by Cindy Mezni
“And what? There’s nothing else to say,” I lied.
“Don’t take me for stupider than I am, Nemesis. There’s something you won’t tell me and which is eating you up. I saw it during the battle and I still see it now.”
I let out a long sigh. He wouldn’t leave me alone as long as I hadn’t answered him. Resigning me to do it, I looked away.
“The High Instances present me with an ultimatum. Either I brought them Ezekiel back alive or I paid in his place. Yet he died and he succeeded in having them come here by creating all these attacks among the humans. Given everything that happened, we might as well say that at best I’m dead and, at worst, I’ll be subjected to the Selem Sescä.”
His features were unreadable during a long moment, saying nothing as he thought about what I said.
“You’re not going to be bothered about all this,” he eventually assured me, self-confident. “Ezekiel is responsible for all this. They know it like you and me. Furthermore, even if he isn’t alive as they wished him to be, you got rid of the problem of the Mëvia. And you managed to repel the invasion of the army on our territory. For the rest, it’s not irreparable. The food in New Hell will soon be back and I’ll find a way to convince the government the attacks weren’t our fault. So, you see, you’re not going to be bothered,” he repeated, looking deeply into my eyes.
I opened my mouth and closed it immediately, not knowing what to say. What he’d just told me was too good to be possible.
“And even if the High Instances try something, I won’t let them do so without a fight. And even if it costs me to admit it, I’m certain I won’t be the only one to be by your side to defend you.”
His words didn’t surprise me. I’d expected him to say that, even though I didn’t think he would bring Xander up again.
“You—”
He didn’t give me the time to say two words before he pressed his mouth against mine. He caught me by the neck to pull me closer to him, intensifying our kiss. I moved my lips against his without asking myself any question nor having any doubt, and it was a first. I surrendered myself to the kiss totally. I’d always been reserved and haunted by the memory of Ezekiel. After all that had happened and now that Ezekiel was dead, it seemed like all those things in me had disappeared, as if they’d never existed. Letting myself be submerged by my desire, I enjoyed the moment and got closer to Nathanael until my breasts were against his chest. He groaned with satisfaction before his tongue came to dance with mine. My hands went to get lost in his golden hair soaked by rain as one of his hands moved my pelvis closer to his. Suddenly, Nathanael put an end to our kiss and pushed me away a little.
“Sorry, I wanted this since I came back to life,” he said to me, his eyes closed.
I smiled, a bit amused by his confession. His eyes opened.
“You gave me your blood,” he noted while looking deeply into my eyes.
Hardly had he come back that, already, he was bringing back the ‘Parinrä’ matter on the table. Why was I not even surprised?
“You were in a bad shape. It was obvious you needed it given the quantity of blood you’d lost.”
He pinched his lips. It wasn’t the words he’d wanted to hear.
“You gave me your blood to drink,” he insisted. “Before, mortal wounds or not, you would never have done it.”
He wasn’t wrong. Some time ago, he could have been at death’s door I wouldn’t have given him my blood. But now it was different. I didn’t know how to explain it but, lately, something had changed. Something in me had been modified or, more exactly, had come back little by little and my perception of Nathanael had changed at the same time. And now that I saw him in this new way, the idea to say yes to his request didn’t seem so terrible. After all we’d gone through today, it was obvious that both of us were ready to do anything to save the other. So I could agree to be his damn Parinrä, even if it had no importance for me.
“Something . . . changed,” I confided to him in an uncertain voice before swallowing with difficulty.
I couldn’t go on. I was incapable of expressing myself like I wanted to. It was impossible to say the words he wished to hear. A real emotional cripple. It was the expression which Ava, my elder sister, used to say to describe me. When I was human, I’d never been the kind of person who succeeded in evoking her feelings. I doubted I’d be able to change it now.
“What—”
I didn’t hear the end of his sentence. The suffering was so sudden that my brain was unable to assimilate anything other than the fact I was in atrocious pain. Screaming like never before, I fell on the ground without being able to do anything. It seemed to me Nathanael caught me before I fell, but I wasn’t certain of it. It was abominable. I had the sensation that a flood of lava was flowing through my veins. That all the fires of Hell were gathered in my body. I’d never endured anything like this. And the torture was getting worse with every passing second. It seemed to me that Nathanael shook me but I wasn’t sure. I tried to keep my eyes open. It was more than hard. I just wanted to close my eyelids and be taken away by unconsciousness or death.
“Nemesis,” I heard Nathanael saying distantly.
I tried to open my mouth. I had to start again several times before managing to put some words together.
“Do—so—thing—”
“What do you want—”
I didn’t perceive the rest of his words. A new scream prevented me from understanding it. I felt Nathanael’s hands which seemed to be everywhere on me. He had to look for the wound causing my pain. The catch was that there was absolutely no injury. The source of the problem came from the inside. I felt it.
