If Minali's mate died after the spells were cast but before meeting her, then the outlook for Minali was not good. It was similar to what happened when half of a mated pair died after years of being together. The other half wasted away, but at least they had the memory of a love so deep it was killing them to be apart. Minali had nothing to hold on to.
“That's just it. Minali is suffering because she's the called mate. Her mother's ability is too powerful; it's keeping Minali from answering the call. Her mate only has the recognition spell. He, or she, can only recognize her; they can't come to her because they don't know where she is.” Libby was never more animated than she was when she'd discovered something in her books.
She spun the text around so that it was right side up for Maeve. “It's all right here.” She pointed out the relevant passage. It was printed on a press with movable type in English, putting the event about a hundred years earlier. It confirmed Maeve's thoughts that it didn't happen often in modern times.
“What do we do?” This from Camilla, ever focused on the end result. The healer had to get her patient well; she wasn't used to being useless. Even Nanae, who was unencumbered by her abilities specifications, with his near limitless abilities had been able to do nothing for Minali.
“I can matchmake for Minali. We'll leave it up to her.” Maeve decided.
Camilla shook her head. “Slipped into a coma.” They wouldn't be asking her anything, not and expecting any answer.
Maeve rubbed her forehead with open palm, closed her eyes and pinched her lips together anxiously. The decision fell to her, as it often did now that she was Abbess, and she didn't have long to deliberate. Not now that Minali had gotten this bad. “I'll do it and hope that her mate isn't being held by pirates or something. If I don't, we'll lose Minali her anyway. It still might not happen in time to save her.” She stood. Better now than later. It was a risk to Minali's unacknowledged mate. They could end up in the reverse situation with the mate being unable to come to Minali and then they'd both die.
***
Billy became aware that he was not alone. He was the subject of an argument.
“If you take another god-damned step, fuck-all good Oren will do you. I will cut you from crown to cunt if you try to hurt him, Hurrit. I don't care how fine your ass is or how well you stroke the little man in my canoe.”
Billy smiled. Only one woman he knew used that kind of language on a regular basis. He pulled his longtime friend and sometimes lover, Special K, against him. The move solicited a warning from Kay that was more of an 'undt-uh' than real words but it wasn't directed at him. She was keeping someone from pulling them apart.
In a flash of red violence he remembered. The women, the beast, the blood, the pain; it all came rushing back to him. He crab-walked back against the headboard and tried to get his eyes to adjust. Kay was there in a heartbeat, her hand on his chest, soothing him.
“Where di...wha...good goddess, what was that thing?”
“It was a dark vrykolak.” A mans voice answered him with a smooth cadence that put him at ease even though Billy didn't understand what it meant. “Now you must answer the questions of Sarrum Arakiel Maru.”
“Oren!” Kay jumped up from the bed and ran straight into the arms of a giant. A green haired, tattooed giant picked Kay up and held her against his chest like an infant. The way he kissed her was nothing like how one treats a baby though.
“I thought that all the Nephilim were gathering around Austin. What are you doing way out here? Shouldn't you be protecting the One? The others have sworn their allegiance to her already or so my mom tells me.” They all three just stared at him so he continued. “You've been gone forever, Kay. So much has happened. You really should have returned my calls. Or at least Ingrid's calls. She's your Primo for goddess sakes. She's been worried sick. She's why I'm here. I left the compound like six months after you did. I've been backpacking around the country for maybe ten months and Ingrid called me and ask me to look in on you.”
“Enough! Before you can be allowed access to the queen, we must determine what you are.” The dark skinned, dark haired man's voice was out of this world. The giant still had not spoken.
Billy's laugh rang out. “I don't know what's funnier – you wondering 'what I am' or that Special K is your queen.”
Hurrit ignored him. “Do you hunger for anything?”
Billy shook his head, no.
“Look at Sarrum Sinnis Tara Kay. What does she make you want? Raw meat, blood, sex?” If the native American hadn't looked so serious, Billy would have laughed again.
