Ardor's Leveche (14 page)

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Ardor’s Leveche

“Beautiful?” Breva echoed, his eyebrows lifted.

“Morrigunia,” the Reaper said. “The Triune Goddess of Life, Death and War. It was War who found me, Death who took me and Life who sat there then, and the most stunning smile on lush red lips that looked like crushed cherries.”

“She gave you life,” Breva said with a sigh. Ever the romantic, he enjoyed tales of fated lovers.

“A facsimile of it, at any rate,” Lord Savidos said and got up from the ground.

“Then what?”

“Then she made me what I am.”

“The old hag or the beautiful one or…”

“Does it matter, Raoul?” his brother snapped. “It is how she did, you should be worried about.”

Breva blinked. “Why?”

“Just let me finish my tale and you’ll know why!”

Chastened, Breva watched the Reaper as he began to pace.

“For a moment there, I actually felt good about the situation. I was satiated to the point of being senseless and as I lay there—realizing my wound had finally stopped bleeding—I thought I was well on my way to flying away with The Gatherer. There was no way I could survive after all that blood loss and the bouncing she had done on my gut.”

“But you did, didn’t you?”

Lord Savidos gave his brother an astounded look. “Of course I did, you moron!”

Breva had the grace to blush. “You know what I meant,” he mumbled.

“It was while I was lying there waiting for The Gatherer that she flipped me over to my belly and knelt beside me. I don’t remember what I thought at the moment but whatever it was didn’t stay in my memory for I felt a terrible pain along my lower back and knew she’d cut me open.”

Breva’s eyes widened. “Cut you open?”

“Before I could react, I felt something fall onto my skin—something cold and slimy—then the most horrendous agony invaded my back. It was unlike any pain I’d ever experienced and I writhed on the ground like a serpent without its head. I screamed as something seemed to be gnawing through my vital organs, burning them, biting through them. I twisted and turned, flipping to my back to try to dislodge whatever had crawled inside me.”

“Something had crawled into you?” Breva asked breathlessly.

“I could feel it slithering around in there,” the Reaper said. “The pain was horrible but the feel of that thing wriggling inside me nearly drove me mad. I tried to reach behind me to pull it out but there was no opening there. The flesh had sealed over whatever it was and when I scrambled to my feet—trying desperately to claw at the 77

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burning pain—I realized that the cut on my abdomen had also sealed shut.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “Whatever had invaded my body was now locked inside me.”

Breva shuddered. “By the gods, Gabriel. What was it?”

“A revenant worm,” the Storian prince replied. “A vile piece of filth that had snagged its teeth into my kidney and even then was sucking on my blood and producing hundreds of offspring.”

Breva swallowed convulsively. “Offspring?” he repeated, his face green. “You mean the…”

“Aye, the parasite,” the Reaper replied. “And now I need you to take one of them from me and put it in Ardor.”

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“No!” Breva said, shaking his head. “I’ll not—”

“It is the only thing we can do for her, Raoul,” his brother pointed out. “The parasite will heal her.”

“Heal her?” Breva repeated.

“You see this scar?” his brother asked, pointing to a tiny V-shaped white mark above his left eye. “Do you remember when I got this?”

“Aye, Gabriel, but…”

The Reaper pulled his shirt from his britches and exposed his belly. “Do you see where I was stabbed that day on the battlefield?”

“No, but—”

“I had the scar over my eye before I was made a Reaper. The parasite left the scar alone because it was unimportant. It didn’t affect me in any debilitating way. The stab wound would have, so the parasite healed it. It will heal Ardor’s hearing and vision.”

“I don’t understand—”

“Because just as I did not need a gaping wound in my gut to fester and grow morbid, she doesn’t need to be left unable to see or hear!” his brother explained. “Those are two things a warrior—or in her case, a warrioress—needs to survive. The parasite will give those things back to her.” He threw out a negligent hand. “A shaving cut on her legs, healed scars from whatever source, the parasite will ignore.”

Breva started back toward the curving staircase leading up through the cavern. He crossed his hands back and forth in front of him in negation. “I don’t care. I won’t do it!”

