by M. R. Forbes
"Hello, Landon," he said. He was handsome, middle-aged, with a neatly cut mane of salted red hair and a crisply groomed goatee. His smile was perfect and white, and his red eyes hypnotic. He was wearing a simple black suit with a black tie, and I could see the runes running up his wrists.
I looked at Charis. Her eyes were wide, and she was frozen like she was in shock. Sarah was on the ground behind her, head buried in her hands, whimpering.
"Do you surrender?" I asked. It was stupid, but it was all I had.
Myzl laughed. "Do you?" he replied.
I strained against the grip of the angels. One was male, the other was female. They both had short black hair and similar features. "What do you think?"
"I think I'll have to convince you, like I convinced them," he said. He held his hand out, and then he was gone.
"Landon," Rebecca said. She was standing in front of me, blood staining the front of the dress she had been wearing in the Beast's prison. "You let me die. You could have saved me. How could you do that?"
I knew it wasn't Rebecca, didn't I? It seemed so real. My mind felt muddled by the vision, by the power. "I'm sorry," I said, the words falling out unbidden. My head caught fire, and I felt the guilt and fear begin working its way up my spine.
"Sorry?" she asked. "I would have done anything for you, if you had only asked. I would have stopped following the Beast for you. I would have been on your side forever. We could have been together. Friends, lovers, anything you wanted."
My thoughts lost cohesion, and I dropped to the ground. "I'm sorry," I repeated. I felt the wetness of my tears. "Please, forgive me." My hands were up, and I was on my knees, begging her.
"I can't," she said. "You let me die. You gave me to the Beast."
I was tired. So tired. I fell forward, still in supplication. Rebecca stood over me, and the blood from the wound in her heart dripped down into my hair. "I'm sorry," I whispered. The floor was spinning, and I knew I was going to lose consciousness.
"Hey, meat." The voice resonated in my faltering mind, echoing into a vast emptiness.
"Ulnyx?"
"How did you like that bathing suit?" he asked. "Charis. Man, is she hot or what? Oh, and when she took it off? Wooo-Eeee! Too bad she killed that asshole vampire. I think I'm going to kill her."
I felt the Great Were flooding into my mind, his power eating into my soul. "What are you doing?" I asked, my voice barely more than a croak.
"I've been waiting," he said. "Waiting for you to be weak. Waiting for you to be spent. Waiting to take over. Your soul is mine, meat."
I felt the power growing, felt him pushing me out of my own body, my soul sinking behind his own. I tried to focus, to fight it, but he was right. I was too weak. I had lost too much to hold him back, and I didn't have Josette to help keep him at bay. "Ulnyx, wait. You don't understand."
"I understand enough," he growled back. "Lylyx is dead because of you, and her killer because of that bitch of yours. I'm going to get my payback, and then I'm going to go have some fun. You've been driving too long, meat."
"The Beast," I said. His power was overwhelming me, pushing me further and further down. I felt like a ghost in a machine. Was this how he had lived since I had absorbed him, observing and waiting for a chance to surface?
"The Beast can suck it," he replied. "Let him destroy the world, what do I care? I'll party while it burns, and I'll laugh when he comes around to destroy me. I'll laugh in that stupid bearded mug of his."
I wanted to say more, but he cut me off. I pushed my thoughts forward to speak, but a vice clamped down on me, creating an insane pressure in my head. "Keep it shut, meat," he said. "I've got work to do."
I felt my body moving. I saw it through my eyes. First, the floor. Then, the demon Myzl's feet. He was kneeling in front of me, his hand still out, trying to control me with his power. He didn't know I wasn't in charge anymore. He didn't know the new power he was dealing with. I felt my hand grow and change into a claw. My mouth emitted a harsh, guttural growl, and it lashed out, ripping the hand right off the archfiend.
He stumbled back, crying out in pain. Ulnyx lunged, grabbing the demon by the throat and twisting, snapping his head off his shoulders like it was nothing more than the top of a dandelion. He roared, turning towards the angels, catching their swords on enlarging, toughening skin, grabbing each by the head and smashing them together. They shattered like watermelons.
