by C. V. Larkin
Other nightmares oozed out behind it: a frighteningly non-child little girl with skeletal long fingered hands that lengthened and retracted, making gruesome popping sounds and an anti-child that towered at around six feet elevated by legs that didn't belong to it. Its stolen gams were stitched with thick black thread, one on top of the other. All four of the tiny knees were horribly swollen with waggling flaps of flesh that peeled from the attachment sights.
The list kept going; so many atrocities ran together at once his brain couldn't process them all. He was looking at a crime scene so brutal that the bits and pieces came off as abstract: big bodies with extra limbs, exceptionally long arms, misshapen joints, childlike perfection under sloughing skin, anatomy twisted at impossible angles. Each affectation was increasingly disturbing even to a card carrying member of the desensitized horror junkie generation. The air of menace that rolled off the pack of them made his blood curdle like a bad drink, but the stolen innocence that hung heavy in those small faces was what put him over the edge.
The female with the spider leg digits and the soiled night shirt started to move. Sio stood entranced, watching the methodical way in which she used those malformed hands to drag her small body forward. Her seeking skeletal fingers climbed from the floor, reaching toward the tan coat Loren was wearing.
"Don't let her touch him," Tian said.
The hollow note in her tone caught his attention. She was pressed up against the wall with her gun aimed at the tiny bald monster with the teeth in its mug. Otherwise she was a statue, emotions locked down so tight, she was practically inanimate. Her expression reminded him of the night he'd seen her in the fireplace. God, that seemed like years ago.
There was another nightmare standing on the opposite side of her. The entire lower half of its face had elongated, skin stretching in horrific ways while bones hung in broken patches sticking through the skin at impossible angles. What remained of its nasal passageways and ruined mouth slid up her thigh with lecherous affection. Sio closed his eyes while a fear-fueled desire for violence built to unreasonable proportions in his skull.
"Get her away from him," Tian reiterated.
Sio looked back at Loren. The anti-girl had her talons into the skin of the guy's chest and he'd turned the gun on himself. Sio reached out, grabbing both of her brittle paws in one hand, and jerked them free with a sickening crunch. Her small head whipped toward him as if it were the first time she'd noticed he existed. Her awful child face contorted and her lower lip twitched. She looked dead at him and shrieked so loudly that he let go out of sheer reflex. There was a collective hiss from the peanut gallery.
"It lies," came the creature's shrill whine. "It lies with its eyes. False, treacherous, shadow wrapper! The dark one hides its lies inside. It lies!!!" She was hysterical, wasn't making a damn bit of sense, and the high pitched Eliza Doolittle accent was overkill.
"Are you wearing contacts?" Tian asked under her breath.
"I am."
"Do you need them to see?"
"No."
"Fuck me," she sighed. "I need you to take them out."
The last thing he wanted to do was fly his freak flag so soon in front of her. Sio looked at Loren slumped against the wall, grabbed the guy by the collar, hauled him closer. Then he did what he was told.
Chapter 11
A Somewhat Belated Introduction
The energy in the room had shifted. Even the red cap molesting her leg had paused in hungry anticipation. Its scarlet red hair was caked with thick mats of dried blood that did nothing to distract from the annihilated face mashed against her thigh. Tian stared hard at the pieces of red cap next to her as Sio leaned down to remove his contacts. She didn't like admitting to herself, how much she wanted to see what he went out of his way to conceal. The desire was sick and invasive.
Sio straightened and went to flick the two translucent gray disks dwarfed in his palm onto the ground. The resulting electric spike of panic cleared the cobwebs and propelled Tian into action. She switched the gun to her left and caught the disks as they slid in wet tracks down his skin. Power radiated from their contact, spreading outward in sharp metallic lines of fire. The red cap balked, breaking contact and dragging the elongated mess of its face behind its retreating form.
"Keep them," she said. The deep hurt her words had inadvertently generated flowed through the point of contact between them, squeezing her chest until it ached and she couldn't breathe. That was not supposed to be able to happen. It took her two attempts to speak.
