Retribution, Devotion

by Kai Leakes

  “Our Princess. Princess Reina A’archy, daughter to the royal lineage of M’ylce. Our Dark Lady and Primus Anarchy Snatcher.”

  The words from the house of Johnson fueled her pumping blood causing her to drop her head forward with a scoff. She pulled back with a bloody open-mouth sneer, smoothed her hair back, and nodded, shielding her blade while walking away.

  “Please enjoy your night and congratulations to your new heir.”

  Heading back out to the party, Reina noticed Winter slowly walking next to her returning father and her stomach quickly soured. She hated when she could tell that her father touched one of her pets. She had no power over stopping him from touching Winter because she had belonged to her mother but nonetheless it angered her. Duty kept her from seeking Winter out.

  It was strange for her. Only Nydia and Winter were able to silence the madness that crept into her mind and she never could understand why but, right now, the madness was a comfort. The heated stare from her father made her hustle through the dance floor searching for someone to distract her. Her wish was answered in the guise of a handsome human who stood in a black-and-white suit.

  His smile drew her in. The broad build of his shoulders and body made her plum clutch in need. His blood made her hunger ravenously as she slowly walked his way. She knew he wanted her, could tell by the way his eyes held her. She did not even have to drop her gaze to see if he was hard. His aura fed her that truth. He stepped forward and asked her to dance. The roaring in her ears in need of his blood blocked out her ever hearing his name and the moment his hands swallowed her waist made her mark him as hers. Tonight she didn’t need any new pets, but damn if he didn’t almost make her want to turn him herself.

  She swayed to the music in his arms; his spicy musk and brushing girth of his bulge made her feel intoxicated. Why was she so drawn to this human? No, she wasn’t drawn, she just wanted to be away from her father’s stares. Lie. She was drawn to his scent of incredible. She needed him now.

  Her mind was a confused jumble, but she was far from falling into lust. Her lips found his earlobe. Her tongue teased the sensitive area of his neck, which caused her to lightly groan as his voice dripped over her like molasses. This brother was fine as she heard some of her pets describe men such as him. His arms seemed to almost crush her and she liked that a lot.

  She never had a man fit her body like this except for Jacques and she did not want to think of him. Every time she did, she knew he was near. Sure enough, with a sudden glance up and around the dance floor there stood that bald bastard with an amused look upon himself. She instantly wanted him within her and it pissed her off. It made her want to cast this guy off and go fuck Jacques like a wildcat but it was the woman who stood behind him who drew her attention and made her return her attention to the man holding her.

  A rising anxiety caused her to glance back to where Jacques stood again but she was immediately greeted with nothing but the handsome man in front of her. Who was that woman and where did she go? Reina frowned then shuddered in confusion. It should have been like cold water over her libido. Instead, it was the opposite.

  Everything in her whispered that she wanted and craved this male she held so she continued her dance and focused her gaze into his toffee irises. His skin was like caramelized honey, brown and syrupy. She wanted a taste. She let him whip him around in a slow, seductive tango, and she noticed the tattoos that were scrolling over his neck, slightly hidden by his collar.

  She tried to ask him his name, but all she got was his seductive smile. His thick lips spread for her, asking for a kiss as his thin moustache and trimmed patch of hair on his chin accented the chiseled cut of his handsome face. Her chest hurt and she felt strange in this man’s arms. Quién coño es esto? Who the fuck is this?

  Her hands slid over his wavy low-cut hair and his hold tightened again making her glance over his shoulder again. He was so tall, like a giant, built like a warrior and she swore if he wasn’t human that he had the traits of a Nephilim, which would not be good for any of them here tonight. There it is again, that strange feeling. She needed to step away from this culo, but the moment they whirled around the dance floor, she swore she saw her again. That familiar face. A woman who had her drawn but also seemed have her stuck in this male’s arms.

  The music ended cutting off the connection as rounds of applause sounded. She pressed a hand to her chest then looked up at her dance partner. He gave her another seductive smile then walked away. That act alone made her tilt her head to the side and glance after him. Men were attracted to her. Drawn to her like moths to a flame. No one left her! No one! Well her plaything did escape her but he did not count.

  This was not acceptable or tolerated! She found herself following him as he walked away. People stopped her, her own father’s Councilmen and she almost decapitated them in that moment of scoping the crowd for the male. Where was he? He was so tall that he shouldn’t have been able to blend in. Hijo de puta!

  Music played on. People danced, ate, or were eaten. It appeared every minute someone came to distract her from finding the human and, each time, she tried to get away only to be locked into a boring conversation. The ache between her legs was talking to her and the hunger in her stomach was furious. She wanted to be eaten. She wanted to feel his girth between her lips. Never had she craved like this, and it made her want to kill off half of the population in Chicago.

  “You seem in a rut, my dear,” an amused male voice whispered against her ear.

  Goddammit! She did not have time for this. Of course, he would find a way toward her. “Hello, Lord Jacques.”

  “Princess. It is good to see you and a shock that your Harpy is nowhere near. Who was that human you found yourself looking for?”

  “My next meal, if you’ll excuse me. I have a man to suck and eat.” Rushing past him, she huffed.