"God damn it feels good," he shouted in his deep, rocky voice.
The archfiend was dead, his hold on Charis broken. "Landon?" she asked, her voice tentative. Ulnyx turned to face her.
"Not quite," he said. "But if you want to leave a message before you die, I'll pass it on to him."
She gasped and whipped her sword up, too slow. Ulnyx caught her wrist and twisted, breaking it and making her drop the blade.
I tried to cry out, to ask the Were to stop. I tried to focus and force it. I tried to find Josette. It was like sitting in the front row of a movie theater, watching the nightmare unfold on the screen. I was powerless to stop him.
"I don't want to kill you too fast," Ulnyx said to her. "I didn't get to take my revenge on the vamp, so you'll have to do instead."
"Unlyx, wait," Charis said. The Were had finished shifting, and he crouched, packed tightly into the small room.
"For what?" he asked. "Are you going to undead the vampire so I can have a turn? One thing. One freaking thing in my entire life that meant anything to me. One thing that filled the blackness of my soul. I'm a demon. I'm evil. Deal with it." He reared back to lash her with his claws.
"No," Sarah Commanded, ducking out from behind Charis. "Stop."
I felt her power resonate through my hijacked soul. The Were was strong, and he fought against it. "You can't stop me, little girl," he said.
"I can," she replied. "Go back to your hiding place, dog."
The word infuriated him, but his fury cost him his concentration. The power shook inside of me, vibrating every molecule of my essence. I could feel him weakening below the Commands.
"No," he said again. He tried to bring his arm forward, to slash Charis. He couldn't.
"Give Landon his body back."
The pressure was intense. My existence shook violently, and I felt my body shudder.
"No," he said one last time, turning and leaping.
He crashed through the outer wall of the room and dropped to the ground below, ripping into the smaller weres on the ground. They scattered in front of him, and he bounded away, out into the city. I could feel my body working, my blood pumping, the raw power of the Were coursing through it. I didn't know where he was going, or what I was going to do to stop him. He knew the score, and he didn't care. What the hell was I going to do now?
CHAPTER SEVEN
We raced through the city, headed north. I don't know if Ulnyx knew where he was taking us. I doubted that he cared. Away was sure to be good enough. Away from Sarah, the only one who could stop him from ripping Charis apart.
"Ulnyx!" I tried to shout to the Were, to get his attention, to slow his escape. I could feel his power surrounding mine, the strands of his energy wrapped tightly around my own, holding it the way I had held his. Ever since Charis had killed Cho, he had hidden, hoping for a time when I wouldn't be able to stop him from taking over. He hadn't been wrenched loose by the Beast like Charis had been. Instead, he had seemed so small to Sarah because that was his design. He couldn't have known the Beast would weaken me so much, could he? It had been a perfect storm that had brought him into power. How long might he have had to wait without it?
If he could hear me, he was ignoring me. He wasn't giving me a chance to ask him if he was a servant of the Beast, or to find out the whole of his game. We ran at a breakneck pace, out of the city limits and onto a one land country road, twisting westerly into the hills. I wish I could have enjoyed the scenery more, because the landscape around us was beautiful. Instead, I had to figure out some way to get Ulnyx to stop acting out of
the pain of his loss, and start listening to whatever type of reason I could pass on to him.
"Where are we going?" I asked him, focusing my energy and digging into his own. "Damn it, Ulnyx! At least tell me that."
"I'm going to find some nice country folk," he replied, finally answering me. I wished he hadn't. "I want a farmer's daughter."
"Ulnyx, don't," I said. "Slow down, and let's talk about this."
His laughter boomed around me. "You want to talk, meat?" he asked. "You never wanted to talk when I was the one in the sidecar. You never asked me what I wanted. Why the hell should I care what you want?"
Why? I had no idea. I had nothing to offer. Nothing to give him in exchange for my freedom. He had my body, he was free to roam the world. Why would he ever give that back? If I was lucky, maybe one day Charis and Sarah could catch up to him, and she could talk him into relinquishing control.
