by I. T. Lucas
Where had he gone wrong?
He had been so careful, thinking of every little detail, covering his tracks so meticulously…
It doesn't matter.
It is all over.
Amanda might have prevented his field execution, but she would not be able to keep her brother from locking him in a small dark cell and throwing away the key.
Which would be worse than death.
Even entombment was better than that. Though it took a long time, consciousness eventually faded at some point—not so with an indeterminate prison sentence.
Maybe he could goad the fucker to attack him. Call his sister some nasty names… that would certainly do it…
But Dalhu knew he wouldn't.
As it were, allowing a Doomer to touch her and then making it worse by defending him, Amanda had already lost her brother's respect. There was no way he was making it even more difficult for her.
His only other option was to plead with the fucker to kill him…
Like hell.
No way would he give the arrogant, condescending, pretentious cocksucker the satisfaction.
Fuck him.
Dalhu was made of stronger stuff than that.
And brother or not, no one was looking down his nose at Amanda. No one.
He would challenge the fucker to a fight for making his own sister feel like crap.
There was nothing to justify such a sanctimonious attitude.
She hadn't stolen anything, hadn't harmed anyone or herself, and as the sole owner of her own body, she was free to do with it as she pleased—without prejudice or judgment.
That brother of hers was such a hypocrite. Where were his clan's lofty ideas of freedom and equality? Of a woman's right to choose whomever she pleased?
Supposedly, this whole ancient feud between their people was the result of the mother of their clan exercising that exact right, and choosing one male over another.
Amanda's brother was no better, in attitude if not in deeds, than the scum in Dalhu's part of the world who murdered their own daughters and sisters for putting a blemish on their family's honor.
The supposed blemish, more often than not, was the product of being a victim of rape.
It was ironic, really, that Dalhu, a Doomer, was going to teach that supposedly progressive jerk a thing or two about the respect he ought to show his sister.
Straightening his shoulders, Dalhu lifted his head and took a quick glance behind him, but Amanda and the mortals had fallen behind. He could dimly hear the murmur of their voices, but he couldn't see her.
CHAPTER 32: KIAN
Barreling downhill, Kian waited till he walked off some of his anger before pulling out his sat-phone to call his mother.
"We've got Amanda. Unharmed… perfectly fine, actually." Kian did his best to sound civil, hoping his mother wouldn't notice the bite he struggled to keep out of his tone.
"I told you she was fine. Never doubt me, Kian."
"I'm glad you were proven right. Is Syssi with you?"
"She is here by my side, waiting impatiently to talk to you."
"Could you put her on?"
"Here you go, sweetie,” he heard his mother say as she handed the phone to Syssi.
"Oh, God, I'm so relieved. Is everybody okay? Did anyone get hurt?"
"Andrew's plan worked without a hitch, or rather despite a hitch or two…"
"Why? What happened?"
"Nothing I'm in the mood to discuss over the phone. I'll tell you when we get home."
There was a moment of silence. "You don't sound as happy as I thought you would be…" Syssi hesitated before whispering, "Did you kill the Doomer? Is that why you sound so strange?"
"No, I didn't. Though, not because I didn't want to or am such a forgiving kind of guy," he grated. "Amanda didn't let me. She practically pulled out chunks of my hair to stop me from—" tearing his throat out.
Oh, hell, he had almost blurted that out. Let her assume he only meant to put the fucker to sleep, permanently, with an overdose of venom… "Yeah, I probably have a few bald spots on my head."
"Oh, wow…"
"Yeah, wow is right. And that is not even the half of it. But I'll tell you the rest later."
"I guess Amanda is not next to you. Is she close by? I want to talk to her, see how she is coping, offer my support… She must be traumatized by the ordeal."
His sweet Syssi. She was on to him and was trying, very delicately, to bring him around to see things from a different perspective.
He sighed. "No, she is not. I had to get out of there and left Anandur and Brundar to deal with her and that thing."
"I hope that by 'to deal with' you don't mean 'to take care off' like in the gangster movies…"
He chuckled. "No, we are bringing the perp to the keep and rewarding him for kidnaping Amanda with indefinite free room and board in a small cell down in the basement."
"That's good… I can't wait for you guys to get home." Syssi paused and sighed. "Be nice to Amanda, Kian. She had been through enough."
He wanted to tell Syssi he would try, but that would have been a lie. Right now he couldn't even bring himself to look at his sister, let alone be nice to her. The best he might be able to pull off was to ignore her. And he wasn't sure he could do even that.
How the hell could she? Let that animal touch her? A cold-blooded murderer?
It might not have been this particular Doomer's fangs that had killed Mark, but he was part of the team that had done it. And even if that wasn't the case, he was a Doomer, for fuck's sake. A filthy, disgusting, evil creature.
"I need to speak with my mother. Could you pass her the phone?"
There was a silent pause before Syssi answered. "Yeah, sure."
She probably expected him to say he couldn't wait to hold her in his arms, or some other nice romantic thing, but he just couldn't. Not yet.
"You wish to speak with me?"
