He put the point against her temple, but relaxed his grip on her air supply. He was just holding her in position now, not choking her. “Take off that dress and let's see ya. It's been a while and I'm horny as fuck.” She started to cry, but she did as he'd said. Her dress dropped to the floor at their feet. Never taking his hand off of her throat, he lowered the dagger, tracing her hip with it. He sliced through the waistband of her panties on both sides and they joined her dress on the floor. Then he trailed down her stomach and put the oddly warm weapon between her legs. “See? I knew you wanted this.”
Nathalia was not the same young girl he had tortured. She was now the leader of a very rich and connected organization. She had skilled witches at her beck and call as well as a pool of energy at her disposal. All this, and she had never felt more helpless or alone. Well, at least she was alone; she couldn't stand the thought that he might hurt a sister.
Michael leaned in and kissed the trails on her cheeks that her tears had left. She hadn't even realized she was crying. He put his cheek against hers and whispered in her ear, “Let's play the game we used to, the one you enjoy so much.”
She shook her head. No, she didn't want to. Trying to make him cum before she lost consciousness from asphyxiation was not her idea of a game. It was terrifying and degrading and definitely not about her enjoyment.
He rapped the side of her head with handle just hard enough to remind her who was in control. Then he did it again because he liked the way her eyes had gone out of focus the first time. Star bursts erupted and burned through her brain. She couldn't let him do that again and keep her cognizance. Defeated, she unzipped his jeans, reached in, and took it out. He was already very excited about the game. “I'll even give you the advantage to start with: you can lick your hand.”
He watched as she raised her hand to her mouth and lubricated her palm. She wrapped her hand around his erect cock as he got a better grip on her thin neck. Both hands clamped down tight at the same time, but hers started to pump.
She looked into his eyes as she did it. Her lungs screamed for air, but none could get through his vice like grip. If he was going to make her play, at least he would burn up his lust and be done with her sooner.
“I just want to get this first one out of the way so I'm not distracted by my hard on. Either way, I still win.”
How was he doing that? Nathalia certainly wasn't intentionally broadcasting her thoughts to him.
“Your parent's deaths gave me the blood I needed to bind you to me. I'm inside your head. You can't help but share everything with me. When you're unconscious, I'm in total control. Didn't you know that?”
She managed to keep her composure as he boasted and her consciousness as he climaxed. His hot sperm blasted onto her toned stomach and made it lurch.
“Ahh...shit, yes. Oh...fuck. That's a good girl.” He released his hold on her throat and she collapsed on the floor coughing and gasping for breath. He put his knife hand on top of her head holding it still as he wiped the last drip from his tip across her face, like she was nothing more than a rag.
He tucked it back inside and did up his pants again. “Tonight I finally take what ya been saving for me all these years. A virgin in a palace a prostitutes. Imagine! But, first things first.” Her head dipped down and he swiped the blade across her back. “The old gods await their release. They came to me when I was just a little boy. They chose me. They told me to find you, to hurt you, to make you my own. Your blood is the key to letting them through.” He gave her another creepy grin before drawing an elaborate design in the air with the now dripping knife. When nothing happened he turned over the upturned vanity chair that had fallen in their struggle and sat in it. He leaned back. His eyes went glossy for a minute and then cleared again. He was hearing voices. Goddess only knew what they were telling him to do.
“You know, not taking your virginity years ago almost got me in trouble. If you'd given it to some other man, I might not have been able to keep my hold on you. I convinced you that all men were dangerous and evil so you'd never go near another one. I did it with dreams. I had to settle for the minor hurt I could get you to do to yourself until you started talking in your sleep.” He laid the knife down on the vanity. He studied her as she lay there catching her breath and struggling to understand.
“Mary was easy; that website was a wealth of information. You gave me everything I needed to get to that dike couple too, nasty whores. That was really fun. After you told me about killing a couple during sex, I was so excited I almost botched it. I was thinking of you the whole time.”
No, this couldn't be true. She would never share her secrets with Michael.
He saw the look of shock on her face, “Oh, yes. You betrayed your loved ones. You're the cause of all this death and pain. You can't help yourself. Tell me, who do you love most in this world?”
No, she thought, not Maeve.
“Maeve?! Now this night just keeps getting better and better. Time for the next game. Call her.”
“No”, her voice came out in a hoarse whisper.
“Don't be jealous, love. I'm not gonna to touch her. You are going to kill her. After that, after you have killed the one you love the most, your blood will be ripe. It will allow me to slice through the veil.” Hers was the key to opening the barrier between this world and the next. He was relatively sure this time. The Old Gods were so damn baffling. Everything was a riddle with them. “Call her.”
No, not her Maeve. Maeve had just gotten together with Aaron. Nathalia wouldn't be the cause of a mated pair’s death. Another mated pair's death. She refused to further add blackness to the storage or pain to the capacitors. She jumped up and made a run for the alarm button. He was faster and smashed the knife hilt into the back of her head hard enough to knock her out cold.
She lay on the floor and he could see the blood pooling beside her. A big grin spread across his face, “Yes, you will”.