"I know you cared for her," I said. "I know you wanted to kill Cho. I was there, Unlyx. He was kicking your ass."
He stopped running, skidding to a halt and standing in the center of the roadway. "You think I don't know that?" he roared. "She was my mate, Landon. I couldn't even avenge her death! For all of my strength, all of my power, and even with your help, I couldn't kill that piece of crap!"
That's what was really eating at him. "So killing Charis is going to change that somehow? He wasn't just an archvampire. He had drank Rebecca's blood, my blood from the Holy Grail. The only reason Charis was able to defeat him is because she was using a freaking vorpal blade."
He started trotting forward again, but I could feel some of the fire and anger burning away from him. "It doesn't matter," he said. "She's gone, and I'm horny."
"I've seen your memories," I said. "I know the truth. You've done a lot of messed up crap, and you've hurt a lot of people, but I know what it's all about."
"I'm a demon, meat. Remember? Just because I've been stuck inside you, doesn't mean I've turned into a wuss like you."
I flashed through the memories. The violent, angry, vile memories. He had murdered, he had tortured, he had raped. He had eaten the flesh of man while they were still alive, laughing as they screamed in pain and horror. He had ripped the teeth from a vampire one by one, feeding each back to their owner, forcing him to swallow them. He had done much worse than that. If my body was my own, I could have retched.
Yet, he also had the capacity to love. He had the ability to desire offspring, so badly that it had been this simple truth that had been his greatest undoing, driving him to so much of his violence. He was able to care about Rolix, enough that he felt such fury towards the Templar who had killed him. He was a demon, and his potential for destruction and lack of remorse over the agony of others was undeniable. So was his sense of loyalty, and of duty, and of pain and loss and love. He needed that spark of life, that connection to the Creator to survive, just like all of Lucifer's earthly creations did. It was that spark that made him more than just a machine of death and chaos.
"You aren't all evil," I said. There was a time that I believed he was. That was when I had only seen the memories, but I'd since experienced them. The debilitating waves of history had brought me to a deeper understanding of both of my companions. "You loved Lylyx."
I felt the wave of sadness crash through him. "I did," he replied. "I could never give her what she wanted, because I was too weak. She died to save me, because I was too weak. When a Divine dies, there is no afterlife. No Heaven. No Hell. No something more. She's gone... like, gone, gone. There's nothing else for me, meat. Nothing but the anger, and the hate, and the desire. It's all I have, and it's all I am."
There was nothing to say. How could I possibly respond to that? I felt the pain myself, a sharp stab in my soul, and Rebecca's face rounded into my memory. No something more. My inability to save her weighed on me. I knew it shouldn't, she had been an enemy, but there was something there I just couldn't shake. I shifted my thoughts to Rachel, and to Zeek. Where were they now? They had been mortal, their longevity provided by their allegiance. Did they go to Heaven, or Hell? Would I see them again?
Ulnyx continued trotting for another hour or so, until he came to a high stone wall. He raised our nose to the air and took in a deep breath. It smelled like tomato sauce. "Do you think they have a daughter?" he asked, gathering himself and leaping the barrier with ease.
"You're really going to do this?" I asked.
"Why not?"
I was going to tell him not to, because it was evil. I almost made myself laugh. Instead, I said nothing.
We could smell them as we moved in closer. The musty, musky, dirty smell of the man who had spent the day out in the fields we now stalked through, tending tomatoes and herbs, caring for cows and pigs and goats. The sweeter, softer smell of his wife, who had made him fresh pasta and bread, and smelled like the kitchen she spent her days in. The flowery, youthful, evanescent scent of their daughter, fresh and clean out of the shower, ready for their meal together. Ulnyx had found what he was looking for, and he was going to do it, unless I could figure out some way to stop him.
He shifted back to human form, and crept through the fields. He didn't bother trying to conceal our approach, because they couldn't have seen us anyway. We reached the house, and we made our way right up to the kitchen window and peered in.
