But, the word champion kept pounding in my ears.
“Champion?” I asked.
Mockery scowled.
“If you appeared on the stage, right now, you could redeem her honor.”
I didn’t think.
Jumping up, I yanked the chain out of Mockery’s hands.
Then, I launched myself off of the balcony’s edge. Flying through the air, I looped the chain around the string of lights that ran down to the stage and illuminated the arena.
“Dark Lady, let the line hold,” I shouted as my weight came down upon the cable.
The string of lights bowed down but didn’t snap.
The bulbs… that was another story.
They exploded, one after another, as my loop of chain whizzed me down to the stage at a startling speed. Swaying back and forth, I rocketed downward with an explosion of lights flaring behind me.
Buck naked, I zoomed over the crowd and then dropped onto the stage.
In my head, I had planned to land with a flourish, announcing my heroic attempt to save my wife.
Instead, I landed right on top of her mother.
The impact drove the breath out of both of us and knocked her to the ground… unconscious. My head bounced off of hers, and I saw stars. Together our bodies rolled off of the stage and crashed into the sand behind it.
Wobbling, I struggled to my feet, as armored guards with spears surrounded me.
Everyone on stage stared at me in shock.
Especially Brynn.
“Hi, Sweetheart,” I rasped, barely able to talk. I still saw stars, and I swore that the ground was shifting from side to side.
“Who the fuck are you!” a man shouted, pushing to the front of the guards.
Charles.
I had only seen him once, but I was positive that it was Charles Vanaken. He was dressed in crimson armor that left his chest uncovered. A heavy white cloak with a snarling lion on his lapel covered his back. His kilt matched the armor and like the cloak, had a lion upon it as well.
“I’m her champion!” I shouted, pointing at Brynn.
My wife looked like she couldn’t decide if she wanted to cry, cheer, or sob.
Charles took a step back. His eyes grew wide, and he glanced from Brynn back to me. Addisyn lay on the ground, completely incoherent.
Candace’s pedophile ran his fingers through his long blonde hair, as he tried to figure out what to do. According to their laws, I could announce my intentions to protect Brynn. The guards looked back and forth between each other, unsure of who was in charge now that Addisyn was unconscious.
“You are no longer her husband,” Charles finally spat out. “So, the challenge is invalid.”
Pleased with himself, Charles played with his tiny goatee.
“We were married in the Cathedral of Saints in Savannah,” I shouted at him. “Brynn is my wife.”
“My sister severed your bond,” he snapped back at me.
“It is only dissolved if I agree,” I shouted back at him. “And I do not.”
Before he could say anything else, I shouted at Brynn. “Are you still my wife?”
She nodded.
I turned back to Charles. “I say we are married, and she says we are married.”
“And, so do I.”
The words reverberated over the stage.
Surprised, I turned and saw my father stride out onto the stage.
- 18 -
Dad and I looked a lot alike, except his skin was a darker gray than mine, and he had dark black scales on his back. Like me, he had thick black hair, except his was graying at the temples. Eyes the color of midnight glared at the humans, as my goblin father strode toward them. Whisker horns the color of a midnight storm made him look old but distinguished.
Like Addisyn, he wore a white robe with golden stitching. His mantle had a black manticore emblazoned upon it. Dad was carrying an ebony staff that I had never seen before. The end of it curved forward into the beak of a bird of prey. Under the curve of the beak, a shard of an uncut ruby glittered in the lantern light.
“You have no authority here, Hob,” Charles said with a sneer.
My father growled, exposing his dark black fangs.
“What will your mother say, when I fuck her tonight, little man? Will she side with you… or me?”
Dad had always been direct… savagely direct. The last I had heard, he had been taken captive.
Charles blanched.
Then, he capitulated.
I saw the surrender in his eyes.
And then… my lover’s ritual ignited. I felt it break open like a rotten peach. The circle containing their spell burst open, finally revealing its intent. The demons that had been swirling around it screamed in glee, as the black magic burst into life.
I could see my women kneeling around a corpse that no longer had one inch of skin remaining on it.
But… Margaret’s heart still beat.
Her lips quivered with curses that only God could hear.
Hana, Taesa, and Mary were covered in blood. It coated their skin, hair, and faces. I could only see their eyes peeking out at me, amidst the madness that filled the circle.
I blanched when Hana smiled, revealing teeth that were coated in gore worse than her skin.
Fuck.