The Reaper grabbed his brother by the shoulder and spun him around. “Would you want to be left blind and deaf, Raoul?” he demanded. “I know I wouldn’t. Can you imagine the horror of being unable to communicate with those around you? At the mercy of those around you?” He shook Breva. “Think,
chanto
! She is a warrior. What kind of life would she have as an invalid?”

“No, Gabriel! I told you no! I won’t be a part of this.”

“Then who should I ask?” the Reaper asked.

“This is just wrong,” Breva stated.

“Right or wrong has nothing to do with it,
chanto
. It is a matter of doing what we can to help her. Will you leave her as she is now?”

Breva’s eyes filled with tears. “Don’t make me do this.”

“I have no one else I trust, Raoul,” Lord Savidos said.

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“Don’t you have enough trouble already without doing this?” Breva asked. “You let the Coalition see you. How are you going to fix that?”

“I don’t think that matters now,” the Reaper said. “I would have preferred to wait a while longer for my identity to be revealed but they say everything happens for the best.”

“
Who
says that?” Breva snarled. “Those with nothing to lose?”

Gabriel Leveche tightened his grip on his brother’s shoulders. “Help me,
chanto
,” he asked, his heart in his eyes. “Help me do this. I can’t do it alone.”

“Don’t you realize what you are asking me?” Breva protested. A tear slid down his cheek. “I can’t do it.”

“Aye, you can,” the Reaper said. “When I said there was something I needed you to do for me, you said name it and it will be done.”

“That’s not fair,” Breva said. “I had no idea you’d ask for such an evil thing!”

Lord Savidos held his brother’s stare. “Am I evil?”

Breva shook his head. “No, Gabriel, but—”

“Is she?”

“No, but that thing inside you is!” Breva replied. “Do you really think she would want it curled up within her? I don’t want her hating me for having done such a wicked thing.”

“It is my decision to do this so if she blames anyone, it will be me. Please help me.”

Breva’s shoulders slumped and his eyes told the tale—he had lost the discussion.

Never had he denied his brother anything and he knew he wouldn’t start then, despite his loathing of what was about to happen.

Hanging his head, the Storian major put up a hand to pinch the bridge of his nose.

“What is it you want me to do?”

The Reaper breathed a sigh of relief. “You’ll need to make an incision over my right kidney, reach inside and—”

“Reach inside?” Breva shouted. He began shaking his head.

“Reach inside and pull out one of the fledgling worms.”

“No, no, no, no, no,” Breva was saying, each word punctuated by the shaking of his head.

“You can’t hurt the devilish thing and it won’t attempt to bite you,” the Reaper said. “At least I don’t think it will.”

Breva’s head snapped up. “You don’t know?”

“Just be careful with it. It has teeth,
chanto
.”

Breva sat down abruptly on the stone step behind him and buried his face in his hands. “This is too much to ask, Gabriel. You aren’t being fair.”

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“Once you pull the thing out, the wound will close automatically. We’ll then have to take it up to the laboratory, make an incision in Ardor’s back and drop the thing on.

The parasite will handle the rest of it.”

“And just what,” Breva asked as he snapped his head up, “am I suppose to carry that demonic thing in? Just hold it as it wriggles around in my fingers?”

“No,” the Reaper said and turned away. He went over to ledge where several bottles lay scattered about the sand, picked up a brandy bottle and brought it back. “I doubt there is any liquor left in here. I pretty much drained them all dry a long time ago.” He thrust the bottle out to Breva. “Do you have a blade with you?”

Breva flinched. “No,” he said. He stared up at his brother. “You speak so damned casually of this as though you were asking if I had a kerchief for you to blow snot into!”

“Here,” Lord Savidos said and lifted the black obsidian blade he carried strapped to his thigh in a leather sheath, flipped it over in his palm and handed the wicked-looking weapon to his brother, blade first.

Not giving his brother time to rethink the situation, the Reaper walked over to the loose white sand near the water, tugged the tail of his silk shirt out of his britches and then lay down, stretching out on his belly.

Breva stared at the Reaper’s blade—never having held the deadly weapon before—

and shuddered at the sharp cutting edge. It was an implement of death that gave off emanations Breva wished he’d never felt.

