“I knew the instant it happened,” the queen admitted, gaze sharpening with deadly intent. “I felt the energy shift with his transformation. I chose not to do anything, boy, because I do not meddle in the affairs of humans. One day your kind will be eradicated from the earth as little more than a temporary affliction. I’ve seen it before and will see it again. I survive by maintaining a healthy distance from self-destructive plagues like yourselves.” Casting Terin a sideways glance, she tossed her a playful wink that fell short of beguiling, considering the bitter nature of her subject matter. “With some carnal exceptions, of course.”
The pulling at my shirt stopped, and Terin rose to her feet alongside me with an indignant fire burning in her gaze. “That’s it then? You, the regal merqueen, will let our kind be wiped out simply for your sake of self-preservation? There went my lady boner.”
Malise clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Always the superhero, ready to lay down her life for even the most pitiful cause.” Rolling onto her belly, she kicked over the edge of the pool nearest us, resting her elbows on the rock ledge. “Tell me, warrior princess, what is it you want from me?”
Terin lifted one brow in blatant challenge. “For you to prove that you’re decent enough to do what’s right? That would be a hell of a good start.”
Silence fell, only water dripping in the distance to be heard.
Malise dragged her tongue over her top teeth, seemingly weighing her options between murder or the mundane. After a beat, she threw her arms out wide in acceptance. “Okay, my scorching little flame. Have it your way. My brain is yours to pick.”
Mouth hanging open, Terin spun on me. “I didn’t expect to get this far. My mind is blank.”
I patted her gently on the back, then walked to the hot spring with moisture squishing under the treads of my boots. Hiking up the cuffs of my jeans, I squatted down close enough to see the shimmer of violet scales that highlighted the tops of the merqueen’s cheeks. “Why don’t we start with ya tellin’ us all about the Hellhound tidbits ya regaled Rowan with durin’ his visits.”
Folding her hands one on top of the other, she rested her chin between two knuckles and kicked her tail out with a roll of her hips. “I told him basically what I’ve been implying to you, which is that the Hellhound ailment is a virus you should run and hide from at all costs. It can’t be stopped. It can’t be cured. It spreads, it mutates, and it consumes everything in its path like wildfire.”
While chewing on my lower lip, I dragged my palm over the back of my neck. Humid air clung to me in a thick, stifling blanket. “If this virus—as ya put it—is unstoppable, how did it fall dormant for so long? And why would someone awaken such a thing?”
The humor fizzled from Malise’s gaze, replaced by the harsh edges of reality acquired from years of wisdom. “The curse was resurrected by a branding iron infused with the affliction, wielded by one with nothing left to lose.”
“The Countess,” the title of the malicious sorceress, who once ruled my life, left my lips in a barely audible whisper.
Malise nodded her confirmation. “In my opinion, the nobility of your girl’s sacrifice is in no way tarnished by the fact that it wasn’t a victory in the purest sense of the world. The Countess found a way to live on, in a virus as vile as she was.”
“You know of Celeste?”
A smirk twisting across her lips, Malise’s gaze sharpened with a deadly glint. “The most formidable warrior this generation has ever known? Yes, I am familiar with her work.” Ducking around me, she tagged on for Terin’s benefit, “No offense, pet.”
“I’m a nuclear bomb!” Terin raised her hand in way of an explanation and let it fall to her side.
Raising one finger, I paused to think, tapping the hovering digit against my lips. “Even so, she unleashed it after a long dormant period. Meanin’ … it’s been squelched before. If not, every barista, bank teller, and flight attendant would be a Hellhound and the world would be a far bloodier place.”
“Human lore is so frightfully dull,” Malice pouted, clicking the point of one fingernail against the smooth slate stone. “Can I interest either of you in a sandwich, instead?”
“I’m not hungry, but thank you,” Terin politely declined.
Malise’s tongue dragged slowly over her upper lip, ripening her strawberry pucker. “Different kind of sandwich, love.”
I didn’t have to turn to know a hot blush filled Terin’s cheeks, I could feel the heat of it radiating off my back. “I-I’m good,” the Phoenix-girl stammered.
Clapping my hands into a prayer pose, I pressed them to my chin. “Can we please stay on topic just a bit longer.”
