by Ted Dekker
Of course. Yes, of course.
“You are now in my nest, where I lay unfertilized eggs that become larvae. Any Shataiki but a queen can bring the young ones to life; all it requires is a single drop of blood. A single bite.”
Janae found the words irresistibly seductive. She wasn’t sure why; what he said surpassed all she yet knew about her own existence.
“You wonder why you long for this blood, don’t you, daughter?”
“Yes,” she whimpered, stepping closer.
“Once there were twelve of our forests, each a nest for a queen. One forest was burned, and the queen Alucard left us. And when Alucard left our world, he entered yours, two thousand years before you were born, at the turn of your calendars. There were no Shataiki to fertilize his own larvae. But he found a way to satisfy his need for offspring by injecting his own blood into a human woman. We know this from one of the blood books, the journal of Saint Thomas the Beast Hunter, where it is recorded that a race of half-breeds came into existence and spread their seed on earth. He called the descendants Vampirum. Offspring.”
She knew where he was going, and it terrified her.
“You, Janae, crave the blood because your father many generations removed was a half-breed. Shataiki blood runs in your veins still. You are offspring.” He paused. “Does that excite you?” Marsuuv was speaking softly, drawing her in with his eyes and the gentle movement of his talons.
“Yes,” she breathed. She could taste a hint of blood on her own tongue, and she gave herself to the desire for it. Even Billy . . . his blood had hints of the same irresistible taste.
Shataiki blood.
As she stepped closer, a distant voice whispered a warning: It’s evil, Janae. Raw, unfiltered evil, like the larvae. You have entered hell, and you are begging to drink evil.
“Come, my sweet,” Marsuuv purred. “Come, taste and see that I am evil.” He sprang from the bed and swept the lost books from the stone desk. An altar, she now saw. It was his altar.
Janae walked around to his side of the altar and reached for his claw. He leaned close so that she could feel his breath; the power in that hot blast of air robbed the last threads of resistance from her. She understood Ba’al’s desire to be with this magnificent beast.
She instinctively leaned forward and took his fur in her fingers, longing to be closer. He reacted like a sprung animal, plucking her from the ground and slamming her down on the stone. Pain flashed down her back.
The beast leaped upon the altar, gripping the deeply scarred edge with his long claws. He hunched over her and glared.
“You want more,” the beast growled. “More. This is why he chose you.”
Janae began to cry with gratitude. She’d always known that there was something wrong with her. Something different. Her own appetites for adventure, for pleasure, for more, always more, were far more pronounced than others’. Now she understood.
It was the blood. Shataiki blood. Her own father had passed this desire to her.
“Please . . .” She grabbed the creature’s hair and pulled. “Please . . .”
“You long for it. To be Teeleh’s daughter?”
“Yes!”
“To curse Elyon and embrace evil for eternity?”
“Yes!”
His jaw came down slowly, and she stretched her neck for him. Felt his fangs touch her skin.
Then Marsuuv, queen of the twelfth forest, bit into Janae’s flesh and injected his blood into her veins. And the power that flooded her body made it shake like a dying rat.
Her jaw snapped wide and she screamed. With pain, with pleasure, with the terror of raw evil.
Marsuuv pulled his fangs free, still dripping with her blood, dug three claws into her forehead to mark her as his own, offered a satisfied shudder, and slowly climbed off the table, leaving her to jerk alone.
Billy was saying something, protesting, but she couldn’t focus on him because her nerves had turned to fire. Not with pain, necessarily, but with sensitivity. She could sense everything, the cool stone beneath her, the movement of air around her, the pinpricks of pain on her neck. The scent of the flames, the blood, the sweat, the mucus, everything. Her pain had turned to pleasure, and she was having a hard time containing it all.
“In good time, my love,” Marsuuv was saying. “All in good time. Get her up.”
The sensations softened, leaving her exhausted and content. Hands pulled on her cloak, and she opened her eyes. Billy leaned over her, shaking her. She smiled. “Billy.”