“I'm a vegetarian. Haven't had a bite of meat in ...” He paused to think. “...twelve years, maybe? And as for sex...” He gestured to his crotch. “...no action there since Maeve worked her matchmaking magic on me. She warned me it might not work with other women until I found my mate but I didn't take it as seriously as it obviously was. I have no desire for anything, really.”
The giant and the Indian spoke in a foreign language. Kay jumped down and bounced over to Billy. “So, why'd you leave? Nathalia pull that Abbess' orders shit on you too?”
“Actually no. She died. She came back though, kinda like I just did, I guess. She disappeared for a while and then came back with a Nephilim of her own. She calls herself Ereshkigal of the Kafziel family line. Her magic is crazy powerful now. I left because I tried to kill her. I mean, not on purpose. I ran into an Akhkharu and it poisoned my brain, and tricked me into stabbing her because she was his Sinnis in a previous life and she'd chosen his brother as her mate both times.” He ran his hand through his hair. The two men in the door were looking at him as intently as Kay was. “None of this is coming out right. Too much has happened for me to just tell you in one sitting. Plus every thing's getting filtered through my mom. I sound like a crazy man.”
“Hurrit!” Kay exclaimed as the man had tugged Billy into a standing position. “He's not ready yet.”
“Actually I feel great. I'd like to go outside.” Billy looked down at her. He suddenly had a terrible urge to go home, as if seeing her made him homesick. He hoped he could convince her to go with him when he went back to Austin.
Hurrit nodded at him. “The night is calling to you. Annu is full and high and waiting.”
They left without another word.
“I wish you could tell me what the fuck just happened,” Kay complained. “but at least you're here now. I missed you.”
Oren stood in the doorway staring at his Sinnis. “TeRAkay, you are the most beautifully alive woman I have ever seen. You glow. You are the reason to breathe again as well as the air in my lungs and earth at my feet. I am fortunate to have lived long enough to meet you and will be honored to serve you for the remainder of my none too short life.”
Kay gapped and then grinned. “You certainly mastered English fast. That was a pretty damn impressive speech.”
It was Oren's turn to smile. “I learned from the fucking best.”
Chapter 7
Kay made a salad for Billy. Oren said that her progeny would be hungry when he got back, if he hadn't already taken down a deer. That's when she'd decided to make him a salad. Billy wasn't going to eat venison. Especially not raw. She threw together a nice raspberry vinaigrette using her best batch of raspberry preserves.
The minute she was finished, Oren had her in his lap. He palmed the back of her head and pressed it to his bare chest. With the pinkie nail of his other hand, he made a small incision in his skin under her mouth. He pressed her to it without letting her hunger rise.
Kay made three draws before the wound closed up. The blood was much too delicious for that to be it. She had given a lot to Billy. She opened wide and pierced his skin with her own teeth. Oren sat silently as she suckled but his erection was shouting his feelings loud and clear. His blood was heaven and she took it down in great gulps letting it flow over her tongue slowly. He kissed her when she was finished.
“He is vrykolak. Sarrum, her blood has done the impossible. She'
s made a child of the light with no more hunger than a human. He doesn't suffer from the beast at all and he can change at will.” Hurrit was in the kitchen before the front door had even slammed.
“He's a vrykolak... the same as that monster that attacked us?” Kay asked, forcing the slur from her speech.
“No, not the same. Your child is not tainted by the hunger beast. That thing in the orchard is all hunger beast. It has lost whatever part of itself that used to be human. A dark vrykolak feeds on violence and murder. It is bound to it's most terrible shape. Billy has full control over his shift.”
“He's a shape-shifter? A fucking werewolf.” Kay shook her head in disbelief. “My blood did that to him?”