Michael concentrated on the necklace, on the binding, on the blood. He said the ritual words and traced the link through her brain. He could read there how to gather the energy and broadcast a call using his girl's skills. Such skills wasted on women, humph. The spell was cast but the power was tainted.
Nathalia fought through the fog and pushed through the pain. She heard and felt her power as he used her to broadcast his summons, Maeve, office now. No, it would hurt Maeve to get that message. Her head felt like it was going to explode and she clutched at the sides to keep it together.
He laughed at her. “You've been keeping that part from me. I didn't know using the black power brought you pain. Do it again; I want to feel you hurt.”
She gathered the power, dark and light alike could be used if one didn't care about the damage. She broadcast to him, No one uses me or my ability to hurt another. You wanted it. Here it is, asshole.
Michael dropped out of the chair onto his knees in front of her. He was clutching his head too now and telling her to stop. She didn't. He couldn't make her; the unexpected pain was keeping him from concentrating. She realized she was screaming, the pain was so much. It hurt so bad, she wanted to die, but she continued to pull power and focused it on her enemy. She knew in that moment what she had to do.
As long as she was alive, he would have power over her. He would always use that power to hurt the ones she loved. She wished she had never been born, but she could remedy that right now. She continued to pull power and focus it on Michael. The more she did, the more she could feel the blackness taking over.
She would kill as her last act as Abbess and in doing so she would free the Daughters of Women from this horror. She brought her hand out from under the bed skirt holding the scissors he had used to make her cut off her hair.
She showed them to Michael but it was too late for him to do anything about it. She stabbed them through the side of her neck behind the windpipe and yanked them forward. She saw the blood spew. She focused all those suicidal feelings, all that guilt over the death of her friends, all
the evil black energy from the capacitors, toward Michael. She funneled her own death through him.
His control, his binding over her was broken in that moment. She felt it and so did he. The murder of her parents had bound her and her suicide had unlocked her. Enjoy the intimate caress of the evil you created.
Michael died. Blackness seeped from his ears, nose and eyes. He couldn't breathe. He didn't want to. He wanted to die. She made him feel that and then she made him experience it.
It was over. She was dead, but at least he was too. Nathalia heard frantic yelling and banging on the door for a moment. Then it all went blank and she felt the strong masculine arms of an angel pick her up. She heard singing and tasted sweet nectar. Then she was weightlessly flying with his arms around her and his life force was coursing through her. He was warmth and he permeated every cell of her body. Her last thought was that death was the best moment of her life and that there was a heaven after all and they had let her in.
Epilogue
Maeve sat at the Abbess' desk, her own desk, and wondered where the time had gone. She had been interim Abbess for 4 months, but still missed her friend and superior every day. She scooted the chair under the desk as far as her new baby bump would let her. She stared down at the stomach that prevented her from wearing her beloved corsets. No one believed that she was so early in her first pregnancy; most women don't start to show until their 6th month. Aaron thought it was the contrast of seeing her with a cinched waist verses this that made her seem so big.
Maeve turned her eyes to the window into the courtyard. It was starting to get warm again, but it was too early for the rain to have started in earnest, so the children were out enjoying the outdoors. It warmed her heart to think that in a couple of years her child would be running out there too. She only wished Nathalia had lived to see it.
Maeve noticed, and not for the first time, that there was an abundance of guardians standing around while the children frolicked, and realized that she was glad Nathalia couldn't see this. The prior Abbess would never have tolerated all of these additional men stationed within the compound walls. The great good her sacrifice had done, Nathalia would have thought it undone by all of the heightened testosterone hidden behind the guise of security.
She smiled at her guardian standing in the corner of her office. He had been staring at her baby belly. Embarrassed that she had caught him yet again, he averted his eyes, but she could see her smile was returned by him. Although it was a little unnerving at first to have him around all the time, she was glad to have him now. Maeve had been stunned to hear all those months ago that Margaux shared living quarters with him and found that he made her feel secure and grounded, but now that made perfect sense. She was only alone with Aaron, but the guardian had taken residence in the outer chamber of their quarters so that he was never far away. It seemed he could not stand the distance, and Maeve was fine with that. Aaron too seemed to accept the new order of things without any difficulty. He and Samseil had come to some sort of understanding that was blossoming into a real relationship. His cats, Homer and Stirfry, were another thing entirely.
The Daughter's collection of snakes loved the guardians. It was hard to keep Monty away from Maeve's guardian in particular. Whenever one got out, the best place to look for them was with the nearest guardian. The cats: not so much. Homer and Stirfry had adjusted to their life here fairly easily with the exception of the abundance of guardians. It wasn't that they were afraid of all men. Leonard was caught petting them often enough, but they wanted nothing to do with the bigger beefier new residents. It was probably for the best that one loved and the other hated the men. It kept the two animal species from getting into too many fights; neither was ever a winner in that circumstance.