“Get up.”
She looked up at him, lost in the moment.
“Get up!” he snapped.
She sat up, forgiving his jealous outburst. She hopped off the altar, feeling more alive and energized than she’d ever felt. An image of Ba’al’s shriveled husk of a body crossed her mind, but she dismissed it without a second thought. She was no Ba’al.
Janae glanced at Billy, aware of how little she cared for this human now. He seemed small and pitiful to her, a feeble man who’d succumbed to the thirst for evil, not unlike herself, except that she had been bred for it. What was his excuse?
Billy was the author, her inner voice whispered. He’s now your master.
She turned away, refusing to indulge the notion, and faced Marsuuv, who sat on his bed of vines once again.
“You wish to prove yourself?” he asked. Somehow he must know. Perhaps his mind had joined hers while he fed on her blood.
She pulled the three vials from the side of her bra and set them on the altar. He reached for the tiny bottles and touched them with the tip of his talon.
“Tell me,” he said.
“The one marked with the white tape is Raison Strain B. It has the power to destroy all life. Billy and I are immune to it now.”
“It cannot kill albinos or half-breeds,” he said. “None who have bathed in the lakes.”
He knew about the virus?
“The virus originates with Teeleh’s blood,” Marsuuv said, seeing her raised brow. “It will only worsen the disease the Horde already have.”
Her mind spun.
“And the other sicknesses?” he demanded.
“The one marked with the black tape is Asian Ebola. Terminal to all but Billy and me. We’ve been inoculated with a vaccine like everyone in our world. The last vial is as labeled, a sample of Thomas’s blood, which we both have in our systems as well.”
The beast reacted to the mention of Thomas with a jerk of his head.
“He’s in Bangkok,” Janae said, wondering how much the Shataiki knew.
Marsuuv pulled back slowly. “So, the time has come. The humans will decide. We can destroy the land, we can pluck their eyes out, we can whisper evil into their minds, we can rape and pillage and burn, but in the end only humans can unlock their destiny.”
“And now we bring you the keys to that destiny,” Billy said.
“Not you, Billy. My master has another task for you. As soon as you and I become better acquainted.”
Billy glanced at Janae with furtive eyes.
“But Janae,” Marsuuv said, purring again, “you will be our new Eve. Together we will destroy them all, and the world will know that Teeleh owns the humans.”
She had a craving for his blood.
“You will find Samuel. Seduce him. Seduce the half-breeds.” His voice popped with phlegm. “Seduce the albinos. The time has come for the dragon to consume his young.”
He plucked the vial of Asian Ebola from the altar and set it by his side, leaving Thomas’s blood untouched. “You have no need for this. The Raison Strain will give you the power you need.”
“What about the half-breeds?” she asked. “The albinos.”
“They will die.”
“How, if my poison only affects full-breed Horde?”
Marsuuv glared. “Do I look like a fool? Do as I say.”
“And me? Will I die?”
“You, too, are his lover,” he said slowly, enunciating each word. Teeleh’s desire was
to destroy them all and begin over with Billy and Janae, his new lovers in his own twisted garden.
It all fit. The only reason the Shataiki hadn’t already destroyed humanity was because only humans could destroy humanity. As such, people were more powerful than Shataiki. Unable to complete their revenge on the world, the Shataiki had hidden themselves, biding their time.
Now that time had come. Janae held the virus that would destroy the Horde and leave the destruction of the Eramites and the albinos to Teeleh.
Marsuuv gazed at her. “Go and do what you must do quickly.”
33
TORUN VALLEY, to the northwest of Qurongi City, had been turned black with the swarming masses of the Horde army. Chelise stared at the sight, amazed that she was alive, much less here. If not for the Roush, Michal, she would surely be at the Gathering now, safe, but still lost.
She’d wandered into the desert with the Roush’s words swimming around her: They will come for you in the desert. Wait for them.
