parenting.

  My personal opinion? El was a total asshole with a big helping of crazy on the side.

  Along with the training, each lucky human descendant also got an amulet engraved with ancient sigils that imbued pretty much anything with the power to fight demons, giving the bearer the ability to take out creatures that would otherwise be near impossible to kill. Each demon taken out of the game supposedly brought Lilith one step closer to release from her prison.

  As if things weren’t complicated enough, there was so much interbreeding amongst demons, monsters, lesser gods and what not over the years that any number of supernaturals could be considered Lilith’s children. Many of them, however, are not evil. Hell, I work with a lot of them. And most humans have at least a little supe blood in them. A lot of hardcore surfers, for example, have at least a trace of selkie, kelpie, or taniwha. Scratch a fearless horseback rider and you’ll find some centaur or púca way back in the family tree. And so on. In most cases, the bloodline is so diluted it would show up in 23&Me as “unknown genome of Middle Eastern origin” or something along those lines. So not only did I have to worry about potentially killing a harmless creature by mistake, but there was also no retirement plan.