“Can’t be stopped, can’t be cured, can be passed from one being to another,” Malise counted them off on her fingers, snapping to attention when a final element came to her. “Well, there is that whole Wat Rong Khun thing.”
Nodding along, my lack of comprehension made me shift direction to a head shake. “If that was English I didn’t catch a word of it.”
“Wat Rong Khun, otherwise known as the White Temple, is in Chiang Rai, Thailand. It was originally constructed in offering to Buddha.” Flicking her hair out behind her, Malise recited the history with bored detachment. “Some time last century an artist bought it and made it his life’s work to restore it. The simple fool believes the project is his key to immortality.” She snorted her contempt at the simplistic idea.
Footsteps squished up beside me, Terin’s shoulders raising with hopeful interest as she neared. “And this artist also happens to be the world’s most powerful wizard, who possessed the ability to contain any ravaging beastie? Because that would be swell.”
“He thinks his hammer is going to help him live forever.” Sarcasm slathered Malise’s every word, her face white-washed of emotion. “I think it’s safe to say he won’t be your fix-it guy.”
“Then why bring him up?” Quickly losing patience, I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste the coppery rush of blood.
Malise’s tone sharpened to a razor’s edge. “It’s not about him. The true magic lies within the temple.” Lips pursed, she murmured her appreciation, “Oh, and it is a vision. The entire structure is a symphony of bone and ice, every inch a tribute to the raw struggle of the never-ending battle that is life. Along the path that leads to the entrance, four stone hands hold up clay bowls in offering. Three are Buddha bowls that offer hearty food and grains to their god. The fourth, is a Tibetan Singing Bowl.”
Grasping at the only element I could finally follow along with, I dipped my head in a jerk of understanding. “They’re used tah signal the beginnin’ and end of periods of meditation.”
“There’s a smart boy.” Malise’s hand snaked up the cuff of my trousers, until an involuntary twitch of my leg caused her to pull away with a throaty chuckle. “The sound is said to clear away negative vibrations, allowing a freshly cleansed chi into the space. The Singing Bowl at Wat Rong Khun is far different. Once rung, its hypnotic melody calls to the darkness, luring it in. Of course, greedy little artifact that it is, it doesn’t stop there. It takes everything, draining the poor soul its unleashed upon until they are reduced to little more than a helpless babe in a mortal shell.”
Rocketing to my feet I passed a small circle in the rocky cavern. “That's it! That's our answer! We use the magic pottery tah suck the evil out of him! I tell ya, ya gotta hand it to the Tibetans—they know good pot! Tibetonians? Tibettites? Ah, it doesn't matter! We’re finally on to somethin’!”
“Look how excited he is.” Terin turned, watching me over her shoulder. “I see a happy dance coming on.”
“He’s proving to be a bit premature, as most men do.” Malise cupped her hands in the water, pushing back with one wide stroke. “He failed to hear the part where all power is sucked from the inflicted. Our boy, Rowan, is currently punch drunk on that power and bloodlust. If he thinks you’re plotting anything, he will tear out your tongue and wear it like a Yakama.”
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“Gettin’ him there is a matter of geography.” I swatted her barb away with a dismissive flick of my wrist. “Batin’ or tauntin’, that lad has been like a brotha tah me for centuries. I can play on his desires and vices enough tah get him there. What I don’t know is how tah use the singin’ bowl when I get him there. How does it work?”
Stilling her strokes, Malise bobbed upright in the center of the spring. “The technique is a delicate one, each step more crucial than the last. You must start by playing—”
Her words faltered, brow creasing.
A black shadow torpedoed through the space with predatory focus.
I blinked once, twice, and again to clear my eyes.
A choked gasp seeped from Malise’s parted lips.
Her chest exploded outward, filleted flesh bulging and dripping from the gaping cavity.
The merqueen’s eyes widened to sand dollars. Slowly tipping her head to inspect the wound, blood oozed from the corner of her mouth. One final glance up, with mortality’s panic slicing lines of terror across her face, and Malise slumped sideways. She collided with the water like a fallen oak.