“I see nothing! There’s nothing!” he yelled, his voice wavering between anxiety and anger.
I couldn’t say anything. In the same time, I didn’t really care. It had to stop at all costs. I could bear large amounts of suffering but, this, I couldn’t. This had nothing to do with pain. It was probably even worse than how I imagined the Selem Sescä. It was Hell itself.
“Tell me what to do!”
I said nothing, because I didn’t know how he could help me and because I couldn’t express myself. The seconds ticked by with an atrocious slowness.
“Kill me . . .” I said, without knowing how I did it.
“No way!” Nathanael said, categorical.
“My—head—or—my—heart—”
I could only produce pathetic stammers. But Nathanael had understood what I had in mind. I didn’t know what happened and didn’t care. All I knew was I wanted it to stop. By any means.
“Drink,” he ordered me, putting his wrist which he had opened against my lips.
I complied because I couldn’t do anything else, even if I was persuaded his blood wasn’t going to help me. As an umpteenth cry tried to come out from my mouth, which was blocked by Nathanael’s wrist, I realized I had a solution. I tried to focus to use the Illusionaë, despite my current state of weakness. Miracle, it worked when I used it to give me the illusion that the pain wasn’t there anymore. Quickly, the infernal fire in me disappeared. I let out a deep sigh of alleviation.
“Hell . . .” I grumbled, sounding groggy.
“Nemesis?” Nathanael said, puzzled by my behavior.
I offered him a faint smile to show him I felt better. For sure, the suffering was gone but, now, an extreme fatigue seemed to invade all my being as fast as the fire had done, a few moments ago.
“I feel better,” I said with a perceptible relief in my voice.
He frowned.
“How is it—The Illusionaë, of course,” he said, aggrieved, as comprehension dawned on him.
Sleepiness began to invade me. I blinked on several occasions. I almost couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore.
“Shit,” Nathanael said.
I didn’t understand his reaction.
“What’s going on?”
He kept silent, observing me for a long time with a tortured look.
“I don’t understan
d,” he murmured to himself.
“What’s going on?” I repeated.
“A sort of . . . hole is forming in your chest. It’s as if your flesh is . . . burning.”
My neurons might work very badly at the moment but I made the connection between what happened and what had occurred earlier. The fire in me, the hole in the thorax, Ezekiel . . . I hadn’t thought of the connection between the Creätoria and his Creäria when I’d killed Ezekiel. Everything was clear now. As long as the Creätoria or the Creäria didn’t transform another human being in Nëphyr, both Nëphyr were still connected to each other. And if, during this period, one of the two came to die, both died. I deducted that Ezekiel had made sure to not transform anybody since he’d fled New Hell in order to bring me down in case he failed.
I accepted defeat. He had won. I was condemned and I had inflicted it on myself without knowing it. His last plan, but the best he’d ever imagined.
“Ezekiel and I are still connected,” I said, dejected.
“And he died so you’re going to die, too,” Nathanael completed.
I coughed. When I looked at him more closely, I saw that Nathanael’s shirt was stained with tiny black spots, while it was intact a few seconds ago. I felt the pronounced taste of my blood on the tip of my tongue. A mixture of human blood and the smell of sulfur. It wouldn’t be long now.
“Finish me,” I asked Nathanael again with firmness.
“No!” he retorted right away. “I’m not going to kill you! And you’re not going to die!”
I could see a crazy glimmer of hope in his eyes. He still believed a miracle was possible. I thought I even heard him murmuring the first name of his fiancée who’d died centuries ago and adding something like, ‘Not you, too. I can’t.’ but I wasn’t certain. Silence took over. A silence I couldn’t bear.
“Just when I’d resigned myself to become the Parinrä of the pain in the ass that you are,” I told him, trying to lighten the mood.
“Keep quiet,” he implored me with a harsh tone, his jaw clenched to the extreme.
With delicacy, he took my face in his hands then caressed my cheekbones with his thumbs. I had to be cursed. I wasn’t meant to approach happiness, even remotely. Human or Nëphyr, I was incapable of reaching it. It seemed I was predestined to only know suffering.
“I’m losing my strength,” I went on, speaking to forget my unpleasant thoughts, “and I can’t bear that. I don’t want to die slowly.”
“Shut up, Nemesis! Please, shut up!” he said to me, now holding his head in his hands.
I shut my eyes. If I had to die slowly, I would do it, but I would escape this image. I refused to see Nathanael like that as he watched me pass away.
“The hole is getting bigger . . .” he murmured.
He remained silent during a long moment before speaking again.
“Become my Parinrä.”
“What?” I asked weakly as I opened my eyes.