  She did not have time for his banter today, which was shocking for her. She usually always was interested in spitting blades with him but right now a human had her high and that was not something she could accept.

  “Of course. Maybe later, if I’m still around and not checking on my old property, you and I can pick up where we left off. Enjoy your dinner,” Jacques cajoled.

  “I hate your laugh!” Reina spewed out and disappeared, her hunt underway as more people swarmed around her.

  Hours later, nails scraped the wide span of a broad, muscular back before sinking their stiletto length into taut flesh, cutting deeply. Erratic heated moans lifted and filled the looming corridor of the intricate hallway. Sharp tears of fabric and the repeated pounding of flesh slipping in and out of each other rent the air with both the sweet and spicy scent of a male and a woman. The sharp intake of breaths becoming continued pants stopped with a loud release and a final grunt marked the end of the intimate display. Red splashed then dripped in tendrils into an ominous pool. Music seemingly made its gleaming surface vibrate with its tune. Its warm, sweet velvet liquid slowly seeped over the creamy tan marbled floor and flowed toward a pair of spiked golden-toned open-toed Louboutin Pigalili stilettos.

  “M’lady? Princess?”

  A deep voice resonated near her as she held her dinner between her fanged clenched mouth. It was like this for her every time she fed. She’d zone out and lose her awareness, which was why she always kept her protector near at all cost. The loud thump of a heavy mass reverberated down the hall of the hotel where she resided, making her look down at the crumpled male at her feet.

  Delicately stepping upon the chest of the corpse in front of her, she huffed and lifted her golden draped trail attached to her golden dress. It showed off her sculpted soft thighs and long glistening legs. The dampness between her lush thighs made her drop into a crouch on the body to retrieve a handkerchief and move to a clear spot as she wiped his seed and her juices from between her. A simple black card fell and floated in the blood near the body, making her narrow her eyes to read the silver inlaid script: Mikael Lawson {Atlanta, GA}.

  �
��Take him and feed him to the dogs. They’ll enjoy his flesh as much as his polluted soul. Then put him in the wall.”

  The mention of that holding cell, a place humans called Purgatory, made her own supple flesh crawl. Her skin felt it was crawling as she threw the white cloth she held over the body and studied him. The sound of her protection gargoyles taking the body away, their mouths suddenly dripping in hunger from the meal she had gifted them with, instantly irritated her. A disgusted huff formed in her throat as she watched her demonic pets drop to their knees and lap at the blood, cleansing the area from any evidence of anything going on.

  Something in the way the blood pooled made her lost in its glossy surface. The pulsing beat of her dark husk of a heart made her stumble forward and move down the hallway away from the party her father had demanded she oversee. Music thumped over her, instantly adding to the forming headache she was having and shifting vision plaguing her senses. What was in that bastard’s blood?

  A click of additional heels made her look up and she gave a quick smile.

  “My pet, Medusa?” Reina languidly asked. The image before her hazy stare made her blink, once, then twice at the curvaceous body walking her way and stood in a fear that unexpectedly had her gripping the side of the walls.

  Nydia? She found herself screaming in her mind. The fact that her pet was mingling with other Cursed representatives at the ballroom was forgotten on her as the indescribable body inched closer. A dipping undulating of the marble floor and walls around her made her footing unstable and hard for her to pull out her blades and she couldn’t understand any of this. She was trained beyond the usages of blades; and whatever that was coming from her instantly washed in clearing white light drowned her nose in sweet lilac and honeysuckle and made her swing out against the affront.

  “This game you are playing will not be allowed, Nydia!” she screamed in crazed confusion.

  The moment she swung forward, that body dropped into a low crouch to come forward. A hand covered in matching gold rings and a filigree braided chain jeweled glove, slammed over her face, covering her mouth and nose to drop her in a slow backward fall. With that hand, the mirror of her own features followed and her eyes widened at that familiar face. It smiled lovingly at her before shifting into a contorted darkness with soul-tearing pupils that reminded her of the Reaper, the Sin Eater: her cousin.

  The simple word “No,” softly tore into her mind. She fell backward by that hand that pushed her to the ground then straddled her.

  “Momma,” Reina sputtered out, paralyzed in her mind and that face bowed her moving head then her hand to kiss her temple. The sound of the blades that came out too late falling to the marble floor clattered in sad disarray.

  “Remember your place. Remember you are mine, not your father’s, but mine, and His. Remember what you did and what you promised. As was before, shall be again,” the woman said.

  With those simple words, Reina seemed to watch from the side of her body as her mother tore her heart from her body, covering its decrepit husk with threads of entwining white light, making it turn red and plump with life.

  The instant it pulsed with a beat, a charge hit her and set her flying into darkness and light. Reina saw everything that happened with that male was nothing but her mind twisting her reality. None of it had happened and all of it triggered by her dead mother. Fury made her reach out to her mother in one last failed attempt, but the final image was of black wings ripping from her mother’s back. She locked in on those piercing orbs of knowledge and truth, pupils of a Sin Eater, which left her paralyzed in shock. Fear made Reina scream and fight for a life she never knew she had to a right in claiming. All the while, those threads of light cut through the light and covered her in a blanket, sending Reina into the deepest recesses of her mind.