The flesh that was missing from Margaret’s body… was in their bellies.
Lady Shufen screamed two words that reverberated around me.
“Jāḷaṇē Rakta.”
Then, her blade came down, slamming into Margaret’s chest.
Power rippled out in waves. It arched up from Columbia and screamed toward Ashmouth like the proverbial phoenix of legend. It took just three seconds to reach us.
Mog’s eyes opened wide as waves of crimson energy poured out of the ceiling.
But, before he could act, blades of blood--ten feet tall--slammed down into hundreds of people, skewering them where they stood.
And… one of those victims was Charles.
His body quivered in front of me, as the man stared at me in shock. He couldn’t even collapse to his knees. The blade held him upright. It had entered between his shoulder blades and slammed into the ground through his groin.
Blood was gushing out of his mouth and ass…
Boiling blood.
It snapped and crackled like it had been poured out of a molten ingot. His skin burned and flaked away around his mouth, turning as black as a piece of charcoal.
“Those fools!” Mog shrieked as he stared at the screaming throng of impaled citizens. Looking up, he screamed at Lady Shufen. “You fool! You have doomed us all!”
“But…” Lady Shufen murmured. “I have saved the King.”
Her words rippled through me, catapulting me out of my shock.
Pushing past the stunned guard, I yanked the lever that had pulled Brynn up into the air. She fell at my feet, moaning in pain. Her eyes rolled back into her head, and she fainted, which surprised me. Brynn had always been so strong.
Unshackling my wife, I picked her up in a bridal carry. All around me, the surviving citizens were fleeing the coliseum.
Mog glared at me.
Then, he stamped the staff on the ground.
“She must die,” he hissed. “Mahadaji demands her sacrifice.”
Stepping forward, I did something that I had never done before.
I punched my father.
It was an uppercut that Blister’s gladiators had taught me. The trick was to flex my knees and get all of my body weight behind the uprising strike.
And, the key was the placement of the attack.
The punch connected right between my father’s hornlike whiskers, cutting the shit out of my hand.
But, it connected with a goblin’s sweet spot.
Good old Dad’s eyes rolled back into his head, and he collapsed.
The ebony staff slipped out of his fingers, and without thinking again, I grabbed it with my bloody hand.
Suddenly, in my mind, I fel
t something dark and ancient peer at me in anticipation. It felt like a predatory bird--a vulture--who was sizing up some delicious roadkill that wasn’t quite dead yet.
My blood should have dripped along its length, but instead, the staff absorbed it.
“Greetings, Morikowa,” the bird rasped. The world seemed to stop around me. I could hear a dark wind rustling through dried up leaves. The smell of rot and death filled my nostrils, as the light in the room disappeared. Looking up, I could only see the moon and an old dead tree.
In its branches were thousands of blackbirds.
“What do you desire?” the creature in my mind whispered.
“Power.”
My answer was almost instantaneous. It was my honest, most profound passion. Ever since I took my first breath in the goblin caves of Bonesack, I had wanted magic more than anything else. The girls came first now, but I still burned for power.
“What will you trade for it?” the creature cawed at me. It wasn’t a cry from a crow. This was a massive creature that flew through the night’s sky with wings of lightning and fire. Hail fell as it circled around me with hurricanes following in its wake like hounds.
“Souls,” I replied. “I offer you souls.”
My answer shocked me. It felt like the raptor was talking directly to my soul, bypassing both the goblin and human that lived inside of me.
“How many?” it asked.
Suddenly, I could hear the pounding of the ocean. Except, it was the Sea of Hell itself. Instead of waves of water, all I could see were souls from horizon to horizon. They screamed and clawed at the sky, desperate to escape.
“All of them,” my soul answered. “I offer… all of them... to you.”
The raptor laughed.
And, then it said… “I accept.”
- 19 -
Something was blowing on my face.
Annoyed, I tried to swat it and failed.
The blowing continued, annoying me enough that I opened my eyes.
Brynn was leaning against my chest. Her pursed lips let me know where the annoying sensation had originated.
I blinked my eyes and stared at her in surprise. We were in a bed, looking around, I could see the sun peeking through the drawn shades at the other end of the room.
“Where are we?” I asked.
Brynn leaned forward and kissed me. Her lips were so soft that I forgot where I was. My mind blanked, and all I felt was her mouth.
Then, she shifted back with her elbows were on my chest. Brynn’s fingers touched my chin, playing with the dark black hairs that were bunched in a hornlike wad.