The reality of the instant had crashed on him. I could see the renunciation, the despair in his gaze. I was going to die. I knew it and he knew it, too. This time, it was over for good.
“Become my—”
“No,” I said as curtly as possible, interrupting him at the same time.
I wasn’t now going to accept it when I’d be gone in a matter of a few minutes. I didn’t want to condemn him to remain alone for the rest of his existence because of me, because of a damned stupid, insane and desperate union and one I’d never wanted in the first place.
“It’s too late,” I told him in a warmer tone when I saw his hurt expression. “We don’t have time anymore. I just want—”
An abominable coughing fit prevented me from continuing. Death was here, in me, and it was spreading with an astounding speed, reducing life to nothing on its passage. I was going to join Ezekiel much earlier than intended. But before dying, I had to make sure of something, that even if I hadn’t succeeded in keeping the promise which I’d made to Efflamm many years ago, somebody was going to take care of it for me.
“I want . . . you to take over . . . the clan,” I said, having a hard time articulating.
“Shut up,” he ordered me in an almost tender way.
If things had been normal, I was certain I would have shot him a black look. Or I would have made an acerbic remark.
“Promise me this,” I insisted.
He hesitated. I gave him an imploring look. He eventually gave up.
“I swear.”
I sighed with relief. Then I remembered there was another thing which I wished to do before going in Hell to burn . . .
“I also have to—” I began to say, the words tangled on my tongue and in my mind.
I tried to find the appropriate words and pronounce them but it seemed impossible. Yet I had to tell him what I felt. But my body hadn’t the same opinion, obviously. My eyelids became terribly heavy. Death deprived me of my vital energy in a lightning speed, like an insatiable vampire who would empty me of my blood until he’d drunk the last drop.
“You have to know that I—” I reiterated.
“Shut up,” he told me, putting two fingers over my lips to force me to keep silent. “You’ll tell me that later. You’re going to survive. I refuse to let you go. Not yet . . .”
In a burst of revolt, I fought the horrifying torpor which dominated me and tried to formulate these damned words before my time on earth expired.
“You have to—”
The third time was the charm as they say. And, in a sense, it was for me. My eyelids closed and I couldn’t fight it. My breath became weaker and laborious. The last thing I heard before sinking into nothingness was the distant voice of Nathanael whispering unintelligible words in my ear.
END OF BOOK 1
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Hello, dear reader!
First of all, thank you for reading my book. I hope you enjoyed spending time with Nemesis, and her clan.
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About Cindy Mezni
Cindy Mezni is a Swiss writer living near beautiful Lake Geneva. She loves creating new universes and creatures and playing with fictional characters. If she’s not lost in one of her imaginary worlds, she’s probably with her family, her two Energizer Bunny dogs, and her Snorlax of a cat.
She’s the writer of the urban fantasy romance series, The Last Hope, the dark fantasy trilogy, Nëphyr, and the post-apocalyptic dystopian trilogy, The Red Era.
Her books have been published in French by Editions J’ai Lu and in English by Evatopia Press. They are now self-published.
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Shadow’s Dangers by Cindy Mezni
An urban fantasy romance
Shadow’s Dangers - an urban fantasy romance
“Appearances can be deceiving . . .”
Losing a loved one is never easy. Deliah learned to live without her parents when they were taken from her as a young girl, but history repeats itself, and she is faced with even greater challenges when Tess, the woman who raised her and was like a second mother to her, passes away.
In addition to her grief, Deliah is having inexplicable nightmares. She becomes consumed with images she doesn't understand and a recurring dream about her parents' car accident. However, the details of this dream are different from what she's always been told about the accide
nt.
When the Wates family arrives in town and begins to pay close attention to her, even stranger events follow. Now, Deliah must not only face her nightmares, but the possibility that a world she could never imagine exists. And this world may cost her everything.
Poisoned Iris by Cindy Mezni
A post-apocalyptic dystopia
Poisoned Iris - a post-apocalyptic dystopia
Athens was once the cradle of civilization. Now it’s slowly but surely becoming the tomb of humanity.
The Red Plague, a violent virus that ran rampant decades ago, left its imprint on the planet and the flesh of men. All that remains of the modern world is an endless wasteland of ruins—Erebos—and two cities—Elysion, the obscure island of the Non-Infecteds, which no one knows a thing about, and Tartaros, the crumbling town of the Infecteds, where despair, hatred, violence, and poverty are the operative words.
At the heart of this universe lives Irisya, a sixteen-year-old, Non-Infected girl, recluse in her home to stay safe and relying on her brother, Memphis, for everything.
But then, one day, he disappears without a trace.
Irisya has no choice. To save him, to survive, she will have to brave all the dangers of the outside world.