"It's not safe to leave pieces of yourself around."
Tian didn't break contact, didn't want to, and didn't know if she could. Sio looked at her and she had to wonder if he could feel her response to him in the same way.
The Slaugh hollow shifted and rearranged itself with a loud echo, but all she could see was him. The earth bucked under the force of the wild energy between them. Sio's eyes were inhuman and mesmerizing, a luminous pale color she couldn't quite make out in the red light, rimmed with a shockingly contradictory thin black line that matched his pupils. The sound of her own heartbeat drowned her voice.
"You're beautiful."
She hadn't meant to say that. The raw aftershocks ricocheting through Sio's system made the ache in her chest unbearable; scared her more than the red cap had.
"What's happening?" Loren asked around a sick wet cough.
"What a valid question." The dry maturity to the phrasing was at odds with the voice that had rendered the statement.
Tian let go of Sio's hand in the futile hope that nothing had noticed the spark simmering between them. The tiny bee sting electric currents continued to trace lovers' patterns over her skin. She fought back a shudder and looked around.
They were standing on a platform of worn bones. The remains had been stripped bare; interlaced in dizzying artful patterns inside of an ancient stone megalith. The power of the place thrummed against the residual energy in the air. The Slaugh were everywhere, draped against the tall menhirs, crouching on top, and lurking in the black beyond. The sheer number of them was suffocating.
"Don't say something unless you've been addressed," she said loud enough for the men next to her to hear. "And don't make any promises...In fact, don't say anything."
The Slaugh Lord Augustine stood ram rod straight where he was dwarfed by a thick tangle of vines that reached from a shadowed pit like the wooden flames of a fire. The black orbs of his eyes burned with interest as he regarded them. They'd managed to startle Faerie's oldest nightmares who also happened to be the last vestiges of the wild hunt. Startling the Slaugh had never played out well.
The long legged fae that had unfurled itself from the shadows of the bar scuttled over to Augustine. All four of its knees bent at separate intervals, causing the thick black stitches to gape and bulge under the pressure. It shot them wary glances as it made a valiant attempt to shield the collection of vines with its gangly limbs and emaciated torso.
"They don't smell like food, Auggie," it hissed through pointed teeth. It cocked its head to the side in a delicate gesture. Tian swallowed, willing the moisture to return to her mouth. Her hands were shaking, though to be honest she wasn't sure which of the night's events had rattled her the most. She balled them into fists at her sides and started talking before she lost her nerve.
"We were brought here. It was not our wish, nor was it our intent to intrude on your domain without invitation."
"And yet here you are." Black eyes bored into her. Nameless terrors shifted in the darkness outside of the circle, hiding from the soft illumination emanating from the remains of the dead. The air grew colder and soft scraping noises rustled the darkness.
"No, no, no, you silly git. They's food, yeah, but they's also faerie. Ask dembo what squiggy types of fae they be, luv muppet. Sick the big chacka on them if they don't tell out wif it right quick." The shrill voice that cut through the stillness was grating and unmistakable.
Tian force
d down a curse. The crackling sing song belonged to a night hag, and there was never just one night hag anywhere. They traveled in packs, preferring stolen flesh to their own skin, and parading around in the decaying corpses of young children until the bodies rotted and they were forced to jump ship.
Tian didn't answer the hag's question. The lot of them had a violent aversion to being spoken to by adults, regardless of how many centuries they'd been alive. She waited to be addressed. The rest of the Slaugh shifted in anticipation.
"You could be food. We find we are rarely opposed to the notion or the practice of cannibalism," Augustine began. His mouth curled back up into that awkward leer. "Before you become dinner, however, there seems to be some speculation as to what lineage of Faerie you hail from. If you would be so kind as to alleviate further questions by supplying the requisite information, we would be happy to repay the favor by making your deaths as painless as possible under the circumstance."
"You've got to be shitting me," Sio said.