"We are bringing in the… the Doomer to be jailed in the basement. Permanently. On the remote chance that he will somehow manage to escape, or find a way to communicate with the other minions of evil, I don't want him to find out you're here. So please, don't wait for us on the roof."
"As you wish. I will await my daughter in her quarters."
Ending the call, Kian suspected that Annani humored him for now, but most likely was already planning on visiting the Doomer later on.
He could understand her desire to question the enemy, but there was no need for that. He would do the gruesome task for her, sparing her delicate sensibilities.
In fact, he was looking forward to it. And if that made him a bad guy, so be it. He had never claimed to be a saint.
Providing an apt ambiance for his malevolent intentions, the wolf pack that had hightailed it after the explosions was back, following him from a safe distance and howling like crazy.
He wasn't worried about them attacking him, and there were enough armed men with Amanda to ensure her safety. His brisk pace had nothing to do with the pack. But it brought him to his destination well ahead of the others.
The helicopter was parked at the spot they'd agreed on, where the narrow paved road had a little shoulder, providing just enough space for the thing not to block it completely. There was no traffic this late at night high up in the mountains. But on the remote chance that some random vehicle might be passing through, the pilot had placed small flares around the chopper and had left just enough space for a car to squeeze by. A truck would be shit out of luck.
Kian climbed inside and moved to sit up front with the pilot.
"How did it go?" the guy asked.
"Mission accomplished," Kian bit out. The pilot waited for him to elaborate. "They are on their way with an additional load of two hundred and something pounds. If this thing cannot take the added weight, I have no problem with disposing of it."
It took a moment for the pilot to catch his drift, and then his face paled. "No, it's okay, this bird is designed to take ten passengers, ni
ne in the cabin and one more next to the pilot. We changed the configuration to make more space for cargo."
Bloody civilians. He should demand that all of the Guardians learn how to fly those things; himself included. Bringing uninitiated rookies on missions was a mistake.
What if someone had been injured? Would the guy faint at the sight of blood?
Kian sighed, running his hand through his hair and wincing as he pulled on a sore spot.
Truth was, he envied the guy.
Must be nice to be so naive, to still cringe at the sight of blood, or the mere thought of carnage. It was a luxury Kian had never been afforded. Since he was scarcely more than a boy, he had witnessed and participated in enough bloodbaths to fill a lake.
It was hard to maintain humanity, or rather what mortals referred to as humanity, after seeing how little of it there was in the world, and how easily it was shed. The term no longer held the same meaning for him as it did for others. He knew how little it took to incite people into becoming murderous monsters that killed, maimed and raped everyone in their path. History recounted plenty of examples, too many of which Kian had witnessed first-hand.
Being nearly two thousand years old, he had a lot of shit to carry around in his head; shit he would've gladly forgotten.
The thing was, though, history had a nasty habit of repeating itself. And if one were foolish enough to forget the lessons of the past, one couldn't recognize the pattern—the chain of events that time and again had led to catastrophes of epic proportions.
The burden of his memories, his experiences, and his deeds had hardened him; like a sharp blade, annealing him until he became a formidable weapon. He had accepted his fate and was resigned to the sacrifices he had to make, paying with bits and sometimes chunks of his so-called immortal soul, until he felt hollow on the inside.
It was his fate.
But sometimes, in moments of weakness, he wished for oblivion.
Dear fates, he prayed that if he and Syssi were ever blessed with a child, it would be a daughter. Because, even though gender roles were changing, as a girl chances were better that she wouldn't have to go into battle and become a killer.
The act of killing tainted the soul.
It didn't matter if you killed in self-defense, or in the defense of your family, or if your enemy was the lowest, evil scum that deserved to be eradicated from the face of the earth.
Once you killed another, something inside you died as well. And then it became easier and easier with each subsequent kill.
More than anything, he wished for his children to be spared that fate. And he would do his best to shield them and their mother from the ugliness of reality and his own disillusionment with humans and immortals alike.
Fucking Doomers.
It was all their fault.
Dimly, he was aware that it wasn't true. Mortals were perfectly capable of instigating wars and committing genocide without the Doomers stirring things up—as evident by the bloody history of the Maya and other primitive peoples that the Doomers had never given a fuck about.
Still, it was more gratifying to focus the blame on a particular group.
That way, he could still harbor an irrational shard of hope that without the Doomers to poison the minds and hearts of mortals, global peace and prosperity could be achieved, and the future was not as bleak as it seemed.
But whether true or not, there was no way to get rid of the Doomers, so it was a moot point. They were too powerful, and their evil tentacles reached too far, too wide, and too deep.
Stupid girl.
How could his own sister be so fucking stupid?
And she attacked him, her own brother, to defend that scum.
If it wasn't for the 'If even a little of his skin tears, I'm never going to forgive you. Ever!' she had screamed in his ear, he might have still harbored hope she was saving the Doomer for the information that could be extracted from him, and that the whole naked thing was about her pulling a Mata Hari.
The best orgasm of her life…
As he felt the bile rise in his throat, Kian took a big gulp from his water bottle, swallowed some, then gurgled and spat out the rest.
He wished he had something stronger than water with him. But in a pinch, a cigarette would work.