Rowan—or a version of him—solidified in front of us with Malise’s over-sized heart clutched in his blood-soaked hand. Not so long ago, the time spent on the deck of a ship had kissed his skin to a golden brown and lightened his hair to a gleaming flaxen. Now, darkness tainted every inch of him.
“If I could offer a suggestion for the song-bowl thing,” he casually mused, raising a ventricle to his mouth, “I would love to hear a chorus of ‘Killing Me Softly’.”
Curling his lips around the heart chamber, he sucked mouthfuls of pulsating life from the still-twitching muscle, draining it dry with a noisy slurp.
Chapter Five
“Rowan, this isn’t you, mate.” Jaw tensed, I risked a tentative step closer.
Flinging the depleted heart aside, Row wiped his mouth on the back of his arm, smearing slashes of ruby gore across his face. Complexion drained bone white, he flicked a strand of hair the color of ash from his black eyes.
“Not me, but not alone.” His cheek twitched in manic desperation. The cadence of his voice rose and fell from plaintive whimper to gruff growl. “Protect the girl. Kill them all.”
Radiating heat scorched my arm, Terin edging up beside me. “Protect who, Rowan? Celeste?”
His frame convulsed at the mention of her name. Head whipping side to side in inhuman blur, his bones cracked and popped into a muzzle that retracted as quickly as it appeared. The spasm passing, his shoulders slumped, chest rising and falling in fevered pants.
“Don’t say her name. Can’t say her name,” he pleaded.
Despite everything, Celeste remained his trigger. Fighting back my instinct of possessive jealousy, I utilized that as the only tool I had to work with. “She wouldn’t want any of this. Ya know that. Ya know her.”
Eyes bulging to manic saucers, he paced alongside the hot spring where the merqueen’s body floated like discarded trash. “Doing it for her. All for her. Sever the line. Destroy the connection.”
“Sever the …” I parroted, chewing on the words. Icy awareness chilled me to the bone. “You’re destroying any connection between you and Celeste.”
Planting his feet, Rowan spun on me, hands clenched into white knuckle fists at his sides. “You can’t say her name!” The force of his bellow reddened his face, the tendons of his neck protruding.
Terrin’s hands raised to pump the brakes on his hissy fit. “Okay, no problem. We’ll go the Rowling route and call her She That Shall Not Be Named. Motion passed, now let’s stay calm.”
If he heard her, he was too far gone for the words to register. Again, his head shook, morphing outward with each frantic whip. A flash of canine fangs. The blaze of blood red eyes. Ears elongating to points. A widening snout tearing from Rowan’s chiseled features. Through the flurry, the beast emerged in all his heaving, nightmarish splendor.
“Demon,” he hissed, jaws snapping in ravenous delight. Head snapping in Terin’s direction, he tilted his head in a fashion more canine than human. Sniffing the air, his jaw lolled open, drool dripping from his fangs. “And the Conduit. Your delicious scent gives you away, Chosen One. I longed to hunt you down, but it seems my generous new host delivered you right to me. What an unexpected treat for fangs and flesh to revel in.”
“The Conduit,” Terin sampled the phrase, the mistaken identity souring on her tongue. “Yes, I suppose I am.”
A sidestep and I positioned myself between her and the hound. “I love ya, brotha. But, I’m not gonna let ya raise one hand tah harm her.”
Red eyes bore into me, daring me to attack. “My essence was forged in the pits of hell. My appetite has leveled entire kingdoms. Do you really mean to challenge me, boy?”
Lungs expanding, I called water to me. Blue diamonds ebbed and flowed across my skin. Salty sea air breezed through the cave, tossing my hair from my scalp.
“I’ve spent my fair share of time in hell.” Raising my arms at my sides, the hot spring responded to my call, churning and slapping angrily against the rocks. “Shall we compare monsters? I bet mine’s bigger.”
The Hellhound stalked a slow circle around us, prompting me to follow his movement to deny him a path to her.
“Wanna take a run at the title of alpha, do you?” His tongue smacked against his teeth. “Ask me nicely and I will keep you alive long enough to watch her die. Her screams could act as your funeral march before I rip out your throat and reveal you for the pitiful little bitch you are.”