“Raoul, don’t think about it,” Lord Savidos said. “Just do it.”

It took Breva a long moment before he gained his feet. He was pale, his gait somewhat unsteady as he made his way over to his brother. His harsh breathing was loud in the cavern—even over the rush of the wind careening through the grotto—and the sour smell of his sweat was making itself known.

The Reaper had pulled his shirt out of the way, baring his lower back and lay there as still as death, his fingers splayed upon the fine white sand. His legs were spread apart as though he was bracing himself for the pain he knew he would experience.

“You’re sure about this?” Breva questioned as he dropped to his knees beside his brother.

“Just do it,” was the order.

With jaw set, Breva put the tip of the blade to his brother’s back and made a quick three-inch lateral incision, hoping that was wide enough. He said nothing but drove two, then three fingers into the bloody wound. Almost immediately, something slithered past his fingertips and it was all he could do not to jerk his hand from the cut.

Lord Savidos was sweating, too, and his teeth were clenched against the pain.

When he spoke, it was through that obstruction.

“Hook your fingers into the wound and drive them down further. Never mind about hurting me. It can’t be helped and I can take it.”

“Aye, but can I?” Breva quipped.

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“One of the worms will slide across them. Just pull it out between your thumb and fingers. The queen knows what’s happening and She’ll make sure one of Her offspring volunteers itself.”

“Oh, yeah?” Breva queried. “That’s damned nice of Her.”

“Drop it into the bottle as quickly as you can.”

“Don’t worry. I don’t want to hold that thing any longer than I have to.”

Breva took a deep breath, pulled his index and middle fingers into a hook, and thrust them down deeper into the Reaper’s wound. Blood bubbled out of the gaping cut and he could feel his brother trembling from the agony, but he pushed deeper until something hard and scaly writhed across his fingers and he jerked it up, clamping onto it tightly with his thumb.

It was the most sickening thing Breva could ever remember seeing. A diseased-looking green color with sharp red spines ranging along the segmented back, it looked like something he’d once seen on one of his aunt’s tomato plants. The tip of its tail was forked and the thing had red eyes, elliptical in shape like a viper’s. Row after row of teeth showed in the mouth as it tried to snag into his fingers. With a groan of disgust, he dropped the vile thing into the bottle and held it at arm’s length. Through the murky amber glint of the bottle, the creature glared at him, a milky substance falling in a long threat from the gaping maw to sizzle against the glass as it shot out its forked tongue. If he hadn’t torn his stare from the abomination, he would not have seen the cut on his brother’s back sealing itself shut. He stared down at that miracle, unable to look away, for in the blink of an eye, no sign of the wound was visible on Gabriel’s back.

“By the gods that hurt like hell” the Reaper said, turning over. His hands were tight around clumps of sand and he let go of the silicate to run trembling fingers over his sweaty face. “It was all I could do not to moan.”

“The cut healed,” Breva said, his voice filled with awe.

“Aye, I know it did. Any wound I get, any wound
She
gets, will heal just that fast.”

“Although I can see the advantage of it, Gabe, I’m damned glad I don’t have one of those beastlets inside me.”

“Accept Me, warrior. Protect Me and I will protect you!”

Breva jumped as though he’d been spurred and he almost dropped the bottle from his nerveless fingers. He stared at the bottle—eyes as wide as saucers.

“Not this one,” the Reaper said. “He isn’t the one to whom you’re destined.”

“It spoke to me,” Breva said, shuddering as though with the ague. “The
thing
spoke to me!”

“Take Me unto you, warrior, and I will make you invincible!”

“Shut it up!” Breva shouted.

The Reaper could hear the sensual, seductive voice of the parasite and found it as sickening as did his brother. He wondered how Raoul could be hearing the thing for the parasite only spoke to those whose body hosted the vile thing.

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“Stay here,” Lord Savidos ordered. “I’ll take the worm to the lab. Don’t go into the water, don’t even touch it, until I return.”

Breva turned pale. “Why?” He glanced fearfully at the still water. “What’s in there?”

“Nothing that I know of, but just don’t go near it.”

Breva moved back, putting distance between him and the tranquil blue-green water. “I don’t want to stay here,
chanto
. This place is evil!”