Janrae Frank Journey of Sacred King 01 My Sister's Keeper

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her wrists to her ankles before stepping back to assume a position of
attentive waiting. Behind and to the left side of them stood four more guards.
Bodramet ran his amaranthine eyes devoid of whites, pupils and irises,
hungrily over another pair of captives: a pair of young, auburn-haired Valdren
males, nude but for their heavy shackles.
Mephistis stroked the peasant's hair, drinking in the fear in the trembling
of her body. "You should be far enough along in the change, my dearest, to
manage this," he purred, nuzzling the woman's throat, feeling the delicious
throbbing of her pulse as he ran his rough tongue along the artery. He
extended his hand to Margren, drawing her from her chair. "Link and follow me,
then take one of those for your own." He indicated the Valdren pair.
Mephistis caressed Margren's face with languid sensuality. "Taking blood this
way can heal almost any wound."
"It's like being a vampire..." A hot eagerness underlined her words. She
placed her hand on the back of Mephistis' neck in link.
Mephistis laughed. "No, they are like us. Sa'necari devour life in many, many
ways. This is just..." he paused to touch her again, "a very pleasurable one.
To become sa'necari is to attain the highest, most powerful transformation our
necromancers and banewitches have been able to discover. All the powers of the
undead possessed by the living."
Margren gave him a look that told him she was utterly and completely his. But
then, he told himself, she had always been his ever since the winter that he
first encountered Aejys and Margren, the former ten and the latter just six
years old. He found Margren hiding in a torn up snow fort the castle children
had built in the keep's garden before traipsing off after Aejys and abandoning
the smallest child. Eleven-year-old Mephistis comforted Margren, luring her
deep into the nearby bushes where he took blood from her. Margren remembered
it only as a dream; an oddly warm, comforting dream. Every year afterward he
came to her again at winter's solstice in the garden at night, taking blood
from her and in her ninth year sharing his own. It was the taint of his blood
in Margren's body that caused the unicorn stud at the high meadows to drive
her off each year.
At ten, Margren's body as well as her veins opened to him and he took her
sexually. Then three years before the war, he revealed himself to her on
Dragonshead as something more than a pleasant solstice dream.
Mephistis turned his attention back to his captive, kissing and nuzzling the
girl who had begun to whimper. His fangs extended as he felt the girl's
pulsing artery beneath his lips. A ticklish itch crawled down his tongue,
twining in his throat. His fangs entered the artery, sending a warm gush of
blood into his mouth. The girl gasped sharply at the pain, stiffening, then
going limp as her heart stilled.
Margren's low moaning drew his attention and he lifted his mouth from the
dead girl's throat, blood dribbling down into his beard. He smiled at the
glazed look in Margren's eyes. "Bring her that one," he told the guards.
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"Bodramet, you may rite the third as reward for bringing us this catch."
The youth twisted, struggling vainly against the guards who threw him face
down before Margren. Mephistis caught the youth by the hair, wrenching his
head around until he could not move. The second youth screamed as Margren's
fangs extended and she threw herself hungrily onto his companion. Blood filled
Margren's mouth, she slurped, drinking greedily, letting the warmth and
electricity of the blood send tingles of ecstasy racing through her.
Mephistis stroked Margren's head fondly, watching her drain the youth dry.
"Sylvan blood is one of the finest vintages in all the world," he murmured.
The body, a gray and shriveled husk now, fell away as Margren released it.
* * * *
Isranon heard the soft, sad strains of Juldrid's lute before he had walked
far into the dense woods near the hunter's trace that led from the bluffs to
the valley. He wondered what Margren had done to her this time ... or had his
prince done it? A sick anger coiled in his stomach as he lifted the flute to
his lips and began to play. Isranon let the music announce his presence to
that he did not come suddenly upon her and frighten her. He shouldered his way
through a tangle of trembling aspen and a tighter knot of evergreens until he
could see her.
Juldrid wore the black of mourning, which made her look very pale. He
wondered what she was mourning over. Rose crouched beside her, listening and,
from time to time, patting her shoulder comfortingly. The little nibari's
intercession had allowed Isranon to get closer and closer to Juldrid over the
past months.
He settled cross-legged a short distance from them. He found the rhythms of
the song she played and joined her in them. Juldrid gifted him with a small,
sad smile, and nodded. Then she began to sing. Isranon's grasp of common was
limited since it was rarely spoken in Waejontor, yet after a while he realized
it was a very old song about rape and grief, suicide and the fall of houses.
It made him shiver.
As always they played until dark when Juldrid rose to leave. This time
Isranon took a chance and caught her arm. She flinched, her eyes widening with
fear, but he did not let her go until he could get the words out. "Mephistis
raped you, didn't he?"
"Yes."
Isranon released her arm and Juldrid fled. He prayed he had not ruined their
tentative relationship. He dropped back to the ground, feeling numb now as he
retreated into the silences. Having his fears confirmed did not make it
better, if anything it made it worse. Rose crept up to him and laid her head
in his lap.
"All sa'necari are like that," she said, confirming his beliefs. "But you are
not sa'necari."
Isranon lowered the flute again without beginning another song. "I know that.
A lion must be a lion, or the others devour him ... and yet ... I feel for
her." In Waejontor women were property, except among the sa'necari whose women
were sometimes strong enough to eat their mates.
"She carries his child as well as the one Margren put there. Two sons for
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your prince."
Two heirs for his prince, what a wondrous thought! But such a tragic way to
get them. Isranon pitied Juldrid. He put the flute away. Rose turned her head
to the side, waiting for the touch of his fangs. Instead he began to undress
her.
"If I got a child on you," Isranon said. "By law, they would not be allowed
to harm you." Sa'necari born were too rare and only their longevity made up
for it. He hoped that, having not crossed the line in the rites, he would
prove more fertile than the others. And taking a non-sa'necari increased the
chances. "Will you allow me to try?"
Rose arched up, presenting herself to him and shrugging out of her dress.
"You are the only one who bothers to ask... I have had many sa'necari inside
me, whether I wished it or no. I love you, Isranon."
"And I, you." Isranon realized that he was trembling as he opened his own
clothing and Rose's soft, gentle fingers closed on his cock.
CHAPTER EIGHT. CALLTHUNDER
A soft rustle of movement woke Aejys in the last hour before dawn. Her right
hand, beneath the pillow, slithered instinctively to the Aroanan Rune sword
leaning against the cot. Her heart quickened with a rush of adrenaline that
preceded strong action. She controlled her urge to act in favor of identifying
the threat first. The recklessness of youth had long ago been schooled out of
her by experience. She cracked her lids just enough to see without giving any
sign of wakefulness. In the pre-dawn darkness she could not make out anything.
Then a warm wet tongue swiped across her face as a sudden heavy weight was [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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