Chin to my chest, I focused on the water. My rage channeled through it, swelling it from the pool in a furious cyclone. The roar of its lashing winds echoed through cavern. “They say ya can’t die,” I shouted over the howling storm. “I do hope that means ya’ll suffer for all eternity when I cast ya tah Davy Jones’ locker.”
Fixing his ominous crimson stare my way, a low-rumble of laughter leaked from his clenched jaws. “Such brave posing and posturing. Even so, you’ve forgotten one crucial detail.”
A twitch of his head and an unseen hand closed around my throat, hoisting me up with barely the tips of my toes brushing the ground. Gasping for breath, I lost my hold on the water. It splashed down dormant, jostling the carcass of the floating merqueen.
Prowling intimately close, he whispered against my cheek, “I possess all your friend’s talents now. If it suits me, I will bring you to your knees and make you worship me as your messiah.”
Flames burst from Terin’s shoulders, her hair licking from her scalp in a blaze that ignited the room the bright orange of dawn. “Let him go!” she flared.
The hound raised one finger and Terin’s mouth knit shut. Weaving between us, he edged alongside her, dragging the back of his knuckle down her cheek. “The things I could do with control of your mind. I could make you offer me your throat and beg me to hurt you just a little … bit … more.”
“Keep your hands off of her,” I rasped with as much force as I could muster.
Burying his nose in the crook of her neck, the hound breathed deep. “I’m going to explore every inch of you. Indulge my cravings in your flesh. Tell me, Conduit, what you want me to do to you?”
Chin quivering, tears welled in Terin’s eyes as her own lips betrayed her by speaking his desires. “I want you to devour me.”
Struggling against the force trapping my arms captive at my sides, my shoulders thrashed violently from side to side. “Terin! Ya will get through this, lass! I promise ya that!”
The hound turned his gruesome snout my way, strands of his hair tickling Terin’s alabaster throat which she held still and stretched in unwilling offering.
“Tsk, tsk,” his tongue clucked against the roof of his mouth. “Don’t lie to the girl. That’s simply cruel.”
The unseen noose around my neck tightened. Mouth opening and closing in desperate gulps, my ears rang in warning. Black spots danced before my eyes, quickly banding together in a curtain of
darkness.
Hand to her throat, the hound guided Terin back, easing her down against a hefty bolder. Tears zigzagged down her cheeks, fear trembling her clamped lips.
“Don’t pass out on us yet,” the hound encouraged, loosening the grip on my throat to the slightest degree. “I want you to watch. To feel the full weight of your impotence to protect her.”
Greedily gulping in what air I could, I prayed it would grant me the clarity to plot a brilliant escape—or lackluster fumbling to freedom. At that point either would do.
Back arching, the hound’s hackles rose, his top lip curling from his teeth. Terin stiffened as he bowed his head to her neck. His vicious, curled claws weaved into her hair, wrenching her head to the side to farther expose her delicate flesh.
Voice dropping to a throaty whisper, he dragged his sandpaper tongue up from her collarbone to her jawline. “I’m going to grant you your voice so you can scream for me. Be a good girl, and let me hear every torturous moment. Take me on a journey into your nightmare.”
Blinking her indignant rage at the ceiling, Terin forced the words through clenched teeth. “I refuse to grant you the pleasure.”
Sliding one hand beneath her, the hound pulled her body to his. “As if you could refuse me anything.”
With a sickening thunk, he unhinged his jaw into a cavernous maw. Terin bristled, her eyes wide with the scream she stifled. Turning his head to the side, the hound sealed his mouth around hers. Chest lurching, her legs twitched for escape from the beast preparing to feast on her soul.
The weight of my own helplessness crushed into me more than the ocean ever could. There was nothing I could do for her. Fortunately, Terin had friends far more powerful than myself.
“Terin,” I croaked, the strain chaffing my throat raw, “go nuclear!”
The hound could stifle Terin, but the full inferno of the Phoenix was another matter.
Red-rimmed eyes peering my way, her head jerked in denial. Not that I could blame her. Setting off a fiery explosion in air pocket at the bottom of the ocean wasn’t the most desirable course of action. Be that as it may, it was a far less terrifying alternative than letting a Hellhound absorb a Conduit.
Inferno (The Gryphon Series Book 6) Page 5