Pulling the pack from his back pocket, he was surprised to see he had only two left. Evidently, the habit was back in full force.
Whatever, he had bigger problems than this insignificant addiction.
Stepping out of the chopper, he walked a few feet away and lit one of his remaining coffin-nails, then took a long drag out of the thing.
Damn, it felt good.
And by the time the brothers showed up with the Doomer between them, Kian was on his second and last cigarette, and in a much calmer mood.
Which was lucky for the fucker.
"Did he give you guys any trouble?"
"Nah, he was doing the dead-man-walking thing most of the way." Anandur helped the Doomer climb inside… and buckled him in…
What the hell?
"Why are you so cordial with him?" Kian gestured with his cigarette.
"What? You wanted me to roughen him up? You should have said something…" Anandur's red brows went in tight together.
"No, I'm just surprised. Usually, you're not as… reserved."
"For one, he didn't give us any trouble, and I'm not a bully who beats up prisoners. Second, he didn't harm our girl. And if she defended him, he obviously isn't some evil abomination. And third, he doesn't stink like some of the others. Besides, he looks so dead that it would’ve been like kicking a corpse. Which I don't do. Not unless they stink, that is."
"I never thought I would say this to you, but you are a better man than I, Anandur." Kian slapped the guy's thick bicep.
"I'll be damned. Did you hear that, Brundar? I want you to commit this to memory for future reference and back me up when no one believes me. I actually got a compliment from the big man himself."
Kian shook his head as he stubbed out what was left of his cigarette on the heel of his boot and returned it to join the other butts in the empty box. Anandur had a knack for making him smile. The big oaf… what was it that Andrew had dubbed him? The redheaded Goliath… Nah, that was a mouthful, he’d stick with oaf… The big oaf never took anything seriously.
Nevertheless, hard as he tried, Kian couldn't dismiss the guy's assessment, or fault his logic. Who would have thought that while Kian's hatred for the enemy was turning him into a psychopath, Anandur was keeping his cool? On the other hand, it wasn't Anandur's sister who the fucker had kidnaped and defiled.
"Go and knock him out. I want him unconscious until he wakes up in the dungeon."
"And who is going to carry him in? Did you see the size of that guy? Why not just blindfold him?"
"We'd manage. I don't want him to have any idea where we're taking him. Not the distance traversed, not the sounds on the way, nothing."
"Got it. A blow to the head or a tranquilizer?"
"Whichever, I don't care.”
CHAPTER 33: AMANDA
As they cleared the trees and the chopper came into view. Amanda's eyes immediately went searching for Dalhu.
She found him, sitting between Anandur and Brundar, his huge body slumped forward, held in place by the seatbelt he was strapped in with.
Oh, no. She felt guilt slide over her, coating her with a layer of nasty self-reproach. She shouldn't have let Dalhu out of her sight, leaving him undefended with her brother and his sidekicks. Pulling her hand out from Andrew's grip, she tore across the narrow road and leaped up into the thing.
She grabbed for Dalhu's wrist even before her knees touched the helicopter's cabin floor, searching for his pulse as she went down to kneel in front of him.
Thank heavens; he wasn't dead. But he was out like a light.
"What have you done to him?" She glowered at the brothers.
"Just a tranquilizer, the boss's orders, princess."
She eye
d Anandur suspiciously. "You didn't beat him up or anything, did you?"
"And earn your wrath? No, thank you very much." Feigning offense, Anandur humphed and looked away, crossing his tree-trunk-sized arms over his chest.
"Stop bullshitting. If Kian had ordered you to do it, you would've done it in a heartbeat. My wrath, my ass… Now, move over, you two. I want to sit next to him."
Brundar got up and moved to sit in the row behind them, but Anandur ignored her, pretending to be absorbed by the view of the dark forest he was gazing at through the chopper's window.
"You too," she commanded.
"Sorry, no can do, princess. His body will soon neutralize the tranquilizer, and I'd have to dose him again. Take Brundar's seat."
"Fine." She plopped down next to Dalhu and crossed her arms over her chest.
Her feet hurt, and after a moment or two of pouting, she bent down and took her dirty sneakers off, along with the socks. Rubbing her toes, she glanced at the back of Kian's head.
The big jerk was ignoring her. Sitting up front with the pilot, he didn't even turn around to acknowledge her presence. Would it kill him to say something nice? Like, I'm glad you are not dead, Amanda? Or, I was so worried about you, Amanda?
Whatever, she was too tired to deal with the supercilious prick. Syssi must have the heart of an angel to put up with that. Poor girl.
Kian didn't deserve her.
And to think she was the one who had brought these two together.
Yet instead of showing his gratitude, her brother was being an ogre.
Tears stung the back of her eyes as she imagined the very different welcome she would get from Syssi. She had no doubt her friend was waiting anxiously for her to come home and would run to hug her and kiss her and tell her how worried she was, and how happy she was to have Amanda back safe and sound.
Syssi was such a sweet soul… and so was Andrew…
Following after his two friends into the craft, Andrew yanked the heavy sliding door shut, then gave her shoulder a little squeeze before heading back to join his friends in the last row.