The family was there, sitting down at a small wooden table, enjoying their fare. The parents were middle-aged, with wild, greying black hair, their faces creased in reaction to their lives. They talked and laughed, touching one another lovingly as each told a story, or they shared a moment from their past and relived it with their offspring. She was no more than fifteen, with long, black hair and a freshness that I could feel stirred the desire in the Were's dark soul. She was smiling and happy, wrapped up in the joy and love of her family.
"She's just a kid," I said. "She doesn't deserve this."
"Shut up, meat," he replied. I felt his power clamp down on my own, inhibiting me from speaking to him.
Ulnyx circled back around to the front door of the small home, and then reached out and twisted the knob. The door groaned slightly as it swung open. They felt so safe, they didn't even bother to lock it.
"Did you hear the door?" I heard the wife say.
"Probably just the wind," her husband replied.
Ulnyx slipped into the house, into a small living room with an old couch and a rocking chair, a fireplace and a shelf filled with books. We walked directly across it towards the kitchen, a creepy grin spreading across our face, our heart gaining speed with the imminency of our conquest. I could feel our libido thrumming and eager for the taste of young flesh.
"Is someone there?" the man asked, after we stepped on a creaky floorboard. It was that sound, that question, that propelled the Were into action.
He swept into the room, a figure out of their nightmares, reaching out and lifting the girl from her seat, holding her from behind. The girl's mother screamed, and the father rose to his feet, his kitchen knife clutched like he could cut someone with it.
"Hello, child," Ulnyx whispered into the girl's ear. "Such a beautiful creature. I have something special for you."
The girl shivered in his arms, tears rolling down her face. The smell of her urine overwhelmed the other kitchen scents.
"Let go of her," her father demanded.
"Or what?" Ulnyx growled. "Are you going to butter me?"
The farmer's arm shook as he stepped forward, the knife shaking wildly from side to side. Ulnyx let out a soft laugh, and his hand shot forward, grabbing the man's wrist and twisting. I heard the crack, and the knife dropped to the ground.
"Let her go!" The girl's mother hadn't been stationary. She had grabbed a pan from somewhere, and it came screaming towards the back of our head. It hit us hard, and even managed to force Ulnyx to take a step forward to rebalance us. He growled and reached back, taking the woman by the neck.
"That wasn't smart," he said, pulling her towards him. He brought her right up t
o his face and took a deep breath. "I smell the sickly sweetness running down your leg. I was only interested in your child, but you may hold some entertainment value as well."
"Wait, please!" The husband was coming towards us again, his hand hanging limp. "I'll give you whatever you want."
"I already have what I want," Ulnyx snapped. "Now, be a good boy, and clear the table for me. As you can see, I have my hands full."
The man hesitated until Ulnyx tightened his grip on his wife's neck. "If you're agreeable, I might leave them alive," he said.
The man nodded and obeyed, using both hands to push the food from the table, despite the amount of pain it caused. Once it was clear, Ulnyx pulled the mother over to it, turning her towards him. "The end of the world is coming," he said. "Is it wrong for me to want some simple pleasures before it does?"
I closed myself off from him then, the way he had done to me. I retreated, pulling my soul in as tightly as I could, separating myself with every ounce of effort. I didn't want to witness what he was going to do. It would be enough that it was my face they would see.
As I retreated, I pushed one last time, sending one final message to the monster I was trapped with.
"I hate you," I said, letting go of my external senses, watching the world fade away even as the Were pushed the woman onto the table and tore away at her clothes. I couldn't cry here, but the pain was no less real, and no less intense.
Despite my best efforts, I could still hear the outside world as whispers in my disembodied consciousness. I could hear the crying of the girl, the pleading of the mother, and the heavy breathing of the Were. I could feel the racing heartbeat, the feral pleasure of conquest. A heartbeat passed, and then another, and then another. I waited for Ulnyx to act, to finish removing the woman's clothes, to ravish her in front of her family. I don't know why, but he had paused.
"Damn it," he cursed, tilting his head up and howling in rage. "What the hell did you do to me?" He looked at the woman. "Get up," he ordered. She rushed to comply.