Wait for who, the Horde? The Circle? Thomas and her father? Could it be that Elyon was coming for her? Or the Shataiki . . .
The sun rose after Michal left her, and she had slowly worked her way home toward Paradose Valley and the Circle, waiting to be overtaken any moment by whomever she was to wait for. The sun rose. The day passed.
And as she drew nearer to home, she began to see signs of albinos arriving in response to Thomas’s call. They were coming from far and wide, eager to flood Paradose Valley. Perhaps she should leave the desert and return to the Gathering rather than wait. She wanted to kiss her Jake and make sure that all was well. But of course all was not well. Thousands would be pouring into the valley. Samuel was in danger or was a danger. Thomas had vanished.
Besides, how would she know she’d been found by whomever she was waiting for?
And then she had crested a tall dune, seen the Scab patrol under a lone tree, waiting for her, and she knew. She’d been found as she was meant to be found.
Still, it took her five full minutes to work up the courage to approach the two men, who seemed content to watch her. She approached with dread and determination.
“My name is Stephen,” the young Horde scout had said. “Your mother, Lady Patricia, has requested that you join her in the Torun Valley immediately.”
Immediately. Chelise knew that the worst had happened. Qurong and Thomas had fallen into terrible trouble. Why else would a plea come from her mother?
“Stephen?” It was the first word she’d spoken to a Scab since her drowning.
“Yes, my lady. We will keep you safe, but you must not leave our sides.”
It wasn’t until much later, after the first long day’s ride, that she realized he wasn’t protecting her from other Horde warriors. He was on the sharp lookout for the new breed of albino fighters. “We all know they are much faster, far more skilled than even the Eramites.”
His companion had chuckled. “And everyone knows the Eramites are superior to most Horde.”
“Really?”
“How does an army that has no war stay in fighting shape?” the man named Reeslar demanded. “Our Throaters and scouts are the only ones who have the skills that once made the Horde proud.”
“And even then the Forest Guard used to beat us up pretty badly,” Chelise said.
Her use of the inclusive “us” silenced them for a moment. But it had been “us” back then, and it should be again, she thought. Their smell didn’t bother her as much as it bothered other albinos. In fact, the only difference between them and many albinos was the fact that albinos had drowned in a red lake.
Stephen had broken the silence. “Teeleh save us if the albinos ever decide to take up arms.”
The other grunted his agreement, and for the smallest amount of time, Chelise understood Samuel’s desire to fight. Until now, she hadn’t understood the superiority of the average albino’s fighting skill and strength. The absence of disease and their constant running from scouting parties had kept them fresh and hardened, ready to engage any enemy.
After crossing the desert for the second time in a day, she sat on her mare between the two Throaters and studied the armies in the Torun Valley. She’d seen dozens of patrols as a youth, but always from a distance. Before they’d overtaken the forests, the Horde went to great lengths to blend into the sand, breeding horses with tan hides and keeping to the valleys. Afterward, they’d reversed their strategy, preferring to be seen in all their dominant glory rather than hide as fugitives like the Circle.
A small army of Horde had once made it to the edge of Chelise and Thomas’s camp before the tribe of albinos had escaped. She’d watched the Horde with Thomas from the nearby hills, wondering if she could talk reason into them.
That was at the beginning, before her father unleashed the full force of his rage against them. The Horde butchered several camps and captured hundreds of albinos in the months that followed. She’d once helplessly watched from a cliff as Throaters hung three albinos she knew well: Ismael, Judin, and Chrystin.
Chelise wept that day, and Thomas made the decision to go deeper into the desert. The Circle learned to adapt, and the Horde grew impatient with the meager pickings. But life in the deep desert was harsh, and the red pools were scarce. They had to move every two or three weeks to find food and wood, and long trips were made to harvest the desert wheat. A hunting party might take a week to kill two or three deer for a feast.