Oren smoothed the hair back from her face. “That and much more. Your blood has done something never done before. It has taken the shit parts of being a child of light or dark and given only the strength and life. That is why my first is so god-damned excited. He and his kind have suffered under the weight of the hunger but your blood, freely offered, could end all of that.”
Kay spoke to Oren. “I've offered it to him repeatedly but he won't take it.” She turned to Hurrit who now knelt on the floor. “I know how powerful it is. I know what it feels like to give. I know what the blood does. Will you just grow a pair and bite me, Hurrit?” She laughed but wished she hadn't.
Hurrit looked up at her with his solid black eyes, his hunger full on him yet again, and nodded. He didn't bite immediately when she got close enough to offer her neck to him. He let his hunger rise, enjoying the feel of it, the strength of it, for the last time. He was shaking and his appetite hadn't yet crescendoed fully. He knew what would whet his whistle.
He held his hands only an inch from her body, a question in his eyes. Kay noted that he was asking her and only her. He wasn't asking Oren if it was okay. He understood that she belonged to no man, and so did Oren. His queen smiled at him. “If it's gonna be like it was with Billy, I'm gonna need some petting.”
Hurrit ran his hands along the curves of her body savoring the soft material of her dress and skin. Suddenly Oren was pressed against her back. Kay reached over her shoulder, expecting to run her fingernails over his chest, but met his shoulder instead. He was kneeling behind her just as Hurrit was kneeling in front. Oren was so tall that in this position he was closer to her height, only one foot taller instead of three. He traced the soft skin of her inner arm from elbow to pit, leaving a trail of fire along the way, before cupping her breast. His giant palm made her double D's look almost normal sized.
Kay's intake of breath was the only sound in that kitchen. Hurrit slipped the strap of her dress off her shoulder, pulling it down to reveal the other magnificent breast. He had seen her of course at the club where she danced but was unprepared for the experience up close. Perfectly round, slightly too large for her delicate frame, but still perky, those milky white mounds with dainty pink nipples were exquisite. They had the same blue veins that marked the rest of her, though here they were even more visible, even the smallest ones.
He traced the subtle lace with his tongue. He could almost taste her prana through her skin. He wanted it but not bad enough. He wanted the desire to hurt before he banished it forever. He nuzzled the soft white skin with his sun darkened face, rubbing back and forth over the even softer pink areola and nipple with his cheeks and mouth. He flicked it with the tip once, then twice, before laving at it with the flat of his tongue. He blew on it, pleased when it hardened into a hard pink peak. There on the edge of the tiny goose bumped area was an especially thick blue line. That was where Hurrit would take from.
He thought about how soft she would be in his mouth, how sweet she would taste, how the sound of her soft moans and sweet pussy smell would fill the kitchen as the thrall set on and he knew he had waited long enough. He was more excited than he'd ever been, just from one breast of his queen. He felt Sarrum Arakiel move his hand between them. His maker pulled Kay's dress up and slipped her panties down so that he could get at her flooding folds. The aroma of her arousal was perfume to Hurrit's nose.
“Yes,” she whimpered. She was speaking to both of them while watching Hurrit's face as he opened his mouth and prepared to take her into his mouth. He took a deep breath, putting every detail to memory. He waited until Oren had brought the flush of climax to her face before sliding his teeth through her thin skin.
All reasonable thought left his brain when her prana hit his tongue. Instantly, permeating his every cell, it was like his first drink of the Sarrum only better. Sweeter. For a moment he heard Tara Kay's moans and then the voice of the great mother, Ki, came through as clear as any time previously.
This is my blood, which is given to you. This is my chosen daughter, my vessel. So then, whoever drinks of her blood in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against my body and my blood and they will not find peace in the feast. They that would drink ought to examine themselves before taking from the vessel. For those who drink bring my judgment on themselves. Nevertheless, when you are judged in this way, you are being disciplined so that you will not be taken at the final coming of the Shinar. So then, my sons and daughters, when you gather to eat, you should all eat together. Each year you shall gather together to feast on her blood and through her, and only through her, you shall revel in my word. This is my will and you, first son of the first son, will ensure it is carried out as I would have it.