Tian shot him what she hoped was a dark look, though it lingered too long for comfort.
"Sado pontsy little wanker, you. Wants to show off. Fancy talkin fer the bigguns. Silly turtle, whot's so great bout em anyway?" another hag piped up from the opposite side of the darkness.
Irritation slid across Augustine's face. His peeling skin sloughed faster, exposing embarrassed bloating purple patches of muscle while the teeth jutting out from the side of his puss caused him to resemble a blow fish. For a moment the interaction struck Tian as odd, as if the Slaugh were more lost than they had interest in letting on. As quickly as the feeling came on it dissipated, leaving only wariness in its wake. Pissed off and hungry was a less than desirable combination. No one on her plot of circle spoke.
"Tickey, tickey, tickey muppy kins. Whot's it shines down ear maybe can't be seein' it's way clear," the hag's voice had jumped again, but another one like it joined the first from across the circle.
"You know little cranial minsky, you ain't never done no pontificatin' to we's down ear like you be doin' to those gratinoose biggers. Makes we's all wubsy bums galled out in plontz tinkers. You's runnin' around makin' the do in your knickers every time we get to jonesing for a snuggly bump. Ain't no fair you's always hoggin' the bestest toys. The pretty ones. We's pretty. No playing with the food ain't no fair at all. Go frip your painless, muppet. We's not playin' that game."
Augustine closed his eyes with a long suffering expression. "Someone be so kind as to tell the shrews that I have been attempting to glean the answer to the question that was so poorly posed at the beginning of our conversation. Unfortunately, their incessant yammering is hampering the process."
None of the slaugh responded.
"I'll fucking tell them," Loren said from his position on the floor next to Sio's foot. He gripped the handle of the Springfield harder.
"What is this place?" Sio asked.
Augustine's dark eyes snapped open. "You and your female brought us to this place. Do not speak as if our pain is not a palpable force here; as if you did not know that the beating heart has been lost to us for over a century. I will only ask once more. What. Are.You?" Augustine's childlike voice had grown louder, deeper, and older.
"It hasn't been determined what he is," Tian said. She licked her lips and fought the urge to reach out and run her hand against Sio's chest for comfort. "There has been no intentional attempt on our part to deceive the Slaugh specifically. If this Nemed has been lost to Faerie, then its discovery should be considered a gift. Do you not find it so?"
The night was filled with the beating of wings and a collective hiss from the gallery of horrors. She was inclined to retract her last statement, but she didn't. It wouldn't have done any good. The power of the Nemed pulsed against her head like a halo, sliding down her body to twine like an adoring cat around her ankles. The space inside the circle was filled with a longing she didn't understand.
"What is that?" Loren asked.
"Which that are you referring to?" Sio responded.
Tian shook her head. The banter may have created comfort, but comfort wasn't safety.
The Slaugh Lord cleared his throat. "A return to our most sacred space is a painful gift. However, you speak true. We have only your lives to offer you for the magic you have rote while in our lands. You may take your consort and depart, though the way you have come is sealed and will remain so. There are other paths to depart from."
Tian raised her voice. "You say nothing of the human."
"The human stays for the trespass committed against us."
In the resulting cacophony, hands shot out of the darkness beyond the stones. They grabbed hold of Loren's jacket and jerked him backward. Tian made a desperate grab for the human. Sio wrapped an arm around Loren's torso and he worked with her to brace against the stone menhirs. Loren fired calculated bursts into the black and Tian's system thrummed with adrenaline and an unbidden sweet burn at Sio's touch. The goddess' presence blazed like a pyre as the battle induced blood lust warred with desire under the surface of her skin.
The muzzle flash illuminated the unfathomable and brutal chaos in short bursts of eye gouging terror. The clawing hands abruptly let go. Tian scrambled across the floor, shifting her weight and her grip, sliding to Loren's legs and dragging him toward the center of the circle. This was exactly what she'd been trying to avoid.