This, and the fact that Elyon had left his red pools in and near the forests, persuaded Thomas that they should move closer to the forests once again. The danger was higher, but so was the reward.
Besides, the elders often agreed, Elyon would be returning soon anyway. Any day. Any week. Not even a few months. Surely not more than a year.
That was seven years ago. And now more than a few albinos wanted to retake the forests.
This Horde army crawling through the Torun Valley might be slower and weaker than any albino army, but they were as numerous as the sands! A massive blanket of men and horses and tents stretched out to the horizon, then was swallowed in a dusty haze.
“There must be a million,” she said.
“Many,” Stephen said.
“The whole army?”
Again, silence, though Stephen had already let the fact slip. At times, she was certain he forgot she was albino and regarded her only as royalty. He was taking her home, after all.
“All this for a training exercise?” she asked in wonder.
“It’s never been done, but it makes sense. The army needs training.”
“Yes, but the logistics. It must be a nightmare to move so many men.”
Reeslar scoffed. “We did it all the time in the desert! This . . . this is nothing.”
“You’re sure my father isn’t with them?”
Stephen ignored the question. “They’re waiting. We shouldn’t wait.”
“They?”
The scout turned his horse from the crest of the hill and trotted toward the trees. “Your mother awaits you, daughter of Qurong.”
“Where?” She kicked her mount into a run, flanked by the other two.
“Close. Just over the hill.”
They rode hard, passing by several patrols and guards stationed in the trees. She wore a hooded robe at Stephen’s insistence. His orders were to deliver her in secrecy. They could either go in with her bound in chains or looking like Horde, and he recommended the latter. She was, after all, Qurong’s daughter.
The royal camp was erected on a plateau above Torun Valley, surrounded by a company of Throaters who’d formed a perimeter several hundred yards out. A dozen flags bearing the winged serpent image flapped over a large canvas tent that was bordered by four smaller tents. Around this grouping sat several dozen smaller tents belonging to the royal entourage and the guard.
Temple guard, if she wasn’t mistaken. Then Ba’al was out here as well?
“It has been a pleasure escorting you, daughter of Qurong,” Stephen said. �
��I pray that Teeleh will favor you from the many evil spirits who seek to kill the less fortunate.”
How long had it been since she’d heard such a blessing? “Thank you,” she said.
He slowed as they passed the main guard, then saluted another, who glared and took her reins.
“You’re a good man, Stephen. I pray Elyon will smile on you.”
The scout hesitated, then dipped his head.
Her new guard dismounted and delivered her to the main tent’s flap before stepping aside. “Inside,” he said gruffly. Chelise took a deep breath, pulled the flap open, and stepped back into her past.
The first thing that stood out to her was the bowl of morst by the entrance. She wasn’t sure why this would take her attention from the lavish furnishings inside or from the three people who stood across the room. Maybe because the morst represented all that was wrong with her old way of life.
To think that a paste the consistency of soft flour could cover up a disease was ludicrous. It was a beautiful lie.
She released the flap and peered into the dimly lit room. Patricia, whom she had not seen in ten years, stood by the center pole ten yards away, hands clasped in front of her. She wore a red robe, and her hair was drawn back in ceremonial fashion.
“Chelise?”
She felt her knees weaken. To hear her mother call her name . . . She’d missed the woman more than even she’d realized.
“Is that you?”
Her hood! She was standing in the shadows with her hood pulled up. Chelise stepped forward into the light cast by two lamp stands and slipped her hood off.
“Hello, Mother.”
Patricia’s face slowly wrinkled as emotion swallowed her. Her hands lifted as if to embrace her daughter, but then lowered. She glanced to her right, where the two men stood. The first was the general she’d known years earlier when he was only a captain. Cassak. The second . . .
Chelise felt every nerve in her body shut down as she stared at the large form and gray eyes belonging to Qurong, supreme commander of the Horde. Her own father, whom she loved as much as her own life.