  The smell of the sweetest of blood, no, wine hit Reina’s awareness and made her open her eyes. She gasped as she tried to talk but all she could do was watch, as she felt locked into a body that wasn’t her current form. Hands reached up into her visual and Reina almost screamed again. She was no longer herself, she was now a he and she was no longer in the present but in the past.

  Chapter 19

  (Lost Scrolls of Nephilim)

  I am the scorn. The deceiver. The vilified. Number two in the line of people who brought a plight to the human race. Titles of hatred I wear due to my own weak resolve. Thirty pieces of silver were my reward for my betrayal. My name remembered with those who brought shame unto the human race. Nevertheless, before that, I was just a man. A devoted disciple, gifted with extended knowledge of protecting the coinage of the One Son until I was made tainted by that silver’s promise.

  Before that, I was just an innocent businessman. My tribulations were as any other, yet it was the teachings I heard from other men and women, scholars who were called Disciples that changed my life. I was drawn to them instantly and it was that meeting with the One Son, a man who instantly felt like family, a brother who made me accept my place as a fellow Disciple. He welcomed me.

  In his tutelage, I learned that several of his scholars were legends in the flesh and that my wife and children carried the same gifts, which was why they accompanied me and why I instantly felt safe with them. I gave up my old home to travel and learn with these fellow Disciples. Absorbing the teachings as if it were bread and water. I was at peace with being the treasurer to the One Son and assisting in his healing help to those lost by the hands of the enemy.

  My travels were wondrous and I saw breathing myths. Men and women who were called Dragons from the far East, some from Egypt, as well. Trusted protectors, whom the One Son entrusted with his Word and who assisted in preserving his Word. Those were peaceful times until we came home. Whispers of Nephilim, a word used in tandem with demons, began following us.

  Traitors, liars, killers, also followed us. Danger surrounded us at every turn and it became hard to protect our families. Those Disciples with divine gifts, including my children and wife, who passed the gifts to them, had to go into hiding and I became scared. It was indoctrinated in us all to never to allow such fear into our hearts because the enemy whom we fought, the ones who tainted the good name of Nephilims, could creep in and twist our psyche. I wish I had listened.

  I recall being ordered to meet the chief priests of the land before the grand Supper. My wife and children had gone to her family and I was left in our home. Like everyone in the towns and cities we traveled through, the One Son was wanted as were we and we vowed to keep our families safe. As did the One Son and the Angels who followed him as Disciples, as well.

  We prepared for any dangers that may have come our way and we sent many families into hiding. Everywhere I went I saw demons watching us in the flesh of humans who gave way to their sins. Every night I prayed for the nation’s safety with that of my children until it came to the day of the Supper. I remember sitting in my home thinking of my family as I readied for the night gathering. I should have gone with them, for it was that night when the chief priests invaded my home. Three men came into my modest home. These men dressed in opulent attire stifled me with their power. I knew as I stared into their pupils that they were pure evil, but I was forced to stay where I sat.

  “You are a follower of the treacherous Messiah?” was asked of me by a man whose face I recalled. He was the Iberian Roman general and soon to be King Caius Grete. He was as was told by the locals. As tall as a giant with dark, long hair that curled around his neck. Eyes dark as soot but a face as handsome as sin. One glance from him and my soul was open to fear and it was if he knew and fed from it. A madness seemed to choke at me due to his look and I tried to remember the faces of his partners. It was hours that I sat locked in my home with them. I fought them and tried to make them leave but to no reprieve. Those two silent men, who seemed to guide General Grete, eventually threatened my safety.

  The hood fell back from one and I almost tumbled backward. He was divine. His features golden and perfect, eyes of many hues, a smile
of sunlight and I knew that he was related to the One Son yet he wasn’t. My heart quaked and whispered to me, as this man calmly spoke in a voice that felt like silk. His hand brushed my own and I felt sinful lust and engulfing hatred at that moment. I never felt such before and it burned me great. This man was a fallen Angel. The ruler of hell.

  I was instantly condemned. The third cloaked figure poured us cups full of a dark wine that stunk of sweetness and sulfur. It was then that the devil himself handed me the cups as General Grete coaxed me into the drink.

  “Thirty pieces of silver will be your reward if you tell us where your Messiah is. If you tell us, your family will go free.”

  This for me was my moment of failure when darkness crept into my heart. Fear tore at me, but I still fought. I fought until the third cloaked figure dropped his hood and stared into my soul. His head was bald and he shone with an odd power of his own. He wore a branding on his wrist in the shape of two twisted interlocked S’s and he simple stated, “You want to do this and you will do this to keep your brothers safe. You know we will never harm thee. Thus is your birthright.”

  I was drowning and I felt my world turn apart. It was then that I heard myself pledge myself to General Grete. I kissed his rings and I felt a nick, no a bite, on my wrist. The General looked down at me with blood around his lips: my blood. My vision then was overcome by sinewy rotting wings as the two men he came with disappeared like dark mists.

  Coldness with that of a sudden sickness took me over and my path was set.