The guardian stiffened in his corner and made a step towards the door. That movement brought Maeve's mind back to the task at hand. The whole reason she was in her office instead of out enjoying the clear day was probably nearing the other side of that door. Today would be her first visit from the new Counsel Representative. Until now she had received all her correspondence through the guardian. She hoped that they had decided on a permanent new Abbess for this chapter, and that it was not herself. She didn't hold out much hope on that account since only she had been called for the meeting.
There was a knock on the door and her guardian looked to her for permission to admit her guests. She stood, slowly and at an awkward angle, as her condition required. After tidying her clothes, she nodded to him that she was ready. He opened the door and two people came in. Both were robed in the long black capes with hoods that were now kept in every corner of every building. It was the preferred dress of all guardians, and Maeve knew that many wore nothing underneath.
Both were extremely tall. The first was obviously a woman and the second her guardian. Her hood was pulled down over her eyes, shielding her features. His was thrown back, so that Maeve could see his eyes darting around. His gaze settled on Maeve's guardian and they bowed, never taking their eyes of each other. He was tall, muscular and tan, but Maeve found him nondescript, like all of the guardians. She now knew it to be a type of camouflage, a spell cast on them each to keep outsiders from being able to recognize them.
Maeve welcomed them and offered the Voice a drink. She refused without saying a word. Her guardian was a blond, Maeve noticed, now that his guard was not quite so high. He stood next to the Representative, placing himself between his mistress and the other guardian in the room. The Voice started to speak in a very formal manner.
The grandson of heaven has found the daughter of man and their joining has brought the One to earth. Rejoice, highly favored one, She is within you; blessed are you among women. You, Maeve, are chosen by fate to mother the savior of mankind and to be this chapter's Abbess Primo. You have steerage of their course; Direct their sails onward, lusty gentlewoman.
Maeve might not have recognized the voice alone, as it was much changed, but she knew only one person who used Shakespearean phrases in normal conversation. “Nathalia?” she whispered.
Yes and no. The Nathalia you knew died but was born anew in me. I am Ereshkigal of the Kafzeil family line.
The representative pushed her hood back and showed her face to the new Abbess. Maeve gasped, because it was the face of her childhood friend, but it was changed somehow. Maeve didn't know what to think or feel. It had been long enough since Nathalia's presumed death that Maeve was over the grieving steps. She had accepted that her friend was gone and now here she was standing just feet away. She waddled around the desk, her arms extended for an embrace, but Nathalia held her hand up quickly in a motion for her to stop.
It's better if we don't touch. I love you too much to handle seeing the look of disgust that would surely follow an embrace. Please be satisfied in knowing that I'm alive and happy with the second chance to sit together.
Maeve, it's been decided that because of my death, you've learned a valuable and much needed lessen.
“And what lessen is that?”
The value of our secrets. Look at the damage that just one man in possession of our secrets was able to do to us. Imagine the damage that could be done if our enemies were organized or zealous about wiping us out. We must remain a secret society. The knowledge of our organization is power over us. You must now see that secrets are to be kept just that. But you aren't the only one who had a lessen to learn. We learned from you.
Now seeing the danger the outside world is to our existence, we agree with you that this organization should go on the offensive. We can no longer live carefree, believing that if we do no harm then no harm will be done to us. There's much evil in this world and we must do more to protect ourselves from it. We'll continue to practice as we always have and increase the good and love in the world, but we'll also hunt down and destroy the evil in it too. We can no longer sit by and wait for danger to come to us.
Maeve, we were foolish to think we alone had found power in this world. There are others out there collecti
ng power, for less noble reasons. We're in the midst of a battle and didn't know it.
“Your mouth isn't moving, Nathalia.” She must be speaking telepathically, but Maeve was not nauseated by the foreign mental disturbance. “How can your ability be so much improved after only a few months, when it took you years to reach the level you were when you died?”
I have no idea how long ago it was that I last stood in this room. Time's perceived differently by us. My ability's changed because we have a different power source. I can still access the capacitor's power, but if I were to power my voice with their collected supply you'd be very sick by now and they'd be completely drained. Telepathy is not the only current draw on our attentions and abilities. We're in a constant battle for control of our thoughts and it consumes energy in abundance.
“Who is 'us' and what are you talking about?” Maeve's voice cracked ever so slightly. If Nathalia had not been so intimately acquainted with Maeve, she would not have heard her anxiety.
Be not afraid. You'll find me much changed since our life here together. So much so, that I now consider myself one of the guardian kind.
Maeve could not help but laugh. Her laugh made everyone smile. “You consider yourself one of them!? Just minutes before you came in, I was thinking that you would roll over in your grave if you knew that there were so many men walking around the compound.”
Nathalia stopped smiling. I've come to understand many things. One of which, is that I misjudged and mistreated men. They're tortured creatures, wholly unaware that they're being influenced by evil. I deeply regret my old attitudes, but nothing can be done concerning my past life. The second of which, is that these guardians are not men.
Maeve was not over the first revelation, Nathalia's attitudes toward men changed?, before the second one punched her in the gut. “What do you mean, the guardians aren't men?” Maeve felt like the floor was falling out from under her and she looked toward the one familiar face in the room.
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