****
The Slaugh were strong. Pushing against those claw-like vise grips was like being yoked to a semi driving in the opposite direction. Sio's joints groaned under the strain as he readjusted his grip on Loren's torso and planted his shoulder in the center of the guy's back. He felt the electric pin pricks of contact as Tian's hand inadvertently brushed against the muscles in his forearm. That scorching thick liquid sensation he'd been hit with when she'd grabbed him earlier reasserted itself with dizzying force.
A honeyed warmth unfurled in his torso, snaking vines through his limbs. He sparked with a sensory awareness that made him feel like he'd lived his life in an insulated haze. A burning hunger rolled off those desiccated clutching nightmares that amped the dial to all of his other senses. He heard Tian's sharp intake of breath, the erratic beating of her heart, and the sounds her limbs made under her clothes as she maneuvered herself into position to switch grips without losing contact with their screaming charge.
The barrage of gunshots next to his skull resulted in a layer of tinnitus. Muzzle flash illuminated the dark in sanity stealing bursts. Tian broke contact and lunged for Loren's legs as a chorus of high pitched keening rose from the pitch. The disturbing sense of hyperawareness receded, replaced by the reality of what he'd witnessed. Sio clamped down on the strangled cry tearing at his throat and shoved Loren linemen style away from the edge of the circle. As he used the slick knotted protrusions jutting from the ground as leverage, he realized his eyes had done more than adjust to the darkness. The night world was a shocking crystalline display of gut wrenching, technicolor glory. The bones that supported them weren't stripped clean and reflecting light, they were the light source in a perpetual midnight.
The remains beneath them phosphoresced with a pale ivory glow that reminded him of the full moon. The circle, with its giant Stonehenge monoliths was a pin prick in the vast, mysterious stillness that traveled for an eternity in all directions.
Tian stopped abruptly. He and Loren plowed into her, unable to pull back in time, and in return, they collided with the little turd who'd laid down their death sentence. Auggie didn't budge under the onslaught of momentum. It was as if all the natural laws in existence, the ones that said any creature of such petite stature should have gone flying, had decided they weren't interested in tangling with the fucker.
Tian bounced off with a sharp gasp. Sio felt an involuntary protective outburst bubbling its way up his throat and choked it down, producing a brusque suffocated gurgle. Whatever was wrong with him was becoming an issue. Tian scrambled to her feet and pressed the lean line o
f her right thigh against his arm before he did anything stupid. He took a deep breath, ratcheting down the insane amount of adrenaline his brain was pumping into his blood stream.
He stared at her fingers and realized with a jolt of panic she wasn't armed. He soothed himself with the reassurance that Loren was and at least one of them had a weapon leveled at the bad guy. It wasn't the same, but Loren's hands were steady even though his face was drawn. The sights aligned, creating a perfect gothic lollipop out of Auggie's skull.
"We cannot." Tian swallowed before continuing, "Will not accept that offer." The edge in her voice cut through the sullen anticipation in the air around them. "His fate is tied to our own. An oath has been given, sworn by the endless night. He steps true. We will not break it."
Sio felt the distant stirrings of anger and had a split second to wonder if the anger was his own, or if it belonged to the woman next to him. He was so damned aware of her it was hard to tell. They were touching even though the layers of her clothing kept the mind bending shit that happened whenever they were skin to skin at bay. Not distracted by debilitating lust, his brain raced to catch up with the fury gnawing at his gray matter. He lunged to his feet, dragging Loren with him. The fragments of realization smashed through the heartbeat of incomprehension and the bland expression on Auggie's face was revealed for what it was... a mask. A feral gleam burned in the dark pits of its eyes, mocking the outward illusion of bland neutrality.
"Tian," Sio said. "Were they or were they not trying to add our bones to their collection?"
Her silence acknowledged the truth of the statement.
"Christ," Loren said. "Little bastards take entrapment to a whole new level."
"Wouldn't that have meant they broke their oath to let us leave?" Sio asked.
"They would have waited until our safe passage had concluded before hunting us down."