The door slammed and Hurrit came back to himself. He suckled gently as the puncture holes he had made in his queen, the chosen vessel of the great mother earth, healed themselves closed. He placed a dozen reverent kisses on her bosom, worshipfully.
“Whoa, wow. Geez, sorry to interrupt.” Billy was standing in the kitchen opening starring at the menage a' trois.
All three of them had heard the mother, though her words had been addressed only to Hurrit. Kay was in the throws of the afterglow and that, added to hearing a goddess' voice, was a heady mix. She couldn't struggle through the fog to speak. She thought of Billy. She thought of how it had felt to give him her blood and of all the times they'd had sex. She motioned that Billy should join them.
Oren laughed in a large jolly way that sent shivers down Kay's spine. He found it amusing that her bloodlust was insatiable and she was unabashed about it.
“Not that I wouldn't love to, but I just came in to tell you that the police are here.” He wasn't happy about their appearance. Some of the men smelled off to him and his new nose but he didn't know how to interpret what he was sensing. At least they saved him from having to admit that even in the presence of such a sexual fantasy, his equipment just wasn't co-operating.
***
Sheriff Whitney Stout was waiting for them when they reached the orchard. The sun wasn't breaching the horizon but its light was. It exposed a gruesome sight behind the visibly shaken sheriff with the feminine name. Oren, who had insisted on carrying her, set Kay down near Whitney but stood even closer. He wouldn't risk this man with a golden star on his shirt grabbing his Sinnis again.
Unable to shake the effects of Ki's words, Hurrit had stayed behind. He had so much to think about. His life, his mission, unchanged for thousands of years, had just switched tracks. Billy had stuck with the vitala. They were still uncertain about his control around so many people, no matter how he protested that he wasn't a danger. He hadn't wanted to let Special K get too far away from him and was puzzled by the feelings. Hurrit had said it was natural to feel protective of ones maker.
The sheriff got out his notebook and pencil. It wasn't often that Rusk county sheriffs department had a triple homicide to investigate and he didn't intend to botch this one. He needed notes when he talked to the two prime suspects. “We got an anonymous call a while ago saying there had been some people killed in a satanic ritual on the witch's property north of town. You're the only witch I know so we came out here and find this in your orchard. Can you tell me just what the hell happened here, Miss Woods?”
Kay shook her head and shrugged
, though her eyes were glossy with tears. “Looks like some kind of animal attack to me. Maybe a bear? I heard some people at the diner talking about seeing a pack of bears.”
“In east Texas?” He looked at her suspiciously.
“Well yeah. It looks like they were torn apart. See the jagged edges and massive bite and claw marks? No man could do that.” She reasoned.
“Maybe a woman with the right tools could make it look like an animal did it.”
“A wom... you mean me? I'm a suspect? I couldn't have done it. It happened while I was at work.”
“You seem to know an awful lot about this mess not to be involved.”
She did know a lot. She knew that there was one giant vrykolak's body missing, but mentioning it would place her at the scene of the crime. “Call Crash. Or better yet just ask your sons ... or Will. They were there.”
“I know they were but he wasn't.” Whitney poked his thumb in Oren's stomach. “What do you think, Will? This guy weighs what, 400 lbs, 450? A team of horses can draw and quarter a man, I bet a couple big guys like this could manage it.” He called to Will who was standing next to a tall black man in a suit. They were as far from Oren and Kay as possible while still being in the scene. Will looked green. He didn't bother to answer.
The coroner and his assistant arrived then. They drove their specially made hearse right up to the crime scene. They made a big show of putting on their paper suits, masks and gloves. Kay thought they looked old, like they ordered all that stuff years ago and this was their first chance to use them. They got out a couple body bags but after seeing the state of the bodies, exchanged them for smaller bags of varying sizes and shapes.
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