“These are new,” she mused. Then, she touched my skin. “I like the gray, it makes you look dangerous.”
Brynn had never seen me with so much Arcane Radiation.
I felt her slip her hand down and caress my length. I gasped.
Damn, that felt good.
Then, her hand slipped around my tail.
“This is new also,” she murmured.
Her warm, delicate touch felt good on it too.
“You didn’t have to stop the annulment of my family name,” she said. “Why did you?”
“You’re mine.”
“We aren’t bonded together anymore,” she said.
Leaning closer, she added, “And, our marriage specified until death do we part.”
“I claimed you in front of everyone,” I insisted.
Brynn moved in closer. “Yes… you did.”
Her second kiss was even better than the first. Brynn’s tongue slid so far into my mouth that I thought that I was going to choke. But, her breasts were so soft that I could barely concentrate. They pillowed against my chest, making my mind spin with excitement.
Breaking out kiss again, she began to idly caress me beneath the sheets.
“Do you know what you did?” she asked.
“I claimed you,” I said again.
“Yes,” Brynn said with a smile, “but other than that.”
“Mockery said that you needed a champion.”
Brynn’s hand squeezed hard, making me gasp.
“How do you know her?” she growled.
Sighing, I told her about everything that had happened since she was captured by the monsters in Columbia. Several times, she squeezed me hard when I told her about my exploits. I didn’t hide anything… not even when Taesa and I had slept with Azlin.
Or, when I had fucked Mockery.
Candace’s name made Brynn’s blood burn hard. Her eyes blazed and sparked with fury. Especially when she learned that I had brought her back to life if only for a few hours.
“Do you think you were infected with Azlin’s blood?” she finally asked me when I was finished.
I nodded. It was the only thing that made sense. I still remembered when Azlin had shattered my stone when we had fought. Some of her blood must have seeped into my wounds then.
Brynn’s hand had retreated… when she had found out I was infected.
“Pandora’s Last Curse is the most potent arcane virus ever released from the Chalice,” she said, leaning back and pulling a pillow under her head.
I noticed that there was now an air gap between us, as well.
“Mages who taste the infection can grow powerful, but dark. Eventually, if they live long enough, and bond with a Desmese, they will become Malignant.”
I didn’t like the sounds of that.
“Every monstrous race in existence knows its origin from the Original Curse, including the goblins.”
Her hands began to tremble.
Then, she slipped out of bed.
Dammit.
Brynn was gorgeous. Her long dark hair hung below her waist. I had never seen a woman with so long and thin of a torso, but with breasts that should have been on a much larger woman.
She took my breath away.
But… I could see the concern on her face, as Brynn wrapped a blue nightgown around her body. Now that she knew that I was infected… fuck… we might be finished.
“Does the sun burn you now?” she asked, “Child of the Mournflower.”
Leaning back, I stewed on her words. I didn’t really like being called Azlin’s child, even if it was true from a certain perspective.
“Yes,” I said, looking at the ceiling.
“Azlin feeds on despair, misery, and sorrow,” Brynn said, moving to the foot of the bed. “And, so do all of her children.”
I fidgeted.
“Every one of her lovers has committed suicide, or has indulged in some other form of self-destruction,” Brynn added.
Placing her hands on the edge of the bed, Brynn said. “I do not want to die.”
I sat up and stared at her.
I hadn’t really understood what becoming infected had meant from my lover’s perspective.
“You are a Death-Leech now, just like her,” Brynn announced. “And I want nothing to do with you.”
Then… my wife, the mother of my child… turned and walked out of the room.
- 20 -
“Well… that could have gone better.”
I twisted my head.
Xot was sitting on a chair near the window. The red goblin looked tired. He was wearing an expensive blue and gold coat covered in silver buttons that hung down past his waist. Black pants that looked like some sort of leather were nearly hidden under it. But, no boots. Scaly red feet with black claws worried at the carpeting.
“Hello, Boss.”
“How long have you been sitting there?”
“Long enough to hear your whole story.”
The goblin turned and looked out the window. The sunlight was fading, which was good. Reaching out with my senses, I was surprised to be able to tell that the sun would set soon.
“How did I get here?”
“I carried you,” he replied. “After Lady Shufen killed most of House Vanaken, the remainder of the Cabal announced that they accepted you as Lady Brynn’s champion.”
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